QU Graduate Corner

Easter Story

Three blondes (natural) died and found themselves standing before St. Peter. he told them that before they could enter the Kingdom, they had to tell him what Easter was.

The first blond said, " Easter is a holiday where they have a big feast and we give thanks and eat turkey."

St. Peter said, "Nooooooo," and he banished her to Hell.

The second blond said, " Easter is when we celebrate Jesus' birth and exchange gifts."

St. Peter said, "Nooooooo," and he banished her to Hell.

The third blond said,she knew what Easter is, and St. Peter said, " So, tell me."

She said, " Easter is a Christian holiday that coincides with the Jewish festival of Passover. Jesus was having Passover feast with his disciples when he was betrayed by Judas, and the Romans arrested him. The Romans hung Him on the cross and eventually he died. Then they buried him in a tomb behind a large boulder."

St Peter said, "Verrrry good."

Then the blond continued, "Now every year all the Jews roll away the boulder and Jesus comes out. If he see his shadow, we have six more weeks of basketball."

St Peter fainted.

Priceless

With all the great information that has been posted to our blog. I figured I will lighten it up a bit with a few jokes and funny stories from time to time. Here is a classic and also a late great find for the sons.

The story is priceless. From today's New York TImes:

Everyone thought the conservator did it. But as it turns out, it was the husband, in the throes of a bitter divorce.

For serveral years, museum curators and American paointing experts had been troubled by discrepancies between Norman Rockweell's 1954 canvas "Breaking Home Ties" and tear sheets of the legendary Saturday Evening Post cover for which he painted it.

Comparing the two, experts mused that the painting's colors seemed oddly washed out. They conjectured that a zealous conservator had overcleaned the work ...

Orginal "Breaking Home TIes," left, and the copy at the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, Mass.

The painting's provenance was undisputed: Don Trachte, known as the cartoonist who took over the Sunday edition of the comic strip "Henry" in the 1940's, bought the painitng from Rockwell for $900 in 1960. It became his prized possession. So prized, it seems, that when Mr. Trachte and his wife, Elizabeth, jointly filed for divorce more than a decade later, the cartoonist cooked up a ruse, presumably to ensure keeping the treasure himself, hiding the orginal in a secret niche behind a wall in his house in Sandgate, Vt.

What he and his wife subsequently divvied up -- the Rockwell and seven other paintings by other local artists -- were therfore copies, presumably made, their children say, by Mr. Trachte himself.

Last month -- more than three decades after the divorce, and nearly a year after Mr. Trachte's death -- his son Dave, 54, noticed a strange gap in a wood-paneled wall in his father's house. When he and his brother Don Jr. , 59, gave it a shove, the wall suddenly slid open, revealing the Rockwell and other canvases hanging on a wall in the hidden compartment.

"Every divorce is always a little messy." conceded Don Jr. in an interview ...

Mr. Trachte's ex-wife, Elizabeth Markey, now 98, is apparently unfaxed. When her eldest son gave her the news, he said, her response was a wry, "Doesn't surprise me."

A Sad But True American Management Joke

The following is a joke that was sent to me that I had to post.

"A Japanese company and an American company decided to have a canoe race on the Mississippi River.  Both teams practiced long and hard to reach their peak rowing performance before the race.

On the big day the Japanese won by a mile.

Afterward, the American team became very discouraged and depressed. The American company decided the reason for their crushing defeat had to be found, and formed a Management Team made up of its senior executives to investigate and recommend appropriate action.

The American Management Team eventually discovered that the Japanese had 8 people rowing and 1 person steering, while the American team had 8 people steering and one person rowing. The American Management Team hired a consulting firm to assist in analyzing this data, happily paying their considerable fee. After six months of hard work, the consulting firm concluded that too many people were steering the Americans boat, while not enough people were rowing.

So the American Management Team acted: To prevent losing to the Japanese rowing team again the following year, the team's management structure was totally reorganized to include 4 steering supervisors, 2 area steering superintendents and 1 steering manager. They also implemented a new rowing performance system that would give the 1 person rowing the boat greater incentive to row faster. It was called  "The Rowing Team Quality First Program," with meetings, dinners and free pens for the rower. In an all-out attempt to further provide incentive for empowerment and enrichment to the rower, new state-of-the-art paddles were provided. Also for motivational purposes, the rower was promised a new medical benefit package. Additionally, a shorter work week and higher wages were offered, all contingent on a decisive victory in the coming rowing competition.

The next year the Japanese won by two miles.

Humiliated, the American Management Team laid off the rower for unsatisfactory performance, halted development of a new streamlined canoe, sold the state-of-the art paddles and canceled all capital investments for new equipment.

The money saved by this maneuver was distributed to the senior executives as bonuses for a "job well done."