Lazy
I had an uncle over in North Carolina who was voted the laziest man in the county. When the committee came out to give him the prize, he said: “Well, I don’t really deserve it, but if you want me to have it, just turn me over and put it in my hip pocket.
—Glenn Massey Manchester, Tenn.
Practical Way
A country fellow was going through town dragging a long chain. When he went by a store, the merchant called out, “Hey mister, why are you pulling that chain?” The man replied, “Because it’s easier than pushing it.”
—Loyal Jones
Excerpts from the book Laughter in Appalachia Southern Mountain Humor written by Loyal Jones and Billy Edd Wheeler
I’ve never been good at telling jokes but I like them. The Jenkins and Truetts (Granny’s family) loved a good joke.
My great uncle Byers was known for his jokes, but there were others who told them too. His brothers Henry and Hardy. Granny’s brother James also told jokes. They were such a happy bunch of people.
When Paul was really little he was influenced by all those jokes and he started telling them himself. He also did impersonations which were adorable and funny. He was never backward like me. He’d stand in Granny Gazzie’s little living room and entertain the whole crowd.
My older brother Steve likes jokes too.
When Steve and Paul hear a good joke they make sure to tell it to each other and to Granny.
A few giveaway winners from our Thankful November never contacted me. I’m sharing their names one more time in the hopes they will.
The winner of the used book Dorie Woman of the Mountains written by Florence Cope Bush is Sanford who said: “Tipper, Florence Cope Bush wrote some very interesting material and would be a joy to read.
Growing up, we never considered rats serving any useful purpose, but your post made me curious enough to find out that rats play important roles in the ecosystem by helping to control waste, aerate soil and numerous other purposes. Needless to say, that does not make me a fan of rats!”
The winners of the book Letters to Lori – The Family History and Stories of Opal Corn Myers written by Barbara League are
Shawn Wagner who said: “People may spurn our appeal, reject our message, oppose our arguments, despise our persons, but they are helpless against our prayers.”
Rebecca who said: “This is a great story, I can picture this scene unfolding. I like how she wrote it, especially that first paragraph. And those bites taken, sounds like something I would have done as a child. Like Randy I thought of Eve and the forbidden fruit too. My aunt, mom’s sister, had planted a small bed of tulips encircled by one of those little white landscape fencings at my grandmother’s farm house. One day my mom left me with Grandma to go somewhere with her sister. While they were gone I was outside playing with the gang of cats and kittens that lived on Grandma’s back porch. I ended up picking all but one of those tulips, perhaps because the kittens were frolicking in there and knocking them over. When they got back my aunt had noticed immediately. She was not happy at all and asked me why I had picked her tulips. My four year old little self told her the cats made me do it. I don’t think I got in trouble but I figured out I had done something wrong. Thankfully, as the years went by it was a funny story for the four of us to remember.”
The winners of the slightly damaged copies of Celebrating Southern Appalachian Food written by Jim Casada and Tipper Pressley are:
Steve Staley who said: “God bless you all!”
Sally Thompson who said: “As our family gets smaller at the elder end, it grows larger at the younger end. How I miss my Mama and Daddy, and the holidays we shared. I pass on memories to my children, and joyfully see how they have kept family trafitions alive as they also create their own. We are blessed.”
Winners send your mailing address to me at blindpigandtheacorn@gmail.com and I will get your book on the way.
Last night’s video: Old Christmas Customs in Appalachia.
Tipper
Subscribe for FREE and get a daily dose of Appalachia in your inbox
Dr. Ray Guarendi, who is a radio shrink specializing in marital and child-raising issues, has a joke he often tells about “the Ray Guarendi Humility Prize”– whoever would win it, if they were REALLY humble, would think they didn’t deserve it, and would decline to show up for the award ceremony.
Loved the humor today. Sometimes we just need a good laugh.
Why do we say we have to run errands then drive off in a car?
Why do we hop in the shower? Is that safe?
When you pop something in the oven why I can’t hear the sound?
Why can’t I flip a light on?
Why do we make a turn then drive off and leave it?
That’s not laugh out loud humor but it has its place.
The ability to tell jokes is a real gift, in my opinion. I’m terrible at it. I forget part of the joke, talk too quickly, forget the punch line or get my tongue tangled up.
The joke about the man pulling the chain reminds me of the tune Arkansas Traveler where the traveler asks the farmer why he doesn’t fix the hole in his roof. The farmer replies that “When it is raining, he’d get wet and when it’s not raining, the roof doesn’t leak.”
Thanks for sharing these jokes with us today!
I don’t retell jokes but I think I still have a sense of humor. Most people don’t seem to find me funny, I suppose, or just don’t react to my attempts. I find humor in everything but rarely laugh out loud. That’s how I survive.
I enjoy a good joke, but when I try to repeat them, I start laughing and can’t get it out to make any sense.
I read this in a Foxfire book this week about a man that tanned coon hides told about his best coon dog. He said all he had to do was show his dog the board he was going to stretch the hide on and the dog would go, catch a coon the size of the board and bring it back to him. One day his wife stepped out in the back yard with her ironing board, the dog got a puzzled look on his face before taking off. He still has not came back, the man said near as I can tell his dog is still trying to find a coon to fit the ironing board.
The jokes were great and reminded me of my Uncle Glenn Donald who also like to tell big tales. I think he enjoyed telling them because all of would smile and laugh. But the story about the rats really hits us to a tee.
The story about rats really was something else. Now we know why we have the best weeds in the county
around the dog pens. Somehow the rats got in the house one fall. It seemed like an eternity of getting rid of them when it lasted only several months. Yes it was a WAR. We were afraid to put out rat poison because of the dogs. We tried moth balls, water in their holes, the clickers used to ward off mice, baking soda and salt, water buckets with peanut on a wire on top of it, and traps of all kinds— sticky, live traps, and good old rat traps. They got into the transmission of the pickup and ate some wires destroying it, then onto the car we had left for parts and ate up the upholstery. We chased them from one hole in the house to another hole. We even shot some. It was awful. They were coming in from the woods because of cold weather. Finally my cousin was fixing the chewed wire on the new pickup– he told us to get a mayonaise jar lid and glue it to the top of the windshield washer case in the front of the car. Then to get a bucket of poison and put under the house or wherever we saw them. I told him I was afraid the dogs would eat the dead ones. He told me his mother had had the same problem with them in her chicken house. He put poison out away from the chicken house in the woodshed. The rats are it and went to their holes and died. He also told us that were we lived– woods on three sides they were finding a warm place for the winter. His dogs and cats did not mess with the dead remains of the rats. So not to worry. Taking Charlie at his word– we did followed his advice. In TWO days, seriously two days all the rats were gone. We were so thankful. Sorry this is gross but when living in the mountains our local critters forget that they are not welcome in our homes. So we have to be “mean” to them. Happily to say the rats have returned to their beloved and less tasty walnut Grove on our neighbor’s land and all of us are very very happy including the rats. Kathy Patterson
I love when I get all comfy in my jammies, laying in my bed with candles burning and you reading a bedtime story. At least it’s a bedtime story to me. Thank you, Tipper.
When I met my husband’s grandfather (Papa) in Georgia 27 years ago, he told me silly jokes with the absolute strongest poker face I’ve ever seen: “Lady, did you know I only have half the toes on one foot?” “Oh?” I replied. “Yep. Got the other half on the other foot.” And in the same vein, “I can grow watermelon with the seeds on one side!” “What?” “On the inside.”
My grandpa McKinney loved to tell jokes, however he was often the only who got the punchline. He always stated laughing before the joke was over. His laughter and the twinkle in his eye was better than any joke.
As always praying for Granny.
Saw this bit of humor on FB. Older adult was stopped for speeding..she told the officer her funeral was at 4 and didn’t want to be late!!
Always enjoy your readings and looking forward to the next book.
Continued prayers for your mama.
My hubby loves a good joke, and he can be very funny himself. My grandchildren love to read the jokes we sometimes find on popsicle sticks. Then they rush to tell them to their Pap. The little ones will make up jokes that are so crazy you can’t ‘not’ laugh. Our laughter keeps them making up more and more. What a joy they are!
I was given two thick joke books by my adult offspring. They know I enjoy a bit of foolishness. I sit and read a few pages when the mood hits me or when I just need a lift in spirits. Both books are organized by subject. The church jokes always ring true, like when the little boy was asked how he liked the church service. He said, “The music and singing were nice, but the commercial was too long.” Same song, second verse: “The sermon had been going on endlessly. Finally, the preacher’s voice cracked. He said, “What more can I say?” Someone in the back said, “How about ‘Amen’!”
some
Before my brother-in-law got dementia, he would go out of his way to tell a joke. The joke might not be all that funny, but he could make the listener roll with laughter with his animated storytelling. Oh, how I would love to hear just one more of his quirky jokes.
Good Morning Tipper, Matt and Acorns. I enjoyed last nights post. My Daddy was a great joke teller. My brother is too and he does impersonations. I can never remember jokes but I love hearing them. I’m getting ready to turn my New Years Day leftover Cabbage into some of your Cabbage Patch Stew. I can’t wait to eat it. I still can’t taste anything, it’s been 5 years now, but I have come to enjoy different textures of foods that I never noticed before. My son, Ed, will eat some and tell me if it is good or not. I’m always having him to “take just one little bite” of stuff to tell me what it tastes like. I keep everyone here and up Wilson Hollow in my prayers. I love y’all.
I love waking up in the morning, sitting down with my coffee and reading an email from The Blind Pig and the Acorn! It’s a treat.
Well, I reckon it is a life skill to be able to laugh at yourself without dragging yourself down. But an even greater skill is to never cause someone else to be laughed at so as to hurt them. In my mind, Appalachian humor is a gentle kind, without sharp points on it, more like gentle pushes,sorta “Ah, go on with ya!” At least that’s the kind I’ve known. It is a good feeling to laugh with someone and not at anybody, more about laughing at the funny side of the human condition we are all subject to. This post reminds me of that black and white picture you posted of Matt and 2 or 3 of his co-workers laughing together about something. It would make a great cover for a book of Appalachian humor. A great thing about it is that it doesn’t need identification of time, place, who or what and each person can personalize it with their own memories of friends and relatives.
Ron, the men I worked with at Michelin were always “picking on or teasing one another” but we were best friends and would have died for one another. None of it was out of meanness. One thing I did to one was to come back to work on Monday after seeing him at a Christmas light display over the weekend and telling my supervisor my youngest grandson had asked me why that man (Ken) still had his Halloween mask on at Christmas. My supervisor had soon spread it over the department. Ken would shake his fist at me while laughing at the same time. We were always teasing him about being ugly. He had a long beard and a “hillbilly” look about him but like by everyone. I tell people it is just a “man thing” to do this especially with blue collar workers, usually someone not being teased was not very well liked. A cardinal rule with us was you don’t tease someone about a physical handicap he may have.
I had a much longer comment going until my computer went nuts. The co-worker declared she would never give me any more ammunition. Shes. did though several time
I don’t tell jokes, I tell stories. A lot of folks claim they are jokes. A co-worker gave me a one – liner one morning and by lunchtime I had a 3-4 minute “story” ready by telling the “hook” before I gave her punch line.
Enjoyed reading the jokes. Hope the winners contact you shortly.
I’m a horrible joke teller and sometimes they go over my head. My brothers love/ loved telling jokes. I can/could never see them without one. My youngest brother has told jokes to anyone and everyone since he could talk. Years ago our neighbor was an Avon lady and she would stop by and could hardly wait for his joke. She had the biggest laugh I ever heard.
congratulations to the winners, God bless you, God bless everybody, have a great day today,
I really enjoyed last nights video. I look forward to these readings on Friday’s. Have a nice weekend Tipper and family.