1Warning: The fortunes contained in the fortune database have 2 been collected haphazardly from a caphony of sources, 3 in number so huge it boggles the mind. It is 4 impossible to do any meaningful quality control on 5 attributions, or lack thereof, or exactness of the 6 quote. Since this database is not used for profit, and 7 since entire works are not published, it falls under 8 fair use, as we understand it. However, if any 9 half-assed idiot decides to make a profit off of this, 10 they will need to double check it all, and nobody not 11 involved of such an effort makes any warranty that 12 anything in here bears any relation to the real world 13 of literature, law, or other bizzarrity. 14 15[All examples are indented by one tab stop -- KCRCA] 16 17Numbers should be given in parentheses, e.g., 18 19 (1) Everything depends. 20 (2) Nothing is always. 21 (3) Everything is sometimes. 22 23Attributions are two tab stops, followed by two hyphens, followed by a 24space, followed by the attribution, and are *not* preceded by blank 25lines. Book, journal, movie, and all other titles are in quotes, .e.g, 26 27 $100 invested at 7% interest for 100 years will become $100,000, at 28 which time it will be worth absolutely nothing. 29 -- Lazarus Long, "Time Enough for Love" 30 31Attributions which do not fit on one (72 char) line should be continued 32on a line which lines up below the first text of the attribution, e.g., 33 34 -- A very long attribution which might not fit on one 35 line, "Ken Arnold's Stupid Sayings" 36 37Single paragraph fortunes are in left justified (non-indented) 38paragraphs unless they fall into another category listed below (see 39examle above). Longer fortunes should also be in left justified 40paragraphs, but if this makes it too long, try indented paragraphs, 41with indentations of either one tab stop or 5 chars. Indentations of 42less than 5 are too hard to read. 43 44Laws have the title left justified and capitalized, followed by a 45colon, with all the text of the law itself indented one tab stop, 46initially capitalized, e.g., 47 48 A Law of Computer Programming: 49 Make it possible for programmers to write in English and you 50 will find the programmers cannot write in English. 51 52Limericks are indented as follows, all lines capitalized: 53 54 A computer, to print out a fact, 55 Will divide, multiply, and subtract. 56 But this output can be 57 No more than debris, 58 If the input was short of exact. 59 60Accents precede the letter they are over, e.g., "`^He" for e with a 61grave accent. Underlining is done on a word-by-word basis, with the 62underlines preceding the word, e.g., "__^H^Hhi ____^H^H^H^Hthere". 63 64No fortune should run beyond 72 characters on a single line without 65good justification (er, no pun intended). And no right margin 66justification, either. Sorry. 67 68Definitions are given with the word or phrase left justified, followed 69by the part of speech (if appropriate) and a colon. The definition 70starts indented by one tab stop, with subsequent lines left justified, 71e.g., 72 73 Afternoon, n.: 74 That part of the day we spend worrying about how we wasted the 75 morning. 76 77Quotes are sometimes put around statements which are funnier or make 78more sense if they are understood as being spoken, rather than written, 79communication, e.g, 80 81 "All my friends and I are crazy. That's the only thing that keeps us 82 sane." 83 84Elipses are always surrounded by spaces, except when next to 85puncuation, and are three dots, unless there is a good reason not to. 86(In fact, all these rules can be broken if they make a good joke.) 87 88 "... all the modern inconveniences ..." 89 -- Mark Twain 90 91Human initials always have spaces after the periods, e.g, "P. T. 92Barnum", not "P.T. Barnum". However, "P.T.A.", not "P. T. A.". 93 94All fortunes should be attributed, but if and only if they are original 95with somebody. Many people have said things that are folk sayings 96(i.e., are common among the folk (i.e., us common slobs)). There is 97nothing wrong with this, of course, but such statements should not be 98attributed to individuals who did not invent them. 99 100Horoscopes should have the sign indented by one tab stop, followed by 101the dates of the sign, with the text left justified below it, e.g., 102 103 AQUARIUS (Jan 20 - Feb 18) 104 You have an inventive mind and are inclined to be progressive. You lie 105 a great deal. On the other hand, you are inclined to be careless and 106 impractical, causing you to make the same mistakes over and over 107 again. People think you are stupid. 108 109Single quotes should not be used except as quotes within quotes. Not 110even single quotes masquerading as double quotes are to be used, e.g., 111don't say ``hi there'' or `hi there' or 'hi there', but "hi there". 112However, you *can* say "I said, `hi there'". 113 114A long poem or song can be ordered as follows in order to make it 115fit on a screen (fortunes should be 19 lines or less if at all 116possible): 117 118 11111111111111111111 119 11111111111111111111 120 11111111111111111111 22222222222222222222 121 11111111111111111111 22222222222222222222 122 22222222222222222222 123 33333333333333333333 22222222222222222222 124 33333333333333333333 125 33333333333333333333 44444444444444444444 126 33333333333333333333 44444444444444444444 127 44444444444444444444 128 44444444444444444444 129 130Fortunes are split into potentially offensive and not potentially 131offensive, into the files "obscene" and "scene", respectively. 132Anything which would not make it onto network prime time programming 133should *not* go into "scene". Also, anything which would only get on 134if some discredited kind of guy said it should *not* go in scene. 135Fortunes containing "shit", "fuck", "cock" (not the male version of a 136chicken, obviously, but "penis"), "cunt", "pussy", and such like are 137*obscene*. Political opinions are supposed to be in "obscene", too. 138Antyhing which is blatantly racist, mysoginist, or homophobic, should 139not be in either, since they are not really funny unless *you* are 140racist, mysoginist, or homophobic. 141