Punch Line: Absence

An old family friend died today. They lived around the corner from us, and when we moved around the block, they lived down the street. 

My father first met Wally when he came around a corner and discovered a guy with a beat up Land Rover and a trailer ... and a boat that had fallen off the trailer into the street. They became fast friends - and remained friends for the next 50 years. 

 Wally was a musician, a raconteur, a delight. He loved to fish; here he is in the Deschutes, with his first steelhead, wearing an inimitable hat.

And he was an inveterate joke teller. Here's one: 

 A guy went to the doctor and said, Doctor, I don’t know what’s wrong with me, but every time I fart, it sounds like the word honda. 

That’s interesting. I've never heard of anything like that before. Do you think you could fart for me? says the doctor. 

The guy said okay and sure enough, the doctor heard honda. 

After several attempts to figure out what was wrong with the guy, the doctor ran out of ideas, so he sent him to all sorts of specialists, but none of them could figure out why the guy's farts sounded like honda. Finally, as a last resort, someone suggested that the guy see a dentist. 

After explaining the problem to the dentist, the dentist opened the guy's mouth and examined his teeth. The dentist said Aha! You have an abscessed tooth. 

The guy said Okay, but what has that got to do with my farts?

Don't you see? said the dentist, Abscess Makes The Fart Go Honda.

Wally, I hope you are telling your jokes to the angels.

Punch Line: Diesel Fitter

I used to go to Mets games. I used to be lucky, in that my father's wife's father had box seats at Shea, about five rows back from the field between home plate and the Mets dugout, but because he lived in Florida, his tickets were frequently up for grabs. I remember once taking the #7 train to Shea with my sister and her friend Adam, while he told a joke. He stretched it out, elaborated it to a fair-thee-well, embellished it with accents, and had the entire packed subway car listening raptly. It's another one of those jokes where, once heard, the punch line lives on - kind of like you can conjure up the whole of The Cutting Edge just by singing out "toe pick".

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Joe and Larry were brothers, who worked together in a bra factory. Work slowed down, and they were both laid off, and so they trotted down to the local unemployment office.

The clerk called Joe into her office and asked him what he did. Joe said "Cup stitcher. I sew two pieces of fabric together to make the cups for the brassieres."

The clerk looked up cup stitcher in the big book of jobs. Finding it classed as unskilled labor, she gave him $300 a week unemployment pay.

Larry then went into the clerk's office. She asked Larry his occupation. Larry told her he was a diesel fitter. The clerk determined that diesel fitter was a skilled job, and awarded him $600 a week.

When Joe found out that Larry was getting twice as much, he was furious. He stormed back in to find out why his brother was collecting double his unemployment pay.

The clerk explained, "When I looked it up, cup stitchers were unskilled laborers and diesel fitters were skilled laborers."

"Skill? What skill?" yelled Joe. "I sew the cups together. Larry puts 'em on his head and says 'Yeah. Dese'll fit 'er.'"

Punch Line: Beige

In last week's Punch Line post, my sister left a single word comment: "beige". It's like a thrown gauntlet - I have to post the beige joke. And honestly? Once you've heard it, beige will never be the same.

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What's the difference between the whore, the mistress and the wife?

The whore rolls over and says "that'll be $200".

The mistress finishes and says "honey, that was awesome, that was the best, you're the greatest".

The wife lies there and says "beige. I think I'll paint the ceiling beige".

Punch Line: The Duck Won

You know how sometimes you get a joke in your head, and it's such a great joke that just hearing the punchline is all you really need to bring a smile to your face? This is one of them, which I first heard told by a Circuit Court judge from Louisiana, who had just the right drawl and pitch perfect delivery.

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Down in a county in the bayous of Louisiana over towards Texas, the Sheriff got wind of some Saturday night cock-fighting down at an old abandoned sugar, so he sent his deputy down to investigate. When the deputy came back, he said to the sheriff, "They's cock-fightin' goin' on down theah, all right. And they seems to be three criminal elements involved: Aggies, Cajuns, and the Mafia."

"Now hold on a minute, boy," said the sheriff. "The Mafia? You better tell how you done come to this heah conclusion."

"Well," said the deputy, "You know they's Aggies for sure, on account of somebody done entered a duck in the cock-fight. And sure they's Cajuns, 'cause somebody done went and bet on the duck."

"Well, but how about the Mafia?" said the sheriff, "How kin you 'splain that?"

"Well," said the deputy, "The duck won!"

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(Shamelessly copied from the website of The Prairie Home Companion, and yup, I'm still cleaning out my drafts folder.)

One Sentence

I'm all posted out. So, here's my favorite one-sentence joke:

A skeleton walks into a bar and says "I'll have a beer and a mop".

It's about the only joke I can remember with any consistency. You?