I don't understand - what is this for?

In article ,
writes:

Koans are not quite the same as aphorisms . . .

Actually, they are.

Old saws 'n chestnuts are not the same as koans.

Well, they are, too. After all, it's not about
the nail -- it's about the hammer. Or the hand
that swings the hammer. Or the mind that decides
to swing the hammer. Or the superlative being that
decides that an hammer should be swung. Or the
Parvardegar that says: "Yeah, sure. Swing the hammer
if ya wanna. I dreamt that it would happen, anyway. And
what are dreams to me, are reality to you, and what you
believe to be real is mere, ethereal daydreaming to me:
I daydreamed you up. Knock yerselves out. Try not to
hurt each other, but rather try to help each other, and
co-exist in mutual love and respect. You're going to do
that anyways, 'cuz that's how I invented you in my daydreams.
So feel good, and don't hurt anybody. Love your fellows."

The Almighty might even be able to put up with you on a
personal level, if you don't bug him too much. Just remember,
he's already got a lot on his plate, what with making the
entire universe work, and we're not particularly special.

Well, we all are special, but we're not allowed to wield
it against each other. By helping each other, we're
helping the Cosmic Him/Her/It.

Screw koans. Screw aphorisms. Screw ego. Screw my ego.
Screw your ego. Screw everybody's ego.


cheers,
Tom


--
We're upping our standards. So up yours.
-- Pat Paulsen

"Have you heard the news -- there's good rockin' tonight"

Tom Keats wrote:
...
Screw koans. Screw aphorisms. Screw ego. Screw my ego.
Screw your ego. Screw everybody's ego.

Screw threaded fasteners.

--
Tom Sherman - Holstein-Friesland Bovinia
"I didn't expect a kind of Spanish Inquisition!"

--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

On Mon, 13 Aug 2007 01:57:54 -0700, (Tom Keats)
wrote:

In article ,
writes:

Koans are not quite the same as aphorisms . . .

Actually, they are.

Old saws 'n chestnuts are not the same as koans.

Well, they are, too. After all, it's not about
the nail -- it's about the hammer. Or the hand
that swings the hammer. Or the mind that decides
to swing the hammer. Or the superlative being that
decides that an hammer should be swung. Or the
Parvardegar that says: "Yeah, sure. Swing the hammer
if ya wanna. I dreamt that it would happen, anyway. And
what are dreams to me, are reality to you, and what you
believe to be real is mere, ethereal daydreaming to me:
I daydreamed you up. Knock yerselves out. Try not to
hurt each other, but rather try to help each other, and
co-exist in mutual love and respect. You're going to do
that anyways, 'cuz that's how I invented you in my daydreams.
So feel good, and don't hurt anybody. Love your fellows."

The Almighty might even be able to put up with you on a
personal level, if you don't bug him too much. Just remember,
he's already got a lot on his plate, what with making the
entire universe work, and we're not particularly special.

Well, we all are special, but we're not allowed to wield
it against each other. By helping each other, we're
helping the Cosmic Him/Her/It.

Screw koans. Screw aphorisms. Screw ego. Screw my ego.
Screw your ego. Screw everybody's ego.


cheers,
Tom

Dear Tom,

A Zen student asked his master whether koans were aphorisms.

The master told him to shoplift the second volume of the condensed
Oxford English Dictionary from WalMart.

The puzzled student protested that shoplifting seemed unethical, that
neither "aphorism" nor "koan" would appear in P-Z, and that WalMart
was unlikely to stock a two-volume dictionary meeting the UCI minimum
weight requirement.

The master told the student, "Never mind. Buy a Fury RoadMaster at
WalMart and cook it for dinner."

After pondering the annihilation of self and sense for a few seconds,
the student left the monastery, stopped payment on his tuition check,
used the money to buy an elegant new bicycle at the local bike shop,
and enjoyed the fine spring weather.

A few months later, the lapsed student was pleased to read in the
newspaper (whose cartoons made more sense than his previous studies)
that the master had left the monastery, too, after embezzling its
meagre funds, but had been easily apprehended because he fled on foot.

Three to five year later (with time off for good behavior), the master
finished contemplating his sentence and placed an ad in the same
newspaper, inviting all his former students to come on down to his new
workplace, where he sold used automobiles that answered the question,
"What is the sound of one piston knocking?"

The student rode past the car lot every day, but waved only when he
could not see his former master.

Cheers,

Carl Fogel

wrote:
On Mon, 13 Aug 2007 01:57:54 -0700, (Tom Keats)
wrote:

In article ,
writes:

Koans are not quite the same as aphorisms . . .
Actually, they are.

snip-de-dip****


The student rode past the car lot every day, but waved only when he
could not see his former master.

Cheers,

Carl Fogel

Carl,
FFS go ride your bike!

On Aug 4, 1:49 pm, wrote:
On Sat, 04 Aug 2007 12:33:57 -0500, Tim McNamara

wrote:
In article ,
"Tom \"Johnny Sunset\" Sherman" ""sunsetss0003\"@invalida .com"
wrote:

See http://www2.trekbikes.com/Bikes/2007/mountain/69er.html.

Is the bigger front wheel to better roll over obstacles, or is it
just a demented fashion statement? Conversely, does the smaller rear
wheel provide any real advantage?

Back in the day, Charlie Cunningham built MTBs with a smaller rear
wheel- IIRC 20" rear and 26" front. Many dirt motorbikes have a smaller
rear wheel. I have no idea why. MaybeCarlFogel does, he used to ride
trialsand the like.

Dear Tim,

Sorry, but we fooled you.

Don't feel bad, since 9 out of 10trialsriders will mistakenly insist
that their front tires are bigger.

After all,trialsmachines use 21-inch front rims and 18-inch rear
rims, so the front tire must be 3 inches taller, right?

Nope.

Look at this 2007 GasGas TXT 300cc, which has the standard 21 x 2.75
front tire and 18 x 4.00 rear ti

http://i16.tinypic.com/4pl4yhk.jpg

You can't tell the front tire from the rear with a yardstick on atrialsmachine, particularly if the rider's weight is squashing the
lightly inflated tires.

For practical purposes, the front and rear tires are the same height.
In fact, the height of the tread blocks on a particular model of tire
has more effect on the tire height than whether it's a "21" front or
"18" rear tire.

On the front, the narrow 21-inch rim mounts a skinny 2.75 tire. The
combination is tall enough to roll over obstacles easily, but still
light enough to steer, bounce, and pop up in tricky places. The rim is
strong enough because the leading tire takes less impact, carries less
weight, and has more suspension.

On the rear, the wide 18-inch rim mounts a 4.00 tire, which is so
thick in cross-section that it ends up just as tall and willing to
roll over obstacles as the dainty front tire.

The 4-inch width gives traction for the engine, the huge increase in
cross-section gives more pneumatic suspension at the same 4~6 psi
(think 700x38 versus 700x21), and the massive rim and tire withstand
~400 pounds of rider and machine slamming into waist-high rock ledges.

Since the rear tire steers a gentler curve than the front tire, the
enormous increase in weight doesn't hurt handling.

That's why the original 19-inch front and rear rims were replaced.
They were fine for pavement and okay for fairly smooth off-road
riding, but too heavy and clumsy for the front and not heavy and
strong enough for the rear when riders began bouncing over fallen logs
and big rocks.

Cheers,

CarlFogel

An email asked whether non-trials motorcycles also have tires with
different size rims, but the same effective tire height.

Non-trials motorcycles are a dark and bloody mystery to me, since I
can't see what purpose they serve, but I grabbed the first picture of
a motocrosser that I saw on the Honda site and popped it into my etch-
a-sketch--er, sophisticated computer paint program:

http://i11.tinypic.com/67sni44.jpg

The rims turn out to be 19" and 21":

http://powersports.honda.com/motorcy...lId =CRF450R7

You could argue that the front tire here is a tiny bit taller, but
that may be due to the picture angle, tire inflation, or my etch-a-
sketch skills. It's certainly not 2 inches taller.

Cheers,

Carl Fogel

On Aug 8, 11:49 am, A Muzi wrote:
JD wrote:
Get this dickhead, RACING DOESN'T MEAN ****.
"Michael Warner" wrote:
Translation: "I WOULD GET DROPPED IN UNDER A MINUTE"
G.T. wrote:
Even if that were the case RACING STILL DOESN'T MEAN ****.
A Muzi wrote:
OK, then how do we know who's fastest?
c'mon, 'racing' in all its forms is very human. Bikes, cash, SAT scores,
poker, whatever.
Doug Taylor wrote:
Again, I think we have a "failure to communicate" and a values
conflict between amb and rbt culture.

Of course racing and competing is inherent in human nature. But the
categories of faster, stronger, better, etc., have no inherent
priority: the are merely value judgments. Either they make a
difference to you, or they don't.

Our mountain biking SS rider doesn't measure his worth by comparing
himself to the abilities of others, regardless of which side of any
equation he may be on in terms of strength or skill (and he might
REALLY be "faster, stronger, better"). Riding for him is not a
competition; it is an activity to be enjoyed in itself.

"I ride my bike to ride my bike" - Zen proverb.

Furthermore, when you add to the mix that virtually ALL professional
and world class athletic competitions are tainted, if not thoroughly
discredited, by doping in all its myriad forms, then the value
judgments of faster, stronger, better, lose all legitimacy and even
relevance.
A rider who rides to enjoy the ride for itself could care less about
which doped rider on which dope (or not) is faster, stronger, better
than which other doped riders (or not).
Hence, RACING DOESN'T MEAN ****.

Well said. My reply was flippant, perhaps the humor didn't work well.
Yes some people find a challenge in every bit of human discourse. I'm
with you personally, I ride my bike to ride my bike.

p.s. Actually some Zen Master or just Grant's article in RR?
--
Andrew Muziwww.yellowjersey.org
Open every day since 1 April, 1971- Hide quoted text -


I knew you got it all. Anyone who takes a nickel out of their pocket
and welds it to a broken off u-lock key as a fix definitely gets it.

JD

JD wrote:
Get this dickhead, RACING DOESN'T MEAN ****.
"Michael Warner" wrote:
Translation: "I WOULD GET DROPPED IN UNDER A MINUTE"
G.T. wrote:
Even if that were the case RACING STILL DOESN'T MEAN ****.
A Muzi wrote:
OK, then how do we know who's fastest?
c'mon, 'racing' in all its forms is very human. Bikes, cash, SAT scores,
poker, whatever.

Doug Taylor wrote:
Again, I think we have a "failure to communicate" and a values
conflict between amb and rbt culture.
Of course racing and competing is inherent in human nature. But the
categories of faster, stronger, better, etc., have no inherent
priority: the are merely value judgments. Either they make a
difference to you, or they don't.
Our mountain biking SS rider doesn't measure his worth by comparing
himself to the abilities of others, regardless of which side of any
equation he may be on in terms of strength or skill (and he might
REALLY be "faster, stronger, better"). Riding for him is not a
competition; it is an activity to be enjoyed in itself.
"I ride my bike to ride my bike" - Zen proverb.
Furthermore, when you add to the mix that virtually ALL professional
and world class athletic competitions are tainted, if not thoroughly
discredited, by doping in all its myriad forms, then the value
judgments of faster, stronger, better, lose all legitimacy and even
relevance.
A rider who rides to enjoy the ride for itself could care less about
which doped rider on which dope (or not) is faster, stronger, better
than which other doped riders (or not).
Hence, RACING DOESN'T MEAN ****.

A Muzi wrote:
Well said. My reply was flippant, perhaps the humor didn't work well.
Yes some people find a challenge in every bit of human discourse. I'm
with you personally, I ride my bike to ride my bike.
p.s. Actually some Zen Master or just Grant's article in RR?

JD wrote:
I knew you got it all. Anyone who takes a nickel out of their pocket
and welds it to a broken off u-lock key as a fix definitely gets it.

Do you know her? That was a fun job!
I silver brazed 4 nickels on the air cleaner cover bolts of my MG in
1975 (Brit air cleaners are on and off so often you can't reach for a
wrench every time) and just kinda got into the habit.
--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

Andrew Muzi wrote:
...
I silver brazed 4 nickels on the air cleaner cover bolts of my MG in
1975 (Brit air cleaners are on and off so often you can't reach for a
wrench every time) and just kinda got into the habit.

My MG had a latch on the air cleaner. In addition to the filter, it also
had soybeans (must have been mice climbing up the air intake hose and
using the vacant space for food storage).

--
Tom Sherman - Holstein-Friesland Bovinia
"I didn't expect a kind of Spanish Inquisition"

--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

On Aug 14, 6:29 pm, A Muzi wrote:
JD wrote:
Get this dickhead, RACING DOESN'T MEAN ****.
"Michael Warner" wrote:
Translation: "I WOULD GET DROPPED IN UNDER A MINUTE"
G.T. wrote:
Even if that were the case RACING STILL DOESN'T MEAN ****.
A Muzi wrote:
OK, then how do we know who's fastest?
c'mon, 'racing' in all its forms is very human. Bikes, cash, SAT scores,
poker, whatever.
Doug Taylor wrote:
Again, I think we have a "failure to communicate" and a values
conflict between amb and rbt culture.
Of course racing and competing is inherent in human nature. But the
categories of faster, stronger, better, etc., have no inherent
priority: the are merely value judgments. Either they make a
difference to you, or they don't.
Our mountain biking SS rider doesn't measure his worth by comparing
himself to the abilities of others, regardless of which side of any
equation he may be on in terms of strength or skill (and he might
REALLY be "faster, stronger, better"). Riding for him is not a
competition; it is an activity to be enjoyed in itself.
"I ride my bike to ride my bike" - Zen proverb.
Furthermore, when you add to the mix that virtually ALL professional
and world class athletic competitions are tainted, if not thoroughly
discredited, by doping in all its myriad forms, then the value
judgments of faster, stronger, better, lose all legitimacy and even
relevance.
A rider who rides to enjoy the ride for itself could care less about
which doped rider on which dope (or not) is faster, stronger, better
than which other doped riders (or not).
Hence, RACING DOESN'T MEAN ****.
A Muzi wrote:
Well said. My reply was flippant, perhaps the humor didn't work well.
Yes some people find a challenge in every bit of human discourse. I'm
with you personally, I ride my bike to ride my bike.
p.s. Actually some Zen Master or just Grant's article in RR?
JD wrote:
I knew you got it all. Anyone who takes a nickel out of their pocket
and welds it to a broken off u-lock key as a fix definitely gets it.

Do you know her? That was a fun job!
I silver brazed 4 nickels on the air cleaner cover bolts of my MG in
1975 (Brit air cleaners are on and off so often you can't reach for a
wrench every time) and just kinda got into the habit.


I have met someone who does know her. There are a lot of cheesehead
refugees in SoCal.

JD

JD wrote:
...There are a lot of cheesehead refugees in SoCal.

Why?

--
Tom Sherman - Holstein-Friesland Bovinia

--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com