META - ENGLISH - November 27, 1999

The Spiritual Translator Newsletter

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IN META TODAY

1 DICTIONARIES AND GLOSSARIES
2. QUOTES XIX
3. JOKES
4. A FOREVER FRIEND

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1 DICTIONARIES AND GLOSSARIES

This should be helpful for many among you. This list has been published by Mary Maloof in Transfree, Issue 7. I show it here again because some may not receive this wonderful ezine.

http://www.mabercom.com

The translator's portfolio of Internet resources

http://allserv.rug.ac.be/~rvdstich/eugloss/welcome.html

A multilingual glossary of medical terms.

http://www.bureaudelatraduction.gc.ca/pub.htm

The website of the Translation Bureau of the Department of Public Works and Government Services of Canada offers a number of free French/English and French/English/Spanish glossaries.

http://www.llp.fu-berlin.de/baum/hyperref.html

Online English-language dictionaries, glossaries, and encyclopediae, touching on everything from aikido to meteor astronomy.

http://www.notebook4u.com/glossary.htm

Sony's and Aiwa's Technical Terms Glossaries

http://www.mtnds.com/af/

English-language acronym finder. Over 106,700 acronyms and abbreviations from various fields.

http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jel/doddict/

Dictionary of military terms and acronyms, compiled by the United States Department of Defense.

http://www.link.cs.cmu.edu/dougb/rhyme-doc.html

The Semantic Rhyming Dictionary. A boon to the literary translator who translates into English.

 

AND NOW TIME TO LAUGH....

 

2. QUOTES XIX

"[Washington DC] is too small to be a state but too large to be an asylum for the mentally deranged." -Anne Burford

"Every day, the dog and I, we go for a tramp in the woods. And he loves it! Mind you, the tramp is getting a bit fed up." - Jerry Dennis

"If you want to see a comic strip, you should see me in the shower." - Groucho Marx

"After marriage, husband and wife become two sides of a coin; they just can't face each other, but still they stay together." - Hemant Joshi

"I think that all right-thinking people in this country are sick and tired of being told that ordinary, decent people are fed up in this country with being sick and tired. I'm certainly not! But I'm sick and tired of being told that I am." - Monty Python

"How tall are you?" "Six foot seven." "Let's forget about the six feet and talk about the seven inches."

- Mae West

"To be a successful father there's one absolute rule: when you have a kid, don't look at it for the first two years." - Ernest Hemingway

"Ask your child what he wants for dinner only if he's buying." - Fran Lebowitz

"I can't understand my own medical bills. Last spring my son suffered some injuries requiring medical treatment, and ever since I've been receiving incomprehensible bills from dozens of random medical computers. I'm pretty sure that I'm now paying for medical care given to people injured in the Hindenburg disaster." - Dave Barry

"Americans will put up with anything provided it doesn't block traffic." - Dan Rather

"I used to smoke marijuana, but that was when I was in college, before it was a drug." - Dan Quayle

"Dad always thought laughter was the best medicine, which I guess is why several of us died of tuberculosis." - Jack Handey

"During bomb drills, we students were told to crouch under our desks. Apparently the desks used in classrooms in the fifties were made of an exceptionally missile-resistant variety of wood. During the Cold War years I often wondered why it never occurred to our defense planners to protect the entire nation from nuclear attack by simply covering it, from sea to shining sea, with a huge Strategic Classroom Desk."

- Dave Barry

"I'm tired of all this nonsense about beauty being only skin-deep. That's deep enough. What do you want, an adorable pancreas?" - Jean Kerr

"Normally I don't believe in miracles, but something happened whan I was about seven years old I still can't explain. I was on the front porch with Grandpa, about to eat my Twinkies, when Grandpa started grabbing his chest and saying he was having a heart attack. I ran to get Mom, but when I got back, Grandpa was okay. 'An angel helped me,' he said. 'Also, he ate your Twinkies.'" - Jack Handey

"He may look like an idiot and talk like an idiot but don't let that fool you. He really is an idiot." - Groucho Marx

"For far too long, few options have been available to buttocks-impaired individuals. Yes, they can do what

thousands of top models such as Cindy Crawford do, namely, stuff wads of newspaper down the back of their underwear to achieve a fuller look. Unfortunately, however, newspaper ink tends to rub off, which can lead to embarrassment during intimate moments ("Darling, it's not that I don't find it attractive, but how come you have a picture of Ziggy on your behind?)" - Dave Barry

"The brain is a wonderful organ. It starts working the moment you get up in the morning and does not stop until you get to work." - Robert Frost

"When I get real, real bored, I like to drive downtown and get a great parking spot. Then I sit in my car and count how many people ask me if I'm leaving." - Steven Wright

"The thing that impresses me most about America is the way parents obey their children." - Duke of Windsor

 

3. JOKES

"True Stories..."

- Compaq is considering changing the instruction "Press Any Key" to "Press Return Key" because of the flood of calls asking where the "Any" key is.

- An AST customer was asked to send a copy of her defective diskettes. A few days later a letter arrived from the customer along with photocopies of the floppies.

- A confused caller to IBM was having troubles printing documents. He told the technician that the computer had said it "couldn't find the printer." The user had turned the computer screen to face the printer but his computer still couldn't see the printer.

 

"An Irishman, an Englishman and a Scotsman"

An Irishman, an Englishman and a Scotsma are in a bar discussing how stupid their wives are...

The English man says: You know my wife must be the most stupid woman on this planet. There was a sale down at the supermarket last week, she bought $300 worth of meat, and we don't even have a freezer...

The Scotsman says: That's nothing, my wife went out last week and bought a brand new car for $8000, and she can't even drive...

The Irishman says: You think that's stupid, I went home last week and my wife told me that she'd booked herself a two week holiday in Tenerife. I watched her packing her case and she took 8 dozen condoms with her, and she doesn't even have a penis.

Sent by Marie-Claude (Switzerland)

 

"The Spoon"

I took some clients out to dinner last week, and I noticed a spoon in the shirt pocket of our waiter as he handed us the menus. It seemed a little odd, but I dismissed it as a random thing. Until our busboy came with water and tableware; he too, sported a spoon in his breast pocket. I looked around the room, and all the waiters and busboys had spoons in their pockets.

When our waiter returned to take our order, I just had to ask, "Why the spoons?"

"Well," he explained, "our parent company recently hired some Andersen Consulting efficiency experts to review all our procedures, and after months of statistical analyses, they concluded that our patrons drop spoons on the floor 73% more often than any other utensil, at a frequency of 3 spoons per hour per workstation. By preparing our workers for this contingency in advance, we can cut our trips to the kitchen down and save time... nearly 1.5 extra man-hours per shift."

Just as he concluded, a "ch-ching" came from the table behind him, and he quickly replaced the fallen spoon with the one from his pocket. "I'll grab another spoon the next time I'm in the kitchen instead of making a special trip," he proudly explained.

I was impressed. "Thanks, I had to ask."

"No problem," he answered. Then he continued to take our orders.

As the members of our dinner party took their turns, my eyes darted back and forth from each person ordering and my menu. That's when, out of the corner of my eye, I spotted a thin black thread protruding from our waiter's fly. Again, I dismissed it; yet I had to scan the room and, sure enough, there were other waiters and busboys with strings hanging out of their trousers.

My curiosity overrode discretion at this point, so before he could leave I had to ask. "Excuse me, but...uh...why, or what...about that string?"

"Oh, yeah," he began, in a quieter tone, "not many people are that observant. That same efficiency group found we could save time in the Men's Room, too."

"How's that?" I asked.

"You see, by tying a string to the end of our, uh, selves, we can pull it out at the urinals literally hands-free and thereby eliminate the need to wash our hands, cutting time spent in the washroom by over 93%!"

"Hey, wait a minute. If the string helps you pull it out, how do you get it back in?"

"Well," he whispered, "I don't know about the other guys, but I use the spoon."

 

"Only once"

A sale representative stops at a small manufacturing plant in the Midwest. He presents a box of cigars to the manager as a gift.   "No, thanks," says the plant manager.  "I tried smoking a cigar once and I didn't like it."

The sales rep shows his display case and then, hoping to clinch a sale, offers to take the manger out for martinis.  "No, thanks," the plant manager replies. "I tried alcohol once, but didn't like it."

Then the salesman glances out the officer window and sees a golf course. "I suppose you play golf,"  says the salesman. "I'd like to invite you to be a guest at my club."

"No, thanks," the manager says. "I played golf once, but I didn't like it." Just then  a young man enters the office. "Let me introduce my son, Bill," says the plant manager.

"Let me guess," the salesman replies. "An only child?"

 

"OfficeSpeak For The American Worker"

Latest terms to add to your vocabulary in the late 90s office environment:

Blamestorming

Sitting around in a group discussing why a deadline was missed, or a project failed, and who was responsible.

Seagull Manager

A manager who flies in, makes a lot of noise, poops over everything and then leaves.

Salmon Day

The experience of spending an entire day swimming upstream only to get screwed and die in the end.

Chainsaw Consultant

An outside expert brought in to reduce the employee head count, leaving the brass with clean hands.

CLM

Career Limiting Move - Used among microserfs to describe ill-advised activity. Trashing your boss while he or she is within earshot is a serious CLM. (Also known as CLB - Career Limiting Behavior)

Adminisphere

The rarefied organizational layers beginning just above the rank and file. Decisions that fall from the adminisphere are often profoundly inappropriate or irrelevant to the problems they were designed to solve.

Dilberted

To be exploited and oppressed by your boss. Derived from the experiences of Dilbert, the geek-in-hell comic strip character. "I've been dilberted again. The old man revised the specs for the fourth time this week."

Flight Risk

Used to describe employees who are suspected of planning to leave the company or department soon.

404

Someone who's clueless. From the World Wide Web error message "404 Not Found," meaning that the requested document could not be located. "Don't bother asking him . . . he's 404, man."

Ohnosecond

That minuscule fraction of time in which you realize that you've just made a BIG mistake.

Percussive Maintenance

The fine art of whacking the crap out of an electronic device to get it to work again.

Prairie Dogging

When someone yells or drops something loudly in a "cube farm" (an office full of cubicles) and everyone's heads pop up over the walls to see what's going on.

Assmosis

The process by which some people seem to absorb success and advancement by kissing up to the boss.

 

"The special frog"

A woman went into a pet shop to buy her husband a pet. After looking around, she realized that all the pets were very expensive. She went to the counter and questioned the clerk. "I wanted to buy my husbandpet, but all of yours are so expensive, " she said.

"Well," said the clerk, "I have a huge bullfrog in the back for $50.00. Would you like to see it?"

"$50.00?! For a frog?!!" asked the woman.

The clerk explained, "It's a special frog. It gives blow jobs."

Well, the woman didn't particularly enjoy giving head, so, she thought this was a heck of a deal. She'd get her husband a gift he'd surely enjoy, and she'd never have to do that again!

The woman decided to buy the frog. She took it home to her husband and explained the strange gift. Of course, the husband was skeptical, but said for sure he'd try it out that night. The woman went to bed that night, relieved knowing that she'd never have to give another blow job. Around two in the morning, she woke to hear pots and pans banging around in the kitchen. She got up to go see what was going on. When she got to the kitchen, she saw her husband and the frog, sitting at the kitchen table like best buddies, looking through cookbooks.

"What are you two doing looking through cookbooks at this hour?" she asked.

Her guy looked up at her and said, "Well, if I can teach this frog to cook, your ass is outta here!!!"

Contributed by CC Translation

 

"Short Stories XV"

Bill worked in a pickle factory. He had been employed there for a number of years when he came home one day to confess to his wife that he had a terrible compulsion. He had an urge to stick his penis into the pickle slicer. His wife suggested that he should see a sex therapist to talk about it, but Bill indicated that he would be too embarrassed. He vowed to overcome the compulsion on his own. One day a few weeks later, Bill came home ashen. His wife could see at once that something was seriously wrong.

"What's wrong, Bill?" she asked.

"Do you remember that I told you how I had this tremendous urge to put my penis into the pickle slicer?"

"Oh, Bill, you didn't."

"Yes, I did."

"My God, Bill, what happened?"

"I got fired."

"No, Bill. I mean, what happened with the pickle slicer?"

"Oh... she got fired too."

A man was visiting his wife in the hospital where she has been in a coma for several years. On this visit, he decides to rub her left breast instead of just talking to her. On doing this, she lets out a sigh. The man runs out and tells the doctor who says this is a good sign and suggests he should try rubbing her right breast to see if there is any reaction. The man goes in and rubs her right breast and this brings a moan from his wife. Hearing this, the man runs out to tell the doctor the result of his suggestion. The doctor now suggests the man should go in and try oral sex, saying he will wait outside as it is a personal act and he doesn't want the man to be embarrassed. The man goes in then comes out about five minutes later, white as a sheet and tells the doctor his wife is dead. The doctor asks what happened, to which the man replies: "She choked."

A small guy goes into an elevator, when he gets in he notices a huge dude standing next to him. The big dude looks down upon the small guy and says"7 foot tall, 350 pounds, 20 inch dick, 3 pound left ball, 3 pound right ball, Turner Brown." The small white guy faints!!! The big dude picks up the small guy, bringing him to, slapping him in the face and says "What's wrong?" The small white guy says, "Excuse me, but what did you say?" The big dude looks down and says "7 foot tall, 350 pounds, 20 inch dick, 3 pound left ball, 3 pound right ball, my name is Turner Brown." The small guy says, "Thank god, I thought you said 'Turn around'."

A couple had been married for 50 years. They were sitting at the breakfast table one morning when the old gentleman said to his wife, "Just think, honey, we've been married for 50 years." "Yeah," she replied, "Just think, fifty years ago we were sitting here at this breakfast table together." "I know," the old man said, "We were probably sitting here naked as jaybirds fifty years ago." "Well," Granny snickered, "What do you say... should we get naked?" Whereupon the two stripped to the buff and sat down at the table. "You know, honey," the little old lady breathlessly replied, "My nipples are as hot for you today as they were fifty years ago." "I wouldn't be surprised," replied Gramps. "One's in your coffee and the other's in your oatmeal!

Sent by C.C. Translation

 

"Shining boots"

A young man bought a new pair of boots of which he was so proud that he decided to go dancing an give them a try.

After dancing with a lady for a few minutes he said, "I bet I can guess the color of your panties."

"O.K.", she replied, "what color do you think they are?"

"Blue", he replied.

"You're right!" she exclaimed. "How did you know that?"

"I saw the reflection in my shiny new boots", he said.

"Here," she said, "dance with my sister and see if you can tell what color her panties are."

After dancing a while, the young man frowned and started rubbing his boots on his pants, then he shook his head and started to dance again.

After a few minutes he asked the new lady, "What color panties do you have on? I can't seem to make them out."

She giggled and said, "I don't have any panties on."

With a sigh of relief the young man said, "Oh good, for a minute I thought I had a crack in my new boots."

 

"Smoke rings"

A guy traveling through the prairies of the USA stopped at a small town and went to a bar. He stood at the end of the bar, ordered a drink, and lit up a cigar.

As he sipped his drink, he stood there quietly blowing smoke rings.

After he blew nine or ten smoke rings into the air, an angry American Indian stomped up to him and said, "One more remark like that and I'll smash your face in!"

 

"Today's newspaper"

A guy got on a bus one day and sat in the aisle seat beside an elderly lady. A few minutes later, he couldn't control himself and let loose a big noisy fart.

Embarrassed, he tried to make conversation with the lady and asked her "Do you by any chance have today's paper?"

The lady looked at him and said, "No, but the next time we pass by a tree I'll grab you a handful of leaves."

 

"Dragon story"

A Chinese man had three daughters, he asked his eldest daughter what kind of man she would like to marry.

"I would like to marry a man with three dragons on his chest", said the eldest daughter.

He then asked his second daughter who she would like to marry.

"I would like to marry a man with two dragons on his chest", said the second daughter.

He finally asked his youngest daughter who she would like to marry.

"I would like to marry a man with one draggin' on the ground", said the youngest daughter.

 

"Wrong Number?"

Late one Saturday evening, I was awakened by the ringing of my phone. In a sleepy grumpy voice I said hello. The party on the other end of the line paused for a moment before rushing breathlessly into a lengthy speech.

"Mom, this is Susan and I'm sorry I woke you up, but I had to call because I'm going to be a little late getting home. See, Dad's car has a flat but it's not my fault. Honest! I don't know what happened. The tire just went flat while we were inside the theater. Please don't be mad, okay?"

Since I don't have any daughters, I knew the person had misdialed.

"I'm sorry dear, "I replied, "but you've reached the wrong number. I don't have a daughter named Susan."

"Gosh, Mom, "came the young woman's voice, "I didn't think you'd be this mad."

 

"Vacation Week"

This married business executive had to make a trip to Palm Beach alone for his corporation. After a few days he was enjoying himself so much that he decided to stay another week as part of his vacation.

Wanting to share this newly discovered paradise, he wired his bachelor friend:

"Take next plane for fun week on me. Bring my wife and your mistress."

His friend was quick to wire back... "Your wife and I arriving tomorrow 11.30 a.m. How long have you known about us?"

 

"The Lord's Army"

A friend was in front of me coming out of church one day, and the preacher was standing at the door as he always is to shake hands. He grabbed my friend by the hand and pulled him aside. The pastor said to him, "You need to join the Army of the Lord!"

My friend replied, "I'm already in the army of the Lord, Pastor."

The Pastor questioned, "How come I don't see you except at Christmas and Easter?"

And with a totally straight face, he whispered back, "I'm in the Secret Service."

 

"Easy solution"

"So let me get this straight," the prosecutor says to the defendant, "you came home from work early and found your wife in bed with a strange man."

"That's correct," says the defendant.

"Upon which," continues the prosecutor, "you take out a pistol and shoot your wife, killing her."

"That's correct," says the defendant.

"Then my question to you is, why did you shoot your wife and not her lover?" asked the prosecutor.

"It seemed easier," replied the defendant, "than shooting a different man every day!"

 

"IRS Payment"

A nervous taxpayer was unhappily conversing with the IRS Tax auditor who had come to review his records. At one point the auditor exclaimed, "Mr. Carr, we feel it is a great privilege to be allowed to live andwork in the USA. As a citizen you have an obligation to pay taxes, and we expect you to eagerly pay them with a smile." "Thank goodness," returned Mr. Carr, with a giant grin on his face from ear to ear. "I thought you were going to want me to pay with cash."

 

"DON'T WORRY, MOM..."

The following is a letter that a typical boyscout will send home from camp:

Dear Mom,

Our scout master told us all to write to our parents in case you saw the flood on TV and worried. We are OK. Only 1 of our tents and 2 sleeping bags got washed away. Luckily, none of us got drowned because we were all up on the mountain looking for Chad when it happened. Oh yes, please call Chad's mother and tell her he is OK. He can't write because of the cast. I got to ride in one of the search & rescue jeeps. It was neat. We never would have found him in the dark if it hadn't been for the lightning.

Scoutmaster Webb got mad at Chad for going on a hike alone without telling anyone. Chad said he did tell him, but it was during the fire so he probably didn't hear him. Did you know that if you put gas on a fire, the gas can will blow up? The wet wood still didn't burn, but one of our tents did. Also some of our clothes. John is going to look weird until his hair grows back.

We will be home on Saturday if Scoutmaster Webb gets the car fixed. It wasn't his fault about the wreck. The brakes worked OK when we left. Scoutmaster Webb said that a car that old you have to expect something to break down; that's probably why he can't get insurance on it. We think it's a neat car. He doesn't care if we get it dirty, and if it's hot, sometimes he lets us ride on the tailgate. It gets pretty hot with 10 people in a car. He let us take turns riding in the trailer until the highway patrolman stopped and talked to us.

Scoutmaster Webb is a neat guy. Don't worry, he is a good driver. In fact, he is teaching Terry how to drive. But he only lets him drive on the mountain roads where there isn't any traffic. All we ever see up there are logging trucks.

This morning all of the guys were diving off the rocks and swimming out in the lake. Scoutmaster Webb wouldn't let me because I can't swim and Chad was afraid he would sink because of his cast, so he let us take the canoe across the lake. It was great. You can still see some of the trees under the water from the flood. Scoutmaster Webb isn't crabby like some scoutmasters. He didn't even get mad about the life jackets.

He has to spend a lot of time working on the car so we are trying not to cause him any trouble. Guess what? We have all passed our first aid merit badges. When Dave dived in the lake and cut his arm, we got to see how a tourniquet works. Also Wade and I threw up. Scoutmaster Webb said it probably was just food poisoning from the leftover chicken, he said they got sick that way with the food they ate in prison. I'm so glad he got out and become our scoutmaster. He said he sure figured out how to get things done better while he was doing his time.

I have to go now. We are going into town to mail our letters and buy bullets. Don't worry about anything. We are fine.

Love, Cole

 

AND TIME TO ENJOY THE BEAUTY OF LIFE

 

4. A FOREVER FRIEND

You can pick up this beautiful file on my ftp site:

ftp://www.all-languages.com/specialfiles/forever.pps

You need POWERPOINT to look at this file.

Contribution Maria-Eugenia (Peru)