WHAT'S THAT YOU SAID?

January 30, 2020

Scene:  end of Dinner.  Ned is clearing the table

NED:  Are you done?
ME:  Yes,
NED:  Why don't you write your mother?

It's the punch line of an old joke.  A guy named John Dunn moves from Ireland to New York, but his mother hasn't heard from him.  A few years later, another is going to New York and the mother tells him to ask her son to write to her.

He arrives in NYC, goes into a public bathroom and sees a guy standing at a urinal.  He asks "Are you Dunn?"  The guy says "yes" and he says "why don't you write your mother?" Whenever someone asks me if I'm "done" I always want to ask "why don't you write your mother?"

This family has no original material.  We talk in punch lines.  Like someone being on the roof.

A guy has a beloved cat and when he goes on vacation, he asks his friend to take care of the cat for him, but something terrible happens and the cat dies.  The guy sends his friend a telegram that his cat died.  The guy says that he should have softened the news.  “You could have told me the cat was on the roof. The next time we talked, you could say the Fire Department is trying to get him down. The next time, you could say the cat fell during the rescue and was in the veterinarian hospital. The next time I called, you could say the cat succumbed to his injuries and passed away. That way I would be prepared for the bad news.”

The next time the guy goes on vacation, he receives a telegram from his friend saying "your mother is on the roof."

When Char and Mike were living in Alaska and their cat died, we got a telegram that said "Yom is on the roof."  I actually framed that telegram and had it on the wall for many years.

I couldn't believe I could find this joke on the internet, but I did:

A single man named Mr. Ginsberg went on a cruise. Being single, he was seated with another single man, at dinner. The other man was a Frenchman, who spoke no English. Mr. Ginsberg spoke no French.

The first night, Mr. Ginsberg arrived at dinner, to find that his dinner companion was already seated. The Frenchman greeted him by standing and saying "Bon Appetit!" Not knowing what it meant, he responded, "Ginsberg". This exchange of "Bon Appetit!" & "Ginsberg" went on for 3 nights, until one of the waiters noticed it.

The waiter explained that when the Frenchman said "Bon Appetit" he was not introducing himself, but wishing a hearty appetite. Naturally, Mr. Ginsberg felt pretty foolish & was determined to right the situation. So the next night, he arrived early for dinner. When the Frenchman arrived, Mr. Ginsberg stood up & said "Bon Appetit!". The Frenchman's response...."Ginsberg!"

Whenever someone says "bon appetit" to me, I want to say "Ginsberg," but nobody understands except Walt.

In addition to joke punch lines, we speak in movie quotes. I love it that we and the kids mostly know many of the same movies and can quote appropriate lines.   One of my favorite quotes is "I always think there's a band, kid."  I don't get to use it often, but I have found reasons to use it (it's from The Music Man) occasionally.

Gilbert & Sullivan people are famous for quoting lines.  William S. Gilbert is wonderfully quotable and if you're around G&S people you're certain to hear quotes inserted in conversation.  I was surprised one time when Ned came out with "Oh, to be wafted away, from this black Aceldama of sorrow, where the dust of an earthy today is the earth of a dusty tomorrow!"  He had done some work with the Lamplighters while they were rehearsing a production of Patience and the quote stuck with him.

I was having dinner one night with a guy from the Lamplighters and at some point he said something familiar and it took me a minute to realize he wasn't quoting W.S. Gilbert, but Tom Leherer -- another wonderful source for quotes.

We do occasionally speak original material, but it's amazing how much of our conversation contains quotes from somewhere else.

* * * Bozoette reminded me of Stan Freberg.  Freberg is quoted a LOT around here!!!