901

SOME AMAZING (AND SOME DECIDEDLY HORRID) FACTS

If you'd yelled solidly for 8 years, 6 months and 5 days you would have produced enough sound energy to heat one cup of coffee.

(Hardly seems worth it.)

If you farted consistently for 6 years and 9 months, enough gas would be generated to create the energy of an atomic bomb.

(Hey, that's more like it!)

The human heart creates enough pressure when it pumps round the body to squirt blood 30 feet into the air.

(Wow!)

A pig's orgasm lasts 30 minutes.

(Double wow!!)

Is that why they're always squealing?

A cockroach will live for nine days without its head before it starves to death. (Creepy)

(I'm still not over the pig.)

Banging your head against a wall uses up 150 calories an hour.

(Er, don't try this at home; maybe at work.)

The male praying mantis cannot copulate while its head is attached to its body. The female initiates sex by ripping the male's head off.

(Honey, I'm home . What the f...?)

The flea can jump 350 times its own body length. It's like a human jumping the length of a football field.

(30 minutes. Lucky pig! Can you imagine?)

The catfish has over 27,000 taste buds.

(Now what could be that darned tasty on the bottom of a pond?)

Some lions mate over 50 times a day.

(I still cannot believe that pig.... quality over quantity!)

Butterflies taste with their feet.

(Something I had always wanted to know.)

The strongest muscle in the body is the tongue.

(Hmm....)

Right-handed people live, on average, nine years longer than left-handed ones do.

(If you're ambidextrous, do you split the difference?)

Elephants are the only animals that cannot jump.

(Okay, so that would be a good thing.)

A cat's urine glows under a black light.

(Indeed? I wonder - how much did it cost the government to work that one out?)

An ostrich's eye is bigger than its brain.

(I know some humans like that.)

Starfish don't have brains.

(I know some humans like that as well.)

Polar bears are left-handed.

(If they switched, wouldn't they live a lot longer?)

Humans and dolphins are the only species that have sex for pleasure.

(What about that pig? Do the dolphins know about the pig?)

WAYS TO FINISH A RELATIONSHIP QUICKLY

My wife has been dropping hints to me about what she wants for our upcoming anniversary. Recently, she said, 'Ooh, I want something that goes from 0 to 150 in 3 seconds!'
So I got her a set of bathroom scales.

I tried to talk my wife into buying a case of Miller Lite beer for $13.95. Instead, she bought a jar of cold cream costing $7.85.
I told her the Lite would make her look a lot better at night than the cold cream.
Then the fight started....

My wife asked me if a certain velvet outfit made her butt look big. I told her not as much as the one that she wore yesterday.

A man and a woman were woken from a joyous post-coital sleep at 3.00 o'clock in the morning by a noise outside.
The woman leapt from the bed and yelled at the man 'Holy crap. That must be my husband!' The perplexed man leapt out of bed still naked and jumped out of the window.
He crashed to the ground, ran through a mass of thorn bushes and off to his car as fast as he could go.
A few moments later he returned, torn and bloody, and yelled at the woman, 'Hold on a minute... I AM your husband!'
The woman yelled back, 'Exactly! So why were you running?'

Last Saturday I got up early; quietly put my clothes on; had some coffee; made lunch and slipped out to the garage.
I tied the boat up to the Volvo then drove off, straight into a torrential downpour.
A lively 50 mph gale was blowing, so I pulled back into the garage, switched on the radio, and heard that the weather was set to be the same all day.
I tiptoed back into the house, quietly undressed, and slipped into bed. I snuggled up against my snoozing wife and, cupping her breasts suggestively, I whispered in quiet anticipation: 'It's me, sexy; the weather out there is awful.'
My loving wife of 10 years replied, 'Can you believe that my stupid husband is out fishing in all that?'
Then the fight started...

A woman is sitting in the cool of the evening on the veranda with her husband.
She says gently, "Oh, I love you so very much."
He smiles shyly, and says, "Is that you or the wine talking?
She says, "It's me talking to the wine."

902

La Belle Dame Sans Merci
by John Keats

O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
Alone and palely loitering?
The sedge has withered from the lake,
And no birds sing.

O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
So haggard and so woe-begone?
The squirrel's granary is full,
And the harvest's done.

I see a lily on thy brow,
With anguish moist and fever-dew,
And on thy cheeks a fading rose
Fast withereth too.

I met a lady in the meads,
Full beautiful-a faery's child,
Her hair was long, her foot was light,
And her eyes were wild.

I made a garland for her head,
And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;
She looked at me as she did love,
And made sweet moan

I set her on my pacing steed,
And nothing else saw all day long,
For sidelong would she bend, and sing
A faery's song.

She found me roots of relish sweet,
And honey wild, and manna-dew,
And sure in language strange she said-
'I love thee true'.

She took me to her Elfin grot,
And there she wept and sighed full sore,
And there I shut her wild wild eyes
With kisses four.

And there she lulled me asleep,
And there I dreamed-Ah! woe betide!-
The latest dream I ever dreamt
On the cold hill side.

I saw pale kings and princes too,
Pale warriors, death-pale were they all;
They cried-'La Belle Dame sans Merci
Hath thee in thrall!'

I saw their starved lips in the gloam,
With horrid warning gaped wide,
And I awoke and found me here,
On the cold hill's side.

And this is why I sojourn here,
Alone and palely loitering,
Though the sedge is withered from the lake,
And no birds sing.

Raising Bedlam with Mademoiselle Miley Cyrus
- A Sordid Tale
Jason Lofts

A deranged girl is on a wrecking ball,
Lonely and lewdly twerking:
An underdressed shepherdess
Masquerading in a string.

She suggestively licked a sledgehammer,
This degenerate Disney lass,
Swaggering and unashamedly
Showing off her ass.

With pasties plastered on her tits,
Half-naked, lewd and willing,
Young Miley gyrated flirtatiously,
Her followers a-thrilling.

Serenaded by Robin Thicke on MTV,
She twerked and enthralled.
Though others such as Will Smith
And young family were appalled.

We watched her shuddering in flagrante,
The dishevelled sweaty jezebel;
Brandishing a tasteless foam dildo,
A much desired titillating belle.

O how heedless and wholehearted,
She degenerated even more,
Middle-aged fathers and mothers
Called her a loathsome hoidenish whore.

O, her wanton naked tawdriness
Caused an infinite outrage.
Had she been inhaling on a hashish pipe
Before installing herself on stage?

A wholesome paragon of womanhood, oh not!
Bleating Sinead O'Connor was interviewed,
Entreated her to stop her deviant fantasies,
Uneffeminate, witless old Irish prude!

Once more, dear Miley, andante!
She twerked and thrashed away like mad,
Little did she know she'd created
The year's hottest new fad.

All together now, twerk it up:
Ooh-aah-aah, harder, ooh-aah-ooh!
A wild and fallen maiden,
The trashier the better, it's true!

(Refrain: Ooh-aah-aah, ooh-aah-ooh!)

903

WE THREE KINGS OF ORIENT ARE

We three kings of Orient are
Bearing gifts we traverse afar
Field and fountain, moor and mountain
Following yonder star

[Chorus] O Star of wonder, star of night
Star with royal beauty bright
Westward leading, still proceeding
Guide us to Thy perfect light

Born a King on Bethlehem's plain
Gold I bring to crown Him again
King forever, ceasing never
Over us all to reign

[Repeat Chorus]

Frankincense to offer have I
Incense owns a Deity nigh
Prayer and praising, all men raising
Worship Him, God most high

[Repeat Chorus]

Myrrh is mine, its bitter perfume
Breathes of life of gathering gloom
Sorrowing, sighing, bleeding, dying
Sealed in the stone-cold tomb

[Repeat Chorus]

Glorious now behold Him arise
King and God and Sacrifice
Alleluia, Alleluia
Earth to heav'n replies

[Repeat Chorus]

WE FOUR LADS OF ABBEY ROAD FAME

We four lads of Abbey Road fame;
Liverpool Brits, we made a name.
Fab Four higher, The Beatles greater
Millionaires we became!

[Chorus]
Oh, songs with stories, flowed with fun!
Lead guitar is Harrison,
With bass McCartney, drummer Starkey,
Don't ignore ranting Lennon.

Too halfhearted, Girl insisting;
Afraid to kiss All My Loving.
See Lovely Rita in Nirvana,
Innocent, Oh! Darling.

[Repeat Chorus]

Hooligans finishing Ticket to Ride;
Fire into flood, are spinning inside.
And I Love Her Helter Skelter,
Urchins sighed, infants cried.

[Repeat Chorus]

Wrongdoing Eggmen engaging,
Gargantuan Piggies gorging,
Fool on the Hill, Bungalow Bill,
Sun King imagining!

[Repeat Chorus]

Work on riffs, Day Tripper;
Too artistic Sgt. Pepper!
Come Together with no other;
Here, There and Everywhere.

[Repeat Chorus]

904

[Dickinson's seasonal poem is anagrammed into a poem about a snowman that also contains a visual constraint, detailed below:]

'There's A Certain Slant Of Light' by Emily Dickinson

There's a certain Slant of light,
Winter Afternoons -
That oppresses, like the Heft
Of Cathedral Tunes -

Heavenly Hurt, it gives us -
We can find no scar,
But internal difference,
Where the Meanings, are -

None may teach it - Any -
'Tis the Seal Despair -
An imperial affliction
Sent us of the Air -

When it comes, the Landscape listens -
Shadows - hold their breath -
When it goes, 'tis like the Distance
On the look of Death -

A Lone Snowman In The Lane

Infinities
Of idle sleet
Are cast across
A rustic street;
This can eclipse
The scenic glee
That occupants
Awoke to see.
But one terrain
No veil can hide;
Our fervent knight
Is keen, coal-eyed.
The snowflakes fall
Yet this can't pain
This sentry, here
On my fair lane.
The frosted drafts
Won't mar that pine;
They're prone to fear
His fine, white shine,
And when their breaths
Shall fog this night,
That beam should aid
A sled mid-flight.

[The constraint: The white snowman that the poem describes actually appears when the monospaced text is centered and all the C's (which stand for Coal) are blackened:]