Roy Exum
When I heard that the legendary “Little Johnny” had quit going to weddings because all the old ladies would pinch his cheeks and giggle, “You’ll be next!” I understood completely. But not long ago The Saturday Funnies learned our Johnny had devised a way to stop it. Living in a small town, Johnny would walk to where the matrons were huddled at a funeral, remind one who had pinched too hard and repeat her very words: “You’ll be next!”
Welcome to this week’s edition of The Saturday Funnies.
As you know, I neither write nor edit these jokes and stories, I just glean them from my daily stack of funny emails and pass them along. So, here we go …
* * *
WE WONDER WHAT HAPPENED TO KENNY THE COWPOKE
A modern day cowboy named Kenny has spent many days crossing the South Dakota prairies without water. His horse has already died of thirst. He's crawling along the dusty ground, certain that he has breathed his last breath, when all of a sudden he sees an object sticking out of the ground several yards ahead of him. He crawls to the object, pulls it out of the ground and discovers what looks to be an old briefcase.
He opens it and out pops a genie named Patty. But she is no ordinary genie. She is wearing an IRS ID badge and a dull grey outfit. There's a calculator in her pocketbook. She has a pencil tucked behind one ear. 'Well, cowboy,' says Patty, 'You know how I work. You have three wishes.'
'I'm not falling for this,' said Kenny, 'I'm not going to trust an IRS genie.'
'What do you have to lose? You've got no transportation, and it looks like you're a goner anyway!'
The cowboy thinks about this for a minute and decides that the genie is right. ‘OK! I wish I were along-side a lush spring with plenty of food and drink.'
Poof! The cowboy finds himself beside the most beautiful spring he has ever seen, and he's surrounded with jugs of wine and platters of delicacies.
'OK, cowpoke, what's your second wish?'
'My second wish is that I was rich beyond my wildest dreams.'
Poof! The cowboy finds himself surrounded by treasure chests filled with rare gold coins and precious gems.
'OK, cowpuncher, you have just one more wish. Better make it a good one!'
After thinking for a few minutes, the cowboy says, 'I wish that no matter where I go, beautiful women will want and need me.'
Poof! He was turned into a tampon.
Moral of the story: If the U.S. Government offers to help you, there's going to be a string attached.
* * *
IT SEEMS THE TOWN’S SQUIRRELS WENT TO CHURCH …
The Presbyterian church called a meeting to decide what to do about their squirrel infestation. After much prayer and consideration, they concluded the squirrels were predestined to be there and they shouldn’t interfere with God's divine will.
At the Baptist church, the squirrels had taken an interest in the baptistery. The deacons met and decided to put a water-slide on the baptistery and let the squirrels drown themselves. The squirrels liked the slide and, unfortunately, knew instinctively how to swim, so twice as many squirrels showed up the following week. They took down the water slide.
The Lutheran church decided that they were not in a position to harm any of God's creatures. So, they humanely trapped their squirrels and set them free near the Baptist Church. Two weeks later the squirrels were back when the Baptists took down the water-slide.
The Catholic church came up with a very creative strategy. They baptized all the squirrels and made them members of the church. Now they only see them at Christmas and Easter.
Not much was heard from the Jewish synagogue. They circumcised the first squirrel. They haven't seen another squirrel since.
* * *
GRAMMAR LESSON: ‘COMPLETE,’ ‘FINISHED,’ OR ‘COMPLETELY FINISHED?
No English dictionary has been able to adequately explain the difference between these two words - "Complete" and "Finished”. In a recent linguistic competition held in London and attended by, supposedly, the best in the world, Samdar Balgobin, a Guyanese man, was the clear winner with a standing ovation which lasted over 5 minutes.
The final question was: “How do you explain the difference between COMPLETE and FINISHED in a way that is easy to understand? Some people say there is no difference between COMPLETE and FINISHED.”
Here is his astute answer: "When you marry the right woman, you are COMPLETE. When you marry the wrong woman, you are FINISHED. And, when the right one catches you with the wrong one, you are COMPLETELY FINISHED!"
He won a trip around the world and a case of 25-year-old Scotch.
* * *
I’M BETTING THAT 0VER 90 PERCENT OF AMERICANS KNOW …
#1 In more than half of all states in the United States of America, the highest paid public employee in the state is a football coach.
#2 It costs the U.S. government 1.8 cents to mint a penny and 9.4 cents to mint a nickel. Interesting links.
#3 Almost half of all Americans (47 percent) do not put a single penny out of their paychecks into savings.
#4 Apple has more cash than the U.S. Treasury.
#5 The state of Alaska is 429 times larger than the state of Rhode Island. But Rhode Island has a significantly larger population than Alaska does.
#6 Alaska has a longer coastline than all of the other 49 U.S. states put together.
#7 The city of Juneau, Alaska, is about 3,000 square miles in size. It is actually larger than the entire state of Delaware.
#8 When LBJ's "War on Poverty" began, less than 10 percent of all U.S. children were growing up in single parent households. Today, that number has skyrocketed to 33 percent.
#9 In 1950, less than 5 percent of all babies in America were born to unmarried parents. Today, that number is over 40 percent.
#10 The poverty rate for households that are led by a married couple is 6.8 percent. For households that are led by a female single parent, the poverty rate is 37.1 percent.
#11 In 2013, women earned 60 percent of all bachelor's degrees that were awarded that year in the United States.
#12 According to the CDC, 34.6 percent of all men in the U.S. are obese at this point.
#13 The average supermarket in the United States wastes about 3,000 lbs of food each year. Meanwhile, approximately 20 percent of the garbage that goes into our landfills is food.
#14 According to one recent survey, 81 percent of Russians now have a negative view of the United States. That is much higher than at the end of the Cold War era. (That's okay with me.)
#15 Montana has three times as many cows as it does people.
#16 The grizzly bear is the official state animal of California. But no grizzly bears have been seen there since 1922.
#17 One recent survey discovered that "a steady job" is the number one thing that American women are looking for in a husband, and discovered that 75 percent of women would have a serious problem dating an unemployed man.
#18 According to a study conducted by economist Carl Benedict Frey and engineer Michael Osborne, up to 47 percent of the jobs in the United States could soon be lost to computers, robots and other forms of technology.
#19 The only place in the United States where coffee is grown commercially is in Hawaii.
#20 The original name of the city of Atlanta was "Terminus".
#21 The state with the most millionaires per capita is Maryland.
#22 One survey of 50-year-old men in the U.S. found that only 12 percent of them said that they were "very happy".
#23 The United States has 845 motor vehicles for every 1,000 people.
#24 48 percent of all Americans do not have any emergency supplies in their homes whatsoever. Even fewer have fire extinguishers.
#25 There are three towns in the United States that have the name "Santa Claus".
#26 There is actually a town in Michigan called "Hell". (I wonder how far down the road from Detroit that is?)
#27 If you have no debt and also have 10 dollars in your wallet...you are wealthier than 25 percent of all Americans.
#28 By the time an American child reaches the age of 18, that child will have seen approximately 40,000 murders on television.
* * *
THE OLD MAN AND HIS VISITS TO THE WHITE HOUSE
One sunny day in February, 2016 an old man approached the White House from across Pennsylvania Avenue, where he'd been sitting on a park bench. He spoke to the U.S. Marine standing guard and said, "I would like to go in and meet with President Obama." The Marine looked at the man and said, "Sir, Mr. Obama is no longer president and no longer resides here."
The old man said, "Okay", and walked away. The following day, the same man approached the White House and said to the same Marine, "I would like to go in and meet with President Obama." The Marine again told the man, "Sir, as I said yesterday, Mr. Obama is no longer president and no longer resides here." The man thanked him and, again, just walked away. The third day, the same man approached the White House and spoke to the very same U.S. Marine, saying "I would like to go in and meet with President Obama."
The Marine, understandably agitated at this point, looked at the man and said, "Sir, this is the third day in a row you have been here asking to speak to Mr. Obama. I've told you already that Mr. Obama is no longer the president and no longer resides here. Don't you understand?" The old man looked at the Marine and said, "Oh, I understand. I just love hearing it."
The Marine snapped to attention, saluted, and said, "See you tomorrow, Sir."
* * *
THIS WEEK’S VIDEO: Between the ages of 5 and 7, Ray Charles lost his eyesight as a child in Albany, Ga., but until he died in 2004 in Los Angeles, he was often called “The Genius.” He had such incredible talent that Billy Joel once said in an interview, “This may sound like sacrilege, but I think Ray Charles was more important than Elvis Presley". He was criticized when his soulful version of “America The Beautiful” was first recorded but since it has been recognized as an American classic. To see his performance,
CLICK HERE.