Tuesdays Are Taxing!

The Idiot — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 14:48:57 -0700

"It's tax time. I know this because I'm staring at documents that make no sense to me, no matter how many beers I drink."
-- Dave Barry

"The number of words dealing with income taxes in the Internal Revenue Code and IRS regulations rose nearly tenfold between 1955 and 2005, from 718,000 to more than 7 million How is a mugger different from the Internal Revenue Service? Both take your money, but the mugger doesn't make you fill out forms."
--Jacob Sullum in Reason

"More than ever before, Americans are suffering from back problems: back taxes, back rent, back auto payments."
-- Robert Orben

"To tax and to please, no more than to love and to be wise, is not given to men."
-- Edmund Burke, 18th Century Irish political philosopher and British statesman

"Taxation with representation ain't so hot either."
-- Gerald Barzan, humorist

"Earlier today, the White House released President Bush's tax return. Not surprisingly, under dependents, the president listed Iraq."
--Conan O'Brien

"The IRS now says you can deduct weight loss plans off your taxes. You can write it off because the government has officially declared obesity a disease. And it's a disease, you can deduct medical expenses. That shows what a difference an administration can make. See under Bush, obesity is a disease. Under Clinton it was just sexy."

"The term "tax humor" is no doubt an oxymoron to many people; to the more cynical, it is an apt description of the entire tax code."
-- John F. Lekel

"You must pay taxes. But there's no law that says you gotta leave a tip."
-- Advertisement

"It's income tax time again, Americans: time to gather up those receipts, get out those tax forms, sharpen up that pencil, and stab yourself in the aorta."
-- Dave Barry

"If a person is an economic being and figures out the odds, then there is a very high incentive to cheat. That is, of course, putting aside honor, duty and patriotism."
-- Jerome Kurtz, former Commissioner, Internal Revenue Service

"The wages of sin are death, but by the time taxes are taken out, it's just sort of a tired feeling."
-- Comedian

Called in for an audit, Mr. Briggs was confronted by a surly IRS agent. "It says here, Mr. Briggs, that you are a bachelor; yet you claim a dependent son. Surely this must be a mistake." Looking him straight in the eye, Mr. Briggs replied, "Yup, it surely was."

"A fool and his money are soon parted. It takes creative tax laws for the rest."
-- C Bob Thaves

"The question is: What can we, as citizens, do to reform our tax system? As you know, under our three-branch system of government, the tax laws are created by: Satan. But he works through the Congress, so that's where we must focus our efforts."
-- Dave Barry

"Worried about an IRS audit? Avoid what's called a red flag. That's something the IRS always looks for. For example, say you have some money left in your bank account after paying taxes. That's a red flag."
-- Jay Leno

"If you are truly serious about preparing your child for the future, don't teach him to subtract - teach him to deduct."
-- Fran Lebowitz

"Day in and day out, your tax accountant can make or lose you more money than any single person in your life, with the possible exception of your kids."
-- Harvey Mackay

" In general, the art of government consists in taking as much money as possible from one party of the citizens to give to the other."
-- Voltaire

"Our party has been accused of fooling the public by calling tax increases 'revenue enhancement'. Not so. No one was fooled."
-- J. Danforth Quayle V.P.

The more you earn, the less you keep,
And now I lay me down to sleep.
I pray the Lord my soul to take,
If the tax collector hasn't got it before I wake.
-- Ogden Nash

This guy walks into the tax auditor's office, the auditor looks at him and says, "Please Mr. Johnson, take a seat. We already own a piece of yours."

Installing Your Husband

The Idiot — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 10:41:48 -0700

Dear Tech Support,

Last year I upgraded from Boyfriend 5.0 to Husband 1.0 and noticed a distinct slow down in overall system performance, particularly in the flower and jewelry applications, which operated flawlessly under Boyfriend 5.0.In addition, Husband 1.0 uninstalled many other valuable programs, such as Romance 9.5 and Personal Attention 6.5 and then installed undesirable programs such as NBA 5.0, NFL 3.0 and Golf Clubs 4.1. Conversation 8.0 no longer runs, and Housecleaning 2.6 simply crashes the system. I've tried running Nagging 5.3 to fix these problems, but to no avail. What can I do?

Signed,
Desperate

***

DEAR DESPERATE,

First keep in mind, Boyfriend 5.0 is an Entertainment Package, while Husband 1.0 is an Operating System.

Please enter command: ithoughtyoulovedme.html and try to download Tears 6.2 and don't forget to install the Guilt 3.0 update. If that application works as designed, Husband 1.0 should then automatically run the applications Jewelry 2.0 and Flowers 3.5.But remember, overuse of the above application can cause Husband 1.0 to default to Grumpy Silence 2.5, Happy Hour 7.0 or Beer 6.1. Please note that Beer 6.1 is a very bad program that will download the Snoring Loudly Beta. Whatever you do, DO NOT install Mother-In-Law 1.0 (it runs a virus in the background that will eventually seize control of all your system resources.) Also do not attempt to reinstall Boyfriend 5.0 program. These are unsupported applications and will crash Husband 1.0. In summary, Husband 1.0 is a great program, but it does have limited memory and cannot learn new applications quickly. You might consider buying additional software to improve memory and performance. We recommend Cooking 3.0 and Hot Lingerie 7.7.

Good Luck,
Tech Support

Top Ten Drawbacks To Working in a Cubicle

The Idiot — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 13:19:17 -0700

10. Being told to 'Think outside the Box' when you're in a box all day long.

9. Not being able to check e-mail attachments without turning around to see who's behind you.

8. Fabric cubicle walls do not offer much protection from any kind of gunfire.

7. Always having that nagging feeling that if you press the right button, you'll get a piece of cheese!

6. Lack of roof rafters for the noose.

5. The walls are too close together for the hammock to work right.

4. There are 23 power cords but only ONE outlet.

3. Prison cells are not only bigger... they also have beds.

2. When tours come through, you get lots of peanuts thrown at you.

and the Number One Drawback to Working in a Cubicle. . . . .

1. You can't slam the door when you quit and walk out. (I have a piece of cardboard with a knob drawn on it. I slam that quite often. Not the same effect as wood, though.)

Murphy's Ten Laws of Computers

The Idiot — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 15:46:35 -0700

10. When computing, whatever happens, behave as though you meant it to happen.

9. When you get to the point where you really understand your computer, it's probably obsolete.

8. The first place to look for information is in the section of the manual where you least expect to find it.

7. When the going gets tough, upgrade.

6. For every action, there is an equal and opposite malfunction.

5. To err is human...to blame your computer for your mistakes is even more human, it is downright natural.

4. He who laughs last probably made a back-up.

3. If at first you do not succeed, blame your computer.

2. A complex system that does not work is invariably found to have evolved from a simpler system that worked perfectly.

and Murphy's Number One Law of Computing...

1. The number one cause of computer problems is computer solutions.

The Salary Theory

The Idiot — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 11:52:59 -0800

Dilbert's "Salary Theorem" states that "Engineers and scientists can never earn as much as business executives and sales people."

This theorem can now be supported by a mathematical equation based on the following two postulates:

As every engineer knows: Power = Work / Time

Since:

Knowledge = Power
Time = Money
Knowledge = Work/Money.

Solving for Money, we get:

Money = Work / Knowledge.

Thus, as Knowledge approaches zero, Money approaches infinity, regardless of the amount of work done.

Conclusion:

The less you know, the more you make.

Ode to a Computer

The Idiot — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 17:39:08 -0800

If a packet hits a pocket on a socket on a port,
And the bus is interrupted as a very last resort,
And the address of the memory makes your floppy disk abort,
Then the socket packet pocket has an error to report.

If your cursor finds a menu item followed by a dash,
And the double clicking icon puts your window in the trash,
And your data is corrupted 'cause the index doesn't hash,
Then your situation's hopeless and your system's gonna crash.

If the label on the cable on the table at your house,
Says the network is connected to the button on your mouse,
But your packets want to tunnel on another protocol,
That's repeatedly rejected by the printer down the hall,

And your screen is all distorted by the side effects of gauss,
So your icons in the window are as wavy as a souse,
Then you may as well reboot it, and let it go out with a bang,
'Cause as sure as I'm a poet, the sucker's gonna hang.

When the copy of your floppy's getting sloppy on the disk,
And the micro-code instructions cause unnecessary risk,
Then you have to flash your memory and you'll want to ram your ROM,
So quickly turn off your compu...

I Need A Raise

The Idiot — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 09:08:53 -0800

Presented before you are two letters between an employee and his boss.

The Employee:

Dear Bo$$, A$ all of u$ have red from the new$paper$, the $ingapore economy ha$ come out of the rece$$ion. In thi$ life, we all need $ome thing mo$t de$perately. I think you $hould be under$tanding of the need$ of u$ worker$ who have given $o much $upport including $weat and $ervice to your company. I am $ure you will gue$$ what I mean and re$pond $oon.

Your$ $incerely,

$teven $oh

Boss's reply:

Dear Steven,

I kNOw you have been working very hard. NOw a days, NOthing much has changed. You must have NOticed that our company is NOt doing NOticeably well as yet.

NOw the newspaper are saying the world's leading ecoNOmists are NOt sure if the United States may go into aNOther recession. After the NOvember presidential elections things may turn bad.

I have NOthing more to add NOw. You kNOw what I mean.

Yours truly,

NOrman NOn

Manager

Corporate Lessons

The Idiot — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 11:35:12 -0800

CORPORATE LESSON 1

A man is getting into the shower just as his wife is finishing up her shower when the doorbell rings. The wife quickly wraps herself in a towel and runs downstairs. When she opens the door, there stands Bob, the next door neighbor. Before she says a word, Bob says, 'I'll give you $800 dollars to drop that towel."

After thinking for a moment, the woman drops her towel and stands naked in front of Bob. After a few seconds, Bob hands her $800 dollars and leaves. The woman wraps back up in the towel and goes back upstairs. When she get to the bathroom, her husband asks, "Who was that?"

"It was Bob the next door neighbor" she replies.

"Great!" the husband says. "Did he say anything about the $800 he owes me?"

Moral of the story: If you share critical information pertaining to the credit and risk with your shareholders in time, you may be in a position to prevent avoidable exposure.

-----------------------
CORPORATE LESSON 2

A sales rep, an administration clerk, and the manager are walking to lunch when they find an antique oil lamp. They rub it and a Genie comes out. The Genie says, "I'll give each of you just one wish."

"Me first! Me first!" says the admin. clerk. "I want to be in the Bahamas, driving a speedboat, without a care in the world." Poof! She's gone.

"Me next! Me next!" says the sales rep. "I want to be in Hawaii, relaxing on the beach with my personal masseuse, an endless supply of Pina Coladas and the love of my life." Poof! He's gone.

"OK, you're up," the Genie says to the manager. The manager says, "I want those two back in the office after lunch."

Moral of the story: Always let your boss have the first say.

---------------------------
CORPORATE LESSON 3

A crow was sitting on a tree, doing nothing all day. A rabbit asked him, "Can I also sit like you and do nothing all day long?"

The crow answered, "Sure, why not?"

So, the rabbit sat on the ground below the crow, and rested. A fox jumped on the rabbit and ate it.

Moral of the story: To be sitting and doing nothing, you must be sitting very high up.

--------------------------------------
CORPORATE LESSON 4

A turkey was chatting with a bull. "I would love to be able to get to the top of that tree", sighed the turkey, "but I haven't got the energy."

"Well, why don't you nibble on my droppings?" replied the bull. "They're packed with nutrients."

The turkey pecked at a lump of dung and found that it gave him enough strength to reach the lowest branch of the tree. The next day, after eating some more dung, he reached the second branch. Finally after a fourth night, there he was proudly perched at the top of the tree. Soon he was spotted by a farmer, who shot the turkey out of the tree.

Moral of the story: B.S. might get you to the top, but it won't keep you there.

Wink, Wink, Nudge, Nudge

The Idiot — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 11:31:46 -0800

A man with a winking problem is applying for a position as a sales representative for a large firm. The interviewer looks over his papers and says, "This is phenomenal. You've graduated from the best schools; your recommendations are wonderful, and your experience is unparalleled.

"Normally, we'd hire you without a second thought. However, a sales representative has a highly visible position, and we're afraid that your constant winking will scare off potential customers. I'm sorry....we can't hire you."

"But wait," he said. "If I take two aspirin, I'll stop winking!"

"Really? Great! Show me!"

So the applicant reaches into his jacket pocket and begins pulling out all sorts of condoms: red condoms, blue condoms, ribbed condoms, flavored condoms; finally, at the bottom, he finds a packet of aspirin. He tears it open, swallows the pills, and stops winking.

"Well," said the interviewer, "that's all well and good, but this is a respectable company, and we will not have our employees womanizing all over, the country!"

"Womanizing? What do you mean? I'm a happily married man!"

"Well then, how do you explain all these condoms?"

"Oh, that," he sighed. "Have you ever walked into a pharmacy, winking, and asked for aspirin?"

16 Reasons Why Alcohol Should Be Served At Work

The Idiot — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 15:20:56 -0800

From The Office Party Planning Committee:

1. It's an incentive to show up.

2. It leads to more honest communications.

3. It reduces complaints about low pay

4. Employees tell management what they think, not what they want to hear.

5. It encourages car pooling.

6. Increase job satisfaction because if you have a bad job, you don't care.

7. It eliminates vacations because people would rather come to work.

8. It makes fellow employees look better.

9. It makes the cafeteria food taste better.

10. Bosses are more likely to hand out raises when they are wasted.

11. Salary negotiations are a lot more profitable.

12. Employees work later since there's no longer a need to relax at the bar.

13. It makes everyone more open with their ideas.

14. Eliminates the need for employees to get drunk on their lunch break.

15. Employees no longer need coffee to sober up.

16. Sitting "Bare ass" on the copy machine will no longer be seen as gross.

Universal Laws of the Office

The Idiot — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 15:01:38 -0800

Rome did not create a great empire by having meetings. They did it by killing all those who opposed them.

If you can stay calm while all around you there's chaos, then you probably haven't completely understood the seriousness of the situation.

Doing a job right the first time gets the job done. Doing the job wrong 14 times gives you job security.

Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines.

Artificial Intelligence is no match for Natural Stupidity.

A person who smiles in the face of adversity probably has a scapegoat.

Never put off until tomorrow what you can avoid altogether.

Teamwork means never having to take all the blame yourself.

Hang in there, retirement is only 30 years away!

Go the extra mile. It makes your boss look like an incompetent slacker.

A snooze button is a poor substitute for no alarm clock at all.

When the going gets tough, the tough take a coffee break.

Indecision is the key to flexibility.

Aim Low, Reach Your Goals, Avoid Disappointment.

"Hello, This Is Customer Service..."

The Idiot — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 14:46:22 -0800

Actual dialog of a former WordPerfect Customer Support employee with a caller:

"Ridge Hall computer assistant; may I help you?"
"Yes, well, I'm having trouble with WordPerfect."
"What sort of trouble?"
"Well, I was just typing along, and all of a sudden the words went away."
"Went away?"
"They disappeared."
"Hmm. So what does your screen look like now?"
"Nothing."
"Nothing?"
"It's blank; it won't accept anything when I type."
"Are you still in WordPerfect, or did you get out?"
"How do I tell?"
"Can you see the C: prompt on the screen?"
"What's a sea-prompt?"
"Never mind. Can you move the cursor around on the screen?"
"There isn't any cursor, I told you, it won't accept anything I type."
"Does your monitor have a power indicator?"
"What's a monitor?"

"It's the thing with the screen on it that looks like a TV. Does it have a little light that tells you when it's on?"

"I don't know."
"Well, then look on the back of the monitor and find where the power cord goes into it. Can you see that?"

"Yes, I think so."
"Great. Follow the cord to the plug, and tell me if it's plugged into the wall."

".......Yes, it is."
"When you were behind the monitor, did you notice that there were two cables plugged into the back of it, not just one?"
"No."
"Well, there are. I need you to look back there again and find the other cable."
".......Okay, here it is."
"Follow it for me, and tell me if it's plugged securely into the back of your computer."
"I can't reach."
"Uh huh. Well, can you see if it is?"
"No."
"Even if you maybe put your knee on something and lean way over?"
"Oh, it's not because I don't have the right angle - it's because it's dark."
"Dark?"
"Yes - the office light is off, and the only light I have is coming in from the window."
"Well, turn on the office light then."
"I can't."
"No? Why not?"
"Because there's a power outage."

"A power... A power outage? Ah, Okay, we've got it licked now. Do you still have the boxes and manuals and packing stuff your computer came in?"

"Well, yes, I keep them in the closet."

"Good. Go get them, and unplug your system and pack it up just like it was when you got it. Then take it back to the store you bought it from."

"Really? Is it that bad?"
"Yes, I'm afraid it is."
"Well, all right then, I suppose. What do I tell them?"
"Tell them you're too stupid to own a computer."

You vs. Your Boss

The Idiot — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 12:19:18 -0800

When you take a long time, you're slow.
When your boss takes a long time, he's thorough.

When you don't do it, you're lazy.
When your boss doesn't do it, he's too busy.

When you make a mistake, you're an idiot.
When your boss makes a mistake, he's only human.

When doing something without being told, you're overstepping your authority.
When your boss does the same thing, that's initiative.

When you take a stand, you're being bull-headed.
When your boss does it, he's being firm.

When you overlooked a rule of etiquette, you're being rude.
When your boss skips a few rules, he's being original.

When you please your boss, you're apple polishing.
When your boss pleases his boss, he's being co-operative.

When you're out of the office, you're wandering around.
When your boss is out of the office, he's on business.

When you're on a day off sick, you're always sick.
When your boss is a day off sick, he must be very ill.

When you apply for leave, you must be going for an interview.
When your boss applies for leave, it's because he's overworked.

Wink, Wink, Nudge, Nudge

The Idiot — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 12:13:37 -0800

"But wait," he said. "If I take two aspirin, I'll stop winking!"

"Really? Great! Show me!"

"Well," said the interviewer, "that's all well and good, but this is a respectable company, and we will not have our employees womanizing all over the country!"

"Womanizing? What do you mean? I'm a happily married man!"

"Well then, how do you explain all these condoms?"

"Oh, that," he sighed. "Have you ever walked into a pharmacy, winking, and asked for aspirin?"

A Cubicle Conundrum: The Downside of Working in a Cube

The Idiot — Mon, 13 Aug 2007 14:27:37 -0700

* Being told to "Think Outside the Box" when I'm in the darn box all day!

* Not being able to check E-mail attachments without first seeing who is behind me.

* Fabric cubicle walls do not offer much protection from any kind of gun fire.

* That nagging feeling that if I just press the right button, I will get a piece of cheese.

* Lack of roof rafters for the noose.

* My walls are too close together for my hammock to work right.

* 23 power cords, 1 outlet.

* Prison cells are not only bigger, they have beds.

* When tours come through, I get lots of peanuts thrown at me.

* Can't slam the door when you quit and walk out.

* If you talk to yourself it causes all the surrounding cubicle inhabitants to pop their heads over the wall and say "What? I didn't hear you."

* If your boss calls you and aske you to come into his office for a minute the walk there is like a funeral march... people hand you tissues as you pass and refuse to make eye contact.

* You always have the feeling that someone is watching you, but by the time you turn to look they're gone.