‘WILL you be good, sir? The reason for this, and the reason for that, indeed! You are always wanting the reason. No reason. There! Hoity toity me! I am sick of your grown-up reasons.’
This first tale was recounted by my father, who, as a professional actor, always put his whole soul into the tale:
A skydiver, having pulled his ripcord, discovered that his chute was defective; even the emergency chute was non operational. As he plunged to earth, he prayed fervently, “Blessed St. Francis, save me!”
Suddenly a huge hand grabs him by the back of the neck and a hollow voice intones¹: “St. Francis Assisi or St. Francis Xavier?”
Sweating bullets, the hapless wight looks skyward and whispers “Assisi?”
“AAAAaaaaahhhhhh….”
And a second one:
A similar mishap befell a skydiver, and being an atheist, it did not occur to him to do any praying. As he prepared himself for oblivion, to his surprise he saw a man rising up toward him from the ground.
As he passed, he shouted, “Do you know anything about parachutes?”
The man shouted back, “No! Do you know anything about Coleman stoves?”
The Old Wolf has Spoken
¹ Not “plugh”
Both excellent jokes!
They remind me of a story my mother tells. I should mention that my mother’s father was a farmer, and my mother is very proud of being a farmer’s daughter even as she enjoys how far her life has brought her from the farm.
A city slicker is in a hot air balloon but has lost all sense of direction. Seeing a farmer below, he calls out, “Where am I?”
The farmer yells back, “You’re up in a balloon, you dang fool!”
Lovely. I’ve heard some variations on this story in different contexts. One added a coda:
“Frustrated by this answer, the city slicker asks, “Well then, where are you?” to which the farmer replied, “I’m on the ground!”
I think you have heard every joke there is!