䷰ Xīn Jīn Mèng 新金梦
#Rentfree
There's an episode of the M*A*S*H show where an explosive shell lands in the middle of camp. They send an amateur crew out to disarm it, while their CO reads instructions over a bullhorn, from a safe distance.
Reading the instructions line by line yields, "Carefully cut the wires leading to the clockwork fuse at the head. But first, remove the fuse." Someone wrote these instructions down in this opposite order and thought it was fine.
So naturally, during this delicate operation, the wires get cut before they remove the fuse. The bomb winds up exploding, of course.
How did this come up? Today I've been trying to install FOSS.
Carefully cut the wires, chief.
Jan 19 at 3:00amWeb
Show threadJulie SqveakarooJan 19

@xinjinmeng

If I remember right, it ended up being a propaganda bomb, spreading leaflets of papers.

Henry was not good at reading instructions.

Show thread䷰ Xīn Jīn Mèng 新金梦Jan 19

@JulieSqveakaroo

He was great at reading instructions. Those were bad instructions.
Finagle's Law is, "if anything can go wrong, it will." The actual Murphy's Law is "If there's two ways to do something, and one way is the wrong way, someone will do it the wrong way."

Show threadAustin Dern, Dean of CoatisJan 19

@xinjinmeng @JulieSqveakaroo I mean, the instructions were bad, but I'd have given them a read-through before going out in the field and I don't think just because of the experience of seeing that episode.

Also worth mentioning: Bob Newhart's bomb-defuser sketch. Had a killer line about how one wire is a sort of blue-ish grey, while the other is more of a grey-ish blue.

Show threadElectric Keet, SN76489 enjoyerJan 19
@xinjinmeng Reading this just now, I think it'll live in my head too. Thank you for the reminder to review some documentation and possibly improve the order of some sections. Nothing so crucial or harrowing as bomb defusing, fortunately. :)
Show thread䷰ Xīn Jīn Mèng 新金梦Jan 19

@electrickeet

Thank you for reviewing. Never does one stand so tall as when they stoop to help someone else up. 💙