I work in a busy office where a computer going down causes quite an inconvenience. Recently one of our computers not only crashed, it made a noise that sounded like a heart monitor. “This computer has flat-lined,” a co-worker called out with mock horror. “Does anyone here know how to do mouse-to-mouse?”
Sony has announced its own computer operating system now available on its hot new portable PC called the Vaio. Instead of producing the cryptic error messages characteristic of Microsoft’s Windows and DOS systems, Sony’s chairman Asai Tawara said, “We intend to capture the high ground by putting a human, Japanese face on what has been-until now-an operating system that reflects Western cultural hegemony. For example, we have replaced the impersonal and unhelpful Microsoft error messages with our own Japanese haiku poetry.”
The computer haiku messages are just as informative as Microsoft’s and they make you pause just long enough that you’re able to fight the impulse to put a fist through the screen. The chairman went on to give examples of Sony’s new error messages:
A file that big?
It might be very useful.
But now it is gone.
You seek a Web site.
It cannot be located.
Countless more exist.
Chaos reigns within.
Stop, reflect, and reboot.
Order shall return.
ABORTED effort:
Close all that you have worked on.
You ask way too much.
Yesterday it worked
Today it is not working
Windows is like that.
First snow, then silence.
This thousand dollar screen dies
So beautifully.
With searching comes loss.
The presence of absence.
“June Sales.doc” not found.
The Tao that is seen
Is not the true Tao
Until you bring fresh toner.
Windows NT crashed.
The Blue Screen of Death.
No one hears your screams.
Stay the patient course.
Of little worth is your ire.
The network is down.
A crash reduces
Your expensive computer
To a simple stone.
You step in the stream
But the water has moved on.
Page not found.
Out of memory.
We wish to hold the whole sky,
But we never will.
Having been erased,
The document you are seeking
Must now be retyped.
Serious error.
All shortcuts have disappeared.
Screen. Mind. Both are blank.
Three things are certain:
Death, taxes, and lost data.
Guess which has occurred.
Upon arriving home, a husband was met at the door by his sobbing wife. Tearfully she explained, “It’s the druggist – he insulted me terribly this morning on the phone.” Immediately the husband drove downtown to confront the druggist and demand an apology.
Before he could say more than a word or two, the druggist told him, “Now, just a minute – listen to my side of it. This morning the alarm failed to go off, so I was late getting up. I went without breakfast and hurried out to the car, just to realize that I locked the house with both house and car keys inside. I had to break a window to get my keys. Then, driving a little too fast, I got a speeding ticket.
Later, when I was about three blocks from the store, I had a flat tire. When I finally got to the store there was a bunch of people waiting for me to open up. I got the store opened and started waiting on these people, and all the time the darn phone was ringing off the hook.”
He continued, “Then I had to break a roll of nickels against the cash register drawer to make change, and they spilled all over the floor. I got down on my hands and knees to pick up the nickels – the phone was still ringing – when I came up I cracked my head on the open cash drawer, which made me stagger back against a showcase with a bunch of perfume bottles on it…half of them hit the floor and broke.
Meanwhile, the phone is still ringing with no let up, and I finally got back to answer it. It was your wife – she wanted to know how to use a rectal thermometer, and believe me, Mister, I TOLD HER!
Helpdesk: Good day. How may I help you?
Male customer: Hello… I can’t print.
Helpdesk: Would you click on start for me and ..
Customer: Listen pal; don’t start getting technical on me! I’m not Bill Gates!
Brenda, pregnant with her first child, was paying a visit to her obstetrician’s office. When the exam was over, she shyly began, “My husband wants me to ask you…”
“I know, I know.” the doctor said, placing a reassuring hand on her shoulder, “I get asked that all the time. Sex is fine until late In the pregnancy.”
“No, that’s not it at all,” Brenda confessed. “He wants to know if I can still mow the lawn.”
An airline captain was breaking in a very pretty new blonde stewardess.
The route they were flying had a stay-over in another city, so upon their arrival, the captain showed the stewardess the best place for airline personnel to eat, shop and stay overnight.
The next morning as the pilot was preparing the crew for the day’s route, he noticed the new stewardess was missing. He knew which room she was in at the hotel and called her up wondering what happened to her.
She answered the phone, sobbing, and said she couldn’t get out of her room.
“You can’t get out of your room?” the captain asked, “Why not?”
The stewardess replied, “There are only three doors in here, “she cried,” one is the bathroom, one is the closet, and one has a sign on it that says ‘Do Not Disturb’!”
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