Tag Archives: Dot

The Basics of Teaching Farming.

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JoeI watched “Lean on Me” with Joe and Dot this afternoon.  For those of you who may not have seen this movie, it is based on a true story, and it stars Morgan Freeman as a high school principal who is sent into the worst, most dangerous school in the New Jersey district.  His job is to whip the students and the teachers into shape, and to get the test scores up to par.  It’s one of my all-time favorite movies and I cry every single time I see it.  Joe enjoyed the movie as well, because when it was over he just couldn’t stop talking about school and teaching, etc.

For example, when I took Joe to the bathroom and got him seated comfortably on the pot, he said, “Well I’d better get this over with so I won’t be late for school.”

Me:  “Oh yeah?  What grade are you in?”

Joe chuckled:  “No, no, no…you’ve got it all wrong.  I’m not a student; I’m a teacher.”

Me:  “Oh yeah, how could I forget?  Remind me again, which class do you teach?”

(Joe was never a teacher)

Joe:  “Oh this and that.  Farming mostly.”

Me:  “Yeah, I bet you’re a great teacher!”

Joe grinned:  “I do alright I guess.  Don’t get too many complaints.  Not much to teach anyhow.  I just tell them to dig a hole in the dirt and put a seed in there and cover it back up.”

Me:  “That about covers it, huh?”

Joe chuckled:  “Yup.”

Once I got him cleaned up and back on his feet, Joe looked in the toilet bowl and said, “That reminds me!  I’d better teach them about manure as well.”

A little later in the day…

Joe:  “School was sure a lot smaller when I went there…”

Me:  “Oh yeah?  How many people were in your school?”

Joe:  “Oh…around 12 or so.”

Me:  “There were 12 people in your class?”

Joe burst into laughter:  “No, there were 12 people in my whole school!”

Me:  “WOW, that’s a small school all right!  Did you have lots of friends?”

Joe:  “Can’t say I had lots of friends, but I had as many as were there.  When there’s only a dozen people in your school you can’t be too picky!”

Lightning and Heart Attacks.

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I’m watching the local news in Portland with Joe and Dot, and they are reporting on a lightning strike in the Rock Creek area.

Apparently a bolt of lightning struck a giant tree last night which cracked the tree in half. The tree then fell on some poor, chubby, Old Fella’s house, and the electricity transmitted through the tree started a fire in one of the bedrooms of the house.

The old man, who was hooked up to an oxygen tank, ran to his garage to get a fire extinguisher.   He made it back to the bedroom, but he had a heart attack as he was trying to put the fire out.  Luckily his implanted defibrullator shocked his heart back to life, and he was able to tell the story on the news from the front yard of his fire damaged house.

When being interviewed by the reporter about his near death experience, the jolly old fella chuckled and said, “Well, it was the first time I’ve been hit by lightning, but it wasn’t the first time that I died from cardiac arrest.  To tell you the truth, I’d rather not experience either of those things again.”

Reporter:   “How are you feeling today, Sir?  You’re lucky to be alive!”

Old Man:  “Well let’s see…My wife’s alright and my cat’s alright, so I guess we’re all alright s’far as I can tell.  Ya know, it gets you thinkin’ about life and whatnot, that’s for sure!”

Who’s Next?

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joe_dotI was tucking Joe into bed last night and I asked him if he was warm enough.

Joe:  “Not quite…”

Me:  “Would you like another blanket?”

Joe:  “I don’t think we’ll need another blanket.  Once you crawl in beside me here, we’ll be plenty warm.”

I laughed:  “Well I won’t be crawling in bed beside you, so I’d better get you another blanket.”

Dot came in then to give Joe his goodnight kiss, as she does every night.  She puckered up her lips, closed her eyes, and moved in for the kiss.  Joe’s eyes got really big and he tried to cover his head under his blanket.

Dot:  “Don’t you wanna kiss me goodnight, Joe?”

Joe:  “Oh…is that you, Dot?”

Dot:  “Yes, it’s me!  Who else would be giving you a goodnight kiss?”

Joe:  “You were going to kiss me??”

Dot:  “Of course I was!  What’d you think I was trying to do?”

Joe:  “I was worried that you were going to bite me.”

Dot:  “I’m not going to bite you!  Now, do you want a goodnight kiss or not?”

Joe puckered up real quick, and Dot planted a big kiss on his lips.  Joe grinned from ear to ear, and then he looked at me and puckered up again.

Joe:  “Okay, who’s next…?”

The Cherry Tree.

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joe_dotWe were sitting at the table eating breakfast, when I felt Joe’s eyes on me.  I looked over at him and he was just grinning ear to ear.

Me:  “You look like you’re in a pretty good mood today, Joe!”

Joe:  “Yep, I guess so.”

Me:  “I bet it’s because you’re wearing your red shirt.  You look really handsome in red.”

Dot:  “Red has always been a good color on him.”

Joe:  “What’s so good about it?”

Me:  “It brightens up your cheeks.”

Joe:  “What good does that do me?”

Dot:  “We’re the ones who have to look at you, and you look good in RED!  Now, eat your breakfast.”

Joe:  “Does it make me look taller?”

Dot:  “Huh?”

Joe:  “Does my red shirt make me look taller?”

Dot:  “Oh for heaven’s sake…”

Me:  “I think it makes you look taller, Joe.”

Joe’s eyes lit up:  “Well if it makes me look taller, then maybe I’ll have a better chance of picking a cherry from the cherry tree!”

Dot:  “We don’t have a cherry tree.”

Joe:  “But if we DID have a cherry tree; when I wear this red shirt then I’ll be taller, and I can pick cherries.”

Me:  “You’re right, Joe.  You’d be tall enough to pick the cherries AND you’d look very handsome while doing so.”

Joe beamed:  “See Dot, I told you so.”

Dot:  “I think maybe you’d better not wear red anymore.  It gives you a big head…”

Joe:  “No Dot, see my head only looks bigger because my red shirt makes me look so much taller.”

Survival.

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JoeAfter eating a big lunch this afternoon, including dessert, I asked Joe if he’d had enough to eat.

Joe:   “I ate enough to survive.”

Dot:   “Aren’t you full? You should be full!”

Joe:   “I wouldn’t say I’m full so much as…I’m still alive.”

Okay then.

Tiger? What Tiger?

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imagesToday I watched “Life of Pi” with Joe (who slept through the entire thing) and Dot (who only slept through part of it).  Before I start any movie I always give Joe and Dot a brief summary of what it is going to be about.  I described “Life of Pi” as being about a shipwrecked teenager who has to figure out how to survive on a lifeboat with a tiger.  Joe and Dot thought that it sounded pretty interesting, so we went with it.

When the movie was over, I asked Dot what she thought:

Dot:  “Well, it was okay…but I was waiting to see the tiger.”

Me:  “You didn’t notice the tiger?”

Dot:  “No, I didn’t notice it.  Which scene was it in?”

Me:  “The tiger is pretty much in every scene.”

Dot:  “Oh well.  I guess you put the wrong movie in huh?”

Me:  “Bummer.  I guess I did.”

(I didn’t.)

A little while later she asked, “What did the tiger look like?”

Me:  “It’s a large orange cat with black stripes…”

Dot:  “OH!  THAT was the tiger?!  I thought that was an elephant.”

Me:  “Nope.  It was a tiger.”

Dot:  “It looked an awful lot like an elephant though didn’t it…?”

Me:  “Um…not really.  It pretty much looked exactly like a tiger.”

Dot laughed:  “I guess you should wear your glasses next time huh?”

Me:  “Yeah, I guess I should.”

(I don’t wear glasses.)

Dog Food for Supper.

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joe_dotIt was extremely hot yesterday, so Dot suggested that I make something “cool” for supper.  When I looked in the refrigerator, I noticed that there were three large pieces of steak that were leftover from the BBQ that Dot attended with her daughters the night before, so I decided to make steak salad for supper.

Once I got both Joe and Dot seated at the dinner table, I poured each of them a glass of wine, and then I set their plates in front of them.  I had made fresh ranch dressing, so I poured a bit of it onto Joe’s salad, and he started digging in.  I notice that Dot was just sort of staring at her plate with a bewildered expression for a moment, but soon enough she was chowing down as well.

After we had all cleaned our plates, and I had served Joe and Dot their brownies and ice cream for dessert, Dot asked me where I got the steak.

Me:  “The steak was wrapped up in tin foil in the fridge.  It was your leftovers from the BBQ last night.”

Dot:  “Oh, I was wondering where it came from!  Now I remember…Julie (Joe and Dot’s oldest daughter) didn’t eat all of her steak, so she sent it home with me so that I could feed it to the dog!”

Me:  “Well I did feed the dog the scraps that were leftover.”

Dot:  “Oh well, it doesn’t matter.  Just don’t tell Julie…”

Me:  “Don’t tell Julie that I fed you guys dog food for supper?”

Dot:  “Yes, don’t tell her that.”

Joe:  “We had WHAT for supper?!?!”

 

Crop-Dusting.

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joe_dotDot suddenly shot up from the couch in the middle of her favorite celebrity gossip show “Extra“, and she hobbled her way toward the bathroom.  As Dot marched past Joe and I, an incredibly loud and continuous burst of gas bellowed out behind her.  Even so, she did not seem amused when Joe called out, “Hurry Dot…Hurry!”

Once Dot was in the bathroom, Joe turned to me and said, “That there is what happens when you grow up on a farm…”

Me:  “Oh yeah?  What do you mean?”

Joe:  “Well see…Dot grew up on a farm, and that’s why she knows the importance of crop-dusting.”

I laughed:  “You noticed that huh?”

Joe laughed:  “Hard not to notice when she goes breezing past ya like that without so much as a how-do-ya-do.”

Me:  “It’s probably best not to mention it to Dot though, okay?  I’m pretty sure that she thinks that we didn’t notice.”

Joe:  “Oh I’m not gonna say anything to her about it!  She may have crop-dusted the place, but she’s STILL a lady!”

Nuns.

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imagesI watched “Sister Act” with Joe and Dot this afternoon, or I guess I should say that I watched it while both Joe and Dot enjoyed their daily head-bobbing naps in their chairs.

During one of the infamous choir scenes, Joe woke up, his eyes got big and he said, “My god, that’s A HELLUVA LOT of Nuns!”

Me: “Yep, it’s a-whole-lotta-nuns all right.”

Later in the movie, Joe woke up during a scene where Whoopi Goldberg was out of her nun costume and wearing an enormous, 80’s, afro-wig.

Joe said, “Do you think that lady knows that a giant yak up and died on her head?”

Me: “If not, I’m sure she’ll figure it out soon enough.”

Joe: “Once it gets too heavy for her neck to hold it up she’ll put it back out to pasture.”

Me: “I’m sure you’re right about that, Joe.”