Most commented jokes

LOS ANGELES TIMES, October 8:
People of northwestern Montana have been advised to be on the lookout for drunken bears. Black bears and grizzlies have been congregating along the tracks of the Burlington Northern railroad tracks, where a train carrying hundreds of tons of corn derailed some time ago. The corn has fermented, and the aroma is attracting the bears.

- The bears are actually intoxicated up there - said wildlife biologist Loren Hicks. And a grizzly with a hangover can be cross as a bear.

Chicago Tribune

William P. Holcomb, whose job is to supervise the tracking down of Houston, Texas parking ticket violators. It was revealed that he had 375 unpaid tickets.

Many folks have written with perfectly plausible explanations about why merchants take my phone number on a credit card charge. What these fail to address, however, is that if I'm perpetrating a fraud in the use of this credit card, I'm not about to give out a correct phone number. They make no effort to validate the phone number before I leave, so what they're doing is collecting the phone numbers of a bunch of honest people.

Now then... Why are they collecting the phone numbers of a bunch of honest people?

I once asked why you are asked for your phone number when using your charge cards. The clerk explained that theives have been caught because they stupidly put down THEIR home phone number, not the phone number of the person who "owned" the card.

The following appeared on the back page of one of Australia's more outrageous computer publications, "Computing Australia", 21st Sept 1987:

... Blame it on the computer.

An unfriendly computer has been held responsible for a "potentially lethal error" involving a Mafia loan collector.

A New York paper inadvertently put the `heavy' in the running for a pair of custom-fitted concrete shoes when it identified him as a "ruthless informer".

According to a published retraction (and apology!), a writer on the paper had actually typed "ruthless enforcer" - but the computer system's spelling checker liked it the other way.

And I thought the worst you could expect from a "computer error" was a bill for a million dollars!

LOS ANGELES TIMES, September 14:
According to a database maintained by Academic Guidance Services, there are 3,000 scholarships earmarked for golf caddies, newspaper carriers, glee clubbers, and band members.

Juanita College in Pennsylvania gives grants to needy left-handers.

Parents whose children were born on June 12, 1979 can plan ahead to apply for a scholarship to the Rochester Institute of Technology in honor of the school's 150th anniversary.

Bucknell University gives grants to students who do not use alcohol, tobacco, or narcotics and don't engage in strenuous activities.

A judge in Seattle uses the fines he collects from prostitutes to finance scholarships for their reformed sisters who want to return to school.

On Saturday last, I had dinner at a local Chinese restaurant. My fortune read:

- You will gain admiration from your pears.

Comice? Bartlett? Canned? I don't grow or eat them, anyway.

Shortly after the 911 emergency number became available, an elderly and quite ill lady appeared in a Rochester hospital emergency room, having driven herself to the hospital and barely managing to stagger in from the parking lot. The horrified nurse said, 'Why didn't you call the 911 number and get an ambulance?' The lady said, 'My phone doesn't have an eleven.'

The "Environmental Engineering News" published some rather sobering information about punishment for drunk driving convictions in other countries.

- In Australia, the names of drunk drivers are printed in newspapers under the caption, "He's drunk and in jail."

- In Malaysia the driver is jailed and, if married, the spouse is jailed.

- In the United Kingdom, Finland and Sweden there's an automatic jail term of one year.

- In Turkey, drunk drivers are driven twenty miles out of town and forced to walk back ten miles.

- In Bulgaria, a second drunk-driving conviction results in capital punishment.

- In El Salvador, your first offense is your last -- execution by firing squad.

From the August Road & Track.

According to "The Australian," an airliner recently encountered severe vibration in flight.

The captain decided to make an emergency landing, and switched on the seat belt sign.

The vibration stopped immediately.

A passenger emerged from a lavatory and explained that he had been jogging in place inside.

This last weekend I was reminded at the pace we are converting to metric. I was on I-75 in Ohio when I saw a sign that said:

All signs metric
Next 20 miles