Jokes

The following breeds are now recognized by the AKC:

Collie + Lhasa Apso: Collapso, a dog that folds up for easy transport
Spitz + Chow Chow: Spitz-Chow, a dog that throws up a lot
Pointer + Setter: Poinsetter, a traditional Christmas pet
Great Pyrenees + Dachshund: Pyradachs, a puzzling breed
Pekingnese + Lhasa Apso: Peekasso, an abstract dog
Irish Water Spaniel + English Springer Spaniel: Irish Springer, a dog fresh and clean as a whistle (Irish Spring is an American bath soap, adverts have the jingle "Fresh and Clean as a whistle").
Labrador Retriever + Curly Coated Retriever: Lab Coat Retriever, the choice of research scientists
Newfoundland + Basset Hound: Newfound Asset Hound, a dog for financial advisors
Terrier + Bulldog: Terribull, a dog that makes awful mistakes
Bloodhound + Labrador: Blabador, a dog that barks incessantly
Malamute + Pointer: Moot Point, owned by....oh, well, it doesn't matter anyway
Collie + Malamute: Commute, a dog that travels to work
Deerhound + Terrier: Derriere, a dog that's true to the end
Bull Terrier + Shitzu: Oh, never mind....

Dear Mom and Dad,

It has now been three months since I left for college. I have been remiss in writing this and I am very sorry for my thoughtlessness in not having written before. I will bring you up to date now, but, before you read on, please sit down.

YOU ARE NOT TO READ ANY FURTHER UNLESS YOU ARE SITTING DOWN, OKAY!

Well then, I am getting along pretty well now. The skull fracture and the concussion I got when I jumped out of the window of my dormitory when it caught fire shortly after my arrival are pretty well healed now. I only get those sick headaches once a day. Fortunately the fire in the dormitory and my jump were witnessed by an attendant at the gas station near the dorm, and he was the one who called the fire department and the ambulance. He also visited me at the hospital and, since I had nowhere to live because of the burned out dormitory, he was kind enough to invite me to share his apartment with him. It's really a basement room, but it's kind of cute. He is a very fine boy and we have fallen deeply in love and are planning to be married. We haven't set the exact date yet, but it will be before my pregnancy begins to show. Yes, Mother and Dad, I am pregnant. I know how much you are looking forward to being grandparents and I know you will welcome the baby and give it the love, devotion and tender care you gave me when I was a child. The reason for the delay in our marriage is that my boyfriend has some minor infection which prevents us from passing our pre- marital blood tests, and I carelessly caught it from him. This will soon clear up with the penicillin injections I am having daily. I know you will welcome him into our family with open arms. He is kind and, although not well educated, he is ambitious. Although he is of a different race and religion than ours, I know your often expressed tolerance will not permit you to be bothered by the fact that his skin color is somewhat different than ours. I am sure you will love him as I do. His family background is good too, for I am told that his father is an important gun-bearer in the village from which he came.

Now that I have brought you up to date, I want to tell you that there was no dormitory fire, I did not have a concussion or a skull fracture. I was not in the hospital, I am not pregnant, I am not engaged. I do not have syphilis and there is no man in my life. However, I am getting a 'D' in History and an 'F' in Science and I wanted you to see those marks in the proper perspective. Anyway this news is better than those above.

Your Loving Daughter

On a tour of Florida, the Pope took a couple of days off his itinerary to visit the coastline on an impromptu sightseeing trip. His 4X4 Popemobile was driving along the beautiful shoreline (an area where Canadian tourists typically visit in the winter) when there was an enormous commotion heard just off the headland. He drove closer to see what it was.

Upon approaching the scene, he saw a man in the water wearing a Montreal Canadians hockey jersey, struggling frantically to free himself from the jaws of a 25-foot shark! At that moment, a speedboat containing three men wearing Toronto Maple Leafs jerseys, roared into view from around the point.

Immediately, one of the men took aim and fired a harpoon into the shark's ribs, immobilizing it instantly. The other two reached out and pulled the Montreal fan from the water and then, using long clubs, beat the shark to death. They then bundled the bleeding, semi-conscious man into the boat along with the dead shark and then prepared for a hasty retreat when they heard frantic shouting from the shore.

It was the Pope summoning them to the beach. After they reached shore, the Pope praised them for the rescue and said, "I give you my blessing for your brave actions. I had heard that there was bitter hatred in your country between the fans of the Leafs and the Canadians, but now I have seen with my own eyes this is not true. I can see that your society is a truly enlightened example of true harmony and companionship that could serve as a model on which other countries, like this one, could follow".

He blessed them all and drove off in a cloud of dust.

As he departed, the harpooner asked the others, "Who was that?"

"That," one answered, "was his Holiness the Pope. He is in direct contact with God and has access to all of God's wisdom".

"Well," the harpooner replied, "he doesn't know a thing about shark fishing!! Is the bait holding up okay, or do we need to get another one?"

GO LEAFS GO

It's time, once again, to consider the candidates for the annual Stella Awards. The Stella's are named after 81-year-old Stella Liebeck who spilled coffee on herself and successfully sued McDonald's. That case inspired the Stella Awards for the most frivolous successful lawsuits ONLY in the United States. The following are this year's candidates:

1. Kathleen Robertson of Austin, Texas, was awarded $780,000 by a jury of her peers after breaking her ankle tripping over a toddler who was running inside a furniture store. The owners of the store were understandably surprised at the verdict, considering the misbehaving little toddler was Ms. Robertson's son.

2. A 19-year-old, Carl Truman of Los Angeles, won $74,000 and medical expenses when his neighbor ran over his hand with a Honda Accord. Mr. Truman apparently didn't notice there was someone at the wheel of the car when he was trying to steal his neighbor's hub caps.

3. Terrence Dickson of Bristol, Pennsylvania, was leaving a house he had just finished robbing by way of the garage. He was not able to get the garage door to go up since the automatic door opener was malfunctioning. He couldn't re-enter the house because the door connecting the house and garage locked when he pulled it shut. The family was on vacation, and Mr. Dickson found himself locked in the garage for eight days. He subsisted on a case of Pepsi he found, and a large bag of dry dog food. He sued the homeowner's insurance claiming the situation caused him undue mental anguish. The jury agreed to the tune of $500,000.

4. Jerry Williams of Little Rock, Arkansas, was awarded $14,500 and medical expenses after being bitten on the buttocks by his next door neighbor's beagle. The beagle was on a chain in its owner's fenced yard. The award was less than sought because the jury felt the dog might have been just a little provoked at the time by Mr. Williams who was shooting it repeatedly with a pellet gun.

5. A Philadelphia restaurant was ordered to pay Amber Carson of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, $113,500 after she slipped on a soft drink and broke her coccyx (tailbone). The beverage was on the floor because Ms. Carson had thrown it at her boyfriend 30 seconds earlier during an argument.

6. Kara Walton of Claymont, Delaware, successfully sued the owner of a night club in a neighboring city when she fell from the bathroom window to the floor and knocked out her two front teeth. This occurred while Ms. Walton was trying to sneak through the window in the ladies room to avoid paying the $3.50 cover charge. She was awarded $12,000 and dental expenses.

7. This year's favorite could easily be Mr. Merv Grazinski of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Mr. Grazinski purchased a brand new 32-foot Winnebago motor home. On his first trip home, having driven onto the freeway, he set the cruise control at 70 mph and calmly left the drivers seat to go into the back and make himself a cup of coffee. Not surprisingly, the R.V. left the freeway, crashed and overturned. Mr. Grazinski sued Winnebago for not advising him in the owner's manual that he couldn't actually do this. The jury awarded him $1,750,000 plus a new motor home. The company actually changed their manuals on the basis of this suit, just in case there were any other complete morons buying their recreation vehicles.

The Bitter Truth Cheri Lee Funk © 2000

Who wrote the fairy tale Cinderella? Was it a man or was it some woman's cruel idea of a joke? It is a beautiful Sunday morning and I have just gotten off the phone with my daughter. She is the mother of 4 beautiful children and will be thirty years old and she has been crying. Crying, not tears of happiness, not even tears of unhappiness, but tears of despair. She has fallen into that big black pit and there are times I worry if she will ever get back out again. Hell, there are times I worry if she will meet me on one of my frequent trips to that big black whole of darkness!!

She is having problems, lots of problems but the main one is money. Now, I know the majority of us have experienced some difficulties with money ourselves but in the state she is in, she doesn't really care about what is going on with others. She just wants to know why her life can't just work out, why she can't just get someone to listen to her instead of say, "So, you want a divorce?"

As I listen to her cry and hear her sobs, I wonder what is it I can say. What can I tell her that will help her today and every day from here on in. I am struck with the idea, I can say nothing really. I am her Mother and I will always love her and be here for her but what she needs is those strong arms and gentle words to come from somewhere else....not from her mother.

The sad thing I have to tell her is I need those same things! My life is really no better off then hers...sure I don't really have problems with money, but I also don't have that support system that I craved, desired, longed for my whole life. How am I any better off than she is..... Who am I to give advice to her... Well, that isn't going to work, she needs me to tell her something to give her some hope. So, I talked to her. And while I was at it, I also talked to myself.

I promised her she would never be alone again! Heck she had 4 children, loneliness was one luxury she wasn't going to have for a very long time! I took her back through her childhood...back to the days when her father worked shift work and our family consisted of me, her and her sister. The three of us made a life for ourselves. We went to dinner together, we went to the movies together. We did everything together, just the three of us. We laugh now about the times we even went cruising the shopping centers together....the three of us with the windows down and the radio blasting cruising to see what was happening at the local hangouts.

Then I remind her of the hard times. When I hurt my back and required surgery, it was her that picked up the slack around the house. She helped with cleaning and cooking and errands and grocery shopping. I had no one else to call upon to help me out. So I did the only thing I knew how. I taught my children to become independent and to help out and to be strong. It got us through and without each other we never would have made it.

But, it seems that I may have done my children a real disservice. I didn't take the time to tell them that being strong and capable can get tiring at times. I didn't tell them there are times you wonder when your time is going to come, when are you going to be able to let go of the reins for just one minute and have someone else pick up the slack....

I had to tell her that she was never going to be able to sit down and just let things happen, that she was always going to have to be on top of everything to always be standing there waiting for someone to take advantage, to push her or to just make things difficult. How can I tell my child she will have to live the rest of her life on guard not letting her guard down for one minute because if she does she will lose her footing and there will be no one there to help her back up to help her every day for the rest of her life.

Did we just pick the wrong men? Heck no, women are like that also! You know, we all have friends like that, the ones that are always telling you about how they would never put up with what you do. Giving you advice instead of getting off their butts and saying, "Bring the kids over for 2 hours, I will watch them while you go take a shower and get into some clean clothes." No they are the traitors, the ones that just smile at you and say oh it will get better! While the whole time they are holding on to their own realities by the skin of their teeth.

I have to tell my child the only person in the whole wide world she will ever be able to count on for the rest of her life is....herself! And that is not what she wants to hear. She wants me to tell her a fairy tale. She wants me to hold her in my arms and to tell her life will get better and someone will come along and all her prayers will be answered and we will all live happily ever after.

Yeah, right...I am her mother, I have to tell her the truth....

Great Quotes by Great Ladies!

Inside every older person is a younger person -- wondering what the hell happened.
-Cora Harvey Armstrong-

The hardest years in life are those between ten and seventy.
-Helen Hayes (at 73)-

I refuse to think of them as chin hairs. I think of them as stray eyebrows.
-Janette Barber-

Things are going to get a lot worse before they get worse.
-Lily Tomlin-

A male gynecologist is like an auto mechanic who never owned a car.
-Carrie Snow-

Laugh and the world laughs with you. Cry and you cry with your girlfriends.
-Laurie Kuslansky-

My second favorite household chore is ironing. My first being, hitting my head on the top bunk bed until I faint.
-Erma Bombeck-

Old age ain't no place for sissies.
-Bette Davis-

A man's got to do what a man's got to do.
A woman must do what he can't.
-Rhonda Hansome-

The phrase "working mother" is redundant.
-Jane Sellman-

Every time I close the door on reality it comes in through the windows.
-Jennifer Unlimited-

Whatever women must do they must do twice as well as men to be thought half as good. Luckily, this is not difficult.
-Charlotte Whitton-

Thirty-five is when you finally get your head together and your body starts falling apart.
-Caryn Leschen-

I try to take one day at a time, but sometimes several days attack me at once.
-Jennifer Unlimited-

If you can't be a good example, then you'll just have to be a horrible warning.
-Catherine-

When I was young, I was put in a school for retarded kids for two years before they realized I actually had a hearing loss. And they called ME slow!
-Kathy Buckley-

I'm not offended by all the dumb blonde jokes because I know I'm not dumb ... and I'm also not blonde.
-Dolly Parton-

If high heels were so wonderful, men would still be wearing them.
-Sue Grafton-

I'm not going to vacuum 'til Sears makes one you can ride on.
-Roseanne Barr-

When women are depressed they either eat or go shopping. Men invade another country.
-Elayne Boosler-

Behind every successful man is a surprised woman.
-Maryon Pearson-

In politics, if you want anything said, ask a man- if you want anything done, ask a woman.
-Margaret Thatcher-

I have yet to hear a man ask for advice on how to combine marriage and a career.
-Gloria Steinem-

I am a marvelous housekeeper. Every time I leave a man I keep his house.
-Zsa Zsa Gabor-

Nobody can make you feel inferior without your permission.
-Eleanor Roosevelt-

HIS and HERS Road Trip

HERS:
1. Pulls off at wrong exit.
2. Opens window.
3. Asks directions of a knowledgeable police officer.
4. Arrives at destination promptly.

HIS:
1. Pulls off at wrong exit positive it's the correct one.
2. Drives five miles into wilderness, still thinks he's right.
3. Drives an extra 5 miles just in case.
4. Finally rolls down window.
5. Hocks a loogie.
6. Pulls up to a 7-11.
7. Gets three hot-dogs, a large slurpee, and beef jerky.
8. Asks person behind counter how to get back onto the highway.
9. Gets back into car.
10. Farts.
11. After he closes the door.
12. laughs at looking at a map as he pulls away from the 7-11.
13. Drives down a dirt road with no street lights insisting this is the way back because guy from 7-11 said it was.
14. Almost hits a deer.
15. Curses the night.
16. Curses you.
17. Curses the large slurpee.
18. Stops by the side of the road.
19. Takes a leak.
20. Still taking a leak.
21. Almost done.
22. I think.
23. Returns to car.
24. Drives and fiddles with radio.
25. Yells at you for suggesting the map again.
26. Admits he didn't want to do Thanksgiving at your sister's.
27. He hates your sister.
28. Ever since she called him a pernicious weasel.
29. He had to look up pernicious.
30. Couldn't find a dictionary.
31. Finally found a dictionary.
32. Couldn't spell pernicious.
33. Seethes at the memory of it all.
34. But she is laughing inside...
35. And of course you're still lost.

ABC's OF AGING

A is for arthritis
B is for bad back
C is for the chest pains. Corned beef? Cardiac?
D is for dental decay and decline
E is for eyesight--can't read that top line
F is for fissures and fluid retention
G is for gas (which I'd rather not mention and not to forget other gastrointestinal glitches)
H is high blood pressure
I is for itches, and lots of incisions
J is for joints, that now fail to flex
L is for libido--what happened to sex? Wait! I forgot about K!
K is for my knees that crack all the time (But forgive me, I get a few lapses in my
M-memory from time to time)
N is for nerve (pinched) and neck (stiff) and neurosis
O is for osteo-for all the bones that crack
P is for prescriptions, that cost a small fortune
Q is for queasiness. Fatal or just the flu? Give me another pill and I'll be good as new!
R is for reflux--one meal turns into two
S is for sleepless nights, counting my fears on how to pay my increasing medical bills!
T is for tinnitus--I hear bells in my ears and the word "terminal" also rings too near
U is for urinary and the difficulties that flow (or not)
V is for vertigo, as life spins by
W is worry, for pains yet found
X is for X ray--and what one might find
Y is for year (another one I'm still alive)
Z is for zest for surviving the symptoms my body's deployed,

And keeping twenty-six doctors gainfully employed

Do you know someone who seems to know everything?

When asked why, they say, "A little birdie told me."

Did you know they probably aren't lying? It is a little known fact that there are little birds that fly very fast, are never seen, and they are everywhere. - Thus, these creatures are called "Flies Unseen Everywhere" or FUE for short.

These birds have an extensive communications network, and they can generally find out anything from anywhere quite quickly. Some of these birds befriend certain individuals and communicate with them by making clucking sounds, much like a chicken. They are not dumb like chickens, however, and can establish a sort of clucking language with the lucky person they befriend.

This person is then the one who is always in the know; one step ahead of the competition. And those people who seem to be in the dark? Those who just don't get it? Those who's standard response to any given question is, "Huh?"

Why I think it should be pretty obvious to all, now, that the reason is simply because they don't have a clucking FUE.

80 years after Little Big Horn, an East Coast journalist began research on George Armstrong Custer. A friend told him that an Indian that lived through that experience was still living and furthermore remembered EVERY event of his long life.

The journalist visited Chief Big Eagle, who now lived in a small town in Pennsylvania. When he arrived and stated his purpose, the Chief agreed to answer his questions.

"On what day of the week did the event take place? " "Wednesday" "What was Custer wearing?" "Black uniform.. ceremony sword.. old hat" "What did Custer eat for breakfast?" "Eggs"

The journalist was skeptical and figured anyone could make up these answers. He left, and never published his article.

Ten years later, the journalist was by coincidence driving through the same small town, and decided to see if the old Chief was still living. To his surprise, he was. As the journalist walked in he raised his hand in the air and said, "How!"

"Over easy, with potatoes on the side," said the chief.

RIAA BREAKTHROUGH

Music bosses have unveiled a revolutionary new recording format that they hope will help win the war on illegal file sharing which is thought to be costing the industry millions of dollars in lost revenue. Nicknamed the Record, the new format takes the form of a black, vinyl disc measuring 12 inches in diameter, which must be played on a specially designed turntable.

"We can state with absolute certainty that no computer in the world can access the data on this disc," said spokesman Brett Campbell. "We are also confident that no-one is going to be able to produce pirate copies in this format without going to a heck of a lot of trouble. This is without doubt the best anti-piracy invention the music industry has ever seen." As part of the invention's rigorous testing process, the designers gave some discs to a group of teenage computer experts who regularly use file swapping software such as Limewire and gnutella and who admit to pirating music CDs.

Despite several days of trying, none of them were able to hack into the disc's code or access any of the music files contained within it. "It's like, really big and stuff," said Doug Flamboise, one of the testers. "I couldn't get it into any of my drives. I mean, what format is it? Is it, like, from France or something?"

In the new format, raw audio data in the form of music is encoded by physically etching grooves onto the vinyl disc. The sound is thus translated into variations on the disc's surface in a process that industry insiders are describing as completely revolutionary and stunningly clever.

To decode the data stored on the disc, the listener must use a special player which contains a stylus that runs along the grooves on the record surface, reading the indentations and transforming the movements back into audio that can be fed through loudspeakers.

Even Shawn Fanning, the man who invented Napster, admits the new format will make file swapping much more difficult. "I've never seen anything like this," he told reporters. "How does it work?"

As rumors that a Taiwanese company has been secretly developing a 12 inch wide, turntable -driven, stylus-based, firewire drive remain unconfirmed, it would appear that the music industry may, at last, have found the pirate-proof format it has long been searching for....