Joke 788

Train tracks, taken from a moving train. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

This is a little ruder than I usually post, but it’s too good not to share.  Thanks to my friend Cliff for forwarding it.

The US standard railroad gauge (distance between the rails) is 4 feet, 8.5 inches. That’s an exceedingly odd number.

Why was that gauge used? Because that’s the way they built them in England, and English expatriates designed the US railroads.

Why did the English build them like that? Because the first rail lines were built by the same people who built the pre-railroad tramways, and that’s the gauge they used.

Why did they use that gauge then? Because the people who built the tramways used the same jigs and tools that they had used for building wagons, which used that wheel spacing. 

Why did the wagons have that particular odd wheel spacing? Well, if they tried to use any other spacing, the wagon wheels would break on some of the old, long distance roads in England, because that’s the spacing of the wheel ruts. 

So who built those old rutted roads? Imperial Rome built the first long distance roads in Europe (including England) for their legions. Those roads have been used ever since.

And the ruts in the roads? Roman war chariots formed the initial ruts, which everyone else had to match for fear of destroying their wagon wheels. 

Illustration for the topic of bureacracy. The form is fictional. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Since the chariots were made for Imperial Rome , they were all alike in the matter of wheel spacing. Therefore the United States standard railroad gauge of 4 feet, 8.5 inches is derived from the original specifications for an Imperial Roman war chariot.

Bureaucracies live forever.

So the next time you are handed a specification/procedure/process and wonder ‘What horse’s ass came up with this?’ you may be exactly right. Imperial Roman army chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate the rear ends of two war horses i.e. two horses’ asses. 

Space Shuttle “Enterprise” (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Now, the twist to the story:

When you see a Space Shuttle sitting on its launch pad, there are two big booster rockets attached to the sides of the main fuel tank. These are solid rocket boosters, or SRBs. The SRBs are made by Thiokol at their factory in Utah. 

The engineers who designed the SRBs would have preferred to make them a bit fatter, but the SRBs had to be shipped by train from the factory to the launch site. The railroad line from the factory happens to run through a tunnel in the mountains, and the SRBs had to fit through that tunnel. The tunnel is slightly wider than the railroad track, and the railroad track, as you now know, is about as wide as two horses’ behinds. 

The April 12 launch at Pad 39A of STS-1, just seconds past 7 a.m., carries astronauts John Young and into an Earth orbital mission scheduled to last for 54 hours, ending with unpowered landing at Edwards Air Force Base in California. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

So, a major Space Shuttle design feature of what is arguably the world’s most advanced transportation system was determined over two thousand years ago by the width of a horse’s ass.

And you thought being a horse’s ass wasn’t important? Ancient horse’s asses control almost everything.

And current horses’ asses in Washington, London, and Europe are controlling everything else!

 

Weekly Photo Challenge: Escape

The Hub has often tried to escape from me:

This is the result:

He tried to pay me off:

Trouble is, the party his generosity paid for lead to this:

And, consequently, this:

Face it, Hub: there’s no escaping me:

Joke 787

We haven’t had any Tim Viners for a while, so here you go:

• I went out on a date with Simile. I don’t know what I metaphor.
  

  An old-style Tipp-Ex bottle. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

• My DVD cellophane was put on by a psychiatrist. It was shrink-wrapped.
• I used go out with an anaesthetist – she was a local girl.
• I had a dream last night that I was cutting carrots with the Grim Reaper… dicing with death.
• Albinos – you can’t say fairer than that.
• The advantages of easy origami are two-fold.
• So I said to the gym instructor: “Can you teach me to do the splits?” He said: “How flexible are you?” I said: “I can’t make Tuesdays.”
• When I left home, my mum said: “Don’t forget to write.” I thought: “That’s unlikely – it’s a basic skill, isn’t it?”
• Velcro… what a rip-off. 
• You invented Tipp Ex, correct me if I’m wrong.
• I’m so lazy I’ve got a smoke alarm with a snooze button.
• I bought some Armageddon cheese today, and it said on the packet ‘Best Before End…’

101/1001 (Week 112)

Did something I’ve never done before

I meant to write this post yesterday but the P Diddy/Downton thing was more fun.  By the way, if you can’t see the video, just Google/You Tube it.  It’s worth a watch.

It has been three months since my last update of 101 tasks in 1001 days.  I haven’t done much, apart from the aforementioned thing I’ve never done before, though I did complete three tasks:

Make thirty submissions to competitions or publishers (31/30)

I was a runner-up in the last competition I entered, and the poem will be coming out with others in an e-book.  I’ll be sure to let you know when that happens.

Find 26 unfamiliar words, one for each letter of the alphabet. (Words: 26/26)

Then use them in a post a day for 26 days.

I did skip a day by accident (I forgot) but I used all 26 words, each of which I have already forgotten.  We had fun with that one, didn’t we?

Learn the names of all twelve disciples.

That was more complicated than I expected – thirteen are named, though there are only twelve.  Thaddeus/Judas may or may not be the same person.  Can’t believe I’ve been reading the Bible for 36 years and never noticed that before.  

Then came the something I’ve never done before – it’s a biggy!

Saarbrucken funny toilet 0124 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Expose myself to twenty new experiences (14/20)

I have already told you about twelve in earlier 101/1001 posts.

I also told you about number 13: I asked a stranger for a favour.  That was the whole email-an-author-to-talk-to-us-for-free thing.  Feeling pleased about that one: Stockport Writers were still raving about her at our last meeting.

14. I changed a toilet seat by myself!

How impressive am I??

I decorated the bathroom the other weekend.  Everything looked clean and fresh apart from the grotty toilet seat (never knew a bum could cause such wear and tear).  We bought a new toilet seat and it sat there and sat there and sat there, waiting for the Hub to feel well enough to change it.  Use me, it cried; Pee on me, please…well, not on me, of course, between me…through me…?

The toilet seat was obviously having some sort of existentialist crisis so I asked the Hub, If I remove the old seat and clean the loo in the parts where I normally can’t reach, do you feel well enough to put on the new one?

Urggh, he grunted from his sick bed, which I took to mean ‘Yes’.

I’ll be honest: taking off the old toilet seat was the yuckiest, grossest, most revolting job I’ve ever done; and I say that as a woman who fed prunes to her babies.  It was disgusting with a capital disgusting.  However, some rubber gloves helped, as did turning my face away so I couldn’t see what I was doing (though I had to explain to the Hub why I had unscrewed the pedestal from the floor).

Turns out it was my imagination: what I thought was +++ (fill in the blank; this is a family blog so I’m not going to be poo graphic), turned out to be rust from the old screws.  I know this because I had to snap them off when first Vaseline and then WD40 didn’t work enough to allow me to turn them.

Ahem…that’s not quite true: I did manage to turn them, but the wrong way, so I tightened the old screws.  I wasn’t strong enough to loosen them but there was nothing a good kick in the old cistern couldn’t fix.

Prize money check drawn on the underside of a toilet seat (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Having removed the old seat and cleaned the rusty holes, I had to see how the new seat would look.  It looked really easy to attach, so I tried attaching it.  And succeeded!  

Okay, the Hub had to remove it again to adjust it so we wouldn’t trap flesh and dangly bits between the seat and base but, hey!  I replaced a toilet seat!  I’m fifty this year and I replaced a toilet seat for the first time in my life.  Am I cool or what?

It was worth doing this 101/1001 thing for that alone.  I replaced a toilet seat!

A note of caution: if you intend to visit me in the next few weeks, be advised – upon arrival, all guests will immediately be taken on a tour of my new toilet seat, which I replaced, all by myself!

 

Joke 786

A business man enters a large Las Vegas casino followed by his well-groomed hunting dog. The two make their way to a roulette table, and he sits down with his dog at his side. As the next game begins, the man’s dog tosses a mouthful of $1000 chips onto the table. Remarkably, the numbers each chip fall on pay off. The dog jumps up on the table, gathers up their winnings and heads off to another table, as the man follows. 

As before, the dog tosses a mouthful of chips onto the table for betting, and once again the couple walk away winners. To yet another table they head. This time the man’s dog dumps all of their winnings on one hand of Blackjack. Remarkably, the dealer presents an ace and king to the man. A bit shocked, the dealer presents the man with his winnings.  Not missing a beat, the dog hurls its massive body onto the game table, grabs all of their chips in its mouth and jumps back down to the man’s side. 

Tired from all of the gambling, they find a bar to sit down at. The man asks for a pint of ale for his dog and a club soda for himself. Puzzled by the man’s request, and the large pile of chips at the dog’s side, the bartender asks what type of dog does this very wealthy man have? Patting his canine companion on the head, he smiles and says, “An Irish Better…what else?”

 

A Treat For Downton Abbey Fans

Breaking News!  Downton Abbey has cast its first black character – Sean Combs, better known as P Diddy.

Don’t believe me?  Hear it from the horse’s (occasionally foul) mouth:

For more details, go to Sky News

 

Joke 785

The ‘nacho cheese’ was so popular, I found some more cheesy jokes for you.

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‘Q: Did you hear about the explosion at a French cheese factory?

A: All that was left was de brie.

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Q: Whom did the cheesy Bible start with?

A: Edam and Eve.

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Q: What hotel do mice stay in ?

A: The Stilton

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Q: What dance do cheese makers do every Halloween?

A: The Muenster mash.

*

Q: What did the piece of Cheddar say to the ghost?

A: I’m Lac-ghost intolerant

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Q: What’s the most popular American cheese sitcom?

A: Curd Your Enthusiasm

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Q: Why does cheese look sane?

A: Because everyone else on the plate is crackers.

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Q: What did the street cheese say after being attacked by several blades?

A: I’ve felt grater.