100 Most beautiful words in the English language*

1. Ailurophile A cat-lover.
2. Assemblage A gathering.
3. Becoming Attractive.
4. Beleaguer To exhaust with attacks.
5. Brood To think alone.
6. Bucolic In a lovely rural setting.
7. Bungalow A small, cozy cottage.
8. Chatoyant Like a cat’s eye.
9. Comely Attractive.
10. Conflate To blend together.
11. Cynosure A focal point of admiration.
12. Dalliance A brief love affair.
13. Demesne Dominion, territory.
14. Demure Shy and reserved.
15. Denouement The resolution of a mystery.
16. Desuetude Disuse.
17. Desultory Slow, sluggish.
18. Diaphanous Filmy.
19. Dissemble Deceive.
20. Dulcet Sweet, sugary.
21. Ebullience Bubbling enthusiasm.
22. Effervescent Bubbly.
23. Efflorescence Flowering, blooming.
24. Elision Dropping a sound or syllable in a word.
25. Elixir A good potion.
26. Eloquence Beauty and persuasion in speech.
27. Embrocation Rubbing on a lotion.
28. Emollient A softener.
29. Ephemeral Short-lived.
30. Epiphany A sudden revelation.
31. Erstwhile At one time, for a time.
32. Ethereal Gaseous, invisible but detectable.
33. Evanescent Vanishing quickly, lasting a very short time.
34. Evocative Suggestive.
35. Fetching Pretty.
36. Felicity Pleasantness.
37. Forbearance Withholding response to provocation.
38. Fugacious Fleeting.
39. Furtive Shifty, sneaky.
40. Gambol To skip or leap about joyfully.
41. Glamour Beauty.
42. Gossamer The finest piece of thread, a spider’s silk.
43. Halcyon Happy, sunny, care-free.
44. Harbinger Messenger with news of the future.
45. Imbrication Overlapping and forming a regular pattern.
46. Imbroglio An altercation or complicated situation.
47. Imbue To infuse, instill.
48. Incipient Beginning, in an early stage.
49. Ineffable Unutterable, inexpressible.
50. Ingénue A naïve young woman.
51. Inglenook A cozy nook by the hearth.
52. Insouciance Blithe nonchalance.
53. Inure To become jaded.
54. Labyrinthine Twisting and turning.
55. Lagniappe A special kind of gift.
56. Lagoon A small gulf or inlet.
57. Languor Listlessness, inactivity.
58. Lassitude Weariness, listlessness.
59. Leisure Free time.
60. Lilt To move musically or lively.
61. Lissome Slender and graceful.
62. Lithe Slender and flexible.
63. Love Deep affection.
64. Mellifluous Sweet sounding.
65. Moiety One of two equal parts.
66. Mondegreen A slip of the ear.
67. Murmurous Murmuring.
68. Nemesis An unconquerable archenemy.
69. Offing The sea between the horizon and the offshore.
70. Onomatopoeia A word that sounds like its meaning.
71. Opulent Lush, luxuriant.
72. Palimpsest A manuscript written over earlier ones.
73. Panacea A solution for all problems
74. Panoply A complete set.
75. Pastiche An art work combining materials from various sources.
76. Penumbra A half-shadow.
77. Petrichor The smell of earth after rain.
78. Plethora A large quantity.
79. Propinquity Proximity; Nearness
80. Pyrrhic Successful with heavy losses.
81. Quintessential Most essential.
82. Ratatouille A spicy French stew.
83. Ravel To knit or unknit.
84. Redolent Fragrant.
85. Riparian By the bank of a stream.
 86. Ripple A very small wave.
87. Scintilla A spark or very small thing.
88. Sempiternal Eternal.
89. Seraglio Rich, luxurious oriental palace or harem.
90. Serendipity Finding something nice while looking for something else.
91. Summery Light, delicate or warm and sunny.
92. Sumptuous Lush, luxurious.
93. Surreptitious Secretive, sneaky.
94. Susquehanna A river in Pennsylvania.
95. Susurrous Whispering, hissing.
96. Talisman A good luck charm.
97. Tintinnabulation Tinkling.
98. Umbrella Protection from sun or rain.
99. Untoward Unseemly, inappropriate.
100. Vestigial In trace amounts.
101. Wafture Waving.
102. Wherewithal The means.
103. Woebegone Sorrowful, downcast.

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 A little knowledge can go a long way

 A lot of professionals are crackpots
 A man can’t know what it is to be a mother
 A name means a lot just by itself
 A positive attitude means all the difference in the world
 A relaxed man is not necessarily a better man
 A sense of timing is the mark of genius
 A sincere effort is all you can ask
 A single event can have infinitely many interpretations
 A solid home base builds a sense of self
 A strong sense of duty imprisons you
 Absolute submission can be a form of freedom
 Abstraction is a type of decadence
 Abuse of power comes as no surprise
 Action causes more trouble than thought
 Alienation produces eccentrics or revolutionaries
 All things are delicately interconnected
 Ambition is just as dangerous as complacency
 Ambivalence can ruin your life
 An elite is inevitable
 Anger or hate can be a useful motivating force
 Animalism is perfectly healthy
 Any surplus is immoral
 Anything is a legitimate area of investigation
 Artificial desires are despoiling the earth
 At times inactivity is preferable to mindless functioning
 At times your unconsciousness is truer than your conscious mind
 Automation is deadly
 Awful punishment awaits really bad people
 Bad intentions can yield good results
 Being alone with yourself is increasingly unpopular
 Being happy is more important than anything else
 Being judgmental is a sign of life
 Being sure of yourself means you’re a fool
 Believing in rebirth is the same as admitting defeat
 Boredom makes you do crazy things
 Calm is more conductive to creativity than is anxiety
 Categorizing fear is calming
 Change is valuable when the oppressed become tyrants
 Chasing the new is dangerous to society
 Children are the most cruel of all
 Children are the hope of the future
 Class action is a nice idea with no substance
 Class structure is as artificial as plastic
 Confusing yourself is a way to stay honest
 Crime against property is relatively unimportant
 Decadence can be an end in itself
 Decency is a relative thing
 Dependence can be a meal ticket
 Description is more important than metaphor
 Deviants are sacrificed to increase group solidarity
 Disgust is the appropriate response to most situations
 Disorganization is a kind of anesthesia
 Don’t place to much trust in experts
 Drama often obscures the real issues
 Dreaming while awake is a frightening contradiction
 Dying and coming back gives you considerable perspective
 Dying should be as easy as falling off a log
 Eating too much is criminal
 Elaboration is a form of pollution
 Emotional responses are as valuable as intellectual responses
 Enjoy yourself because you can’t change anything anyway
 Ensure that your life stays in flux
 Even your family can betray you
 Every achievement requires a sacrifice
 Everyone’s work is equally important
 Everything that’s interesting is new
 Exceptional people deserve special concessions
 Expiring for love is beautiful but stupid
 Expressing anger is necessary
 Extreme behavior has its basis in pathological psychology
 Extreme self-consciousness leads to perversion
 Faithfulness is a social not a biological law
 Fake or real indifference is a powerful personal weapon
 Fathers often use too much force
 Fear is the greatest incapacitator
 Freedom is a luxury not a necessity
 Giving free rein to your emotions is an honest way to live
 Go all out in romance and let the chips fall where they may
 Going with the flow is soothing but risky
 Good deeds eventually are rewarded
 Government is a burden on the people
 Grass roots agitation is the only hope
 Guilt and self-laceration are indulgences
 Habitual contempt doesn’t reflect a finer sensibility
 Hiding your emotions is despicable
 Holding back protects your vital energies
 Humanism is obsolete
 Humor is a release
 Ideals are replaced by conventional goals at a certain age
 If you aren’t political your personal life should be exemplary
 If you can’t leave your mark give up
 If you have many desires your life will be interesting
 If you live simply there is nothing to worry about
 Ignoring enemies is the best way to fight
 Illness is a state of mind
 Imposing order is man’s vocation for chaos is hell
 In some instances it’s better to die than to continue
 Inheritance must be abolished
 It can be helpful to keep going no matter what
 It is heroic to try to stop time
 It is man’s fate to outsmart himself
 It is a gift to the world not to have babies
 It’s better to be a good person than a famous person
 It’s better to be lonely than to be with inferior people
 It’s better to be naive than jaded
 It’s better to study the living fact than to analyze history
 It’s crucial to have an active fantasy life
 It’s good to give extra money to charity
 It’s important to stay clean on all levels
 It’s just an accident that your parents are your parents
 It’s not good to hold too many absolutes
 It’s not good to operate on credit
 It’s vital to live in harmony with nature
 Just believing something can make it happen
 Keep something in reserve for emergencies
 Killing is unavoidable but nothing to be proud of
 Knowing yourself lets you understand others
 Knowledge should be advanced at all costs
 Labor is a life-destroying activity
 Lack of charisma can be fatal
 Leisure time is a gigantic smoke screen
 Listen when your body talks
 Looking back is the first sign of aging and decay
 Loving animals is a substitute activity
 Low expectations are good protection
 Manual labor can be refreshing and wholesome
 Men are not monogamous by nature
 Moderation kills the spirit
 Money creates taste
 Monomania is a prerequisite of success
 Morals are for little people
 Most people are not fit to rule themselves
 Mostly you should mind your own business
 Mothers shouldn’t make too many sacrifices
 Much was decided before you were born
 Murder has its sexual side
 Myth can make reality more intelligible
 Noise can be hostile
 Nothing upsets the balance of good and evil
 Occasionally principles are more valuable than people
 Offer very little information about yourself
 Often you should act like you are sexless
 Old friends are better left in the past
 Opacity is an irresistible challenge
 Pain can be a very positive thing
 People are boring unless they are extremists
 People are nuts if they think they are important
 People are responsible for what they do unless they are insane
 People who don’t work with their hands are parasites
 People who go crazy are too sensitive
 People won’t behave if they have nothing to lose
 Physical culture is second best
 Planning for the future is escapism
 Playing it safe can cause a lot of damage in the long run
 Politics is used for personal gain
 Potential counts for nothing until it’s realized
 Private property created crime
 Pursuing pleasure for the sake of pleasure will ruin you
 Push yourself to the limit as often as possible
 Raise boys and girls the same way
 Random mating is good for debunking sex myths
 Rechanneling destructive impulses is a sign of maturity
 Recluses always get weak
 Redistributing wealth is imperative
 Relativity is no boon to mankind
 Religion causes as many problems as it solves
 Remember you always have freedom of choice
 Repetition is the best way to learn
 Resolutions serve to ease our conscience
 Revolution begins with changes in the individual
 Romantic love was invented to manipulate women
 Routine is a link with the past
 Routine small excesses are worse than then the occasional debauch
 Sacrificing yourself for a bad cause is not a moral act
 Salvation can’t be bought and sold
 Self-awareness can be crippling
 Self-contempt can do more harm than good
 Selfishness is the most basic motivation
 Selflessness is the highest achievement
 Separatism is the way to a new beginning
 Sex differences are here to stay
 Sin is a means of social control
 Slipping into madness is good for the sake of comparison
 Sloppy thinking gets worse over time
 Solitude is enriching
 Sometimes science advances faster than it should
 Sometimes things seem to happen of their own accord
 Spending too much time on self-improvement is antisocial
 Starvation is nature’s way
 Stasis is a dream state
 Sterilization is a weapon of the rulers
 Strong emotional attachment stems from basic insecurity
 Stupid people shouldn’t breed
 Survival of the fittest applies to men and animals
 Symbols are more meaningful than things themselves
 Taking a strong stand publicizes the opposite position
 Talking is used to hide one’s inability to act
 Teasing people sexually can have ugly consequences
 Technology will make or break us
 The cruelest disappointment is when you let yourself down
 The desire to reproduce is a death wish
 The family is living on borrowed time
 The idea of revolution is an adolescent fantasy
 The idea of transcendence is used to obscure oppression
 The idiosyncratic has lost its authority
 The most profound things are inexpressible
 The mundane is to be cherished
 The new is nothing but a restatement of the old
 The only way to be pure is to stay by yourself
 The sum of your actions determines what you are
 The unattainable is invariable attractive
 The world operates according to discoverable laws
 There are too few immutable truths today
 There’s nothing except what you sense
 There’s nothing redeeming in toil
 Thinking too much can only cause problems
 Threatening someone sexually is a horrible act
 Timidity is laughable
 To disagree presupposes moral integrity
 To volunteer is reactionary
 Torture is barbaric
 Trading a life for a life is fair enough
 True freedom is frightful
 Unique things must be the most valuable
 Unquestioning love demonstrates largesse of spirit
 Using force to stop force is absurd
 Violence is permissible even desirable occasionally
 War is a purification rite
 We must make sacrifices to maintain our quality of life
 When something terrible happens people wake up
 Wishing things away is not effective
 With perseverance you can discover any truth
 Words tend to be inadequate
 Worrying can help you prepare
 You are a victim of the rules you live by
 You are guileless in your dreams
 You are responsible for constituting the meaning of things
 You are the past present and future
 You can live on through your descendants
 You can’t expect people to be something they’re not
 You can’t fool others if you’re fooling yourself
 You don’t know what’s what until you support yourself
 You have to hurt others to be extraordinary
 You must be intimate with a token few
  You must disagree with authority figures
 You must have one grand passion
 You must know where you stop and the world begins
 You can understand someone of your sex only
 You owe the world not the other way around
 You should study as much as possible
 Your actions are pointless if no one notices
 Your oldest fears are the worst ones

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Quotes from Albert Einstein

26/05/2011

1. Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It
takes a touch of genius — and a lot of courage — to move in the opposite
direction.”
2. “Imagination is more important than knowledge.”
3. “Gravitation is not responsible for people falling in love.”
4. “The hardest thing in the world to understand is the income tax.”
5. “Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.”
6. “The only real valuable thing is intuition.”
7. “A person starts to live when he can live outside himself.”
8. “Weakness of attitude becomes weakness of character.”
9. “I never think of the future. It comes soon enough.”
10. “The eternal mystery of the world is its comprehensibility.”
11. “Sometimes one pays most for the things one gets for nothing.”
12. “Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.”
13. “Great spirits have often encountered violent opposition from weak minds.”
14. “Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler.”
15. “Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen.”
16. “Science is a wonderful thing if one does not have to earn one’s living at it.”
17. “The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources.”
18. “The only thing that interferes with my learning is my education.”
19. “The whole of science is nothing more than a refinement of everyday thinking.”
20. “Technological progress is like an axe in the hands of a pathological criminal.”
21. “Peace cannot be kept by force. It can only be achieved by understanding.”
22. “The most incomprehensible thing about the world is that it is comprehensible.”
23. “We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we
created them.”
24. “Education is what remains after one has forgotten everything he learned in
school.”
25. “The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for
existing.”
26. “Do not worry about your difficulties in Mathematics. I can assure you mine are
still greater.”
27. “Equations are more important to me, because politics is for the present, but an
equation is something for eternity.”
28. “If A is a success in life, then A equals x plus y plus z. Work is x; y is play; and z is
keeping your mouth shut.”
29. “Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I’m not sure
about the the universe.”
30. “As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain, as far as
they are certain, they do not refer to reality.”
31. “Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is
shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods.”
32. “I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV
will be fought with sticks and stones.”
33. “In order to form an immaculate member of a flock of sheep one must, above all,
be a sheep.”
34. “The fear of death is the most unjustified of all fears, for there’s no risk of accident
for someone who’s dead.”
35. “Too many of us look upon Americans as dollar chasers. This is a cruel libel, even
if it is reiterated thoughtlessly by the Americans themselves.”
36. “Heroism on command, senseless violence, and all the loathsome nonsense that
goes by the name of patriotism — how passionately I hate them!”
37. “No, this trick won’t work…How on earth are you ever going to explain in terms
of chemistry and physics so important a biological phenomenon as first love?”
38. “My religion consists of a humble admiration of the illimitable superior spirit who
reveals himself in the slight details we are able to perceive with our frail and
feeble mind.”
39. “Yes, we have to divide up our time like that, between our politics and our
equations. But to me our equations are far more important, for politics are only a
matter of present concern. A mathematical equation stands forever.”
40. “The release of atom power has changed everything except our way of
thinking…the solution to this problem lies in the heart of mankind. If only I had
known, I should have become a watchmaker.”
41. “Great spirits have always found violent opposition from mediocrities. The latter
cannot understand it when a man does not thoughtlessly submit to hereditary
prejudices but honestly and courageously uses his intelligence.”
42. “The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of
all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no
longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are
closed.”
43. “Now he has departed from this strange world a little ahead of me. That means
nothing. People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between
past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.”
 44. “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.”
45. “One had to cram all this stuff into one’s mind for the examinations, whether one
liked it or not. This coercion had such a deterring effect on me that, after I had
passed the final examination, I found the consideration of any scientific problems
distasteful to me for an entire year.”
46. “…one of the strongest motives that lead men to art and science is escape from
everyday life with its painful crudity and hopeless dreariness, from the fetters of
one’s own ever-shifting desires. A finely tempered nature longs to escape from the
personal life into the world of objective perception and thought.”
47. “He who joyfully marches to music rank and file, has already earned my
contempt. He has been given a large brain by mistake, since for him the spinal
cord would surely suffice. This disgrace to civilization should be done away with
at once. Heroism at command, how violently I hate all this, how despicable and
ignoble war is; I would rather be torn to shreds than be a part of so base an
action. It is my conviction that killing under the cloak of war is nothing but an act
of murder.”
48. “A human being is a part of a whole, called by us ‘universe’, a part limited in time
and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something
separated from the rest… a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This
delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to
affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from
this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures
and the whole of nature in its beauty.”
49. “Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be
counted counts.”

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Ten Rules for Being Human

15/05/2011

1. You will receive a body. You may like it or hate it, but it’s yours to keep for the
entire period.
2. You will learn lessons. You are enrolled in a full-time informal school called, “life.”
3. There are no mistakes, only lessons. Growth is a process of trial, error, and
experimentation. The “failed” experiments are as much a part of the process as the
experiments that ultimately “work.”
 4. Lessons are repeated until they are learned. A lesson will be presented to you in
various forms until you have learned it. When you have learned it, you can go on
to the next lesson.
5. Learning lessons does not end. There’s no part of life that doesn’t contain its
lessons. If you’re alive, that means there are still lessons to be learned.
6. “There” is no better a place than “here.” When your “there” has become a
“here”, you will simply obtain another “there” that will again look better than
“here.”
7. Other people are merely mirrors of you. You cannot love or hate something
about another person unless it reflects to you something you love or hate about
yourself.
8. What you make of your life is up to you. You have all the tools and resources you
need. What you do with them is up to you. The choice is yours.
9. Your answers lie within you. The answers to life’s questions lie within you. All you
need to do is look, listen, and trust.
10. You will forget all this.

Author: Cherie Carter-Scott

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Questions with no answers

15/05/2011

 Who closes the door after the bus driver gets off the bus?
 Why are pizza boxes square when the pizza is round?
 What ever happened to an E grade? We have A,B,C,D,F but no E.
 Why is there a light in the fridge and not in the freezer?
 Don’t you find it worrying that doctors call treating you their “practice” ?
 Do they have the word “dictionary” in the dictionary?
 What do you call a female daddy long legs?
 If croutons are stale bread, why do they come in airtight packages?
 Why can’t women put on mascara with their mouth closed?
 If a transport truck carrying a load of cars gets into a car accident, does it increase the
number of the cars in the pile-up?
 In France do people just ask for toast and get French toast? or do they have to ask for
American toast?
 Why is it called a “drive through” if you have to stop?
 Why does mineral water that has “trickled through mountains for centuries” go out of
date next year?
 If Milli Vanilli fell in the woods, would someone else make a sound ?
 Why are SOFTballs hard?
 Do vampires get AIDS?
 Why do toasters always have a setting that burns the toast to a horrible crisp which no
decent human being would eat?
 Why are they called goose bumps? Do geese get people bumps?
 Why is it that lemon dishsoap is made with real lemons, but lemon juice is artificial
flavoring?
 If you stole a pen from a bank then would it still be considered a bank robbery?
 Is French kissing in France just called kissing?
 Why can magicians make things disappear into thin air, but not thick air?
 Can people without hands get a grip?
 Why is it that rain drops but snow falls?
 Why is the third hand on the watch called second hand?
 Why is the time of day with the slowest traffic called rush hour?
 Who was the first person to look at a cow and say, “I think I’ll squeeze these dangly
things here, and drink what ever comes out”?
 What do people in China call their good plates?
 Can you sentence a homeless man to house arrest?
 If feathers tickle people, do they tickle birds?
 Does a postman deliver his own mail?
 Do the minutes on the movie boxes include the previews, credits, and special features, or
just the movie itself?
 If the professor on Giligan’s Island can make a radio out of coconut, why can’t he fix a
hole in a boat?
 Why doesn’t a chicken egg taste like chicken?
 Why is it that cargo is transported by ship while a shipment is transported by car?
 Does peanut butter really have butter in it?
 Do mimes watch silent movies?
 Is the fear of flying groundless?
 Why do people say “You scared the living daylights out of me” when daylight is not
living?
 Why do people point to their wrist when asking for the time, but people don’t point to
their crotch when they ask where the bathroom is?
 Why does your OB-GYN leave the room when you get undressed if they are going to
look up “there” anyway?
 If somebody vanished without a trace, how do people know they are missing?
 Why are boxing rings square?
 Why is it called pineapple, when’s there neither pine nor apple in it?
 Why is it called eggplant, when there’s no egg in it?
 Why do people never say “it’s only a game” when they’re winning?
 What was the best thing before sliced bread?
 Why do birds have white poop?
 Can good looking Eskimo girls be called hot?
 Why is an elevator still called an elevator even when its going down?
 Why is an electrical outlet called an outlet when you plug things into it? Shouldn’t it be
called an inlet.
 If love is blind, how can we believe in love at first sight?
 If you accidentally ate your own tongue, what would it taste like?
 Do sore thumbs really stick out?
 Why is it when you’re almost dead you’re on deaths doorstep, but when you’re actually
dead your not in deaths house?
 Why do we scrub Down and wash Up?
 What’s the opposite of opposite?
 If Practice makes perfect, and nobody’s perfect, then why practice?
 Why are toe nail clippers bigger than finger nail clippers when your toe nails are smaller
than your finger nails?
 Is the opposite of “out of whack” “in whack” ?
 If you try to fail and succeed, what did you just do?
 Why does Goofy stand erect while Pluto remains on all fours? They’re both dogs!
 Why is the blackboard green?
 Why do they call it a black light when it’s really purple?
 Why do hotdogs come in packs of 8 when hotdog rolls come in packs of 10?
 What do you call male ballerinas?
 How come the sun makes your skin darker but your hair lighter?
 If you dig a tunnel straight through the earth, will you come out with your feet first?
 Why are pennies bigger than dimes?
 Did they have antiques in the olden days?
 Are zebras black with white stripes, or white with black stripes?
 If Pringles are “so good that once you pop, you can’t stop” why do they come with a
resealable lid?
 Is a sleeping bag a nap sack?
 What came first, the fruit or the color orange?
 Where does the white go when the snow melts?
 Can blind people see their dreams?
 What is the exception to the rule that every rule has an exception? Does that make this
rule right or wrong?
 Why do you click on start to exit Microsoft Windows?
 Have you ever wondered why Trix are only for kids?
 Why doesn’t Tarzan have a beard?
 If we all evolved from monkeys, how come there’s still monkeys around now?
 Why do most cars have speedometers that go up to at least 130 when you legally can’t go
that fast on any road?
 Why do they call it “getting your dog fixed” if afterwards it doesn’t work anymore?
 If Wile Coyote had enough money for all that Acme crap, why didn’t he just buy dinner?
 If masochists like to torture themselves, wouldn’t they do it best by not torturing
themselves? and if so, aren’t we all masochist?
 Why is it called lipstick when it always comes off?
 Why is black history month (February) the shortest month of the year?
 If when people freak out they are said to be “having a cow”, when cows freak out are
they said to be “having a person?”
 Aren’t you tired of people asking you rhetorical questions and you don’t know if they are
rhetorical questions or not?
 Why is a person that handles your money called a BROKER?
 Why do we leave expensive cars in the driveway, when we keep worthless junk in the
garage?
 Why do they have handicap parking spaces in front of they skating rings?
 What happens if someone loses a lost and found box?
 Why do they call it taking a dump? Shouldn’t it be leaving a dump?
 What if the hokey-pokey really is what it’s all about?
 Where in the nursery rhyme does it say humpty dumpty is an egg?
 If quizzes are quizzical then what are tests?
 Why do they sterilize needles for lethal injections?
 Why do banks leave the door wide open but the pens chained to the counter?
 What would happen if an Irresistible Force met an Immovable Object?
 What’s the difference between a wise man and a wise guy?
 If Americans throw rice at weddings, do the Chinese throw hamburgers?
 How can you chop down a tree and then chop it up?
 Why are both male and female ladybugs called ladybugs instead of ladybugs and
manbugs?
 How can you hear yourself think?
 If corn oil is made from corn, and vegetable oil is made from vegetables, then what is
baby oil made from?
 Is a man full of wonder a wonderful man?
 Is a hot car cool or is a cool car hot?
 How come thaw and unthaw mean the same thing?
 If The Flintstones were B.C. and before America, why did they have Flintstones
Thanksgiving and Flintstones Christmas?
 If a Man is talking in the forest and there is no woman there to hear him, is he still
wrong?
 Why is it that when a person tells you there’s over a million stars in the universe you
believe them, but if someone tells you there’s wet paint somewhere, you have to touch it
to make sure?
 If you fed a bee nothing but oranges, would it start making marmalade?
 Why is it you get a penny for your thoughts, but have to put in your two cents worth?
 If electricity comes from electrons, does morality come from morons?
 If the speed of movement is slower than the speed of light – how fast is a moving light?
 Why do you get on a bus and a train but get into a car?
 Why is it good to be a Daddy’s girl, but bad to be a Momma’s boy?
 How can something be new and improved? if it’s new, what was it improving on?
 Is Disney world the only people trap operated by a mouse?
 Why did they name that underwear company fruit of the loom?
 Why do grocery stores buy so many checkout line registers if they only keep 3 or 4 open?
 Why is the alphabet song and twinkle twinkle little star the same tune?
 Do illiterate people get the full effect of alphabet soup?
 How does Santa get into a house that doesn’t have a chimney?
 If you get cheated by the better business bureau, who do you complain to?
 If you’re in hell, and are mad at someone, where do you tell them to go?
 What would Geronimo say if he jumped out of an airplane?
 What would Cheese say if they got their picture taken?
 Why are turds pinched off at the end?
 I know you can be overwhelmed, and I know you can be underwhelmed, but can you just
be whelmed?
 If Barbie is so popular, then why do you have to buy her friends?
 Why does Donald Duck wear a towel when he comes out of the shower, when he doesn’t
usually wear any pants?
 If you take an oriental person and spin him around a few times, does he become
disoriented?
 How come overtones and undertones are the same thing?
 What would you use to dilute water?
 What should one call a male ladybird?
 How can military troops be deployed if they have never been ployed to begin with?
 If you lived in Siberia and you wronged the Russians government, where would they
send you?
 Why do they call it an asteroid when its outside the hemisphere but call it a hemorrhoid
when its in your ass?
 If a cow laughed real hard, would milk come out her nose?
 Before they invented drawing boards, what did they go back to?
 Aren’t all generalizations false?
 Can atheists get insurance for acts of God?
 Do you need a silencer if you are going to shoot a mime?
 Can I get arrested for running into a Fire House yelling Movie! Movie!?
 Can you be a closet claustrophobic?
 Could someone ever get addicted to counseling?
 If so, how could you treat them?
 Did Adam and Eve have navels?
 Did the early settlers ever go on a camping trip?
 Did you ever notice when you blow in a dog’s face he gets mad at you? But when you
take him in a car, he sticks his head out the window!
 Do fish get cramps after eating?
 Do infants enjoy infancy as much as adults enjoy adultery?
 Do Lipton employees take coffee breaks?
 Do one legged ducks swim in circles?
 Do Roman paramedics refer to IV’s as 4′s?
 Does the little mermaid wear an algebra?
 Does the Postmaster General need a stamp of approval?
 Have you ever imagined a world with no hypothetical situations?
 How can overlook and oversee be opposites, while quite a lot and quite a few are alike?
 How can someone “draw a blank”?
 How can the weather be hot as hell one day and cold as hell another?
 How can there be “self help GROUPS”?
 How come Superman could stop bullets with his chest, but always ducked when someone
threw a gun at him?
 How come you press harder on a remote control when you know the battery is dead?
 How do they get a deer to cross at that yellow road sign?
 How do you know when yogurt goes bad?
 How do you know when you’re out of invisible ink?
 How does a shelf salesman keep his store from looking empty?
 How does the guy who drives the snowplow get to work in the mornings?
 How fast do you have to go to keep up with the sun so you’re never in darkness?
 How is it possible to have a civil war?
 If a parsley farmer is sued, can they garnish his wages?
 If a stealth bomber crashes in a forest, will it make a sound?
 If a synchronized swimmer drowns, does her partner also have to drown?
 If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to see it, do the other trees make fun of it?
 If a tree fell on a mime in the forest, would he make a sound and would anyone care?
 If a turtle doesn’t have a shell, is he homeless or naked?
 If a woman can be a meter maid, can a man be a meter butler?
 If all the world is a stage, where is the audience sitting?
 If an orange is orange, why isn’t a lime called a green or a lemon called a yellow?
 If God dropped acid, would he see people?
 How many people thought of the Post-It note before it was invented but just didn’t have
anything to jot it down on?
 How much deeper would the ocean be if sponges didn’t grow in it?
 If 7-11 is open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, why are there locks on the doors?
 If 75% of all accidents happen within 5 miles of home, why not move 10 miles away?
 If a book about failures doesn’t sell, is it a success?
 If a bus station is where a bus stops, and a train station is where a train stops, why do I
have a work station on my desk?
 If a case of the clap spreads, is it then considered a case of the applause?
 If a cat always lands on its feet, and buttered bread always lands butter side down, what
would happen if you tied buttered bread on top of a cat?
 If a chronic liar tells you he is a chronic liar do you believe him?
 If a dog sweats through his tongue, why does he have armpits?
 If a jogger runs a the speed of sound can he still hear his walkman?
 If a mute child swears, does his mother make him wash his hands with soap?
 If all those psychics know the winning lottery numbers, why are they all still working?
 If Fed Ex and UPS were to merge, would they call it Fed UP?
 If God sneezes…what should you say?
 If inert is to be stationary, what is ert?
 If it’s zero degrees outside today and it’s supposed to be twice as cold tomorrow, how
cold is it going to be?
 If Jimmy cracks corn and no one cares, why does he keep doing it?
 If knees were backwards, what would chairs look like?
 If love is blind, why is lingerie so popular?
 If nothing ever sticks to TEFLON, how do they make TEFLON stick to the pan?
 If one synchronized swimmer drowns, do the rest have to drown too?
 If people from Poland are called Poles, why aren’t people from Holland called Holes?
 If pro is the opposite of con, is progress the opposite of congress?
 If quitters never win, and winners never quit, who came up with, “Quit while you’re
ahead”?
 If soap is used to make you clean, why does it leave a scum?
 If someone has a mid-life crisis while playing hide and seek, does he automatically lose
because he can’t find himself?
 If someone invented instant water, what would they mix it with?
 If someone with multiple personalities threatens to kill herself, is it considered a hostage
situation?
 If superglue is so good, why doesn’t it stick to the side of the tube?
 If the #2 pencil is the most popular, why’s it still #2?
 If the cops arrest a mime, do they have to tell him he has the right to remain silent?
 If the Energizer Bunny attacks someone, is it charged with battery?
 If the folks at the psychic hotlines were really psychic, wouldn’t they call you first?
 If the funeral procession is at night, do folks drive with their lights off?
 If the plural of tooth is teeth, why isn’t the plural of booth beeth?
 If vegetarians eat vegetables, what do humanitarians eat?
 If white wine goes with fish, do white grapes go with sushi?
 If women ran the Pentagon, would missiles and submarines be shaped differently?
 If women wear a pair of pants, a pair of glasses, and a pair of earrings, why don’t they
wear a pair of bras?
 If you ate pasta and anti-pasta, would you still be hungry?
 If you bear a child, why do you have a cow?
 If you can read the marking, isn’t that end already up?
 If you can’t drink and drive, why do you need a driver’s license to buy liquor, and why
do bars have parking lots?
 If you dive into a pool of dry ice, can you swim without getting wet?
 If you got into a taxi and he started driving backwards, would the driver end up owing
you money?
 If you have a bunch of odds and ends and get rid of all but one of them, what do you call
it?
 If you have a friend who works for the Psychic Friends Network, should you plan a
surprise birthday party for them?
 If you have an open mind why don’t your brains fall out?
 If you have your finger touching the rearview mirror that says — “objects in mirror are
closer than they appear”, how can that be possible?
 If you keep trying to prove Murphy’s Law, will something keep going wrong?
 If you play a blank tape at full volume and have a mime for a neighbor, will he complain?
 If you put freeze-dried coffee in the microwave, will you go back in time?
 If you spend your day doing nothing, how do you know when you’re done?
 If you steal a clean slate, does it go on your record?
 If you take a shower, where do you put it?
 If you throw a cat out a car window does it become kitty litter?
 If you try to fail, and succeed, which have you done?
 If you’re cross-eyed and have dyslexia can you read correctly?
 If you’re traveling at the speed of light and you turn your headlights on, what happens?
 Instead of talking to your plants, if you yell at them would they still grow, only to be
troubled and insecure?
 Is a castrated pig disgruntled?
 Is it possible to be totally partial?
 Is it progress if a cannibal learns to eat with a fork?
 Is it true that cannibals don’t eat clowns because they taste funny?
 Is there a Dr. Salt?
 Isn’t hot water already hot?
 Can you grow birds by planting birdseed?
 Just before someone gets nervous, do they experience cocoons in their stomach?
 Should crematoriums give discounts for burn victims?
 Should vegetarians eat animal crackers?
 Shouldn’t it be called a “near hit”?
 Shouldn’t it be some things in moderation?
 Shouldn’t there be a shorter word for “monosyllabic”?
 There are 24 hours in a day, and 24 beers in a case. Coincidence?
 What came first the chicken or the egg?
 What color is a chameleon on a mirror?
 What colour would a smurf turn if you choked it?
 What did we do before the Law of Gravity was passed?
 What do little birdies see when they get knocked unconscious?
 What do sheep count when they can’t sleep?
 What do you do when you see an endangered animal that eats only endangered plants?
 What does it mean if you break a mirror with a rabbits foot?
 What hair color do they put on the driver’s license of a bald man?
 What happened to the first 6 ups?
 What happens if you get scared half to death twice?
 What happens when you call a 1-800 number collect?
 What is a free gift? Aren’t all gifts free?
 What is another word for “thesaurus”?
 What is the speed of dark?
 What part of the monkey do you use a monkey wrench on?
 What should you do when you see an endangered animal that is eating an endangered
plant?
 What’s another word for synonym?
 When blind people go to the bathroom, how do they know when they are done wiping
their butt?
 When people lose weight, where does it go?
 When sign makers go on strike, is anything written on their signs?
 When vultures are on their deathbed, are they ever tempted to eat themselves?
 When you open a bag of cotton balls, is the top one meant to be thrown away?
 When your pet bird sees you reading the newspaper, does he wonder why you’re just
sitting there, staring at carpeting?
 When you’re sending someone Styrofoam, what do you pack it in?
 Where are Preparations A through G?
 Where do forest rangers go to “get away from it all”?
 Who invented accents?
 Who tows the tow trucks when they break down?
 Whose cruel idea was it for the word “lisp” to have an “s” in it?
 Why are builders afraid to have a 13th floor but book publishers aren’t afraid to have a
Chapter 11?
 Why are cigarettes sold in gas stations when smoking is prohibited there?
 Why are the cabs from the Yellow Cab Company painted orange?
 Why are there never any artist’s materials in a drawing room?
 Why are there flotation devices under plane seats instead of parachutes?
 Why are there interstate highways in Hawaii?
 Why are they called ‘stands’ when they’re made for sitting?
 Why are we afraid of falling? Shouldn’t we be afraid of the sudden stop?
 Why aren’t there bullet-proof pants?
 Why did kamikaze pilots wear helmets?
 Why didn’t Luke Skywalker tell Darth Vader to turn to the light side of the Force?
 Why do airlines call flights nonstop? Won’t they all stop eventually?
 Why do bars advertise live bands?
 What does a dead band sound like?
 Why do fat chance and slim chance mean the same thing?
 If your feet smell and your nose runs, are you built upside down?
 Why do guys wear underpants?
 Why do people who only eat natural foods drink decaffeinated coffee?
 Why do they call it disposable douche? Is there a kind of douche you keep after using?
 Why do they call them “apartments” when they are all stuck together?
 Why do they put Braille dots on the keypad of the drive-up ATM?
 Why do they report power outages on TV?
 Why do they sell a pound cake that only weighs 12 ounces?
 Why do ‘tug’boats push their barges?
 Why do we drive on parkways and park on driveways?
 Why do we have hot water heaters?
 Why do we play in recitals and recite in plays?
 Why do we put suits in a garment bag and garments in a suitcase?
 Why do we sing ‘Take me out to the ball game’, when we are already there?
 Why do we wash bath towels? Aren’t we clean when we use them?
 Why do you weep and sniffle over a TV program and the imaginary Why does “cleave”
mean both split apart and stick together?
 Why does “slow down” and “slow up” mean the same thing?
 Why does an alarm clock “go off” when it begins ringing?
 Why does flammable and inflammable mean the same thing?
 Why doesn’t “onomatopoeia” sound like what it is?
 Why don’t sheep shrink in the rain?
 Why don’t you ever hear about gruntled employees?
 Why don’t you ever see baby pigions?
 Why is a person who plays the piano called a pianist, but a person who drives a race car
not called a racist?
 Why is a women’s prison called a penal colony?
 Why is it called a “building” when it is already built?
 Why is it called a bust, when it stops right before the part it is named after?
 Why is it called a TV “set” when you only get one?
  Why is it called ‘after dark’, when it is really after light?
 Why is it so hard to remember how to spell MNEMONIC?
 Why is it that when you transport something by car, it’s called a shipment, but when you
transport something by ship, it’s called cargo?
 Why is it that when you’re driving and looking for an address, you turn down the volume
on the radio?
 Why is it when a door is open it’s ajar, but when a jar is open it’s not adoor?
 Why is it when two planes almost hit each other it is called a “near miss”?
 Why is it, whether you sit up or sit down, the result is the same?
 Why is lemon juice mostly artificial ingredients but dishwashing liquid contains real
lemons?
 Why is Mickey Mouse bigger than his dog Pluto?
 Why is the alphabet in that order? Is it because of that song?
 Why is the word “abbreviate” so long?
 Don’t you have to get up to get to the tape?
 Why is there an expiration date on SOUR cream?
 Why is there only ONE Monopolies Commission?
 Why isn’t “palindrome” spelled the same way backwards?
 Why isn’t phonetic spelled the way it sounds?
 Why isn’t there mouse-flavored cat food?
 Would a fly without wings be called a walk?
 You know how most packages say “Open here”. What is the protocol if the package says,
“Open somewhere else”?
 Can fat people go skinny-dipping?
 After eating, do amphibians have to wait an hour before getting out of the water?
 You know that little indestructible black box that is used on planes, why can’t they make
the whole plane out of the same substance?
 Are there seeing eye humans for blind dogs?
 Have ex-bankers become disinterested?
 Have ex-civil lawyers been distorted?
 Have ex-locomotive engineers been derailed?
 Have ex-mathematicians become dysfunctional?
 Have ex-punsters been expunged?

Source: Penders
I was trying to describe you to someone a few days ago. You don’t look like any woman I’ve
ever seen before.

I couldn’t say “Well she looks just like blah blah, except that she’s got curly hair, and her mouth
is different and of course, she’s not a movie star…”

I couldn’t say that because you don’t look like blah blah at all.

I finally ended up describing you as a movie I saw when I was a child. I guess I saw it in 1973 or
74, somewhere in there. I think I was seven, or eight, or six.

It was a movie about rural electrification, a perfect 1930′s New Deal morality kind of movie to
show kids. The movie was about farmers living in the country without electricity. They had to
use lanterns to see by at night, for sewing and reading, and they didn’t have any appliances like
toasters or washing machines, and they couldn’t listen to the radio. They built a dam with big
electric generators and they put poles across the countryside and strung wire over fields and
pastures.

There was an incredible heroic dimension that came from the simple putting up of poles for the
wires to travel along. They looked ancient and modern at the same time.

Then the movie showed electricity like a young Greek god, coming to the farmer to take away
forever the dark ways of his life. Suddenly, religiously, with the throwing of a switch, the farmer
had electric lights to see by when he milked his cows in the early black winter mornings. The
farmer’s family got to listen to the radio and have a toaster and lots of bright lights to sew
dresses and read the newspaper by.

It was really a fantastic movie and excited me like listening to the Binaca geetmala, or seeing
photographs of Prime Minister Indira gandhi, or hearing her on the radio “… the Prime Minister
of India… ”

I wanted electricity to go everywhere in the world. I wanted all the farmers in the country to be
able to listen to P.M on the radio….

And that’s how you look to me.