February 27, 2001 - All the Rest

ALL THE REST – February 27

Today's Quotations — ADVICE

Never take the advice of someone who has not had your kind of trouble.

— Sidney J. Harris

Quit now, you'll never make it. If you disregard this advice, you'll be halfway there.

— David Zucker

People who ask our advice almost never take it. Yet we should never refuse to give it, upon request, for it often helps us to see our own way more clearly.

— Brendan Francis

The best advisers, helpers and friends, always are not those who tell us how to act in special cases, but who give us, out of themselves, the ardent spirit and desire to act right, and leave us then, even through many blunders, to find out what our own form of right action is.

— Phillips Brooks

I believe God is managing affairs and that He doesn't need any advice from me. With God in charge, I believe everything will work out for the best in the end. So what is there to worry about.

— Henry Ford

Today's Word – EVANESCENT

ev·a·nes·cent adjective Vanishing or likely to vanish like vapor. Synonyms transient. --ev"a·nes"cent·ly adv.

The joy and moral stimulation of work no longer
must be forgotten in the mad chase of evanescent profits.

Franklin D.Roosevelt's First Inaugural Address

Definitions from American Heritage Dictionary

Today's Fact

Over the next several days the facts here on the DM will be about Serendipitous Discoveries.
This is the first fact on this subject.

Serendipity
Discoveries

Photography

Serendipity, or chance discovery. This has been the means of a number of scientific discoveries both great and small.

SERENDIPITY 11
The first successful photographic process was invented by L. J. M. Daguerre in 1835. Daguerre made his first photograph using a "camera obscura." This camera was first described by Leonardo da Vinci in 1519. Daguerre's camera was essentially a box with a lens in one end and a ground glass plate where the image was focused. This type of camera was used by many to trace objects and scenes onto thin paper placed over the glass plate. Daguerre was looking for a way to "fix" the image and make it more permanent.

In 1822 J. N. Niepce developed the world's first photograph. He used a material called asphaltum or "bitumen of Judea," to produce a more or less permanent image from the "camera obscura." The asphaltum became unstable in certain substances after exposure to light. The process was not pratical and not very satisfactory. Daguerre heard of Niepce's work with the camera osscura. Daguerre had been working with silver salts which were sensitive to decomposition by light. He contacted Niepce and they formed a partnership. Niepce died in 1833 and Daguerre continued the work on his own.

Daguerre made plates of highly polished silver-plated copper. He exposed them to iodine vapor, which created a thin layer of silver iodide on the surface of the plate. Using the camera obscura he exposed the plates to produce a faint image. The problem was the image was much too faint. Daguerre needed to find a way to intensify the image. He tried for some time with many different methods to intensify the image. No attempts were successful. One day he place an exposed plate with a faint image in a cupboard. The cupboard contained various chemicals. He planned to clean the plate and use it again. Several days later, he removed the plate and discovered the image had intensified. It was, to his amazement, a much stronger image than when he place it in the cupboard.

Now Daguerre had to discover what had been responsible for the image becoming more intense. He decided that one of the chemicals in the cupboard was responsible. Each day he placed another exposed silver iodide plate in the cupboard and removed one of the chemicals. This process continued until all of the chemicals had been removed. To his surprise, after all of the chemicals had been removed the image on the plate still intensified. What was the cause of the image intensification? He examined the cupboard and discovered that there was a few drops of mercury on a shelf from a broken thermometer. He concluded that mercury vapor was the agent responsible for the intensification of the image. He then proved this hypothesis by experimentation. The Daguerreotype, and photography was born.

After his discovery, picture takers would develop the image on the plates by placing the exposed plates over a cup of mercury heated to 75 degrees Celsius. Unfortunately, at that time the toxicity of mercury vapors was not known at the time. Many Daguerreotype workers suffered severe illness and early death from the poisonous mercury.

Sources: Serendipity | Encyclopaedia Britannica | The New Shell Book of Firsts

Today's SMILE

"What sunshine is to flowers, smiles are to humanity. These are but trifles, to be sure; but, scattered along life's pathway, the good they do is inconceivable."

Joseph Addison

A cheerful heart is good medicine,
but a crushed spirit dries up the bones.
Proverbs 17:22 (NIV)





Lunching with Doctors

Two doctors were having lunch at the park when they saw man approaching their way. His hands were clenched in tight fists, his knees pressed together towards the middle, " Said the first doctor, "Must be arthritis." Replied the second, "More like cerebral palsy." By the then the man was in front of them. He asked, through clenched teeth, "Excuse me, do you know where the nearest rest room is?"

Exercise Program

The doctor recommended a running schedule of ten miles a day for a patient.

After a week, the patient called, "Doc, I'm seventy miles away now. What should I do now?'

Speaker's Encyclopedia of Jokes, Puns, Riddles, Quotations & Alternate Dictionary

It Takes A Thief

Recently a guy in Paris nearly got away with stealing several paintings from the Louvre. However, after planning the crime, getting in and out past security, he was captured only 2 block away when his Econoline ran out of gas. When asked how he could mastermind such a crime and then make such a obvious error, he replied:

(brace yourself)

(this is going to hurt)

(I warned you)

"I had no Monet to buy Degas to make Van Gogh."

basetrip@cannet.com     | L. Sayre

The Friendly Skies ...

During the "rush hour" at Houston's Hobby Airport, my flight was delayed due to a mechanical problem. Since they needed the gate for another flight, the aircraft was backed away from the gate while the maintenance crew worked on it.

We were then told the new gate number, which was some distance away. Everyone moved to the new gate, only to find that a third gate had been designated for us. After some further shuffling, everyone got on board, and as we were settling in, the flight attendant made the standard announcement:

"We apologize for the inconvenience of this last-minute gate change. This flight is going to Washington, D.C. If your destination is not Washington, D.C., then you should 'deplane' at this time."

A very confused-looking and red-faced pilot emerged from the cockpit, carrying his bags. "Sorry," he said, "wrong plane."

KashaL@concentric.net    | Kasha Linka

THE WONDERS OF POLITICS, EXPLAINED BY A BLOKE WITH TWO COWS

FEUDALISM: You have two cows. Your lord takes some of the milk.

PURE SOCIALISM: You have two cows. The government takes them and puts them in a barn with everyone else's cows. You have to take care of all the cows. The government gives you as much milk as you need.

BUREAUCRATIC SOCIALISM: You have two cows. The government takes them and puts them in a barn with everyone else's cows. They are cared for by ex-chicken farmers. You have to take care of the chickens the government took from the chicken farmers. The government gives you as much milk and as many eggs as the regulations say you should need.

FASCISM: You have two cows. The government takes both, hires you to take care of them, and sells you the milk.

PURE COMMUNISM: You have two cows. You help you take care of them, and you all share the milk.

RUSSIAN COMMUNISM: You have two cows. You have to take care of them, but the government takes all the milk.

DICTATORSHIP: You have two cows. The government takes both and shoots you.

SINGAPOREAN DEMOCRACY: You have two cows. The government fines you for keeping two unlicensed farm animals in an apartment.

MILITARIANISM: You have two cows. The government takes both and drafts you.

PURE DEMOCRACY: You have two cows. Your neighbours decide who gets the milk.

REPRESENTATIVE DEMOCRACY: You have two cows. Your neighbours pick someone to tell you who gets the milk.

AMERICAN DEMOCRACY: The government promises to give you two cows if you vote for it. After the election, the president is impeached for speculating in cow futures. The press dubs the affair "Cowgate".

BRITISH DEMOCRACY: You have two cows. You feed them sheep's brains and they go mad. The government doesn't do anything.

BUREAUCRACY: You have two cows. At first the government regulates what you can feed them and when you can milk them. Then it pays you not to milk them. After that it takes both, shoots one, milks the other and pours the milk down the drain. Then it requires you to fill out forms accounting for the missing cows.

ANARCHY: You have two cows. Either you sell the milk at a fair price or your neighbours try to kill you and take the cows.

CAPITALISM: You have two cows. You sell one and buy a bull.

HONG KONG CAPITALISM: You have two cows. You sell three of them to your publicly-listed company, using letters of credit opened by your brother-in-law at the bank, then execute a debt/equity swap with associated general offer so that you get all four
cows back, with a tax deduction for keeping five cows. The milk rights of six cows are transferred via a Panamanian intermediary to a Cayman Islands company secretly owned by the majority shareholder, who sells the rights to all seven cows' milk back to the listed company. The annual report says that the company owns eight cows, with an option on one more. Meanwhile, you kill the two cows because the fung shui is bad.

ENVIRONMENTALISM: You have two cows. The government bans you from milking or killing them.

FEMINISM: You have two cows. They get married and adopt a veal calf.

TOTALITARIANISM: You have two cows. The government takes them and denies they ever existed. Milk is banned.

POLITICAL CORRECTNESS: You are associated with (the concept of "ownership" is a symbol of the phallo-centric, war-mongering, intolerant past) two differently-aged (but no less valuable to society) bovines of non-specified gender.

COUNTER CULTURE: Wow, dude, there's like... these two cows, man. You got to have some of this milk.

SURREALISM: You have two giraffes. The government requires you to take harmonica lessons.

From Kasha Linka

How do you keep an idiot busy for hours?

TRUE FACT ...

Humans begin laughing at two to three months of age. Six year olds laugh about 300 times per day, while adults laugh from 15 to 100 times per day.

SOURCE: NYT, Dr. William F. Fry, Stanford University

No job is so simple that is can't be done wrong.

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Have A Great Day

Phillip Bower

Soul Food February 27

Today in History February 27

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Copyright Information: Phillip Bower is not the author of the humor, and does not claim to own any copyright privileges to the jokes. Sources of jokes are listed when known. Birthday's and Happenings for the date, and quotations are public knowledge and collected from numerous sources. Quotations are public knowledge and sources are listed when known. Weekendspirations are written by Tim Knappenberger who has copyright privileges. Cathy Vinson authors Whispers from the Wilderness and owns copyright privileges. Weekendspirations and Whispers from the Wilderness are used with permission by the respective authors. Other devotions are written by Phillip Bower unless otherwise stated. In all cases credit is given when known. The Daily Miscellany is nonprofit. Submissions by readers is welcome.