A magician was working on a cruise ship in the Caribbean. The audience would be different each week, so the magician allowed himself to do the same tricks over and over again. There was only one problem: The captain's parrot saw the shows each week and began to understand how the magician did every trick. Once the understood he started shouting in the middle of the show: "Look, it's not the same hat" "Look, he is hiding the flowers under the table" "Hey, why are all the cards the Ace of Spades ?" The magician was furious but couldn't do anything; it was, after all, the captain's parrot. One day the ship had an accident and sank. The magician found himself on a piece of wood in the middle of the ocean with the parrot, of course. They stared at each other with hate, but did not utter a word. This went on for a day and another and another. After a week the parrot said: "OK, I give up. Where's the boat?"

You'll recall a Darwin Award from not too long ago where a guy decided to strap a cargo plane rocket booster to his car to see how fast it would go, and ended up hitting a cliff several hundred feet in the air. Here's one more... This story was clipped from the recent Darwin awards, which people get for doing something incredibly stupid. True stories. Here's the winner: Larry Walters is among the relatively few who have actually turned their dreams into reality. His story is true, as hard as you may find it to believe . . . Larry was a truck driver, but his lifelong dream was to fly. When he graduated from high school, he joined the Air Force in hopes of becoming a pilot. Unfortunately, poor eyesight disqualified him. So when he finally left the service, he had to satisfy himself with watching others fly the fighter jets that crisscrossed the skies over his backyard. As he sat there in his lawn chair, he dreamed about the magic of flying. Then one day, Larry had an idea. He went down to the local Army-Navy surplus store and bought forty-five weather balloons, and several tanks of helium. These were not your brightly colored party balloons, these were heavy-duty spheres measuring more than four feet across when fully inflated. Back in his yard, Larry used straps to attach the balloons to his lawn chair, the kind you might have in your backyard. He anchored the chair to the bumper of his jeep, and inflated the balloons with helium. Then he packed a few sandwiches and drinks, and a loaded BB gun, figuring he could pop a few balloons when it was time to return to earth. His preparations complete, Larry sat in his chair and cut the anchoring cord. His plan was to lazily float into the sky, and eventually back to terra firma. But things didn't quite work out that way. When Larry cut the cord, he didn't float lazily up; he shot up as if fired from a cannon! Nor did he go up a couple hundred feet. He climbed and climbed until he finally leveled off at eleven thousand feet! At that height, he could hardly risk deflating any of the balloons, lest he unbalance the load and really experience flying. So he stayed up there, sailing around for fourteen hours, totally at a loss about how to get down. Eventually, Larry drifted into the approach corridor for Los Angeles International Airport. A Pan Am pilot radioed the tower about passing a guy in a lawn chair at eleven thousand feet, with a gun in his lap. . .now there's a conversation I would have given anything to have heard! LAX is right on the ocean, and you may know that at nightfall, the winds on the coast begin to change. So, as dusk fell, Larry began drifting out to sea. At that point, the Navy dispatched a helicopter to rescue him, but the rescue team had a hard time getting to him because the draft from their propeller kept pushing his home-made contraption farther and farther away. Eventually, they were able to hover above him and drop a rescue line, with which they gradually hauled him back to safety. As soon as Larry hit the ground, he was arrested. But as he was led away in handcuffs, a television reporter called out, "Sir, why'd you do it?" Larry stopped, eyed the man, then replied nonchalantly, "A man can't just sit around!"

there was a hunter who was suddenly confronted by a huge, mean bear. In his fear, all attempts to shoot the bear were unsuccessful. Finally, he turned and ran as fast as he could. The hunter ran and ran and ran, until he ended up at the edge of a very steep cliff. His hopes were dim. Seeing no way out of his predicament, and with the bear closing in rather quickly, the hunter got down on his knees, opened his arms, and exclaimed, "Dear God! Please give this bear some *religion*!" The skies darkened and there was lightning in the air. Just a few feet short of the hunter, the bear came to abrupt stop, and glanced around, somewhat confused. Suddenly, the bear looked up into the sky and said, "Thank you, God, for the food I'm about to receive...."

there was a train that broke down in the middle of the desert. In the luxury car was the president of the train line and his most important customer. The engineer tried everything he could think of, but he could not get the train running. They discovered that the man who built the locomotive happened to be a passenger on the train, and they called him forward. He stared at the locomotive for a few minutes, picked up a hammer and hit the locomotive sharply. It started right up. Two weeks later, the president of the line received a bill for $50,000. "$50,000!" he exclaimed,"For five minutes work?" "Oh," said the engine builder,"I should have given you an itemized bill." A few days later, an itemized bill arrived:

                        Hitting engine with hammer: $ 1.00

                        Knowing where to hit engine with hammer: $49,999

                        thanks to Ren Wang (wangr@mr.med.ge.com) for this one.

A hungry lion was roaming through the jungle looking for something to eat. He came across two men. One was sitting under a tree and reading a book; the other was typing away on his typewriter. The lion quickly pounced on the man reading the book and devoured him. Even the king of the jungle knows that readers digest and writers cramp.

There was a man who entered a local paper's pun contest. He sent in ten different puns, in the hope that at least one of the puns would win. Unfortunately, no pun in ten did.

A guy goes to a psychiatrist. "Doc, I keep having these alternating recurring dreams. First I'm a teepee; then I'm a wigwam; then I'm a teepee; then I'm a wigwam. It's driving me crazy. What's wrong with me?" The doctor replies: "It's very simple. You're two tents."

A group of chess enthusiasts had checked into a hotel, and were standing in the lobby discussing their recent tournament victories. After about an hour, the manager came out of the office and asked them to disperse. "But why?", they asked, as they moved off. "Because," he said, "I can't stand chess nuts boasting in an open foyer."

A doctor made it his regular habit to stop off at a bar for a hazelnut daiquiri on his way home. Dick the bartender knew of his habit, and would always have the drink waiting at precisely 5:03 p.m. One afternoon, as the end of the work day approached, the bartender was dismayed to find that he was out of hazelnut extract. Thinking quickly, he threw together a daiquiri made with hickory nuts and set it on the bar. The doctor came in at his regular time, took one sip of the drink and exclaimed, "This isn't a hazelnut daiquiri Dick!" "No, I'm sorry", replied the bartender, "it's a hickory daiquiri, doc."

A Guy goes into a bar with his pet octopus and say's "I bet $50 that no one here has a musical instrument that this octopus can't play." The people in the bar look around and someone fetches out an old guitar. The octopus has a look, picks it up, tunes up the strings and starts playing the guitar. The octopus's owner pockets the fifty bucks. Next guy comes up with a trumpet, octopus takes the horn, loosens up the keys,licks it's lips and starts playing a jazz solo. The guy hands over another fifty bucks to the octopus's owner. The bar owner has been watching all this and disappears out back, coming back a few moments later with a set of bagpipes under his arm. He puts them on the bar and says to the guy and his octopus, "Now, if your octopus can play that I'll give you a hundred dollars." The octopus takes a look at the bagpipes, lifts it up, turns it over, has another look from another angle. Puzzled, the octopus' owner comes up and says "What are you fooling around for? Hurry up and play the thing!" The octopus says "Play it? If I can figure out how to get its pajama's off I'm gonna make love to it!"

A man went to his dentist because he feels something wrong in his mouth. The dentist examines him and says, "that new upper plate I put in for you six months ago is eroding. What have you been eating?" The man replies, "all I can think of is that about four months ago my wife made some asparagus and put some stuff on it that was delicious...Hollandaise sauce. I loved it so much I now put it on everything --- meat, toast, fish, vegtables, everything." "Well," says the dentist, "that's probably the problem. Hollandaise sauce is made with lots of lemon juice, which is highly corrosive. It's eaten away your upper plate. I'll make you a new plate, and this time use chrome." "Why chrome?" asks the patient. To which the dentist replies, "It's simple. Everyone knows that there's no plate like chrome for the Hollandaise!"

An Indian chief had three wives, each of whom was pregnant. The first gave birth to a boy. The chief was so elated he built her a teepee made of deer hide. A few days later, the second gave birth, also to a boy. The chief was very happy. He built her a teepee made of antelope hide. The third wife gave birth a few days later, but the chief kept the details a secret. He built this one a two story teepee, made out of a hippopotamus hide. The chief then challenged the tribe to guess what had occurred. Many tried, unsuccessfully. Finally, one young brave declared that the third wife had given birth to twin boys. "Correct," said the chief. "How did you figure it out?" The warrior answered, "It's elementary. The value of the squaw of the hippopotamus is equal to the sons of the squaws of the other two hides."

A hungry lion was roaming through the jungle looking for something to eat. He came across two men. One was sitting under a tree and reading a book; the other was typing away on his typewriter. The lion quickly pounced on the man reading the book and devoured him. Even the king of the jungle knows that readers digest and writers cramp.

If restaurants functioned like Microsoft:
Patron: Waiter!
Waiter: Hi, my name is Bill and I'll be your Support Waiter. What seems to be the problem?
Patron: There's a fly in my soup!
Waiter: Try again, maybe the fly won't be there this time.
Patron: No, it's still there.
Waiter: Maybe it's the way you're using the soup; try eating it with a fork instead.
Patron: Even when I use the fork, the fly is still there.
Waiter: Maybe the soup is incompatible with the bowl; what kind of bowl are you using?
Patron: A SOUP bowl!
Waiter: Hmmm, that should work. Maybe it's a configuration problem; how was the bowl set up?
Patron: You brought it to me on a saucer; what has that to do with the fly in my soup?
Waiter: Can you remember everything you did before you noticed the fly in your soup?
Patron: I sat down and ordered the Soup of the Day!
Waiter: Have you considered upgrading to the latest Soup of the Day?
Patron: You have more than one Soup of the Day each day?
Waiter: Yes, the Soup of the Day is changed every hour.
Patron: Well, what is the Soup of the Day now?
Waiter: The current Soup of the Day is tomato.
Patron: Fine. Bring me the tomato soup and the check. I'm running late now.
[Waiter leaves and returns with another bowl of soup and the check.]
Waiter: Here you are, Sir. The soup and your check.
Patron: This is potato soup.
Waiter: Yes, the tomato soup wasn't ready yet.
Patron: Well, I'm so hungry now, I'll eat anything. [Waiter leaves.]
Patron: Waiter! There's a gnat in my soup!
The check: Soup of the Day . . . . . . . . . . . $ 5.00
Upgrade to newer Soup of the Day. . . $ 2.50
Access to support . . . . . . . . . . $10.00
Editors Note: Bug in the soup........included at no extra charge (will be fixed with Tomorrow's soup of the day)

For the first time in, oh, a decade, I think, something from Microsoft shipped
on time: Jennifer Katharine Gates, weighed 8 pounds 6 ounces when she was
downloaded, er, born on Friday, April 26 at 6:11 p.m.
And what do Baby Gates and Daddy's products have in common?

1. Neither can stand on its own two feet without a LOT of third party support.
2. Both barf all over themselves _regularly_.
3. Regardless of the problem, calling Microsoft Tech Support won't help.
4. As they mature, we pray that they will be better than that which preceeded them.
5. At first release they're relatively compact, but they seem to grow and grow and grow with each passing year.
6. Although announced with great fanfare, pretty much anyone could have produced one.
7. They arrive in shaky condition with inadequate documentation.
8. No matter what, it takes several months between the announcement andthe actual release.
9. Bill gets the credit, but someone else did most of the work.
10. For at least the next year, they'll suck.