Humor 12/21/97: Christmas Humor

Hi everyone,

I hope everything is going well, and that you're not too stressed with
your Christmas shopping and other things. In case I do not get a chance
to see you over the Christmas holidays or talk to you in person, I wish
you a great Christmas and New Year's. Please remember the real meaning
of Christmas! It is very easy to get caught up in all the commercialism
during the Christmas season. But for me, the purpose of Christmas is to
celebrate the birth of baby Jesus, who came on earth to die for our
sins. If you get a chance to sing some of the Christmas carols, I would
encourage you to think about the meaning of the lyrics.

Now for a commercial announcement. If you or any of your friends are
looking for a job in the San Francisco bay area, read on. A friend of
mine, Grande Lum, works for a conflict resolution consulting company in
San Francisco. Apparently, his company is looking to hire some
analysts.

"My company is hiring analysts right now and I thought you might know
some highly qualified, high initiative folks who might be interested.
Basically we're looking for people with very strong academic
credentials
plus 1-3 years of business or consulting experience. Business
development and marketing skills would be a plus. They'll be
researching, proposal and report writing, editing, project management,
and interviewing. Give me a call at your convenience. I'm at
415-776-4759."

Now back to our regularly scheduled programming. In keeping with the
Christmas theme, here some some Christmas-related humor. The first one
comes to us from Vivian Chiang and second from Dave Shim. Enjoy and
Merry Christmas!

-Josh.
___________________________________________

SANTA CLAUS: An Engineer's Perspective

I. There are approximately two billion children (persons under 18) in
the world. However, since
Santa does not visit children of Muslim, Hindu, Jewish or Buddhist
religions, this reduces the
workload for Christmas night to 15% of the total, or 378 million
(according to the Population
Reference Bureau). At an average (census) rate of 3.5 children per
house hold, that comes to
108 million homes, presuming that there is at least one good child in
each.

II. Santa has about 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the
different time zones and
the rotation of the earth, assuming he travels east to west (which seems
logical). This works
out to 967.7 visits per second. This is to say that for each Christian
household with a good
child, Santa has around 1/1000th of a second to park the sleigh, hop
out, jump down the
chimney, fill the stockings, distribute the remaining presents under
the tree, eat whatever
snacks have been left for him, get back up the chimney, jump into the
sleigh and get o to the next house. Assuming that each of these 108
million stops is evenly
distributed around the earth (which, of course, we know to be false, but
will accept for the
purposes of our calculations), we are now talking about 0.78 miles per
household; a total trip
of 75.5 million miles, not counting bathroom stops or breaks. This means
Santa's sleigh is
moving at 650 miles per second --- 3,000 times the speed of sound. For
purposes of comparison,
the fastest man-made vehicle, the Ulysses space probe, moves at a poky
27.4 miles per second,
and a conventional reindeer can run (at best) 15 miles per hour.

III. The payload of the sleigh adds another interesting element.
Assuming
that each child gets nothing more than a medium sized Lego set (two
pounds), the sleigh is carrying over 500 thousand tons, not counting
Santa himself. On land, a
conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 pounds. Even granting
that the "flying"
reindeer could pull ten times the normal amount, the job can't be done
with eight or even nine
of them---Santa would need 360,000 of them. This increases the payload,
not counting the weight
of the sleigh, another 54,000 tons, or roughly seven times the weight of
the Queen
Elizabeth (the ship, not the monarch).

IV. 600,000 tons traveling at 650 miles per second creates enormous air
resistance --- this would heat up the reindeer in the same fashion as a
spacecraft re-entering the earth's atmosphere. The lead pair of reindeer
would absorb 14.3
quintillion joules of energy per second each. In short, they would burst
into flames almost
instantaneously, exposing the reindeer behind them and creating
deafening sonic booms in their
wake. The entire reindeer team would be vaporized within 4.26
thousandths of a second, or
right about the time Santa reached the fifth house on his trip. Not
that it matters, however,
since Santa, as a result of accellerating from a dead stop to 650 m.p.s.

in .001 seconds, would be subjected to centrifugal forces of 17,500 g's.
A 250
pound Santa (which seems ludicrously slim) would be pinned to the back
of the sleigh by
4,315,015 pounds of force, instantly crushing his bones and organs and
reducing him to a
quivering blob of pink goo.

Therefore, if Santa did exist, he's dead now
_____________________________________________

THE NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS, LEGALLY SPEAKING

Whereas, on or about the night prior to Christmas, there did occur
at a certain improved piece of real property (hereinafter "the
House")
a general lack of stirring by all creatures therein, including, but

not limited to a mouse.

A variety of foot apparel, e.g. stocking, socks, etc., had been
affixed by and around the chimney in said House in the hope and/or
belief that St. Nick a/k/a/ St. Nicholas a/k/a/ Santa Claus
(hereinafter "Claus") would arrive at sometime thereafter. The
minor
residents, i.e. the children, of the aforementioned House were
located
in their individual beds and were engaged in nocturnal
hallucinations,
i.e. dreams, wherein vision of confectionery treats, including, but

not limited to, candies, nuts and/or sugar plums, did dance, cavort

and otherwise appear in said dreams.

Whereupon the party of the first part (sometimes hereinafter
referred to as "I"), being the joint-owner in fee simple of the
House
with the parties of the second part (hereinafter "Mamma"), and said

Mamma had retired for a sustained period of sleep. (At such time,
the
parties were clad in various forms of headgear, e.g. kerchief and
cap.)

Suddenly, and without prior notice or warning, there did occur upon

the unimproved real property adjacent and appurtent to said House,
i.e. the lawn, a certain disruption of unknown nature, cause and/or

circumstance. The party of the first part did immediately rush to
a
window in the House to investigate the cause of such disturbance.
At that time, the party of the first part did observe, with some
degree of wonder and/or disbelief, a miniature sleigh (hereinafter
>
"the Vehicle") being pulled and/or drawn very rapidly through the
air
by approximately eight (8) reindeer. The driver of the Vehicle
appeared to be and in fact was, the previously referenced Claus.

Said Claus was providing specific direction, instruction and
guidance
to the approximately eight (8) reindeer and specifically identified

the animal co-conspirators by name: Dasher, Dancer, Prancer,
Vixen,
Comet, Cupid, Donner and Blitzen (hereinafter "the
Deer"). (Upon information and belief, it is further asserted that
an
additional co-conspirator named "Rudolph" may have been involved.)

The party of the first part witnessed Claus, the Vehicle and the
Deer
intentionally and willfully trespass upon the roofs of several
residences located adjacent to and in the vicinity of the House,and

noted that the Vehicle was heavily laden with packages, toys and
other
items of unknown origin or nature. Suddenly, without prior
invitation
or permission, either express or implied, the Vehicle arrived at
the
House, and Claus entered said House via the chimney. Said Claus was

clad in a red fur suit, which was partially covered with residue
from
the chimney, and he carried a large sack
containing a portion of the aforementioned packages, toys, and
other
unknown items. He was smoking what appeared to be tobacco in a
small
pipe in blatant violation of local ordinances and health
regulations.

Claus did not speak, but immediately began to fill the stocking of
the
minor children, which hung adjacent to the chimney, with toys and
other small gifts. (Said items did not, however, constitute
"gifts"
to said minor pursuant to the applicable provisions of the U.S. Tax

Code.)

Upon completion of such task, Claus touched the side of his nose
and
flew, rose and/or ascended up the chimney of the House to the roof
where the Vehicle and Deer waited and/or served as "lookouts."

Claus immediately departed for an unknown destination.

However, prior to the departure of the Vehicle, Deer and Claus from

said House, the party of the first part did hear Claus state and/or

exclaim: "Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!" Or words
to
that effect.

Respectfully Submitted,

s./ The Grinch