Religion

In Atlanta, U.S. District Judge Charles Moye overturned a death sentence for a murderer because the jury that convicted him 10 years ago had asked for a Bible during deliberations.

The Irish girl knelt in the confessional and said, "Bless me, Father, for I have sinned."

"What is it, child?"

The girl said, "Father, I have committed the sin of vanity. Twice a day I gaze at myself in the mirror and tell myself how beautiful I am."

The priest turned, took a good look at the girl, and said, "My dear, I have good news. That isn't a sin - it's only a mistake."

Sid and Al were sitting in a Chinese restaurant. "Sid," asked Al, "are there any Jews in China?"

"I don't know," Sid replied. "Why don't we ask the waiter?"

When the waiter came by, Al asked him, "Are there any Chinese Jews?"

"I don't know sir, let me ask," the waiter replied, and he went into the kitchen. He returned in a few minutes and said, "No, sir. No, Chinese Jews."

"Are you sure?" Al asked.

"I will check again, sir," the waiter replied and went back to the kitchen. While he was still gone, Sid said, "I cannot believe there are no Jews in China. Our people are scattered everywhere."

When the waiter returned he said, "Sir, no Chinese Jews."

"Are you really sure?" Al asked again.

"I cannot believe there are no Chinese Jews."

"Sir, I ask everyone," the waiter replied exasperated. "We have Orange Jews, Prune Jews, Tomato Jews and Grape Jews, but we have no Chinese Jews."

A Brit, a Frenchman and a Russian are viewing a painting of Adam and Eve frolicking in the Garden of Eden.

"Look at their reserve, their calm," muses the Brit. "They must be British."

"Nonsense," the Frenchman disagrees. "They're naked, and so beautiful. Clearly, they are French."

"No clothes, no shelter," the Russian points out, "they have only an apple to eat, and they're being told this is paradise. They are Russian."

Our Morning Prayer . . .

Our Hard Drive
Which art internal
Volume C by name;
Thy code be clean,
Thy fonts be seen
On screen as they are on paper.
Give us this day our documents,
And lead us not into fragmentation
But deliver us our data.
For thine is the SCSI,
And the EISA,
And the NuBus,
Forever and Ever, Amen.

1. Thou shalt run lint frequently and study its pronouncements with care, for verily its perception and judgement oft exceed thine.
2. Thou shalt not follow the NULL pointer, for chaos and madness await thee at its end.
3. Thou shalt cast all function arguments to the expected type if they are not of that type already, even when thou art convinced that this is unnecessary, lest they take cruel vengeance upon thee when thou least expect it.
4. If thy header files fail to declare the return types of thy library functions, thou shalt declare them thyself with the most meticulous care, lest grievous harm befall thy program.
5. Thou shalt check the array bounds of all strings (indeed, all arrays), for surely where thou typest ``foo'' someone someday shall type ``supercalifragilisticexpialidocious''.
6. If a function be advertised to return an error code in the event of difficulties, thou shalt check for that code, yea, even though the checks triple the size of thy code and produce aches in thy typing fingers, for if thou thinkest ``it cannot happen to me'', the gods shall surely punish thee for thy arrogance.
7. Thou shalt study thy libraries and strive not to re-invent them without cause, that thy code may be short and readable and thy days pleasant and productive.
8. Thou shalt make thy program's purpose and structure clear to thy fellow man by using the One True Brace Style, even if thou likest it not, for thy creativity is better used in solving problems than in creating beautiful new impediments to understanding.
9. Thy external identifiers shall be unique in the first six characters, though this harsh discipline be irksome and the years of its necessity stretch before thee seemingly without end, lest thou tear thy hair out and go mad on that fateful day when thou desirest to make thy program run on an old system.
10. Thou shalt foreswear, renounce, and abjure the vile heresy which claimeth that ``All the world's a VAX'', and have no commerce with the benighted heathens who cling to this barbarous belief, that the days of thy program may be long even though the days of thy current machine be short.

Satan greets him: "Welcome Mr. Gates, we've been waiting for you. This will be your home for all eternity. You've been selfish, greedy and a big liar all your life. Now, since you've got me in a good mood, I'll be generous and give you a choice of three places in which you'll be locked up forever.

Satan takes Bill to a huge lake of fire in which millions of poor souls are tormented and tortured. He then takes him to a massive coliseum where thousands of people are chased about and devoured by starving lions. Finally, he takes Bill to a tiny room in which there is a bottle of the finest wine sitting on a table. To Bill's delight, he sees a PC in the corner. Without hesitation, Bill says "I'll take this option."

"Fine," says Satan, allowing Bill to enter the room. Satan locks the room after Bill.

As he turns around, he bumps into Lucifer. "That was Bill Gates!" cried Lucifer. "Why did you give him the best place of all!"

"That's what everyone thinks" snickered Satan."

The bottle has a hole in it!"

"What about the PC?"

"It's got Windows 95!" laughed Satan."

And it's missing three keys,"

"Which three?"

"Control, Alt and Delete."

An elderly couple were killed in an accident and found themselves being given a tour of heaven by Saint Peter. "Here is your oceanside condo, over there are the tennis courts, swimming pool, and two golf courses. If you need any refreshments, just stop by any of the many bars located throughout the area."

"Heck, Gloria," the old man hissed when Saint Peter walked off, "we could have been here ten years ago if you hadn't heard about all that stupid oat bran, wheat germ, and low-fat diets!"

An elderly woman had just returned to her home from an evening worship service and was startled to find an intruder in her house.

Catching the man in the act of burglarizing her home, she yelled, "STOP! Acts 2:38!" ("Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ so that your sins may be forgiven.") As the burglar stopped dead in his tracks, the woman calmly called the police and explained what she had done. Shortly, several officers arrived and took the man into custody.

As he was placing the handcuffs on the burglar, one of the officers asked, "Why did you just stand there? All the lady did was mention a scripture verse."

"Scripture?" replied the burglar.

"She said she had an axe and two 38's!"

A man with a nagging secret couldn't keep it any longer. In the confessional he admitted that for years he had been stealing building supplies from the lumberyard where he worked.

"What did you take?" his priest asked.

"Enough to build my own house and enough for my son's house. And houses for our two daughters and our cottage at the lake."

"This is very serious," the priest said. "I shall have to think of a far-reaching penance. Have you ever done a retreat?"

"No, Father, I haven't," the man replied. "But if you can get the plans, I can get the lumber."