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From: kscott@ucsfcgl.UUCP (Kevin Scott%Kuntz)
Newsgroups: net.jokes
Subject: Re: Cartoon Quotes:  A challange (unusua
Message-ID: <720@ucsfcgl.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 28-Nov-85 05:50:40 EST
Article-I.D.: ucsfcgl.720
Posted: Thu Nov 28 05:50:40 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 29-Nov-85 11:00:38 EST
References: <682@lasspvax.UUCP> <29500046@ISM780.UUCP>
Reply-To: kscott@ucsfcgl.UUCP (PUT YOUR NAME HERE)
Organization: UCSF Computer Graphics Lab
Lines: 40

In article <29500046@ISM780.UUCP> dianeh@ISM780.UUCP writes:
>
>>Actually, that quote's a reference to a more literary beastie that does tap
>>dance, and fart, as a method of communication.  Anybody know the book, the
>>author, and the alien species?
>
>Sure. Breakfast_of_Champions by Kurt Vonnegut, but they're
>actually characters in a book by Kilgore Trout. Unfortunately, I
>don't remember the name of the alien species, so I don't suppose
>I win any sort of prize, right?
>
>Diane Holt
>Interactive Systems, Inc.
>ima!ism780!dianeh

Kilgore Trout is supposedly a fictional, non-existant author, but it turns
out he does have one book to his name, written in the style described by
Vonnegut.  It is called "Venus On the Half Shell", in reference to the 
famous (stucco?) artwork of Venus coming from the sea to be found by Zephyr.
The book was in actuality written by Phillip Jose Farmer, and I would reccomend
it to anyone who likes Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

Obligatory Joke:  well, since someone suggested this should be net.humor,
I'll share this amusing footnote from George F. Simmons' _Differential_Equations
with_applications_and_historical_notes_ .

Joseph Fourier (1768-1830), an excellent mathematical physicist, was a friend of
Napoleon and acompanied his master to Egypt in 1798.  On his return he became
prefect of Isere in France, and in this capacity built the first real road
from Grenbole to Turin.  He also befriended the boy Champolion, who 
later deciphered the Rosetta stone.  During these years he worked on a theory 
of conduction of heat, and in 1822 published his famous _Theorie_Analytique_
_de_la_Chaulier, in which he made extensive use of the series that now bear
his name.  However, he contributed nothing whatever to the mathematical 
theory of these series, which were well known to Euler, Bernoulli, Lagrange,
and others.  Fourier held the curious opinion that desert heat is the ideal
environment for a healthy life, and accordingly swathed himself like a mummy
and lived in overheated rooms.
-- 
two to the power of five thousand against and falling ...