What I am referring to here are laws of nature that we make up, mostly to amuse ourselves. My favorite is one that my friend Sam came up with:
Sam’s Law: The rate at which everything sucks is increasing.
Another law in this style is the famous Murphy’s Law.
What are your laws?
Joey
No one enforces the Law of Gravity
And (the much maligned) if you are going North and someone says:“You’re going the wrong way!” You don’t necessarily go South.
“Never force a fart”
I call this my eleventh commandment.
There shall never be two or more crying babies on any form of public transport, nor shall there be none. There shall be one every single time.
“If you can’t see him, he’s right behind you.”—Gaston’s Axiom on Dogfights
Also,
“Anything not physically or technologically impossible at the moment, that a person can imagine—no matter how bizarre, perverted, or evil—has been done before. Probably more than once, and very possibly filmed.”
Porpentine’s Law:
i. No matter how offensive, baseless, or downright bizarre any given opinion may be, there will always be at least two people in the world who hold it.
ii. Thanks to the miracle of the Internet, these people will find each other.
iii. When they do, they will start reinforcing each other’s batshit in an endless feedback loop that will cause them to think they are in the majority.
Lawyers will attempt to rewrite copy. They will then overlook the technical errors they were supposed to catch.
Well, there’s always Cole’s Law.
Which is chopped cabbage.
<D&R>
You can’t rely on Murphy’s Law.
This isn’t original with me, but I like it:
“It rains on the just and the unjust fella; but Unjust has swiped Just’s umbrella.”
Any man’s attraction to me will be a perfect inverse correlation with how repellent I find him.
In front of every silver lining there’s a cloud.
Beth’s Law of Radio: The desireability of the music is inversely proportional to the power of the station.
Hamish’s law of cats: All cats are weird, even for a cat.
Hamish’s law of boxes: Boxes contain cats.
The first poem I ever learned!
The rain it raineth on the Just
And also on the Unjust fella
But mostly on the Just because
The Unjust steals the Just’s umbrella.
– Lord Charles Bowen (although a google search shows that the authorship is in doubt)
I didn’t make up this law, but I’m sure it’s somehow written in the by-laws of the City of Cleveland, Ohio:
The Steelers Suck.
No matter if they won the Superbowl or if they wiped their asses with the Browns the last 40 times we played. They still suck. And so do their fans. To think otherwise would be…unthinkable.
Agustin’s Law (of stupid students who refuse to believe in thermodynamics; he was my 12th grade Physics teacher)
You don’t have to believe in the Laws of Physics, it’s not like they give a fart about you.
Responsibility exceeds authority; or, Just because you had nothing to do with it doesn’t mean it isn’t your fault.
Jurph’s First Traffic Law - When approaching a cross street in a car, the light is usually red, except: (1) if the cross street happens to be the one you’re supposed to turn onto, AND (2) there are no signs to tell you what street you’re crossing. Unlike Murphy’s Law, the converse to this law works (I’ve tested it!). The converse is: if the light’s green and you can’t tell what street it is, it’s probably the turn you’re looking for. There are corrollaries with freeways, too – if a line of tractor-trailers are preventing you from merging right, your (unmarked!) exit will appear.
Jurph’s Jersey Juggernaut: Intersections, cloverleaves, exit ramps, overpasses, and any other method for getting from one road to another will not function as anticipated when in New Jersey. Exit ramps marked “US-9 North and South” will only lead to US-9 North if you need to go south, and vice versa. The converse cannot be used to one’s advantage; for example, if you know that you need to turn left, and merge right, the intersection will have the only left arrow in the State of New Jersey. If you do this again, you will find New Jersey’s other left arrow, which they forgot to mention was just installed last week. If you continue to anticipate jug-handles, they will continue to be retroactively replaced with left arrows until you merge left, at which point jug-handles will be de rigeur until the next time you merge right.
Jurph’s Jersey Juggernaut, Abridged - All traffic laws are void in New Jersey.
General Hospital Rule about Call Nights:
NEVER say “quiet” except in past tense.
It’s just asking for trouble to do this. If a colleague hopes that you have a “quiet” night, you’ll spend the night on the phone or at the hospital.
Every item of camp equipment will need maintenance, and not get it.
Infants will poop in their diapers right after baths, not before.
Weeds and crabgrass flourish in your lawn, no matter the weather; nice green grass is as delicate as porcelain.
That call you really wanted to get? The one you’ve been waiting for, and that you won’t be able to easily return? It will come when you’re not available.
“Improvements” to the office computer system almost invariably slow things down and provide services you don’t need.