I love funny stories that date back to the old one-room schoolhouses that so many of us oldsters attended in our youth.
I got this story from one of the old boars, Judge Ordecourt, who joins us every Wednesday mornings for the Saffordville Gentle Men’s Club’s Old Boars’ Breakfast.
Since it waz 10 degrees outside, we were discussing some of the cold weather games that we kids played at our one-room schoolhouses. The outdoor games included fox and geese, handy-over, drop the handkerchief, and hide and seek. The indoor games included Crazy 8s, Old Maid, Books and Authors, rummy, jacks, fiddlesticks, and puzzles.
Then we got to talking about our various means of transportation to and from those tiny rural schools. They included walking, riding a bicycle, riding horses, and, of course, having our parents drop us off.
That’s when Judge recalled the time one of his schoolmates got bucked off his Shetland pony on the way to school. The distraught youngster had to walk the rest of the way to school because the naughty pony immediately headed back to its warm stall.
And, kids being kids, the youngster who’d gotten bucked off became the butt of a lot of jokes and comments through the day.
Finally, the kid had enough of his harassment and in the afternoon asked permission to go to the outhouse. Once outside, he immediately turned loose every horse and pony tied up outside the schoolhouse and every one of the horses took its freedom seriously and headed home —riderless.
When someone noticed what had happened, the teacher admonished the offending youngster who replied, “Well, everyone thought it was so funny that I have to walk home after school that I figured everyone should have the same fun.”
Now, that’s a funny story about getting even.
***
Well, the New Year’s celebrations are over, but I got an email from an Iowegian friend about New Year’s Eve party safety that I feel compelled to pass along because the advice is timeless. Here goes:
“Please, take care of yourself out on the roads this holiday season. A recent joint study conducted by the Department of Health and the Department of Motor Vehicles indicates that 23% of traffic accidents are alcohol-related.
“This means that the remaining 77% are caused by schmucks who drink bottled water, Starbucks, soda, juice, energy drinks, egg nog, milk, and stuff like that.
“Therefore, those who don’t drink alcohol are three times as dangerous in the long run as those who do.”
I’m really not advocating drinking and driving. It really is dangerous. But, I still think the story is funny.
***
Ol’ Nevah and I had one of the quietest New Year’s of our lives. It wuz subzero outside and so we sat around reading and watching TV until 11 o’clock and then called it quits for 2017.
***
I’ve got a true Damphewmore Acres chicken story to tell. A month ago I had an Old English Game hen (that I’d gotten by mistake in a chick order) who insisted that she wanted to set on a clutch of eggs in the winter. I finally got tired of throwing her off the next each evening, so I said, “OK, ol’ gal, if it’s eggs you want, it’s eggs you get!”
So, I grabbed up a little wire pen, put a dark box with straw in the pen, dropped six eggs in the nest, and plopped the hen on them.
Well, I didn’t see that little hen out of the nest box but one time in three weeks, although she obviously did eat and drink a few times more than that. So, I suspicioned that she’d successfully hatch some of the eggs, but not all of them. I wuz wrong. On the 21st day, right on schedule and right in time for winter’s first real blast of cold weather, that little hen hatched all six of the eggs.
I moved her and her brood to the brooder house and they’ve been thriving, despite temperatures that dropped below zero.
If I get those six chicks raised up, I’ll probably have $10 each invested in them because of the cost of the brooder lamp and water heater. Oh, well, I raise chickens for the eggs and fun, not for profit.
***
Here’s another one-room schoolhouse story:
A rough and tumble farm kid returns from school and says he got an F in arithmetic.
“Why,” asks his equally rough and tumble father.
The kid replies, “My teacher asked how much is 2 x 3 and I said 6.”
“But that’s right,” says his dad.
Then the kid goes on, “But then she asks me how much is 3 x 2.”
“What’s the ******** the difference?” blurts his father.
“That’s what I said,” replies his son. “And it’s why I got an F in Math.”
***
Words of wisdom overheard in the coffee shop:
“My goal for 2017 was to lose 10 pounds. Only 15 to go.”
That sounds like me. Hope we warm up soon. Have a good ‘un.
