For about 15 years, I fancied myself a stand-up comic. I guess it dates back to my senior year at Ruston High School. I had Miss Ruth Johnson for Algebra II. Her class was first hour and I was always tardy.
One day, fed up with me strolling in late each morning, she stopped me at the door. “You stand up here and tell us why you’re late….and it better be good,” she demanded. She wasn’t smiling. Before she started driving, she walked about a mile right past my house on her way to school—after feeding and milking a cow—so I couldn’t use the excuse of having to walk less than a quarter-mile.
So, I did my first stand-up bit, making the story up as I went along.
“Well, Miss Ruth (everyone called her Miss Ruth), this morning about 2 o’clock, we heard a noise out in the chicken house. My granddad thought it was the possum that had been killing our chickens. So, he grabbed his shotgun and stuck his magnetic flashlight onto the barrel. He was standing in the entrance to the chicken house waving the gun around, shining the light, looking for the possum. He had his long johns on because it was cold last night. But it wasn’t that cold, so he had the bottoms open. Our old blue tick hound came up behind him with his cold nose and, Miss Ruth, we been cleanin’ chickens since 2 this morning.”
If Miss Ruth had allowed it, I’d have gotten a standing ovation. The entire classroom exploded. She tried not to laugh and fussed at me over the laughter of the class. As of that moment, I had the bug. Many years later, I took a dare and went onstage at a Baton Rouge comedy club on open mic night. I was never so nervous in my life but the emcee, Spud McConnell asked me to come back. And I did. I became the house emcee at the old Funny Bone and stayed around for 15 years—probably about 12 years too long.
Funny Bone owner Mike Rogers tried to break it to me nicely, informing me that after 15 years, everyone in Baton Rouge had probably heard my joke. He brought me back for a 25th anniversary show, but that was it. So, I went back to my first love: writing. Some (perhaps many) think I’m still a joke, but that’s okay. This country was founded on the principle that everyone should have his say and if readers disagree with me, that’s their right to say so.
Having said that, there will be some who will suggest that I give up comedy and writing.
But for sheer audacity, no one can top Donald Trump.
Just look at some of his utterances:
- “Putin told me he didn’t do it.”
- “North Korea is no longer a nuclear threat.”
- “I’m going to build a wall and Mexico is going to pay for it.”
- “I’ve been treated very unfairly by this judge. Now, this judge is of Mexican heritage. I’m building a wall, OK? I’m building a wall.”
- “The concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing noncompetitive.”
- “By the way, I have great respect for China. I have many Chinese friends. They live in my buildings all over the place.”
- “My fingers are long and beautiful, as, it has been well documented, are various other parts of my body.”
- “A certificate of live birth is not the same thing by any stretch of the imagination as a birth certificate.”
- “They (The New York Times) don’t know how to write good.”
- “All of the women on The Apprentice flirted with me—consciously or unconsciously. That’s to be expected.”
- “Sorry losers and haters, but my IQ is one of the highest—and you all know it! Please don’t feel so stupid or insecure, it’s not your fault.” (Ranks right up there with “I’m a very stable genius.”)
- “Nobody respects women more than me.”
- “What’s that?” (his response to a question about his insulting a Gold Star family.)
- “He’s not a war hero. He’s a war hero because he was captured. I like people that weren’t captured.”
- “Lock her up! Lock her up!” (cheerleading his rabid followers in response to Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email account. Now you have to wonder if he is going to demand that IVANKA be locked up. Oops.)
Granted, some of those remarks weren’t jokes and they certainly weren’t very funny. Whenever he opens his mouth, something downright crude and/or stupid usually spills out. Sometimes, his remarks are outright lies, but all are typical Trump.
But for sheer stupidity, idiocy, lunacy, and absurdity, yesterday’s ADVICE on how California could reduce the risk of forest fires pretty much tops them all:
“You gotta take care of the floors. You know the floors of the forest, very important,” Trump told reporters. “You look at other countries where they do it differently and it’s a whole different story. I was with the president of Finland and he called it a forest nation, and they spend a lot of time on raking and cleaning and doing things and they don’t have any problem. And when they do, it’s a very small problem.”
If I ever entertained any thought of returning to the stage, Donald Trump has laid those thoughts to rest. No one could possibly be funnier than our Clown in Chief, especially when he’s trying to be serious.
Well, while others (especially FINNS) are laughing their backsides off at the solution offered by our Forester/Scientist/Raker-in-Chief, I for one, am making a run to Lowe’s and Home Depot to buy up all their rakes. I have to do my civic duty. There’s a lot of wooded area between my house and the Amite River that needs raking. Of course, that’s the same river that overflowed back in August 2016, flooding half of Livingston Parish and destroying hundreds of homes, mine included. So, I guess I’d better rake the river bottom, too, to prevent future flooding.
John Sachs, a Ruston High classmate (who missed my comedic debut 57 years ago) said Trump needs to rake Central Park lest it catch fire and burn down Trump Tower.
There was a serious story in the fake news WASHINGTON POST that explains the real reason forest fires are a rare event in Finland—and it’s got nothing to do with raking.
Meanwhile, President Big Mac is taking a lot of heat (no pun intended) for letting his alligator mouth overload his hummingbird brain:
SIGN OF THE TIME (in Helsinki)
Louisiana Voice 
I didn’t imagine Miss Ruth would have put up with any BS! She scared me. As for the Big Mouth, I doubt he even knows he’s a joke and probably believes what he says, no matter how absurd. The time for laughing is long past.
Amen sister, amen!
I must say, your excuse for tardiness beats my high school friend’s excuse hands down, He claimed his chronic tardiness should be excused because he had been a. stolen by gypsies or b. abducted by space aliens, both excuses accepted by a laughing teacher.
As for the ravings of the loon in the white house, the internet is alive with the new slogan “Rake America great again.” Nuff said.
Never has such a lightweight tried to throw his weight around. Risible.