Twas the night before xmas... - Posted on 2006-12-23 18:39:45
loz 1300cc Superstar
Joined:
Sunday, September 18, 2005
Posts: 1628
Location:
Fife
United Kingdom
Twas the night before Christmas and Santa's a wreck...
How to live in a world that's politically correct?
His workers no longer would answer to "Elves",
"Vertically Challenged" they were calling themselves.
And labor conditions at the north pole
Were alleged by the union to stifle the soul.
Four reindeer had vanished, without much propriety,
Released to the wilds by the Humane Society.
And equal employment had made it quite clear
That Santa had better not use just reindeer.
So Dancer and Donner, Comet and Cupid,
Were replaced with 4 pigs, and you know that looked stupid!
The runners had been removed from his sleigh;
The ruts were termed dangerous by the E.P.A.
And people had started to call for the cops
When they heard sled noises on their roof-tops.
Second-hand smoke from his pipe had his workers quite frightened.
His fur trimmed red suit was called "Unenlightened."
And to show you the strangeness of life's ebbs and flows,
Rudolf was suing over unauthorized use of his nose
And had gone on Geraldo, in front of the nation,
Demanding millions in over-due compensation.
So, half of the reindeer were gone; and his wife,
Who suddenly said she'd enough of this life,
Joined a self-help group, packed, and left in a whiz,
Demanding from now on her title was Ms.
And as for the gifts, why, he'd ne'er had a notion
That making a choice could cause so much commotion.
Nothing of leather, nothing of fur,
Which meant nothing for him. And nothing for her.
Nothing that might be construed to pollute.
Nothing to aim. Nothing to shoot.
Nothing that clamored or made lots of noise.
Nothing for just girls. Or just for the boys.
Nothing that claimed to be gender specific.
Nothing that's warlike or non-pacific.
No candy or sweets...they were bad for the tooth.
Nothing that seemed to embellish a truth.
And fairy tales, while not yet forbidden,
Were like Ken and Barbie, better off hidden.
For they raised the hackles of those psychological
Who claimed the only good gift was one ecological.
No baseball, no football...someone could get hurt;
Besides, playing sports exposed kids to dirt.
Dolls were said to be sexist, and should be passe;
And Nintendo would rot your entire brain away.
So Santa just stood there, disheveled, perplexed;
He just could not figure out what to do next.
He tried to be merry, tried to be gay,
But you've got to be careful with that word today.
His sack was quite empty, limp to the ground;
Nothing fully acceptable was to be found.
Something special was needed, a gift that he might
Give to all without angering the left or the right.
A gift that would satisfy, with no indecision,
Each group of people, every religion;
Every ethnicity, every hue,
Everyone, everywhere...even you.
So here is that gift, it's price beyond worth...
"May you and your loved ones enjoy peace on earth.
Replies
Twas the night before xmas... - Posted on 2006-12-23 18:42:32
loz 1300cc Superstar
Joined:
Sunday, September 18, 2005
Posts: 1628
Location:
Fife
United Kingdom
As a result of an overwhelming lack of requests, and with research help from that renowned scientific journal SPY magazine (January, 1990) - I am pleased to present the annual scientific inquiry into Santa Claus.
No known species of reindeer can fly. BUT there are 300,000 species of living organisms yet to be classified, and while most of these are insects and germs, this does not COMPLETELY rule out flying reindeer which only Santa has ever seen.
There are 2 billion children (persons under 18) in the world. BUT since Santa doesn't (appear) to handle the Muslim, Hindu, Jewish and Buddhist children, that reduces the workload to to 15% of the total - 378 million according to Population Reference Bureau. At an average (census) rate of 3.5 children per household, that's 91.8 million homes. One presumes there's at least one good child in each.
Santa has 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the different time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming he travels east to west (which seemes logical). This works out to 822.6 visits per second. This is to say that for each Christian household with good children, Santa has 1/1000th of a second to park, hop out of the sleigh, jump down the chimney, fill the stockings, distribute the remaining presents under the tree, eat whatever snacks have been left, get back up the chimney, get back into the sleigh and move on to the next house. Assuming that each of these 91.8 million stops are evenly distributed around the earth (which, of course, we know to be false but for the purposes of our calculations we will accept), we are now talking about .78 miles per household, a total trip of 75-1/2 million miles, not counting stops to do what most of us must do at least once every 31 hours, plus feeding and etc.
This means that Santa's sleigh is moving at 650 miles per second, 3,000 times the speed of sound. For purposes of comparison, the fastest man-made vehicle on earth, the Ulysses space probe, moves at a pokey 27.4 miles per second - a conventional reindeer can run, tops, 15 miles per hour.
The payload on the sleigh adds another interesting element. Assuming that each child gets nothing more than a medium-sized lego set (2 pounds), the sleigh is carrying 321,300 tons, not counting Santa, who is invariably described as overweight. On land, conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 pounds. Even granting that "flying reindeer" (see point #1) could pull TEN TIMES the normal anount, we cannot do the job with eight, or even nine. We need 214,200 reindeer. This increases the payload - not even counting the weight of the sleigh - to 353,430 tons. Again, for comparison - this is four times the weight of the Queen Elizabeth.
353,000 tons travelling at 650 miles per second creates enourmous air resistance - this will heat the reindeer up in the same fashion as spacecrafts re-entering the earth's atmosphere. The lead pair of reindeer will absorb 14.3 QUINTILLION joules of energy. Per second. Each. In short, they will burst into flame almost instantaneously, exposing the reindeer behind them, and create deafening sonic booms in their wake. The entire reindeer team will be vaporized within 4.26 thousandths of a second. Santa, meanwhile, will be subjected to centrifugal forces 17,500.06 times greater than gravity. A 250-pound Santa (which seems ludicrously slim) would be pinned to the back of his sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force.
In conclusion - If Santa ever DID deliver presents on Christmas Eve, he's dead now.
Twas the night before xmas... - Posted on 2006-12-23 18:42:56
loz 1300cc Superstar
Joined:
Sunday, September 18, 2005
Posts: 1628
Location:
Fife
United Kingdom
Dear College:
I read with disbelief your paper "IS THERE A SANTA CLAUS" in light of the seemingly unreputable scientific evidence presented, I passed the article to our School of Science for confirmation of your calculations. I was relieved when I recieved the following reply which confirms my belief in the existence of Santa.
THERE IS A SANTA CLAUS
An earlier circulation made some erroneous assumptions leading to a totally fatuous argument concerning the possibility of the existence of Santa Claus. The authors of the document place all their trust in classical mechanics and show a woeful ignorance of any Santum effects deriving from the wave-nature of Santa.
Wave Theory
Any impartial observer will note that as soon as consideration is given to the theory, two very significant features become immediately evident. We are confident with some certainty of the high kinetic energy of the particle (i.e. santum) and hence have little confidence in the spatial position of the santum. Yes, santum is a wave and not localised to one volume of space. Anyone familiar with wave theory will have encountered tunnelling effects e.g. electron tunnelling. The phenomenon in the santum effect is more correctly termed "the chimney effect" . Hence the santum particle may appear to penetrate walls, enter and escape from locked rooms etc.
You may well ask what evidence there is to support the theory and of course at this moment scientists are agreed that it is tenuous and circumstantial. The bulk of evidence comes through attempted observations of Santa which invariably give readings in the red region of the visible spectra due to red shift. As you wilI be aware nearly all sightings of Santa have been reported as having red associations.
Proof of the Pudding
It has been clear for some time that work needs to be done substantiating the theory. A major research project is underway currently. A team at the University of Greenwich have landed a plum contract to enable them to investigate the phenomenon over the festive season. Based at the Thames barrier, a diffraction grating is being erected to show the wave nature of Santum. The grating will consist of a giant array of Christmas puddings. Continuous monitoring over the festive season should provide the evidence we seek.
The Future
Answering one question will open the door to futher questions:
How can tonnes of non-santa material be inter-converted and travel as a wave?
Will this lead to a practical form of space travel?
[One note of caution to those stimulated to any theoretical calculations involving this phenomenon .... the SI unit you should use is the kSa (kilosanta) not the Sa as you might have expected. You may also find it convenient to use the non-Si unit of red shift the Rudolf]
--Attributed to:
Dr. Mary Claus
The School of Biological & Chemical Sciences
University of Greenwich
London
Twas the night before xmas... - Posted on 2006-12-23 20:57:19
gixxer 1300cc Superstar
Joined:
Tuesday, May 31, 2005
Posts: 1563
Location:
sheffield
United Kingdom
you wanna get a boyfriend you do...
Twas the night before xmas... - Posted on 2006-12-23 21:06:30
fredcbr6uk 1300cc Superstar
Joined:
Saturday, July 08, 2006
Posts: 513
Location:
beccles
United Kingdom
omg. you appear to have a little bit to much spare time on your hands loz, but good effort anywa. As for the spare time you could always come and wrap my xmas pressies for me, i hate doing it. cheers
Twas the night before xmas... - Posted on 2006-12-23 21:15:30
loz 1300cc Superstar
Joined:
Sunday, September 18, 2005
Posts: 1628
Location:
Fife
United Kingdom
hahaha no chance! i hate wraping pressies!!!
Twas the night before xmas... - Posted on 2006-12-23 22:52:28
gfisher 1300cc Superstar
Joined:
Tuesday, November 02, 2004
Posts: 2725
Location:
Glasgow
United Kingdom
well loz - is this an example of homework thats getting all coursework banned because of plagiarism?
lol
Twas the night before xmas... - Posted on 2006-12-23 22:53:37
the_ox 1300cc Superstar
Joined:
Saturday, October 30, 2004
Posts: 8803
Location:
London
United Kingdom
Get a boyfriend then
Twas the night before xmas... - Posted on 2006-12-24 00:00:35
inazuma 50cc Newbie
Joined:
Thursday, December 21, 2006
Posts: 1
Location:
Peterborough
United Kingdom
Nice one Loz, where did you get that from?
Twas the night before xmas... - Posted on 2006-12-24 15:17:39
Twas the night before xmas... - Posted on 2006-12-23 18:39:45
Twas the night before xmas... - Posted on 2006-12-23 20:57:19
