Halloween – A Fun Day

Halloween is a fun day. I loved it when my kids were little, and I love it now. I love Halloween now because it’s the day before CANDY GOES ON HALF PRICE!

Yes, I have been known to go door-to-door at all the groceries in Sallisaw searching for half-price candy on Nov. 1. I confess, I also do the same on the day after Easter. I still have Easter candy in the fridge.

But I didn’t love it when I was a kid. My one memory of Halloween was the one, when I was in elementary school, when Mom decided to dress me up as a gypsy. I was to wear a pair of her fancy earrings. Back then the earrings were not for pierced ears. They all had screw-on backs. So you can guess it was many years ago. Mom was trying to put those earrings on me, when the screw back got off kilter with the screw threads. Mom fiddled and fiddled and fiddled with those earrings, trying to get them to line up correctly. But it didn’t happen. Instead those earrings got tighter, and tighter, and tighter.

I remember screaming. It’s a wonder I didn’t end up with pierced ears. Don’t remember the rest of that Halloween. Maybe I was too traumatized to even go trick-or-treating.

And to this day I will not wear earrings.

But I loved dressing up my kids and grandkids for Halloween. Usually my kids had to wear an old sheet with holes for eyes and a mouth. We didn’t have a lot of money back then, but we had a lot of old sheets.

As a grandma, dressing up Granddaughter Jessie was a delight. Her handmade Tinker Belle costume was the best ever! But I had to re-make the M&M costume when son noticed I had ironed the M on backwards. Oops. Nothing like having to start from scratch on the very day the costume is due!

All families are full of such stories. So I went looking for more.

-The real monsters are the people that give away little boxes of raisins instead of Halloween candy.

ME: How true! We had one old lady in our neighborhood who went out to her apple tree and just gave the kids an apple on Halloween. One year my enterprising sons and friends crept into the old lady’s backyard early on Halloween day and stole all the apples, hoping for better treats. All they got was caught, and in trouble.

-Want to hear blood-curdling screams. Tell your wife she has a spider on her shoulder.

ME: Yep. That would be me. Saw a spider on my bed blanket last week. By 6 a.m. I had washed all the blankets but was still bug spraying the bedroom.

-The only thing really scary about Halloween is running out of candy.

ME: I actually know people (and you know who you are), who ate up all the Halloween candy, then, on Halloween night, they had to turn off all the lights and hide in a closet because they had nothing to give the trick-or-treaters, not even apples and raisins.

-Aren't we clever, making the kids go door to door collecting candy for us?

ME: Well, in defense of all parents, we have to check the candy the best way we can. We eat it!

All right. Trick-or-treaters, and parents, can avoid Halloween mistakes from too-tight earrings to candy theft (mostly) by visiting the Halloween on Elm Street, sponsored by the Sallisaw Police Department on Monday. The show opens at 5:30 p.m. and includes games and bounce houses as well as candy. That way the kids can burn off all (mostly) that sugar before bed. KXMX will be there, and looking forward to seeing all those costumed kids.

Have a safe and fun Halloween.

Marriage Advice from Someone Who Should Know Better

My good friends, Carrol and Linda Copeland who many of you probably know, celebrated their wedding anniversary Saturday.

I was not able to attend their anniversary party. It’s a Saturday. I stay in old sweats, and sometimes bed, on Saturdays. But I felt guilty so I offer the following, captured off the internet, as a gift. I hope they laugh.

-A husband and wife were celebrating 50 years of marriage with a big anniversary party. At one point they were toasted, then asked what it’s like to be married for 50 years. The wife, known to have a quick wit, replied, “It all seems like five minutes....under water.”

-“We always hold hands. If I let go, she shops.” 

-Love is blind but marriage is an eye-opener.

-“My wife and I were happy for 25 years. Then we met.” – Rodney Dangerfield

-“A good wife always forgives her husband when she’s wrong.” – Milton Berle

-“I was married by a judge. I should have asked for a jury.” – George Burns

-After a quarrel, a wife said to her husband, “I was a fool when I married you.” The husband replied, “Yes dear, but I was in love and didn’t notice.”

-When a man steals your wife, there’s no better revenge than to let him keep her.

-A man said his credit card was stolen but he decided not to report it because the thief was spending less than his wife.

-Man is incomplete until he marries. Then he is finished.

-The most effective way to remember your wife’s birthday is to forget it once.

-Words to live by: Do not argue with a spouse who is packing your parachute.

-Marriage is the triumph of imagination over intelligence. A second marriage is the triumph of hope over experience.

-If you want your spouse to listen and pay absolute attention to every word you say, talk in your sleep.

-When a married man says, “I’ll think about it,” what he really means is that he doesn’t know his wife’s opinion yet.

-Q: How do you keep your husband from reading your e-mail? A: Rename the e-mail folder “Instruction Manuals.”

-A man is boasting to his buddies that he is taking his wife to Rome for their 40th wedding anniversary. 

"What will you do for your 50th?" one of them asks.

"I'll go and get her."

And finally. . .

-To keep your marriage brimming,

With love in the loving cup,

Whenever you're wrong admit it;

Whenever you're right shut up. - Ogden Nash.

So Happy Anniversary my friends. Perhaps you won’t pay any attention to the above, and probably shouldn’t except to laugh out loud. Laughter, I hear, helps a marriage.

But you’ve made it for 46 years without my help. Congratulations. Wishing you at least another 50, or so. And thank you for being my friends.

Tell Me This Won’t Happen to Us

 All my friends and I seem to be aging at about the same rate at about the same time.

And they share the same aging concerns as I do. . .Will this happen to me?!? Yes, we do worry about what age will do to us.

Witness the following, sent to me by a recently retired friend. He wrote:

“Tell me this won’t happen to us!”

An elderly Floridian called 911 on his cell phone to report that his car has been broken into. He is hysterical as he explains his situation to the dispatcher: 'They've stolen the stereo, the steering wheel, the brake pedal and even the accelerator!' he cried. The dispatcher said, 'Stay calm... An officer is on the way.' A few minutes later, the officer radios in 'Disregard.' He says. 'He got in the back seat by mistake.'

“Tell me this won’t happen to us!” my friend continued to worry.
 
Three sisters, ages 92, 94 and 96, live in a house together. One night the 96-year-old draws a bath. She puts her foot in and pauses. She yells to the other sisters, 'Was I getting in or out of the bath?' The 94-year-old yells back, 'I don't know. I'll come up and see.' She starts up the stairs and pauses. 'Was I going up the stairs or down?’ The 92-year-old is sitting at the kitchen table having tea listening to her sisters, she shakes her head and says, 'I sure hope I never get that forgetful, knock on wood...' She then yells, 'I'll come up and help both of you as soon as I see who's at the door.'

(Confession:  Yes I have wondered “What in the world am I doing?”)

“Tell me this won’t happen to us!” (Too late!)

Three retirees, each with a hearing loss, were playing golf one fine March day. One remarked to the other, 'Windy, isn't it?' 'No,' the second man replied, 'it's Thursday.' And the third man chimed in, 'So am I. Let's have a beer.'

(Have had to tell several friends they needed to get their hearing checked.  Couldn’t hear their answers though.)

“Tell me this won’t happen to us!”

Two elderly gentlemen had been friends for many decades. Over the years, they had shared all kinds of activities and adventures. Lately, their activities had been limited to meeting a few times a week to play cards.

One day, they were playing cards when one looked at the other and said, 'Now don't get mad at me. I know we've been friends for a long time, but I just can't think of your name! I've thought and thought, but I can't remember it. Please tell me what your name is.’

His friend stared at him for at least three minutes -- he just stared and stared at him. Finally he said, 'How soon do you need to know?'
 
(OOPS! Oh good grief! It is happening to us!)

“Tell me this won’t happen to us!”

As a senior citizen was driving down the freeway, his cell phone rang. Answering, he heard his wife's voice urgently warning him, 'Herman, I just heard on the news that there's a car going the wrong way on the interstate. Please be careful!' 'Heck,' said Herman, 'It's not just one car. It's hundreds of them!'

This will NOT happen. I signed a pact with adult children that I will not use cell phone while driving. That should save me.

Funny Filosopher’s Measurements Measure Up

One of my Funny Filosophers decided to measure things this week.

His report illustrates just how imaginative the English language is, or how frustrating if you are a non-English speaker.

Enjoy. . .

The Funny Filosopher’s Measurements:

1. Ratio of an igloo’s circumference to its diameter = Eskimo Pi

2. Two thousand pounds of Chinese soup = Won Ton

3. One millionth of a mouthwash = one microscope

4. Time between slipping on a peel and smacking the pavement = one bananosecond

5. The weight an evangelist carries with God = one billigram

6. The time it takes to sail 220 yards at one nautical mile per hour = knotfurlong

7. 365.25 days of drinking low-calorie beer = one lite year

8. 16.5 feet in The Twilight Zone = one Rod Serling

9. Half a large intestine = one semicolon

10. One million aches = one megahertz

11. One basic unit of laryngitis = one hoarsepower

12. The shortest distance between two jokes = one straight line

13. Two thousand mockingbirds = two kilomockingbirds

14. One kilogram of falling figs = one Fig Newton

15. One thousands ccs of wet socks = one literhosen

16. Sixteen nickels = one paradigms

17. One million-million microphones = one megaphone

18. One million bicycles = two megacycles

19. Ten cards = one decacards

20. One millionth of a fish = one microfiche

21. One trillion pins = one terrapin

22. Ten rations = one decoration

23. One hundred rations = one C-ration

24. 2.4 statute miles of intravenous surgical tubing at Yale University Hospital = one I.V. league.

And if that doesn’t leave you laughing, or at the least a little bit confused about our language, and math, nothing will. But then I was already confused about math.

Have a happy day!