Once upon a time there were three little bears, sitting around in a bar, sipping three glasses of martini; one glass with a bored-to-death olive drowned depressingly in four ounces of alcohol. The olive had been a brilliant intellectual in his age, so the manner of his probable death was perfectly understandable. His outstanding thesis countermanding the great Chomskian paradigm of “All foreign policies suck and why autoworkers are lazy,” was a hard-cover best seller. It was quite appropriately titled: “Labors of thy Fruit”. Oprah loved it!
The other two olives led ordinary lives.
There is nothing sexy about three little bears goofing around in a bar. In fact, there is nothing sexy about martinis either. Mix four ounces of gin, half an ounce of vermouth, a splash of olive juice and drown an olive. It’s only because ‘license to kill’ loves to kick up his mojo, floor his Aston Martin and smoke some ethnic criminal ass after shaking a glass of martini, that the drink stirs up such a frenzy. Shaken, not stirred - Big deal! Prefer Long-Island iced tea anyway.
Back to the three little bears. One was a physics major, one an engineering major and the other Major major. They had gathered to solve an impossible Catch-22 situation – If Life shoots a bullet through your head then does Life take life? If yes, go to 10. If no then you are weird.
The engineering major says, “I am scared to death to die. There is no point in making a difference if all that remains are my ashes. I don’t know what terrible things happen to you after you die”.
The physics major says, “4.5 billion years”, and shuts up. He drinks an ounce of his martini.
Major major nods, sips an ounce of his martini and concentrates on filling up a 3x3 magic square with numbers so that the sum of each column and row are equal. He casts a furtive glance at the bar-tender.
The engineering major says, “Life is meaningless. Whatever I do is incremental improvements in well established technologies. I don’t believe in ripple effects.”
10> Economics Nobel laureate Milton Friedman died today – 11/16/2006. He was a staunch proponent of the idea that the government should not interfere with economic policy and let free market reign. RIP.
The physics major takes a long contented mouthful from his delicate glass, swirls it around with his tongue, swallows it and says, “4.5 billion years”.
Major major makes a smart observation. He easily proves that for an nxn magic square, the sum of each row and column depends only on n and is equal to (n3+n)/2. He gulps down another ounce of his drink.
The engineering major chokes in exasperation. “Would you explain yourself mister? Creativity is a lost art in science. Everything is driven by derivatives and not by vision. People who matter are people who do not matter at all. It’s all gloss without substance; existence for convenience”.
The physics major drinks up his martini, chews up the olive and with a slightly annoyed demeanor swats an imaginary fly called Marty Englehouse on the slick bar table. Contented with the good hunt he begins, “The earth is 4.5 billion years old. Man has been civilized for 5000 years of which he has learnt to whine and peeve for the past 1000. You had a great time for those billion years before you were born. You will have a great time for the next 4.5 billion years after you die. A mere 75 years will not change the consummate World Order. The fraction of your existence is too small. Even the first order term of a Taylor series expansion will vanish. Peace out”. He pays his bill, tips the bar tender and walks out.
Major major decides he wants to fill out an application to become a cop. He drinks the last two and a half ounces of his martini, spits out the olive, pays and leaves.
The engineering major pushes back his glass with the untouched martini and the intellectual olive. Disgusted, that life isn’t what he thought it was, he stomps out.
Monica Bellucci picks up the untouched glass, swallows down the martini and olive in quick gusto. She was bar tending.
The Olive has a wonderful time!
