Subject: Daily Dose - 050327 - You're not a monk, THIS is TRUE, discussing their future, DDL, Rotten News

A man is driving down the road and breaks down near a monastery. He goes to the monastery, knocks on the door, and says, "My car broke down. Do you think I could stay the night?"

The monks graciously accept him, feed him dinner, even fix his car. As the man tries to fall asleep, he hears a strange sound. A sound not like anything he's ever heard before. The Sirens that nearly seduced Odysseus into crashing his ship comes to his mind. He doesn't sleep that night. He tosses and turns trying to figure out what could possibly be making such a seductive sound. The next morning, he asks the monks what the sound was, but they say, "We can't tell you. You're not a monk."

Distraught, the man is forced to leave.

Years later, after never being able to forget that sound, the man goes back to the monastery and pleads for the answer again.

The monks reply, "We can't tell you. You're not a monk."

The man says, "If the only way I can find out what is making that beautiful sound is is to become a monk, then please, make me a monk."

The monks reply, "You must travel the earth and tell us how many blades of grass there are and the exact number of grains of sand When you find these answers, you will have become a monk."

The man sets about his task. After years of searching he returns and knocks on the door of the monastery. "I have traveled the earth and have found what you have asked for: By design, the world is in a state of perpetual change. Only God knows what you ask. All a man can know is himself, and only then if he is honest and reflective and willing to strip away self deception."

The monks reply, "Congratulations. You are now a monk. We shall now show you the way to the mystery of the sound."

The monks lead the man to a wooden door, where the head monk says, "The sound is beyond that door."

The monks give him the key, and he opens the door. Behind the wooden door is another door made of stone. The man is given the key to the stone door and he opens it, only to find a door made of ruby. And so it went that he needed keys to doors of emerald, gold and diamond.

Finally, the monks say, "This is the last key to the last door."

The man is apprehensive to no end. His life's wish is behind the door! He unlocks the door, turns the knob, and behind that door he is utterly amazed to find the source of that haunting and seductive sound... But I can't tell you what it is because you're not a monk.

___________________________

THIS is TRUE....

WHERE THERE'S SMOKE: Four firefighters in Sacramento, Calif., have been suspended after being caught ...um... engaged in "on-duty consensual sexual misconduct," says Chief Julius Cherry. The four, a male station captain, two male firefighters, and a female firefighter, would have one of the men act as a "lookout" while the others had sex. However, investigators say, the activities did not impair the squad's response to emergency calls. (Sacramento Bee)
...Because most of the calls they got were to report smoke coming out of the fire station's windows.

***

THERE'S FIRE: An investigation in Florida found that a group of firefighters in Tampa ...uh... participated in a "photo shoot" with two models at their station. Investigators say Capt. Al Suarez, 44, organized the event, hiring strippers "Jamie" and "Heather" to pose on fire trucks wearing, at most, firefighter pants, suspenders and high heels, and usually much less. Suarez was fired, and four firefighters were suspended without pay. (St. Petersburg Times)
...Firefighters are always in heat.

***

TRY, TRY AGAIN: A robber who hit a grocery store in Minneapolis, Minn., made the mistake of putting his gun on the counter so he could use both hands to scoop up the $2,000 in cash he got from the heist. As he was stuffing the money into a shopping bag featuring a Smiley Face, the clerk grabbed the gun, pointed it at the robber, and ordered him to leave. The robber did, but came back a few minutes later asking for his gun back. During the ensuing fight the robber's mask came off and he fled a second time, again without his gun. Police arrived just as the robber was leaving. They charged Dantzler L. Thomas, 24, with aggravated robbery. Officers found a left glove in Thomas's car; it matched a right glove left at the store. (Minneapolis Star Tribune)
...And I can't help but picture that glove as being still wrapped around the gun.

***

TRUST ME, DAHLING -- A SHAR PEI IS SUPPOSED TO BE WRINKLY: "West Hollywood May Ban Cosmetic Surgery for Pets"
-- Los Angeles Times

____________________________

Now that they are retired, my mother and father are discussing all aspects of their future. "What will you do if I die before you do?" Dad asked Mom.

After some thought, she said that she'd probably look for a house-sharing situation with three other single or widowed women who might be a little younger than herself, since she is so active for her age.

Then Mom asked Dad, "What will you do if I die first?"

He replied, "Probably the same thing."

______________________________

DDL

He died in attempting to swallow,
Which proves that, though fat, he was hollow.
For in gasping for space,
He swallowed his face,
And hadn't the courage to follow.

______________________________

"This week the U.S. Navy launched a nuclear submarine named after Jimmy Carter. Experts say the sub will be ineffective for four years but tremendously respected once it's retired."
--Conan O'Brien

***  

"Have you been following this steroid scandal? This is the first time in baseball history that the players have more additives than the hot dogs."
--Jay Leno

***  

"We've had more mudslides than the Bush twins on spring break"
--Bill Maher, on the weather in California.

***

She was only a steelworker's daughter, but you should see that pig iron.

***

Q. Why is Chelsea Clinton so ugly?  

A. Because Janet Reno is her real father.

____________________________

Rotten News...  (true)

Rice with everything in China - including relics

Mon Feb 28,12:58 AM ET 

BEIJING (Reuters) - Rice fills the bowls on many Chinese tables -- and also the cracks in its ancient buildings, and maybe even the Great Wall, Xinhua news agency reported.

"The legend that ancient Chinese craftsmen used glutinous rice porridge in the mortar while building ramparts has been verified," it said in a report seen on Monday.

Archaeologists researching an ancient wall around the city of Xi'an, a former imperial capital and home to the famed terracotta warriors, were stumped by the ingredients of a resilient mortar holding bricks together.

The hardened paste reacted similarly to glutinous, or sticky, rice in chemical tests, Qin Jianming, a researcher with the Xi'an Preservation and Restoration Centre of Cultural Relics, was quoted as saying.

"Thus we can conclude that the sticky material was in the mortar," Qin said.

The 12-metre (40-ft) wall was built during the early Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) and remains well preserved today.

Rice, a staple for most of the country, may also have been used to keep one of the world's most famous structures together, Xinhua said.

"It is said that ancient construction workers used glutinous rice porridge when building the Great Wall more than 2,000 years ago."

**********

February 25, 2005 

Fishing tale easy swallow: Norwegian lands halibut too big for his boat

OSLO, Norway (AP) - Unlike many fishermen, Harald Skoge didn't have to exaggerate the size of his latest catch. The 146-kilogram halibut was too big for his nearly nine-metre-long boat.

Skoge, who fishes as a hobby, was trying his luck off western Norway with a simple hook and line Wednesday when he thought something had gone wrong.

"At first, I thought the hook had gotten stuck at the bottom," the retiree was quoted as saying in Friday's edition of his local newspaper, Sunnmoersposten.

Slowly, he was able to roll in the line, and realized something very, very big was on the end. When the giant halibut broke the surface, he realized it was too big to haul into his boat.

"I had to tow it to land," he told the newspaper.

After three hours of towing the fish, he was able to deliver it to a local fish processing plant, which weighed and bought the catch.

According to Skoge, the fish's head alone weighed 19 kilograms, more than many anglers can claim for their whole catch.

**********

Thais in a flap over public rubbing of breasts

Fri Feb 25,12:11 AM ET 

BANGKOK (Reuters) - A promotion for breast enhancing cream that involved three models having a 15 minute mammary massage in public has caused a furore in Thailand, with family groups saying it violates traditional values and morality.

Despite Bangkok's racy reputation as the "anything goes" sex capital of southeast Asia, most Thais are uncomfortable with public nudity and all newspaper pictures of the demonstration had the breasts blurred out. "The campaign is just to promote the product without considering the damage to society," Ladda Thangsupachai of the Cultural Watch Centre told the Nation newspaper on Friday. "This is taking advantage of society and an irresponsible act."

Executives of St Herb Co., which makes the "breast beautifying" cream, said they laid on the stunt merely to counter suggestions their advertising claims were exaggerated.

The Nation said Ying, one of the models, was embarrassed at having to bare herself in front of the cameras, but did believe her breasts had become firmer and the gap between them smaller as a result of the treatment.

St Herb is likely to evade the wrath of regulators because the cream is "breast beautifying" rather than "breast enlarging" -- a trick missed by makers of a "breast enlarging bra" now under scrutiny from the Thai Food and Drug Administration.

Whether it works or not, a headline in the Thai Post tabloid summed up the controversy best in a society obsessed with marketing gimmicks: "Big breast bras good for people with small brains".

Dumb cop.