Funny Old World

Travelling Companion

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A certain young man climbed on board of the overnight ‘sleeper’ train alone.  He did not intend to fall asleep and he hoped for an interesting or amusing companion with whom to while away the hours in conversation.  Suddenly walking up the carriage he spotted the most beautiful, shapely young blonde he had ever seen.  Please, please! He thought. 
 
Sure enough, she took the seat beside him.
 
Giving her a few minutes to settle in, he finally opened a conversation.
 
‘Excuse me, miss, is this a business or pleasure trip?’
 
‘Well, both.’  She spoke gaily and with easy fluency.
 
‘I’m going to a Nymphomaniacs Convention.’
 
He gagged, but finally recovered enough to speak again.
 
‘If you don’t mind me asking, what do you do?’
 
‘Oh, I don’t mind.  I’m a lecturer.  I’m delivering a lecture on ‘Common myths of sexual mores and practices.”
 
‘Very interesting,’ he managed to splutter.
 
‘It is really, you know.  For example there is a commonly held myth that the best endowed men are Afro-Americans.  They’re not.  It is the American Indian who is.’
 
‘Yes?’
 
‘And French men are said to make the best lovers.  Not true, either.  It is the Greeks.’
 
‘Really?’
 
‘But excuse me, how rude I am!  I neglected to ask you your name.’
 
He took a deep breath.
 
‘Oh, me?  My name?’ he answered.
 
I’m pleased to meet you.
 
My name is Tonto Papadoupalis!’

That Tastes Like Cats’ ****

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It was an innocent enough idea to begin with.  Indeed it may have begun with an attempt on the part of Governor Jed Bush to distract from the Florida authorities’ continued disenfranchisement of blacks and Hispanic and any others who might be tempted to vote for Kerry in the upcoming Presidential elections.
 
‘Florida has been ravaged recently by hurricanes, infestation, poverty and crime.  Why don’t the media consult their readership on the ideal adjective to describe Florida?  I suggest ‘ravished’, he concluded.
 
As it happened, the top ten suggestions were unprintable!  Most were preceded by an expletive, with qualifying adjectives suggesting widespread corruption.  ‘Ravished’ did indeed come in at number eleven.  A straw poll of those who agreed with Bush’s word indicated that this was how they felt as victims of rape, violent crime and disenfranchisement.  Jeb soon dropped the hot potato!
 
 
Meanwhile the U.S. Secretary of Labor was praising the beneficial effect on the strained job market of the Iraq war.
 
‘More than 135,000 U.S. citizens are gainfully employed as military personnel in Iraq alone,’ she boasted.  ‘The war there is keeping these young men and women out of the unemployment lines and also teaching them such valuable skills as operating radar equipment, driving battle tanks and filling body bags.
 
Most troops won’t need to seek new work for another four to seven years.  Then there’s Afghanistan still, Iran, Syria, North Korea.  An emergency draft might even return the country to full employment.’
 
Not the literal truth, but the underlying message was there.
 
 
On a lighter vein we learned this week of an Australian woman who allegedly suffered from ‘sleep sex’.  Apparently she left her house at night and had sex with total strangers without waking up.
 
How, I wondered, did she learn this?  How did she meet them, did they proposition her or vice versa?  Was there no foreplay? Did neither feel anything?  Will Peter at the Pearly Gates accept her story?  Does any of this matter?   What is her address?
 
 
Kopi luwak coffee, I learned this week, at

Referee over-reacts!

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Congratulations to the Irish team which comprehensively defeated the Aussies today in the International Rules Series to win both the game and the series.  Admittedly there were a few dubious decisions by the Irish referee, especially in the second quarter, that penalised the Australian team.  There were lots of incidents, including many’s the lively row on-field but the referee escaped public censure.
 
The outcome was not so satisfactory in Eastern Cape, South Africa when Ekithumpi met Soarnoseni.  The South Africa Football Association was quick to issue a statement after that game, to deny any responsibility for its after-effects.
 
‘Some of the Soarnoseni players objected when the referee gave one of them a yellow card.  A row broke out and some of the Ekithumpi supporters stormed the field.
 
The referee was quick to pull a pistol and immediately began shooting at them.  He shot the Ekithumpi coach dead and seriously wounded two of their players.  He ran off the field shouting, ‘I am the master of the Universe’.  He has not been seen since.
 
We are unanimously agreed that the referee over-reacted in this instance.’
 
A later statement was issued when all the facts became known.
 
‘The referee that officiated at this match was not a properly qualified official registered with Safa.  He was one of the spectators asked by the organisers to handle the match.  Safa passes its condolences to the family of the coach and of the injured players. 
 
If any of our referees feel it necessary to arm themselves before a game, we do not recommend a loaded pistol’, the statement concluded.

…Except Us Chickens

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The police were in hot pursuit of the bank robbers who sought refuge in Rio de Janeiro zoo.  The gang spread out to make their detection more difficult.  They had to be careful not to secrete themselves in dangerous animals’ enclosures. 
 
Some thieves elected to hide in the enclosure for deer and tapir.  Police thought they might buck the trend by kidnapping Bambi or some other such hind.  They were eventually captured.
 
It was a dear mistake.  They were additionally charged with trespass and criminal damage to municipal property.
 
Those who chose the exotic fowl enclosure found that their hidey-hole was dark and cavernous.  Still when they arrived, the cops shone their torches into it for some time to check if anybody was hiding inside.
 
Eventually this croaky voice emerged from the coop at the back..
 
‘There’s nobody in here, except us chickens!’
 
…
 
Sorry! I know you heard it before!  But it still creases me up!
 
 

If ye gotta go!

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A century ago in Ireland a couple searching for a holiday home chose the West of Ireland and after much house-hunting, they found a country cottage to their taste.  They hadn’t inspected it fully and when they returned to England the woman asked her husband whether it came with a suitable W.C.  He of course, couldn’t remember either so he wrote to ask the landlord.
 
 
 
Unfortunately the landlord didn’t understand the new-fangled term W.C. (for water-closet – contrasted with a ‘dry-toilet’) and studied an Ordnance Survey map to check.  There he learned that a Wesleyan Chapel – named for the founder of Methodism, John Wesley – was so abbreviated.
 
 
He wrote back immediately.
 
 
Dear Sir,
 
 
I regret the delay in this matter but I have much pleasure in informing you that the W.C. is situated nine miles from the house.  It is capable of seating two hundred and fifty persons.
 
If you are in the habit of going regularly, this is unfortunate for you.  You will no doubt be interested to know that a great many people take their lunch with them and make a day of it.  Others who are more pressed go by car and often arrive just in the nick of time!  These are people who are generally in too much of a hurry to wait.
 
The last time, six years ago, that my wife and I were there, we had to stand all the time.
 
 
Yours sincerely
 
 
Seamus Murphy.

Compensation Sets In

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Have you ever thought that the country was couped?
 
I have just heard that some 2000-3000 former paramilitary prisoners, including godfathers, are suing the State because their dignity was mortally wounded at having to ‘slop out’ their cells when the Government ought to have provided them individually with W.C.s and personal washing facilities.
 
Some years ago the State had to fork out ten of millions in compensation because apparently almost every soldier who ever served in the Irish Army was suffering from deafness brought on by the absence (or ineffectiveness) of ear-muffs when they were given shooting practice.
 
Currently priests and pastors are seeking compensation against the vagaries of the drink-driving legislation.  Apparently those who have to serve more than one Church on Sundays for example, may accidentally imbibe (at the Consecration) sufficient wine to put them over the limit, and they have to drive from Church to Church.  Their suggested solution?  The State must provide from taxes, sufficient funds for them to employ a chauffeur.  Of course there are several thousand ‘religious’ in this invidious position!
 
Isn’t it amazing how quickly compensation sets in?

The Undead!

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‘How can one disturb the peace of the dead?  The charge is ridiculous as is the sentence.  I am innocent!
 
‘In any case, what did they expect?  This is Transylvania, after all, home of Dracula, no less!’ This was Marina Tecoeur’s only reply when she was found guilty by the court in Romania.  Her husband Boeuf was more forthcoming.
 
‘There is no law against it.  How can you be guilty of an offence that isn’t even on the statute books? 
 
If the State is right, it doesn’t matter for Toma was already dead when we dug him up and re-killed him. 
 
If we are right and we destroyed a vampire, then we have saved thousands of lives for ages to come.  It’s because he was our son-in-law that we know of his nefarious deeds.  Everyone in the world knows that vampires originated here and they are still here in numbers. 
 
We deserve a state pension for this deed!
 
On the night after he was entombed, we opened the casket, ripped his heart out, burned it to ashes, mixed it with water and drank it.  That is the time-honoured way in this valley to deal with vampires.  It’s not nice and he tasted awful but there was no alternative.
 
They charged us both with disturbing the peace of the dead, and we got three years imprisonment.  This travesty of justice will rouse the local people here to fury.  They know we are heroes.’
 
‘There’s far too much of this sort of thing going on,’ commented police chief Constantin Van Ripponof, ‘and we have to put a stop to it.’
 
I noticed however that he had a large wooden cross hanging from a chain around his neck.  And his breath had a heavy smell of garlic.  Whether he was just after a meal, or adopting the ‘belt-and-braces’ policy, I’ll never know.  Anyway when I felt Marina and Boeuf were taking an unhealthy interest in me I made my excuses and left.

Everybank goes Religious

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EveryBank Ltd
Hill Street
NEWRY
28 August 2004
 
Dear Valued Customer,
 
Further to our letter of 12 April earlier this year, we are delighted to inform you of an exciting new improvement to our services which will take effect immediately. 
 
Being sadly aware of the growing deficit of priests in Ireland, and the subsequent difficulty our customers are currently experiencing in having masses offered for the deceased, special intentions etc and other vital religious services such as confessions, baptisms and even marriages – and in recognition of the many under-employed Catholic clergymen in India and other missionary outposts – Everybank will now offer all these and MORE, across the telephone line!
 
Our fantastic new Call Centre recently opened in Bacca Beyon, The Keys, Dacca Peninsula, Punjab is now staffed at all times by at least one consecrated pastor who, for a small stipend, will offer prayers for special intentions. We cannot guarantee that he is of your denomination every time, but those things are less relevant than before, aren’t they?  You will continue to receive penance, though it will usually be awarded in monetary order debits from your Cashcard accounts. 
 
We anticipate no serious problems in the transfer process but would like to make the following observations, and perhaps appeal to your patience and understanding over what might be considered as early teething problems.  Please allow for a 20 second delay as your call is re-routed via satellite 26,000 miles above the Earth!   Have no fear, your pastor is near!