I will contact Jakie Mason asap.
Best Audio Related Story (or joke).
With all the stress and pressure going around at Audiogon these days, (posting issues, complaints and legal issues), seems like this would be a good opportunity to inject some light hearted audio related comments, stories or just plain old jokes. Please share yours!
57 responses Add your response
Let's go multimedia, here's an audio related classic from Not The Nine O' Clock News http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSINO6MKtco |
How many Teamsters does it take to screw in a lightbulb? 12. Have a problem with that? How many Kennedys does it take to screw in a lightbulb>? 3. One to hold the lightbulb and two to drink to make the room spin. How many feminists does it take to screw in a lightbulb? That's not funny. How many Jewish mothers does it take to screw in a lightbulb? It's OK. I will sit in the dark. |
Not hi-fi................. WHY CONDOMS COME IN BOXES OF 3, 6, AND 12 !!! A man walks into a drug store with his 8-year old son. They happen to walk by the condom display, and the boy asks, “What are these, Dad?" To which the man matter-of-factly replies, "Those are called condoms son. Men use them to have safe sex." "Oh I see," replied the boy pensively. "Yes, I've heard of that in health class at school." He looks over the display and picks up a package of 3 and asks, "Why are there 3 in this package?" The dad replies, "Those are for high school boys, one for Friday, one for Saturday, and one for Sunday." "Cool" says the boy. He notices a 6 pack and asks, "Then who are these for?" "Those are for college men," the dad answers, "TWO for Friday, TWO for Saturday, and TWO for Sunday." "WOW!" exclaimed the boy, "then who uses THESE?" he asks, picking up a 12 pack. With a sigh and a tear in his eye, the dad replied, "Those are for married men. One for January, one for February, one for March......." |
MAN KILLED ON GOLF COURSE A foursome of guys is waiting at the men's tee while a foursome of women is hitting from the ladies' tee. The ladies are taking their time. When the final lady is ready to hit her ball, she hacks it 10 feet. She goes over and whiffs it completely. Then she hacks it another ten feet, and finally hacks it another five feet. She looks up at the patiently waiting men and says apologetically, 'I guess all those f..king lessons I took over the winter didn't help.' One of the men immediately responds, 'Well, there you have it, you should have taken golf lessons instead!' He never even had a chance to duck... |
Not hi-fi related. A man boarded an aircraft at London 's Heathrow Airport for New York , and taking his seat as he settled in, he noticed a very beautiful woman boarding the plane. He realised she was heading straight toward his seat and bingo - she took the seat right beside him "Hello", he blurted out, "Business trip or vacation?" She turned, smiled enchantingly and said, "Business. I'm going to the annual nymphomaniac convention in the United States ..." He swallowed hard. Here was the most gorgeous woman he had ever seen sitting next to him, and she was going to a meeting for nymphomaniacs! Struggling to maintain his composure, he calmly asked, "What's your business role at this convention?" "Lecturer," she responded,” I use my experience to debunk some of the popular myths about sexuality.." "Really", he smiled, "what myths are those?" "Well," she explained, "one popular myth is that African-American men are the most well endowed when, in fact, it's the Native American Indian who is most likely to possess that trait. Another popular myth is that French men are the best lovers, when actually it is the men of Greek descent. We have also found that the best potential lovers in all categories are the Irish." Suddenly the woman became uncomfortable and blushed. "I'm sorry," she said. "I really shouldn't be discussing this with you, I don't even know your name!" "Tonto," the man said. "Tonto Papadopoulos, but my friends call me Paddy." |
An audiophile gets lonely since the wife left him for a conductor, he gets himself a pet centerpede. Every day they chat and listen to music, one day he tells the centerpede let's go out for some drinks, centerpede agrees, so he's waiting and waiting, finally he asks the centerpede "when are we leaving??", centerpede says "can't you see I am putting my shoes on!! |
True story: I was assisting in surgery. I introduced myself to the new surgeon, this being his first case in our O.R. As we started to close and pressure eased, the surgeon asked some personal questions- where you from, family, blah... He was from Detroit, so I asked about Motown. Had he seen any of the great soul groups, etc? He said his favorite music was gospel. Then he asked if I was religious. I evaded. So the discussion turned to you know what and I said my brother is a born again Christian. The MD was delighted to hear this! Like an opening salvo. Meanwhile, the anasthesioligist put a CD on with a horrible bass solo. So I said, "if there really is a God, that bass solo would end right now!" Everybody laughed, took it in stride. Then as we put dressings on the wound, the surgeon asked me if he could pray for me. I looked at the other nurse in the room, a look of instant death swarmed my being, I dared not flounder. So, in my brothers honor, I said OK. Talk about being put on the spot! We all held hands- Surgeon, myself, circulating nurse and anasthesia- as the surgeon summed up all his powers and prayed for me and my soul from his deep down. Honestly- I was on a cloud for the whole week. I really felt good, like I was Django in the clouds- heavenly! After the deep, soul saving call for my soul, David, the anasthesiologist, told this joke. A guy from NY goes on his dream vacation- the deep Congo of Africa! All the arrangements are in order- 100 porters, translators, equipment, etc. For days and weeks, he hears drumming in the jungle. Finally he asks the translator "what's the drumming about?" "Drumming good Bwana. Only when drumming stops, big trouble" This news put a damper on the entire safari. He could not help himself, so the New Yorker asked, "what happens when the drumming stops?" "Everything good, drums good, we don't want drums to stop!" The guy is getting worried. Suddenly, the drumming STOPS! The porters toss the equipment and run wildly through the jungle, screaming in a frenzy. Bwana grabs the translator, "what's happening?" "Run Bwana!" "Time for the bass solo!!!" |
The Luxman receiver Steve O speaks of reminds me of a period of time when I was attending school. I worked on a part time basis in a "stereo" store in Stratford, Ct. Westchester Stereo was it's name and we had a few decent lines for that period... Luxman, NAD, JBL, etc. We were also an authorized service center for Luxman. Our tech, (Donny, The Unit King) was actually a pretty sharp cookie. We had a Luxman RX-101 come in for a repair. The RX series receivers had a servo driven face (suck face) that would retract and reveal it's front panel controls when it powered up. The complaint with the unit was that the servo face would only retract part of the way back. We wrote a repair order and put the unit on the tech's (who was at lunch at the time) repair bench. About an hour later we hear this blood curdling male screaming blasting from the repair room. As we ran back through the store to find out what was happening, we see Donny (The Unit King) running with this Luxman RX receiver dangling from it's power cord. Donny jumps up with both feet, kicks the Fire emergency door open and proceeds to fling (with great velocity) the fine Luxman unit out the back door (which, by the way was elevated about 10 feet due to the loading dock). It seems, the most probable reason the "suck face" wouldn't draw back completely, was that the unit was filled with cockroaches. Which, (when Donny removed the unit's cover) were now running all over his repair bench. The fine Luxman unit took quite a flight. About 15 to 18 feet I would guess. Thank Heavens the store owner's (Tony) 1982 Cadillac Biarritz was parked down below to catch it. The Fireman told us about the receiver laying on the hood of Tony's car right next to the broken windshield. That of course was when they arrived with the police due to the fire door alarm which we couldn't stop from ringing. I think Tony closed the store a couple of years later. |
After a minute or so she turned to me with a very astonished look on her face and exclaimed in a rather loud voice "how do they DO that?!" She was referring to the speakers and their ability to soundstage and image. That's why those of us that love music buy the hardware we do. The hardware is only important in that it serves the music. Great story. |
I have a friend who is as nuts about classical music as I am. A few years ago, she came down to drop something off at the house. I said "before you go, I want you to hear something." So I got out Rachmaninoff's Paganini Variations (she's a piano player), plopped her down at the sweet spot between my Spica TC-60's and hit play. After a minute or so she turned to me with a very astonished look on her face and exclaimed in a rather loud voice "how do they DO that?!" She was referring to the speakers and their ability to soundstage and image. She had never heard loudspeakers do that before. Weeks later she bought a used pair of TC-60's and a Luxman receiver on A'gon. Steve O. |
True story about a provincial orchestra in Argentina, performing the 1812 overtue. A trombone player was a tad too effective in entering into the spirit of Borodino and the siege of Moscow. As you would, he put a large firecracker in his trombone, setting it off to accompany the cannon fire at the climax. Good plan, but the firecracker was very large indeed. After the explosion in the brass section, the trombone slide shot through the string section, scattering them like Cossacks scything through French infantry. It then struck the conductor a hefty blow in the abdomen, throwing him off the podium, collapsing the first 5 rows of the audience. Altogether, a very successful reenactment of the chaos of 1812. |
Three audiophiles are travelling across the desert to reach a Home Theater Expo (obviously not this year). They are pressed for time and hire the quickest camels available. And they take off. Two of the camels are making excellent time but the third is making loops in the sand! So he returns to the camel rental depot and complains. Upon hearing the story the camel mechanic has the camel walk over to the pit. He gets down into the pit with two rocks in his hands finds the camel's gonads and slams them with the rocks. The camel takes off like a rocket ship. The audiophile remarks " Wow thats incredible, but now how do I catch up to him?" The mechanic says " Stand over the pit!" |
A lady goes shopping at the local super market. She finds the young cashier attractive. So she asks him if he could he carry the grocery bags out to the car. He agrees. As they exit she wispers into his ear that she has an itsybushi, he replies lady "itsybushi mitsubishi these cars all look the same". |
Heres one for ya, this happened to me about 20 years ago. I work in HVAC. After working a long day doing service calls till about 10 PM. I get home sit in my seat in the stereo room figuring I'll wind down alone because the wife has gone to bed by now but low and behold in comes my wife and says to me you must have had a hard day and picks up my feet from the foot stool and takes off my shoes and lights me a smoke. She does not smoke and cannot stand it mind you. Says I'll be right back, she returns with dinner and gives it to me also goes and gets me a drink. Kitchen is supposed to be closed at 8:00 and always had before that day. I look at my wife and say, okay what has happened your going way overboard here. The wife looks at me say's Well.... I turned on the stereo and all of a sudden it starts making popping noises, smoking and making pretty color sparks. I ask here did she turn it on as we had agreed and she looks at me with those sad eyes and said "of course, honey!" I even switched all the switches up and down many times trying to make it stop doing those things and I even did that hale Mary thingy you do every time you turn it on! That was a very expensive day. Both the amps and preamp were toast. The mercury on all the tube turned black and 2 output tubes had exploded. I had Audio Research SP6 & 2 D90's bridged for mono mode at the time and always prayed before turning the system on, usually worked for me. In those days AR sounded great but had issue with powering on and tube life. |
Little boy asks his father what is economics and politics? "Well" said the dad "I am the capatalist because I bring home the money, your mother is the government because she distributes the money, the maid is the working class, you are the people, and your baby brother is the future." Boy goes to sleep. The same night the baby brother is crying because his diapers are soiled. So he goes to the parent's bedroom and mom is dead asleep, goes to the maid's bedroom and dad is on top of her, he goes back to bed. Next day the father asks the son to explain what he had been told the night before about family and economics. "Sure dad" he replies, " while the capatalist is screwing the working class, the government is dead asleep, the public is neglected and the future is still full of s#!t. |
This audiophile is in pursuit of a better stereo system. He thought he would do well if he got a vesectomy. This way... well you know he could buy class a+ stereo components. So he goes to his buddy who is his doctor as well to get the procedure done. The doctor realizes every penny counts so he gives him the home method vesectomy instructions rather than pay the hospital. He tells him "Go and buy a pack of fire crackers and go home. Hold the fire cracker in your left hand light it and count to ten." The audiophile guy goes to china town and buys a pack of fire crackers. When he gets home he finds a lighter, takes the pack apart, holds one in his left hand lights it. He starts to count with his right hand up in the air using his fingers to keep count, he reaches 5, stops, looks at his right hand then his left hand then right then left realizing he has to reach ten he puts the fire cracker between his legs and contnues counting.......... |
My fave story involves that company everybody here loves - Bose. ;) You may recall the Bose vs Consumer Reports legal case where Bose sued CR because they stated in a review that the sound of a certain model of Bose speaker "wandered around the room". Bose (somehow) won the case. Well, my friend Bill worked at a local audio dealer that sold Bose, Klipsch, Yamaha, B&O, etc. We were talking about speakers one day and Bose came up - he mentioned that the "sound of the instruments wanders around the listening room" when listening to Bose speakers. I know for a fact he did not know about the above mentioned lawsuit, but had heard it for himself. |
A man feared his wife (insert wife's name here...say..."Mary") wasn't hearing as well as she used to and he thought she might need a hearing aid. Not quite sure how to approach her, he called the family doctor to discuss the problem. The doctor told him there is a simple informal test the husband could perform to give the doctor a better idea about her hearing loss. “Here's what you do,” said the doctor, “stand about 40 feet away from her, and in a normal conversational speaking tone see if she hears you. If not, go to 30 feet, then 20 feet, and so on until you get a response.” That evening, the wife is in the kitchen cooking dinner, and he was in the den. He says to himself, “I'm about 40 feet away, let's see what happens.” Then in a normal tone he asks, “Mary, what's for dinner?” No response. So the husband moves closer to the kitchen, about 30 feet from his wife and repeats, “Mary, what's for dinner?” Still no response. Next he moves into the dining room where he is about 20 feet from his wife and asks, “Mary, what's for dinner?” Again he gets no response. So, he walks up to the kitchen door, about 10 feet away. “Mary, what's for dinner?” Again there is no response. So he walks right up behind her. “Mary, what's for dinner?” “(Your name here), for the FIFTH time, CHICKEN!” |
After the expo in NYC we decide to go to this supposedly excellent (zagat rated) chinese joint. We sit down and since there is seven or eight of us the waitress uses two hands to bring us our hot tea. We were so revved up over some speakers at the show that none of us noticed the waitress carried those cups of tea with her fingers inside the cups. I said "HEY YOU GOT YOUR FINGERS IN OUR TEA", she said "I know ,,,,,, I'm used to it!~) |
Sean, there was one time, I was there,one of my friend told Him, that the palpability sounds like disorted, and appear invincible,He went to John the next day, And John cant understand what he was saying, John end up calling me.He also said its the third time he consulted Him.Sean sometimes, He will end up tweaking his system up to 2 am.I am sure Sean if you are THE repair man.YOU WOULD LIKE TO HUNT US AND BLOW US WITH YOUR SHOTGUN.bUT WE ARE NOT LIKE SADDAM WHO HIDE ONLY ON SPIDER HOLE, WITH ONLY ONE PISTOL. |
Jayctoy: You and your buddy are the kind of guys i'd like to kill : ) I have a few customers that are easily rattled. Their buddies / co-workers know this and screw with them all the time. One of these customers used to come into my shop 2 - 3 times a week to have his equipment checked out because all of these "pranksters" kept telling him it wasn't working correctly. As it turns out, yes, you guessed it, it always worked just as it should and his buddies were pulling his leg. After about two to three months of this, ( and about 30 - 40 visits to my shop ), he finally caught on to what they were doing. Needless to say, i wanted to kill those other guys as i was the one that had to deal with this guy and all of his anxieties. I bet from their perspectives though, it was all quite funny : ) Sean > PS... is this "jingle cats" disc still available ? |
Albert we have a friend that He can easily be manipalted, so we play into his head,In term of audio He is ahead of us,We like to pull jokes on him.I would also tell Him, that one of our friend has the best ears in terms,of audio.So I told Him to invite Him.But before we went to His home my friend andI agree, that I will agree on His evaluation.There we go. After 5 songs.He asked. What do you think? My friend said the bass sound sterile, He said.What? My friend look at me.I said yes.He started talking, I wonder whats wrong, My friend said maybe the cabling, spend time replacing cable, while my friend and I are laughing whenever He turn his back on.After that. 5 songs after. Hows the bass? We both agree, that it improve,but my friend told Him, the midrange is no longer measuring up with the bass,Whats wrong? We told Himto remove the bass trap,in our surprise He did.Oh albert we are having a ball, to make Him more confuse we did not help him, so he will get tired.After removing the bass trap,We told Him its now balance, except the vocal are shaking, And He looks and I said Yes.We spend four hours pulling this jokes,the next day, He called me If,He need to upgrade, I told Him just put things back together. This is so funny, It went for weeks. |
Thanks Zstokes, I somehow thought this very funny thread might find time for a bit of light. So, along your lines, I offer the following: I recently downloaded AOL 9 to an office computer I sometimes use to check for my emails. This is the one used to run our payroll. oops. Anyway, we use a payroll service that we access online. the next morning our accountant calls me on my cell phone, wanting to know what I did to 'his' computer. He could not access the internet, and instead he got a whole S*load of AOL stuff. As it turns out, the Broadband server was having trouble elsewhere and all was okay by 2pm. Still, even though he apologized, he still glares at me when I go anywhere near 'his' computer. |
So I'll tell a story....it's not audio related, but rather computer system related. I am a systems engineer for the Walt Disney Company. 4 years ago when I was new and green, I went into the Data Center to replace a system board on a Sun server. Well, I had popped the failed board out, and a group of senior guys were watching me. It seems I was providing much entertainment to these fellas, as I must have had a 'scared $h**less' look on my face. Anyway, just as I sat the new board into the server, all the lights went out in the computer room. Just at that exact moment, Cal Edison had drilled through a core line down the street and we were without power for the whole day. I am now affectionitly known as 'Crash' Z |
One year at CES, when we were making our way down one of the hallways, the cardboard signs sticking out from the doorways indicate who is displaying in each of the rooms. One year the signs lined up, in such a way as to be irresistible. I commented in my best Irish Spring/Scottish accent, "Aye, we've got some very MANLEY amps in there! And to add to the confusion, Those BERNING amps must have caused the FRIED speakers!" Sorry, this is my kind of humor. |
Back in '73 when Quad (remember 4 channel?) was in vogue, I built a chip-based CD4 decoder to experiment with. But I only had 2 channel, so the plan was to demo it on an engineer friends' 4 speaker rig. Plugged everything in & powered on to the sound of an audible "pop" & 120 Hz buzzing (amps in hard DC clipping). Shut it all down right away, but the damage was already done. Two woofers' cones were frozen forward, & the smell of burning coil varnish then became evident. I had neglected to install coupling-caps on the decoders' output lines, placing +24 Vcc supply right into direct-coupled amps' inputs! The amps only needed new fuses, but I ended up buying him a pair of new woofers. Not to mention the embarrassment right in front of several other engineers... It wasn't terribly expensive, but I'll never live that one down. |
That story about the Jingle Cats is hysterical! I have a huge white Persian cat, and I've played this CD every Christmas and New Years for the last three years. My guests laugh, and my cat listens with a strange look on her face. It is priceless, and lucky for me, the cat is female and prefers to look disgusted, rather than pee on anything. |
Is Audioreview the Bose and Grand Enigma reviews? Anyway, here is a mishap that happened the day before Christmas in our household. I would not recommend this CD to cat owners. I have copied and pasted the following from a previous email...I picked up a holiday CD at a thrift shop that is entitled "Jingle-Cats", real kittens singing 20 holiday classics, from "Silent Night" to "Auld Lang Syne". I had thought that the cats (the little men) would enjoy it, but by the time the second song had finished they were in an uproar. One had sprayed one of the speaker stands and two of the others were trying to attack the speakers (that are on 29" stands). It was a total disaster. I had to put them outside and then later keep an eye on them around the speakers for the next 24 hours, as even with "normal" music playing they kept eying the Reynauds. Finally their tiny little brains forgot all about it and everything is back to normal (normal meaning that they are now peeing the Xmas tree that I brought home yesterday morning). |
Ray, in response to your question in new postings, copied and pasted here at this site: Does anyone know of any collections of audio-related humor on the web? I miss the Lirpa articles in Audio (I know there are two listings on Audioreview). This will bring this thread up to the top, where you may access them, and hopefully post something of your own. Albert |
Here's a true story. When I got my new speaker system (a four-piece system with an active crossover), the guy who built it didn't have monoblock crossovers for me, so he gave me two stereo ones, both prototypes, to use till the new ones were built. The speakers were built in a large warehouse, not hermetically sealed. When he arrived with the new crossovers, I went to take out one of the old ones and found a dead bird under it (don't ask me how, but I'll bet it flew into the 3 1/2 inch port of one of the subwoofers in that warehouse)! Of course, I turned to the guy and told him with a straight face that no wonder his speaker sounded dull to me, it had a dead tweeter. He then hit me on the head with my new crossover...... |
Response to David99 about reviewers. Your statement is exactly what my buddy was trying to disprove! These individuals are not always the godly, golden eared people that everyone takes them for!...they are human, like you and me. This means that we all have preferences, are not always impartial, and usually can be swayed to believe in something, due to our pre-concieved notions. Additionally, CES shows have some of the worst rooms in which to make decisions on "what a new component sounds like". Believe me, there is more than one reviewer "recommended manufacturer", that is actually a stinker, as compared to their competition. IF ANYONE READING THIS THINKS OTHERWISE, THEN YOU ARE READY TO JOIN THE P.T. BARNUM CLUB! (P.S.-I will contact my buddy this week to see if he is willing to reveil himself.) |