N/A Five Phases
- Thread starter Terry
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Frank Browne
Final Approach
LOL! Very true. I would change #5 to....Promote the guilty.
Ghery
Touchdown! Greaser!
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Display name:
Ghery Pettit
The version I got in the early 80s at Martin Marietta had that last phase as "Praise and honors for the non-participants (Launch)"
there are actually 6 phases of a project :
- Enthusiasm
- Disillusionment
- Panic
- Search for the Guilty
- Punishment of the Innocent
- Praise and Honors for the Non-Participants
S
SJP
Guest
(Stolen from http://www.grahamnasby.com/misc/engineering_jokes.shtml)
Engineering vs Math Majors
A math and engineering convention was being held. On the train to the convention, there were both math majors and engineering majors. Each of the math majors had his/her own train ticket. But the Engineers had only ONE ticket for all of them. The math majors started laughing and snickering. The engineers ignored the laughter.
Then, one of the engineers said, "Here comes the conductor". All of the engineers piled into the bathroom. The math majors were puzzled. The conductor came aboard and collected tickets from all the math majors. He went to the bathroom, knocked on the door, and said, "Tickets Please". An engineer stuck their only ticket under the door. The conductor took the ticket and left. A few minutes later, the engineers emerged from the bathroom. The math majors felt really stupid.
On the way back from the convention, the group of math majors had ONE ticket for their group. They started snickering at the engineers, who had NO tickets amongst them.
When the engineer lookout shouted, "Conductor coming!", all the engineers again piled into a bathroom. All of the math majors went into another bathroom. Then, before the conductor came on board, one of the engineers left the bathroom, knocked on the other bathroom, and said, "Ticket please."
Definition of a Chemical Engineer
CHEMICAL ENGINEER: n. A person who does for profit what a chemist does for fun. see also "Prostitution"
Q: What is the difference between a chemist and a chemical engineer?
A: Oh, about $10 K a year.
THE BOY AND THE FROG
A boy was crossing the road one day when a frog called out to him and said, "If you kiss me, I'll turn into a beautiful princess." He bent over, picked up the frog and put it in his pocket.
The frog spoke up again and said, "If you kiss me and turn me back into a beautiful Princess, I will stay with you for one week." The boy took the frog out of his pocket, smiled at it and returned it to his pocket.
The frog then cried out, "If you kiss me and turn me back into a beautiful Princess, I'll stay with you and do *Anything* you want." Again the boy took the frog out, smiled at it and put it back into his pocket. Finally the frog asked, "What is it? I've told you I'm a beautiful Princess, that I'll stay with you for a week and do *Anything* you want. Why won't you kiss me?"
The boy said, "Look, I'm an engineering major. I don't have time for girlfriends, but a talking frog is really cool."
YOU MAY BE AN ENGINEER...
If you introduce your wife as "mylady@home.wife"
If your spouse sends you an e-mail instead of calling you to dinner
If you can quote scenes from any Monty Python movie
If you want an 500X CD-ROM for Christmas
If Dilbert is your hero
If you stare at an orange juice container because it says CONCENTRATE
If you can name 6 Star Trek episodes (bonus points if you have more than 6 recorded on video tape).
If the only jokes you receive are through e-mail
If your wrist watch has more computing power than a 486DX-50
If your idea of good interpersonal communication means getting the decimal point in the right place
If you look forward to Christmas only to put together the kids' toys
If you use a CAD package to design your son's Pine Wood Derby car
If you have used coat hangers and duct tape for something other than hanging coats and taping ducts
If, at Christmas, it goes without saying that you will be the one to find the burnt-out bulb in the string
If you window shop at Radio Shack
If your ideal evening consists of fast-forwarding through the latest sci-fi movie looking for technical inaccuracies
If you have "Dilbert" comics displayed anywhere in your work area
If you carry on a one-hour debate over the expected results of a test that actually takes five minutes to run
If you are convinced you can build a phazer out of your garage door opener and your camera's flash attachment
If you don't even know where the cover to your personal computer is
If you have modified your can-opener to be microprocessor driven
If you know the direction the water swirls when you flush
If you own "Official Star Trek" anything
If you have ever taken the back off your TV just to see what's inside
If a team of you and your co-workers have set out to modify the antenna on the radio in your work area for better reception
If you ever burned down the gymnasium with your Science Fair project
If you are currently gathering the components to build your own nuclear reactor
If you own one or more white short-sleeve dress shirts
If you have never backed-up your hard drive
If you are aware that computers are actually only good for playing games, but are afraid to say it out loud
If you truly believe aliens are living among us
If you have ever saved the power cord from a broken appliance
If you have ever purchased an electronic appliance "as-is"
If you see a good design and still have to change it
If the salespeople at Circuit City can't answer any of your questions
If you still own a slide rule and you know how to work it
If the thought that a CD could refer to finance or music never enters your mind
If you own a set of itty-bitty screw drivers, but you don't remember where they are
If you rotate your screen savers more frequently than your automobile tires
If you have a functioning home copier machine, but every toaster you own turns bread into charcoal
If you have more toys than your kids
If you need a checklist to turn on the TV
If you have introduced your kids by the wrong name
If you have a habit of destroying things in order to see how they work
If your I.Q. number is bigger than your weight
If the microphone or visual aids at a meeting don't work and you shove up to the front to fix it
If you can remember 7 computer passwords but not your anniversary
If you have memorized the program schedule for the Discovery channel and have seen most of the shows already
If you have ever owned a calculator with no equal key and know what RPN stands for
If your father sat 2 inches in front of your family's first color TV with a magnifying lens to see how they made the colors, and you grew up thinking that was normal
If you know how to take the cover off of your computer, and what size screw driver to use
If you can type 70 words a minute but can't read your own handwriting
If people groan at the party when you pick out the music
If you can't remember where you parked your car for the 3rd time this week
If you did the sound system for your senior prom
If your checkbook always balances
If your wristwatch has more buttons than a telephone
If you have more friends on the Internet than in real life
If you thought the real heroes of "Apollo 13" were the mission controllers
If you think that when people around you yawn, it's because they didn't get enough sleep
If you spend more on your home computer than your car
If you know what http:// stands for (bonus points if you actually care)
If you've ever tried to repair a $5.00 radio
If you have a neatly sorted collection of old bolts and nuts in your garage
If your three year old son asks why the sky is blue and you try to explain atmospheric absorption theory
If your lap-top computer costs more than your car
If your 4 basic food groups are: 1. Caffeine 2. Fat 3. Sugar 4. Chocolate
Job Interview
Reaching the end of a job interview, the Human Resources Person asked the young Engineer fresh out of MIT, "And what starting salary were you looking for?"
The Engineer said, "In the neighborhood of $75,000 a year, depending on the benefit's package."
The HR Person said, "Well, what would you say to a package of 5-weeks vacation, 14 paid holidays, full medical and dental, company matching retirement fund to 50% of salary, and a company car leased every 2 years - say, a red Corvette?"
The Engineer sat up straight and said, "Wow!!! Are you kidding?"
And the HR Person said, "Of course, ...but you started it."
"High Tech" Management Skills
A young engineer was leaving the office at 6 p.m. when he found the CEO standing in front of a shredder with a piece of paper in his hand.
"Listen," said the CEO, "this is important, and my secretary has left. Can you make this thing work?"
"Certainly," said the young engineer. He turned the machine on, inserted the paper, and pressed the start button.
"Excellent, excellent!" said the CEO as his paper disappeared inside the machine. "I just need one copy."
A Programmer and an Engineer
A programmer and an Engineer are sitting next to each other on a long flight from Los Angelos to New York. The Programmer leans over to the Engineer and asks if he would like to play a fun game. The Engineer just wants to take a nap, so he politely declines and rolls over to the window to catch a few winks.
The Programmer persists and explains that the game is real easy and a lotta fun. He explains, "I ask you a question, and if you don’t know the answer, you pay me $5. Then you ask me a question, and if I don’t know the answer, I pay you $5."
Again the Engineer politely declines and tries to get to sleep.
The Programmer, now somewhat agitated, says "Ok, if you don’t know the answer, you pay me $5, and if I don’t know the answer, I’ll pay you $50!"
This catches the engineer’s attention, and he sees no end to this torment unless he plays, so he agrees to the game. The programmer asks the first question: "What is the distance from the Earth to the moon?"
The engineer doesn’t say a word, but simply reaches into his wallet, pulls out a five-dollar bill, and hands it to the programmer. Now, it’s the engineer’s turn. He asks the programmer, "What goes up a hill with three legs, and comes down on four?"
The programmer looks up at him with a puzzled look. He takes out his laptop computer and searches all of his references. He taps into the Airphone with the modem and searches the net and the library of Congress. Frustrated, he sends e-mail to his coworkers - all to no avail. After about an hour, he wakes the engineer and hands him $50. He politely takes the $50 and turns away to try to get back to sleep.
The programmer, more than a little miffed, shakes the engineer and asks, "Well, so what’s the answer?" Without a word, the engineer reaches into his wallet, hands the programmer $5, and turns away to get back to sleep.
Engineering Pick-up Lines
If a packet hits a pocket on a socket on a port,
and the bus is interrupted as a very last resort,
and the address of the memory makes your floppy disk abort,
then the socket packet pocket has an error to report.
If your cursor finds a menu item followed by a dash,
and the double clicking icon puts your window in the trash,
and your data is corrupted 'cause the index doesn't hash,
then your situation's hopeless and your system's gonna crash.
If the label on the cable on the table at your house,
says the network is connected to the button on your mouse,
but your packets want to tunnel on another protocol,
that's repeatedly rejected by the printer down the hall,
and your screen is all distorted by the side effects of gauss,
so your icons in the window are as wavy as a souse,
then you may as well reboot it and go out with a bang,
'cause as sure as I'm a poet, that sucker's gonna hang.
When the copy of your floppy's getting sloppy on the disk,
and the microcode instructions cause unnecessary risk,
and you have to flash your memory and you want to RAM your ROM,
quickly turn off your computer and be sure to tell your mom.
Thermodynamics and Couch Potatoes
As we all know, it takes 1 calorie to heat 1 gram of water 1 degree centigrade. Translated into meaningful terms, this means that if you eat a very cold dessert (generally consisting of water in large part), the natural processes which raise the consumed dessert to body temperature during the digestive cycle literally sucks the calories out of the only available source, your body fat.
For example, a dessert served and eaten at near 0 degrees C (32.2 deg. F) will in a short time be raised to the normal body temperature of 37 degrees C (98.6 deg. F). For each gram of dessert eaten, that process takes approximately 37 calories as stated above. The average desser tportion is 6 oz, or 168 grams. Therefore, by operation of thermodynamiclaw, 6,216 calories (1 cal./gm/deg. x 37 deg. x 168 gms) are extracted from body fat as the dessert's temperature is normalized.
Allowing for the 1,200 latent calories in the dessert, the net calorie loss is approximately 5,000 calories.
Obviously, the more cold dessert you eat,the better off you are and the faster you will lose weight, if that is your goal.
This process works equally well when drinking very cold beer in frosted glasses. Each ounce of beer contains 16 latent calories, but extracts 1,036 calories (6,216 cal. per 6 oz. portion) in the temperature normalizing process. Thus the net calorie loss per ounce of beer is 1,020 calories. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to calculate that 12,240 calories (12 oz. x 1,020 cal./oz.) are extracted from the body in the process of drinking a can of beer.
Frozen desserts, e.g., ice cream, are even more beneficial, since it takes 83 cal./gm to melt them (i.e., raise them to 0 deg. C) and an additional 37 cal./gm to further raise them to body temperature. The results here are really remarkable, and it beats running hands down.
Unfortunately, for those who eat pizza as an excuse to drink beer, pizza (loaded with latent calories and served above body temperature) induces an opposite effect. But, thankfully, as the astute reader should have already reasoned, the obvious solution is to drink a lot of beer with pizza and follow up immediately with large bowls of ice cream.
We could all be thin if we were to adhere religiously to a pizza, beer, and ice cream diet.
An old Engineering Joke
An engineering student was walking across campus when another engineer rides up on a shiny new motorcycle.
"Where did you get such a rockin' bike?" asked the first.
The second engineer replied, "Well, I was walking along yesterday minding my own business when a beautiful woman rode up on this bike. She threw the bike to the ground, took off all her clothes and said "Take what you want."
The second engineer nodded approvingly "Good choice, the clothes probably wouldn't have fit."
If God were an Engineer...
A bunch of engineers are sitting around at a party, discussing the nature of the God, and who designed women.
The mechanical engineer states that God must also be a mechanical engineer because "if you look at all the pulleys and levers that drive the body, how the tendons and muscles and bones all work together, well, it's just amazing."
The chemical engineer says that no, God has to be a chemical engineer because "if you look at all the chemical processes that drive the body, how the hormones and the brain and the glands and everything else all interact, well, it's just astounding."
The electrical engineer says that no, God has to be an electrical engineer because "if you look at the circuitry of the body, how the thousands upon millions of nerve cells transmit signals from one part to another, well, it boggles the mind."
The civil engineer speaks up last of all and says, no, God is definitely a civil engineer, because "only a civil engineer would run a sewer through a playground. "
Stranded
There was this male engineer, on a cruise ship in the Caribbean for the first time. It was wonderful, the experience of his life.
A hurricane came up unexpectedly. The ship went down almost instantly.
The man found himself, he knew not how, swept up on the shore of an island. There was nothing else anywhere to be seen. No person, no supplies, nothing. The man looked around. There were some bananas and coconuts, but that was it. He was desperate, and forlorn, but decided to make the best of it. So for the next four months he ate bananas, drank coconut juice and mostly looked to the sea mightily for a ship to come to his rescue.
One day, as he was lying on the beech stroking his beard and looking for a ship, he spotted movement out of the corner of his eye. Could it be true, was it a ship? No, from around the corner of the island came this rowboat. In it was the most gorgeous woman he had ever seen, or at least seen in 4 months. She was tall, tanned, and her blond hair flowing in the sea breeze gave her an almost ethereal quality. She spotted him also as he was waving and yelling and screaming to get her attention. She rowed her boat towards him.
In disbelief, he asked, "Where did you come from? How did you get here"?
She said, "I rowed from the other side of the island. I landed on this island when my cruise ship sank."
"Amazing", he said, "I didn't know anyone else had survived. How many of you are there? Where, did you get the rowboat? You must have been really lucky to have a rowboat wash-up with you?"
"It is only me", she said, "and the rowboat didn't wash up, nothing else did."
"Well then", said the man, "how did you get the rowboat?"
"I made the rowboat out of raw material that I found on the island," replied the woman (who was a mechanical engineer). "The oars were whittled from Gum tree branches, I wove the bottom from Palm branches, and the sides and stern came from a Eucalyptus tree".
"But, but," asked the man, "what about tools and hardware, how did you do that?"
"Oh, no problem," replied the woman (who was also a geologist), "on the south side of the island there is a very unusual stratum of alluvial rock exposed."
" I found that if I fired it to a certain temperature in my kiln, it melted into forgeable ductile iron," said the woman (who was also an accomplished metallurgist). "I used that for tools, and used the tools to make the hardware. But, enough of that," she said. "Where do you live?"
At last the man was forced to confess that he had been sleeping on the beach.
"Well, let's row over to my place,"she said. So they both got into the rowboat and left for her side of island.
The woman (who was also a bodybuilder) easily rowed them around to a wharf that led to the approach to her place. She tied up the rowboat with a beautifully woven hemp rope. They walked up a stone walk and around a Palm tree, there stood an exquisite bungalow painted in blue and white (she was also a civil engineer and an architect).
"It's not much, " she said, "but I call it home. Sit down, please, would you like to have a drink?"
"No," said the man, "one more coconut juice and I will puke."
"It won't be coconut juice," said the woman (who was, of course, also a chemical engineer, experienced in brewing and distillation), "I have a still, how about a Pina Colada?"
Trying to hide his continued amazement, the man accepted, and they sat down on her couch to talk.
After a while, and they had exchanged their stories, the woman asked, "Tell me, have you always had a beard?"
"No", the man replied, "I was clean shaven all of my life, and even on the cruise ship".
"Well if you would like to shave, there is a man's razor upstairs in the cabinet in the bathroom." So, the man, no longer questioning anything, went upstairs to the bath room. There in the cabinet was a razor made from a bone handle, two shells honed to a hollow ground edge were fastened on to its end inside of a swivel mechanism (as you've probably guessed, she had a degree in Industrial Design as well). The man shaved, showered and went back downstairs.
"You look great," said the woman, "I think I will go up and slip into something more comfortable." So she did.
And, the man continued to sip his Pina Colada. After a short time, the woman returned wearing fig leaves strategically positioned, and smelling faintly of gardenia.
"Tell me," she said, "we have both been out here for a very long time with no companionship. You know what I mean. Have you been lonely, is there anything that you really miss? Something that all men and woman need. Something that it would be really nice to have right now?"
"Yes there is," the man replied, as he moved closer to the woman while fixing a winsome gaze upon her, "Tell me.... Can I check my email from here?"
Strong and dumb artsie vs. an Engineer
An artsie, sick of working at Mickey D's for what had seemed an eternitude decided to get a job working as a labourer at a construction site. Being a usual overconfident artsie, he soon began to brag to the other workers about all sorts of things. One day he decided to brag that he could outdo anyone in a feat of strength. He made a special case of making fun of the wiry engineer on the site. After several minutes, the engineer had had enough.
"Why don't you put your money where your mouth is," said the engineer. "I will bet a week's wages that I can haul something in a wheelbarrow over to that outbuilding that you won't be able to wheel back."
"You're on, little guy!" the braggart replied. "Let's see what you got."
The engineer reached out and grabbed the wheelbarrow by the handles. Then, nodding to the young man, he said, "All right: Get in."
Why Engineers Make the Best Lovers
10. - The world does revolve around us... we chose the coordinate system.
9. - No "couple" enjoy a better "moment".
8. - We know how to handle stress and strain in a relationship.
7. - We have significant figures.
6. - EK301: The motion of rigid bodies.
5. - Projectile motion: Do we need to say more?
4. - Engineers do it to specification.
3. - According to Newton, if two bodies interact, their forces are equal and opposite.
2. - We know it's not the length of the vector that counts, but how you apply the force.
1. - WE KNOW THE RIGHT HAND RULE!
An Engineer in Hell
An engineer dies and reports to the pearly gates. St. Peter checks his dossier and says, "Ah, you're an engineer - you're in the wrong place."
So the engineer reports to the gates of hell and is let in. Pretty soon, the engineer gets dissatisfied with the level of comfort in hell, and starts designing and building improvements. After a while, they've got air conditioning and flush toilets and escalators, and the engineer is a pretty popular guy.
One day God calls Satan up on the telephone and says with a sneer, "So, how's it going down there in hell?"
Satan replies, "Hey, things are going great. We've got air conditioning and flush toilets and escalators, and there's no telling what this engineer is going to come up with next."
God replies, "What??? You've got an engineer? That's a mistake - he should never have gotten down there; send him up here."
Satan says, "No way. I like having an engineer on the staff, and I'm keeping him."
God says, "Send him back up here or I'll sue.
Satan laughs uproariously and answers, "Yeah, right. And just where are YOU going to get a lawyer?"
The Sensitivity of the Technical Mind
A pastor, a doctor and an engineer were waiting one morning for a particularly slow group of golfers.
The engineer fumed, "What's with these guys? We must have been waiting for 15 minutes!"
The doctor chimed in, "I don't know, but I've never seen such ineptitude!"
The pastor said, "Hey here comes the greenskeeper. Let's have a word with him."
[dramatic pause]
"Hi George. Say what's with that group ahead of us? They're rather slow aren't they?"
The greenskeeper replied, "Oh, yes, that's a group of blind firefighters. They lost their sight saving our clubhouse from a fire last year, so we always let them play for free anytime."
The group was silent for a moment.
The pastor said, "That's so sad, I think I will say a special prayer for them tonight."
The doctor said, "Good idea. And I'm going to contact my opthalmologist buddy and see if there's anything he can do for them."
The engineer said, "Why can't they play at night?"
Engineer to the Rescue
There was an engineer who had an exceptional gift for fixing all things mechanical. After serving his company loyally for over 30 years, he happily retired. Several years later the company contacted him regarding a seemingly impossible problem they were having with one of their multi-million dollar machines.
They had tried everything and everyone else to get the machine to work but to no avail. In desperation, they called on the retired engineer who has solved so many of their problems in the past.
The engineer reluctantly took the challenge. He spent a day studying the huge machine. At the end of the day, he marked a small "x" in chalk on a particular component of the machine and stated, "This is where your problem is". The part was replaced and the machine worked perfectly again. The company received a bill for $50,000 from the engineer for this service. They demanded an itemized accounting of his charges.
The engineer responded briefly:
Civil Engineers vs. Mechanical Engineers
What is the difference between Mechanical Engineers and Civil Engineers?
Mechanical Engineers build weapons, Civil Engineers build targets.
The Architect and his Mistress
An architect, an artist and an engineer were discussing whether it was better to spend time with the wife or a mistress.
The architect said he enjoyed time with his wife, building a solid foundation for and enduring relationship.
The artist said he enjoyed time with his mistress, because of the passion and mystery he found there.
The engineer said, "I like both."
"Both?"
Engineer: "Yeah. If you have a wife and a mistress, they will each assume you are spending time with the other woman, and you can go to the lab and get some work done."
Christmas in an Engineer's Mind
There are approximately two billion children (persons under 18) in the world. However, since Santa does not visit children of Muslim, Hindu, Jewish or Buddhist (except maybe in Japan) religions, this reduces the workload for Christmas night to 15% of the total, or 378 million (according to the population reference bureau). At an average (census) rate of 3.5 children per household, that comes to 108 million homes, presuming there is at least one good child in each. Santa has about 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the different time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming east to west (which seems logical). This works out to 967.7 visits per second. This is to say that for each Christian household with a good child, Santa has around 1/1000 th of a second to park the sleigh, hop out, jump down the chimney, fill the stocking, distribute the remaining presents under the tree, eat whatever snacks have been left for him, get back up the chimney, jump into the sleigh and get onto the next house.
Assuming that each of these 108 million stops is evenly distributed around the earth (which, of course, we know to be false, but will accept for the purposes of our calculations), we are now talking about 0.78 miles per household; a total trip of 75.5 million miles, not counting bathroom stops or breaks. This means Santa's sleigh is moving at 650 miles per second -- 3,000 times the speed of sound. For purposes of comparison, the fastest man made vehicle, the Ulysses space probe, moves at a poky 27.4 miles per second, and a conventional reindeer can run (at best) 15 miles per hour.
The payload of the sleigh adds another interesting element. Assuming that each child gets nothing more than a medium sized LEGO set (two pounds), the sleigh is carrying over 500 thousands tons, not counting Santa himself. On land, a conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 pounds. Even granting that the "flying" reindeer can pull 10 times he normal amount, the job can't be done with eight or even nine of them---Santa would need 360,000 of them. This increases the payload, not counting the weight of the sleigh, another 54,000 tons, or roughly seven times the weight of the Queen Elizabeth (the ship, not the monarch).
600,000 tons traveling at 650 miles per second creates enormous air resistance - this would heat up the reindeer in the same fashion as a spacecraft reentering the earth's atmosphere. The lead pair of reindeer would absorb 14.3 quintillion joules of energy per second each. In short, they would burst into flames almost instantaneously, exposing the reindeer behind them and creating deafening sonic booms in their wake. The entire reindeer team would be vaporized within 4.26 thousandths of a second, or right about the time Santa reached the fifth house on his trip.
Not that it matters, however, since Santa, as a result of accelerating from a dead stop to 650 m.p.s. in .001 seconds, would be subjected to acceleration forces of 17,000 g's. A 250 pound Santa (which seems ludicrously slim) would be pinned to the back of the sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force, instantly crushing his bones and organs and reducing him to a quivering blob of pink goo. Therefore, if Santa did exist, he's dead now.
Merry Christmas.
The Doctor, Chemisist and Engineer in a Bit of A Bad Spot
Once upon a time there lived three men: a doctor, a chemist, and an engineer. For some reason all three offended the king and were sentenced to die on the same day.
The day of the execution arrived, and the doctor was led up to the guillotine.
As he strapped the doctor to the guillotine, the executioner asked, "Head up or head down?"
"Head up," said the doctor.
"Blindfold or no blindfold?"
"No blindfold."
So the executioner raised the axe, and z-z-z-z-ing! Down came the blade--and stopped barely an inch above the doctor's neck. Well, the law stated that if an execution didn't succeed the first time the prisoner had to be released, so the doctor was set free.
Then the chemist was led up to the guillotine.
"Head up or head down?" said the executioner.
"Head up."
"Blindfold or no blindfold?"
"No blindfold."
So the executioner raised his axe, and z-z-z-z-ing! Down came the blade--and stopped an inch above the chemist's neck. Well, the law stated that if the execution didn't succeed the first time the prisoner had to be released, so the chemist was set free.
Finally the engineer was led up to the guillotine.
"Head up or head down?"
"Head up."
"Blindfold or no blindfold?"
"No blindfold."
So the executioner raised his axe, but before he could cut the rope, the engineer yelled out:
"WAIT! I see what the problem is!"
Excerpt from a Romance Novel written by an Engineer
Also known as "The Sex Life of an Electron" (author unknown)
One night when his charge was pretty high, Micro Henry decided to try to get a cute little coil to let him discharge. He picked up Millie Amp and took her for a ride on his Mega cycle. They rode across the Wheatstone bridge, around by the sine wave, and stopped in a magnetic field by a flowing current.
Micro Henry, attracted by Millie's characteristic curves, soon had her resistance at a minimum and his field was fully excited. He laid her on the ground potential, raised her frequency, lowered her capacitance and pulled out his high voltage probe. He inserted his probe into her test socket, connected them in paralell, and began to short circuit her shunt.
Fully excited Millie Amp exclaimed, "Mho, mho, mho." With his tube operating at it's maximum peak current and her coil vibrating from the current flow, she soon reached her maximum peak potential. The excess current flow had gotten her coil hot and Micro Henry started rapidly discharging and soon had drained off every last electron.
They fluxed all night trying various connections and sockets, until Micro Henry's bar magnet had lost all of it's field strength. Afterwards, Millie Amp tried self induction and damaged her solenoid. With his batteries fully discharged, Micro Henry was unable to further excite his generator, so they ended it all by reversing polarity and blowing each other's fuses.
Wisdom from Above
A man is flying in a hot air balloon and realizes he is lost. He reduces height and spots a man down below. He lowers the balloon further and shouts, "Excuse me, can you tell me where I am?"
The man below says, "Yes, you're in a hot air balloon, hovering 30 feet above this field."
"You must be an engineer," says the balloonist.
"I am," replies the man. "How did you know?"
"Well," says the balloonist, "everything you have told me is technically correct, but it's of no use to anyone."
The man below says, "You must be in management."
"I am," replies the balloonist, "but how did you know?"
"Well," says the man, "you don't know where you are, or where you're going, but you expect me to be able to help. You're in the same position you were before we met, but now it's my fault."
Engineering vs Math Majors
A math and engineering convention was being held. On the train to the convention, there were both math majors and engineering majors. Each of the math majors had his/her own train ticket. But the Engineers had only ONE ticket for all of them. The math majors started laughing and snickering. The engineers ignored the laughter.
Then, one of the engineers said, "Here comes the conductor". All of the engineers piled into the bathroom. The math majors were puzzled. The conductor came aboard and collected tickets from all the math majors. He went to the bathroom, knocked on the door, and said, "Tickets Please". An engineer stuck their only ticket under the door. The conductor took the ticket and left. A few minutes later, the engineers emerged from the bathroom. The math majors felt really stupid.
On the way back from the convention, the group of math majors had ONE ticket for their group. They started snickering at the engineers, who had NO tickets amongst them.
When the engineer lookout shouted, "Conductor coming!", all the engineers again piled into a bathroom. All of the math majors went into another bathroom. Then, before the conductor came on board, one of the engineers left the bathroom, knocked on the other bathroom, and said, "Ticket please."
Definition of a Chemical Engineer
CHEMICAL ENGINEER: n. A person who does for profit what a chemist does for fun. see also "Prostitution"
Q: What is the difference between a chemist and a chemical engineer?
A: Oh, about $10 K a year.
THE BOY AND THE FROG
A boy was crossing the road one day when a frog called out to him and said, "If you kiss me, I'll turn into a beautiful princess." He bent over, picked up the frog and put it in his pocket.
The frog spoke up again and said, "If you kiss me and turn me back into a beautiful Princess, I will stay with you for one week." The boy took the frog out of his pocket, smiled at it and returned it to his pocket.
The frog then cried out, "If you kiss me and turn me back into a beautiful Princess, I'll stay with you and do *Anything* you want." Again the boy took the frog out, smiled at it and put it back into his pocket. Finally the frog asked, "What is it? I've told you I'm a beautiful Princess, that I'll stay with you for a week and do *Anything* you want. Why won't you kiss me?"
The boy said, "Look, I'm an engineering major. I don't have time for girlfriends, but a talking frog is really cool."
YOU MAY BE AN ENGINEER...
If you introduce your wife as "mylady@home.wife"
If your spouse sends you an e-mail instead of calling you to dinner
If you can quote scenes from any Monty Python movie
If you want an 500X CD-ROM for Christmas
If Dilbert is your hero
If you stare at an orange juice container because it says CONCENTRATE
If you can name 6 Star Trek episodes (bonus points if you have more than 6 recorded on video tape).
If the only jokes you receive are through e-mail
If your wrist watch has more computing power than a 486DX-50
If your idea of good interpersonal communication means getting the decimal point in the right place
If you look forward to Christmas only to put together the kids' toys
If you use a CAD package to design your son's Pine Wood Derby car
If you have used coat hangers and duct tape for something other than hanging coats and taping ducts
If, at Christmas, it goes without saying that you will be the one to find the burnt-out bulb in the string
If you window shop at Radio Shack
If your ideal evening consists of fast-forwarding through the latest sci-fi movie looking for technical inaccuracies
If you have "Dilbert" comics displayed anywhere in your work area
If you carry on a one-hour debate over the expected results of a test that actually takes five minutes to run
If you are convinced you can build a phazer out of your garage door opener and your camera's flash attachment
If you don't even know where the cover to your personal computer is
If you have modified your can-opener to be microprocessor driven
If you know the direction the water swirls when you flush
If you own "Official Star Trek" anything
If you have ever taken the back off your TV just to see what's inside
If a team of you and your co-workers have set out to modify the antenna on the radio in your work area for better reception
If you ever burned down the gymnasium with your Science Fair project
If you are currently gathering the components to build your own nuclear reactor
If you own one or more white short-sleeve dress shirts
If you have never backed-up your hard drive
If you are aware that computers are actually only good for playing games, but are afraid to say it out loud
If you truly believe aliens are living among us
If you have ever saved the power cord from a broken appliance
If you have ever purchased an electronic appliance "as-is"
If you see a good design and still have to change it
If the salespeople at Circuit City can't answer any of your questions
If you still own a slide rule and you know how to work it
If the thought that a CD could refer to finance or music never enters your mind
If you own a set of itty-bitty screw drivers, but you don't remember where they are
If you rotate your screen savers more frequently than your automobile tires
If you have a functioning home copier machine, but every toaster you own turns bread into charcoal
If you have more toys than your kids
If you need a checklist to turn on the TV
If you have introduced your kids by the wrong name
If you have a habit of destroying things in order to see how they work
If your I.Q. number is bigger than your weight
If the microphone or visual aids at a meeting don't work and you shove up to the front to fix it
If you can remember 7 computer passwords but not your anniversary
If you have memorized the program schedule for the Discovery channel and have seen most of the shows already
If you have ever owned a calculator with no equal key and know what RPN stands for
If your father sat 2 inches in front of your family's first color TV with a magnifying lens to see how they made the colors, and you grew up thinking that was normal
If you know how to take the cover off of your computer, and what size screw driver to use
If you can type 70 words a minute but can't read your own handwriting
If people groan at the party when you pick out the music
If you can't remember where you parked your car for the 3rd time this week
If you did the sound system for your senior prom
If your checkbook always balances
If your wristwatch has more buttons than a telephone
If you have more friends on the Internet than in real life
If you thought the real heroes of "Apollo 13" were the mission controllers
If you think that when people around you yawn, it's because they didn't get enough sleep
If you spend more on your home computer than your car
If you know what http:// stands for (bonus points if you actually care)
If you've ever tried to repair a $5.00 radio
If you have a neatly sorted collection of old bolts and nuts in your garage
If your three year old son asks why the sky is blue and you try to explain atmospheric absorption theory
If your lap-top computer costs more than your car
If your 4 basic food groups are: 1. Caffeine 2. Fat 3. Sugar 4. Chocolate
Job Interview
Reaching the end of a job interview, the Human Resources Person asked the young Engineer fresh out of MIT, "And what starting salary were you looking for?"
The Engineer said, "In the neighborhood of $75,000 a year, depending on the benefit's package."
The HR Person said, "Well, what would you say to a package of 5-weeks vacation, 14 paid holidays, full medical and dental, company matching retirement fund to 50% of salary, and a company car leased every 2 years - say, a red Corvette?"
The Engineer sat up straight and said, "Wow!!! Are you kidding?"
And the HR Person said, "Of course, ...but you started it."
"High Tech" Management Skills
A young engineer was leaving the office at 6 p.m. when he found the CEO standing in front of a shredder with a piece of paper in his hand.
"Listen," said the CEO, "this is important, and my secretary has left. Can you make this thing work?"
"Certainly," said the young engineer. He turned the machine on, inserted the paper, and pressed the start button.
"Excellent, excellent!" said the CEO as his paper disappeared inside the machine. "I just need one copy."
A Programmer and an Engineer
A programmer and an Engineer are sitting next to each other on a long flight from Los Angelos to New York. The Programmer leans over to the Engineer and asks if he would like to play a fun game. The Engineer just wants to take a nap, so he politely declines and rolls over to the window to catch a few winks.
The Programmer persists and explains that the game is real easy and a lotta fun. He explains, "I ask you a question, and if you don’t know the answer, you pay me $5. Then you ask me a question, and if I don’t know the answer, I pay you $5."
Again the Engineer politely declines and tries to get to sleep.
The Programmer, now somewhat agitated, says "Ok, if you don’t know the answer, you pay me $5, and if I don’t know the answer, I’ll pay you $50!"
This catches the engineer’s attention, and he sees no end to this torment unless he plays, so he agrees to the game. The programmer asks the first question: "What is the distance from the Earth to the moon?"
The engineer doesn’t say a word, but simply reaches into his wallet, pulls out a five-dollar bill, and hands it to the programmer. Now, it’s the engineer’s turn. He asks the programmer, "What goes up a hill with three legs, and comes down on four?"
The programmer looks up at him with a puzzled look. He takes out his laptop computer and searches all of his references. He taps into the Airphone with the modem and searches the net and the library of Congress. Frustrated, he sends e-mail to his coworkers - all to no avail. After about an hour, he wakes the engineer and hands him $50. He politely takes the $50 and turns away to try to get back to sleep.
The programmer, more than a little miffed, shakes the engineer and asks, "Well, so what’s the answer?" Without a word, the engineer reaches into his wallet, hands the programmer $5, and turns away to get back to sleep.
Engineering Pick-up Lines
- I won't stop bugging you until I get the address of your home page.
- You fascinate me more than the Fundamental Theorem of Calculus.
- Since distance equals velocity times time, let's let velocity and time approach infinity, because I want to go all the way with you.
- My love for you is like a concave up function because it is always increasing.
- Let's convert our potential energy to kinetic energy.
- Wanna come back to my room? ...and see my 1000 Mhz Pentium VII?
- How about you and I go back to my place and form a covalent bond?
- You and I would add up better than a Riemann sum.
- You're sweeter than glucose.
- We're as compatible as two similar Power Macintoshes.
- Why don't we measure the coefficient of static friction between you and me?
- Wanna see the programs in my HP-48GX?
- Your body has the nicest arc length I've ever seen.
- Isn't your e-mail address beautifulgirl@mydreams.com
- You're hotter than a bunsen burner set to full power!
If a packet hits a pocket on a socket on a port,
and the bus is interrupted as a very last resort,
and the address of the memory makes your floppy disk abort,
then the socket packet pocket has an error to report.
If your cursor finds a menu item followed by a dash,
and the double clicking icon puts your window in the trash,
and your data is corrupted 'cause the index doesn't hash,
then your situation's hopeless and your system's gonna crash.
If the label on the cable on the table at your house,
says the network is connected to the button on your mouse,
but your packets want to tunnel on another protocol,
that's repeatedly rejected by the printer down the hall,
and your screen is all distorted by the side effects of gauss,
so your icons in the window are as wavy as a souse,
then you may as well reboot it and go out with a bang,
'cause as sure as I'm a poet, that sucker's gonna hang.
When the copy of your floppy's getting sloppy on the disk,
and the microcode instructions cause unnecessary risk,
and you have to flash your memory and you want to RAM your ROM,
quickly turn off your computer and be sure to tell your mom.
Thermodynamics and Couch Potatoes
As we all know, it takes 1 calorie to heat 1 gram of water 1 degree centigrade. Translated into meaningful terms, this means that if you eat a very cold dessert (generally consisting of water in large part), the natural processes which raise the consumed dessert to body temperature during the digestive cycle literally sucks the calories out of the only available source, your body fat.
For example, a dessert served and eaten at near 0 degrees C (32.2 deg. F) will in a short time be raised to the normal body temperature of 37 degrees C (98.6 deg. F). For each gram of dessert eaten, that process takes approximately 37 calories as stated above. The average desser tportion is 6 oz, or 168 grams. Therefore, by operation of thermodynamiclaw, 6,216 calories (1 cal./gm/deg. x 37 deg. x 168 gms) are extracted from body fat as the dessert's temperature is normalized.
Allowing for the 1,200 latent calories in the dessert, the net calorie loss is approximately 5,000 calories.
Obviously, the more cold dessert you eat,the better off you are and the faster you will lose weight, if that is your goal.
This process works equally well when drinking very cold beer in frosted glasses. Each ounce of beer contains 16 latent calories, but extracts 1,036 calories (6,216 cal. per 6 oz. portion) in the temperature normalizing process. Thus the net calorie loss per ounce of beer is 1,020 calories. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to calculate that 12,240 calories (12 oz. x 1,020 cal./oz.) are extracted from the body in the process of drinking a can of beer.
Frozen desserts, e.g., ice cream, are even more beneficial, since it takes 83 cal./gm to melt them (i.e., raise them to 0 deg. C) and an additional 37 cal./gm to further raise them to body temperature. The results here are really remarkable, and it beats running hands down.
Unfortunately, for those who eat pizza as an excuse to drink beer, pizza (loaded with latent calories and served above body temperature) induces an opposite effect. But, thankfully, as the astute reader should have already reasoned, the obvious solution is to drink a lot of beer with pizza and follow up immediately with large bowls of ice cream.
We could all be thin if we were to adhere religiously to a pizza, beer, and ice cream diet.
An old Engineering Joke
An engineering student was walking across campus when another engineer rides up on a shiny new motorcycle.
"Where did you get such a rockin' bike?" asked the first.
The second engineer replied, "Well, I was walking along yesterday minding my own business when a beautiful woman rode up on this bike. She threw the bike to the ground, took off all her clothes and said "Take what you want."
The second engineer nodded approvingly "Good choice, the clothes probably wouldn't have fit."
If God were an Engineer...
A bunch of engineers are sitting around at a party, discussing the nature of the God, and who designed women.
The mechanical engineer states that God must also be a mechanical engineer because "if you look at all the pulleys and levers that drive the body, how the tendons and muscles and bones all work together, well, it's just amazing."
The chemical engineer says that no, God has to be a chemical engineer because "if you look at all the chemical processes that drive the body, how the hormones and the brain and the glands and everything else all interact, well, it's just astounding."
The electrical engineer says that no, God has to be an electrical engineer because "if you look at the circuitry of the body, how the thousands upon millions of nerve cells transmit signals from one part to another, well, it boggles the mind."
The civil engineer speaks up last of all and says, no, God is definitely a civil engineer, because "only a civil engineer would run a sewer through a playground. "
Stranded
There was this male engineer, on a cruise ship in the Caribbean for the first time. It was wonderful, the experience of his life.
A hurricane came up unexpectedly. The ship went down almost instantly.
The man found himself, he knew not how, swept up on the shore of an island. There was nothing else anywhere to be seen. No person, no supplies, nothing. The man looked around. There were some bananas and coconuts, but that was it. He was desperate, and forlorn, but decided to make the best of it. So for the next four months he ate bananas, drank coconut juice and mostly looked to the sea mightily for a ship to come to his rescue.
One day, as he was lying on the beech stroking his beard and looking for a ship, he spotted movement out of the corner of his eye. Could it be true, was it a ship? No, from around the corner of the island came this rowboat. In it was the most gorgeous woman he had ever seen, or at least seen in 4 months. She was tall, tanned, and her blond hair flowing in the sea breeze gave her an almost ethereal quality. She spotted him also as he was waving and yelling and screaming to get her attention. She rowed her boat towards him.
In disbelief, he asked, "Where did you come from? How did you get here"?
She said, "I rowed from the other side of the island. I landed on this island when my cruise ship sank."
"Amazing", he said, "I didn't know anyone else had survived. How many of you are there? Where, did you get the rowboat? You must have been really lucky to have a rowboat wash-up with you?"
"It is only me", she said, "and the rowboat didn't wash up, nothing else did."
"Well then", said the man, "how did you get the rowboat?"
"I made the rowboat out of raw material that I found on the island," replied the woman (who was a mechanical engineer). "The oars were whittled from Gum tree branches, I wove the bottom from Palm branches, and the sides and stern came from a Eucalyptus tree".
"But, but," asked the man, "what about tools and hardware, how did you do that?"
"Oh, no problem," replied the woman (who was also a geologist), "on the south side of the island there is a very unusual stratum of alluvial rock exposed."
" I found that if I fired it to a certain temperature in my kiln, it melted into forgeable ductile iron," said the woman (who was also an accomplished metallurgist). "I used that for tools, and used the tools to make the hardware. But, enough of that," she said. "Where do you live?"
At last the man was forced to confess that he had been sleeping on the beach.
"Well, let's row over to my place,"she said. So they both got into the rowboat and left for her side of island.
The woman (who was also a bodybuilder) easily rowed them around to a wharf that led to the approach to her place. She tied up the rowboat with a beautifully woven hemp rope. They walked up a stone walk and around a Palm tree, there stood an exquisite bungalow painted in blue and white (she was also a civil engineer and an architect).
"It's not much, " she said, "but I call it home. Sit down, please, would you like to have a drink?"
"No," said the man, "one more coconut juice and I will puke."
"It won't be coconut juice," said the woman (who was, of course, also a chemical engineer, experienced in brewing and distillation), "I have a still, how about a Pina Colada?"
Trying to hide his continued amazement, the man accepted, and they sat down on her couch to talk.
After a while, and they had exchanged their stories, the woman asked, "Tell me, have you always had a beard?"
"No", the man replied, "I was clean shaven all of my life, and even on the cruise ship".
"Well if you would like to shave, there is a man's razor upstairs in the cabinet in the bathroom." So, the man, no longer questioning anything, went upstairs to the bath room. There in the cabinet was a razor made from a bone handle, two shells honed to a hollow ground edge were fastened on to its end inside of a swivel mechanism (as you've probably guessed, she had a degree in Industrial Design as well). The man shaved, showered and went back downstairs.
"You look great," said the woman, "I think I will go up and slip into something more comfortable." So she did.
And, the man continued to sip his Pina Colada. After a short time, the woman returned wearing fig leaves strategically positioned, and smelling faintly of gardenia.
"Tell me," she said, "we have both been out here for a very long time with no companionship. You know what I mean. Have you been lonely, is there anything that you really miss? Something that all men and woman need. Something that it would be really nice to have right now?"
"Yes there is," the man replied, as he moved closer to the woman while fixing a winsome gaze upon her, "Tell me.... Can I check my email from here?"
Strong and dumb artsie vs. an Engineer
An artsie, sick of working at Mickey D's for what had seemed an eternitude decided to get a job working as a labourer at a construction site. Being a usual overconfident artsie, he soon began to brag to the other workers about all sorts of things. One day he decided to brag that he could outdo anyone in a feat of strength. He made a special case of making fun of the wiry engineer on the site. After several minutes, the engineer had had enough.
"Why don't you put your money where your mouth is," said the engineer. "I will bet a week's wages that I can haul something in a wheelbarrow over to that outbuilding that you won't be able to wheel back."
"You're on, little guy!" the braggart replied. "Let's see what you got."
The engineer reached out and grabbed the wheelbarrow by the handles. Then, nodding to the young man, he said, "All right: Get in."
Why Engineers Make the Best Lovers
10. - The world does revolve around us... we chose the coordinate system.
9. - No "couple" enjoy a better "moment".
8. - We know how to handle stress and strain in a relationship.
7. - We have significant figures.
6. - EK301: The motion of rigid bodies.
5. - Projectile motion: Do we need to say more?
4. - Engineers do it to specification.
3. - According to Newton, if two bodies interact, their forces are equal and opposite.
2. - We know it's not the length of the vector that counts, but how you apply the force.
1. - WE KNOW THE RIGHT HAND RULE!
An Engineer in Hell
An engineer dies and reports to the pearly gates. St. Peter checks his dossier and says, "Ah, you're an engineer - you're in the wrong place."
So the engineer reports to the gates of hell and is let in. Pretty soon, the engineer gets dissatisfied with the level of comfort in hell, and starts designing and building improvements. After a while, they've got air conditioning and flush toilets and escalators, and the engineer is a pretty popular guy.
One day God calls Satan up on the telephone and says with a sneer, "So, how's it going down there in hell?"
Satan replies, "Hey, things are going great. We've got air conditioning and flush toilets and escalators, and there's no telling what this engineer is going to come up with next."
God replies, "What??? You've got an engineer? That's a mistake - he should never have gotten down there; send him up here."
Satan says, "No way. I like having an engineer on the staff, and I'm keeping him."
God says, "Send him back up here or I'll sue.
Satan laughs uproariously and answers, "Yeah, right. And just where are YOU going to get a lawyer?"
The Sensitivity of the Technical Mind
A pastor, a doctor and an engineer were waiting one morning for a particularly slow group of golfers.
The engineer fumed, "What's with these guys? We must have been waiting for 15 minutes!"
The doctor chimed in, "I don't know, but I've never seen such ineptitude!"
The pastor said, "Hey here comes the greenskeeper. Let's have a word with him."
[dramatic pause]
"Hi George. Say what's with that group ahead of us? They're rather slow aren't they?"
The greenskeeper replied, "Oh, yes, that's a group of blind firefighters. They lost their sight saving our clubhouse from a fire last year, so we always let them play for free anytime."
The group was silent for a moment.
The pastor said, "That's so sad, I think I will say a special prayer for them tonight."
The doctor said, "Good idea. And I'm going to contact my opthalmologist buddy and see if there's anything he can do for them."
The engineer said, "Why can't they play at night?"
Engineer to the Rescue
There was an engineer who had an exceptional gift for fixing all things mechanical. After serving his company loyally for over 30 years, he happily retired. Several years later the company contacted him regarding a seemingly impossible problem they were having with one of their multi-million dollar machines.
They had tried everything and everyone else to get the machine to work but to no avail. In desperation, they called on the retired engineer who has solved so many of their problems in the past.
The engineer reluctantly took the challenge. He spent a day studying the huge machine. At the end of the day, he marked a small "x" in chalk on a particular component of the machine and stated, "This is where your problem is". The part was replaced and the machine worked perfectly again. The company received a bill for $50,000 from the engineer for this service. They demanded an itemized accounting of his charges.
The engineer responded briefly:
- One chalk mark $1
- Knowing where to put it $49,999
Civil Engineers vs. Mechanical Engineers
What is the difference between Mechanical Engineers and Civil Engineers?
Mechanical Engineers build weapons, Civil Engineers build targets.
The Architect and his Mistress
An architect, an artist and an engineer were discussing whether it was better to spend time with the wife or a mistress.
The architect said he enjoyed time with his wife, building a solid foundation for and enduring relationship.
The artist said he enjoyed time with his mistress, because of the passion and mystery he found there.
The engineer said, "I like both."
"Both?"
Engineer: "Yeah. If you have a wife and a mistress, they will each assume you are spending time with the other woman, and you can go to the lab and get some work done."
Christmas in an Engineer's Mind
There are approximately two billion children (persons under 18) in the world. However, since Santa does not visit children of Muslim, Hindu, Jewish or Buddhist (except maybe in Japan) religions, this reduces the workload for Christmas night to 15% of the total, or 378 million (according to the population reference bureau). At an average (census) rate of 3.5 children per household, that comes to 108 million homes, presuming there is at least one good child in each. Santa has about 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the different time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming east to west (which seems logical). This works out to 967.7 visits per second. This is to say that for each Christian household with a good child, Santa has around 1/1000 th of a second to park the sleigh, hop out, jump down the chimney, fill the stocking, distribute the remaining presents under the tree, eat whatever snacks have been left for him, get back up the chimney, jump into the sleigh and get onto the next house.
Assuming that each of these 108 million stops is evenly distributed around the earth (which, of course, we know to be false, but will accept for the purposes of our calculations), we are now talking about 0.78 miles per household; a total trip of 75.5 million miles, not counting bathroom stops or breaks. This means Santa's sleigh is moving at 650 miles per second -- 3,000 times the speed of sound. For purposes of comparison, the fastest man made vehicle, the Ulysses space probe, moves at a poky 27.4 miles per second, and a conventional reindeer can run (at best) 15 miles per hour.
The payload of the sleigh adds another interesting element. Assuming that each child gets nothing more than a medium sized LEGO set (two pounds), the sleigh is carrying over 500 thousands tons, not counting Santa himself. On land, a conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 pounds. Even granting that the "flying" reindeer can pull 10 times he normal amount, the job can't be done with eight or even nine of them---Santa would need 360,000 of them. This increases the payload, not counting the weight of the sleigh, another 54,000 tons, or roughly seven times the weight of the Queen Elizabeth (the ship, not the monarch).
600,000 tons traveling at 650 miles per second creates enormous air resistance - this would heat up the reindeer in the same fashion as a spacecraft reentering the earth's atmosphere. The lead pair of reindeer would absorb 14.3 quintillion joules of energy per second each. In short, they would burst into flames almost instantaneously, exposing the reindeer behind them and creating deafening sonic booms in their wake. The entire reindeer team would be vaporized within 4.26 thousandths of a second, or right about the time Santa reached the fifth house on his trip.
Not that it matters, however, since Santa, as a result of accelerating from a dead stop to 650 m.p.s. in .001 seconds, would be subjected to acceleration forces of 17,000 g's. A 250 pound Santa (which seems ludicrously slim) would be pinned to the back of the sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force, instantly crushing his bones and organs and reducing him to a quivering blob of pink goo. Therefore, if Santa did exist, he's dead now.
Merry Christmas.
The Doctor, Chemisist and Engineer in a Bit of A Bad Spot
Once upon a time there lived three men: a doctor, a chemist, and an engineer. For some reason all three offended the king and were sentenced to die on the same day.
The day of the execution arrived, and the doctor was led up to the guillotine.
As he strapped the doctor to the guillotine, the executioner asked, "Head up or head down?"
"Head up," said the doctor.
"Blindfold or no blindfold?"
"No blindfold."
So the executioner raised the axe, and z-z-z-z-ing! Down came the blade--and stopped barely an inch above the doctor's neck. Well, the law stated that if an execution didn't succeed the first time the prisoner had to be released, so the doctor was set free.
Then the chemist was led up to the guillotine.
"Head up or head down?" said the executioner.
"Head up."
"Blindfold or no blindfold?"
"No blindfold."
So the executioner raised his axe, and z-z-z-z-ing! Down came the blade--and stopped an inch above the chemist's neck. Well, the law stated that if the execution didn't succeed the first time the prisoner had to be released, so the chemist was set free.
Finally the engineer was led up to the guillotine.
"Head up or head down?"
"Head up."
"Blindfold or no blindfold?"
"No blindfold."
So the executioner raised his axe, but before he could cut the rope, the engineer yelled out:
"WAIT! I see what the problem is!"
Excerpt from a Romance Novel written by an Engineer
Also known as "The Sex Life of an Electron" (author unknown)
One night when his charge was pretty high, Micro Henry decided to try to get a cute little coil to let him discharge. He picked up Millie Amp and took her for a ride on his Mega cycle. They rode across the Wheatstone bridge, around by the sine wave, and stopped in a magnetic field by a flowing current.
Micro Henry, attracted by Millie's characteristic curves, soon had her resistance at a minimum and his field was fully excited. He laid her on the ground potential, raised her frequency, lowered her capacitance and pulled out his high voltage probe. He inserted his probe into her test socket, connected them in paralell, and began to short circuit her shunt.
Fully excited Millie Amp exclaimed, "Mho, mho, mho." With his tube operating at it's maximum peak current and her coil vibrating from the current flow, she soon reached her maximum peak potential. The excess current flow had gotten her coil hot and Micro Henry started rapidly discharging and soon had drained off every last electron.
They fluxed all night trying various connections and sockets, until Micro Henry's bar magnet had lost all of it's field strength. Afterwards, Millie Amp tried self induction and damaged her solenoid. With his batteries fully discharged, Micro Henry was unable to further excite his generator, so they ended it all by reversing polarity and blowing each other's fuses.
Wisdom from Above
A man is flying in a hot air balloon and realizes he is lost. He reduces height and spots a man down below. He lowers the balloon further and shouts, "Excuse me, can you tell me where I am?"
The man below says, "Yes, you're in a hot air balloon, hovering 30 feet above this field."
"You must be an engineer," says the balloonist.
"I am," replies the man. "How did you know?"
"Well," says the balloonist, "everything you have told me is technically correct, but it's of no use to anyone."
The man below says, "You must be in management."
"I am," replies the balloonist, "but how did you know?"
"Well," says the man, "you don't know where you are, or where you're going, but you expect me to be able to help. You're in the same position you were before we met, but now it's my fault."
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