After my 91-year-old mother finished having her hair cut and shaped, the stylist announced, “There, now you look ten years younger.”
My mother, un­impressed, replied, “Who wants to look 81 years old?”

I held a garage sale with my little blond cairn terrier for company. Soon came the first customer. He took his time browsing and examining everything I had out for sale. Eventually, he found something that interested him. “Excuse me,” he said. “How much for the dog?”

My 11-year-old takes his homework seriously. One question required him to write a sentence using the word version. His sentence: “Have you heard of the version Mary?”

One day, my physician father treated himself to a plate of raw oysters and offered to share them with me. Just as I was about to dig in, he picked up an oyster, examined it, and commented, “They remind me of infected tonsils.”And that’s the story of how he ended up eating the entire plate of oysters himself.

My friend took her teenage daughter to a new doctor for a checkup. The nurse asked the usual questions, including if she had an STD.
“No,” said the teen. “We have a Toyota.”

When people hear that my husband and I just celebrated our 60th wedding anniversary, they inevitably ask us the secret to our long, successful marriage. In response, my husband will smile sweetly, nod my way, and explain, “We both love me.”

As the general inspected our troops, he asked some of the Marines which outfit they were serving with. Ramrod straight, each would respond, “Marine Air Group 36, sir” or “Second Marine Division, General.” Then there was one young private. When the general asked, “Which outfit are you in?” the Marine replied, “Dress blues, sir, with medals!”

It was World War II—the front—and we were on high alert. Around midnight, I noticed movement behind a bush. Rather than fire a shot, I shouted out the first half of the password: “George!”
I waited for whoever it was to prove he was an American and reply with the countersign, “Marshall.” Instead, silence.“George!!” Again, no reply. I lifted up my rifle and gave it one last try: “George!!!”An angry voice finally replied, “My name ain’t George!”

A frightened man goes to the secret police and says, “My talking parrot disappeared.”

“Why did you come here? Go to the regular police.”

“I will. I’m just here to tell you that I disagree with whatever that parrot is going to say.”

Q: Who is the leader of the Kitty Communist Party?

A: Chairman Meow.

Q: What is the difference between capitalism and socialism?

A: In a capitalist society, man exploits man,  and in a socialist one, it’s the other way around.

Q: How did we know communism was doomed from the beginning?

A: All the red flags.

Q: Why do Communists drink herbal tea?

A: Because proper tea is theft.

What’s the difference between a  poorly dressed man on a unicycle and a well-dressed man on a bicycle?
Attire.

On a Facebook page for beginning artists, one asked, “Any suggestions for painting dogs?” Another responded,  “Wait till they’re asleep.”

Living in rural Minnesota, I find driving through crowded Minneapolis difficult. “I have trouble figuring out when to turn and what lane to be in,” I complained to my grandson.
His wife could commiserate. “I know what you mean,” she said. “I never know at which cornfield to turn when we come to visit you.”

Our doctor’s office called to let my husband know that the results from his blood tests came back and he was just fine. That didn’t suit my husband.

“What’s my cholesterol level?” he asked.

“Mr. Crocker, you are just fine,” insisted the nurse.

“Still, I’d like you to mail me the results.”

A few days later, he received a postcard from the doctor’s office. It read, “Mr. Crocker, you are just fine!”

My great-aunt looked confused when I told her that my daughter was 18 months old. “Oh,” she said. “I thought she was a year and a half.”

“But Aunt Marie,” I said, “18 months and a year and a half are the same.”

She shrugged. “What do I know? I never had kids.”

An Uber is cruising down a boulevard when it runs a red light. “Hey!” the passenger shouts. “Be careful!”

“Don’t worry,” says the driver. “My brother does it all the time.”

He barrels through the next red light, and the passenger screams, “Stop doing that!”

“I’m telling you, my brother does this all the time.”

They approach the next light. Just when it turns green, the driver slams on the brakes. The confused passenger asks, “You just ran two red lights; why’d you stop at a green?”

“I had to,” says the driver. “My brother might have been coming.”

My father was serving in a port city in post–World War II Germany when a ship laden with GIs docked. As the soldiers disembarked, they started to jeer and boo. The reason? The local band hired to greet them was playing a popular hit of the time, “I Wonder Who’s Kissing Her Now.”

My daughter was anxious to do some landscaping at her new home, but then she called up sounding discouraged.

“I don’t think I’ll ever get these flowers planted,” she moaned. “It says to plant in full sun, but it’s been cloudy for four days.”

Although I’d been dating a woman for several months, I guess I didn’t know her as well as I thought. One day I called, and her ten-year-old son answered.

“Hi,” I said. “It’s Tom. Can I speak with your mom?”

He responded, “Are you Tom One or Tom Two?”

Needless to say, his mother is now down to one Tom.

I’m lucky that my wife and mother are very close. I realized just how close the time I drove my mother to her doctor, which my wife usually does. When the doctor came into the room, my own dear mother introduced me as her “daughter-in-law’s husband.”

My six-year-old loved his pet fish. He watched and fed it faithfully, morning and night. But one day while he was in school, his fish died, so I flushed it down the toilet. I told him when he got home, and he was inconsolable. Nothing I said helped. After a while, I asked, “Why are you crying so much?”Arching his back, he shouted, “I wanted to flush!”

Q: How did the dead brother and his dead brother resemble each other?
A: They were dead ringers.

Q: What kind of a shot was the dead man?
A: He had dead aim.

Q: What kind of personality did the dead man have?
A: He gave you the cold shoulder.

Q: How did the two dead brothers do in school?
A: They were dead even.

Q: Why were the people trying to get the dead man to change his mind?
A: Because they knew he was dead wrong.

Q: Why was the dead man not living well?
A: Because he was dead broke.

Q: Why was the dead man not courageous?
A: Because he had cold feet.

Q: Why was the dead man insensitive?
A: Because he had a cold heart.

Q: Why did the dead man divorce his dead wife?
A: Because she was frigid.

Q: Why did the town chase out the dead drifter?
A: Because he was a deadbeat.

Q: If you’re an American in the kitchen, what are you when you’re in the bathroom?

A: European!

I ate a clock yesterday, it was very time-consuming.

Q: How come nobody liked the dead lawyer?
A: Because he was rotten to the core.

Q: What is a dead man’s favorite magazine?
A: Life

Q: Why was the dead man happy to be sentenced during his trial?
A: Because they gave him life.

In the foyer of a church, a young boy was looking at a plaque with the names of men and women who had died in various wars.  He asked the pastor, “Who are these people?”  The pastor said, “Those are members from our church who died in the service.”  The boy asked, “The early service or the second service?”

Q: What do you call an animal you keep in your car?

A: A Carpet

Q: Why shouldn’t you visit an expensive wig shop?

A: It’s too high a price ‘toupee.’

Q: Why did the pig have ink all over its face?

A: Because it came out of the pen.

Whoever said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results has obviously never had to reboot a computer.

—William Petersen

I was on a business call when I realized I was late for a class at the gym. I must have sounded rushed, because the woman on the phone said, “Am I keeping you from something?”

I replied, “I have to leave for tai chi.”

“Oh,” she said, sounding intrigued. “What country is that in?”

—Linda Platt

My paramedic team was called to an emergency. Before we took the patient to the hospital, I had a question for his wife. “Does your husband have any cardiac problems?” I asked.

“Yes,” she said with a note of concern. “His cardiologist just died.”

—Aaron Webster

A musician friend is always upbeat. But when she developed ringing in one ear, I was concerned it might overwhelm even her. When I asked whether her condition was especially annoying to a musician, she shook her head.

“Not really,” she said cheerfully. “The ringing sound is in the key of B flat, so I use it to tune my cello half a tone lower.”

—Kathleen Cahill, in Reader’s Digest Asia

A young lawyer is working late one night when his door opens and in walks Satan himself. “I have an offer,” says Satan. “If you give me your soul and the soul of everyone in your family, I’ll make you a full partner in your firm.”

The lawyer stares icily at the devil for a full minute before demanding, “So what’s the catch?”

—kinsleylaw.com

The graveside service had just ended when there was a frightening clap of thunder, followed by a tremendous bolt of lightning accompanied by even louder thunder. The little old man looked at the pastor and said calmly, “Well, she’s there.”

—Submitted by G.C. via mail

Why is it a penny for your thoughts but you have to put your two cents in? Somebody’s making a penny.

—Steven Wright, comedian

A broke guy walks past a pub. He looks at the door longingly, but since he has no money, he walks on. Just then, he spots a lamp lying in the gutter. He picks it up and rubs it, and a genie emerges.

“I will grant you three wishes,” intones the genie.

“Give me a bottomless mug of beer,” the guy says.

A mug of beer appears in his hand. He takes a sip, then another. With each chug, the mug magically refills.

“And for your other two wishes?”

Between swallows, the lucky guy shouts, “Give me two more just like this one!”

—friarsclub.com

Q. What did Neil Armstrong say when no one laughed at his moon jokes?
A. “I guess you had to be there.”

Q. How do you know when the moon is broke?
A. When it’s down to its last quarter.

Q. Which is closer, Florida or the moon?
A. The moon. You can’t see Florida from here.

Q. Why is a moon rock tastier than an Earth rock?
A. It’s a little meteor.

My neighbor texted me, “I just made synonym buns!”

I texted back, “You mean like grammar use to make?”
I haven’t heard from her since.

A friend took her son to the doctor’s office after he sprained his finger. The nurse applied a splint, only to be told she’d put it on the wrong finger.

“I’m sorry,” she said.
“That’s OK,” my friend’s son said. “You were only off by one digit.”

My husband talks in his sleep. Unfortunately, he also snores, so I sometimes give him the wifely elbow.
“What?!” he demanded one night, still mostly asleep.
“Turn over—you’re snoring,” I said.
He did as instructed and while doing so muttered, “That’s nothing; you should hear my wife snore.”

Because my wife and I are flea market dealers, we usually carry stacks of $1 bills. Not long ago, we had lunch at a restaurant and paid the check with singles. As our waitress collected the ones, she sized up my 70-year-old wife and said, “You had a good night dancing last night, huh?”

I stopped off at the super­market to buy my son-in-law his favorite pie, sour cream raisin. The box had the $15 price stamped on the top, which I thought would be tacky on a gift, so I asked the man behind the counter for a marker to black out the price. Didn’t work—you could still see the price through the ink.

“I know what to do,” the man said. “I’ll cover it up.”And with that, he slapped a sticker over the price that read “$2.98 Day Old.”

Q: Why don’t pirates take a shower before they walk the plank?

A: They just wash up on shore.

Q: How much did the pirate pay for his peg and hook?
A: An arm and a leg.

A patient came to the hospital with a burned right hand. As the
doctor took down his medical history, he asked the injured man, “Do you smoke?”

“Yeah, a pack and a half a day,” said the patient.
Concerned, the doctor told him, “You should consider quitting.”
“No, it’s OK,” said the patient. “I smoke with my left hand.”

Q: Do you know what stinks about a pirate ship?
A: The poop deck.

The CEO of a large corporation was giving advice to a junior executive. “I was young, married, and out of work,” he lectured.
“I took the last nickel I had and bought an apple. I polished it and sold it for a dime. The next day I bought two apples, polished them, and sold them for ten cents each.”

“I see,” said the junior executive. “You kept reinvesting your money and grew a big business.”
“No,” said the CEO. “Then my wife’s father died and left me a fortune.”

Two regulars are sitting at a bar when one of them casually points to a couple of drunks across from them. “That’s us in ten years,” he says.
His friend takes a sip from his beer, sets it down on the bar, turns to his friend, and slurs, “That’s a mirror.”

A college girl was visiting my farm and noticed the ring in our bull’s nose. Intrigued, she asked, “Did you put that ring in his nose or was he born that way?”

After I paid for my items in an adorable Italian shop, the salesperson smiled and said “Grazie,” Italian for “thank you.” My Italian isn’t very good, but I knew that the Italian word for “you’re welcome” was the same as the name of a spaghetti sauce. So I confidently replied “Ragú!” and walked out of the store. A few blocks later, it hit me: I had the wrong spaghetti sauce. “You’re welcome” is prego.

During a high school visit to France, I stayed with a French family.
One night, I was unsure what the meat on my dinner plate was, so I pointed to it and asked in my best 11th-grade French: “Qui est-ce?” The family’s expressions told me I needed some tutoring. Instead of asking “What is it?” as I had intended, I’d asked “Who is it?”

My boss arrived at work in a brand-new Lamborghini. “Wow,” I said. “That’s an amazing car.”
He replied, “If you work hard, put all your hours in, and strive for excellence, I’ll get another one next year.”