- Smart Horse
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There was once a very smart horse. Anything that was shown it, it mastered easily, until one day, its teachers tried to teach it about rectangular coordinates and it couldn't understand them. All the horse's acquaintences and friends tried to figure out what was the matter and couldn't. Then a new guy (what the heck, a computer engineer) looked at the problem and said,
"Of course he can't do it. Why, you're putting Descartes before the horse!"
Permalink: descartes
- Category: Shaggy dog stories
- Slave Games
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Back in Roman days, as you may know, slavery was part of life. People went to slave markets to buy and sell slaves from all over the known world.
One particular slave market holder became well known for his special promotional contests - people would come from all over the Empire to win one of his slaves.
His most popular contest was a game where you had to try to throw a coin into a Roman urn. If you've seen pictures, you'll know that these urns have very narrow necks, so the game was quite challenging, but if you succeeded, you would win a slave from the market, so the prizes were good.
One day, a fairly poor woman returned from the market with a slave. Her husband immediately berated her for spending so much money to buy a slave, but she told him that she had won the contest, so it had only cost a single penny.
"After all," she said "You've always told me that a penny urned is a penny slaved."
Permalink: urned
- Category: Shaggy dog stories
- Roman Rollers
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Back in the days of the Roman Empire, the famous Emperor Nero instituted a new game. The players would take those little disks you set your glass on in order to protect the furniture, and see who could get the most distance rolling them across the floor.
They were the first roller coasters.
Back in those days, the disks were made of iron, and they would bet on whose disk would roll the farthest.
They called them ferrous wheels.
Permalink: roman_rollers
- Category: Shaggy dog stories
- Insect Assault
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One night, as he finished his last beer, Joe's doorbell rang. He answered the door and found a six-foot cockroach standing there. The bug grabbed him by the collar and threw him across the room, then left.
The next night, the doorbell rang, and found the same six-foot cockroach standing there. The big bug punched him in the stomach, then left.
The same same happened the next night. This time, he was kneed in the groin and hit behind the ear as he doubled over in pain. Then the big bug left.
The following day, Joe went to see his doctor. He explained the events of the preceding four nights. "What can I do?" he pleaded.
"Not much" the doctor replied. "There's just a nasty bug going around."
Permalink: insect
- Category: Shaggy dog stories
- Chess Fans
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A chess competition was being held in a hotel and various contestants were in the open-air lobby discussing their victories of the day. After about an hour of this, manager of the hotel came into the lobby and asked them all to leave.
"But why?" they cried.
"Because," the manager explained, "I can't stand chess nuts boasting in an open foyer."
Permalink: chess_fans
- Category: Shaggy dog stories
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