Ockham's Spoon

My wife suggested that we start a restaurant and call it 'Karma'. I asked what we would serve there. She said, "Just desserts."

A man was complaining about his life to his clergyman. "I was a hard-working clerk making $30,000 per year. I was frugal, living carefully, saving my money, and I was happy and content. Then one day I fell in with some shady characters and I got suckered into a high-stakes poker game. That was my ruin. Now I am anxious, stressed, and miserable." The clergyman says "So you fell into temptation and lost all your savings?" "No, I won, and like a fool I bought this lousy internet company."

I have heard some complaints about Harrison Ford being too old to be in the latest Indiana Jones movie. But honestly, an 80-year old professor not retiring is the most accurate part of the whole franchise.

I took my car to a mechanic recently and the news was worse than I thought. He told me my battery needed a new car.

A hiker is passing by a farm and stops to say hello and pet the farmer’s dog. After a brief chat with the farmer, the hiker starts making barking noises, which the dog responds to. “What are you doing?” the farmer asks. “Oh, I can speak with animals.” says the hiker. “That’s impossible.” the farmer says. “Well, your dog tells me that you live alone out here on the farm, and he is your best friend, and sometimes you give him steak off you plate when you have dinner.” “Well, that is all true, but you could have guessed that. Animals can’t talk.” says the farmer. The hiker then makes some neighing noises, and the farmer’s horse responds in kind. “Well, now, your horse tells me that you brush him daily, and he gets oats and carrots at least once a week.” “Lots of horses eat oats and carrots. That doesn’t mean anything.” says the farmer. “Okay, then, let me ask your sheep over there something that only she would know.” says hiker. The farmer says angrily “Now don’t be talking to the sheep, she’s a damn liar!”

The growing pilot shortage has led to lowering of standards at airlines, and the following incident: A new pilot and copilot landing for the first time at Des Moines, Iowa, International Airport, are flummoxed by the runway. After a minute, the pilot says, "Wow! This is short. We need full flaps and air brakes." Co-pilot replies, "Sure!" The pilot looks ahead and tells the co-pilot, "This runway is way so short, when we touch down I need full reverse throttle." Co-pilot says, "Ok, sir!" The plane touches down on the numbers! With all the dirty wings and reverse engines, it makes a horrendous noise, skidding and swerving until it comes to a halt just short of the grass. The pilot says, "Wow! That’s the shortest runway I’ve ever seen!" The co-pilot looks out both windows and says, "Yeah, but did you ever see one so wide?"

John visited his 90-year-old grandpa who lived way out in the country. On the first morning of the visit, John’s grandpa prepared a breakfast of bacon and eggs. John noticed a film-like substance on his plate, and asked, “Are these plates clean?” His grandpa replied, “They’re as clean as cold water can get them. Just go ahead and finish your meal.” For lunch, Grandpa made hamburgers. Again, John was concerned about the plates, as his appeared to have specks of dried egg on it. “Are you sure these plates are clean?” he asked. Without looking up, Grandpa said, “I told you before, those dishes are as clean as cold water can get them!” Later, as John was leaving, his grandpa’s dog started to growl and wouldn’t let him pass. John said, “Grandpa, your dog won’t let me get by!” Grandpa yelled to the dog, “Cold Water, go lie down!”

In 1945 the Second World War a soldier was asked by the regimental medical orderly when he had last had sex with a woman. He replied "1943, sir." The orderly was surprised and said "Well, that was a quite a while ago." The soldier looked at his watch and said "Well, it is only 20:45 now, sir."

A rural dean once went to visit one of his local priests. He could see the priest looked sad, so he asked what the matter was. The priest replied, “I have had my bicycle stolen, and what is worse, I think it has been stolen by one of my congregation.” The wise rural dean thought for a second and said, “Ah, what you need to do.. is preach a sermon on the 10 Commandments. When you get to “Thou shalt not steal” look sternly at all the congregation. The person who looks embarrassed will be the one who stole it.” A few weeks later, the rural dean visited the priest again and he was much happier. The priest told. him he had got his bike back. The rural dean said, “Did you preach on the 10 Commandments?” “Yes.” replied the priest “And did you find out who took it?” “Er, not exactly. When I got to “Thou shalt not commit adultery”, I remembered where I left it.”

A Russian agent arrives at a small Welsh station and asks for Mr Jones. “Well,” says the stationmaster, “there’s Jones the Milk, Jones the Meat, Jones the Flowers, Jones the Undertaker. In fact, my name’s Jones.” The agent whispers to him, “The eagle doesn’t walk over the mountain.” “Ah,” says the stationmaster, “you want Jones the Spy.”

When you are in your 20’s and a girl looks at you, it is because of your youth and vitality. When a woman looks at you in your 30’s, it is because of your maturity and sophistication. When you are in your 40’s and a woman looks at you, it is because of your grey hairs and wisdom. I’m at the age now where if a woman looks at me, I look down to see if I have my pants on.

After a particularly mild winter in small town, the place became infected with squirrels in the spring. Because the local churches had the best trees, the squirrels often congregated (pun intended) near them and this is what each church decided to do about the pesky animals. The Presbyterian church called a meeting to decide what to do about their squirrel infestation. After much prayer and consideration, they concluded that the squirrels were predestined to be there, and they shouldn’t interfere with God’s divine will. At the Baptist church the squirrels had taken an interest in the baptistery. The deacons met and decided to put a waterslide on the baptistery and let the squirrels drown themselves. The squirrels liked the slide and unfortunately, knew instinctively how to swim, so twice as many squirrels showed up the following week. The Lutheran church decided that they were not in a position to harm any of God’s creatures. So, they humanely trapped their squirrels and set them free near the Baptist church. Two weeks later the squirrels were back when the Baptists took down the waterslide. But the Catholic church came up with their own strategy. They baptized all the squirrels and made them members of the church. Now they only see them at Christmas and Easter.

Whoever put the 's' in 'fast food' is a marketing genius

Credit Bill Murray: "Whenever someone says they did something 'like a boss', I assume that means they didn't do it at all, and are merely taking credit for it."

Two best friends, Hank and Tom, share a passion for baseball. They played numerous games together over decades, collected baseball memorabilia, coached leagues, you name it. As they got older and retired, the realization hit they couldn’t play like they used to. So they made a pact. Whichever of them passed first, he would come back and let the other know if there was baseball in heaven. Not too long after this, Hank passes away. Tom is heartbroken and visits their beloved baseball diamond everyday. One day while he’s sitting and reminiscing, he hears Hank's voice clear as day. “Hank is that you?” Tom asks. “Yes it is buddy! I didn’t forget our pact. I have good news and bad news. The good news is there’s baseball in heaven!” Tom is elated, “Well, what could possibly be bad then?” Hank says ”The bad news is, you’re scheduled to pitch next week!”

An upper-class fellow is going through his household accounts, and realizing they are spending beyond their means. He looks up and says to his wife: “You know, darling, if you would learn how to prepare meals properly, we could get rid of the cook.” She answers: “And if you learned how to screw, we could get rid of the chauffeur.”

A bartender in the old west is busy cleaning glasses when a guy comes bursting thru the swinging doors gasping “Big Earl's a-commin into town”. Immediately, all the drinkers drop whatever they're doing, run out the door and down the street. The bartender thinks this is a little odd (he's new in town), but whatever. He steps away from the bar and starts cleaning up tables. Pretty soon, he hears loud foot steps coming towards the saloon. Then the biggest guy he's ever seen rips the doors off, tosses them aside, bends down a little to get thru the doorway. He sees the bartender cowering behind a table, picks him up, tosses him behind the bar, walks over and says “Whiskey”. Terrified, the bartender gets a glass and a bottle and brings them over. The guy grabs the bottle, breaks the top off with his teeth, and drinks it down, dashing, the bottle into shards on the floor. The bartender says “Can I get you anything else, sir”? “Nope. Gotta run. Big Earl's coming.”

On a train from London to Manchester, an American was berating a British guy sitting across from him in the compartment, about Britain leaving Europe. "The trouble with you English is that you are too stuffy. You set yourselves apart too much and it is going to be worse now you are leaving the EU. You think your stiff upper lip makes you above the rest of us. Look at me . . . . . I'm an ‘all round’ me! I have a little Italian in me, a bit of Greek blood, a little Irish and some Spanish blood. What do you say to that?" The British fellow lowered his newspaper, looks over his glasses at the American and replies; "Well, that was terribly sporting of your mother!"

I never liked the way D&D tried to balance spell-casters and warriors, so on that count I whole-heartedly agree with you. One of the strengths of the Hero system is that building powers with points helps ensure balance in the game. If some characters buy their 'powers' with points and others buy them with money, you potentially lose some of that balance. How much is going to depend on how you set up your magic system and what characters are allowed to do with magic. The one downside to making magic depend only on a 5 point skill is that it lowers the barrier to spell-casting to the point that everyone would be doing it (or at least all the PCs). If that is what you want, go for it. But consider how radically it would change a fantasy world if magic is a run-of-the-mill ability that almost everyone has. Yes, you can make it rare by saying only people with the mark of the dragon or something can wield magic, but that is a consideration the GM is going to have to take into account when building the world. I never liked the way D&D tried to balance spell-casters and warriors, so on that count I whole-heartedly agree with you. One of the strengths of the Hero system is that building powers with points helps ensure balance in the game. If some characters buy their 'powers' with points and others buy them with money, you potentially lose some of that balance. How much is going to depend on how you set up your magic system and what characters are allowed to do with magic. The one downside to making magic depend only on a 5 point skill is that it lowers the barrier to spell-casting to the point that everyone would be doing it (or at least all the PCs). If that is what you want, go for it. But consider how radically it would change a fantasy world if magic is a run-of-the-mill ability that almost everyone has. Yes, you can make it rare by saying only people with the mark of the dragon or something can wield magic, but that is a consideration the GM is going to have to take into account when building the world.

Science fact: 100% of the people who confuse correlation with causation die.

A traveling salesman walks up the driveway and knocks on the door. After a while the door opens and a little boy, about 9, stands with a glass of whisky in one hand and a cigar in the other. The salesman says “Oh, hi. is you mommy or daddy home?” Little boy looks at his whisky and his cigar and says, “Does it look like it?”

My doctor tells me that there are health risks associated with cured meats, but I'm not sure I believe that. I mean, they have to be better for me than diseased meats.