Witticisms (supposedly) from Steven Wright

[RWEST]

If you’re not familiar with the work of Steven Wright http://www.wright-house.com/steven-wright/steven-wright-jokes.html#TOC , he’s the guy who once said, “I woke up one morning and all of my stuff had been stolen...and replaced by exact duplicates.”
Here are some more of his gems:
I’d kill for a Nobel Peace Prize.
Borrow money from pessimists - they don’t expect it back.
Half the people you know are below average.
99% of lawyers give the rest a bad name.
42.7% of all statistics are made up on the spot.
A conscience is what hurts when all your other parts feel so good.
A clear conscience is usually the sign of a bad memory.
All those who believe in psychokinesis, raise my hand.
The early bird may get the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese.
I almost had a psychic girlfriend but she left me before we met.
OK, so what’s the speed of dark?
How do you tell when you’re out of invisible ink?
Depression is merely anger without enthusiasm.
When everything is coming your way, you’re in the wrong lane.
Ambition is a poor excuse for not having enough sense to be lazy.
Hard work pays off in the future, laziness pays off now.
I intend to live forever - so far, so good.
If Barbie is so popular, why do you have to buy her friends?
Eagles may soar, but weasels don’t get sucked into jet engines.
What happens if you get scared half to death twice?
My mechanic told me, “I couldn’t repair your brakes, so I made your horn louder.”
Why do psychics have to ask you for your name?
If at first you don’t succeed, destroy all evidence that you tried.
A conclusion is the place where you got tired of thinking.
Experience is something you don’t get until just after you need it.
The hardness of the butter is proportional to the softness of the bread.
To steal ideas from one person is plagiarism; to steal from many is research.
The problem with the gene pool is that there is no lifeguard.
The sooner you fall behind, the more time you’ll have to catch up.
The colder the x-ray table, the more of your body is required to be on it.
Everyone has a photographic memory, some just don’t have film.

 

[RWEST]

Found some more:
More great quotations from Steven Wright:
Curiosity killed the cat, but for a while I was a suspect.
Everywhere is walking distance if you have the time.
I bought some batteries, but they weren't included.
I have an existential map. It has 'You are here' written all over it.
I used to work in a fire hydrant factory. You couldn't park anywhere near the place.
I was walking down the street wearing glasses when the prescription ran out.
It doesn't make a difference what temperature a room is, it's always room temperature.
It's a small world, but I wouldn't want to paint it.
Last night I stayed up late playing poker with Tarot cards. I got a full house and four people died.
Last night somebody broke into my apartment and replaced everything with exact duplicates... When I pointed it out to my roommate, he said, 'Do I know you?'
Last year I went fishing with Salvador Dali. He was using a dotted line. He caught every other fish.
My theory of evolution is that Darwin was adopted.
There's a fine line between fishing and just standing on the shore like an idiot.
What's another word for Thesaurus?
When I woke up this morning my girlfriend asked me, 'Did you sleep good?' I said 'No, I made a few mistakes.'
You can't have everything. Where would you put it?

 

[Vilan]

Last night I stayed up late playing poker with Tarot cards. I got a full house and four people died.

 

[mechtech2]

I'm in front of my computer laughing like an idiot.

 

[moribundman]

Originally Posted By: mechtech2
I'm in front of my computer laughing like an idiot.


Did you read your own post about "Steven" Hawking?

 

[moribundman]

Originally Posted By: RWEST

The hardness of the butter is proportional to the softness of the bread.


That one really should say, "directly inverse proportional."

Wright is great. Sometimes he seems to almost fall asleep before he comes up with another depressing crack.

 

[Benzadmiral]

Originally Posted By: moribundman
Originally Posted By: RWEST

The hardness of the butter is proportional to the softness of the bread.


That one really should say, "directly inverse proportional."

Wright is great. Sometimes he seems to almost fall asleep before he comes up with another depressing crack.

No, I think that one's on target. As the hardness of the butter increases, so does the softness of the bread. (Remember trying to butter white bread with stick butter/margarine right out of the refrigerator?) So they'd be directly proportional.

I've seen Wright on TV, but I hadn't realized how much of these "observations" I see quoted everywhere are his. I guess I assumed they were George Carlin's.

 

[moribundman]

Gleaned from wikipedia:

"the concept of inverse proportion means that as the absolute value or magnitude of one variable gets bigger, the absolute value or magnitude of another gets smaller, such that their product (the constant of proportionality) is always the same."

The softer the bread, the harder the butter. That's inverse proportionality.

 

[Benzadmiral]

Originally Posted By: moribundman
Gleaned from wikipedia:

"the concept of inverse proportion means that as the absolute value or magnitude of one variable gets bigger, the absolute value or magnitude of another gets smaller, such that their product (the constant of proportionality) is always the same."

The softer the bread, the harder the butter. That's inverse proportionality.

Oh, so you mean the harder the butter, the less hard the bread? Then that's right.

I was thinking (this is the humor forum, after all) of softness being on a separate scale; the higher up on that scale the bread is, the greater its softness. So as the hardness of the butter increases on its own scale, so would the softness of the bread on its own special scale.

If we're dealing with just one scale of hardness, from diamond down to talcum powder, then the two things (butter and bread) would be moving away from each other -- the butter toward the hardness end and the bread toward the softness.

I'm hungry now. . . .

 

[moribundman]

Originally Posted By: Benzadmiral
Originally Posted By: moribundman
Gleaned from wikipedia:

"the concept of inverse proportion means that as the absolute value or magnitude of one variable gets bigger, the absolute value or magnitude of another gets smaller, such that their product (the constant of proportionality) is always the same."

The softer the bread, the harder the butter. That's inverse proportionality.

Oh, so you mean the harder the butter, the less hard the bread? Then that's right.


Murphy's Law dictates the worst possible scenario. Therefore, the softer the bread that you have, the harder the butter, and the shorter your lunch break! Not to mention you won't be able to find a butter knife.

PS: I would say hardness and softness are on one and the same scale.