Ouch! I’M Shot in the Knuckle: Humor, Columns and Cartoons

By Eric Foster Rhodes

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• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: May 20, 2010
• ISBN: 9781462842995

Eric Foster Rhodes

Dr. Eric Foster Rhodes, along with being a business and labor consultant, educator, and author of mystery stories and novels, is also an amateur magician. When you see him, ask him about his mind reading act. Eric and wife Barbara now live on the banks of the Pithlachascotee River near the Gulf of Mexico

Book preview

Ouch! I’m Shot

InThe Knuckle

Humor, Columns And Cartoons

Eric Foster Rhodes

Copyright © 2010 by Eric Foster Rhodes.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced

or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or

mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any

information storage and retrieval system, without permission in

writing from the copyright owner.

This book was printed in the United States of America.

To order additional copies of this book, contact:

Xlibris Corporation

1-888-795-4274

www.Xlibris.com

[e-mail]

79514

Contents

INTRODUCTION

OUCH! I’M SHOT IN THE KNUCKLE

MULTIPLE CHOICE TEST

A PAIN IN THE SOUL

THROUGH SOMETHING-COLORED GLASSES

SPARKLING ORNAMENTS

DON’T READ THIS

MUSICAL MANAGERS

OH, HOW I SUFFERED IN THE WAR

FOR THE UNDERDOG

IS IT PLUGGED IN?

WHAT EVER HAPPENED TO THE GOOD OLD DAYS?

AND NOW IT’S GAME TIME

NOT BAD FOR THE SHAPE IT’S IN

SEE THE WHALE

AIN’T WINNING GRAND?

BACK TO THE CAVES

WHAT MORE CAN YOU DO TO AN OAT?

THE WORD GAME AGAIN

THE FINE ART OF CURSING

BUT CAN YOU BANK ON IT?

SO, YOU THINK YOU’RE A COMMUTER?

I’LL GET YOU, MRS. GRUNDY

ON BUYING A SUIT

WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO?

IT’S ONLY A GAME, BUT . . .

LAMP UNDER A BUSHEL

WORTH EVERY PENNY

ASSESSING AIRLINE ATTENDANTS

THE GOSSIP COLUMN

HOME BUYERS’ GLOSSARY

PLAYING THE GAME

THE PRICE OF IMMORTALITY

AUTUMN MADNESS

YOU ONLY SEE THIS ONCE

GAME TIME AGAIN

THE TURNPIKE’S OUTSTRETCHED PAW

THE STOCK MARKET COMES ALIVE

AFTERWORD

79514-RHOD-layout.pdf

I think my thermos is broke.

INTRODUCTION

I like to write mystery stories, and I like writing short stories about unusual and intriguing situations. So far I have published three mystery books—two novels, with more to come, and a book of mystery short stories. And there have been two other books of short stories—Going Home for Christmas, 34 stories set in the Christmas season, and Et Cetera, 26 stories widely varied in their themes, settings, and views of life. And, so far, three collections of poems.

In my business career as a management consultant and educator, I wrote two dozen books about various aspects of business, education, and employee relations. A couple of new volumes in those fields will be coming soon.

But I also like to laugh, to see the humorous sides of life, to find what’s funny about the things we say and do. And for my own enjoyment, I began writing short essays, or columns, about how to laugh at the trials and tribulations of everyday living. I also enjoy drawing, and occasionally I will record some humorous situations into cartoon drawings with captions.

So, here are some of my essays, many of them intended to be funny, and some cartoons added in for good measure. They made me laugh, and helped me see the humor in what might otherwise be stressful moments. I hope they can be equally funny and stress-relieving for you. Enjoy!

OUCH! I’M SHOT IN THE KNUCKLE

Some of us remember when we used to go the the cowboy movie matinees on Saturday afternoons. We’d see the heroes in white cowboy hats and the villains in black cowboy hats. It was that easy to tell the good guy from the bad guy.

Then, with the advent of television, Hopalong Cassidy, Gene Autry and Roy Rogers had their weekly western adventures in half-hour segments on the TV screens. There were the same good guys and bad guys, and they’d have showdowns with lots of shooting at each other.

But, in those days, nobody actually died. They were seldom even badly hurt. One in the shoulder, for the villain, causing him to surrender. One in the knuckle, maybe, for the hero’s sidekick, causing him to drop his revolver. The hero seldom even got winged.

How times have changed in the cowboy business. If perhaps anything can symbolize the changing attitudes in the area of public morals, it could be the difference in what we now see in movies and, to almost the same degree, in television dramas. Now if there is not a lot of blood, and people dying gruesomely, it’s not dramatic enough.

But back in the good old days, at the local movie house, there were ironclad rules governing the behavior of the hero in westerns. For that matter, there were rules governing the rest of the characters as well. In case you’ve forgotten, or it was before your time, here’s what some of those rules were:

1.   Hero wore a white hat and rode a white horse—symbols of purity.

2.   All villains wore black hats and rode black horses. The villains often had black stubble on their faces as well.

3.   The hero never drank. Although he often had to enter bars, a careful point was made of his abstention. Some of us can remember scenes like this: Hoot Gibson stands at the bar with his booted and spurred foot on the brass rail, as the bartender, a surly character, says in tones of disbelief, Sarsaparilla? And Gibson replies in dry, droll tones, I said sarsaparilla.

4.   The hero would never strike a questionable blow in a fight. His every fistic stroke would be accentuated on the soundtrack by a sound like a meat tenderizing hammer being whacked into a tough beefsteak, but every one was a clean blow. On the other hand, the villain would try on every occasion to get in a stomp with his pointed boot heel, throw chairs and other furniture, and grunt a lot, while our hero could fight the entire fight without any unseemly noises.

5.   Our hero would never kill anybody. He would always aim for the villain’s gun hand, and, being a marvelous shot, he would almost always connect. In an extreme emergency, he might wound someone in the shoulder or even the ankle. Furthermore, these wound he inflicted never bled.

6.   Our hero, too, could withstand beatings, could fall off cliffs, have his horse shot out from under him, and arise to walk away unscathed. not so the villains, though. Once off their pins, they were usually out of it.

7.   As for such desperate plot devices as our hero being shot or wounded, this rarely occurred, but when it did it was amazing how he could come through a fusillade of bullets. He would get shot in the hat. he could get shot in the boot heel. He might even get nicked in the knuckle. In one extreme case, I recall with horror that our hero was shot in the earlobe. He was very much like the lady who stands in front of the target in the circus sideshow knife-throwing act, while her partner hurls knives at her,burying them to the hilt on all sides of her