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Grex > Agora41 > #8: Tickle your funny bone even if you aren't a spring chicken | |
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| Author |
Message |
russ
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Tickle your funny bone even if you aren't a spring chicken
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Mar 22 06:00 UTC 2002 |
If you find it amusing, you should put it here.
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| 257 responses total. |
srw
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response 1 of 257:
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Mar 22 06:35 UTC 2002 |
Postsale Deity Questionnaire...
God would like to thank you for your belief and
patronage. In order to better serve your needs,
(S)He asks that you take a few moments to answer the
following questions:
1. How did you find out about your deity?
__ Newspaper
__ Bible
__ Torah
__ Koran
__ Television
__ Book of Mormon
__ Divine Inspiration
__ Dead Sea Scrolls
__ Near Death Experience
__ Near Life Experience
__ National Public Radio
__ Tabloid
__ Burning Shrubbery
__ Other (specify): _____________
2. Which model deity did you acquire?
__ Jehovah
__ Jesus
__ Krishna
__ Father, Son & Holy Ghost [Trinity Pak]
__ Zeus and entourage [Olympus Pak]
__ Odin and entourage [Valhalla Pak]
__ Allah
__ Satan
__ Gaia/Mother Earth/Mother Nature
__ None of the above, I was taken in by a false god
3. Did your God come to you undamaged, with all parts
in good working order and with no obvious breakage or
missing attributes?
__ Yes
__ No
If no, please describe the problems you initially
encountered here. Please indicate all that apply:
__ Not eternal
__ Finite in space/Does not occupy or inhabit the entire cosmos
__ Not omniscient
__ Not omnipotent
__ Not infinitely plastic (incapable of being all things to all
creations)
__ Permits sex outside of marriage
__ Prohibits sex outside of marriage
__ Makes mistakes
__ Makes or permits bad things to happen to good people
__ Makes or permits good things to happen to bad people
__ Looks after life other than that on Earth
__ When beseeched, doesn't stay beseeched
__ Requires burnt offerings
__ Requires virgin sacrifices
4. What factors were relevant in your decision to
acquire a deity? Please check all that apply.
__ Indoctrinated by parents
__ Needed a reason to live
__ Indoctrinated by society
__ Needed focus in whom to despise
__ Needed focus in whom to love
__ Imaginary friend grew up
__ Hate to think for myself
__ Wanted to meet girls/boys in church
__ Fear of death
__ Wanted to piss off parents
__ Wanted to please parents
__ Needed a day away from school or work
__ Desperate need for certainty
__ Like organ music
__ Need to feel morally superior
__ Thought Jerry Falwell was cool
__ Thought there had to be something other than Jerry Falwell
__ Shit was falling out of the sky
__ My shrubbery caught fire and told me to do it
5. Have you ever worshipped a deity before?
If so, which false god were you fooled by?
Please check all that apply.
__ Baal
__ The Almighty Dollar
__ Left Wing Liberalism
__ The Radical Right
__ Amon Ra
__ Beelzebub
__ Bill Gates
__ Barney The Big Purple Dinosaur
__ The Great Spirit
__ The Great Pumpkin
__ The Sun
__ The Moon
__ The Force
__ Cindy Crawford
__ Elvis
__ A burning shrub
__ Psychiatry
__ Other: ________________
6. Are you currently using any other source of inspiration
in addition to God? Please check all that apply.
__ Tarot
__ Lottery
__ Astrology
__ Television
__ Fortune cookies
__ Ann Landers
__ Psychic Friends Network
__ Dianetics
__ Palmistry
__ Playboy and/or Playgirl
__ Self-help books
__ Sex and Drugs and Rock & Roll
__ Alcohol
__ Marijuana
__ Tea Leaves
__ EST
__ Amway
__ Jimmy Swaggert
__ Crystals
__ Human sacrifice
__ Pyramids
__ Wandering around a desert
__ Insurance policies
__ Burning shrubbery
__ Other:_____________________
__ None
7. God employs a limited degree of Divine Intervention to preserve a
balanced level of felt presence and blind faith.
Which would you prefer?
Circle one below:
a. More Divine Intervention
b. Less Divine Intervention
c. Current level of Divine Intervention is just right
d. Don't know.
e. What's Divine Intervention?
8. God also attempts to maintain a balanced level of disasters &
miracles.
Please rate on a scale of 1 - 5 your opinion of the
handling of the following
1 = unsatisfactory, 5 = excellent):
a. Disasters:
1 2 3 4 5 Flood
1 2 3 4 5 Famine
1 2 3 4 5 Earthquake
1 2 3 4 5 War & holocausts
1 2 3 4 5 Pestilence
1 2 3 4 5 Plague
1 2 3 4 5 Spam
1 2 3 4 5 AOL
b. Miracles:
1 2 3 4 5 Rescues
1 2 3 4 5 Spontaneous remissions
1 2 3 4 5 Stars hovering over tiny towns & previously unknown hamlets
1 2 3 4 5 Crying statues
1 2 3 4 5 Water changing to wine
1 2 3 4 5 Walking on water
1 2 3 4 5 Coincidence of any sort
1 2 3 4 5 Getting any sex whatsoever
9. From time to time God makes available the names and
addresses of Her/His followers and devotees to
selected reputedly divine personages who provide
quality services and perform intercessions in His
behalf. Are you interested in a compilation of listed
offerings?
__ Yes, please deluge me with religious zealots for
the benefit of my own mortal soul
__ No, I do not wish to be inundated by religious
fanatics clamoring for my money
10. Do you have any additional comments or suggestions
for improving the quality of God's services? (Attach
additional sheets if necessary.)
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srw
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response 2 of 257:
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Mar 22 06:38 UTC 2002 |
That one came to me from MIT without attribution. It was clearly
inspired by the McDonnell Douglas Warrantee Registration
(http://mywebpages.comcast.net/srweiss/humor/warrantee.txt)
written years ago. It's still one of my favorites.
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tpryan
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response 3 of 257:
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Mar 22 10:03 UTC 2002 |
5 Cosmic Muffin
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jaklumen
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response 4 of 257:
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Mar 22 10:50 UTC 2002 |
resp:1 hehehe. nice.
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tsty
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response 5 of 257:
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Mar 23 05:28 UTC 2002 |
needs to be slightly updatd by adding microsoft to hte disasters,
right after aol.
and perhaps a couple of Allah references as well, somewhere?
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mcnally
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response 6 of 257:
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Mar 23 14:56 UTC 2002 |
I was trying to peg when #1 was written by some of the inclusions and
exclusions. Clearly it must be somewhat recent (last six or seven
years) to include AOL. But then how are we to explain the inclusion
of EST? I wonder if AOL was a recent addition to an older version..
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eskarina
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response 7 of 257:
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Mar 23 16:10 UTC 2002 |
What is EST?
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tsty
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response 8 of 257:
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Mar 23 16:39 UTC 2002 |
probablt before '92, no clinton references .. but what IS
puzzling is that there are no micro$oft nor b.g. references (except
in the one i just edited fer myslef ...
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vidar
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response 9 of 257:
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Mar 23 20:54 UTC 2002 |
Hmm . . . some of the choices in the damaged deity section of response
#1 are actually undamaged qualities in my personal package.
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orinoco
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response 10 of 257:
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Mar 23 22:31 UTC 2002 |
I think AOL is a recent addition to #1. Either that or it's been deleted from
some versions. I've got a copy without it.
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mcnally
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response 11 of 257:
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Mar 23 23:01 UTC 2002 |
re #7: I'm probably screwing up the spelling, but EST is/was
Erhard Sensitivity Training or something like that -- kind of
a cult-like self-improvement program that I believe was popular
during the late 70s / early 80s.
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morwen
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response 12 of 257:
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Mar 24 03:18 UTC 2002 |
resp:7 Probably a typo. My guess is they meant to say ES *P*
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mcnally
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response 13 of 257:
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Mar 24 04:24 UTC 2002 |
re #12: considering it comes right before "Amway", I think it at least
fairly likely that "EST" is what they actually meant.. The reference is
just a little dated these days.
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russ
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response 14 of 257:
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Mar 24 20:12 UTC 2002 |
(I see tsty is posting while sloshed... again. Maybe that's why
he forgets whose property he's got, and thinks it's his own.)
Re #12, #13: Definitely EST, not ESP. But EST changed its name
a while ago; it's now "The Forum" or something, and they don't lock
you in a room all day without letting you take bathroom breaks.
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orinoco
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response 15 of 257:
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Mar 25 01:51 UTC 2002 |
"Landmark Forum," perhaps? The Resident Heads in my freshman dorm in Chicago
were into that, and it definitely seemed EST-esque. Might just be a spin-off
of some sort, though.
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srw
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response 16 of 257:
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Mar 25 06:36 UTC 2002 |
I searched the web pretty thoroughly and found no postings of that item,
so I didn't think it was old. You might be reading too much into the
*lack* of a reference. Perhaps the author was deliberately trying to
avoid time-specific references. I agree it's likely that AOL was added
later, especially given orinoco's comments. So when is the earliest
anyone saw this from another source?
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brighn
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response 17 of 257:
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Mar 25 14:46 UTC 2002 |
"Landmark" definitely smacks of EST.
Is EST the bit that spawned the "I'm ok, you're ok" perspective?
(Or Bowie's version: "I'm ok, you're so-so.")
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morwen
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response 18 of 257:
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Mar 25 16:19 UTC 2002 |
Sorry. I never heard of 'em.
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remmers
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response 19 of 257:
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Mar 25 17:31 UTC 2002 |
I think "I'm OK, you're OK" comes out of P.E.T. (Parent Effectiveness
Training)
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eskarina
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response 20 of 257:
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Mar 25 17:45 UTC 2002 |
They actually taught us "I'm OK, you're OK" stuff in health class in high
school.
I think I've seen the P.E.T. book on my parent's shelf. As a kid I HATED it
when my parents read parenting books... like if the other team in a sport is
reading strategy books, was how I felt. I insisted that I be able to read
them, too. Trouble was, I found the books incredibly boring and never made
it much past the first chapter. Must have never made it to the good stuff.
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eeyore
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response 21 of 257:
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Mar 25 17:48 UTC 2002 |
My parents never read parenting books. They're general theory was that they
were raised just fine without them, why did they need to read them?
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lynne
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response 22 of 257:
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Mar 25 19:38 UTC 2002 |
The problem with advice books in general is that I can't bring myself to
believe that whoever wrote them has enough a. experience and b. common sense
to make them worth listening to.
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other
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response 23 of 257:
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Mar 25 19:57 UTC 2002 |
http://www.madblast.com/oska/humor_pong.swf
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tpryan
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response 24 of 257:
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Mar 25 22:43 UTC 2002 |
The parenting book was most effective when used to swat my
behind, as a method to change my behavior.
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