The Hagios Xao Humor Corner

The following pieces have been selected from among all the e-mails humor I have received since I started archiving them about a year ago. If any of the stories below are your creation, let me know and I will see that you are properly credited.

Done anything interesting lately?

Here's an application to NYU undergrad. The student was accepted.

3A. IN ORDER FOR THE ADMISSIONS STAFF OF OUR COLLEGE TO GET TO KNOW YOU, THE APPLICANT, BETTER, WE ASK THAT YOU ANSWER THE FOLLOWING QUESTION: ARE THERE ANY SIGNIFICANT EXPERIENCES YOU HAVE HAD, OR ACCOMPLISHMENTS YOU HAVE REALIZED, THAT HAVE HELPED TO DEFINE YOU AS A PERSON?

I am a dynamic figure, often seen scaling walls and crushing ice. I've been known to remodel train stations on my lunch breaks, making them more efficient in the area of heat retention. I translate ethnic slurs for Cuban refugees, I write award-winning operas, I manage time efficiently.

Occasionally, I tread water for three days in a row.

I woo women with my sensuous and godlike trombone playing, I can pilot bicycles up severe inclines with unflagging speed, and I cook Thirty-Minute Brownies in twenty minutes. I am an expert in stucco, a veteran in love, and an outlaw in Peru.

Using only a hoe and a large glass of water, I once single-handedly defended a small village in the Amazon Basin from a horde of ferocious army ants. I play bluegrass cello, I was scouted by the Mets, I am the subject of numerous documentaries. When I'm bored, I build large suspension bridges in my yard. I enjoy urban hang gliding. On Wednesdays, after school, I repair electrical appliances free of charge.

I am an abstract artist, a concrete analyst, and a ruthless bookie.

Critics worldwide swoon over my original line of corduroy evening wear.

I don't perspire. I am a private citizen, yet I receive fan mail. I have been caller number nine and have won the weekend passes. Last summer I toured New Jersey with a traveling centrifugal-force demonstration. I bat .400.

My deft floral arrangements have earned me fame in international botany circles. Children trust me.

I can hurl tennis rackets at small moving objects with deadly accuracy.

I once read Paradise Lost, Moby Dick, and David Copperfield in one day and still had time to refurbish an entire dining room that evening. I know the exact location of every food item in the supermarket. I have performed several covert operations with the CIA. I sleep once a week; when I do sleep, I sleep in a chair. While on vacation in Canada, I successfully negotiated with a group of terrorists who had seized a small bakery. The laws of physics do not apply to me.

I balance, I weave, I dodge, I frolic, and my bills are all paid. On weekends, to let off steam, I participate in full-contact origami.

Years ago I discovered the meaning of life but forgot to write it down. I have made extraordinary four course meals using only a mouli and a toaster oven.

I breed prizewinning clams. I have won bullfights in San Juan, cliff-diving competitions in Sri Lanka, and spelling bees at the Kremlin.

I have played Hamlet, I have performed open-heart surgery, and I have spoken with Elvis.

But I have not yet gone to college.

The Jean-Paul Sartre Cookbook

by Alastair Sutherland

from Free Agent March 1987 (a Portland Oregon alternative newspaper)
Republished in the Utne Reader Nov./Dec. 1993

We have been lucky to discover several previously lost diaries of French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre stuck in between the cushions of our office sofa. These diaries reveal a young Sartre obsessed not with the void, but with food. Apparently Sartre, before discovering philosophy had hoped to write "a cookbook that will put to rest all notions of flavor forever." The diaries are excerpted here for your perusal.

October 3

Spoke with Camus today about my cookbook. Though he has never actually eaten, he gave me much encouragement. I rushed home immediately to begin work. How excited I am! I have begun my formula for a Denver omelet.

October 4

Still working on the omelet. There have been stumbling blocks. I keep creating omelets one after another, like soldiers marching into the sea, but each one seems empty, hollow, like stone. I want to create an omelet that expresses the meaninglessness of existence, and instead they taste like cheese. I look at them on the plate, but they do not look back. Tried eating them with the lights off. It did not help. Malraux suggested paprika.

October 6

I have realized that the traditional omelet form (eggs and cheese) is bourgeois. Today I tried making one out of cigarettes, some coffee, and four tiny stones. I fed it to Malraux, who puked. I am encouraged, but my journey is still long.

October 10

I find myself trying ever more radical interpretations of traditional dishes, in an effort to somehow express the void I feel so acutely. Today I tried this recipe:

Tuna Casserole Ingredients: 1 large casserole dish
Place the casserole dish in a cold oven. Place a chair facing the oven and sit in it forever. Think about how hungry you are. When night falls, do not turn on the light. While a void is expressed in the recipe, I am struck by its inapplicability to the bourgeois lifestyle. How can the eater recognize that the food denied him is a tuna casserole and not some other dish? I am becoming more and more frustrated.

October 25

I have been forced to abandon the project of producing an entire cookbook. Rather, I now seek a single recipe which will, by itself, embody the plight of man in a world ruled by an unfeeling God, as well as providing the eater with at least one ingredient from each of the four basic food groups. To this end, I purchased six hundred pounds of foodstuffs from the corner grocery and locked myself in the kitchen, refusing to admit anyone. After several weeks of work, I produced a recipe calling for two eggs, half a cup of flour, four tons of beef, and a leek. While this is a start, I am afraid I still have much work ahead.

November 15

Today I made a Black Forest cake out of five pounds of cherries and a live beaver, challenging the very definition of the word cake. I was very pleased. Malraux said he admired it greatly, but could not stay for dessert. Still, I feel that this may be my most profound achievement yet, and have resolved to enter it in the Betty Crocker Bake-Off.

November 30

Today was the day of the Bake-Off. Alas, things did not go as I had hoped. During the judging, the beaver became agitated and bit Betty Crocker on the wrist. The beaver's powerful jaws are capable of felling blue spruce in less than ten minutes and proved, needless to say, more than a match for the tender limbs of America's favorite homemaker. I only got third place. Moreover, I am now the subject of a rather nasty lawsuit.

December 1

I have been gaining twenty-five pounds a week for two months, and I am now experiencing light tides. It is stupid to be so fat. My pain and ultimate solitude are still as authentic as they were when I was thin, but seem to impress girls far less. From now on, I will live on cigarettes and black coffee.

Just what everyone was waiting for...

Dan Quayle Quotes

"I was recently on a tour of Latin America, and the only regret I have was that I didn't study Latin harder in school so I could converse with those people." -- J. Danforth Quayle

"If we don't succeed, we run the risk of failure." -- J. Danforth Quayle

"Republicans understand the importance of bondage between a mother and child." -- Vice President Dan Quayle

"Welcome to President Bush, Mrs. Bush, and my fellow astronauts." -- Vice President Dan Quayle

"Mars is essentially in the same orbit... Mars is somewhat the same distance from the Sun, which is very important. We have seen pictures where there are canals, we believe, and water. If there is water, that means there is oxygen. If oxygen, that means we can breathe." -- Vice President Dan Quayle, 8/11/89

"What a waste it is to lose one's mind. Or not to have a mind is being very wasteful. How true that is." -- Vice President Dan Quayle

"The Holocaust was an obscene period in our nation's history. I mean in this century's history. But we all lived in this century. I didn't live in this century." -- Vice President Dan Quayle, 9/15/88

"I believe we are on an irreversible trend toward more freedom and democracy - but that could change." -- Vice President Dan Quayle, 5/22/89

"One word sums up probably the responsibility of any vice president, and that one word is 'to be prepared'." -- Vice President Dan Quayle, 12/6/89

"May our nation continue to be the beakon of hope to the world." -- The Quayles' 1989 Christmas card. [Not a beacon of literacy, though.]

"Verbosity leads to unclear, inarticulate things." -- Vice President Dan Quayle, 11/30/88

"We don't want to go back to tomorrow, we want to go forward." -- Vice President Dan Quayle

"I have made good judgements in the Past. I have made good judgements in the Future." -- Vice President Dan Quayle

"The future will be better tomorrow." -- Vice President Dan Quayle

"We're going to have the best-educated American people in the world." -- Vice President Dan Quayle, 9/21/88

"People that are really very weird can get into sensitive positions and have a tremendous impact on history." -- Vice President Dan Quayle

"I stand by all the misstatements that I've made." -- Vice President Dan Quayle to Sam Donaldson, 8/17/89

"We have a firm commitment to NATO, we are a *part* of NATO. We have a firm commitment to Europe. We are a *part* of Europe." -- Vice President Dan Quayle

"Public speaking is very easy." -- Vice President Dan Quayle to reporters in 10/88

"I am not part of the problem. I am a Republican." -- Vice President Dan Quayle

"I love California, I practically grew up in Phoenix." -- Vice President Dan Quayle

"A low voter turnout is an indication of fewer people going to the polls." -- Vice President Dan Quayle

"When I have been asked during these last weeks who caused the riots and the killing in L.A., my answer has been direct and simple: Who is to blame for the riots? The rioters are to blame. Who is to blame for the killings? The killers are to blame." -- Vice President Dan Quayle

"Illegitimacy is something we should talk about in terms of not having it." -- Vice President Dan Quayle, 5/20/92 (reported in Esquire, 8/92)

"Murphy Brown is doing better than I am. At least she knows she still has a job next year." -- Vice President Dan Quayle, 8/18/92

"We are ready for any unforeseen event that may or may not occur." -- Vice President Dan Quayle, 9/22/90

"For NASA, space is still a high priority." -- Vice President Dan Quayle, 9/5/90

"Quite frankly, teachers are the only profession that teach our children." -- Vice President Dan Quayle, 9/18/90

"The American people would not want to know of any misquotes that Dan Quayle may or may not make." -- Vice President Dan Quayle

"We're all capable of mistakes, but I do not care to enlighten you on the mistakes we may or may not have made." -- Vice President Dan Quayle

"It isn't pollution that's harming the environment. It's the impurities in our air and water that are doing it." -- Vice President Dan Quayle

"[It's] time for the human race to enter the solar system." -- Vice President Dan Quayle

The Number of the Beast

Ok, we all know that 666 is the Number of the Beast. But have you seen these:

$665.95Retail price of the Beast
$699.25Price of the Beast plus 5% sales tax
$769.95Price of the Beast with all accessories and replacement soul
$656.66Walmart price of the Beast
6, uh... what was
that number again?		Number of the Blonde Beast
00666Zip code of the Beast
1-900-666-0666Live Beasts! One-on-one pacts! Call Now! Only $6.66/minute. Over 18 only please.
Route 666Highway of the Beast
666 FOven temperature for roast Beast
666KRetirement plan of the Beast
6.66 %5 year CD interest rate at First Beast National Bank, $666 minimum deposit.
i66686CPU of the Beast
666iBMW of the Beast
DSM-666Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the Beast
668Next-door neighbor of the Beast

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"...it's important to notice what it feels like to discern meaning where there is no meaning... it's important to get in touch with the "as if madness" experience in order to guard against madness; so I'm hoping to suspend my insistence on Truth for periods of time..."

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It’s ironic that avoiding intellectual ossification was one of the main points that Sam was trying to convey just moments earlier… that there’s no logical reason to use one or more points-of-view which happen to have been elaborated thousands of years ago over new points-of-view developed by one’s own reason in the present time. Of course, that’s easier said than done and when most people start on any sort of Philosophical or Spiritual Path, they’re usually not capable of the kind of deep reasoning that would discern the “true meaning” of the Universe at first glance… so we may need to use ancient philosophy and religion as a crutch for a while… in order to bootstrap our thinking to the point where we can reason with some depth on the Universe and our purpose within it. But I expect that we all have to eventually drop the rhetoric and design our own systems based on First Principles.

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