The Polite Way

Thanks to Patricia - via Nunzio

A guy was getting ready to tee off on the first hole when a second

golfer approached and asked if he could join him.

The first said that he usually played alone, but agreed to the twosome.

They were even after the first few holes. The second guy said,

"We're about evenly matched, how about playing for five bucks a hole?"

The first guy said that he wasn't much for betting, but agreed to the terms.

The second guy won the remaining sixteen holes with ease.

As they were walking off number eighteen,

the second guy was busy counting his $80.00.

He confessed that he was the pro at a neighboring course and liked to pick on suckers.

The first fellow revealed that he was the Parish Priest.

The pro was flustered and apologetic, offering to return the money. The Priest said,

"You won fair and square and I was foolish to bet with you. You keep your winnings."

The pro said, "Is there anything I can do to make it up to you?"

The Priest said, "Well, you could come to Mass on Sunday and make a donation....

.

And, if you want to bring your mother and father along,

I'll marry them.

--

Supersonic Man

Thanks to David H.

Joe Kittinger is not a household aviation name like Neil Armstrong or Chuck Yeager. But what he did for the U. S. space program is comparable. On Aug. 16, 1960, as research for the then-fledgling U. S. space program, Air Force Captain Joseph Kittinger rode a helium balloon to the edge of space, 102,800 feet above the earth, a feat in itself.

Then, wearing just a thin pressure suit and breathing supplemental oxygen, he leaned over the cramped confines of his gondola and jumped--into the 110-degree-below-zero, near-vacuum of space. Within seconds his body accelerated to 714mph in the thin air, breaking the sound barrier.

After free-falling for more than four and a half minutes, slowed finally by friction from the heavier air below, he felt his parachute open at 14,000 feet, and he coasted gently down to the New Mexico desert floor. Kittinger's feat showed scientists that astronauts could survive the harshness of space with just a pressure suit and that man could eject from aircraft at extreme altitudes and survive.

Upon Kittinger's return to base, a congratulatory telegram was waiting from the Mercury seven astronauts--including Alan Shepard and John Glenn. More than four decades later Kittinger's two world records--the highest parachute jump, and the only man to break the sound barrier without an aircraft and live--still stand. We decided to visit the retired colonel and Aviation Hall of Famer, now 75, at his home in Altamonte Springs, Florida, to recall his historic jump.

FORBES GLOBAL: Take us back to New Mexico and Aug. 16, 1960.

Joe Kittinger: We got up at 2 a. m. to start filling the helium balloon. At sea level, it was 35 to 40 feet wide and 200 feet high; at altitude, due to the low air pressure, it expanded to 25 stories in width, and still was 20 stories high!

At 4 a. m. I began breathing pure oxygen for two hours. That's how long it takes to remove all the nitrogen from your blood so you don't get the bends going so high so fast. Then it was a lengthy dress procedure layering warm clothing under my pressure suit. They kept me in air-conditioning until it was time to launch because we were in the desert and I wasn't supposed to sweat. If I did, my clothes would freeze on the way up.

How was your ascent?

It took an hour and a half to get to altitude. It was cold. At 40,000 feet, the glove on my right hand hadn't inflated. I knew that if I radioed my doctor, he would abort the flight. If that happened, I knew I might never get another chance because there were lots of people who didnšt want this test to happen.

I took a calculated risk, that I might lose use of my right hand. It quickly swelled up, and I did lose use for the duration of the flight. But the rest of the pressure suit worked. When I reached 102,800 feet, maximum altitude, I wasn't quite over the target.

So I drifted for 11 minutes. The winds were out of the east. What's it look like from so high up? You can see about 400 miles in every direction. The formula is 1.25 x the sq. root of the altitude in thousands of feet. (The square root of 102,000 ft is 319 X 1.25 = 399 miles)

The most fascinating thing is that it's just black overhead--the transition from normal blue to black is very stark. You can't see stars because there's a lot of glare from the sun, so your pupils are too small. I was struck with the beauty of it. But I was also struck by how hostile it is: more than 100 degrees below zero, no air. If my protection suit failed, I would be dead in a few seconds. Blood actually boils above 62, 000 feet.

I went through my 46-step checklist, disconnected from the balloonšs power supply and lost all communication with the ground. I was totally under power from the kit on my back. When everything was done, I stood up, turned around to the door, took one final look out and said a silent prayer: "Lord, take care of me now." Then I just jumped over the side.

What were you thinking as you took that step?

It's the beginning of a test. I had gone through simulations many times--more than 100. I rolled over and looked up, and there was the balloon just roaring into space. I realized that the balloon wasn't roaring into space; I was going down at a fantastic rate! At about 90,000 feet, I reached 714mph.

The altimeter on my wrist was unwinding very rapidly. But there was no sense of speed. Where you determine speed is visual--if you see something go flashing by. But nothing flashes by 20 miles up--there are no signposts there, and you are way above any clouds. When the chute opened, the rest of the jump was anticlimactic because everything had worked perfectly. I landed 12 or 13 minutes later, and there was my crew waiting. We were elated.

How about your right hand?

It hurt--there was quite a bit of swelling and the blood pressure in my arm was high. But that went away in a few days, and I regained full use of my hand. What about attempts to break your record? We did it for air crews and astronauts--for the learning, not to set a record.

They will be going up as skydivers. Somebody will beat it someday. Records are made to be broken. And I'll be elated. But I'll also be concerned that theyšre properly trained. If they're not, they're taking a heck of a risk.

Dummies guide to what went wrong in Europe

Thanks to David H.

Helga is the proprietor of a bar.

She realizes that virtually all of her customers are unemployed alcoholics

and, as such, can no longer afford to patronize her bar.

To solve this problem, she comes up with a new marketing plan that allows

her customers to drink now, but pay later.

Helga keeps track of the drinks consumed on a ledger (thereby granting the

customers' loans).

Word gets around about Helga's "drink now, pay later" marketing strategy

and, as a result, increasing numbers of customers flood into Helga's bar.

Soon she has the largest sales volume for any bar in town.

By providing her customers freedom from immediate payment demands,

Helga gets no resistance when, at regular intervals, she substantially

increases her prices for wine and beer, the most consumed beverages.

Consequently, Helga's gross sales volume increases massively.

A young and dynamic vice-president at the local bank recognizes that

these customer debts constitute valuable future assets and increases

Helga's borrowing limit.

He sees no reason for any undue concern, since he has the debts of the

unemployed alcoholics as collateral!!!

At the bank's corporate headquarters, expert traders figure a way to make

huge commissions, and transform these customer loans into DRINKBONDS.

These "securities" then are bundled and traded on international

securities markets.

Naive investors don't really understand that the securities being sold to

them as "AA" "Secured Bonds" really are debts of unemployed alcoholics.

Nevertheless, the bond prices continuously climb!!!, and the securities

soon become the hottest-selling items for some of the nation's leading

brokerage houses.

One day, even though the bond prices still are climbing, a risk manager at

the original local bank decides that the time has come to demand payment

on the debts incurred by the drinkers at Helga's bar. He so informs Helga.

Helga then demands payment from her alcoholic patrons, but being

unemployed alcoholics they cannot pay back their drinking debts.

Since Helga cannot fulfil her loan obligations she is forced into

bankruptcy. The bar closes and Helga's 11 employees lose their jobs.

Overnight, DRINKBOND prices drop by 90%. The collapsed bond asset value

destroys the bank's liquidity and prevents it from issuing new loans, thus

freezing credit and economic activity in the community.

The suppliers of Helga's bar had granted her generous payment extensions

and had invested their firms' pension funds in the BOND securities.

They find they are now faced with having to write off her bad debt and

with losing over 90% of the presumed value of the bonds.

Her wine supplier also claims bankruptcy, closing the doors on a family

business that had endured for three generations, her beer supplier is

taken over by a competitor, who immediately closes the local plant and

lays off 150 workers. Fortunately though, the bank, the brokerage houses

and their respective executives are saved and bailed out by a multibillion

dollar no-strings attached cash infusion from the government.

The funds required for this bailout are obtained by new taxes levied on

employed, middle-class, non-drinkers who’ve never been in Helga’s bar.

Now do you understand?

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