Jokes and Puns: Lighten up your day!

Troutman's Laws of Computer Programming:

Any running program is obsolete.
Any planned program costs more and takes longer.
Any useful program will have to be changed.
Any useless program will have to be documented.
The size of a program expands to fill all available memory.
The value of a program is inversely proportional to the weight of its output.
The complexity of a program grows until it exceeds the capability of its maintainers.
Any system that relies on computer reliability is unreliable.
Any system that relies on human reliability is unreliable.
Make it possible for programmers to write programs in English, and you will find that programmers cannot write in English.
Profanity is the one language all programmers know best.

Law of Triviality: The time spent on any item of the agenda will be in inverse proportion to the sum involved.

Trischmann's Paradox (Axiom of the Pipe): A pipe gives a wise man time to think and a fool something to stick in his mouth.

First Law of Travel: No matter how many rooms there are in the motel, the fellow who starts up his car at five o'clock in the morning is always parked under your window.

Travel Axiom: He travels fastest who travels alone . . . but he hasn't anything to do when he gets there.

Transcription Square Law: The number of errors made is equal to the sum of the squares employed.

Torquemada's Law: When you are sure you're right, you have a moral duty to impose your will upon anyone who disagrees with you.

Titanic Coincidence: Most accidents in well-designed systems involve two or more events of low probability occurring in the worst possible combination.

Tipper's Law: Those who expect the biggest tips provide the worst service.

Thwartz's Theorem of Low Profile: Negative expectation thwarts realization, and self-congratulation guarantees disaster. (Or, simply put: If you think of it, it won't happen quite that way.)

Thurber's Conclusion: There is no safety in numbers, or in anything else.

Thoreau's Rule: Any fool can make a rule, and every fool will mind it.

Thoreau's Law: If you see a man approaching with the obvious intent of doing you good, run for your life.

Thinking Man's Tautology: If you think you're wrong, you're wrong.
Corollary: If you think you're wrong, you're right.

Terman's Law of Innovation: If you want a track team to win the high jump you find one person who can jump seven feet, not seven people who can jump one foot.

Terman's Law: There is no direct relationship between the quality of an educational program and its cost.

Taxi Principle: Find out the cost before you get in.

I saw a horse drawn carriage yesterday.
…I didn’t know horses could draw!

Six short years ago my wife’s doctor was delivering pizza and monkeybread. People still say those are bad names for our twins.

Swipple's Rule of Order: He who shouts loudest has the floor.

Sutton's Law: Go where the money is.

Survival Formula for Public Office:

Exploit the inevitable (which means, take credit for anything good which happens whether you had anything to do with it or not).
Don't disturb the perimeter (meaning don't stir up a mess unless you can be sure of the result).
Stay in with the Outs (the Ins will make so many mistakes, you can't afford to alienate the Outs).
Don't permit yourself to get between a dog and a lamppost.

Law of Superstition: It's bad luck to be superstititious.

Law of Superiority: The first example of superior principle is always inferior to the developed example of inferior principle.

Suhor's Law: A little ambiguity never hurt anyone.

Sueker's Note: If you need n items of anything, you will have n - 1 in stock.

Sturgeon's Law: Ninety percent of everything is crud.

Stock's Observation: You no sooner get your head above water than someone pulls your flippers off.

Stock Market Axiom: The public is always wrong.

Stockbroker's Declaration: The market will rally from this or lower levels.

Stewart's Law of Retroaction: It is easier to get forgiveness than permission.

Stephens's Soliloquy: Finality is death. Perfection is finality. Nothing is perfect. There are lumps in it.

Steinbeck's Law: When you need towns, they are very far apart.

Steele's Plagiarism of Somebody's Philosophy: Everyone should believe in something -- I believe I'll have another drink.

Sprinkle's Law: Things always fall at right angles.

Specht's Meta-Law: Under any conditions, anywhere, whatever you are doing, there is some ordinance under which you can be booked.

Spark's Ten Rules for the Project Manager:

Strive to look tremendously important.
Attempt to be seen with important people.
Speak with authority; however, only expound on the obvious and proven facts.
Don't engage in arguments, but if cornered, ask an irrelevant question and lean back with a satisfied grin while your opponent tries to figure out what's going on -- then quickly change the subject.
Listen intently while others are arguing the problem. Pounce on a trite statement and bury them with it.
If a subordinate asks you a pertinent question, look at him as if he had lost his senses. When he looks down, paraphrase the question back at him.
Obtain a brilliant assignment, but keep out of sight and out of the limelight.
Walk at a fast pace when out of the office -- this keeps questions from subordinates and superiors at a minimum.
Always keep the office door closed. This puts visitors on the defensive and also makes it look as if you are always in an important conference.
Give all orders verbally. Never write anything down that might go into a "Pearl Harbor File."

Spare Parts Principle: The accessibility, during recovery of small parts which fall from the work bench, varies directly with the size of the part and inversely with its importance to the completion of the work underway.

Grandma Soderquist's Conclusion: A chicken doesn't stop scratching just because the worms are scarce.

Sodd's Other Law: The degree of failure is in direct proportion to the effort expended and to the need for success.

Sodd's Second Law: Sooner or later, the worst possible set of circumstances is bound to occur.
Corollary: Any system must be designed to withstand the worst possible set of circumstances.

Sodd's First Law: When a person attempts a task, he or she will be thwarted in that task by the unconscious intervention of some other presence (animate or inanimate). Nevertheless, some tasks are completed, since the intervening presence is itself attempting a task and is, of course, subject to interference.

Sociology's Iron Law of Oligarchy: In every organized activity, no matter the sphere, a small number will become the oligarchical leaders and the others will follow.

Woods's Refutation of the First Law of Socio-Genetics: On the contrary, if you never procreate, neither will your kids.

First Law of Socio-Genetics: Celibacy is not hereditary.

First Law of Socio-Economics: In a hierarchical system, the rate of pay for a given task increases in inverse ratio to the unpleasantness and difficulty of the task.

Snafu Equations:

Given any problem containing n equations, there will be n+1 unknowns.
An object or bit of information most needed, will be least available.
In any human endeavor, once you have exhausted all possibilities and fail, there will be one solution, simple and obvious, highly visible to everyone else.
Badness comes in waves.

Smith's Principles of Bureaucratic Tinkertoys:
Never use one word when a dozen will suffice.
If it can be understood, it's not finished yet.
Never be the first to do anything.

Law of Slide Presentation: In any slide presentation, at least one slide will be upside down or backwards, or both.

Skole's Rule for Antique Dealers: Never simply say, "Sorry, we don't have what you're looking for." Always say, "Too bad, I just sold one the other day."

Skinner's Constant (Flannegan's Finagling Factor): That quantity which, when multiplied by, divided into, added to, or subtracted from the answer you got, gives you the answer you should have gotten.

Sinner's Law of Retaliation: Do whatever your enemies don't want you to do.

Simon's Law: Everything put together sooner or later falls apart.

Simmon's Law: The desire for racial integration increases with the square of the distance from the actual event.

Mother Sigafoos's Observation: A man should be greater than some of his parts.

Sevareid's Law: The chief cause of problems is solutions.

Law of Selective Gravity: An object will fall so as to do the most damage.

Short's Quotations:

Any great truth can -- and eventually will -- be expressed as a cliche. A cliche is a sure and certain way to dilute an idea. For instance, my grandmother used to say, "The black cat is always the last one off the fence." I have no idea what she meant, but at one time it was undoubtedly true.
Half of being smart is knowing what you're dumb at.
Malpractice makes malperfect.
Neurosis is a communicable disease.
The only winner in the War of 1812 was Tchaikovsky.
Nature abhors a hero. For one thing, he violates the law of conservation of energy. For another, how can it be the survival of the fittest when the fittest keeps putting himself in situations where he is most likely to be creamed?
A little ignorance can go a long way.
Learn to be sincere. Even if you have to fake it.
There is no such thing as an absolute truth -- that is absolutely true.
Understanding the laws of nature does not mean we are free from obeying them.
Entropy has us outnumbered.
The human race never solves any of its problems -- it only outlives them.
Hell hath no fury like a pacifist.

Shirley's Law: Most people deserve each other.

Shelton's Laws of Pocket Calculators:

Rechargeable batteries die at the most critical time of the most complex problem.
When a rechargeable battery starts to die in the middle of a complex calculation, and the user attempts to connect house current, the calculator will clear itself.
The final answer will exceed the magnitude or precision or both of the calculator.
There are not enough storage registers to solve the problem.
The user will forget mathematics in proportion to the complexity of the calculator.
Thermal paper will run out before the calculation is complete.

Shaw's Principle: Build a system that even a fool can use, and only a fool will want to use it.

Sharkey's Fourth Law of Motion: Passengers on elevators constantly rearrange their positions as people get on and off so there is at all times an equal distance between all bodies.

Shanahan's Law: The length of a meeting rises with the square of the number of people present.

Shalit's Law: The intensity of movie publicity is in inverse ratio to the quality of the movie.

Shaffer's Law: The effectiveness of a politician varies in inverse proportion to his commitment to principle.

Sevareid's Law: The chief cause of problems is solutions.

Laws of Serendipity:
In order to discover anything you must be looking for something.
If you wish to make an improved product, you must already be engaged in making an inferior one.

Sells's Law: The first sample is always the best.

Law of Selective Gravity (the Buttered Side Down Law): An object will fall so as to do the most damage.
Corollary (Klipstein): The most delicate component will be the one to drop.

Segal's Law: A man with one watch knows what time it is; a man with two watches is never sure.

Screwdriver Syndrome: Sometimes, where a complex problem can be illuminated by many tools, one can be forgiven for applying the one he knows best.

Scott's Second Law: When an error has been detected and corrected, it will be found to have been correct in the first place.
Corollary: After the correction has been found in error, it will be impossible to fit the original quantity back into the equation.

Scott's First Law: No matter what goes wrong, it will probably look right.

Old Scottish Prayer: O Lord, grant that we may always be right, for Thou knowest we will never change our minds.

Schumpeter's Observation of Scientific and Nonscientific Theories: Any theory can be made to fit any facts by means of appropriate additional assumptions.

Schultze's Law: If you can't measure output, then you measure input.

Schuckit's Law: All interference in human conduct has the potential for causing harm, no matter how innocuous the procedure may be.

Schmidt's Law (probably a different Schmidt): If you mess with something long enough, it'll break.

Schmidt's Law: Never eat prunes when you're hungry.

Schickel's TV Theorems:
Any dramatic series the producers want us to take seriously as a representation of contemporary reality cannot be taken seriously as a representation of anything -- except a show to be ignored by anyone capable of sitting upright in a chair and chewing gum simultaneously.
The only programs a grown-up can possibly stand are those intended for children. Or, more properly, those that cater to those pre-adolescent fantasies that most have never abandoned.