04/26/04

History's Worst Typo

A new young monk arrives at the monastery. He is assigned to
help the other monks in copying the old canons and laws of
the church by hand. He notices, however, that all of the
monks are copying from copies, not from the original
manuscript.

So, the new monk goes to the head abbot to question this,
pointing out that if someone made even a small error in the
first copy, it would never be picked up. In fact, that error
would be continued in all of the subsequent copies.

The head monk, says, "We have been copying from the copies
for centuries, but you make a good point, my son."

So, he goes down into the dark caves underneath the
monastery where the original manuscript is held as archives
in a locked vault that hasn't been opened for hundreds of
years.

Hours go by and nobody sees the old abbot. So, the young
monk gets worried and goes downstairs to look for him.

He sees him banging his head against the wall, and wailing,
"We forgot the "R", we forgot the "R" His forehead is all
bloody and bruised and he is crying uncontrollably.

The young monk asks the old abbot, "What's wrong, father?"

With a choking voice, the old abbot replies, "The word is
celebrate!"