Joseph # # # # ### # #
Information ## ## # # # January 17
Network ## ## # # # 1 9 9 7
Xmit # # # # ### #
JINX FORGETS ITS OWN BIRTHDAY
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Well not exactly, we just lacked the tools to celebrate properly. As the
one year anniversary of that infamous "rainy day in November" rolled near,
massive changes were taking place at JINXHQ. Our JINXserver, the venerable
PowerBook 165c, had been sold suddenly under great duress (the duress being
precisely $2000 cash) to an eccentric neighbor destined for Italy the very
next day. Twas time for an upgrade anyhow, but PowerBooks are hard to come
by when you live in sleepy fishing hamlets like we do. And as the birthday
came and went we found ourselves shockingly computerless, forced to
communicate with that archaic device called the "voice-phone", ick!
Meanwhile, the entire jinx legacy sat in a single EZ135 diskette, waiting...
It was December before the even-more-venerable PowerBook 520c arrived, and
by then we were too busy singing christmas carols and dealing with
backorders from our fluxsite to pull a digest together.
Doorbell rings, I'm not list'nin',
From my mouth, drool is glist'nin',
I'm happy - although
My boss let me go -
Happily addicted to the Web.
All night long, I sit clicking,
Unaware time is ticking,
There's beard on my cheek,
Same clothes for a week,
Happily addicted to the Web.
Friends come by and shake me saying, "Yo, man!
Don't you know tonight's the senior prom?"
With a listless shrug I mutter, "No, man;
I just discovered letterman-dot-com!"
I don't phone, don't send faxes,
Don't go out, don't pay taxes,
Who cares if someday
They drag me away?
I'm happily addicted to the Web!
<>
Unbeknownst to JINX, our forced hibernation was having a positive effect on
subscriptions: as soon as we went silent, interest in the digest soared!
Just as the most sought after celebrities are those who never show their
faces, people were falling over each other to join this mysterious,
nonexistent mail list. The increase has been so profound that I'm tempted
to disband JINX altogether in the hopes of attracting millions, but this
information must be distributed! The People Deserve To Know... they
deserve to know about Linda, and the brains.
#=-=#=-=#=-=#=-=#=-=#=-=#=-=#=-=#=-=#=-=#=-=#=-=#=-=#=-=#=-=#=-=#=-=#=-=#
A lady named Linda went to Arkansas last year to visit her in-laws, and
while there, went to a store. She parked next to a car with a woman sitting
in it, her eyes closed and hands behind her head, apparently sleeping.
When Linda came out a while later, she again saw the woman, her hands still
behind her head but with her eyes open. The woman looked very strange, so
Linda tapped on the window and asked "Are you okay?" The woman calmly
answered "I've been shot in the head, and am holding my brains in."
Linda didn't know what to do, so she ran into the store, where store
officials called the paramedics. They had to break into the car because the
door was locked. When they got in, they found bread dough on the back of
her head and in her hands. A Pillsbury biscuit canister had exploded,
apparently from the heat in the car, making a loud explosion akin to a
gunshot, and hit her in the head. When she reached back to find what it
was, she felt the dough and presumed it was her brains. She passed out
from fright at first, then woke up and set about holding her brains in.
---<click>---
So elsewhere, there's this guy, we will call him Bob. Bob was driving down
the freeway one fine day, and this other guy, we'll call him J.R., well
J.R. rear ended Bob, and then J.R. just took off! Hit and run. And
luckily for Bob, his car was so dirty, J.R.'s licence plate left an
impression in the dirt, and Bob was able to show this to police and J.R.
was apprehended. And all this is true.
/~\./~\./~\./~\./~\./~\./~\./~\./~\./~\./~\./~\./~\./~\./~\./~\./~\./~\./~\
By the time JINX scrambled back online, it was a brand new year, and
Windows95 was *two* years outdated. This was cause for celebration, kicked
off by recent news out of Japan, where the ominous "where do you want to go
today?" slogan was making it's asian debut. The pitch, splashed across
countless billboards and busses all over the country, translates literally
into this phrase: "Microsoft: If you don't know where you want to go, we'll
make sure you get taken".
Bearing that in mind, here's some recently documented Win95 error codes you
directionless folks should be on the lookout for...
WinErr: 001 Windows95 loaded - System in danger
WinErr: 002 No Error - Yet
WinErr: 003 Dynamic linking error - Your mistake is now in every file
WinErr: 004 Erroneous error - Nothing is wrong
WinErr: 005 Multitasking attempted - System confused
WinErr: 006 Malicious error - Desqview found on drive
WinErr: 007 System price error - Inadequate money spent on hardware
WinErr: 008 Broken window - Watch out for glass fragments
WinErr: 009 Horrible bug encountered - God knows what has happened
WinErr: 00A Promotional literature overflow - Mailbox full
WinErr: 00B Inadequate disk space - Free at least 50MB
WinErr: 00C Memory hog error - More Ram needed. More! More! More!
WinErr: 00D Window closed - Do not look outside
WinErr: 00E Window open - Do not look inside
WinErr: 00F Unexplained error - Please tell us how this happened
WinErr: 010 Reserved for future mistakes by our developers
WinErr: 011 Window open - Do not look outside
WinErr: 012 Window closed - Do not look inside
WinErr: 013 Unexpected error - Huh?
WinErr: 014 Keyboard locked - Try anything you can think of.
WinErr: 018 Unrecoverable error - System has been destroyed. Buy
a new one. Old Windows licence is no longer valid.
WinErr: 019 User error - Not our fault. Is NOT is NOT!
WinErr: 01A Operating system overwritten - Please reinstall all
your software. We are terribly sorry.
WinErr: 01B Illegal error - You are not allowed to get this error.
Next time you will get a penalty.
WinErr: 01C Uncertainty error - Uncertainty may be inadequate.
WinErr: 01D System crash - We are unable to figure out our own code.
WinErr: 01E Timing error - Please wait. And wait. And wait. And wait?
WinErr: 01F Reserved for future mistakes of our developers.
WinErr: 020 Error recording error codes - Additional errors will be lost.
WinErr: 042 Virus error - A virus has been activated in a dos-box. The
virus, however, requires Windows. All tasks will
automatically be closed and the virus will be activated again.
WinErr: 079 Mouse not found - Mouse driver has not been installed. Please
click the left mouse button to continue.
WinErr: 103 Error buffer overflow - Too many errors encountered.
Additional errors may not be displayed or recorded.
WinErr: 678 This will end your Windows session. Do you want to play
another game?
WinErr: 683 Timeout error - Operator fell asleep while waiting for the
system to complete boot procedure.
WinErr: 736 Chicken Used to Test Airplane Windshield.
(oh, the things we do to make articles meld...)
BRITISH BORROW FAA'S CHICKEN-LAUNCHER TO TEST AIRPLANE WINDSHIELD
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In a recent issue of Meat & Poultry magazine, editors quoted from
"Feathers," the publication of the California Poultry Industry Federation,
telling the following story: It seems the U.S. Federal Aviation
Administration has a unique device for testing the strength of windshields
on airplanes. The device is a gun that launches a dead chicken at the
plane's windshield at approximately the speed the plane flies. The theory
is that if the windshield doesn't crack from the carcass impact, it'll
survive a real collision with a bird during flight. It seems the British
were very interested in this and wanted to test a windshield on a brand
new, speedy locomotive they're developing. They borrowed FAA's chicken
launcher, loaded the chicken and fired. The ballistic chicken shattered
the windshield, broke the engineer's chair and embedded itself into the
back wall of the engine cab. The British were stunned and asked the FAA to
recheck the test to see if everything was done correctly. The FAA reviewed
the test thoroughly and had one recommendation: don't use frozen chicken.
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## =======================================
## Assorted Sources:
## <John_Solheim-RLYMV3@email.sps.mot.com>
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### <vbs@thecentre.com><info@wired.com>
...and me, <joseph@thecentre.com>
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