This just about sums things up

A farmer named Bill was overseeing his herd in a remote mountainous pasture in  Scotland  when suddenly a brand-new 4x4 advanced toward him out of a cloud of dust.

The driver, a young man in a Brioni suit, Gucci shoes, RayBan sunglasses and YSL tie, leaned out the window and asked the farmer, "If I tell you exactly how many cows and calves you have in your herd, will you give me a calf?"

Bill looks at the man, obviously a yuppie, then looks at his peacefully grazing herd and calmly answers, "Sure, why not?"

The yuppie parks his car, whips out his Dell notebook computer, connects it to his Cingular RAZR V3 cell phone, and surfs to a NASA page on the Internet, where he calls up a GPS satellite to get an exact fix on his location which he then feeds to another NASA satellite that scans the area in an ultra-high-resolution photo.

The young man then opens the digital photo in Adobe Photoshop and exports it to an image processing facility in  Hamburg.

Within seconds, he receives an email on his Palm Pilot that the image has been processed and the data stored. He then accesses an MS-SQL database through an ODBC connected Excel spreadsheet with email on his Blackberry and, after a few minutes, receives a response.

Finally, he prints out a full-colour, 150-page report on his hi-tech, miniaturized HP LaserJet printer, turns to the farmer and says, "You have exactly 1,586 cows and calves."

"That's right. Well, I guess you can take one of my calves," says Bill.

He watches the young man select one of the animals and looks on with amusement as the young man stuffs it into the boot of his car.

Then Bill says to the young man, "Hey, if I can tell you exactly what your business is, will you give me back my calf?"

The young man thinks about it for a second and then says, "Okay, why not?"

"You're a Member of the European Parliament", says Bill.

"Wow! That's correct," says the yuppie, "but how did you guess that?"

"No guessing required." answered the farmer. "You showed up here even though nobody called you; you want to get paid for an answer I already knew, to a question I never asked. You used millions of pounds worth of equipment trying to show me how much smarter than me you are; and you don't know a thing about how working people make a living - or about cows, for that matter. This is a flock of sheep...


Now give me back my dog.

The Blonde

A blonde city girl named Amy marries a Colorado rancher.

One morning, on his way out to check on the cows, the rancher says to Amy,

'The insemination man is coming over to impregnate one of our cows today, so I drove a nail into the 2 by 4 just above where the cow's stall is in the Barn. Please show him where the cow is when he gets here, OK?'

The rancher leaves for the fields. After a while, the artificial Insemination man arrives and knocks on the front door.

Amy takes him down to the barn. They walk along the row of cows and when Amy Sees the nail, she tells him, 'This is the one right here.'

The man, assuming he is dealing with an airhead blonde, asks, 'Tell me lady, 'cause I'm dying to know; how would YOU know that this is the right cow to be bred?'

'That's simple," she said. "By the nail that's over its stall,' she explains very confidently.

Laughing rudely at her, the man says, 'And what, pray tell, is the nail for?'

The blonde turns to walk away and says sweetly over her shoulder,

'I guess it's to hang your pants on.'

( It's nice to see a blonde winning once in awhile.)

Stratford Upon Avon

We spent a pleasant weekend during November in Stratford Upon Avon and here are a few photos of the town and the river that I thought worth sharing.

Two Of The Year's Best Comebacks

If you ever testify in court, you might wish you could have been as sharp as this policeman. He was being cross-examined by a defence attorney during a felony trial. The lawyer was trying to undermine the police officer's credibility .....  

Q:  'Officer --- did you see my client fleeing the scene?'  

A:   'No sir. But I subsequently observed a person matching the description of the offender, running several blocks away.'

Q:   'Officer -- who provided this description?' 

A:   'The officer who responded to the scene.' 

Q:   'A fellow officer provided the description of this so-called offender. Do you trust your fellow officers?'
 
A:   'Yes, sir. With my life.'

Q:   'With your life? Let me ask you this then officer. Do you have a room where you change your clothes in preparation for your daily duties?'

A:   'Yes sir, we do!'

Q:   'And do you have a locker in the room?'  

A:   'Yes, sir,... I do.'

Q: 'And do you have a lock on your locker?'

A:   'Yes, sir.'

Q:   'Now,... why is it, officer, if you trust your fellow officers with your life, you find it necessary to lock your locker in a room you share with these same officers?' 

A:   'You see, sir -- we share the building with the court complex, and sometimes lawyers have been known to walk through that room.'

The courtroom EXPLODED with laughter, and a prompt recess was called. The officer on the stand has been nominated for this year's 'Best Comeback' line --  and we think he'll win.

Now We Know Why He Was a General

In an recent interview, General Norman Schwarzkopf was asked if he thought there  was room for  forgiveness toward the people who have harboured and abetted the terrorists who  perpetrated the 9/11 attacks on America.

His answer was classic Schwarzkopf.

The General said, "I  believe that forgiving them is God's function... OUR job is to arrange the meeting."   

You got to love them both!

Safari photos in Kenya

A few more of my favourite photos from our Safari in Kenya earlier this year.

African Elephant

Leopard

Lilac breasted roller

Secretary bird

Cheetah

Lions

Rhinoceros

Crocodile

A Three Headed Giraffe

One of my favourite photos from our Safari - not technically brilliant, but I find it amusing!

Giraffes in the Masai Mara, Kenya