Woman steals the internet

It’s amazing what you can do with a spade and a saw

AN OLD WOMAN stole the internet.

Using a spade, Hayastan Shakaryan, aged 75, dug up a large, interesting-looking cable to sell as scrap on March 28.

The Internet instantly vanished for most internet users in two countries, Armenia and Georgia.
*
I can just imagine the conversation when she got home.

Grandma: “Look, I got this nice cable. Think we can get a couple of hundred dram for it?”

Grandson: “Don’t bother me now, Grandma, I lost my internet connection.”

Grandma: “That’s what happens if you don’t clean your room.”

Grandson: “It’s not just me, Grandma. The entire Internet has vanished.”

Grandma: “Well don’t look at me. I don’t have it.”
*
 
Anyway, police eventually worked out she DID have it.

The elderly woman has been charged with several serious crimes, including Stealing the Internet, and Causing The Populations of Two Countries to Return to Reality.

She faces three years in jail.

I think she should get a medal.

When reporters arrived at her door, Mrs Shakaryan pleaded for someone to explain to her exactly what the Internet was.

Older people often find it hard to understanding these things. As Homer Simpson said: “Wow, they have the Internet on computers now.”


*
Anyway, Mrs Shakaryan, just for you, here’s a brief overview of the history of the Internet.

In 1928, a physicist named Arthur Eddington wrote that if you had enough monkeys banging away at enough keyboards, you’d eventually get “all the books in the British Museum”.

In a brief 60 years, this concept crossed the Atlantic.

A politician named Al Gore was intrigued, and created the Internet to balance the US budget deficit and save money at the bookshop.

A vast amount of keyboard hammering started to take place, but Eddington turned out to be wrong: virtually no good books emerged. Why not?

Because Eddington specified monkeys, creature with brains weighing about 100 grams.

In contrast, the majority of comments posted on the Internet seem to come from simple, primitive creatures, such as nematodes, bacteria, YouTube Commenters, Yahoo Answers answerers, Justin Bieber fans, germs, etc.

None have brains bigger than a peanut (0.8 of a gram).
*
But the cables which power the network have been problematic. The United Arab Emirates two weeks ago lost its Internet connection (experts said a shark may have bitten through the underwater cable) as did the Australian town of Rockhampton (plumbers accidentally sliced the wires).
*
But surfers can relax.

Internet connections will one day be cable-free. Data will soon be carried only by invisible beams of wi-fi, according to an on-line computer magazine I read this week.

This is good news for the present writer, whose miserly neighbors have put passwords on all their wi-fi streams.

A nearby office block is more generous. Still, I can only update my Kindle if I lean at a 45-degree angle out of my eldest daughter’s bedroom when the wind is blowing southwest and Mars aligns with Venus. This is inconvenient.

I just hope the monkey enclosure at the zoo has a better wi-fi connection.

They need to get their books finished, so they can topple young master Justin Bieber (above), a singing toddler, from his present perch as Greatest Cultural Artifact So Far Generated by the Internet.

Mr Eddington has been waiting a long time.
*
*
*
ON OTHER MATTERS…
There have been some interesting discussions at the Quite Good Noodle Shop (a metaphorical nickname for this series of posts) this week.

Check out the comments under the previous post (www.mrjam.org version) for great mini-columns by Lift Lurker, TS and Angela.

Other highlights:

On mistaking men for women and vice versa:

Jason: “I was driving across Missouri 10 years ago and stopped for gas, the female station attendant had a beard and mustache. I guess there is something to the urban legends of cousins marrying in rural US ;) When in doubt, like in Thailand, one could always adopt the Crocodile Dundee technique..."just checking"...but one risks getting slapped in the face.” (Jason)

Lift Lurker liked this idea, and suggested checking by “discreet grabbing”.

Irene was opposed to grabbing strangers, and suggested instead “having a celebration of Thai New Year every day: I hear they pour and shoot water on everybody during the two days, so all the people out on the streets are soaking wet! Then we'll see some gender differences.”

Grandpa Fardel said: “When we meet somebody whom we do not know, we should just do like dogs: THEY NEVER make mistakes on the gender of newcomers.”

Bianca Schlimm agreed: “It is 100 percent a good idea to smell people. Only not where dogs do it. I mean, not too soon after meeting someone.”

On the fact that men are unobservant:

Men don’t need to be observant. They have women to do that for them. (TS)

On love:

“Ninety percent of love, even a man of science will volunteer, is illusion." (Grandpa)

SEJ replied: “Grandpa, I don't think you went far enough... I would like to suggest, that love is in fact nothing more than an illusion, period. I think what most of us refer to as "love", is in fact just a mix of lust, happiness and fear.”

That’s a shocking declaration which I hope someone will disprove.
*
And one other issue was raised: many readers would like to know more about Lift Lurker. Me too. How about it, Lifty?

 

 

Technorati Tags: hayastan shakaryan,georgia,armenia,internet,steal,justin bieber,wi fi,kindle

Comments

[Karuna aka Kaye Moreno]

About Lift Lurker,

He is male Asian living in Australia with 2 school going kids. He is a church going christian.

Works for some large company may be in some kind of project management role. His job requires him to followup on other people's work and fill in reports. Basically, does no job. Is good in making power point presentation and detailed excel files with macros.

Has problem with digestive system. Needs to constantly visit the toilet during office hours.

[Lift Lurker]

Is good in making power point presentation and detailed excel files with macros.

This is unacceptable insult! You step out of boundes here!

I stick to my story:

- My home is in Liftuania
- My mother give me up for adoption at 13
- I think grandpa is my grandpa
- I am female
- I have crazy daughter who worry the math world is not inventing new math theories and she is running out of thing to study. She is same daughter who keep picture of Boeing 7whatever7 under her pillow.
- I have timid son who faint at sight of leather belt, or cows, or milk.
- My birthday (I think) is same as Elisha Otis who I am not worthy to follow.
- I have picture of him in my wallet.
- Did i get your attention when i said I am female.
- As Karuna know from discreet grab I am male. Red blooded male. As male as the males in jail who take other male because they miss women.
- My rank and serial number is xxx

[Akris]

StOLe the InTerNet!? Old woman, I got something with your name on it! (Not that I'd miss Nury's 'diary')

[Cindy L.]

More on men who look like women etc.

Two years ago in Jakarta, a “waria”, or transgendered person, died after leaping into the Ciliwung River to flee a hail of stones thrown by a murderous mob.

The mob turned out to be officers of the Central Jakarta Public Order Agency.

[TS]

..Men don’t need to be observant. They have women to do that for them. (TS),

Actually it was sej that should be credited with that quote.

However, Uncle Nury getting it wrong validates the statement.

Only, I have just invalidated it by pointing out Uncle Nury's mistake.

[Karuna aka Kaye Moreno]

@Cindy, it is sad that transgenders are still not accepted by society and cruelly treated in most places.
Even the girl Fransiska whom Nury had written about in the last post was stripped by her husband's neighbors.

[Nury]

Oops, sorry for the wrong attribution, SEJ, thanks TS for fixing it.
Karuna, is your info about liftie a guess or do you have info the rest of us don't? Personally, I can't make up my mind whether Lift Lurker's accent is Indonesian or Eastern European, although I do believe he is of Asian origin.
Perhaps a Jakarta emigrant in Prague?

[Graham]

Good morning.

I would like to let you know, Mr jam, that you are right to doubt what SEJ said about love.

It is lust and happiness, and then when you get married, that’s when it changes to lust and fear, followed by fear alone.

If you want proof I would introduce you to her but you seem like a sensitive guy.

I can hardly glare at people who have a cold and don’t keep it to themselves, and then do this to you.

As for sniffing dogs, I have to tell Grandpa Fardel that I have seen a number of dogs sniff other dogs, and then start getting into position thinking that they are bitches.

They do make this mistake.

Interestingly this too starts off as lust and happiness, and then when they realise the size of the dog they made this mistake with it turns to lust and fear, and then just fear.

The difference is that by the next year they have both forgotten about it rather than one of them expecting flowers and a card.

Is this the thing that truly makes us superior? This and stuffed crust pizza.

[sej]

Doesn't Justin Bieber's hair style remind you of Cousin Itt?

Actually, come to think of it, his singing reminds me of Cousin Itt too...

[Lift Lurker]

Eddington and other academic like Freud in their ovary tower do not notice what happen in the real world.

They type away in their keyboard day after day after day produce large volumes of nonsense (papers like: "Too much lack of sleep might affect concentration", or "Multimedia Experience Retrieval in a Ubiquitous Home").

Maybe someday THEY will produce something useful.

They speculate speculate speculate about infinite amount of monkey producing works of Shakespeare, but do not notice billions of monkey descendants working over 6,000 years of evolution produce not just the work of Shakespeare but also Shakespeare himself, and other great Western literature like the Odyssey, the Iliad, the Nordic classics, Robert Frost, Kipling, Asterix, etc.

Not to mention great Eastern literature like Uncle Nury's columns and maybe some other.

Beside literature these same monkeys build technology like nukular fission, nukular fusion, Apollo 11, The Errbus A300, and of course majestic, glorious, wonderful Lifts.

---

They do make this mistake.
Graham I like your post you should post more, but you assume this is mistake?

[MNAR]

I also recommend medals to both the shark and the plumbers....

[H]

mrs shakaryan,i am in need of your skills. i can barely sneak stuff out of my room without people noticing and you stole an internert cable for two countries! i wonder, did the people become like fish out of water (ahhh! the sun! it burns, burns!ahhhh!)

[Ministry of Welcome to Foreigners: Schlaudia Kiffer]

Life is tough. Whatever gender or sex you may have: you have got to pass an oral exam in order to stay in Berlin.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gOb6klJe568

[rafanjr]

...i got a lil bit of shock when yu said "oral exam" and then got disappointed when i clicked on the link...

[Schlaudia Kiffer]

a LIL bit sounds a lil bit drunk
:-)

I was also a lil shocked when I read it and thought it must be "what sex you are" instead.

but Schlaudia Kiffer is not so smart anyways.

[granpa]

@Rafan
I found e better disappointment for you
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSdELZxEnHY&feature=topvideos_mp

Enjoy

[TS]

It's seems that Uncle Nury have gone off on Easter holiday and left us to our own devices.
Well, I will follow the example of the old woman and steal a little section of the Internet here in the Quite Good Noodle Shop.

Good Friday Looters
In New Zealand somebody forgot to check if the access & control system in a supermarket had been programmed for the public holiday for Easter.

On Good Friday the computer system opened the shop as usual, switched on the lights and unlocked the entrance doors. However, the staff did show up for work on this public holiday.
After a few hours the police was alerted to the situation and turned up at the shop.
There they found people filling up the shopping trolleys as normal and going through the checkout in a less than normal way, without paying.

A few people was found at the self-serve checkouts paying for their groceries as they would on any normal day.

http://tinyurl.com/3v7pg5j

This is just funny on so many levels.
You got the people that seem nice and normal on the surface, turning into looters at the first chance they get. Possibly motivated by revenge for all those years spent trying to steer a trolley with a wonky wheel around the shop.

However, the really funny people was the ones found paying for their groceries at the self-serve checkouts. They come in several categories.

The ones who..

1) are truly honest, realised the situation and decided to pay for the things in their trolley.

2) are looters but realised that the police had arrived and pretended that they had intended to pay all along.

3) did not notice anything unusual, not even that there was no staff in the shop.

4) found the service really poor at the checkouts and annoyed at being forced to use self-service checkout.

[Bianca]

Grandpa: To me its crystal clear what is missing there: that is children.
and then you need to be pragmatic and fall again and again in love with the same person, every three years or so.
and you need HUMOUR.
I am sorry if you are sad.

I'd have a funny grandma T-Shirt to cheer you up.
It is made out of the PUMA logo.
Instead it says OMA (grandma) and has a little flying granny instead of a puma.

[Angela]

TS, it's kinda like the opposite scenario of the Y2K bug that did not happen.

*

Bianca, I like the OMA shirt. Incidentally, I went cycling with my daughter on Saturday and was wearing my PUMA shirt.

Perhaps a photo of me in my PUMA shirt will make OPA happy ;-)

[grandpa]

@Bianca
Who said I was sad?!

Nobody can litter the house floor the way I do
Nobody can make noise the way I do
Nobody can cook the way I do
Nobody can sleep (or not ) the way I do
Nobody can scream at me for no reason for what I do , or don't//
Nobody can spend my money, the way I do
If I feel like having breakfast on the other side of the planet , with grandma there is NOBODY to reason me
Sad ? ME ?

Sorry I need to close office early.
I feel like going for a swim instead of going home.

aargh

being single sounds soooo terrible

[Bianca]

Angela, you look king!

[rafanjr]

...being single sounds soooo terrible

indeed

[Bianca Stupid]

how do I insert a picture? what I see is my whole real name, not exactly what I wanted to "publish"...?

[Lift Lurker]

grandpa, being single sound so nice. But being married is also very nice. Why we need to choose one!?

Status:
[ ] Married
[ ] Single
[ ] Both

I have no solution how to achieve this.

---

TS, that is great story. I think we all need to reflect which type of person we are 1), 2), 3) or 4). (#3 is consciously competent, #4 is unconsciously competent so I think #4 is the highest form)

Something similar happen in Liftuania last year. I fail the honesty test. I pick up 15 items and pay for all of them. But I use the express counter which is for 12 items or less!

[Bianca Solution]

Ask Mrs Solution, LL. Send the family away for the holidays once in a while.

Cannot miss them when they are never gone.

Is Lithuania well prepared for the ESC, that song contest??

[grandpa]

There is a BIG (HUGE) difference between being single and being alone or lonely.

Why am I the only one seeing that in a positive way, (and positively talking about it ) when millions are single and happy about it...

More millions are unhappily married, the silent majority.

By the way , Bianca I have a daughter

[Bianca Schlimm]

Who wrote about being alone?
I would prefer being alone often to being single...

Isn't it that 50 % percent are happily married and the other 50 unhappy? And 50 of all those arranged marriages and the other 50 % Western style free choosing? which means you can love anyone - in a way

If you have a daughter you've got to get up and make good food. instead of littering around
:-)

I put the picture of the OMA T-Shirt on my site.