Valuable Mule

Farmer Jones had a wife who was a terrible, terrible nag. Every time she would talk to him about anything she would nag him and the only way he could get away was to go do some plowing with his old mule in the field.

Needless to say Farmer Jones spent a lot of time walking up and down the fields with his old mule until one day his wife, in a fit of remorse for her nagging ways decided to surprise her husband by fixing him a nice lunch to eat while he was out plowing in the fields. 

She took the lunch out to the field, and Farmer Jones was very happy and surprised to see her and hoped that she had finally changed her nagging ways. She hadn’t been out there for ten minutes when she began nagging her poor husband again about something.

During her tirade, she dropped the picnic basket behind the mule and the mule gave her a good swift kick in the head. She fell over dead as a door nail from the mule’s strong kick.

A few days later, at the funeral parlor a couple of friends of Farmer Jones noticed that after the service both men and ladies would come up to Farmer Jones and offer their sympathy and condolences. In each case, Farmer Jones would nod his head up and down when ladies would speak, and would shake his head from side to side when a man-friend would come up to comfort him.

After the service was over, those friends of Farmer Jones went up to him and asked him why he nodded his head for the ladies but shook his head for the men.

“Well”, Farmer Jones said, “when the ladies would come up they would say something like… Isn’t that a lovely dress she is wearing? or “Doesn’t she look natural, just like she is asleep?… and I would nod my head yes in agreement. But when the men came up, they all asked me if I wanted to sell that mule”.

Setting Louie Straight

Louie lived with his mother, an ancient crone.  It must have been a hard  life for both.  From outward appearances, they seemed very poor.  Their  decrepit home cried out for paint.  Windows needed screens. Old Lady Rick often hung in the crooked doorway shrieking at Louie.  “Louie, get me some taters out o’ the tater house!  Pour a bucket of water on them tomaters!” Louie generally plodded wordlessly to do Mama’s bidding. 

Mama had another son who lived across the street, Don Ricks, the proud father of Boogereater and Jamie, the suspected cigarette thief.  Don plowed and maintained Mama’s poor garden, except for what Louie could be pushed into doing.  The Rolling Store, a converted school bus pulled in next to her house weekly so Louie could fetch the scant  groceries on her list.

Following Boogereater’s gasoline sniffing episode, Daddy was extremely critical of Mother’s handling of the situation.  If Mother had been attending her children instead of trying to sneak a nap, Connie would never have slid off the bed.  Mother should have stood up to to Mrs. Rick and not left her children to take “that kid” to the doctor.  If she’d kept the screen locked like she was supposed to, Louie would never have gotten in to scare her. I guess if she hadn’t put gas in the car, Boogereater wouldn’t have sniffed it.  The bill from the doctor put the icing on the cake. The point of this was, Daddy knew how to handle things.

Thanksgiving was a’coming.  The rooster to have the place of honor at the festivities was shut in a coop fattening.  The accomodations were nothing special but the menu was excellent.  In his neighborhood ramblings, Louie apparently noted the incarcerated rooster, stirring a memory.  Mother noted Louie headed across our yard with the squawking rooster under his arm.  Mother rushed out to rescue her bird.  “Louie, bring back my rooster!  We are fattening him for Thanksgiving!

“I ‘mon eat him.  I ‘mon eat dis rooster.” He replied complacently as he headed home with his new rooster.”

“Louie!  Bring him back!  That’s my rooster!”. This wasn’t the first time Louie got the best of her. 

She was fuming when Daddy got home.  “Louie got my rooster! I saw him cutting across the  front yard with the rooster under his arm.  I hollered at him, but he wouldn’t bring him back!”

“Well, if you’re gonna deal with him, you’re gonna have to be smarter than he is!”This was a generous paraphrase of Daddy’s response.  He’s d never heard of political correctness.  “I’ll go get your damned rooster!”. He strode confidently across the dusty road.

He found Louie out back of the house shutting the rooster in a crate, “Louie, I came to get my rooster.  Don’t be going out on my place no more.”

Louie met the challenge, totally unperturbed.  “I ‘mon eat him.”

Tolerating no nonsense, Daddy glared at him. “I’m taking my rooster.”

“I’ll get me ‘nother one.” Replied Louie steadily, knowing right was on his side.

Bested, Daddy stomped back to his own yard.  Where’s my rooster?” Mother queried.

“Let’im keep the damned thing!” Daddy spouted.  “He ain’t got enough sense to talk to!”

Flower Felons

One fine day, Mother and I ran by our favorite garden center while we were running errands, as any right-thinking person would.  I know better than to take Mother with me around flowers. She has no flower morals and always leads me into sin. I was strolling about, measuring the beauty of the flowers against the high cost of divorce, should I purchase any more this month, a miracle occurred.  One of the vendors walked up to me and asked if I liked flowers.  She cut me off before I really got started.  She lived at ——Jones Street.  She’d collected so many flowers she couldn’t take care of them.  They were all in her yard and on her porch.  Go by and get all I wanted.

“Is this a joke?  What if your neighbors see me loading flowers and call the police?”

“Oh, that’s no problem.  Just take a picture of me and show it to them if they say anything, or tell them to call me.  It will be fine.”  That sounded reasonable.  I snapped her picture making the peace sign and sped to _______Jones Street.  The neighbors were on their doorstep watching us, probably wondering why they hadn’t been offered anything.  I showed them the lady’s picture, telling them she said we could have her plants.  They looked suspicious, but didn’t yell at us.  The plants were gorgeous and the pots artistic. She’d even started a couple of nice pineapples that were nearly ripe! Why would anyone go to all that trouble only to give them away? I was in heaven. I had many of them loaded when I noticed we were on ______Patterson Street.  Hurriedly, we put the lovely plants back, explained to the incredulous neighbors, and took off.

We never did find ________Jones Street, but at least we haven’t been arrested, yet.  I’ll bet that woman in the garden center is still laughing.

Mysogyny

“She’s sick.” Miss Ann confided as she handed over her precious Yorkie I  had just agreed to  responsibility for. “I’m kind of surprised she made it this long. We are both sick and I just can’t take care of her no more. Her medicine costs forty dollars a month and I just ain’t got the money.”. My heart fell. “What’s wrong with her?”

“Irritable Bowel Syndrome,” smiled the vet, mindful that Biscuit’s bowels had already paid off like a slot machine in the seven years Biscuit had been her patient.

Miss Ann sure knew how to hold her tongue till the deal was done. “Don’t worry. She goes on paper.” not mentioning Biscuit preferred towels, rugs, socks, slippers, dog toys, or whatever seemed expeditious.

Buzzy, my gentlemanly American Eskimo Dog, met us at the back door. She warned him off with a scowl, informing him things were going to be different from now on. When I put her down, she smiled contently and pooped on my shiny hardwood floor. Spotting Bud, she strolled over and daintily pawed his ankle. When their eyes met, true love pulsed beween them.

She shot me a look. “You ain’t woman enough to take my man.”