# Today's Dilbert, on the other hand, is sublime!
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [April 3, 2006, 11:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161 "2006-04-03T23:06:55Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)
#### Post date: [April 3, 2006, 11:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161/1 "2006-04-03T23:06:55Z")
Unlike my puzzlement over today’s [Get Fuzzy](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=365786), today’s [Dilbert](http://www.dilbert.com/) is brilliant! bravo!
Plus, how did Scott Adams sneak that past the censors?!
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### Author:  [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)
#### Post date: [April 3, 2006, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161/2 "2006-04-03T23:17:37Z")
I get Dilbert in two papers. The Murky News printed another one, my local paper (where the editors are a few serifs short of a character set), did. I had the same reaction as you.
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### Author:  [@Cunctator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cunctator)
#### Post date: [April 3, 2006, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161/3 "2006-04-03T23:25:42Z")
Is it a normal North American practice for employees to have individual heaters? Aren’t the office buildings already heated?
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### Author:  [@WolfpackJeep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WolfpackJeep)
#### Post date: [April 3, 2006, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161/4 "2006-04-03T23:26:34Z")
It wouldn’t be the first time. Wasn’t there a strip several years ago where Dogbert, having been hired as a consultant, changed the company’s name to “Uranus-Hertz?”
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### Author:  [@Mr.Goob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Goob)
#### Post date: [April 3, 2006, 11:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161/5 "2006-04-03T23:40:28Z")
> [@Cunctator](#):
>
> Is it a normal North American practice for employees to have individual heaters? Aren’t the office buildings already heated?
Yes the buildings are heated, but different area can be cold. My second to last job, I shared a room on an outside wall that was added after the buiding was first built. Outside it in the shop it was toasty but our little room was artic like.
We needed an electric space heater to keep from freezing in the dead of winter.
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### Author:  [@Kilvert\_s\_Pagan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kilvert_s_Pagan)
#### Post date: [April 3, 2006, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161/6 "2006-04-03T23:41:03Z")
> [@Cunctator](#):
>
> Is it a normal North American practice for employees to have individual heaters? Aren’t the office buildings already heated?
They have been rampant among cubicle-dwellers in many offices in which I have worked. If the building isn’t sufficiently warm enough, they bring in their own heaters. This is frowned upon, since the heaters tend to trip the circuit breakers and thus cause the neighboring computers to shut off.
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### Author:  [@Khadaji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Khadaji)
#### Post date: [April 3, 2006, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161/7 "2006-04-03T23:43:43Z")
> [@Cunctator](#):
>
> Is it a normal North American practice for employees to have individual heaters? Aren’t the office buildings already heated?
It is hard to heat a building to suit everyone. So it is often too hot or too cold for people. Often people will put a small space heater under their desks or in the cubicle.
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### Author:  [@Anne\_Neville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anne_Neville)
#### Post date: [April 3, 2006, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161/8 "2006-04-03T23:49:43Z")
> [@Kilvert's Pagan](#):
>
> They have been rampant among cubicle-dwellers in many offices in which I have worked. If the building isn’t sufficiently warm enough, they bring in their own heaters. This is frowned upon, since the heaters tend to trip the circuit breakers and thus cause the neighboring computers to shut off.
And some people plug them into their computer’s surge protector. Not only is that not good for the computer, but it creates a fire hazard (surge protectors aren’t designed to work with an appliance like a space heater that draws a lot of current).
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### Author:  [@Push\_You\_Down](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Push_You_Down)
#### Post date: [April 3, 2006, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161/9 "2006-04-03T23:52:47Z")
…“Uranus” jokes… Not funny.
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### Author:  [@HPL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HPL)
#### Post date: [April 4, 2006, 12:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161/10 "2006-04-04T00:24:55Z")
> [@Push You Down](#):
>
> …“Uranus” jokes… Not funny.
Only someone from Uranus would say that…
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### Author:  [@aktep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aktep)
#### Post date: [April 4, 2006, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161/11 "2006-04-04T00:27:16Z")
Hmm… my “Dilbert” today featured Alice gluing the PHB’s head to a stapler. I guess my paper wimped out on the Uranus joke.
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### Author:  [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)
#### Post date: [April 4, 2006, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161/12 "2006-04-04T00:35:48Z")
> [@Push You Down](#):
>
> …“Uranus” jokes… Not funny.
“In order to get rid of those stupid ‘Your anus’ jokes once and for all, we changed the planet’s name . . . to Urectum” - Futurama ( from memory )
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### Author:  [@critter42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/critter42)
#### Post date: [April 4, 2006, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161/13 "2006-04-04T01:15:04Z")
> [@Jeep's Phoenix](#):
>
> It wouldn’t be the first time. Wasn’t there a strip several years ago where Dogbert, having been hired as a consultant, changed the company’s name to “Uranus-Hertz?”
Yep - he used a random-word generator that used words from astronomy and electronics. There was an alternate strip provided in case newspapers felt skittish publishing it.
Also, Scott used a variation of the gag in “Dogbert’s Top-Secret Management Handbook” in discussing company mergers and postulated if Hertz Rent-a-Car merged with A.B. Dick Office Supplies they’d be come Hertz Dick circumcisions 🙂
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### Author:  [@yBeayf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yBeayf)
#### Post date: [April 4, 2006, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161/14 "2006-04-04T01:18:29Z")
Bwahaha. My company’s building manager the other day sent around yet another email reminding us that personal space heaters and refrigerators were forbidden. I’ve got to pass this one around.
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### Author:  [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)
#### Post date: [April 4, 2006, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161/15 "2006-04-04T01:56:35Z")
Seems rather silly to censor a joke that is the same premise for the one joke all 8 year olds are guaranteed to know.
How is toilet paper like Star Trek?
They both circle around uranus looking for clingons! 😉
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### Author:  [@StGermain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StGermain)
#### Post date: [April 4, 2006, 7:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161/16 "2006-04-04T07:12:21Z")
Here’s a link to the comic, for those who were unable to see it.
[Link](http://news.yahoo.com/comics/060403/cx_dilbert_umedia/20060304;_ylt=AhbDESoaqrmikyO6a..bPyUA_b4F;_ylu=X3oDMTBiMW04NW9mBHNlYwMlJVRPUCUl)
StG
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### Author:  [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)
#### Post date: [April 4, 2006, 8:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161/17 "2006-04-04T08:24:25Z")
Another one who hates Uranus jokes. Well… not so much hates, as baffled by. I could name the planets of the solar system before I turned six, but I probably never neard the word “anus” spoken out loud until I was in my 20s (in all likelihood, it was in the context of a Uranus joke, which then had to be explained to me). I don’t see the humor here - the commonly used word for a major planet is vaguely similar to an obscure synonym for asshole? That’s like saying that “California” sounds sorta like the Urdu word for fellatio. Interesting, sure, but not all that funny.
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### Author:  [@Dunderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dunderman)
#### Post date: [April 4, 2006, 8:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161/18 "2006-04-04T08:31:43Z")
> [@Alessan](#):
>
> I don’t see the humor here - the commonly used word for a major planet is vaguely similar to an obscure synonym for asshole?
I don’t find Uranus jokes funny either, but you’re severely understating the similarity. The name of a major planet sounds exactly like the word “your” and the clinically correct word for asshole. Vaguely similar? Obscure synonym?
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### Author:  [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)
#### Post date: [April 4, 2006, 8:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161/19 "2006-04-04T08:40:46Z")
> [@Priceguy](#):
>
> I don’t find Uranus jokes funny either, but you’re severely understating the similarity. The name of a major planet sounds exactly like the word “your” and the clinically correct word for asshole. Vaguely similar? Obscure synonym?
I’m just talking about myself, here. _To me_ the word “anus” is obscure - it never really comes up in conversation, does it? - while the word “Uranus” isn’t. Diffirent associative world, I guess.
The fact is, the joke is usually told by people with too little knowlege of astronomy and too much knowlege of a very specific portion of anatomy.
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### Author:  [@flodnak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flodnak)
#### Post date: [April 4, 2006, 9:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/todays-dilbert-on-the-other-hand-is-sublime/351161/20 "2006-04-04T09:59:42Z")
> [@Priceguy](#):
>
> The name of a major planet sounds exactly like the word “your” and the clinically correct word for asshole.
English-speaking astronomers generally say YUR-uh-niss or yu-RA-niss.
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