humor

Uncle Albutt Part 2

Uncle Albert was the only person I ever knew who never attended school at all.  He couldn’t write or read a word.  I remember seeing him bring documents for Mother to read and interpret and pen his replies.  He was the first person I ever saw make an X mark for his signature. Mother wrote his name afterward and witnessed it. I was filled with awe that a person had never attended school.  Mother filled out his income tax returns for him every year.

Uncle Albert was very shrewd in his accounts, despite his lack of education.  He handled his business affairs skillfully, requiring no assistance.  He was a skilled trader.  I remember hearing him tell Daddy how he left the house one morning with a goat to barter and after several trades, came home with a shotgun and box of shells.  I never knew him to hold public employment.   He farmed forty acres more than fifty years, providing a living for him and his wife.  He paid cash, bartered, or did without.  The whole time I knew him, he drove a nineteen forty-eight Ford pickup truck.  He and Aunt Jewel smoked Prince Albert Tobacco and rolled their own cigarettes when money was tight, and bought Raleigh cigarettes when they were flush.  Aunt Jewel saved Raleigh Cigarette coupons for prizes.  From time to time, she’d show off a fancy vase or pair of pillowcases. I never knew of them being without cigarettes of some sort.

Daddy was always honored when Uncle Albert and Aunt Jewel came to visit.  One evening, Mother cooked our favorite, fried chicken.  We never got enough of her fried chicken, particularly the crisp scrambles of flour that dropped off during the frying.  Knowing this, Mother scraped up every crisp bit and put it on the platter with the chicken.  After the chicken was devoured, she divided those scrambles among the kids.  They were delicious, a highly anticipated treat.  That evening, the chicken platter passed from on end of the table to the other several times.  Uncle Albert liked Mother’s chicken, too.  As he forked  the last piece, the unthinkable happened.  He tipped the platter up and poured all those beautiful scrambled bits onto his plate.  Our eyes were huge with horror.  Surely he hadn’t just scooped up all the best all for himself!  He had!  Mother shushed us with a look as he noisily crunched and chomped through the pile.  A more heartbreaking sound was never heard.   In just a few seconds, he finished off our stolen treat, then burped his appreciation, wiped his mouth, leaned back his chair and remarked, “That’s the best part of the chicken.  I ain’t never got enough.”

We knew just how he felt.

Chiropractor Jokes

  • I never believed that chiropractors could solve my back problems…. 2 weeks later I stand corrected.
  • What do you call a chiropractor that loves his job?… a crack addict
  • Anyone need some old copies of Chiropractor Monthly?… I have a lot of back issues.
  • “But Quasimodo, what makes you think you need to see a chiropractor?” “Oh it’s just a hunch…”
  • Why was the chiropractor a good interrogator? He always got the suspect to crack
  • I broke up with my chiropractic girlfriend. She was too manipulative
  • My chiropractor is serious as hell. But he still cracks me up
  • How many chiropractors does it take to change a light bulb? Just one but it will take about 8-10 visits
  • What do you call two chiropractors who’ve got each others back? Vertebros
  • Why did the chiropractor go bankrupt? He owed too much in back taxes

Tale of My Uncle’s Tail

imageWhen I got older, I found out Uncle Albert and Aunt Jewel weren’t dull; they were just worn out. Besides that, Uncle Albert had a fascinating physical attribute Daddy slipped up and mentioned one day, to his later regret. Uncle Albert had a tail! From that moment forward, my brother and I stalked him, probabably the first nasty little, voyeuristic kids in the word to molest a pitiful, worn-out old man. We kept hoping his worn-out old khakis would slide off his bony behind, giving us a glimpse of that tail. Eventually Daddy realized why we were pestering him and threatened us enough to put a stop to our tagging.

At any rate, once I got sly enough to ferret out family gossip, I found out Aunt Jewel had once been a very pretty, if not too virtuous, girl. Apparently, Uncle Albert brought her to his house to visit one evening when his wife, Mary, was out. Mary, came home early and found them together in her bedroom. Not surprisingly, she was unhappy. When she tried to get in the bedroom with them, Uncle Albert slammed the door on her arm, breaking it. He and Aunt Jewel became a couple after that.

It’s not surprising he preferred her to the unreasonable Mary. She was a very understanding woman. She told Albert’s sister,my grandma, “Albert has to have a woman! Fortunately, her three sisters and mother were all friendly women, of questionable virtue, willing to accommodate Albert’s needs when she wasn’t well. Uncle Albert and Aunt Jewel lived together over thirty years, becoming very devoted members of their local church the last ten years or so. They gave very good advice once they got too old to set a bad example.

Evil Incarnate on a Pink Tricycle

imageMother gets pretty hot about a few things.  One of these is problems with mail delivery.  One day, she got to her mailbox to find her mail tattered,torn, and lying on the ground.  Worst of all, a government check had been ripped.  Somebody was going to pay for this crime!  Rabid with rage, she cornered a couple of kids who gladly gave up the perpetrator to save their own sorry hides.  They’d seen a little blonde-haired girl with pig-tails standing on her pink tricycle rifling through Mother’s box.  Mother gave the little snitches a five dollar reward after they located the child’s tricycle parked in front of a house two streets over.

Armed with this information, Mother called the Sheriff’s Department to report the heinous crime. Regaling him every shocking detail, the criminal’s description, description of the getaway vehicle, and last known address.  The deputy laughed, asking if she’d had the check back.

“Yes, but that’s not the point.  I want this stopped!  Tampering with the mail is a Federal Crime!”

“Lady, what do you want me to do, put out an APB on a little three-year-old girl on a pink tricycle?

British Pub Jokes

 A man says to his wife, “Grab your jacket I’m going to the pub.”

She asks, “Oh, are you taking me with you?”“No, I’m turning the heating off.”

Comic Sans, Helvetica and Times New Roman walk into a pub. The landlord yells, “Get out! We don’t serve your type in here!”

I used to work in a pub next to a hospital and this guy walked in one day with his hospital gown on and holding a drip on a stand that was still connected to his veins.I asked him how I could help and bizarrely he said, “Can I have 2 pints of lager, 2 pints of Guinness, 4 Jack Daniels and coke, 3 gin and tonics, and 6 shots of tequila?It’s a free country so I start to pour the drinks and put them on the bar one at a time. As I finished pouring all of the drinks he downed them in order and finished on the shots of tequila which he dispatched one at a time at a quick pace. He then looked at me really sad and said, “I shouldn’t have drunk all that with what I’ve got.” I said, “Why what have you got?” He said, “About £3.50.”

Bill BaileyPixie Pub

A penguin walks into a bar and asks the barman, “Has my brother been in for a drink here today?”The barman looks at the penguin and says, “I’m not sure. What does he look like?”

I was in the pub when a guy called me a cheapskate. So I threw his drink in his face.

A skeleton walks into a bar and says, “Give me a cider and a mop, please.”

A polar bear walks into a pub and orders a pint of beer. The barman says, “£17, please.”The polar bear pays and takes a seat. Bemused, the barman approaches and says, “This is exciting, we don’t get many polar bears in here!” To which the polar bear replies, “I’m not surprised with beer at £17 a pint.”

A shy guy goes into a pub and sees a beautiful woman sitting at the bar. After an hour of gathering up his courage, he finally goes over to her and asks tentatively, “Um, would you mind if I chatted with you for a while?”She responds by yelling, at the top of her voice, “NO! I will not sleep with you!”Everyone at the bar is now staring at them. Naturally, the guy is extremely embarrassed and slinks back to his table.After a few minutes, the woman walks over to him and apologises. She smiles and says quietly, “I’m sorry if I embarrassed you. You see, I’m a psychology student and I’m studying how people respond to embarrassing situations.”To this, the man responds at the top of his voice, “WHAT DO YOU MEAN £800?”

Two German agents walk into a pub in London during WW2 and one of them said to the waiter, “Two martinis, please.”The barman asked, “Dry?” To which the customer replied, “Nein! Zwei!”

Fouled Flight Fun: The Unforgettable Snowball Escapade

Image courtesy of Pixabay

Had I met Snowball under different circumstances, I’m sure I would have found her adorable.  Sadly for our friendship, I met her on a crowded plane.  I heard about her before I saw her, listening  in on the conversation between the two passengers sitting between me and the aisle.

”Snowball never pooped when I put her down on her pee pee pad in the bathroom.  I know she has to go by now.”  Ms. Bozo worried as she crowded me closer to the window.

”She’ll be fine.  We can’t do anything about that now.” Mr. Bozo replied, placidly.

”I think you need to take her to the lavatory and put her down on a pad.”  Ms. Bozo insisted.  “I gave her a little laxative last night so she’d go this morning. She never did.   We don’t want her getting constipated again.  You remember what happened last time.”  That sounded ominous.

“I told you not to do that!” Mr. Bozo grouched. “You know how that works her.”  He got up and struggled to pull Snowflake’s carrier from under Ms. Bozo’s seat.  Ms. Bozo unzipped the opening and peeked in at Little Snowball.  The smell was bad news.  Desperate to escape the fetid air in the carrier, Snowball leapt to freedom, smearing Mr. and Ms. Bozo with feces on her way.  Snowball no longer looked snowy.  Ms. Bozo squealed and Bozo roared.  Snowball sprinted down the aisle, ducking between passenger’s feet, the stewardess in pursuit.

”Don’t hurt her!  She’s scared!” Shrieked Ms. Bozo.  “Snowball, come back to Mama!  Snowball! Snowball!

That Snowball could run. Darting in and out among the legs of the other passengers, she left a little of herself all along the way.   She got by Bozo and the stewardess several times.  Eventually  she was recaptured, looking much cleaner, courtesy of hapless passengers’ legs. Ms. Bozo tidied her up in the lavatory, so Snowball was in better shape than her disgruntled new acquaintance who took turns sponging off in the lavatory,.  They clearly held a grudge.

Soon, a miasma from Snowball’s befouled carrier beneath the seat began to reek. As the odor recirculated through the cabin, only the Bozos failed to notice.  Even after the stewardess had them stuff it in a garbage bag, the smell spread,  even crossing the curtain into first class.

It was not the best flight I ever had.

 

 

Hiss in the Dark

Late one night, my son was in the garage unlocking the back door without turning the light on. He heard the cat eating, so reached down to pet her.  He was rewarded with a horrible hiss. Flipping the light on, he found he’d disturbed a mother possom, with numerous babies on board, dining at the cat’s bowl.  Snatching his hand backhe found it nasty and greasy.  It appeared the possom was still filthy from feeding on roadkill.  He insisted, though he washed over and over, he couldn’t get the odor off.  Oh, the babies hissed,too.

Mixed Nuts Part 3

We had plenty of interesting relatives. Dogs were off limits inside our house. All we had were hunting dogs, dogs with a purpose. People with house dogs were considered silly and weak-minded. Cookie and Uncle Riley never came to visit without bringing a couple of fat,shiny, little house dogs. You can guess what category this put them in. Daddy grudgingly tolerated their dogs as long as the dogs didn’t bark or mess up the house. They chattered endlessly about their dogs. Uncle Riley frequently assured us his dog, Jackie, was, “just like a person.” Daddy agreed the dog was as smart as Uncle Riley.

Unfortunately, Jackie got some kind of skin infection. Cookie and Uncle Riley showed up for a visit with poor Jackie, bald as an egg, the skin on his entire body irritated and red. Uncle Riley had been too cheap to take him to a veterinarian and concocted his own home remedy. He would dip Jackie in a Lysol and pine-oil mixture, reasoning it would kill any bacteria. The best we could tell, Jackie was bacteria and hair-free, but itching miserably with blistered skin. Uncle Riley felt badly about his medicine gone bad, and lovingly coated Jackie with Calamine Lotion several times a day. While Uncle Riley told us of Jackie’s troubles, he was unaware of Jackie sitting at his feet, licking his wounds. Not surprisingly, the harsh home remedy inflicted the most damage on Jackie’s sensitive nether portions. As he licked his little doggy privates gingerly, Uncle Riley reminded us Jackie was “just like a person.” Three-year-old son, John,  watched Jackie’s ablutions intently and remarked, “I never saw a person do that!”

Uncle Charlie was a compulsive liar. It didn’t concern him that no one believed him. He just lied because he was so darn good at it. Uncle Charlie would climb up on the roof to tell a lie instead of stand on the ground and tell the truth. If Uncle Charlie told you it was raining, don’t bother with your umbrella. He worked at the paper mill with Daddy, and had such a reputation for lying, that anyone repeating one of Charlie’s stories had to buy coffee for the group. One afternoon on coffee break, Charlie came rushing by the fellows in a big hurry. “Charlie, stop and tell us a lie!” one of them called after him.

Charlie never looked back, “I can’t!” he called over his shoulder as he rushed on. “Ray Pierson fell in Smokestack #2 and I’m going to call an ambulance!” They all rushed to see about their buddy and found Ray Pierson in perfect health at his usual work station, Smokestack #2.

Cousin Vonia and her husband Joe came to visit a lot, bringing their three little kids. Joe was “disabled” and didn’t have to get up early, so he just wouldn’t go home. Mother sent us on to bed, but Joe wanted to sit till midnight, even on a school night. Their little kids would have been drooped over asleep for hours. Finally Daddy started telling Mother, “We’d better to go to bed so these good folks can go home.”

Joe would look disappointed, then get up and shuffle toward the door, saying, “Well, I guess I better get my sorry self on home.” Vonia would trail behind him, carrying two sleeping kids and guiding the other staggering kid to the car. Joe couldn’t carry kids. He had a “bad back.”

Joe had a few other quirks. He had been fortunate enough to hurt his back at work and land a nice settlement and a monthly disability check so invested in a few cows and took care of them from then on. For those who know nothing of cattle farming, it is extremely hard work. Joe and his disabled back spent many hours building fences, making hay, stacking hay in the barn, unstacking that same hay later and loading it on a trailer, then taking it off and feeding it to the cattle, herding cows, wrestling soon-to-be steers to the ground and helping them become steers. He spent hours on end driving a tractor. Hard, hard, hard work.

Joe had a strange quality for a farmer, eschewing all healthy foods and existing on a diet of peanut patties, banana pudding, and milk. He also smoked like a smokestack. This careful attention to diet paid off for him. He didn’t have a tooth in his head by the time he was thirty-five. He refused to get dentures. He just dropped peanut patties from his diet. He said he didn’t need dentures for just milk and banana pudding. The smoking finally killed him when he was seventy-eight. He dropped a cigarette down the bib of his overalls and pulled out in front of a train.

Even though Great Uncle Albert had given Daddy a place to stay and let him work for his keep during the terrible times of the 1930’s when Maw Maw was struggling to feed seven children alone. Daddy appreciated this and was loyal to Uncle Albert all his life. Old, grumpy, and hormone-depleted by the time I knew him in the mid 1950’s, it was hard for me to imagine him in his younger, randy days. He was dull, and full of good advice, a habit he’d developed since he’d gotten too old to set a bad example. Aunt Jewel wasn’t his first wife, and frankly, was on pretty shaky ground mentally.  I heard whispers she had broken up his first marriage to Mary. Even more shocking, Uncle Albert was entertaining her when Mary tried to force her way in to the marital bedroom. Uncle Albert slammed the door, breaking his poor wife’s arm. Mary got the hint, took the baby, and left. Smart girl.

I had trouble envisioning this. I had never met Mary, but she had to look better than the Aunt Jewell I knew. I had heard Aunt Jewell used be really pretty, but she had gotten over it. By the time I knew her, she had smoked over forty years, had nicotine-stained fingers and teeth, wrinkles around her mouth from drawing on a cigarette, and her mouth pulled a little to one side. She had a thick middle, thin hair in a frizzy old-lady perm, and bird legs. She wore stockings rolled to her knees and cotton house dresses. She wheezed constantly and never spoke except to whine, “Albert, I’m ready to go now.” Or “Albert, give me a puff off your cigarette.” Oh yes. One time they came to visit after she’d fallen and broken a rib and she started crying and said, “Albert, I want a puff off your cigarette, but I’m too sore to cough. “ That was kind of interesting, but I couldn’t imagine a man choosing her over anyone else.

It was interesting to see my father treated as a kid. Uncle Albert felt free to give his opinion about whatever Daddy was up to. He arrived for a visit one day before Daddy got home from work and was inspecting the place.

Uncle Albert kept all his stuff organized and in perfect repair. Daddy’s barn was a disorganized mess. He tossed things wherever he got through with them. Uncle Albert walked around, examining items and commenting. “This is a good old singletree. It just needs a new chain.” “This is a good rasp. It just needs to be cleaned up.” “This is a good axe-head. It just needs to be sharpened and have a new handle put in.” Before too long, Daddy came striding up, delighted to see his uncle. He was smiling broadly and thrust out his hand.

Uncle Albert looked at straight at him and pronounced, “Bill, you need to get the junk man out

here and get all this #^%$ hauled off.”

I’m pretty sure I can pass for a #5 most days.

Confucius say, man who runs behind car will get exhausted, but man who runs in front of car will get tired.

Guy walks into an auto parts store and says to the counterman “I’d like new air freshener for my Yugo.” The guy behind the counter shakes his hand and says “OK, that sounds like a pretty decent trade.”

New Teslas don’t come with a new car smell they come with an Elon Musk.

Q: What’s worse than raining cats and dogs?

A: Hailing taxis!

Q: What’s the difference between a Ferrari and six trash bags full of recyclable cans?

A: I don’t have a Ferrari in my garage.

A truck carrying vicks vaporub overturned on the highway, amazingly there was no congestion for 8 hours strait

Robin: The cars not working 

Batman: Did you check the battery?

Robin: Whats a tery?

Q: What did Batman say to Robin before they got in the car?

A: “Robin, get in the car.”

Two Cadillac drivers got in a fender-bender, got out of their cars, and then started yelling at each other.

Within a few seconds they were in a fist-fight. I guess you could say things Escaladed quickly.

Q: What is the last thing that goes through a bug’s mind before it hits the windshield?

A: Its butt.

I couldn’t work out how to fasten my seatbelt. Then it clicked.

My daughter said I could never make a car out of spaghetti. You should have seen the look on her face when I drove pasta.

Q: What do you call a VW bus at the top of a hill?

A: A miracle.

Q: What’s the difference between a Fiat and a golf ball?

A: You can drive a golf ball more than 200 yards.

On a trip to America, Pope Francis lands in New York City and gets picked up by a white stretch limousine. “You know,” the Pontiff says, “I hardly ever get to drive anymore. Any chance I could take the wheel?”

The driver hems and haws for a minute but he’s supposed to see to the Pope’s every want and need. “Yeah, ok,” the driver says. “I can’t really say no to the Pope.”

The Pope pulls away from the curb and buries the gas pedal right to the floor mat. He’s darting in and out of city traffic and drifting the limo around corners.

A motorcycle cop sees the limo coming and pulls it over. The driver’s window slides silently into the door and the cop is standing face to face with the Pope. The officer walks to his bike and and calls the Chief.

The cop says “I pulled over this guy for driving way over the speed limit, but it’s somebody REALLY important.”

“Important like the mayor?” the Chief asks.

“Nope,” the cop says. “More important than that.”

“Important like the governor?” says the Chief.

“Way more important than that,” says the cop.

“Like the president?” the Chief asks.

“Much more important.”

“Well, who’s more important than the president?” asks the Chief.

“I don’t know,” says the cop, “but the Pope is driving him.”

Many years ago we were cruising around Cambridge with Ray Magliozzi from Car Talk.

We came up to a light that just turned red and instead of slowing down, Ray put his foot right to the floor. I yelled out “Ray, you’re going to get us killed!”

Ray laughs and says “Take it easy, man, Tommy drives like this.”

We hit another red light and Ray blazes right through. “Seriously, we’re going die!” I screamed. 

“Relax this is how Tommy drives.”

Finally, we come to a green light he stops dead and looks both ways.

“Ray, what are you doing?” I asked.

He looked at me and said “Tommy might be coming the other way.”