Tag Archives: stories

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Blog Prompt 6-7/8ths

Scour the news for an entirely uninteresting story. Consider how it connects to your life. Write about that.

This prompt reads like it was composed by a Taylor Swift fan, or a MAGA hat speech attendee.  If it is entirely uninteresting, how could it possibly connect to my life??  Okay, here goes….

Back in January of last year, an ostrich farm in British Columbia had three or four of their flock die because of avian flu.  The owners destroyed the diseased birds, and there was no further indication of infection.  Around the first of August, the inappropriate government agency, working at the breakneck speed of smell, notified them that they had to euthanize the balance of a 3000-bird flock.  Appeal is still pending.

Watch how I string this together, like beads on a necklace.

I have attended several Renaissance Faires.  One of the few, historically-accurate foods sold, are entire, roast, turkey legs.  One of those will keep a normal adult male busy all afternoon – or a hyperactive kid about ten minutes.

Vendors would need larger roasters/smokers, and the captive-audience price could break the food budget, but a whole, roast ostrich leg could feed a family of four or five.

I had one emu burger at a French-fry wagon.  It tasted like chicken – ‘cause everything tastes like chicken –at twice the price.

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Book Review #31

I thought that I’d heard a lot about Gilgamesh.  Turns out that I’ve just heard about Gilgamesh, a lot.

The book comes up often in debates between Christians and non-believers, because it is clearly fiction, but contains an account of The Flood, 1500 years before the guys who wrote the Bible, plagiarized it.  I thought that I should know more about it

The book: Gilgamesh

The author: Stephen Mitchell

The review:  Another disappointment.  As Gertrude Stein said, “There’s no there, there!”  😮

I listed Mitchell as the author, but no-one knows who the original author was.  To even use the term author is somewhat misleading.  This was an oral-tradition, told-around-the-fire saga, related by village story-tellers for centuries, beginning more than 5000 years ago, before one of them thought to put it down in cuneiform, the oldest form of writing, so that it would not be lost.

Over more centuries, other storytellers added to it, modified it, and deleted parts of it.  It got written in Akkadian, Sumerian, and then in Persian.  No complete version of it exists in any of the original languages.  An historian will spend years attempting to restore and translate one version of it.  Pottery breaks.  Vellum rots, and papyrus crumbles to dust.

Mitchell didn’t even translate one of them.  He took the work of five other translators, and shuffled their work together.  In spots where every version had common blank sections, he did what early authors did.  He added, edited, and embellished, to say what he thought it should say.

This touted Epic Saga would not hold the interest or attention of many people today, especially teenagers.  Lines are repeated.  Three-line verses which open chapters are repeated, to close them, to embed the account in its listeners.  It’s the story of a powerful bull of a man who is the king of a great idyllic city.  Mention is made of its mighty, six-mile-long, magnificent rampart wall.  I am not particularly impressed.  The boundaries of my tiny home-town of 2000, would be six miles – 1-1/2 miles per side of a square.

The city is joyous, with much music, singing, dancing, poetry, food and drink, and lots of free sex – yet this beloved king somehow oppresses it.  He insists on droit de seigneur, having sex with every bride on her wedding day, as well as other random females at will.  A naïve country lad, as big and strong as him is found.  He is ‘civilized’ with free sex, and brought to the king as a friend and limiting agent.

After some party time, their first adventure is to kill a Monster, whose only crime is to protect the trees of a cedar forest – the original eco-warrior.  This causes the friend to sicken and die, not only causing the anti-hero the anguish of loss, but presenting the specter of his own eventual death.  He then sets out on a voyage to the edge of the world, to find the secret of immortality.  Spoiler Alert: He doesn’t find it, only the grudging acceptance of reality.

The final chapter is an apparent addition, having nothing to do with the original.  For no reason given, a couple of gods decide to wipe out mankind by drowning it.  A trickster god (Like later Loki) warns some elite of the city.  They build a square boat, (?) as long on each side as the later Ark.  They and their animals survive the caprice of the gods, and repopulate the Earth.  Netflix coulda done it better.  😳

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Scriptural Humor

It cannot be found in the scriptures, but one story has it that upon his resurrection, the Lord appeared to a certain fisherman.

“I am Jesus – My death has saved all who do or will believe, and I am returned to show the Father’s love and power.“

“No, you’re not Jesus, so bug off, you’re scaring all the fish,” answered the old fisherman.

“I see thou are full of doubt. What would thou have me do to show who I am?“ replied the Christ.

“Walk across the river,” he tells Jesus.

So Jesus starts walking across the river. Next thing, he sinks and disappears under the water. After he swims back to shore, the old man says to him, “There you are, see, you’re not Jesus, you can’t walk across water!“

Jesus responds, “Well, I used to be able to do it until I got these darned holes in my feet!“

***

I remembered to spring forward….
….but I think I pulled a muscle, doing it.

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A group of Americans were touring Ireland.  One woman in the group was constantly grumbling: The bus seats are uncomfortable. The food is terrible. It’s too hot. It’s too cold. The accommodations are awful.

The group reached the site of the famous Blarney Stone. “Kissing the Blarney Stone brings good luck all your life,” the guide explained. “Unfortunately, it’s being cleaned today, so no one can kiss it. Maybe we can return tomorrow.”

“We can’t be here tomorrow,” the cantankerous woman snapped. “We have another dull tour to attend. So, I guess we can’t kiss that silly stone.”

“Well,” the guide replied, “it’s said that if you kiss someone who has kissed the stone, you’ll receive the same good fortune.”

“I suppose you’ve kissed the stone,” the woman scoffed.

“No, ma’am,” the exasperated guide responded, “but I’ve sat on it.”

***

I caught my great-grandson chewing electrical cords, so I had to ground him.  He’s doing better currently though, and conducting himself better.

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Everything happens for a reason.
Sometimes the reason is that you’re stupid, and make bad decisions.

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Instead of a swear jar, I have a negativity jar.
Every time I have pessimistic thoughts, I put a dollar in.
It’s currently half empty…

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Roses Are Read – So Are These Books

A little song, a little dance, a little seltzer down the pants….

Some books that are good for the mind, some books that are good for the soul, and some books that are good for just passing time.  I read ‘em all last year.

1491
A description of indigenous societies and empires in North and South America before the white man arrived.  Aside from the lack of iron and steel, many of them were as complex and technological as anything in the Old World.

A Harvest of Short Stories
A 1960 Ontario English textbook, complete with notes and questions, and the names of three girls who had owned it.  16 short stories, mostly Canadian and British, including a couple of O. Henry ironies, and Poe’s A Cask of Amontillado.  I didn’t have to download a free PDF.  Two Sherlock Holmes, including The Speckled Band, where I found three errors.  You can’t train a snake.  They do not drink milk, and they are deaf, and will not respond to a whistle.  The notes found one more, where Holmes refers to Watson’s pistol by a company which only ever produced ammunition.

A History of the World In 10 ½ Chapters
Not what it claims to be.  A collection of short stories intended to make fun of blind religion, especially Christianity.

Count Zero
Book number two of a trilogy about surfing the internet, but written 40 years ago, when most of us didn’t know the internet existed.

Dead Moon
A premise that large areas of the moon are used as cemeteries.  Seemed energy-inefficient to me.  Along comes a space rock which re-animates the dead, with no explanation of how, or why.  Still, escapist fun.

Even
Lee Grant’s (Jack Reacher) younger brother writing in the same genre.  Heavy on the thinking and planning, but not averse to a little required violence.
Genellan – First Victory
Again, the second of three sci-fi books about three, then four, then five alien races, including us, who band together to defeat another powerful one, intent on controlling the galaxy.  Think Star Trek Federation versus The Borg.


Gilgamesh
A book written before you were born:  This one was written before almost anyone was born – 5000 years ago.  Book review to follow.

Kingdom of Bones
An excuse to while away some time in retirement.  This one shows a place in darkest Africa where Gaia-energy caused animal life and intelligence to develop.

No Plan B
While ‘Lee Child’ is busy developing the Jack Reacher TV series, (They’re filming the third season in Toronto, where the lead actor, from Minnesota, complains about the cold weather) it falls to his younger brother (see Even above) to keep pumping them out.

One Minute Out
Another Gray Man time-passer.  In the first novel. he got so beat-up and shot-up that I didn’t see how he, or the series, could survive.  This is the ninth, and they both seem to be feeling their age.

Rasputin’s Shadow
Many people are still fascinated by Rasputin.  Even a hundred years later, he’s a good MacGuffin to hang a modern action/suspense novel on.

Relentless
This is number 8 in The Gray Man series.  Same as above – only slightly different.

Run
Same basic plot as Even, above.  An innocent bystander gets screwed over, and works like Hell to get his life back.  Good for a week of casual reading.

Sapiens
A description and illustration of how humans climbed down from the hominid evolution tree.  We – the race  – may have made a great mistake in inventing farming and technology to feed an ever-increasing population.  Hunter/gatherers spend only 18/20 hours a week feeding themselves, with much less stress.

Shatter War
Number two of a trilogy about how areas of Earth are jumbled from different time periods, ranging from ice age, to 200 years in our future.  With a canvas that broad and blank, anything is possible.  From a husband/wife team like the Childs.  He determines the plotline and story arc, and she provides the development prose.

Sierra Six
This is number seven in The Gray Man series.  I’m presenting my titles in alphabetical order, but that inverts the published order.  This book is out of plotline order.  It’s a flashback story to explain how it all started.

Target Acquired
Ghost writers help the ghost of Tom Clancy-past to keep pumping out these Jack Ryan Junior, second-generation novels.

The Kaiser’s Web
If Raymond Khoury can hang a tale on Rasputin, then Steve Berry can hang one on the German Kaiser.  Everything old is new again.

The Kill Clause
A police detective, whose young daughter is raped and murdered, is offered a spot on a vigilante squad to bring justice to those who escape on technicalities.

The Last Orphan
A Jason Bourne-type agent is finally showing some signs of being human.  I am hoping for more books in the new direction.

The Program
The above vigilante policeman, (temporarily) off the force, rescues a rich man’s daughter from a Scientology-type cult.

The Runaway
A missing,16-year-old, female agent trainee, and the possibility of a relationship with a lady DA and her young son, help scrub a few letters off behind his assumed name –  ADD, ADHD, OCD, PTSD.  He may become part of civilized society, even while he’s still knocking off bad guys.

The Span of Empire
Similar to the Genellan book, again, there are more and more interstellar races, joining together to resist the galactic bully, who would ‘cleanse’ them all out of existence.

There Is A God
Lies!  Damned lies, and more desperate Christian Apologetics lies.

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Palindrome Fibbing Friday

Pensitivity101 was anpicitating anticipating my answers to these ten surnames which could also be professions, or of course……………. something else. Over to me – and under to her.

  1. Baker

A manager at any of the now-ubiquitous, newly-legalized marijuana dispensaries.  I thought that they were supposed to be physically separated – one per neighbourhood.  In a rougher section of town, I recently saw two, directly across the street from each other.  Nearby was a 50-year-old blonde, in an 18-year-old’s mini-skirt, down on her knees (and her luck), counting pebbles at the edge of an unpaved parking lot.  Not only was she baked, she was FRIED!!

2.   Carpenter

A carpenter is also a Kevin – the husband and entitled-partner of a Karen – forever bitching and complaining and griping about everything – and nothing.  Always deaf to anything they do not want to hear, they cannot be convinced that they are no more important than 2-day-old bread, on a half-price special at the Golden Crust Shoppe Bakery.

3.   Gardener

He’s a private who is being disciplined by being made to stand outside at a gate for hours, shout “Halt!  Who goes there?” and control access into an Army base.  A General’s driver was told that he and the officer were not allowed onto the base without written authorization from the commanding officer.  The General waved his hand, and ordered the driver to proceed.  The young lad stuck his rifle barrel in the rear window and said, “I’m confused sir.  Do I shoot you – or the driver?”

4.   Mason

It’s a house that Frenchmen live in – and also French-Canadians who like to believe that they are real French Catholics, when most of them are the descendants of prostitutes and Protestants.

5.   Plummer

A blue-collar worker with one of those power-auger things, who makes as much as the Prime Minister.  To be fair, he does more good for the country than the Prime Minister and any two back-benchers.  Before you call in one of these, you have to decide which body organ you can sell on the black market, to pay for his services – and all because Germ Theory and the local Council have decided that we can’t have midden tips any more.

6.   Potter

A potter is a repeat-repeat-repeat customer at our new cannabis retail outlets.  If you accost one by saying, “Hey, Bud” he’ll reply, “Okay, but remove the seeds.”

7.   Rider

A 9-to-5 public transit commuter.  Their sad lot was mourned in a song by the Canadian band, The Guess Who.

8.   Singer

A technician/inventor whose fame and fortune were guaranteed when he designed and built machines that could do in a fraction of the time, hand-sewing tasks that once took forever.

9.   Taylor/Tailor

A none-too-swift female singer/songwriter who has left so many romantic relationship disasters in her wake, that she should be on FEMA’s list of hurricanes.

10. Weaver

An enthralling teller of tall-tales and beguiling stories.  I would like to think that I was one, but my tales are about as tall as a midget’s ass.

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I give my Fibbing Friday posts (sometimes silly) names, rather than merely numbers, to tell one from another.  I called this one ‘Palindrome’ because it happened to be my 1771st post.  My Fibbing Friday list now goes back a way, but neither number 1551, nor 1661 happened to be one.  😎

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Flash Fiction #292

PHOTO PROMPT © Roger Bultot

AN ESSAY: BY ARCHON

My writing method – Teacher says to get marks, I have to make a story outline, then fill it in.
Doesn’t work.  I leave a space at the top, write the story, then build the outline.

I just open the mental floodgates and let the concepts spill out.  I take an idea from here, a pun from there, stitch it together like Frankenstein’s monster, and hope that creative lightning will weld it together into a coherent story.  Sometimes I win.  Sometimes you lose.  Then I use my patented,© push-broom, accurate, re-filing, storage system, ready for next time.

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If you’d like to join the fun, go to Rochelle’s Addicted to Purple site, and use her Wednesday photo as a prompt to write a complete 100 word story.

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A Christmas Rescue

Published without the authorized permission of the Waterloo Region Record – but with the best of intentions.  Credit Record staff – Robert Williams

The snow is piling up, burying our car deeper and deeper into the snowbank.

Deb Dooling-Westover pulls out her crackers, cream cheese, and roasted red pepper jelly, and offers some to her husband, Mark Westover.  In the back seat, a hitchhiker takes a few for himself.  He’s on his way to Listowel for his daughter’s first Christmas, with a bagful of toys and a few spare clothes, but his taxi ha long turned around and left him on Line 86, just outside Wallenstein.  The back seat of the Westovers’ car is his only chance at warmth for the night.

The car is not moving.  The snowbank has made sure of that, and the trio are settling in for a long, cold night.  Snowplows can’t get to them, and there’s no way in or out of this country road. The Westovers – Deb, 63, and Mark, 71 – and their hitchhiker – a young man of about 30, are trapped.

They’re talking, but their eyes dart nervously at the fuel gauge, that’s slowly ticking lower.  The snow is piling up the windows, and they’re equally worried that someone may come piling in behind them.  It’s Christmas Eve, and a winter storm bringing heavy snow and wind gusts of 100 km/h has shut down much of the Province on one of the busiest travel days of the year.

On this rural road, 30 kilometres north of Kitchener, it feels as if nothing and nobody is around you.  It’s a vast rural area. Dotted with Mennonite farms and sprawling fields.  The Westovers are on their way from Ayr, to spend Christmas with friends in Wingham.

They spent the morning checking the weather, to make sure that the roads were still open when they left, just before noon.  The farther they drove, the worse the conditions got.  Eventually, on a long stretch of farmland between Wallenstein and Macton, there is no going any further.

There are a few other cars stuck in this area.  As the winds pick up and blow the snow in blankets across the farm fields and over the road, it gets harder to make them out.  Each car is an island, and the snow is gobbling them up.

After a few hours sitting inside the car, Deb looks out of the snow-covered window and rubs her eyes to make sure she’s not hallucinating.  A man with a pair of snowshoes has emerged from the snowbank.  He knocks on the side of the car, and she opens it up to him.

“Do you have food and water?” he asks.
“Well, we don’t have a lot of food, but we have some water and Diet Coke in the cooler.” she tells him.  “My car is behind my husband’s.  I only have a quarter tank of gas.”

The Westovers had filled their two cars with presents, and they were hoping to do some work on Deb’s fuel tank, once they got to their friends’ house.  She had been following Mark the whole drive, but both of their cars were now stuck in the huge snowdrift.
“Don’t worry.” he says. “I have lots of gas.  I’ll come back for you later.”

An hour goes by.  It’s dark now.  With the wind-chill, it feels like -27 C.  The snow continues to fall, and the wind is howling.  A roar starts up behind them, and Deb jumps out of the car to see approaching blue and red lights.  Their man in the snowshoes has returned, this time with a tractor.

He gets Deb back into her car, pulls it out, and then pulls out Mark and the hitchhiker.  By this point he has already pulled out some of the other cars as well.  Once they’re all safely back on the road, he asks the occupants of all the cars – about six in total – to follow him about a kilometer down the road, and up a long driveway, where they all stop at a farmhouse.

The group walks into the house to find the man’s wife peeling carrots in the kitchen, with two young boys bouncing around the house.  They are a modern Mennonite family, and the farmhouse is equipped with power, heating, and a functioning telephone.

“I’ve never spent any time with a Mennonite family, or been inside a (Mennonite) house before.” Deb said later.  “And I have to tell you, these are the most beautiful people I’ve ever met.”  Deb joins the woman in the kitchen, helping to peel carrots.  Then she watches as she puts potatoes through a food processor, throws them into boiling water, and mixes them with cream and butter to make mashed potatoes.  Then she begins cooking summer sausage, as more people start piling into the farmhouse – there’s about a dozen of them now.

The family has some table extensions, and by the time dinner is served, it’s a feast for nearly 16 people, each with a spot around the ‘harvest table.’  They say a silent prayer, and dinner begins.
“I was literally crying.” says Deb.  “It was the most unbelievable thing I had ever seen in my life.  There we were, thinking that we were going to freeze to death.  We really thought we were going to die.  And now we were all seated around this table, warm, and having dinner at this farmhouse.”

Around the table, the different groups recount their stories.  Each talk about watching the weather advisories, checking to make sure the roads were open, and eventually finding themselves stuck in the snowdrift with no way out.  But something still doesn’t add up.  How did this man know to come and get them?

One of the women at the table speaks up.  While she was waiting in her car, she noticed a name on a nearby mailbox.  She called her son in Listowel, and he started calling every number in the area with that last name.  Eventually he got through to their rescuer, who threw on his snowshoes and headed into the storm to see if he could find them.

Not wanting any unnecessary attention, the family has asked to keep their name private.  “I don’t want any honors or glory.” the man told The Record.  “It’s just the Lord’s glory and we did our Christian duty.”  After dinner is over, the family leads Deb and Mark to a spare bedroom to hunker down for the night.  It’s cold in the room, but thick blankets keep them warm.  The rest of the travellers are spread out around the house, sleeping on makeshift beds and couches.

In the morning, Deb runs out to the car to grab some peameal bacon she had purchased on Christmas morning.  Many of the others do the same, bringing in what food they can contribute to the feast.  Like the night before, they cook up a big meal, each sitting around the table to enjoy a Christmas breakfast.  When the meal is finished, they clean up together, and start getting back in their cars, each bound to family and friends.

None of them know each other.  After they say their goodbyes and wish each other luck for the journeys ahead, all they’re left with is a handful of first names and memories of faces, warmth and a reminder of good people when tragedy strikes.

The Westovers’ Wingham friend said that they did their final checks, but I guess they were just in for an adventure.  They eventually reached their final destination.  The gifts that they had piled in their cars made it to the friends and family they had planned to see.  As they sat around the Christmas dinner table, they told the story of a snowy country road, and a man on snowshoes who appeared out of nowhere, and took them to safety in a farmhouse with his family.

Deb said, “I have to tell you, it was the most beautiful Christmas ever.”

😀  😀

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Dr. Who’s Questions

The Doctor (He doesn’t say, ‘of what.’) claims that he just wants to ask some respectful questions of Atheists – no trick or gotcha ones.  He wants to amass the information, and sift and sort it, to produce a published report.  When asked when he might submit it, and to whom, he was delightfully vague.

He and his wife were Atheists, until each of them had a revelation from the Christian God, and they became Jews For Jesus.  His questions natter on and on – and on, full of presuppositions and leading statements.  Another blogger graciously simplified the list, although I included part of his number six, for context and clarity.  I thought I’d have a go at them.

  • Is Your Atheism Based on Study or Experience? …

Yes!, to both.  As young as seven or eight, I regarded stories that started with “In The Beginning” to be no more believable than those that began, “Once Upon A Time.”  I didn’t realize until I became an adult myself, that other children, and adults, took them seriously.  I became curious enough to begin a long-term investigation.  I spent a great deal of time looking at arguments for or against God’s existence, and eventually had to conclude that there just wasn’t any evidence for God that stood up to examination.

  • Do You Have Purpose and Destiny? …

Yes.  I have had many ‘Purposes,” and will probably have more before I die, but each of them was created and affixed by me, or those close to me, not by some supernatural entity.  I believe that I have a destiny.  It’s just that I am not enough of a fortune-teller to see far enough into the future to get a clear glimpse of what it might be.

  • Does God Exist? …

This might seem a strange question to be asking of Atheists.  In the original long-winded version, he wanted Atheists to provide total, complete, 100% proof, that there was absolutely no chance that God exists.  This is the philosophical equivalent to home invasion.  There are almost no things that can be utterly proved not to exist.  He appeared to want a tiny gap, where he could wedge his definition of God into.  I consider the possibility of God existing, only slightly more likely than the existence of a married bachelor.

  • Can Science Explain the Origin of Life? …

Science has explained the origin of life!  There is one major, largely-accepted (by biologists and related scientists) theory, and a couple of minor variations.  They all entail the chemical soup present in early Earth seas, with geothermal energy and solar radiation fueling and mutating the chemical reactions, until self-replicating RNA strands evolved upward to cells and DNA.  All that free energy powered the increasing DNA complexity.

  • Have You Questioned Your Atheism? …

Constantly and continuously!  I have never been convinced that I can’t be wrong.  Over the years I have done considerable reading and study.  Now, with YouTube, I can watch debates and lectures.  Atheism is merely the lack of belief in God/gods – the failure by theists to provide sufficiently convincing evidence.  (See above) With all the research and investigation that I have done, I continue not to be convinced that God is guilty of existing.

  • Are You Materialistic? …
    Are you completely materialistic in your mindset, meaning, human beings are entirely physical, human consciousness is an illusion, and there is no spiritual realm of any kind?

First, a pedantic language lesson, I think that phrasing should be ‘are you a materialist?’. ‘Materialistic’ refers to someone who prioritizes obtaining money and possessions!  I believe that humans, and all else within our Universe, are material.  I don’t think it makes much sense to say that consciousness is an illusion.  I think a more accurate phrasing of the materialist position on consciousness would be that it’s the product of material things/physical laws.  I continue to see no evidence of a spiritual realm of any kind, except in the hopes and dreams of the gullible.  I do not believe in tarot, Ouija boards, crystals, ghosts, mind-reading, fortune-telling, or a miracle-producing God.

  • Would You Be Willing to Follow the God of the Bible?

It depends which part of the Bible you’re talking about when you say ‘God of the Bible’.

From reading the earlier part of the Old Testament, I remember a god laden with petty jealousy, orchestrating hideous mass deaths, with archaic views on rape and slavery and some strange gaps in his scientific knowledge. The existence of this god would be bad news.

In the later part of the Old Testament, I glimpsed a different and better kind of god; the god of Ezekiel 18 and similar passages, expecting us to take personal responsibility but also willing to see our virtues and our efforts and to judge us fairly. The existence of this god would be good news, and, yes, I would follow and honor him.

In the New Testament, we get the most hideous god of all; the one who condemns all non-Christians to an eternity of torment, who blames the Jews for sticking to the laws that He himself strictly instructed them to keep to forever, who expects us to overlook the ways he acted back in the early books, and who tries to convince us that all these things are really signs of great love and concern on his part. The existence of this god would be terrible news. And, to answer the question, I could never honor such a god, and while I suppose I’d follow him because ‘Or burn in hell’ isn’t really much of an option, it would never be willingly.

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Putting the Fun In Funeral

Subject: The Italian Funeral

A Jewish man was leaving a convenience store with his coffee when he noticed a most unusual Italian funeral procession approaching the nearby cemetery.

A black hearse was followed by a second black hearse about 50 feet behind the first one.  Behind the second hearse was a solitary Italian man walking a dog on a leash.

Behind him, a short distance back were about 300 men walking in single file.

The Jewish man couldn’t stand the curiosity. He respectfully approached the Italian man walking the dog and said:

“I am so sorry for your loss, and this may be a bad time to disturb you, but I’ve never seen an Italian funeral like this. Whose funeral is it?”

“My wife’s.”

‘What happened to her?”

“She yelled at me and my dog attacked and killed her.”  

He inquired further, “But who is in the second hearse”

“My mother-in-law. She came to help my wife and the dog turned on her and killed her also.”   
A very poignant and touching moment of Jewish and Italian brotherhood and silence passed between the two men.

The Jewish man then asked, “Can I borrow the dog?”

The Italian man replied, “Get in line.”

***

If we could convince the Chinese that Jihadists’ testicles were an aphrodisiac, perhaps in ten years they’d be extinct.

***

Married 50 years 

After being married for 50 years, I took a careful look at my wife one day and said, “Fifty years ago we had a cheap house, a junk car, slept on a sofa-bed and watched a 10-inch black and white TV.  But hey I got to sleep every night with a hot 23-year-old girl.

Now … I have a $750,000 home, a $45,000 car, a nice big bed and a large screen TV, but I’m sleeping with a 73-year-old woman.  So I said to my wife “it seems to me that you’re not holding up your side of things.”

My wife is a very reasonable woman.  She told me to go out and find a hot 23-year-old girl and she would make sure that I would once again be living in a cheap house, driving a junk car, sleeping on a sofa bed and watching a 10-inch black and white TV.

Aren’t older women great?

They really know how to solve an old guy’s problems!

***

The wife and I were sitting on the patio yesterday, each sipping a glass of wine, and she said, “I love you so much.  I don’t think I could ever live without you.”
I said, “Is that you, or the wine, talking?

She replied, “That’s me….talking to the wine.”

***

No one believes seniors . . . everyone thinks they are senile.
The wife and I were celebrating our fifty-fourth anniversary.  We had married as childhood sweethearts and had moved back to our old neighborhood after we retired.  Holding hands, we walked back to our old school.  It was not locked, so we entered, and found the old desk we shared, where I had carved ‘I love you, Sally’.

On our way back home, a bag of money fell out of an armored car, practically landing at our feet.  She quickly picked it up and, not sure what to do with it, we took it home.  There, she counted the money – fifty thousand dollars!

I said, “We’ve got to give it back.”
She said, “Finders keepers.”  She put the money back in the bag and hid it in the attic.
The next day, two police officers were canvassing the neighborhood looking for the money, and knocked on our door, “Pardon me, did either of you find a bag that fell out of an armored car yesterday?”

She said, “No.”
I said, “She’s lying. She hid it up in the attic.”
Sally said, “Don’t believe him, he’s getting senile.”
The agents turned to me and began to question me.  One said: “Tell us the story from the beginning.”
So I said, “Well, when she and I were walking home from school yesterday … “
The first police officer turned to his partner and said, “We’re outta here!”

by

’22 A To Z Challenge – C

 

 

I am green, but not with envy, when I can Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle.

Christian Apologists sometimes ask, even if the claims were false, what is the problem with believing “If it’s not hurting anyone?”  A YouTuber recently held up a newspaper headline – “Woman scammed of $160,000 by mother/daughter fortune tellers who promised to rid her of demons.”  There is no ‘not hurting anyone!’

Anyone who believes one thing without good reason, has a mental predisposition to believe other false claims.  Her Christianity had convinced her that angels and demons existed, and she paid the price.  That brings me, highly incensed, to the word

Crucible

a container of metal or refractory material employed for heating substances to high temperatures.
a severe, searching test or trial.

Arthur Miller wrote a book titled “The Crucible.”  It was a rebuke against McCarthyism in the early 1950s, disguised as a novel about the Salem Witch Trials.  There was only one death attributed to McCarthyism, a wrongfully-accused Senator who committed suicide.  Scores of careers and lives were ruined.  In Salem, 24 people died.  19 innocent women were hanged.  4 more died from appalling jail conditions, and one man was tortured to death – all because of lies and fake news, gullibly believed.

Lightening up just a bit, I’m going to recycle a story about a friend who also reused  and recycled by melting down beverage cans, and broken lawn furniture and storm doors in small crucibles which he purchased online, to produce little aluminum hexagons that he used to pave a portion of his back yard, around the barbecue pit.

That whine which you may have heard when you arrived, was not a quad-copter drone, providing Neighborhood Watch security.  That was my mind desperately trying to grind out refills for my random facts posts.  We’ll see how well I do.  Y’all come back now, ya hear.   😎