(January - March 2000) Oldproj

"What a fucking nutcase. You're fucked up, dude." -- Will, while working on our Graphics project

"Wishing for the whispered taste of my attention, she melts into my kiss with 'yes' on her naked lips." -- my entry in the Sieg 233 Construct-a-Sentence competition

"Requests for the cow may not be denied." -- Lizzie, in response to my request that she send me the Mad Cow file, which everyone in the world MUST see/hear at some point in time

"Lesbians are all very fine, but not being able to get a date is no reason for changing your sexual orientation." -- Ginger

"The 738 went non-stop from Homewood to Olympia Fields, without stopping at Flossmoor. A zillion people got out in the dark and started looking for where the exit had been moved to since that morning." -- Dad, regarding the first Illinois Central goof-up he has witnessed in his 24 and a half years of riding train #738

"When he said, 'Turn to the Lacrymosa and please rise,' I was like, 'That's okay, I was going to get up for Bar'chu anyways'." -- Me, during Symphony Chorale rehearsal, since the "Arvit leShabat" movement that I thought we were going to rehearse next (until Maestro Kaplan suddenly switched to rehearsing "Requiem") was a prayer that one would normally stand up to say in synagogue

"The 520 floating point bridge has been closed due to high winds." -- heard on the radio during a Seattle windstorm

Bart: "Except ours is 'p' because they're post offices."
Me, wanting to use the variable 'x': "No! They're xylophone factories!"

Me, trying to prove something mathematically: "How do you say 'long freaking way' in Greek letters?"
Bart: "You say 'epsilon', where epsilon is a LONG FREAKING WAY!'"

"Please, only one entry per person. If you ignore us and submit multiple entries, we will hunt you down and pluck every hair on your body out one by one with tweezers. Then we will ignore all but your last entry." -- Maria G., announcing the Mossy Bits Self Portrait Contest, Phase II

Overheard student #1: "What's this 2x plus x?"
Overheard student #2: "Oh that? That's just 3x."

Elizabeth, about Shana: "[She] wrote a play entitled 'The Creation of Man'. It goes from creation to crucifixion in two hours."
Me: "Wow, not much gestation, then."

"Yeah, I suppose I better sleep. The chances of my going to my lab at 9:00 tomorrow morning are getting slimmer by the minute. ... They're pretty anorexic about now." -- Elizabeth, at 1:35am EST

Michele, to friend in orchestra composed mainly of white people from Snohomish County, that had just finished playing a concert devoted to African music: "That was great! It sounded very African. ... But don't you think your orchestra's a little Snohomishly white?"
Orchestra guy: "Yeah, 's'nohomies in this orchestra."

"Click here for cookie information." -- link on Magna Carta's website

"Come or don't." -- Jason, inviting us to his quals practice talk

Zoran, to unfamiliar student who entered Computer Graphics 50 minutes late, walked determinedly all the way across the lecture hall, oblivious to Gerome's warning of "Wrong class!" and to the clearly Computer Graphics-related slide on the projector screen, and sat in a seat in the very back corner: "Are ... you in this class?"
Student: "Is this Animal Psychology?"
Class: [much laughter]
Student: [silently gets up and leaves the room as determinedly as he entered]

"Don't have SEX during the SUPERBOWL! The SUPERBOWL is MUCH too important for THAT." -- Ginger, upon seeing a Playboy Magazine with the tag line "Sex and the Superbowl"

"You just went top-down on my bottom-up." -- Me, to Bart

"Hah! I'm so intelligent I raise everyone else's I.Q. by proxy." -- Anne

"Everything's log-time for Superman." -- Justin

"We had to vacuum the David, he was so dusty." -- Professor Curless, presenting his recent work in 3D statue modeling, for which he traveled to Florence and, yes, vacuumed Michelangelo's "David" so that the contours would appear properly in his 3D scan

"My monkey said Mylanta." -- Peter

Me, in squeaky, high, hapless, fairy-tale maiden voice: "Oh, no! Will!"
Will, disinterested: "What?"
Me: "I got sucked into you."
Will: "Oh, that's too bad."

"Not only is it obviously optimal; in this case, it actually IS optimal." -- Professor Anderson, commenting on the frequency with which computer scientists wave their hands at theoretical concerns, resulting in incorrect, yet "obviously true", results

"I don't have a practical application here, but let's say that you have to buy vectors from the Math Department. These are the vectors they have available, and these are their costs." -- Professor Anderson, trying to rationalize why there would possibly be costs associated with his vectors

"Bill Bradley and John McCain became strong candidates, because Al Gore was a clueless dork and George W. Bush was a drug addict with the IQ of a mud pie." -- Dave Barry, "World is coming to an end -- now back to Elian story"

"Recommended Reading about Cephalopods" -- link on a highly entertaining website

Bart: "I heard it back when I was wee."
Me: "When you were plural?"

Frank: "I'll be in deep shit."
Me, in a theoretical mood: "How deep? Order N?"

"I have standards. I'm not a cliche slut." -- Will

"If you find something that's not fungus but has the same property ..." -- overheard in Sieg 233

Frank: "Did you say what I think you said?"
Bart: "That I would like two large tits? ... Yes."

"canadit" -- a misspelling found in an undergrad's (a Canadian's, we must infer) problem set

"fuck you.

love, will" -- an endearing message from my office pal Will

"I wasn't FUCKING my ass with the stick, I was just cleaning it!" -- Me, referring to my hypothetical childhood

"Los Invasores de Nuevo Leon" -- the artists for whom the Internet Compact Disc Database (CDDB) mistook Soundgarden, after I stuck "Superunknown" in my CD drive and asked CDDB to fully identify it

Me: "That's fucked up."
Will: "I would tend to agree."

"I'm standing up here, so I can make up what mathematical operations I want." -- Professor Anderson

"I'm wearing orange and blue. That does not count as 'dressed up'." -- Bart

"Why don't you just pick the most expensive one?" -- Will, giving someone advice on purchasing software

"... cuz of the Asian dude." -- Me, trying to retell a very complicated story

Will: "I thought you didn't believe in God."
Me: [blank, uncomprehending stare at the back of Will's head]
Will: "Oh, wait ... that's *hell* that you don't believe in."

"Ha! You can't get me when I'm falling to my death!" -- Will, defiantly, to his Quake3A computer opponent

"My sphincter's starting to get ideas." -- Justin

Justin: "There's more than one way to break a kneecap ..."
Me: "... with a skinned cat."

"String band" -- the Yale Concert Band's nickname for the Yale Symphony Orchestra

"In my version of reality ... " -- from a CSE 501 (Compilers) assignment

"So now we're going to move on and talk about another French guy ... and his little curve." -- Zoran, in Graphics, referring to Bezier

"So if we're right on time we'll have our pick of the WASPs, I guess." -- a Jewish friend, regarding a party we would be attending

"I don't know how lines work in Texas, but in most lines around these parts people all face the same direction!" -- Paul (in Illinois), to Brian (in Texas)

"Shoot ... I knew I had forgotten something. It now occurs to me that I'm also missing sections for 'Gangsta' Rap', 'Opera', and 'Show Tunes'. I can no longer live this LIE!!! I'm going to open my wrists ..." -- Me, to Brian, after he asked where the country music section of my MP3 collection was

Kenneth: "Are you okay?"
Bart: "No. I just ate my leg."

"A memory leak is better than a stream of consciousness, because in a memory leak there's just a little bit of silicon dripping out of your neck, but in a stream of consciousness, you've got it all running down your backside. ... Of course, both of those are better than a river of dreams, because then you wake up in the morning and your bed's soaked and everything. It's a real mess." -- Me

Jayant: "Who's Laszlo Lovasz?"
Justin: "He's like the smartest mathematician alive today."
Me, to Jayant: "Yeah, he's smarter than *you*."
Justin: "Yeah, he's easily twice as smart as you."
Me: "Even 2.5 times as smart."
Justin: "Yeah, you're like little-o as smart as him."

"I have never been so hairless." -- Bart

"I have no need for Asians." -- Me (don't ask)

"Say sorry to my monkey and pick him up." -- Jayant, to Kenneth

Sara Z.: "I would go to yeshiva if it was in, like, Hawaii ..."
Random person: "There are no Jews in Hawaii!"
Sarah B.: "Hey, Sean Smeland is in Hawaii!"
Person: "Who's Sean Smeland?"
Sara: "Sean Smeland is NOT a Jew!"
Sarah: "Sean Smeland: Not a Jew. Eats at the Bagel Brunch."
Sara and Person: "What?"

"The way I see it, if you're going to be a unitarian you may as well be an atheist and get it over with." -- JMS

B5 Fan: "[You] said [you] wouldn't believe in God until God put up a message in the sky, in huge letters, saying, 'Come here, motherfucker!'"
JMS: "Yeah, but I also ended with, 'But I'd *still* like to see where that neon sign's plugged in.'"

Sarah, regarding how she'll survive her existence until grad school starts: "I have to get the hell out of here and go on home. April through August -- that's only five months, right?"
Ginger (dead serious): "Arrrgh! You'll never make it! Can't you get a grant to go to Germany?"

"Jeez, dude, you gotta TELL a guy if you sense that his ass is moist." -- Me

"Wait ... someone crossed me the other day. Who was it? ... Oh, yeah, the Spanish black belt sitting across from me at the Pizza Hut." -- Me

"Fox may want to rename Monday's hit husband hunt 'Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire?' to 'Who Wants to Marry a Big Fat Liar?'" -- MSN News headline

"Yisrael all the way. Being a gabbai comes in handy sometimes." -- Yishai, on knowing to what religious caste certain Jews belong

Yishai, talking to SB's deaf ear: "So, yeah, I'm starting to panic just a little on my senior project, but I just coded 10 lines in Matlab."
SB: "Heeheheeee! Ho! Ho! Go you!"
Yishai: [questioning stare]
SB: "Did you just say that you composed 20 lines of poetry in Russian?"
Yishai: "No. In fact, I said I coded 10 lines in Matlab."
SB: "Well, good, I was wondering what Gelernter wanted with Russian. I didn't think you KNEW Russian."
Yishai: "I don't. This was Matlab. [brightening] But 10 lines of Matlab is equal to, like, 50 in any other language."

"[W. Deen] Mohammed said he'll also be watching for anti-Semitic or anti-white remarks in Farrakhan's speech -- language orthodox Muslims find offensive." -- CNN

"Hmm ... Jupiter's looking a little polygonal today." -- Will, regarding my low-resolution animation of a spaceship encountering the planets

Me, to Jayant (who was behaving decidedly more properly than Will and I): "Yeah, actually, that's a requirement in the department. You have to pass a belching test."
Will: "You know what I think about that? [takes a gulp of Diet Coke]"

"Ow, shit!" -- Me, wincing in pain, as the insurgent spacecraft in my solar system animation plows headfirst into Mars

"In casual writing, it doesn't matter what you do. But formal writing has rules, dammit. If English essays had compilers, then people would be forced to respect those rules. All this confusion arises because English runs on an interpreter with good error recovery and repair." -- Keunwoo, on the question of "s'" vs. "s's"

"Kenneth ... but, Kenneth ... but what the hell are you doing here?" -- Jayant, finding Kenneth's proposed solution somewhat ludicrous (as usual)

"When people think of space, they think of rocket plumes and the Space Shuttle, but the future of space is information technology. We must develop a virtual presence, in space, on planets, in aircraft and spacecraft." -- Daniel S. Goldin, NASA

"When I started playing Asheron's Call back at Microsoft last summer, I spent an entire week killing little bunnies." -- Will

"The Cloth System. That's it! The rebels are there!" -- Me

"The world is closer to random than it is to being reductions from 3-SAT." -- Professor Anderson

"That's surreal, but not as surreal as digging up Salvador Dali's dead body and using him as your corporation's advertising executive." -- Justin

"My guess about you is that you would never just remain silent ... about anything!" -- Jennifer

"Jeez! Makes me want to believe in that Catholic god!!!" -- Jennifer, being somewhat redundant (if you equate "Jeez" with "Jesus", that is)

Lecturer in 590S network security seminar: "If we have some rule that says, 'Accept packets coming from A and going anywhere', and we have another rule that says, 'Deny packets coming from anywhere and going to B', then if we have a packet coming from A and going to B, what should the system do?"
Audience member, sarcastically: "Vacillate."
Audience: [laughter]
Lecturer: "Well ... that's not often what we choose in practice."

"They could both kick my ass with all their limbs tied behind their backs. I've never broken a board, although I broke a bottle of apple juice the other day by dropping it on the ground." -- Brian, regarding Paul's and my TaeKwon-Do skeelz

"To give you an idea of what he's like, imagine if Evan and Andrew Cohen got together and had a child. Oh, my God, no, don't imagine THAT." -- Sarah, scaring me

"I thought you might want to know that we then had swordfights with the limp asparagus." -- Laura

"The coefficient is very zero." -- Will, finding a bug in his code

"Rigid bodies always get my attention." -- Bart

"Yes, things are definitely non-linear. The world would be a pretty boring place if all dynamics was linear." -- Zoran's reply to my e-mail complaining about my non-linear model

"Some people live their whole lives without ever thinking about what they are doing." -- Don, quite wisely

"... but because the spelling is weird, the spelling is w-e-i-r-d." -- Me

Bart: "Would it help if I said, 'Fuck me' again?"
Me: "Yes, it definitely would."

Me: "You just deleted me?"
Bart: "No ... not yet."

"You should just go ahead and ... shit!" -- Will, distracted while giving advice

"Who doesn't enjoy a good session of peeing in your pants? (And by that I don't mean your pants specifically.)" -- Jennifer

"You know what's funny? No, evidently not." -- J

"I'm sure that many people will be intrigued by such an exciting title and will ask me about it. 'Oh, my! Is that the one that goes in depth into irregular verbs?? I've heard about it! Is it good?!'" -- Jennifer, regarding reading "Words and Rules" (S. Pinker) on the bus

"We are still schlonging our way through GUIDO." -- J's female voice training teacher at Pacific Lutheran University, using Yiddish, um, incorrectly in reference to a piece of music software

"We're making action shots of FELT! How sick is THAT, dude?" -- Will

"Can we submit this to, like, Playboy or something? 'Nude Shots of Cloth.'" -- Will

Kenneth, looking at Bart's incomplete jello simulation: "Wow, what the fuck is that?"
Bart, annoyed (especially since Kenneth's simulation sucks ass): "Your MOTHER."

Q: "What's the difference between Mick Jagger and a Scotsman?"
A: "Mick Jagger says, 'Hey, you, get off my cloud.' A Scotsman says, 'Hey, McLeod, get off my ewe.'"