Jokes and Stories from this months issue.

*THE FRENCH have an interesting expression to describe a cuckolded husband involved in a love triangle. The term is ‘mari complaisant' (complaisant husband) and it refers to a man who is perfectly aware of his wife's adultery but meekly acquiesces in it. He is often a stock figure of fun in French fiction and folklore, and recurs often in real life.

One such person was Rene de Villequier, an eminent nobleman in the court of Henri III. For over fifteen years he tolerated the infidelities of his promiscuous wife Francoise de la Marck. He knew all about her numerous affairs, but also cunningly used her influence over many men to further his own political career.

After attending the court at Poitiers on the morning of 1 September 1577, de Villequier decided to take action. He visited his wife in her bedroom, joined her between the sheets, and made love to her for the last time. Then he gave her five thrusts in the back and neck with his sharpened dagger. As Lady Francoise lay gasping with pain and bleeding all over the bed, he ordered one of his bodyguards to finish her off with his sword. Following this, Rene de Villequier stabbed his wife's faithful maidservant to death, and had his wife's body placed in a litter which was paraded before the king and his nobles at court.

Having taken the corpse back to his house for burial, de Villequier returned to court where he triumphed in his avenged honour. He declared that he would gladly have killed all his wife's lovers also, but since taken together they formed a small army, that would have been very difficult. No action was ever taken against Rene de Villequier. He was a nobleman after all and besides, Frenchmen have always had a sneaking sympathy for any man who finally decides that he has had enough of his philandering wife. They are funny that way, the French.

*POLE VAULTER Allan Williams (52) won the World Masters title in 2003 and has kept himself extremely fit all his life. After becoming an Olympian in 1980, he played Golf to a professional standard and was an excellent Road Racing Cyclist. During his twenties, he often competed in a Russian national vest and on one occasion at the National Championships, he mistimed his vault and injured himself as he landed awkwardly in the well of the planting box. He was rushed to a hospital in nearby southeast London for emergency treatment.

“We'll have to give him a sedative and then treat the injury”, said an examining nurse to his friends who had driven him to the In Patients department. “If you speak his language, can one of you translate that to him?” As he was still clad in his Soviet vest, she had assumed that he was a foreign competitor at Crystal Palace Stadium. Williams, born in Plumstead, southeast London in 1953, is actually about as British as it is possible to get. “It's okay, lady”, he said politely, “I've spoken English all my life.”

*A FERVENT evangelist in Taipei hit on the original idea of trying to convert a pride of lions in a zoo to Christianity. He climbed to the top of the bars, and then leapt into their territory, shouting, “Do not despair, creatures of God! Jesus will save you!” Although he chose a time of day when the big cats were fairly docile after their lunch, he was lucky to escape with only one bite on his right leg when the animals took an instant dislike to his message of hope.

*BESIDES JFK, two other famous men also died on 22 November 1963. These were distinguished writers C S Lewis and Aldous Huxley.

*HISTORICAL QUOTES: “Four things come not back – the spoken word, the sped arrow, the past, the neglected opportunity.” (Aristotle)

“Fear not that thy life shall come to an end; but rather fear that it shall never have a beginning.” (Cardinal Newman)

“The problem in defence is how far you can go without destroying from within what you are trying to defend from without.” (Dwight D Eisenhower)

“It's all in a day's work; as the huntsman said as the lion ate him.” (Charles Kingsley)

“Man blames fate for other accidents, but feels personally responsible when he hits a hole in one.” (Sean Connery)

*THE SIMPLE earmuff has an interesting history. A 15-year-old boy named Chester Greenwood who dropped out of grammar school invented them. In 1877, at the age of 19, Greenwood patented his ‘ear protectors' and his invention earned him a fortune. Millions were produced during the First World War in Europe . Allied soldiers going into combat in France were all issued earmuffs, which were clipped below their helmets.

*A SPECIAL suicide-prevention line in Beijing , China , proved to be so popular that nine out of ten callers calling the number got the engaged signal.

*IN NORWAY , a man accused of raping a sleeping woman was acquitted after he claimed that he was also asleep at the time of the alleged offence.

*A 73-YEAR-OLD woman saved her young Scottish terrier from a pit bull attack by biting the attacking dog on the back of its neck.

*IN DAYTONA BEACH , Florida , a tourist was charged with petty theft for stealing a three feet long baby alligator from a miniature golf course and taking it back to his hotel.

*A MALAYSIAN man shot his wife dead when he mistook her for a monkey stealing fruit from his back garden.

*AT A GAY marriage ceremony in Lille , France , the ‘groom' abandoned his ‘bride' after the latter was discovered having intimate relations with the ‘priest' in a room adjoining the reception.

*IN ZAMBIA , a married man hanged himself in shame after his wife had rushed into their apartment to investigate strange noises and found him having sex with a chicken.

*IN MEXICO a man killed his male lover in a drunken rage, and then cooked the body in tomato and onion sauce. He proceeded to eat it over the next three days.

*THREE WIVES of a 67-year-old Iranian man took overdoses in an unsuccessful triple suicide bid. They were consumed with jealousy when the man's fourth (and youngest) wife received an expensive pair of boots from her husband.

*A BRITISH railway conductor stamped and carefully returned the ticket of what he thought was a slumbering passenger. He did not realise that the man had died.
*THE 2005 Tiger Cup (Soccer) in Singapore was a bad tempered business by all accounts. In one game, two players from Myanmar ( Burma ) were sent off within 20 minutes, one of them for kicking mud into the referee's face.

*THE RECORD for the quickest red card in an English Soccer League game is held by Vinnie Jones of Wimbledon FC. He was once sent off just three seconds after kick-off. That's right – THREE (3) seconds. (He held the previous record of 5 seconds).

*IN THE movie ‘The Last Samurai', Tom Cruise (as Captain Nathan Allgren) makes reference to the Battle of Thermopylae (which translates as ‘Hot Gateway', because of the natural hot springs located there). The engagement took place in September 480BC when King Xerxes led one million Persian troops in an invasion of Greece . The Spartan king Leonidas was ordered to cut the advance of the Persian army at Thermopylae in central Greece . This was a narrow strip of land between the sea and impassable mountains. The spearhead of the Persian force, 250,000 strong, attacked the defensive position but were beaten back by the Greeks. The pass was so narrow in one place (2 metres wide) that the Persians could not deploy, and were cut down in their hundreds by the defenders. However, an avaricious farmer named Ephialtes led a force of Persian infantry through a mountain passage and the next day they appeared behind Greek lines. Leonidas ordered the rest of the Greek forces to withdraw, and defended the pass with just 300 men. A typical Spartan, he chose a heroic death over surrender. The 300 Greeks (mainly Spartans) held the pass for three days, allowing the safe withdrawal of the rest of their army. The Medes and Persians charged the Greek line of shields, died on the spears between each shield, and still continued to charge over the dead bodies of their companions. Eventually they prevailed, through sheer force of vastly superior numbers. All 300 defenders were slain, but made their enemy pay a high price. Over 10,000 Persians died in forcing the passageway, which had indeed proved to be a ‘Hot Gateway'.

The heroic Greeks were buried together, with this epitaph by an Athenian poet, “Stranger, go tell the Spartans that here we lie buried, obedient to their orders.” (Herodotus) This slice of ancient history was the inspiration for a 1978 Vietnam-era movie called ‘Go tell the Spartans' starring Burt Lancaster and directed by Ted Post. Another major epic film, ‘Gates of Fire' is apparently in the works featuring the battle of Thermopylae . Let's hope it is as good as ‘Gladiator' and ‘ Troy ' and rather better than Oliver Stone's ‘Alexander'. As a student of Alexander the Great, I was very disappointed at the latter. Stone has made some excellent movies, but this is not one of them.

*A NOTE about Wolfgang Petersen's movie 2004 ‘ Troy '. I was amused at all attempts to make Achilles (Brad Pitt) a rampant heterosexual. (In his first scene, we find him sleeping with two young women). According to Homer, Achilles was a typical Greek of ancient times, born into a society which accepted bisexuality as a norm. So of course he favoured male bonding above all other forms of love. Thus Patroklos was his lover, not his cousin.

*IN SEPTEMBER 2004 the heavy-hitting Tennis star Andy Roddick (USA) smashed a world record ace serve, timed at 155 miles per hour. That converts to 248 kilometres per hour, people. They say that facing Roddick's serve is like trying to stop artillery rounds with nothing but a tennis racket.

*ACCORDING TO the ‘Sydney Sun Herald', Aussie pop star Dannii Minogue is something of a sports groupie. During the 2004 Athens Olympics, she was seen out dancing and partying with Australia 's double Olympic swimming champion Grant Hackett. The latter is known as the ‘wild boy' of Australian sport, and certainly knows how to have a good time. He was seen leaving the Athens night spot arm-in-arm with Ms Minogue, younger sister of pop legend Kylie Minogue. The Aussie entertainment often press refer to Dannii as ‘The Plastic One' as she has had much cosmetic surgery. Meantime, her sister Kylie has had something known as a ‘butt lift'. Oh dear, I'm sure that our sensitive Mr Colin Devonshire will not approve.

*POLITICAL QUOTE: “Freedom and democracy are won by the oppressed. They are not bestowed on people at gunpoint. I sometimes wonder if President Bush will ever learn that basic truth over his policy in Iraq .” (Reverend Jesse Jackson, March 2005)

*A POLITICIAN once asked a local farmer, “What did you think of my speech on the agricultural problems here?”

“Not bad”, said the farmer, “but a good day's rain would have helped us more.”

*PERCY SHAW invented ‘Cats eyes', those reflecting points of light that show the middle of a road in the dark. He seized on the idea when he once saw a cat walking towards him, with its eyes reflecting the headlights of a passing car. It is said that if the cat had been walking away from him, he would have invented the pencil sharpener. Yes, it's another groaner, people.

*THE MOST questionable world track record on the books currently has to be the 10.49 seconds for 100 metres attributed to the late Florence Griffith Joyner at Indianapolis on 16 July 1988. She achieved that monster feat in her second round heat at the US Olympic Trials. It is not the timing that is in question here, it's the amount of wind-assistance she had. Officially, the wind gauge registered ‘zero'; but as everyone who was there knows, she had to have been blown along by a wind of around 5 metres per second, well above the ‘legal limit' of 2 m/sec. Significantly, the men's Triple Jump was taking place alongside the 100 metres straight at this time, and the entire event produced only three ‘legal' readings out of 46 jumps. Then two 100m races were run off with consecutive zero wind readings. This is unprecedented; especially when big following winds were being recorded all afternoon.

Having operated the devices in the past, I know that wind gauges can sometimes jam. I noted this once at an athletics meeting at Kingsmeadow Stadium at Kingston , Surrey , back in 1993. As a 100 metres race was underway, wind was literally howling into the device, but the digital reading on the gauge refused to budge. After the race, I had to un-jam and re-align the two fans inside the gauge so that the device worked again. (Two contra-rotating fans inside a small funnel measure the component of the wind speed over 5, 10 or 15 seconds). The sprinters that day were surely assisted by a wind of around 4-5 m/sec, but the official wind reading was ‘zero'!

Note that Carl Lewis ran 9.78 seconds the next day at Indianapolis in 1988 with a following breeze measured at a whopping 5.2 m/sec. FloJo won her final easily from 1984 Olympic Champion Evelyn Ashford (10.81) in a fine 10.61 seconds, with a following wind of 1.2 m/sec. For many statisticians, that mark is the real world record for women over the 100 metres distance.

*THE ANNUAL Isle of Man Festival of Sport is held every Easter weekend on Britain 's island in the North Sea . Hundreds of sportsmen and women arrive by ferry and aircraft for the occasion which is an exercise in alcohol tolerance and sleep-deprivation for many of the students taking part. The fiercest partygoers are the Rugby players, and they are also the most inventive in thinking up japes. One unfortunate player consumed so much local bitter after a game that he was literally legless when his team-mates got him back to their hotel. At dawn, they carried the bed containing their snoring pal out of the hotel, across the promenade and onto the beach. Then they sat on the outer lobby of the hotel and ate breakfast as they waited for him to wake up. When he eventually did – after 11.30am, he opened his bleary eyes to see a seagull perched on the headrest above him. His colleagues literally fell about laughing.

*WHAT IS the photographers' prayer? “Someday, my prints will come.”

davidcox@loxinfo.co.th

HOW TO CHANGE MOUSE BALLS

This was a real memo sent out by a computer company(IBM) to its employees in all seriousness. It went to all field engineers about a computer peripheral problem.

The author of this memo was quite genuine. The engineers rolled on the floor!

Especially note the last couple of sentences.

——————————————————————————————————

Re: Replacement of Mouse Balls.

If a mouse fails to operate or should it perform erratically, it may need a ball replacement.

Mouse balls are now available as FRU (Field Replacement Units). Because of the delicate nature of this procedure, replacement of mouse balls should only be attempted by properly trained personnel. Before proceeding, determine the type of mouse balls by examining the underside of the mouse. Domestic balls will be larger and harder than foreign balls. Ball removal procedures differ depending upon then manufacturer of the mouse.

Foreign balls can be replaced using the pop-off method. Domestic balls are replaced by using the twist-off method. Mouse balls are not usually static sensitive. However, excessive handling can result in sudden discharge. Upon completion of ball replacement, the mouse may be used immediately. It is recommended that each person have a pair of spare balls for maintaining optimum customer satisfaction. Any customer missing his balls should contact the local personnel in charge of removing and replacing these necessary items. Please keep in mind that a customer without properly working balls is an unhappy customer.

These are from potential visitors. They were posted on an Australian Tourism Website and the answers are the actual responses by the website officials, who obviously have a snide sense of humor.

Q: Does it ever get windy in Australia ? I have never seen it rain on

TV, so how do the plants grow? ( UK )

A: We import all plants fully grown and then just sit around

watching them die.

Q: Will I be able to see kangaroos in the street? ( USA )

A: Depends how much you've been drinking.

Q: I want to walk from Perth to Sydney - can I follow the railroad

tracks? ( Sweden )

A: Sure, it's only three thousand miles, take lots of water.

Q: Is it safe to run around in the bushes in Australia ? ( Sweden )

A: So it's true what they say about Swedes.

Q: Are there any ATMs (cash machines) in Australia ? Can you

send me a list of them in Brisbane, Cairns , Townsville and

Hervey Bay ? ( UK )

A: What did your last slave die of?

Q: Can you give me some information about hippo racing in

Australia ? ( USA )

A: A-fri-ca is the big triangle shaped continent south of Europe .

Aus-tra-lia is that big island in the middle of the Pacific which

does not... oh forget it. Sure, the hippo racing is every

Tuesday night in Kings Cross. Come naked.

Q: Which direction is North in Australia ? ( USA )

A: Face south and then turn 180 degrees. Contact us when you

get here and we'll send the rest of the directions.

Q: Can I bring cutlery into Australia ? ( UK )

A: Why? Just use your fingers like we do.

Q: Can you send me the Vienna Boys' Choir schedule? ( USA )

A: Aus-tri-a is that quaint little country bordering Ger-man-y,

which is...oh forget it. Sure, the Vienna Boys Choir plays

every Tuesday night in Kings Cross, straight after the hippo

races. Come naked.

Q: Can I wear high heels in Australia ? ( UK )

A: You are a British politician, right?

Q: Are there supermarkets in Sydney and is milk available all

year round? ( Germany )

A: No, we are a peaceful civilization of vegan hunter/gatherers.

Milk is illegal.

Q: Please send a list of all doctors in Australia who can

dispense rattlesnake serum. ( USA )

A: Rattlesnakes live in A-meri-ca which is where YOU come

from. All Australian snakes are perfectly harmless, can be

safely handled and make good pets, especially The Taipans.

Q: I have a question about a famous animal in Australia ,but I

forget its name. It's a kind of bear and lives in trees. ( USA )

A: It's called a Drop Bear. They are so called because they drop out of gum trees and eat the brains of anyone walking underneath them. You can scare them off by spraying yourself with human urine before you go out walking.

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