| A young girl who was writing a paper for school came to her father and asked, "Dad, what is the difference between anger and exasperation?" The father replied, "It is mostly a matter of degree. Let me show you what I mean." With that the father went to the telephone and dialed a number at random. To the man who answered the phone, he said, "Hello, is Joe there?" The man answered, "There is no one living here named Joe. Why don't you learn to look up numbers before you dial them?" "See," said the father to his daughter. "That man was not a bit happy with our call. He was probably very busy with something and we annoyed him. Now watch...." The father dialed the number again. "Hello, is Joe there?" asked the father. "Now look herel" came the heated reply. "You just called this number and I told you that there is no Joe here! You've got a lot of nerve calling againl" The receiver slammed down hard. The father turned to his daughter and said, "You see, that was anger. Now I'11 show you what exasperation means." He again dialed the same number, and when a violent voice roared, "Hello!" the father calmly said, "Hello, this is Joe. Have there been any calls for me?" |