This Page is dedicated to humorous things, I intend to add things, as I feel sad and need something to make me laugh.
Make sure to check out the pictures page, send me anything you feel worthy...
some quickies...
You're aware the boy failed my grade school math class, I take it? And
not that many years later he's teaching college. Now I ask you: Is that
the sorriest indictment of the American educational system you ever
heard? [pauses to light cigarette.] No aptitude at all for long
division, but never mind. It's him they ask to split the atom. How he
talked his way into the Nobel prize is beyond me. But then, I suppose
it's like the man says, It's not what you know...
- Karl Arbeiter, former teacher of Albert Einstein
A True Story:
A lady in a faded gingham dress and her husband, dressed in a homespun
threadbare suit, stepped off the train in Boston, and walked timidly
without an appointment into the president's outer office.
The secretary could tell in a moment that such backwoods, country hicks
had no business at Harvard and probably didn't even deserve to be in
Cambridge.
She frowned. "We want to see the president", the man said softly.
"He'll be busy all day," the secretary snapped.
"We'll wait," the lady replied.
For hours, the secretary ignored them, hoping that the couple would
finally become discouraged and go away. They didn't. And the
secretary grew
frustrated and finally decided to disturb the president, even though it
was a chore she always regretted to do. "Maybe if they just see
you for a
few minutes, they'll leave," she told him. And he signed in
exasperation and
nodded.
Someone of his importance obviously didn't have the time to spend with
them, but he detested gingham dresses and homespun suits cluttering up
his outer office.
The president, stern-faced with dignity, strutted toward the couple.
The lady told him, "We had a son that attended Harvard for one year. He
loved Harvard. He was happy here. But about a year ago, he was
accidentally killed And my husband and I would like to erect a memorial
to him, somewhere on campus".
The president wasn't touched he was shocked.
"Madam," he said gruffy, "We can't put up a statue for every
person who
attended Harvard and died. If we did, this place would look like a
cemetery".
"Oh, no," the lady explained quickly, "We don't want to erect a
statue.
We thought we would like to give a building to Harvard.
The president rolled his eyes. He glanced at the gingham dress and
homespun suit, then exclaimed, "A building! Do you have any earthly idea
how much a building costs? We have over seven and a half million dollars
in the physical plant at Harvard".
For a moment the lady was silent. The president was pleased. He could
get rid of them now.
And the lady turned to her husband and said quietly, "Is that all it
costs to start a University? Why don't we just start our own?"
Her husband
nodded.
The president's face wilted in confusion and bewilderment.
And Mr. and Mrs. Leland Stanford walked away, traveling to Palo Alto,
California where they established the University that bears their name, a
memorial to a son that Harvard no longer cared about.