Minor Dictionary
of Humorous Quotations

Paranoia | Parents | Parties | Patriotism and Patriots | Perfection | Pessimism and Pessimists | Pets | Philosophy and Philosophers | Policy | Politics | Problems | Profit | Programs and Programmers | Progress | Psychiatry and Psychiatrists | Psychology and Psychologists |

Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't after you.

Paranoids are people, too; they have their own problems. It's easy to criticize, but if everybody hated you, you'd be paranoid too. D.J. Hicks

If parents only realize how they bore their children! G.B. Shaw

Little girl, rebelliously practicing the piano, to her father: "Another way for me to be popular when I grow up is for you to be rich." E. Brown

The more I see of the average parent the more I respect an average boy. Sir John Laird McClure

After all, what is your host's purpose in having a party? Surely not for you to enjoy yourself; if that were their sole purpose, they'd have simply sent champagne and women over to your place by taxi. P.J. O'Rourke

If Jesus Christ were to come today, people would not even crucify him. They would ask him to dinner, and hear what he had to say, and make fun of it. T. Carlyle

If your party is successful, the police will knock on your door, unless your party is very successful, in which case they will lob tear gas through your living room window. As host, your job is to make sure that they don't arrest anybody, or if they're dead set on arresting someone, your job is to make sure it isn't you.

Those who warn of a population explosion picture a world with too many people and not enough food-like the average cocktail party. Bill Vaughan

A real patriot is the fellow who gets a parking ticket and rejoices that the system works.

I may not be totally perfect, but parts of me are excellent. Ashleigh Brilliant

Always borrow money from a pessimist: he doesn't expect to be paid back.

A pessimist? A man who thinks everybody as nasty as himself, and hates them for it. G.B. Shaw

A pessimist is someone whose environment takes on the shape of his worries.

He is a real pessimist-he could look at a doughnut and only see the hole in it.

Inscription on a tombstone of a notorious hypochondriac: "See!" Michael Jones

A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of. Ogden Nash

Owner of a new puppy: "My dog is fully house-trained-he does everything in the house."

Any two philosophers can tell each other all they know in two hours. Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

I have a simple philosophy:

• Fill what's empty.
• Empty what's full.
• Scratch where it itches.

A.R. Longworth

Truth is the object of philosophy, but not always of philosophers. John Churton Collins

Of course there is no reason for it, it's just our policy.

From the election manifesto of a white Parsee candidate in the Zanzibar election: "My skin may be white but my heart is as black as yours."

Politics are for those who have a great regard for themselves, little regard for others and no regard for the truth.

Politics is like coaching a football team. You have to be smart enough to understand the game but not smart enough to lose interest.

Hoare's law of large problems: Inside every large problem is a small one struggling to get out.

I don't have a solution but I certainly admire the problem. Ashleigh Brilliant

If you only have a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a nail. Maslow

Laugh at your problems; everybody else does.

No problem is so formidable that you can't just walk away from it.

No problem is so large it can't be fit in somewhere.

Schick's law: There is no problem a good miracle can't solve.

The number one problem in our country is apathy... But who cares!

There is always an easy solution to every human problem: neat, plausible, and wrong. H.L. Mencken

You come into the world with nothing-anything you get after that is sheer profit. Tommy Steele

A language that doesn't work the way the way you think about programming is not worth knowing.

All programmers are playwrights and all computers are lousy actors.

A recent study has found that concentrating on difficult off-screen objects, such as the faces of loved ones, causes eye strain in computer scientists. Researchers into the phenomenon cite the added concentration needed to "make sense" of such unnatural three-dimensional objects...

Arnold's laws of documentation:

1. If it should exist, it doesn't.
2. If it does exist, it's out of date.
3. Only documentation for useless programs transcends from the first too laws.

Basic: Programming language. Related to certain social diseases in that those who have it will not admit it in polite company.

Beware of programmers who carry screwdrivers. Leonard Brandwein

Brook's law: Adding manpower to a late software project makes it later.

If a listener nods his head when you're explaining your program, wake him up.

If the code and the comments disagree, then both are probably wrong. Norm Schryer

If you have a procedure with 10 parameters, you probably missed some.

If you perceive that there are four possible ways in which a procedure can go wrong, and circumvent these, then a fifth way will promptly develop.

I haven't lost my mind-it's backed up on tape somewhere.

In a five year period we can get one superb programming language. Only we can't control when the five year period will begin.

In the long run, every program becomes rococo, and then rubble. Alan Perlis

I really hate this damned machine,
I wish that they would sell it.
It never does quite what I want
But only what I tell it!

It is easier to write an incorrect program than understand a correct one.

Lubarsky's law of cybernetic entomology: There is always one more bug.

Pascal: A programming language named after a man who would turn over in his grave if he knew about it.

Pascal users! To show respect for the 313 anniversary (tomorrow) of the death of Blaise Pascal, your programs will be run at half speed.

Program complexity grows until it exceeds the capability of the programmer who must maintain it.

Steinbach's guideline for programmers: never test for an error condition you don't know how to handle.

The greatest programming project of all took six days; on the seventh day the programmer rested. We've been trying to debug the &§®#&& thing ever since. Moral: design before you implement.

The value of a program is proportional to the weight of its output.

Weinberg's law: If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker that came along would destroy civilization.

Albert Einstein, when asked to describe radio, replied: "You see, wire telegraph is a kind of a very, very long cat. You pull his tail in New York and his head is meowing in Los Angeles. Do you understand this? And radio operates exactly the same way: You send signals here, they receive them there. The only difference is that there is no cat."

All progress is based upon a universal innate desire on the part of every organism to live beyond its income. Samuel Butler

...all the modern inconveniences... Mark Twain

An alarm clock is mechanism that is used to scare the daylights onto you. Norris Cool

Ask not for whom the telephone bell tolls... if thou art in the bathtub, it tolls for thee.

Automation hasn't cut out red tape. It merely perforates it. James Herris

Before television, nobody even knew what the headache looked like. D. Fields

Definition of progress: Movement in a direction of which you approve.

How come wrong numbers are never busy?

If God had not given us sticky tape, it would have been necessary to invent it.

If you push the "Extra Ice" button on the soft drink vending machine, you won't get any ice. If you push the "No Ice" button, you'll get ice, but no cup.

Never worry about theory as long as the machinery does what it is supposed to do. R.A. Heinlein

Nothing is as ancient as progress. Japanese proverb

One humiliating thing about science is that it is gradually filling our homes and offices with appliances cleverer than we are.

Road maps tell motorist everything he wants to know except how to fold them up again. John Bishop

The new jet age can be defined as breakfast in London, lunch in New York, dinner in San Francisco and luggage in Bulawayo.Derek Marshall

There are two types of adhesive tape: that which won't stay on, and that which won't come off.

Very important phone calls only come when you can't get the key in the door.

We prefer the old-fashioned alarm clock to the kind that awakens you with soft music or gentle whisper. If there's one thing we can't stand in the morning it's hypocrisy. Bill Vaughan

Anyone who goes to a psychiatrist ought to have his head examined. Samuel Goldwyn

A psychiatrist is a person who will give you expensive answers that your wife will give you for free.

A psychiatrist receives a card from a patient who was on holiday. It read: "Having a wonderful time... Why?"

Be a better psychiatrist and the world will beat a psychopath to your door.

Don't worry if you're a kleptomaniac, you can always take something for it.

Psychiatrists are doctors who do not like the sight of blood.

If I kiss you, that is a psychological interaction. On the other hand, if I hit you over the head with a brick, that is also a psychological interaction. The difference is that one is friendly, and the other is not so friendly. The crucial point is if you can tell, which is which. Dolph Sharp

Psychologist: a man who, when a beautiful girl enters the room, watches everybody else. Bruce Pattersons