Coined Words

Three boys are in the school yard bragging about their fathers.

The first boy says, “My dad scribbles a few words on a piece of paper, he calls it a poem, they give him $50.”

The second boy says, “That’s nothing. My dad scribbles a few words on a piece of paper, he calls it a song, they give him $100.”

The third boy says, “I got you both beat. My dad scribbles a few words on a piece of paper, he calls it a sermon, and it takes eight people to collect all the money!”

Church Whisperer

A Sunday school teacher asked her little children, as they were on the way to church service, “And why is it necessary to be quiet in church?”

One bright little girl whispered, “Because people are sleeping.”

Far-Fetched

A man went to a psychiatrist and said he was worried that he was a dog.

“It’s terrible,” said the man, “I walk around on all fours. I keep barking in the middle of the night and I can’t go past a lamp post any more.”

“Okay,” said the psychiatrist. “Lie down on the couch.”

The man replied, “I’m not allowed on the couch.”

Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.

Did you see the movie about the hot dog? It was an Oscar Wiener.

The medical term for owning too many dogs? A roverdose.

When baking dog biscuits, be sure to use collie flour

A sheep dog puppy who likes cantaloupe is a melon collie baby.

Food for bad dogs is bought by the pound.

Mary owned and operated a small nursery that was renowned for its magnificent chrysanthemums.

Her neighbor Jack had a small kennel, where he raised purebred dalmatians.

They merged in the hope that they could combine the two and grow it into an online sales .com.

Unfortunately, the flower business wilted and the market for dalmatians was spotty, so it remained a small “mum and pup” operation.



Hopeless Spending

The following was discovered in an internal memo from one of our larger county departments: Due to increasing criticism about excessive governmental spending and bloated bureaucratic budgets, we are immediately scaling back to only basic essentials. Therefore effective immediately the light at the end of the tunnel will be turned off until further notice.

Life Support

After the birth of their first child Tom and Sarah decided it was time to write a will and get their affairs in order. They went to a lawyer and outlined for him their ideas about how their estate should be handled.

The lawyer then asked them questions about what medical means should be employed should they become severely injured.

Tom spoke up, “I don’t want my life regulated by some machine. I just can’t stand the idea of receiving my nourishment from a bottle.”

Sarah took Tom’s words to heart. When they got home, she cut the TV cord and dumped out all of Tom’s beer.

Black Toast Intolerant

When my son was two or three and learning the ways of American life, he watched me place some bread in both slots of our toaster so that it would be ready to cook just before serving.

Considering the opportunity, he pulled a chair to the counter and politely asked, “Mommy, may I flush the toaster?”

Withdrawal Symptoms

Mother decided that 10-year-old Cathy should get something “practical” for her birthday.

“Suppose we open a savings account for you?” Mother suggested. Cathy was delighted.

“It’s your account, darling,” Mother said as they arrived at the bank, “so you fill out the application.”

Cathy was doing fine until she came to the space for “Name of your former bank.” After a slight hesitation, she put down “Piggy.”

Shell Shocked

A guy named Bob goes to a costume dress party with a girl on his back.

Harold, answering the door: What are you supposed to be?

Bob: A turtle.

Harold: What do you mean?

Bob: The girl on my back is Michelle.

Q: What fruit teases you a lot?      A: A ba..na..na..na..na..na..na!

Kids Stuff

While I sat in the reception area of my doctor’s office, a woman rolled an elderly man in a wheelchair into the room. As she went to the receptionist’s desk, the man sat there, alone and silent. 

Just as I was thinking I should make small talk with him, a little boy slipped off his mother’s lap and  walked over to the wheelchair.  Placing his hand on the man’s, he said, “I know how you feel. My mom makes me ride in the stroller too.”

Working as a pediatric nurse, I had the difficult assignment of giving immunization shots to children.  One day, I entered the examining room to give four-year-old Lizzie her needle.

“No, no, no!” she screamed. 

“Lizzie,” scolded her mother, “that’s not polite behavior.”

With that, the girl yelled even louder, “No, thank you!  No, thank you!”

On the way back from a Cub Scout meeting, my grandson innocently said to my
son,  “Dad, I know babies come from mommies’ tummies, but how do they get there in the first place?” 

After my son hemmed and hawed awhile,  my grandson finally spoke up in disgust, “You don’t have to make up something, Dad.  It’s okay if you don’t know the answer.”

Paul Newman founded the ‘Hole in the Wall Gang Camp’ for children stricken
with cancer, AIDS, and blood diseases.  One afternoon, he and is wife, Joanne
Woodward, stopped by to have lunch with the kids.

A counselor at a nearby table, suspecting the young patients wouldn’t know
Newman was a famous movie star, explained, “That’s the man who made this
camp possible.  Maybe you’ve seen his picture on his salad dressing bottle?” 

Blank stares. 

“Well, you’ve probably seen his face on his lemonade carton.” 

An eight-year-old girl perked  up…  “How long was he missing?”

Her Prayer for the Orange Trees

Her grandfather’s orchard was a family treasure. Now they were in danger of losing it.

From Guide Post:

“I’ve never seen cold weather last so long!” Mom said when I arrived at the family ranch near Mariposa, California. Since Dad died she was on her own up there. Normally she was able to manage the place by herself, but this January had brought unusually frigid weather for California, and she needed my help.

“Don’t worry,” I told her. “I’ll load more wood in the stoves. Then I’ll check on the oranges.” The small orchard behind the house was our pride and joy. It had weathered many winters–but never one like this.

Any temperatures below freezing were incredibly dangerous for both the orange crop and the trees themselves, and the long-range forecast wasn’t good. When Mom called and told me the temperature had dipped as low as 30 degrees, I drove right over.

“I think it’s time to turn on the sprinklers,” I said, grabbing a flashlight. The running water caused the air temperature to rise, and even just a few degrees could make all the difference.

Outside I got the system up and running. Water droplets burst across the little field. The orchard was small, but mighty in its own way.

The ranch sat in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains, and citrus trees at this elevation–over one thousand feet–were rare. When my dad’s parents had homesteaded here in the early 1900s, they used all the land for cattle grazing.

Then Grandpa noticed the cows had a funny habit of bedding down behind the house in winter. Turned out, this one area was warmer than any other place for miles around. Maybe warm enough to plant some fruit, he thought.

Grandpa worked for years to make the soil more fertile. He grafted the roots of two varieties of oranges–the hardy, cold-resistant Mediterranean Sweet and the delicious Washington Navel–to create his own hybrid.

He planted his saplings in spring and, under his care, a field of 20 orange trees flourished. It seemed impossible, but there they were. Our miracle trees.

A sputtering sound from the sprinklers caught my attention. The flow of water petered out and stopped. Oh, no, I thought. The pipes must have frozen! Now what?

I rushed back to the house to tell Mom. “I don’t know what to do,” I said. “It’s so cold, we won’t just lose the fruit. The trees could die.”

“While you were out, I called my prayer chain at church,” Mom said. “Now the orchard is in God’s hands.” I wished I felt that was enough. I went back outside.

A typical California citrus harvest starts in October, but we held off until February. The cold climate and the long wait made the oranges irresistibly sweet, like candied fruit right off the branch. People came from all over to get a taste of them.

I touched the frosty bark of one of the trees. If we picked the oranges now they wouldn’t be the same. Plus, harvesting the crop wouldn’t save the trees.

Lord, what else can we do? It’s only getting colder. One of my favorite scriptures came to mind: “For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways.” I’d relied on that promise so many times in my life. Could it possibly help me now?

I walked down the line of trees. “Please send angels to protect the orchard,” I asked. “Angels with hot breath to lift the frost.” I touched an orange on each tree as I walked past. They were hard as ice.

I felt overcome with sadness as I walked back to the house. I looked over my shoulder and realized I’d skipped two of the trees off to one side. I suppose it doesn’t really matter….

Back at the house the thermometer read 20 degrees. How many nights could the trees weather this freeze? It went without saying that the oranges themselves were ruined, but that hardly mattered to me now in the face of losing the very trees they grew on.

For five consecutive nights the temperature fell below freezing. On the morning of the sixth day, the weather report improved. The cold snap was over! Mom and I bundled up and trudged outside to survey the damage.

All the native, cold-weather plants around the house were withered and black. My heart buckled at the thought of what our orange trees would look like.

We stepped behind the house. Our miracle trees had never appeared more beautiful, all deep green leaves and bright amber oranges. Every tree in the orchard was well. All except–

“These two trees didn’t make it,” I said. Their leaves were shriveled up and their trunks frostbitten. The dead oranges had already started to drop off. They were the two trees I’d neglected to touch with my prayer.

I picked an orange off one of the trees that appeared to have made it. The fruit was so cold it made my hand sting. “Cut it open,” Mom said. I split the orange in half. The inside practically glowed. It was perfectly healthy. And as sweet as the God who holds our orchard in his hands.

 

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