[2004] in Humor
HUMOR CLASSIC: Effective Time Management
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (abennett@MIT.EDU)
Mon Apr 7 15:16:16 1997
From: <abennett@MIT.EDU>
To: humor@MIT.EDU
Date: Mon, 07 Apr 1997 15:04:46 EDT
This has been around for quite a while under the title "The Efficiency
Expert."
-Drew
From: Merlyn Liberty <merlyn@swcp.com>
Date: 05 Apr 97 08:40:07 -0800
From: Gordon Garb <ggarb@worldnet.att.net>
A managed care company president was given a ticket for a performance
of Schubert's Unfinished Symphony. Since she was unable to go, she
passed the invitation to one of her managed care reviewers. The next
morning, the president asked him how he enjoyed it, and, instead of a
few plausible observations, she was handed a memorandum which read as
follows:
1. For a considerable period, the oboe players had nothing to do.
Their number should be reduced, and their work spread over the
whole orchestra, thus avoiding peaks of inactivity.
2. All twelve violins were playing identical notes. This seems
unnecessary duplication, and the staff of this section should be
drastically cut. If a large volume of sound is really required,
this could be obtained through the use of an amplifier.
3. Much effort was involved in playing the sixteenth notes. This
seems an excessive refinement, and it is recommended that all
notes should be rounded up to the nearest eighth note. If this
were done, it would be possible to use paraprofessionals instead
of experienced musicians.
4. No useful purpose is served by repeating with horns the passage
that has already been handled by the strings. If all such
redundant passages were eliminated, the concert could be reduced
from two hours to twenty minutes.
5. This symphony had two movements. If Schubert didn't achieve his
musical goals by the end of the first movement, then he should
have stopped there. The second movement is unnecessary and
should be cut.
In light of the above, one can only conclude that had Schubert given
attention to these matters, he probably would have had the time to
finish his symphony.
