mattlary's weblog

I just found this site tonight with awesome Star Trek Motivational Posters. One of them might end up in my cube sooner or later. BTW; Picard was the better Captain.

http://www.josplumbing.com/

It is the time of year when stories of a man and his humanity are important to share…..

I truly love this story and it will surely bring a tear to your eye! I know it did mine.

In 1986, Mkele Mbembe was on holiday in Kenya after graduating from Northwestern University .

On a hike through the bush, he came across a young bull elephant standing with one leg raised in the air.

The elephant seemed distressed, so Mbembe approached it very carefully.

He got down on one knee and inspected the elephant’s foot, and found a large piece of wood deeply embedded in it.

As carefully and as gently as he could, Mbembe worked the wood out with his hunting knife, after which the elephant gingerly put down its foot.

The elephant turned to face the man, and with a rather curious look on its face, stared at him for several tense moments.

Mbembe stood frozen, thinking of nothing else but being trampled. Eventually the elephant trumpeted loudly, turned, and walked away.

Mbembe never forgot that elephant or the events of that day.

Twenty years later, Mbemb was walking through the Chicago Zoo with his teenaged son. As they approached the elephant enclosure, one of the creatures turned and walked over to near where Mbembe and his son Tapu were standing.

The large bull elephant stared at Mbembe, lifted its front foot off the ground, then put it down. The elephant did that several times then trumpeted loudly, all the while staring at the man.

Remembering the encounter in 1986, Mbembe couldn’t help wondering if this was the same elephant.

Mbembe summoned up his courage, climbed over the railing and made his way into the enclosure. He walked right up to the elephant and stared back in wonder.

The elephant trumpeted again, wrapped its trunk around one of Mbembe’s legs and slammed him against the railing, killing him instantly.

Probably wasn’t the same elephant.

Randy got this the other day at Yangtze; we all thought it was pretty funny. I once got a cookie that said, You will be hungry soon; order takeout now!- I wish I’d kept that. There’s also a story on his site about a coffee machine incident at work that’s pretty funny; check it all out here.

My father sent this to me; I miss the Dilbert cartoon a lot.

[YouTube]CmYDgncMhXw[/YouTube]

YouTube Video Embedded; please click here if you can’t view it.

Most awesomest thing ever:

(YouTube video embedded; RSS users should go to http://www.mattlary.com to view it)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2S89Y4shxtE

I was reading an article about Moses, and apparently, because of a mistranslation of the Hebrew word qaran in the Latin Vulgate Bible, people thought Moses had horns. The verse is now translated, …the skin of his face shone by reason of his speaking with [God] ( Exodus 34:29 American Standard Version; Excerpt)

Interesting stuff; probably one of the lesser known big oopses in history!  When talking about why Moses’ skin shone, one person referred to it as a type of Divine Radiation Burn.  I thought that was funny (and probably accurate!)

I just came across this randomly and thought I would share it- I’ve gotta find this and thumb through it. Benjamin Franklin must have been the loud FratBoy of the founding fathers.

I got another email I wanted to share; still thinking about that real post I promised…

If you’re not familiar with the work of Steven Wright, he’s the famous erudite scientist who once said: “I woke up one morning and all of my stuff had been stolen…and replaced by exact duplicates. His mind sees things differently than we do, to our amazement and amusement.

Here are some more of his gems:

1- I’d kill for a Nobel Peace Prize.

2- Borrow money from pessimists — they don’t expect it back.

3- Half the people you know are below average.

4- 99% of lawyers give the rest a bad name.

5- 42.7% of all statistics are made up on the spot.

6- A conscience is what hurts when all your other parts feels so good.

7- A clear conscience is usually the sign of a bad memory.

8- If you want the rainbow, you gotta put up with the rain.

9- All those who believe in psycho-kinesis, raise my hand.

10- The early bird may get the worm, the second mouse gets the cheese.

11- I almost had a psychic girlfriend but she left me before we met.

12- OK, so what’s the speed of dark?

13- How do you tell when you’re out of invisible ink?

14- If everything seems to be going well, you have obviously overlooked something.

15- Depression is merely anger without enthusiasm.

16- When everything is coming your way, you’re in the wrong lane.

17- Ambition is a poor excuse for not having enough sense to avoid work.

18- Hard work pays off in the future, laziness pays off now.

19- I intend to live forever — so far, so good.

20- If Barbie is so popular, why do you have to buy her friends?

21- Eagles may soar, but weasels don’t get sucked into jet engines.

22- What happens if you get scared half to death twice?

23- My mechanic said, “I couldn’t repair your brakes, so I made your horn louder.”

24- Why do psychics have to ask you for your name?

25- If at first you don’t succeed, destroy all evidence that you tried.

26- A conclusion is the place where you got tired of thinking.

27- Experience is something you don’t get until just after you need it.

28- The hardness of the butter is proportional to the softness of the bread.

29- To steal ideas from one person is plagiarism; to steal from many is research.

30- The problem with the gene pool is that there is no lifeguard.

31- The sooner you fall behind, the more time you’ll have to catch up.

32- The colder the x-ray table, the more of your body is required to be on it.

33- Everyone has a photographic memory, some just don’t have film.

Steven Wright