Dave Barry

A full-grown manatee, which can weigh more than 1,000 pounds, looks like the result of a genetic experiment involving a walrus and the Goodyear Blimp.

Although golf was originally restricted to wealthy, overweight Protestants, today it's open to anybody who owns hideous clothing.

 

I can win an argument on any topic, against any opponent. People know this, and steer clear of me at parties. Often, as a sign of their great respect, they don't even invite me.

 

I think Superman should go on the Larry King show and announce that he would come back to life if people in all 50 states wanted him to.

 

Skiing combines outdoor fun with knocking down trees with your face.

 

Thus the metric system did not really catch on in the States, unless you count the increasing popularity of the nine-millimeter bullet.

 

What I look forward to is continued immaturity followed by death.

 

You can only be young once. But you can always be immature.

 

Another possible source of guidance for teenagers is television, but television's message has always been that the need for truth, wisdom and world peace pales by comparison with the need for a toothpaste that offers whiter teeth *and* fresher breath.

 

Electricity is actually made up of extremely tiny particles called electrons, that you cannot see with the naked eye unless you have been drinking.

 

The only really good place to buy lumber is at a store where the lumber has already been cut and attached together in the form of furniture, finished, and put inside boxes.

A gene can be either dominant or recessive, depending on which type of gene it is.

Admit it, sport-utility-vehicle owners! It's shaped a little differently, but it's a station wagon! And you do not drive it across rivers! You drive it across the Wal-Mart parking lot!

American business long ago gave up on demanding that prospective employees be honest and hardworking. It has even stopped hoping for employees who are educated enough that they can tell the difference between the men's room and the women's room without having little pictures on the doors.

American consumers have no problem with carcinogens, but they will not purchase any product, including floor wax, that has fat in it.

And so by the fifteenth century, on October 8, the Europeans were looking for a new place to try to get to, and they came up with a new concept: the West.

As a child, I was more afraid of tetanus shots than, for example, Dracula.

Auto racing is boring except when a car is going at least 172 miles per hour upside down.

Because of the level of my chess game, I was able - even against a weak opponent, such as my younger brothers or the dog - to get myself checkmated in under three minutes. I challenge any computer to do it faster.

Big business never pays a nickel in taxes, according to Ralph Nader, who represents a big consumer organization that never pays a nickel in taxes.

Bill Gates is a very rich man today .. and do you want to know why? The answer is one word: versions.

Buying the right computer and getting it to work properly is no more complicated than building a nuclear reactor from wristwatch parts in a darkened room using only your teeth.

Camping is nature's way of promoting the motel business.

Cigarette sales would drop to zero overnight if the warning said "CIGARETTES CONTAIN FAT."

Congress, after years of stalling, finally got around to clearing the way for informal discussions that might lead to possible formal talks that could potentially produce some kind of tentative agreements...

Crabgrass can grow on bowling balls in airless rooms, and there is no known way to kill it that does not involve nuclear weapons.

DNA is an abbreviation for deoxyribonucleicantidisestablishmentarianism, a complex string of syllables.

Dogsled-riding is a sport that is relaxing as well as fragrant.

Don't you wish you had a job like mine? All you have to do is think up a certain number of words! Plus, you can repeat words! And they don't even have to be true!

Eating rice cakes is like chewing on a foam coffee cup, only less filling.

'Escargot' is French for 'fat crawling bag of phlegm'.

Eugene is located in western Oregon, approximately 278 billion miles from anything.

Experts agree that the best type of computer for your individual needs is one that comes on the market about two days after you actually purchase some other computer.

Experts tell us that if the Millennium Bug is not fixed, when the year 2000 arrives, our financial records will be inaccurate, our telephone system will be unreliable, our government will be paralyzed and airline flights will be canceled without warning. In other words, things will be pretty much the same as they are now.

Fishing is boring, unless you catch an actual fish, and then it is disgusting.

For many years the National Pretend Speed Limit was fifty-five miles per hour (metric equivalent: 378 kilograms per hectare.)

For me, the worst part of playing golf, by far, has always been hitting the ball.

Genes are little items that are found in every living thing except Sen. Alfonse D'Amato.

Geographically, Ireland is a medium-sized rural island that is slowly but steadily being consumed by sheep.

Grammatically, should of is a predatory admonition; as such, it is always used as part of a herpetological phrase.

Gravity is a contributing factor in nearly 73 percent of all accidents involving falling objects.

Harvard University, according to the directory of the American Society of Colleges and Universities, is a "type of weevil."

Have you noticed that whatever sport you're trying to learn, some earnest person is always telling you to keep your knees bent?

Hobbies of any kind are boring except to people who have the same hobby. (This is also true of religion, although you will not find me saying so in print.)

I am not a violent person. I am a product of the Flower Power '60s. I have actually worn bell-bottomed jeans.

I am not the only person who uses his computer mainly for the purpose of diddling with his computer.

I argue very well. Ask any of my remaining friends. I can win an argument on any topic, against any opponent. People know this, and steer clear of me at parties. Often, as a sign of their great respect, they don't even invite me.

I believe many Harley guys spend more time revving their engines than actually driving anywhere; I sometimes wonder why they bother to have wheels on their motorcycles.

I believe that we parents must encourage our children to become educated, so they can get into a good college that we cannot afford.

I have always dressed according to certain Basic Guy Fashion Rules,including:* Both of your socks should always be the same color,* Or they should at least both be fairly dark.

I have been a gigantic Rolling Stones fan since approximately the Spanish-American War.

I have never been into wine. I'm a beer man. What I like about beer is you basically just drink it and order more. You don't sniff at it, or hold it up to the light and slosh it around, or drone on and on about it, the way people do with wine. Your beer drinker tends to be a straightforward, decent, friendly, down-to-earth person, whereas your serious wine fancier tends to be an insufferable snot.

I now realize that the small hills you see on ski slopes are formed around the bodies of forty-seven-year-olds who tried to learn snowboarding.

I realize that I'm generalizing here, but as is often the case when I generalize, I don't care.

I recently had my annual physical examination, which I get once every seven years, and when the nurse weighed me, I was shocked to discover how much stronger the Earth's gravitational pull has become since 1990.

I regularly read Internet user groups filled with messages from people trying to solve software incompatibility problems that, in terms of complexity, make the U.S. Tax Code look like Dr. Seuss.

I want a pit crew... I hate the procedure I currently have to go through when I have car problems.

I was a young person once, shortly after the polar ice caps retreated, and I distinctly recall believing that virtually all adults were clueless goobers.

I would not know how I am supposed to feel about many stories if not for the fact that the TV news personalities make sad faces for sad stories and happy faces for happy stories.

I've gained a few pounds around the middle. The only lower-body garments I own that still fit me comfortably are towels.

If a woman has to choose between catching a fly ball and saving an infant's life, she will choose to save the infant's life without even considering if there is a man on base.

You can say any foolish thing to do to a dog, and the dog will give you a look that says, 'My God, you're right! I never would've thought of that!'

How do these celebrities stay so impossibly thin? Simple: They have full-time personal trainers, who advise them on nutrition, give them pep talks, and shoot them with tranquilizer darts whenever they try to crawl, on hunger-weakened limbs, toward the packet of rice cakes that constitutes the entire food supply in their 37,000-square-foot mansions. For most celebrities, the biggest meal of the day is toothpaste (they use reduced-fat Crest).

Karate is a form of martial arts in which people who have had years and years of training can, using only their hands and feet, make some of the worst movies in the history of the world.

Of course it’s possible that there really ISN’T any shadow government. The whole thing could be a phony story that was fed to The Washington Post to mislead our enemies. As you recall, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld recently admitted that the Pentagon had set up an office—officially named “The Office of Disinformation”—that was supposed to put out false statements to the media, thus throwing our enemies off the track. For example, if we were getting ready to attack Iraq, officials of the Office of Disinformation would hold a press conference and state: “Well, we’re certainly not going to attack Iraq!” The news media would report this, and Iraq would relax. (France, meanwhile, would surrender.)

Meanwhile, in nearby Italy, Christopher Columbus was forming. As a youth, he spent many hours gazing out to sea and thinking to himself: “Someday I will be the cause of a holiday observed by millions of government workers.” The fact that he thought in English was only one of the amazing things about the young Columbus. Another was his conviction that if he sailed all the way across the Atlantic, he would reach India. We now know, thanks to satellite photographs, that this makes him seem as stupid as a buffalo, although it sounded pretty good when Columbus explained it to the rulers of Spain, Ferdinand and his lovely wife, Imelda, who agreed to finance the voyage by selling six thousand pairs of her shoes.

Scientists tell us that the fastest animal on earth, with a top speed of 120 ft/sec, is a cow that has been dropped out of a helicopter.

The word aerobics comes from two Greek words: aero, meaning "ability to," and bics, meaning "withstand tremendous boredom."

I like beer. On occasion I will even drink a beer to celebrate a major event such as the fall of communism or the fact that our refrigerator is still working.

Not all chemicals are bad. Without chemicals such as hydrogen and oxygen, for example, there would be no way to make water, a vital ingredient in beer.

Dogs feel very strongly that they should always go with you in the car, in case the need should arise for them to bark violently at nothing right in your ear.

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