Friday Funny

The boys over at CPS (an online forum for Christian Pipe Smokers) shared some jokes the other day and I thought I'd pass a couple along. Enjoy...

What is the last thing "Tickle Me Elmo" receives on the assembly line?
Two test tickles.

This one is more for the Catholic readers...

When the people brought the woman caught in adultery to Jesus, he said, "let you who have not sinned cast the first stone". Stunned, the group fell silent. Suddenly a small rock flew through the air and struck the woman in the head. Jesus spun around and shouted, "Come on, Mom. I'm trying to make a point!"

And finally, one for those of you with a little grosser sense of humor. Mind the children...

Seamus' wife had endured his flatulence for many decades. Each morning he would rip a blistering cacophony of dirty, wet sounds that would make a mortician gag. And each morning his wife would remove herself quickly from the bed and reply, "Seamus! One of these days you're goin' to sh*t your guts right out!"

Finally, one Christmas morning as she was downstairs early cleaning the goose for the holiday meal and she formed a devious idea. She'd just pulled the entrails from the goose and looked up at the ceiling where Seamus was snoozing soundly still above her. Scooping up two fists-full of glistening guts she quickly and stealthily mounted the stairs and found him face down in his pillow with his enormous tighty-whitey-coverd ass displayed. While he snored she pulled the elastic band of his unmentionables back and loaded them with the sickening goose filth. As she crept back downstairs she could scarcely contain her guffaws and chortles.

Some ten minutes later right on schedule she hears Seamus greet the world with a magnificent trumpet of malodorous blasts that suggested something akin to the green apple splatters. And then....a pause.....and finally a blood-curdling scream. She laughs so hard that tears begin to trace her wrinkled cheeks.

Seamus stumbles downstairs, white as a ghost. The look on his face betrays the fear and humiliation of the recent event. "Alice," he says. "Do you know how you always told me that one of these days I'd rip one and sh*t me guts right out?" "Yes, Seamus, I remember." She convulses with laughter while wiping a tear from her eye.

"Well, Alice, it's happened. Right now. This very morning......but, by the grace of God and these two fingers, I think I was able to put them all back in."

Have a great weekend everyone.

I feel so selfish sometimes

Today was a bad day at work. Busy beyond belief, reports not filed, phone calls not returned, and rounding out the day a complete lack of focus on my boss' part which left me picking up the pieces. Add to that I didn't get lunch, I had to do other people's work, and the bank I work for has some really outdated processes that waste a lot of time.

And then to home life... Ell is back to a demanding school load, her work schedule means a few days a week we see each other less minutes than I have fingers on one hand, and I am trying to organize finances that always seem to come up short. And then there's the painful winter cold that numbs my bones and the work it takes to keep our house warm.

Sucky, right? Only to a selfish person.

1) I have two dear friends that each lost one of their parents way too early and daily I think about the heaviness that must bring.
2) My darling little four year old niece is in a fight against disease, infection, and her future. Her Mom, my sister is trying to understand and deal with it all while still keeping her family going with all of its (normal for her, intense for anyone else) stresses of the rest of her family.
3) My Grandma is sitting in an empty home trying to cope with the fact that her husband of 60+ years is gone.
4) My Dad rolls around in a wheelchair, confined to his home, unable to live his old, active lifestyle. Or be the Dad I need and he wants to be.
5) Special friends of our's are living in a foreign country, trying to cope with language barriers, attempting to raise a son, trying to live out God's plan for their lives... all while fighting the blockades that satan keeps throwing at them.
6) People in Haiti are sad, alone, frustrated, and many, simply dying.

How many more do I need to add to the list?

My life is... relatively... great. Yet I whine. It's really annoying when I get like this. Ell calls it my Man-Cycle. Maybe she's right. I get a little depressed, I get moody, I scowl, I hold secret grudges, and I lie that I'm alright. I need to make a list like the one above when I get like that. It helps to know I'm not doing that bad... comparitively. And it helps center my prayer and perspective.

Please, no one comment good wishes for me. Instead say a prayer for someone on that list, or your own list. And thank your God for your own good things. Perspective. Use it.

Friday Funny

So..... I've been getting a bit of spam on Eleven lately. Nothing major; usually just an anonymous comment about an investing website, or a link to a porn blog. You know, the usual. I have been hesitating, I mean intensely fighting, the urge to put up one of those moderating things, or maybe just a word verifier. So far I haven't. I think everyone should have access to Eleven as easily as possible, and those would be hindrances. So I'm still holding off..... and deleting the spam as it comes. Anyway, onto the funny.

I was in a restaurant yesterday when I suddenly realized I desperately needed to pass gas. The music was really, really loud, so I timed my gas with the beat of the music.

After a couple of songs and a good amount of farts, I started to feel better. I finished my coffee and started gathering my stuff. I looked up and noticed that everybody was staring at me....

At that moment I remembered I was listening to my iPod.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Kids and Parents

So one of my nieces is going through a pretty rough time right now. Yesterday she had major surgery to remove her burst appendix, a surgery that maybe (sarcasm) should have been done Thursday when it burst. Unfortunately she was born with Spina-Bifida which complicated the diagnosis stage as the doctors tried to wade through the list of possible other explanations for her symptoms. (If you'd like to see more details or share some much-needed prayers, check out my sister's blog in my blogroll. Her name is Karin.) But my thoughts this morning aren't specifically towards my niece, but about her parents; all parents to be more accurate.

As I followed along with the surgery progress yesterday via text messages, I couldn't help but have an overwhelming sense of love for my sister. I sent her a simple, "Love You" text message, and I started crying. Why? Because I couldn't imagine the intense emotion it must be to watch your 4 year old be wheeled away to be cut open. I can only guess it was a horrific fear filling every sense. How do you not break down from the fear, and sadness, and helplessness, a moment like that must bring? I doubt I could do it.

And the same kind of emotions, and probably a metric ton more, must exist for every parent. What a job you take when you decide to be a parent. I have so much respect for every one of my friends who have made that decision.
Feeding the right foods, choosing the right schooling, allowing the right amount of freedom.
Bandaging wounds, hugging hurts, celebrating smiles.
Guessing sickness, fighting rebellion, teaching skills.

They say the future lies in our children... I disagree. I say the future lies in the parents of our children. You are the people that affect the outcome more than anything else. (Don't screw it up!) I am in awe of the paths you've chosen. Awe and total respect.

I have four nephews and five nieces whom I love. But more importantly I have four brothers and four sisters who I honor and respect. (And love, of course.) I could never have the courage to do what you do, and I want you all to know I think the world of you. You are all awesome.

Friday Funny

My new job has me relicensing for the Securities licenses I used to hold in my previous jobs. The first step is getting my Life and Health Insurance license. In class this week I came across the definition for the word, Sickness. Tell me what you think...

Sickness
Physical illness, disease, and pregnancy
are all considered sicknesses. Mental
Illness is not considered sickness.

You don't say.
Here's a bonus funny for all you married men out there.

What do you get when you mix GPS with PMS?

One crazy f-ing woman who "WILL" find you.

Shout out to Cyndy for that last one.
Have a great weekend everyone.

The dishes

I first noticed it Sunday night. To be sure, it had more than likely begun Saturday afternoon as I stood in four degree winds watching the chimney sweep gracefully walk the ridgepole of my house; the thirty mile per hour winds ripping through my dress pants and the ankle-high snow melting into my socks while neither swayed him as he walked. And most likely I'd added to it smoking one, or ten too many cigarettes in the equally cold temperatures trying to escape the awkward wedding hall conversations with people who pretended to be interested in my life but, if pressed by an attorney in a courtroom while under oath, would have to admit they were just being nosey. But back to Sunday.

The coughs were sporadic throughout the day. I ignored them hoping they were a by-product of the dry, cold air we were subject to by not starting a fire until 3am. But they continued.

I had some big jobs to do when my wife left for work at 6:30 Sunday evening. For starters, two loads of laundry needed dried and folded. That would be followed by at least an hour of dishwashing the glasses, plates, bowls, silverware, and cooking dishes that covered literally every flat surface of our sink, counters, and stove from a weekend of dinner parties and after-New Years festivities. The night would finish with a necessity of our lives: filling the house with firewood from the outdoor woodpile.

Before I knew it, the clock struck 10:40 and I hadn't done a thing. It wasn't for lack of wanting to or any kind of general malaise, I simply hadn't noticed the minutes and hours ticking by. For over four hours I sat in a stupor, moving only to cough or throw an occasional log on glowing embers. I had to admit it, I was sick.

I quickly sent my wife a text apologizing for my laziness, and donned the winter gear to gather firewood; the one task I couldn't be sick through. Outside, as I bent over to pick up a log and place it on the ever-growing stack in my left arm, a blazing pain shot through my back. Only one load was in the house and I knew the sickness was going to be a rough one.

I brought in only three armloads; the last one so painful I knew it would be the one that scarred me for life. I slowly undressed and she texted me back. "Don't worry about the dishes. Please go to bed now. Try to get some good sleep." I wasn't in the mood to argue.

I awoke at 1am to a sharp pain in my chest; like an arrow had pierced me. I ran my right hand across my sternum wondering how true my kindergarten teacher had been when she showed me how to place my hand on my heart for the Pledge of Allegiance. I waited for the telltale numbness in my left arm confirming the heart attack I knew I was having. Just then a second arrow pierced me in the right half of my chest, this one piercing all the way through me to the back. The cold was now in my lungs.

The sleep that night was spotty at best. I pushed through ten hours of work, lying to the clients in my office that I had only a tickle in my throat every time I coughed. By 6pm that night the aches began to set in. The cold had invited his friend, Fever to join the party.

My lovely wife served me dinner and allowed me to go to bed early with a promise she would do the dishes and tend to the fire. As I crawled into bed, my joints felt like they were stiff and immobile. I wasn't so sure about the lungs or cough anymore, but I knew the cold was taking its toll on me in other ways. Only tomorrow would show me how.

I awoke two hours later, still alone in bed. I stumbled downstairs to find my wife but she wasn't in the living room. I crossed through the kitchen only to notice the glow of energy-efficient lightbulbs outlining the bathroom door frame. "You alright?" I asked through the wooden door. "No," came the answer. My cold had attacked my wife.

Whether or not it was the same cold that forced my wife to spend Monday night either facing the toilet on her knees or sitting on it with her butt, or a nasty case of food poisoning, is unclear. One thing that is brightly clear as noonday sun on snow, is that whatever it was had weakened her so she spent all of Tuesday curled up on the couch. It was now obvious this cold wanted us both to be its slaves.

Work on Tuesday was, in a word, horrific. The sneezes came on the hours, the sniffles following along like a well trained drum line. The attempts at ignoring the redundant call for coughing from unseen minions in my throat only led to strangling fits in my larynx which almost left me throwing up. I had to cough over and over and over. The coughing slowly caused my lungs and shoulders and head to ache with a groaning pain. I attempted to go home early but only left twenty minutes before the doors were locked.

I came home to the sight of my wife curled up in sickness. I changed my clothes to get firewood, but after only ten minutes in the cold I had to come inside and sit down in my chair, my lungs wheezing for air and my body sore all over. The fever I thought I'd left at home that morning seemed to have greeted me at the door as I walked through it. My skin crawled and felt as if it would tear, my muscles were weak and wouldn't react to easy brain commands, and my joints were stiff and snapped inside me like cold rubber bands.

It's that fever that has now wrapped its hot hands around me and my wife and is slowly squeezing the life out of us. When I came in from my last trip outside, she had risen from the couch and we hugged each other, assured our time had come. She struggled to simply pick up a blanket. I struggled unzipping my coat. We helped each other make tea, and it took all our strength to do it. We walked with short halting steps like a football star who had just blown out both his knees but could find no one to help him off the field. Our voices were shallow and weak and whispers became our communication. Our every movement caused our skin and bones to tingle with harshly painful pin pricks. I now lay by the fire, unable to move at more than a snail's pace. My wife lays prone on the couch, allowing the thousand pound blanket to slowly crush her. we look at each other and only nod; knowing smiles would rip our fragile face skin apart.

The cold and fever has taken us in its grasp. It was great knowing you all. Can someone please come do our dishes?

Review...

Very soon, instead of mailing it out, I'm going to do an online version of those, "A recap of our year" letters. I'm telling you before I do it so you can avoid the blog for a while if those type of letters aren't your thing. You have been warned. Carry on.