By Homer Hirt …
Shaggy Dog Stories for Fellow Meanderers
Today let’s meander about the countryside, pondering……jokes. “Jokes?” you say. “Jokes…” I say.
Chances are that the first jokes that you heard were the Little Johnny ones. You remember them. Little Johnny was young, somewhere between six and nine years of age, but wise beyond his years. He always had an embarrassing answer to the teacher’s anatomy questions, and he knew, or at least he thought he knew, a lot about the ….gasp….opposite sex.
I made it through my Little Johnny time, and through the almost-smutty ones of my teenagery. Then I went off to Florida Southern College in Lakeland, and encountered Yiddish stories in a strange and delightful way.
Each year my fraternity staged a “Follies”, and it was always a success. For several years running my roommate Tony, who was from the Bronx, directed the show and once… and only once… he convinced me that I should be master of ceremonies and tell Yiddish jokes. The jokes were funny, but they were made hilarious because I told them with my Southern accent.
I made it through.
This goy from Dixie had the chutzpah to tell the klutzes present about the mensch and how to kvetch and nosh on lox and bagels. Oy vey……so I schlepped along and listened to the laughter that this olio of two cultures brought to Lakeland.
But now let’s look at shaggy dog jokes. You know them, because they always elicit a groan from the listener.
The first on record was when Julius Caesar was on the way to the Forum to get stobbed. He had his dog with him, and as was his wont he was talking to him. “You know I am going to git kilt today, probably by Mark Anthony and some other cats, but you don’t think that Brutus would stob me, do you?”. And Phi Deau looked up at him and said: “Yip”.
Do you get it? If you do, then you understand the first shaggy dog joke ever.
I have done a thorough study on shaggy dog stories, and I am astonished at the way that they have spread throughout the world. Truly, it is a poor place indeed that has no shaggy dog stories. They don’t even have to be about a dog. They can be about other animals. In fact, one of the better one was about an ant. Here is how it goes:
Samuel had been cast into a state prison… let’s make it Ryker’s Island just to honor New York City’s Finest… and while he was pondering his imponderables he noticed a rather large ant staring up at him from the edge of his cot.
Time crept onward. They became friends. Samuel taught the ant to stand on his head, and then to walk around in a circle. The ant learned to roll over on command and would answer number questions by nodding his head.
Samuel got time off for being good. He carefully placed his ant in a matchbox and, with visions of performances before the crowned heads of Europe, he caught the bus back to New York City.
He walked along on the way to Broadway and great wealth, but first…(no, I don’t mean he walked butt first…) would not a beer go down good? He went into a bar, bellied up, ordered a beer and drank it down. The barkeep demanded payment.
By now Samuel had the ant in front of him on the bar. he pointed the ant out and said: “Do you see this ant?”, and the barkeep said: “Yeah, they are all over the place”… and crushed the ant with his thumb……
That, my fellow meanderers, is as shaggy as they can get.
But if you feel that there must be a dog within, let’s go with the same scenario. It can even be the same bar and the same barkeep. Remember, this is a joke…we can make it as we wish.
Joe wanders in with his dog, and the friendly barkeep says: “Yo, Joe, you must not bring that animal in here (or words to that effect). Joe ups to the bar, says that his friend can talk. The barkeep doubts that so Joe asks: “What’s on the roof of a house?” and Ol’ Phi says: “Roof”, and the barkeep allows that won’t suffice, so Joe asks: “What does sandpaper feel like?” and back came “Rough”.
Mr. Barkeep is ready to throw them both out, but Joe asks one final question: “Who was the greatest baseball player of all time?” and the answer, of course, was “Ruth”.
The barkeep tosses the pair into the cold…..and as they walked along the dog looks up and says: “DiMaggio?”
So there is where you must groan…..while I give you the last… and the greatest….once more in a bar setting….but this time in the fair Cajun town of Cutoff, Louisiana, which is nigh onto the Bayou Lafourche.
Boudreau and his friend Arseneau are walking their dogs.
The weather is hot, and the sign at the Tippy Toe Inn flashes: “Ice Cold Beer”. Ol’ Boud allows as how a beer would go good, but Arse reminds him that no animals are allowed in the Tippy Toe.
Boud, he up and say: “Jus’ you watch dis” and he put on his shades (dark glasses to you feather merchants) and catches the leash up close and goes in the door.
The barkeep, he say: “You can’t bring in a dog” and Boud he put on a sad face and say: “Dis my seeing eye dog”, and the barkeep pours him a beer.
Arseneau takes the cue, catches up his leash close, puts on his shades and goes in. The barkeep say the same thing, and Arseneau say: “Dis my seeing eye dog” and the barkeep says: “A chihuahua?” And then Arseneau say:
“ YOU MEAN DEY GIVE ME A CHIHUAHUA?”
And that, my meanderers, is the shaggiest dog story of them all!