Honey-Do

I've been taking a lot of criticism for being old school so I'm trying to get better. Usually on a weekend I just get one thing done so instead last weekend I tried multi-tasking and I got 4 things 1/4 done. In three more weekends I'll get them all done unless I continue to multi-task. --Red Green, The Canadian "Handyman" Humorist

Jesse Jackson Does Dr. Suess

http://youtu.be/PPxPciXcJvc

This is a classic: Jesse Jackson does his best parody of Jesse Jackson reading Green Eggs & Ham.

FOR ALL YOU LEXOPHILES

(LOVERS OF WORDS)
1. A bicycle can't stand alone; it is two tired.

2. A will is a dead giveaway.

3. Don't join dangerous cults: practice safe sects.

4. A backward poet writes inverse.

5. A chicken crossing the road: poultry in motion.

6. When a clock is hungry it goes back four seconds.

7. The guy who fell onto an upholstery machine was fully recovered.

8. You are stuck with your debt if you can't budge it.

9. He broke into song because he couldn't find the key.

10. A calendar's days are numbered.

11. A boiled egg is hard to beat.

12. He had a photographic memory which was never developed.

13. The short fortuneteller who escaped from prison: a small medium at large.

14. Those who get too big for their britches will be exposed in the end.

15. When you've seen one shopping center you've seen a mall.

16. If you jump off a Paris bridge, you are in Seine.

17. When she saw her first strands of gray hair, she thought she'd dye..

18. Santa's helpers are subordinate clauses.

19. Acupuncture: a jab well done.

20. Marathon runners with bad shoes suffer the agony of de feet.

21. The roundest knight at king Arthur's round table was Sir Cumference. He acquired his size from too much pi.

22. I thought I saw an eye doctor on an Alaskan island, but it turned out to be an optical Aleutian.

23. She was only a whisky maker, but he loved her still.

24. A rubber band pistol was confiscated from algebra class because it was a weapon of math disruption.

25. No matter how much you push the envelope, it'll still be stationery.

26. A dog gave birth to puppies near the road and was cited for littering.

27. Two silk worms had a race. They ended up in a tie.

28. A hole has been found in the nudist camp wall. The police are looking into it.

29. Atheism is a non-prophet organization.

30. I wondered why the baseball kept getting bigger. Then it hit me.

31. A sign on the lawn at a drug rehab center said: 'Keep off the Grass.'

32. A small boy swallowed some coins and was taken to a hospital. When his grandmother telephoned to ask how he was, a nurse said 'No change yet'

---from an e-mail circular

The Quality of Today's Recruits

Dave Barry's Take on 2011

Nobody does a year-end review like Dave!!!

http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/01/01/1992746/dave-barrys-2010-year-in-review.html

Enjoy Some "Duck Soup"

Why the title Duck Soup?!?!?!

Paramount, 1933

Earlier (in 1927), director Leo McCarey had made a two-reel Laurel and Hardy film with the same title - and he used it again. The film's title uses a slang phrase familiar in early 20th century America. It means anything "simple" or "easy", or alternately, a "gullible sucker" or "pushover." 

The film has become a classic--the ultimate send-up of power-hungry dictators.Groucho supposedly provided the following recipe to explain the title: "Take two turkeys, one goose, four cabbages, but no duck, and mix them together. After one taste, you'll duck soup for the rest of your life." 

(Under the opening credits, four quacking ducks [stylized four Marx Brothers] swim & simmer in a heating kettle.)

If They'd Have Had Facebook....

Please pardon what you find objectionable.....it's pretty funny stuff!

Just for Fun

BANE & WOE
Naughty, naughty, Poison Ivy:
Touch my skin and make me hive-y.
Blotchy skin and splotchy face:
Itchy, itchy every place!
Should have looked a little closer,
Maybe purchased from a grocer;
Should have brought a field guide:
Now I've got that stuff inside!
Thought I knew the out-of-doors---
Wandered over hills and moors---
Now I think I'll stay at home:
'Til tomorrow---then I'll roam.---C. Marie Byars, 1986

How's That?

"How come we believe both the truisms 'The Devil is in the details' & 'Cleanliness is next to Godliness'??? I mean, doesn't cleanliness involve paying attention to details?" (ha, ha!) --Marie Byars

Legal Eagles

As the Marx Brothers were planning to make a movie called A Night in Casablanca, Warner Brothers Pictures threatened legal action because they had made Casablanca five years before. Here are excerpts from some actual letters Groucho sent to the Warner Bros. legal department:

Dear Warner Brothers:
...up to the time we contemplated making this picture, I had no idea that the city of Casablanca belonged exclusively to Warner Brothers...It seems that in 1471, Ferdinand Balboa Warner, your great-great-grandfather, while looking for a shortcut to the city of Burbank, stumbled on the shores of Africa and...named it Casablanca...You claim you own Casablanca and that no one else can use that name without your permission. What about "Warner Brothers"? Do you own that, too? You probably have the right to use the name Warner, but what about Brothers? Professionally, we were brothers long before you were...

Sincerely, Groucho Marx

His letter, of course, confused the Warner Brothers' legal department. They sent a letter with a serious request for a plot outline (like there's ever much of a "plot" in Marx Bros. movies!). Groucho wrote back with a wildly fictitious outline. Being even more confused (and lacking any sense of humor!), the lawyers wrote again, saying they still didn't understand the story line and would appreciate Groucho sending a detailed story line. Here are excerpts from his third letter:

Dear Brothers:
Since I last wrote you, I regret to say there have been some changes in the plot our our new picture...I play Bordello, the sweetheart of Humphrey Bogart. Harpo and Chico are itinerant rug peddlers who are weary of laying rugs and enter a monastery just for a lark. This is a good joke on them, as there has not been a lark in the place for fifteen years...In the fifth reel, Gladstone* makes a speech that sets the House of Commons in an uproar, and the King promptly asks for his resignation...Humphrey Bogart's girl, Bordello, spends her last years in a Bacall house. This, as you can see, is a very skimpy outline. The only thing that can save us from extinction is a continuation of the film shortage.

Fondly, Groucho Marx

*William Gladstone was prime minister four times in the latter part of the 19th century, under Queen Victoria's rule and was the dominant voice of the Liberal Party. He made several rousing speeches in this capacity.
There were no more letters after this.

Report from a Pastor Search Committee

(a typical American church trying to get the pastor they think they deserve):

We do not have a good report: we haven't been able to find a suitable candidate for this church, though we have one promising prospect.
Thank you for your previous suggestions. We followed up on each with interviews or by calling at least three references. The following is our confidential report:
NOAH: Former pastorate of 120 years with no converts. Prone to unrealistic building projects.
JOSEPH: A big thinker, but a braggart; believes in dream interpreting and has a prison record.
MOSES: A modest and meek man, but poor communicator; even stutters at times. Sometimes blows his stack and acts rashly in business meetings. Some say he left an earlier church over a murder charge.
DEBORAH: One word --- Female.
DAVID: The most promising leader of all until we discovered the affair he had with his neighbor's wife.
SOLOMON: Great preacher, but serious woman problem. (He had 700 wives & 300 common-law wives.)
ELIJAH: Prone to depression; collapses under pressure.
HOSEA: A tender and loving pastor, but our people could never handle his wife's occupation. (She was a prostitute; God had actually told Hosea to marry her as an "object lesson.")
JONAH: Told us he was swallowed up by a great fish. He said the fish later spit him out on the shore near here. We hung up.
AMOS: Too much of a country hick. Backward and unpolished. With some seminary training, he might have promise; but he has a hang-up against wealthy people.
JOHN: Says he is a Baptist, but doesn't dress like one. May be too Pentecostal. Tends to lift both hands in the air to worship when he gets excited. You know we limit to one hand. Sleeps in the outdoors, has a weird diet, and provokes denominational leaders.
PETER: Too blue collar. Has a bad temper, even said to have cursed. He's a loose cannon.
PAUL: Powerful CEO type and fascinating preacher. However, he's short on tact, unforgiving with young ministers, harsh, and has been known to preach all night.
TIMOTHY: Too young.
JESUS: Has had popular times, but once when his church grew to 5000, He managed to offend them all; and his church dwindled down to twelve people. Seldom stays in one place very long. And, of course, he is single.
JUDAS: His references are solid. A steady plodder. Conservative. Good connections. Knows how to handle money. We're inviting him to preach this Sunday in view of a call.

Los Ranchos de Deneiros

Here's a fact of southwestern living: if a village or suburb has the name "Farm", "Ranch" or "Rancho" in it, the place, in fact, has no farms or ranches. And real estate there will be mucho expensive. And if a place has "Santa Fe" in the name you will have to have a LOT of "Holy Faith" and a whole lot more pesos to live there! ---Marie Byars

Higher Education

The faculty members might just as well keep their seats. There'll be no diving for this cigar. . .Well I thought my razor was dull until I heard his [the introducing professor's] speech. . .As I look out over your eager faces, I can readily understand why this college is flat on its back. The last college I presided over, things were slightly different. I was flat on my back. Things kept going from bad to worse, but we all put our shoulders to the wheel, and it wasn't long before I was flat on my back again. " ---Groucho Marx, in his first speech as a new college president in Horse Feathers

The "Poe" College Student

Once upon a midnight dreary 

While I pondered weak and weary 

O'er forgotten volumes literary, 

And having no time to go and make merry 

As the words on the page grew small and bleary

And thoughts of "Dreamland" warm and cheery: 

I, finding myself no longer wary 

Let out a shriek that was really quite scary--

Quoth my raving, "Nevermore!" ---C. Marie Byars, 1985