Monday Miscellany: Odds, Ends and Personals

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Last Friday I posted a joke that relied on 24 hour military time for the punch line. In the joke someone asked a sergeant major when was the last time that he had had sex and he replied 1995. The woman makes love to him and says that he hadn’t forgotten much from 1995, to which he replied that he hoped not in that it was 2130 then.

I updated that from an oldie that had 1955 as the date, but that would have made the soldier a geriatric, hence the revised time/year.

Only I screwed up, as Byter Kieran G pointed out in an email to me:

Hi Otto,

Appreciated as always. But one joke, the Sgt Major who hadn’t had sex, which was funny didn’t quite make sense. The time could never have been “1995” as there are of course only 60 minutes. Maybe it should be read as 2001…

Cheers

2001 has its own problem in that most people would say it as “Two Thousand and One”, if only from the title of the Space Odyssey move. I therefore suggest “2010” in that that date would more commonly be stated as “Twenty Ten”, thereby coinciding with the way that that military time would be expressed. The drawback is that the interval, 5 years, is not as long.

Here is the revised joke:

A crusty old Marine Sergeant Major found himself at a gala event hosted by a local liberal arts college. There was no shortage of extremely young idealistic ladies in attendance, one of whom approached the Sergeant Major for conversation.

"Excuse me, Sergeant Major, but you seem to be a very serious man. Is something bothering you?"

"Negative, ma'am. Just serious by nature."

The young lady looked at his awards and decorations and said, "It looks like you have seen a lot of action."

"Yes, ma'am, a lot of action."

The young lady, tiring of trying to start up a conversation, said, "You know, you should lighten up a little. Relax and enjoy yourself."

The Sergeant Major just stared at her in his serious manner. Finally the young lady said, "You know, I hope you don't take this the wrong way, but when is the last time you had sex?"

"2010, ma'am."

"Well, there you are. You really need to chill out and quit taking everything so seriously! I mean, no sex since 2010! She took his hand and led him to a private room where she proceeded to "relax" him several times.

Afterwards, panting for breath, she leaned against his bare chest and said, "Wow, you sure didn't forget much since 2010!"

The Sergeant Major, glancing at his watch, said in his serious voice, "I should hope not ma'am, it's only 2130 now."

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Byter Richard P sent me an email in response to the series of pics entitled “Why Women Live Longer”. Those pics showed men in various Darwin Award situations.

Richard said:

Still my all time favourite:

The above pic was distributed by email some years back with the following qestions:

Challenge yourself here: 

A Backhoe weighing 8 tons is on top of a flatbed trailer and heading east on Interstate 70 near Hays, Kansas. The extended shovel arm is made of hardened refined steel and the approaching overpass is made of commercial-grade concrete, reinforced with 1 1/2 inch steel rebar spaced at 6 inch intervals in a crisscross pattern layered at 1 foot vertical spacing. 

Solve: When the shovel arm hits the overpass, how fast do you have to be going to slice the bridge in half? (Assume no effect for headwind and no breaking by the driver...) 

Extra Credit: Solve for the time and distance required for the entire rig to come to a complete stop after hitting the overpass at the speed calculated above. 

Answer below... 

Answer - 

Who cares, the trucking company just bought themselves a bridge.

The authority on urban myths, snopes.com, classes this as “true” and has the following commentary:

The photographs displayed above capture the aftermath of an accident that occurred on the evening of 13 February 2006 on Interstate 70 near Hays, Kansas. The driver of a semi-tractor trailer that was hauling a track hoe excavator on a flatbed misestimated the clearance at an overpass, and the boom of the hoe collided with the overpass and knocked a 45-foot gap through the deck of the bridge. The accident forced an 11-day closure of the eastbound lanes of Interstate 70. (The bridge itself remained closed even after the highway reopened.) 

The driver of the rig was uninjured, although he was later cited for not having clearance to drive on the interstate. The Kansas Department of Transportation said the construction company for which the driver worked would be liable for the cost of repairs to the overpass, which were estimated at $134,000 as of late March 2006.

Some more pics:

Btw, I liked how one person responded to the above question:  “The answer is 1.21 Jigawatts at 88 MPH.”