To my friends who enjoy a glass of wine and those who don’t and are always seen with a bottle of water in their hand: As Ben Franklin said:  In wine there is wisdom, In beer there is freedom, In water there is bacteria.

In a number of carefully controlled trials, scientists have demonstrated that if we drink 1 liter of water each day, at the end of the year we would have absorbed more than 1 kilo of E. Coli – bacteria found in feces.

In other words, we are consuming 1 kilo of poop annually.

However, we do NOT run that risk when drinking wine & beer (or rum, whiskey or other liquor) because alcohol has to go through a purification process of boiling, filtering and fermenting.

Remember: Water = Poop, Wine = Health

Therefore, it’s better to drink wine and talk stupid, than to drink water and be full of shit.

There is no need to thank me for this valuable information: I’m doing it as a public service

The other day I went over to a nearby CVS Pharmacy.  When I got there, I went straight to the back of the store to where the Pharmacists’ Counter is located.  I took out my little brown bottle along with a teaspoon and laid them both onto the counter. 

The pharmacist came over smiled and asked if he could help me. 

I said, “Yes!  Could you please taste this for me?” 

Being I’m a senior  citizen…I guess the Pharmacist just went along with me. He picked up the spoon and put a tiny bit of the liquid on his tongue and swilled it around.  Then with a stomach-churning look on his face he spit it out on the floor and began coughing. 

When he finally was finished, I looked him right in the eye asked, “Now, does that taste sweet to you?  The pharmacist, shaking his head back and forth with a venomous look in his eyes yelled, “HELL  NO!!!” 

So I said, “Oh thank God! That’s such a relief!  My doctor told me to get a pharmacist to test my urine for sugar!” 

Well, I can never go back to that CVS, but I really don’t care though, because; they aren’t very friendly there anyway!!!

Purdue University: Natural Born Citizens

Those  of you who worry about Democrats versus Republicans — relax, here is our real problem.

In a  Purdue University classroom, they were discussing the qualifications to be President of the United  States.   It was pretty simple. The candidate must be a natural born citizen of at least 35 years of age.

However, one girl in the class immediately started in on how unfair it was of the requirement to be a natural born citizen. In short, her opinion was that this requirement prevented many capable individuals from becoming president. The class was taking it in and letting her rant, and not many jaws hit the floor when she wrapped up her argument by stating, “What makes a natural born citizen any more qualified to lead this country than one born by C-section?”

Yep, these are the same kinds of 18-year-olds that are now voting in our elections! They breed, and they walk among us.  Lord, we need more help than we thought we did!

A woman was sitting at a bar enjoying an after-work  cocktail with her girlfriends when Steven, a tall, exceptionally handsome, extremely sexy, middle-aged man entered. He was so striking that the woman could not take her eyes off him. 

This seasoned yet playful heartthrob noticed her overly-attentive stare and walked directly toward her. (As any man would.) Before she could offer her apologies for staring so rudely, he leaned over and whispered to her, “I’ll do anything, absolutely anything, that you want me to do, no matter how kinky, for $20.00…  on one condition…” 

Flabbergasted but intrigued, the woman asked what the condition was.  

The man replied, “You have to tell me what you want me to do in just three words.” 

The woman considered his proposition for a moment, and then slowly removed a $20 bill from her purse, which she pressed into the man’s hand along with her address. She looked deeply and passionately into his eyes, barely  concealing her anticipation and excitement, and slowly  and meaningfully said…  

“Clean my house.”

(YOU GO, GIRL!)

WORDS  AND PHRASES  REMIND US OF THE WAY  WE WORD.

by Richard Lederer

About a month ago, I illuminated some old expressions that have become obsolete because of the inexorable march of technology. These phrases included “Don’t touch that dial,” “Carbon copy,” “You sound like a broken record” and “Hung out to dry.” A bevy of readers have asked me to shine light on more faded words and expressions, and I am happy to oblige:

Back in the olden days we had a lot of moxie. We’d put on our best bib and tucker and straighten up and fly right. Hubba-hubba! We’d cut a rug in some juke joint and then go necking and petting and smooching and spooning and billing and cooing and pitching woo in hot rods and jalopies in some passion pit or lovers’ lane.

Holy Mackerel! Heavens to Betsy! Gee Whillikers! Jumpin’ Jehoshaphat! Holy Moley! We were hunky dory, in like Flynn and living the life of Riley, and even a regular guy couldn’t accuse us of being a knucklehead, a nincompoop or a pill. Not for all the tea in China!

Back in the olden days, life used to be swell, but when’s the last time anything was swell? Swell has gone the way of beehives, pageboys and the D.A.; of spats, knickers, fedoras, poodle skirts, saddle shoes and pedal pushers. Oh, my aching back. Kilroy was here, but he isn’t anymore.

Like Washington Irving’s Rip Van Winkle and Kurt Vonnegut’s Billy Pilgrim, we have become unstuck in time. We wake up from what surely has been just a short nap, and before we can say, “I’ll be a monkey’s uncle!” or “This is a fine kettle of fish!” we discover that the words we grew up with, the words that seemed omnipresent as oxygen, have vanished with scarcely a notice from our tongues and our pens and our keyboards.

Poof, poof, poof go the words of our youth, the words we’ve left behind. We blink, and they’re gone, evanesced from the landscape and wordscape of our perception, like Mickey Mouse wristwatches, hula hoops, skate keys, candy cigarettes, little wax bottles of colored sugar water and an organ grinder’s monkey.

Where have all those phrases gone? Long time passing. Where have all those phrases gone? Long time ago: Pshaw. The milkman did it. Think about the starving Armenians. Bigger than a bread box. Banned in Boston. The very idea! It’s your nickel. Don’t forget to pull the chain. Knee high to a grasshopper. Turn-of-the-century. Iron curtain. Domino theory. Fail safe. Civil defense. Fiddlesticks! 

You look like the wreck of the Hesperus. Cooties. Going like sixty. I’ll see you in the funny papers. Don’t take any wooden nickels. Heavens to Murgatroyd! And awa-a-ay we go!

Oh, my stars and garters! It turns out there are more of these lost words and expressions than Carter had liver pills.  This can be disturbing stuff, this winking out of the words of our youth, these words that lodge in our heart’s deep core. But just as one never steps into the same river twice, one cannot step into the same language twice. Even as one enters, words are swept downstream into the past, forever making a different river.

We, of a certain age, have been blessed to live in changeful times. For a child, each new word is like a shiny toy, a toy that has no age. We at the other end of the chronological arc have the advantage of remembering there are words that once did not exist and there were words that once strutted their hour upon the earthly stage and now are heard no more, except in our collective memory. It’s one of the greatest advantages of aging.  We can have archaic and eat it, too.       

See ‘ya later, alligator!

ONLY A MAN WOULD ATTEMPT THIS

Pocket Taser Stun Gun, a great gift for the wife.

A guy who purchased his lovely wife a pocket Taser for their anniversary submitted this:

Last weekend I saw something at Larry’s Pistol & Pawn Shop that sparked my interest. The occasion was our 15th anniversary and I was looking for a little something extra for my wife Julie. What I came across was a 100,000-volt, pocket/purse-sized Taser. The effects of the Taser were supposed to be short lived, with no long-term adverse effect on your assailant, allowing her adequate time to retreat to safety…??

WAY TOO COOL! Long story short, I bought the device and brought it home. I loaded two AAA batteries in the darn thing and pushed the button. Nothing! I was disappointed. I learned, however, that if I pushed the button and pressed it against a metal surface at the same time, I’d get the blue arc of electricity darting back and forth between the prongs.

AWESOME!!! Unfortunately, I have yet to explain to Julie what that burn spot is on the face of her microwave.

Okay, so I was home alone with this new toy, thinking to myself that it couldn’t be all that bad with only two AAA batteries, right?

There I sat in my recliner, my cat Gracie looking on intently (trusting little soul) while I was reading the directions and thinking that I really needed to try this thing out on a flesh & blood moving target.

I must admit I thought about zapping Gracie (for a fraction of a second) and then thought better of it. She is such a sweet cat. But, if I was going to give this thing to my wife to protect herself against a mugger, I did want some assurance that it would work as advertised.

Am I wrong?

So, there I sat in a pair of shorts and a tank top with my reading glasses perched delicately on the bridge of my nose, directions in one hand, and Taser in another.

The directions said that:

• a one-second burst would shock and disorient your assailant;
• a two-second burst was supposed to cause muscle spasms and a major loss of bodily control; and
• a three-second burst would purportedly make your assailant flop on the ground like a fish out of water.
• Any burst longer than three seconds would be wasting the batteries.

All the while I’m looking at this little device measuring about 5″ long, less than 3/4 inch in circumference (loaded with two itsy, bitsy AAA batteries); pretty cute really, and thinking to myself, ‘no possible way!’

What happened next is almost beyond description, but I’ll do my best.

I’m sitting there alone, Gracie looking on with her head cocked to one side so as to say, ‘Don’t do it stupid,’ reasoning that a one second burst from such a tiny lil ole thing couldn’t hurt all that bad. I decided to give myself a one-second burst just for the heck of it.

I touched the prongs to my naked thigh, pushed the button, and…

HOLY MOTHER OF GOD. WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION. WHAT THE… !!!

I’m pretty sure Hulk Hogan ran in through the side door, picked me up in the recliner, then body slammed us both on the carpet, over and over and over again. I vaguely recall waking up on my side in the fetal position, with tears in my eyes, body soaking wet, both nipples on fire, testicles nowhere to be found, with my left arm tucked under my body in the oddest position, and tingling in my legs! The cat was making meowing sounds I had never heard before, clinging to a picture frame hanging above the fireplace, obviously in an attempt to avoid getting slammed by my body flopping all over the living room.

Note: If you ever feel compelled to ‘mug’ yourself with a Taser, one note of caution: There is NO such thing as a one-second burst when you zap yourself! You will not let go of that thing until it is dislodged from your hand by a violent thrashing about on the floor!  A three-second burst would be considered conservative!

A minute or so later (I can’t be sure, as time was a relative thing at that point), I collected my wits (what little I had left), sat up and surveyed the landscape.

• My bent reading glasses were on the mantel of the fireplace.
• The recliner was upside down and about 8 feet or so from where it originally was.
• My triceps, right thigh and both nipples were still twitching.
• My face felt like it had been shot up with Novocain, and my bottom lip weighed 88 lbs.
• I had no control over the drooling.
• Apparently I had crapped in my shorts but was too numb to know for sure, and my sense of smell was gone.
• I saw a faint smoke cloud above my head, which I believe came from my hair.

I’m still looking for my testicles and I’m offering a significant reward for their safe return!

PS: My wife can’t stop laughing about my experience, loved the gift and now regularly threatens me with it!

If you think education is difficult, try being stupid!!!!

The Dreaded Phone Call from the Boss

Boss: Is everything OK at the office?

Me: It’s all under control. It’s been a very busy day. I haven’t stopped to take a break all day.

Boss: Can you do me a favor?

Me: Of course, What is it?

Boss: Pick up the pace a little, I’m in the foursome behind you!

Subject: Groaner

Mahatma Gandhi was a peculiar person. He walked barefoot everywhere, to the point that his feet became quite thick and hard. He often went on hunger strikes, and even when he wasn’t on a hunger strike, he did not eat much and became quite thin and frail. He also was a very spiritual person. Finally, because he didn’t eat much and when he did his diet was peculiar, he developed very bad breath.

He became known as a super-calloused fragile mystic hexed by halitosis.

Nothing is impossible. Some things are just less likely than others.

I don’t do jokes. The characters are my jokes.

My paintings and comedy have a lot in common. They are both improvisations based on observation.

If your ship doesn’t come in, swim out to it.

I couldn’t wait for success, so I went ahead without it.

Well, the most terrible fear that anybody should have is not war, is not a disease, not cancer or heart problems or food poisoning – it’s a man or a woman without a sense of humor.

I don’t do anything the same every day. Discipline is tough for a guy who is a rebel.

You’ve got to be an observer. And you’ve got to take time to listen to people, talk, to watch what they do.

Something I’ll always remember – when I was a kid, I shook hands with Orville Wright. Forty years later, I shook hands with Neil Armstrong. The guy that invented the airplane and the guy that walked on the moon. In a lifetime, that’s kinda wild when you think about it.

A big city lawyer went duck hunting in rural northern Minnesota. He shot and dropped a bird, but it fell into a farmer’s field. 

As the lawyer climbed over the fence to claim his bird, an elderly farmer drove up on his tractor and asked him what he was doing.

The litigator responded, “I shot a duck and it fell in this field, and now I’m going to retrieve it.”

The old farmer replied, “This is my property, and you are not coming over here.”

The indignant lawyer said, “I am one of the best trial attorneys in New England and, if you don’t let me retrieve that duck, I’ll sue you and take everything you own.”

The old farmer smiled and said, “Apparently, you don’t know how we settle disputes here in northern Minnesota.  We settle small disagreements like this with the ‘Three Kick Rule.'”

The lawyer asked, “What is the ‘Three Kick Rule’?”

The Farmer replied, “Well, because the dispute occurs on my land, I get to go first. I kick you three times and then you kick me three times and so on back and forth until someone gives up.”

The attorney quickly thought about the proposed contest and, being the person he was, decided that he could easily take the old codger. He agreed to abide by the local custom.

The old farmer slowly climbed down from the tractor and walked up to the attorney. His first kick planted the toe of his heavy steel toed work boot into the lawyer’s groin and dropped him to his knees!  His second kick to the midriff sent the lawyer’s last meal gushing from his mouth. The lawyer was on all fours when the farmer’s third kick to his rear end, sent him face-first into a fresh cow pie.

The lawyer summoned every bit of his will and remaining strength and very slowly managed to get to his feet. Wiping his face with the arm of his jacket, he said, “Okay, you old fart. Now it’s my turn.”

The old farmer smiled and said, “Nah, I give up. You can have the duck.”

A married couple in their early 60s are celebrating their 40th wedding anniversary in a quiet, romantic little restaurant. Suddenly, a tiny yet beautiful fairy appeared on their table. She said, ‘For being such an exemplary married couple and for being loving to each other for all this time, I will grant you each a wish.’

The wife answered, ‘Oh, I want to travel around the world with my darling husband.’ The fairy waved her magic wand and – poof! – two tickets for the Queen Mary II appeared in her hands.

The husband thought for a moment: ‘Well, this is all very romantic, but an opportunity like this will never come again. I’m sorry my love, but my wish is to have a wife 30 years younger than me.’

The wife and the fairy were deeply disappointed, but a wish is a wish.! So the fairy waved her magic wand and poof!…  The husband became 92 years old.

The moral of this story: Men who are ungrateful bastards should remember fairies are female.

SEND THIS TO A WOMANWHO NEEDS A GOOD LAUGH, AND TO ANY MAN WHO CAN HANDLE IT!