The Charm of AFP 3
[ In a meetreport written by MegaMole]
Through no fault of MrO's, we found ourselves all five in a car clearly designed for exactly four. As two of the five were ccooke and myself, this was possibly even more cramped than it might otherwise have been, as either of us could lose six inches from our height and still be over six feet all... After a couple of abortive attempts get getting everyone in we did eventually manage to compress ourselves sufficiently to make the journey, albeit with a bumper sticker that said "Warning: Contents under pressure".
[ another bit on cats]
> [...about Sooty sneaking up on a butterfly..] He sneaked up on it, got
> really close, then instead of catching it, he sniffed it. He sniffed it, after half
> an hour's sneaking up.

Think of it this way: A cat (the size of an elephant) sneaks up on you...
... then he sniffs really loudly on your ear !

You would have a heart attack (no matter how healthy).
That's animal cruelty
[this is a quote, but I have no idea from who in which book. I got it from someone's .sig and quite like it]
"I would feel infinitely more comfortable in your presence if you would agree to treat gravity as a law, rather than one of a number of suggested options."
[Sorcha:]
I know someone who used to service cashpoint machines for a living. To get at some of the
electronics, he would have to undock the machine and pull it away from the wall (inside the
bank), and then climb into the space with the bag of tools and proceed to snip, solder and trim.

Apparently, it took an average of about ten minutes before someone would walk up, not
notice the lack of screen, dispenser, etc., and push their card in through the (now much
wider) card slot, and watch in bemusement as it flopped into the machine instead of
being sucked in as normal.

So, after the third time being hit on the head by flung bank cards he took to throwing
them back out of the slot, usually accompanied either by 'no, you *can't* have any money!'
or 'yargerrofoutofit' on particularly bad days.

[Shim:]
One of my friends still constantly alludes to an event a few
>years back when I walked into a lamppost and apologised to it...

[Grymma:]
Aha! It's not just me that does that then! What makes it worse, is my
following up with "Oh, you're a lamppost, I don't need to apologise to
you....so, Sorry". D'oh

[ in a quotefile]
Charissa: I hate Ally McBeal. I keep shouting at her - Eat some CAKE, woman!

[someone who..erm..hadn't really understood what AFP is..]
> I'll bet if I wrote a post on discworld I'd get a few replies, then everyone'd bunk off for something
>about someone else, or the footie results.

[David]
Probably, because that's an ABP topic. What would more likely happen is that if the thread was interesting it would carry on here for a while and then be cross-posted to ABP, where it would turn [I] in a hurry, the ABPers would bitch about it and cross-post it back here, and after about 70 posts it would mutate into a thread about the role of the chainsaw in modern morris dancing. It's all go on AFP, I'm telling you.

[AFP is famous^Wnotorious…]
alt.games.x-com, 6/10/99.
Alt.Fan.Pratchett -easily the weirdest NG on this planet and the
people occupying the newsgroup are very much like supermarket trolleys,
no matter where you go there are always one or two already there.

:-) A former subscriber, I suspect... -Shim.

Gidjabolgo wrote:
>> alt.fan.pratchett.fans is about as meaningful as the department of
>> redundancy department. This would be aimed to satisfy the fans of afp'ers,
>>where they can discuss the merits of Gabriel's butt, Gid's beard, ppint's
>> anti-capitalistic posts and other subjects of that ilk.

[Melusine]
>Whereas of course, we should really have alt.fan.gid's-beard and its
>inevitable anti-group, alt.gid's-beard.die.die.die
>What else? alt.fan.dog.troll.troll.troll (of course the Dog couldn't
>actually post there for fear of copyright issues on his more vitriollic
>posts when they appeared elsewhere in Usenet),
>alt.fan.charles-cooke.tall.tall.tall and of course,
>alt.fan.peter-ellis.ewok.ewok.ewok

[Gidjabolgo]
Shouldn't that be alt.gid's-beard.shave.shave.shave ?

[Gideon]
> > Of *course* they should know. We are talking about the centre of the
> > entire known Universe, after all...

[Penny]
> Ah, there you have it wrong, young Gideon ... EVERYONE knows that
> Washington, DC is the center of the Universe, known or otherwise.

[Melusine]
I'm afraid you're both wrong. The Centre of the Universe is indeed located close
to the City of London although it moves around [1], and its current location may be
attributed to the fact that I am currently sitting in Shoreditch typing this.
When I get up and go to work, then The Centre of the Universe will move to the
City of London, hence Gideon's confusion [2].
For, as all right-thinking [3] persons will agree, *I* am the Centre of the Universe.

Mmmkay?
Mel

[1] In fact Fremont in Seattle attempted to claim it was the Centre of the Known Universe, but this is obviously false [4]
[2] Which may explain Gideon's otherwise unjustifiable confusion on this whole point, if he knows what's good for him
[3] That is, all persons who know what's good for them
[4] I haven't been to Seattle since April.

Dancing Ham(p)sters.. dancing Jesus.. dancing ferrets, fish, cows, sheep,floppy disks, dildos, chocolate body paint (oops that's just a fantasy of mine).. Don't they know I what they're doing to me?
Soon I'll be afraid to open a web browser for fear of having something new and unexpected dancing at me (with a terrible midi/wav file going off in the background.)

OK so like anyone else, I have my fears. When it first started it used to be spiders.. but only sudden, large and unexpected ones.
You know the type, you have your head deep inside a cupboard whilst trying to read the gas meter and a 2" monster with eyes that you can see your reflection in makes a dash for it from underneath the Jeycloths.. next thing you know I would be nursing the back of my head after accelerating in the opposite direction without taking cupboard dimensions into account. Now a particularly large and sudden one will still make me jump, but once I know it is here, I'm not really overly concerned.

Stuff that would scare other folks doesn't seem to bother me, I've abseiled from the centre of the Tyne bridge into a waiting boat (several times... and since we were running the charity drop it *was* the quickest way to go for coffee.. doesn't half scare the person who is going down at the time when the person who *was* running the safety rope when they left the top passes them at high speed halfway down.. I tend to use speed descent equipment where friction is a minimal restraint and the main concern is not to melt the rope when you slow down at the bottom.. shameless plug.. Petzel gear is wonderful ), I've fallen 30 feet while leading a climb (I put the protection in so it failing is my fault, thankfully I was 35 feet up the climb at the time), I've had a figure of eight snap while I was using it (not a Petzel one..there wasn't a safety rope on at the time.. the rope burns on the hands healed fairly rapidly), I've cycled off a cliff into a deep water bay.. (don't be on the bike when you hit the water).

Now the other week I finally found a phobia... mind- numbing, heart in throat, tightening chest, gut wrenching fear... I broke into a cold sweat and began to shake.
To be stood in a roomful of experienced Jive dancers when you've had 3 lessons and to be expected to string together more than 2 moves without a safety net... knowing that people will see how crap at it I am. Now *that* was fear. Johanna has been to about 15 lessons, is a natural and Jive is a male led dance so although she gets to look stunning *I* have to do all the hard work and remember how to do all of the signals so she goes where I'm hoping.
I couldn't even think of a single move to *start*on, never mind the second one.

Oh and they're lying, a background of defence arts and fencing does not help in dance.. not even a little bit.
I mean presenting someone a target that large and not worrying about being able to reverse balance instantly goes against everything I learned.

Slowly I've got around the problem though.. Jo runs me through the moves over and again at home.. with the official names for the moves.. then when we get on the dance floor, she thinks up the *next* move and that gives me time to remember how on earth to do it. The next problem is going to be when I have to dance with someone who doesn't yell moves at me as they spin past.. ah well such is life.

So slowly I'm starting to recover from that dreadful moment and things start dancing at me.. *gibber*.. *wimper* eep.

Warwick "My name is Paul and I'm at this meeting to recover from not being able to dance"

[Anon]
> >As we suspected, Terry Pratchett is a woman

[Alex Page]
> Then she must be a dwarf, 'cause she's got a bloody good beard... but then she'd be too tall.

[Jens Ayton]
Well, she's a _giant_ dwarf. Obviously. (Some people just can't think for themselves, eh?)

[MEG wrote:]
I'm going to have to re-record my telephone answering machine message after a cock-up on the mobile phone front and I have no imagination. As opposed to the "Hello this is ***. I'm not available to take your boring yawn..zzzz..", I'd like something a little bit more interesting without going to the trouble of faking a Fozzie Bear voice.
It needs to be short but clear without being abrupt. What sort of options do you guys employ?
I expect (and *demand*) there will be at least one URL to hilarious sound bites or transcripts if only for entertainment value.

I'd love to have the guts to say:
*sounds of grunting and heavy breathing*
Sorry I can't take your call. I'm having mad, passionate sex here on the lounge floor. Would mind very much leaving a message until we've finished?
*whoops and hollars*

[Jens Ayton]
>Murphy sez your mum would be the first to phone.

[Stefano Busti]
Murphy's Corollary sez her other half would be second.

[Alex Page]
Hmm, I like my friend Dave Bastard's old message: "Hi, this is Dave's fridge. I'm afraid that Dave's answering machine can't come to the phone right now, but if you'd like to leave a message after the tone, I'll try and rearrange my magnetic letters so it gets through."

[Emma]
"Hi, <insert name here> are a bit busy right now. <i.n.h> likes to do it up and down, but I prefer little circles. Please leave your name and number, and when we've finished brushing our teeth we'll call you back."

Alternatively, a vet I used to know of had a message that took bloody ages to explain exactly why he couldn't answer the phone (down the back paddock up to his knees in cowshit while delivering a calf, or something similarly yukky to think about) so that only really urgent messages would be left on the machine. Dunno if it worked.

[ Ailbhe ]
"We are screening our calls. If you are <name>, don't bother leaving a message, as we won't answer you. If you are <name>, send an email instead. If you are <name>, yes, Sunday would be fine, please suggest a time. If you are none of these people, leave a brief message.
If we can be bothered, and can remember how to work the machine, we might listen to it."

[Flabbergast]
Well one of my favvies are as follows:

< insert normal way of answering>
_pause_
hello?
_pause_
HELLO !?
_pause_
<insert thunking handset to something hard - while muttering in the background "frigging phone">
hello anyone there?
_pause_
<insert manical laugh>
I'm not able to take your call right now, but if you've stayed on this far, you obviously want something. you know the drill by now, after all ansa-phones aren't anything new and hitech anymore.

BEEP

upwards to the index / back to the quote-section / onwards to cut/paste file nr 4