*The Joseph Information Network Xmit -- Volume Two*
"San Diego, CA, November 6, 1995 - WestCode Software, Inc., a new entrant
in the Macintosh software market, today began shipping the release
version of OneClick v1.0 for Macintosh. Providing a new way to make
frequent computer tasks faster and easier to perform, OneClick adds
easy-to-use button palettes (like button bars or toolbars) to the Mac OS
- now any software application can have customizable button bars!"
What else can be said? WestCode is BestCode.
---<>---
I am pleased to present the annual scientific inquiry into Santa Claus.
1) No known species of reindeer can fly.
BUT there are 300,000 species of living organisms yet to be
classified, and while most of these are insects and germs, this
does not COMPLETELY rule out flying reindeer which only Santa has
ever seen.
2) There are 2 billion children (persons under 18) in the world.
BUT since Santa doesn't (appear) to handle the Muslim, Hindu,
Jewish & Buddhist children, that reduces the workload to 15% of the
total - 378 million according to Population Reference Bureau. At
an average (census) rate of 3.5 children per household, that's 91.8
million homes. One presumes there's at least one good child in
each.
3) Santa has 31 hours of Christmas to work with.
This is due to the different time zones and the rotation of the
earth, assuming he travels east to west (which seems logical).
This works out to 822.6 visits/second.
This is to say that for each Christian household with good
children, Santa has .001 second to park, hop out of the sleigh,
jump down the chimney, fill the stockings, distribute the remaining
presents under the tree, eat whatever snacks have been left, get
back up the chimney, get back into the sleigh and move on to the
next house.
Assuming that each of these 91.8 million stops are evenly
distributed around the earth (which, of course, we know to be false
but for the purposes of our calculations we will accept), we are
now talking about .78 miles/household, a total trip of 75.5 million
miles; not counting stops to do what most of us must do at least once
every 31 hours, plus feeding & etc.
So Santa's sleigh must be moving at 650 miles/second, 3,000 times
the speed of sound. For purposes of comparison, the fastest
man-made vehicle on earth, the Ulysses space probe, moves at a poky
27.4 miles/second. A conventional reindeer can run, tops, 15
miles/hour.
4) The payload on the sleigh adds another interesting element.
Assuming that each child gets nothing more than a medium-sized lego
set (2 lb.), the sleigh is carrying 321,300 tons, not counting
Santa, who is invariably described as overweight. On land,
conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 lb. Even granting
that "flying reindeer" (see #1) could pull 10 TIMES the normal
amount, we cannot do the job with 8, or even 9 reindeer. We need
214,200. This increases the payload - not counting the weight of
the sleigh - to 353,430 tons.
This is four times the weight of the ocean-liner Queen Elizabeth.
5) 353,000 tons traveling at 650 miles/second creates enormous air
resistance.
This will heat the reindeer up in the same fashion as a spacecraft
reentering the earth's atmosphere. The lead pair of reindeer will
absorb 14.3 QUINTILLION joules of energy. Per second. Each. In
short, they will burst into flame almost instantaneously, exposing
the reindeer behind them, and create deafening sonic booms in their
wake. The entire reindeer team will be vaporized within .00426 of a
second. Meanwhile, Santa, will be subjected to centrifugal forces
17,500.06 times greater than gravity. A 250-lb. Santa (seems
ludicrously slim) would be pinned to the back of his sleigh by
4,315,015 lb. of force.
If Santa ever DID deliver presents on Christmas Eve, he's dead now.
--[break]--
@SONG: The Best Things in Life
Went to Darlene's party; it was fancy dress.
I just stuck an apple in my face.
I saw a chap who obviously was out to impress,
Reckoned he'd beat Gagarin into space.
He said "Hi there souls!
Like I'm sorry I'm late!
But I was getting done up
As a mobile thrash acetate!"
Me, I got bored
So I went home,
Got into bed,
And came to the conclusion...
There is nothing better in life
Than writing on the sole of your slipper with a Birol
There is nothing better in life
Than writing on the sole of your slipper with a Birol
There is nothing better in life
Than writing on the sole of your slipper with a Birol
There is nothing better in life
Than writing on the sole of your slipper with a Birol
On a Saturday Night instead of going to a pub.
-Half Man, Half Biscuit
[There's no telling what you'll find in the lyric archives...]
To prove it, our brave moderator goes out into the abyss that is internet,
and returns after many hours with enough goods to present:
---------------------------
What's in a name, part one:
---------------------------
54-40 - In the 1800s, Seattle was actually claimed by England
The Hudson's Bay Co. There was a war by the US and
England over the land, in which only a pig died. The Americans wanted the
border to be at 54 degrees 40 min in latitude.
US campaign slogan from that era: "Fifty-four-forty or fight!"
10,000 Maniacs - named deliberately incorrectly after a movie "2,000 Maniacs".
Early names they discussed were Still Life and Burn Victims. Persuaded
that the Burn Victims might not be the most attractive of names, the band
considered various alternatives, including Dick Turpin's Ride To York
and Christian Burial, before settling on the equally unpleasant 10,000
Maniacs which was a derived title of a popular splatter movie, "2,000
Maniacs". Christian Burial survived in another form to become their
record label.
Amos, Tori - born Myra Ellen Amos on 22nd August 1963. Recorded her
first single when she was 17 as Ellen Amos on her MEA label, (after her
initials). We could believe the Atlantic press release about Y Kant
Tori Read, that advised that Tori took her name from the word "notorious",
based on the days she spent conducting her father's church choir while
wearing red leather trousers. Other articles claim her name was taken from
the Torrey Pine, a small, crooked, and rare tree which grows in Southern
California. But the facts are rather less extraordinary: a friend's
boyfriend once remarked that she didn't look much like an Ellen,
but more like a Tori!
Blur - Originally called Seymour. When they signed up to Food Records, they
all decided on the new name, because "to their knowledge, no one had ever
used it before".
Brilliant - so DJs would announce, "That was Brilliant".
Crowded House - Inspired by the cramped accommodation, in Hollywood, where
the band spent 1985 rehearsing their debut album. Originally called The
Mullanes, after Neil Finn's middle name.
Depeche Mode - French magazine title, roughly translates as "Fast Fashion".
Group originally called Composition of Sound.
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Well! High time for more rousing propaganda.
This from "The Greatest Gift" by Dr. Ellen Dickstein:
"An apple is a simple thing that brings pure pleasure and adds no burden.
It is only to be enjoyed....this simple apple fulfills a daily miracle.
It takes rain and sun and nourishment from the earth, and concentrates
them all into sweetness. It does this by obeying its own secret
knowledge....and so enjoy the simple apple, and take heart from its
message of hope...." [What else can be said? Apple is best!]
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Exclusive to JINX: Joseph McLean goes public!
Somehow, somewhere, good television lives on...
This Hour Has 22 Minutes: My favorite show of all. Hard-hitting, brilliantly
informative news program that just happens to be hilarious.
Vacant Lot: Billed as the replacement for KITH this show
falls short at once since nothing could EVER replace the Kids. However, it
*is* produced by the remarkably weird Lorne Mitchels, has four guys, and is
filmed in Halifax before an utterly Canadian audience... exactly like KITH.
Besides, musical scit-bits are provided by Blur & Pursuit of Happiness!
Yum. Oh, some of their sketches are funny too, but *that's* not
important...
Undercurrents: Overhyped, but what does one expect when dealing with an
"electronic-age" program? Alternative Technology up close, some very
interesting stuff.
CODCO: Before even KITH, this newfie group was out there being odd. Very
home-grown and decidedly weird...
Open Wide: hosted by my hero Ruth Degraves, this is a half hour of the most
incredible film shorts the world has ever seen. The very cream of NFB of C
and the world, creativity abounds...
Monday 9:00 This Hour Has 22 Minutes
11:00 Vacant Lot
Tuesday 7:00 Undercurrents
11:30 CODCO
Wednesday 11:30 Vacant Lot
12:00 Open Wide
All are on CBC TV, of course....
[Backwards note: This is a back issue. Don't for a moment believe these
times are still relevent]
---<>---
"No users of microcomputers wants multitasking, nor would they be able to
use it. All they would ever do with it would be background printing, and
you can do that under DOS." -- Bill Gates, 1987
--=+=--
Winning contributions this week from:
<gpark@smartt.com><kawasaki@eworld.com><dfong@waikato.ac.nz><ammon@cs.byu.edu>
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JINX's second issue was originally broadcast November 26th 1995,
reaching about 3 people around the globe.
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