Also see Engineers and Business Humor.

Quotes and One-Liners

• Beware of Quantum Ducks! Quark! Quark! Quark!
• Electrical Engineers deal with current events.
• Electrical Engineers do it with less resistance.
• An engineer is someone who is good with figures, but doesn't have the personality to be an accountant.
• Engineers calculate all the angles.
• Engineer's Motto: If it isn't broken, take it apart and fix it.
• Engineers have no life--and can PROVE it mathematically!
• If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
• If we knew what we were doing it wouldn't be called research.
• It's National Engineers Week so hug an engineer today. The engineer won't like it but do it anyway!
• How does a chemical engineer calculate the airflow over a camel? First assume the camel is a sphere...
• The joy of engineering is to find a straight line on a double logarithmic diagram. (Thomas Koenig)
• The major difference between a thing that might go wrong and a thing that cannot possibly go wrong is that when a thing that cannot possibly go wrong goes wrong, it usually turns out to be impossible to get at and repair. (Douglas Adams)
• Not all engineers are civil.
• Old chemical engineers never die, they just fail to react.
• Optimist: The glass is half full.
  Pessimist: The glass is half empty.
  Engineer: The glass is twice as large as it needs to be.
• People who do the world's real work don't usually wear ties.
• Quantum Mechanics--The dreams stuff is made of.
• Research is the act of going up alleys to see if they are blind.
• To err is human, to forgive divine, but to check--that's engineering.
• You might be an engineer if...your favorite James Bond character is "Q," the guy who makes the gadgets!

Grammatical analysis of the IRU

(author unknown)

The purpose of this examination
Is to monitor the IRU operation
The IRU?
You said "I are you?"
From the viewpoint of a grammarian
I conclude: you're a barbarian!

Following the grammarian cue
You ought to call it "IMU"
"I am you" is grammatical
But--objection--is it logical?
I am I--and--you are you;
So, in accord with the logical view
It's either "IMI" or "URU".

Fortunately the device
Cares not at all about this advice:
Completely ignorant of its name
It functions properly all the same.

You're Really an Engineer If...

• you take a cruise so you can go on a personal tour of the engine room.
• you look forward to Christmas so you can put the kids' toys together.
• you see a good design and still have to change it.
• you window shop at Radio Shack.
• your wife hasn't the foggiest idea of what you do at work.
• you've already calculated how much you make per second.
• you've tried to repair a $5 radio.

Engineering Pick-up Lines

(author unknown)

• I won't stop bugging you until I get the address of your home page.
• You fascinate me more than the Fundamental Theorem of Calculus.
• Since distance equals velocity times time, let's let velocity and time approach infinity, because I want to go all the way with you.
• My love for you is like a concave up function because it is always increasing.
• Let's convert our potential energy to kinetic energy.
• Wanna come back to my room...and see my 4 Ghz Pentium VII?
• How about you and I go back to my place and form a covalent bond?
• You and I would add up better than a Riemann sum.
• You're sweeter than glucose.
• We're as compatible as two similar Power Macintoshes.
• Why don't we measure the coefficient of static friction between you and me?
• Wanna see the programs in my HP-48GX?
• Your body has the nicest arc length I've ever seen.
• Isn't your e-mail address beautifulgirl@mydreams.com
• You're hotter than a Bunsen burner set to full power!

Engineers and Mistresses

An architect, an artist and a chemical engineer were discussing whether it was better to spend time with the wife or a mistress.
The architect said he enjoyed time with his wife, building a solid foundation for and enduring relationship.
The artist said he enjoyed time with his mistress, because of the passion and mystery he found there.
The chemical engineer said, "I like both."
"Both?"
Chemical Engineer: "Yeah. If you have a wife and a mistress, they will each assume you are spending time with the other, and you can go to the lab and get some work done."

Hot Air Balloon

A man is flying in a hot air balloon and realizes he is lost. He reduces height and spots a man down below. He lowers the balloon further and shouts:
"Excuse me, can you tell me where I am?"
The man below says, "Yes you're in a hot air balloon, hovering thirty feet above this field."
"You must work in Engineering or Information Technology," says the balloonist.
"I do," replies the man. "How did you know."
"Well," says the balloonist, "everything you have told me is technically correct, but it's no use to anyone."
The man below says, "You must be a Program Manager."
"I am," replies the balloonist, "but how did you know?"
"Well," says the man, "you don't know where you are, or where you're going, but you expect me to be able to help. You're in the same position you were before we met, but now it's my fault."

Which End is Up?

A group of managers were given the assignment to measure the height of a flagpole. So they go out to the flagpole with ladders and tape measures, and they're falling off the ladders, dropping the tape measures--the whole thing is just a mess.
An engineer comes along and sees what they're trying to do, walks over, pulls the flagpole out of the ground, lays it flat, measures it from end to end, gives the measurement to one of the managers and walks away.
After the engineer has gone, one manager turns to another and laughs. "Isn't that just like an engineer, we're looking for the height and he gives us the length."

Why Engineers Don't Write Cookbooks

(author unknown)

Chocolate Chip Cookies

Ingredients:
1.) 532.35 cm3 gluten
2.) 4.9 cm3 NaHCO3
3.) 4.9 cm3 refined halite
4.) 236 cm3 partially hydrogenated tallow triglyceride
5.) 177.45 cm3 crystalline C12H22O11
6.) 177.45 cm3 unrefined C12H22O11
7.) 4.9 cm3 methyl ether of protocatechuic aldehyde
8.) Two calcium carbonate-encapsulated avian albumen-coated protein ovoids
9.) 473.2 cm3 theobroma cacao 10.) 236 cm3 de-encapsulated legume meats (sieve size #10)

To a 2-L jacketed round reactor vessel (reactor #1) with an overall heat transfer coefficient of about 100 Btu/F-ft2-hr, add ingredients one, two and three with constant agitation.
In a second 2-L reactor vessel with a radial flow impeller operating at 100 rpm, add ingredients four, five, six, and seven until the mixture is homogeneous.
To reactor #2, add ingredient eight, followed by three equal volumes of the homogeneous mixture in reactor #1.
Additionally, add ingredient nine and ten slowly, with constant agitation. Care must be taken at this point in the reaction to control any temperature rise that may be the result of an exothermic reaction.
Using a screw extrude attached to a #4 nodulizer, place the mixture piece-meal on a 316SS sheet (300 x 600 mm).
Heat in a 460K oven for a period of time that is in agreement with Frank and Johnston's first order rate expression (see JACOS, 21, 55), or until golden brown.
Once the reaction is complete, place the sheet on a 25C heat-transfer table, allowing the product to come to equilibrium.

The Guillotine

A priest, a drunkard, and an engineer were led to the guillotine for their crimes. The executioner pulled the priest forward first and asked him if he wanted to be facing up or down when he met his face.
"Upward," said the priest. "I want to be looking toward heaven when I die."
The blade zoomed downward, but stopped just an inch short of the priest's throat. All assembled agreed that it was divine intervention, and let the priest go free.
The drunkard was pulled forward next, and decided to copy the priest, hoping he would get as lucky. Again the blade zoomed down but stopped just short of the drunkard's throat. So the authorities released him as well.
It was finally the engineer's turn. He, like the others, decided to face upward. The blade slowly raised back into place. "Oh, hey, I think I know what the problem is." The engineer exclaimed. "That cable to the left appears to be catching the rope!"

A Boy and His Frog

A boy was crossing a road one day when a frog called out to him and said, "If you kiss me, I'll turn into a beautiful princess." He bent over, picked up the frog and put it in his pocket.
The frog spoke again and said, "If you kiss me and turn me back into a beautiful princess, I will stay with you for one week." The boy took the frog out of his pocket, smiled at it and returned it to his pocket.
The frog then cried out, "If you kiss me and turn me back into a princess, I'll stay with you and do ANYTHING you want." Again the boy took the frog out, smiled at it and put it back into his pocket.
Finally, the frog asked, "What is the matter? I've told you I'm a beautiful princess, that I'll stay with you and do anything you want. Why won't you kiss me?"
The boy said, "Look, I'm an engineer. I don't have time for a girlfriend, but a talking frog is cool."

One day I noticed a poster on a bulletin board at the college I attend. At the top it said "Want to Have Fun With Other Engineers? Attend the Engineer Picnic on Saturday". You could tell the non-engineers who read the sign--they were the ones who were laughing!

Normal People vs. Engineers

Normal people believe that if it isn't broke, don't fix it.
Engineers believe that if it isn't broke, it doesn't have enough features yet.

Engineers Explained

(author unknown)

People who work in the fields of science and technology are not like other people. This can be frustrating to the nontechnical people who have to deal with them. The secret to coping with technology-oriented people is to understand their motivations.

Engineer Identification Test

Engineering is so trendy these days that everybody wants to be one. The word "engineer" is greatly overused. If there's somebody in your life who you think is trying to pass as an engineer, give him this test to discern the truth.

You walk into a room and notice that a picture is hanging crooked. You . . .
A. Straighten it.
B. Ignore it.
C. Buy a CAD system and spend the next six months designing a solar-powered, self-adjusting picture frame while often stating aloud your belief that the inventor of the nail was a total moron.
The correct answer is "C" but partial credit can be given to anybody who writes "It depends" in the margin of the test or simply blames the whole stupid thing on "Marketing."

Social Skills

Engineers have different objectives when it comes to social interaction.
"Normal" people expect to accomplish several unrealistic things from social interaction:
*Stimulating and thought-provoking conversation
*Important social contacts
*A feeling of connectedness with other humans
In contrast to "normal" people, engineers have rational objectives for social interactions:
*Get it over with as soon as possible.
*Avoid getting invited to something unpleasant.
*Demonstrate mental superiority and mastery of all subjects.

Fascination With Gadgets

To the engineer, all matter in the universe can be placed into one of two categories: (1) things that need to be fixed, and (2) things that will need to be fixed after you've had a few minutes to play with them. Engineers like to solve problems. If there are no problems handily available, they will create their own problems. Normal people don't understand this concept; they believe that if it ain't broke, don't fix it. Engineers believe that if it ain't broke, it doesn't have enough features yet.
No engineer looks at a television remote control without wondering what it would take to turn it into a stun gun. No engineer can take a shower without wondering if some sort of Teflon coating would make showering unnecessary. To the engineer, the world is a toy box full of sub-optimized and feature-poor toys.

Fashion and Appearance

Clothes are the lowest priority for an engineer, assuming the basic thresholds for temperature and decency have been satisfied. If no appendages are freezing or sticking together, and if no genitalia or mammary glands are swinging around in plain view, then the objective of clothing has been met. Anything else is a waste.

Love of "Star Trek"

Engineers love all "Star Trek" television shows and movies. It's a small wonder, since the engineers on the starship Enterprise are portrayed as heroes, occasionally even having sex with aliens. This is much more glamorous than the real life of an engineer, which consists of hiding from the universe and having sex without the participation of other life forms.

Dating and Social Life

Dating is never easy for engineers. A normal person will employ various indirect and duplicitous methods to create a false impression of attractiveness. Engineers are incapable of placing appearance above function.
Fortunately, engineers have an ace in the hole. They are widely recognized as superior marriage material: intelligent, dependable, employed, honest, and handy around the house. While it's true that many normal people would prefer not to date an engineer, most normal people harbor a desire to mate with them, thus producing engineer-like children who will have high-paying jobs long before losing their virginity.
Male engineers reach their peak of sexual attractiveness later than normal men, becoming irresistible erotic dynamos in their mid thirties to late forties. Just look at these examples of sexually irresistible men in technical professions:
*Bill Gates.
*MacGyver.
*Etcetera.
Female engineers become irresistible at the age of consent and remain that way until about thirty minutes after their clinical death. Longer if it's a warm day.

Honesty

Engineers are always honest in matters of technology and human relationships. That's why it's a good idea to keep engineers away from customers, romantic interests, and other people who can't handle the truth.
Engineers sometimes bend the truth to avoid work. They say things that sound like lies but technically are not because nobody could be expected to believe them. The complete list of engineer lies is listed below.
"I won't change anything without asking you first."
"I'll return your hard-to-find cable tomorrow."
"I have to have new equipment to do my job."
"I'm not jealous of your new computer."

Frugality

Engineers are notoriously frugal. This is not because of cheapness or mean spirit; it is simply because every spending situation is simply a problem in optimization, that is, "How can I escape this situation while retaining the greatest amount of cash?"

Powers of Concentration

If there is one trait that best defines an engineer it is the ability to concentrate on one subject to the complete exclusion of everything else. This sometimes causes engineers to be pronounced dead prematurely. Some funeral homes in high-tech areas have started checking resumes before processing bodies. Anybody with a degree in electrical engineering or experience in computer programming is propped up in the lounge for a few days just to see if he or she snaps out of it.

Risk

Engineers hate risk. They try to eliminate it whenever they can. This is understandable, given that when an engineer makes one little mistake the media will treat it like it's a big deal or something.
Examples of Bad Press for Engineers:
*Hindenberg
*SPANet(tm)
*Hubble space telescope
*Titanic
*Corvair
The risk/reward calculation for engineers looks something like this:
Risk: Public humiliation and the death of thousands of innocent people.
Reward: A certificate of appreciation in a handsome plastic frame.
Being practical people, engineers evaluate this balance of risks and rewards and decide that risk is not a good thing. The best way to avoid risk is by advising that any activity is technically impossible for reasons that are far too complicated to explain.
If that approach is not sufficient to halt the project, then the engineer will fall back to a second line of defense: "It's technically possible but it will cost too much."

Ego

Ego-wise, two things are important to engineers:
*How smart they are.
*How many cool devices they own.
The fastest way to get an engineer to solve a problem is to declare that the problem is unsolvable. No engineer can walk away from an unsolvable problem until it's solved. No illness or distraction is sufficient to get the engineer off the case. These types of challenges quickly become personal--a battle between the engineer and the laws of nature.
Engineers will go without food and hygiene for days to solve a problem. And when they succeed in solving the problem they will experience an ego rush that is better than sex--and I'm including the kind of sex where other people are involved.
Nothing is more threatening to the engineer than the suggestion that somebody has more technical skill. Normal people sometimes use that knowledge as a lever to extract more work from the engineer. When an engineer says that something can't be done (a code phrase that means it's not fun to do), some clever normal people have learned to glance at the engineer with a look of compassion and pity and say something along these lines: "I'll ask Bob to figure it out. He knows how to solve difficult technical problems."
At that point it is a good idea for the normal person to not stand between the engineer and the problem.

You might be a chemical engineer if...

(author unknown)

• You have a favorite pump manufacturer.
• You can quote scenes from any Monty Python movie.
• You can size distillation columns in your head, but need a pencil and paper to figure the tip on a $45 restaurant bill...
• ...and think that spending $45 for dinner is exorbitant.
• You see a good design and still have to change it.
• You can remember seven computer passwords but not your anniversary.
• You know who invented Jell-O.
• The microphone or visual aids at a meeting don't work and you rush up to the front to fix it.
• You've modified your can-opener to be microprocessor driven.
• You've actually used every single function on your graphing calculator.
• You've ever described your spouse in terms of MTBF.
• You stare at an orange juice container because it says CONCENTRATE.
• You can name six Star Trek episodes.
• You've ever considered installing a scrubber on your chimney.
• The only jokes you receive are through e-mail.
• Your idea of good interpersonal communication means getting the decimal point in the right place.
• You automatically associate the words "sexy," "beautiful" and "new butterfly valve".
• You've used coat hangers and duct tape for something other than hanging coats and taping ducts.
• Your ideal evening consists of fast-forwarding through the latest sci-fi movie looking for technical inaccuracies.
• You have any of the following personalized items: hard hat, safety goggles, calculator case or slide rule.
• You have "Dilbert" comics displayed anywhere in your work area.
• You carry on a one-hour debate over the expected results of a test that actually takes five minutes to run.
• You know the direction the water swirls when you flush.
• You've ever taken the back off your TV just to see what's inside.
• A team of you and your co-workers have set out to modify the antenna on the radio in your work area for better reception.
• You thought the concoction ET used to phone home was stupid.
• You cannot write unless the paper has both horizontal and vertical lines.
• You think the value of a book is directly proportionate to the amount of tables, charts and graphs it contains.
• You once burned down the gymnasium with your Science Fair project.
• You think you look rather snappy in a tie and short-sleeve shirt.
• You have a habit of destroying things in order to see how they work.
• People hound you for pocket protectors at Halloween time.
• You think that when people around you yawn, its because they didn't get enough sleep.
• Your spouse hasn't the foggiest idea what you do at work.
• Your three-year-old nephew asks why the sky is blue and you try to explain atmospheric absorption theory.
• You have no life--and you can prove it mathematically.
• You've explained your position in the company to a junior engineer as "I am a vast oasis of knowledge in a desert of ignorance".
• You lost your wedding ring for six months and found it in a box of brass tubing fittings in your desk.
• You and a buddy spend two work days customizing each engineer's phone ring so that you can tell them apart from anywhere--using cut-up lids from snuff cans and scotch tape.
• Your work clothes are almost as old as you are...
• ...and so is your car.
• You think of the Carnot cycle every time you turn on your AC unit.
• When you look at objects in the distance you think of mean free path.
• You explain surface tension to a 10-year-old when they ask why you are adding oil to boiling spaghetti.
• You have a clock with inverted numbers that runs counter-clockwise in your office and you prefer it that way.
• You make your own shampoo!
• You pick your girlfriends by their GPA.
• You have ever thought about how coffee changes color in the body.
• You try to explain entropy to strangers during casual dinner conversation.
• You actually read this whole list beginning to end!

Note from Denny: I hope any engineer who reads this file will not take exception to the humor--it is not meant in a negative way. I have a close friend who is an engineer and I have sent some of the jokes to him. He has never taken offense--though he sometimes sends an explanation of the logical and technical errors they contain ;-)