Jokes and Encyclopedia is a nice topic that I would like to write at this time. there are many funny and information thing which you will get it. Have you enjoy it !

The Fly
From an article in the Wall Street Journal, about the Dutch firm that has been hired to manage the International Arrivals Building at New York's John F. Kennedy Airport:
The tile under the urinals in the Arrivals Building has that familiar lemony tinge; rubber soles stick to it. Over in Amsterdam, the tile under Schiphol's urinals would pass inspection in an operating room. But nobody notices. What everybody does notice is that each urinal has a fly in it. Look harder, and the fly turns into the black outline of a fly, etched into the porcelain.
"It improves the aim," says Aad Kieboom. "If a man sees a fly, he aims at it." Mr. Kieboom, an economist, directs Schiphol's own building expansion. His staff conducted fly-in-urinal trials and found that etchings reduce spillage by 80%. The Dutch will transfer the technology to New York.

"We will put flies in the urinals yes," Jan Jansen says in a back office at the Arrivals Building. He is the new Dutch general manager, the boss as of noon today. "It gives a guy something to think about. That's the perfect example of process control."
But a spokesperson for Rudy Guiliani, Mayor of New York, was heard to say, "What do we need with Dutch flies when we have more than enough roaches to piss on?"

Historical Origin of The "Finger"
This is not meant to be crude. It is strictly for your edification and enjoyment. Before the Battle of Agincourt in 1415, the French, anticipating victory over the English, proposed to cut off the middle finger of all captured English soldiers. Without the middle finger, it would be impossible to draw the renowned English longbow and therefore be incapable of fighting in the future. This famous weapon was made of the native English Yew tree, and the act of drawing the longbow was known as "plucking the yew." Much to the bewilderment of the French, the English won a major upset and began mocking the French by waving their middle fingers at the defeated French,saying, "See, we can still pluck yew! PLUCK YEW!"

Over the years, some 'folk etymologies' have grown up around this symbolic gesture.� Since 'pluck yew' is rather difficult to say (like "pleasant mother pheasant plucker", which is who you had to go to for the feathers used on the arrows for the longbow), the difficult consonant cluster at the beginning has gradually changed to a labiodental fricative 'F', and thus the words often used in conjunction with the one-finger-salute are mistakenly thought to have something to do with an intimate encounter.
It is also because of the pheasant feathers on the arrows that the symbolic gesture is known as "giving the bird."

ENCYCLOPEDIA

English language

English is a West Germanic language originating in England and is the first language for most people in the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland and the Anglophone Caribbean. It is used extensively as a second language and as an official language throughout the world, especially in Commonwealth countries and in many international organisations.
Historically English originated from the dialects, now called Old English, which were brought to England by Anglo-Saxon settlers, beginning in the 5th century. The language was heavily influenced by the Old Norse language of Viking invaders. The Norman conquest brought a stage called Middle English with heavy borrowing of vocabulary from Norman French and modernization of spelling conventions. Modern English continues to adopt foreign words, especially from Latin and Greek.

Contents of English Language
6 Grammar
7 Vocabulary
7.1 Number of words in English
7.2 Word origins
7.2.1 Dutch origins
7.2.2 French origins
8 Idiomatic
9 Writing system
9.1 Basic sound-letter correspondence
9.2 Written accents
10 Formal written English
11 Basic and simplified versions
12 See also
13 Notes
14 References
15 External links
15.1 Dictionaries

English
Pronunciation:	/ˈɪŋɡlɪʃ/[1]
Spoken in:	(see below)
Total speakers:	First language: 309–400 million Second language: 199–1,400 million[2][3] Overall: 500 million–1.8 billion[4][3]
Ranking:	3 (native speakers)[5] Total: 1 or 2 [6]
Language family:	Indo-European Germanic West Germanic Anglo–Frisian Anglic English
Writing system:	Latin (English variant)
Official status
Official language in:	53 countries United Nations European Union Commonwealth of Nations
Regulated by:	No official regulation
Language codes
ISO 639-1:	en
ISO 639-2:	eng
ISO 639-3:	eng
Countries where English is a majority language are dark blue; countries where it is an official but not a majority language are light blue. English is also one of the official languages of the European Union.
Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode.

Source : From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia