Jokes, a Fork, and a Give Away!

by

I’m writing my blog post this month from Aladdin, Wyoming. Population 15. Yep, 15. My daughter, myself, and two fellow authors bumped the population up when we arrived last Wednesday. So far, we’ve met over half the town! There’s a hundred year old general store and a little cafe where we had breakfast, visited with the locals, and got some good inspiration for future stories. We’re in this neck of the woods for the fourth annual Wild Deadwood Reads in Deadwood, South Dakota. It’s a fun-filled book event held at the same time as Wild Bill Days in the famous town. It also fills up the local hotels which is why we’re staying 45 minutes away in Aladdin.

But I know what you’re thinking. “What about the fork?” Well, as some of you know, I spent the month of May and part of June taking care of my little sister who had a hip replacement. The poor thing had a tussle of a time for a while but is now pleasantly on the mend.

I have two sisters, one older, one younger. My younger sis, Marijo, and I share a house and so, as sisters do, we tend to play jokes on one another. One on-going joke involves one of her son’s old plastic cowboys. Black Bart. I think he once had a parachute judging from some funny little plastic do-dads attached to his sides. Who knows? All I know is he shows up in the darnedest places! My shoes are a popular hiding place for Bart, and he likes to find himself in my sister’s pillow case. Sometimes he’s in the medicine cabinet or hiding behind Marijo’s shampoo in the shower. But lately, Bart has ventured further.

He was seen studying a bank in Spokane! Oh no! And then he found his way to Mount Rushmore with a few Western Romance authors! He had coffee here in Aladdin with some real cowboys and even showed up at the book signing in Deadwood! My how the little fellow gets around. I wonder if my sister has noticed that he’s missing? She will once a few pictures start getting posted!

But what does this all have to do with a silly fork? Well, my sister has a favorite. It’s one of the few pieces left from our mother’s original sterling sliver flatware set she got shortly after she and our father were married. Marijo’s been looking for that fork and can’t figure out how it could be missing. Little does she know Frankie the Fork (my daughter and I named him) has been traveling with Bart and being led into a life of crime! Oh no!

When your daughter is in film, you can do things like this. We’ve been taking shots of Bart for days and are just now filming Frankie the Fork’s scenes. It’s silly, I know, but this is something that will be laughed about for years. By the time Frankie and Bart make it home to Oregon, who knows what adventures they will have shared?

These bits of silliness were all some folks had back in the day. Some jokes were elaborate, some simple and cute, but cowboys, businessmen, ranchers, lawmen, you name it, all loved a good joke when they heard one. And some loved pulling them on others. Makes you wonder what a good prank consisted of between cowboys, doesn’t it? Here are just a few jokes from back in the day:

1870: While passing a house on the road, two Virginia salesmen spotted a “very peculiar chimney, unfinished, and it attracting their attention, they asked a flaxen-haired urchin standing near the house if it ‘drawed well’ whereupon the aforementioned urchin gave them the stinging retort: ‘Yes, it draws all the attention of all the d***** fools that pass this road.’ ” Daily Milwaukee News, May 21, 1870

1872: A man said to a preacher, “That was an excellent sermon, but it was not original.” The preacher was taken aback. The man said he had a book at home containing every word the preacher used. The next day the man brought the preacher a dictionary. Daily Phoenix, April 4, 1872


1888: There was a man whose last name was Rose. As a lark, he named his daughter Wild, “with the happy conceit of having her called Wild Rose.” But that sentiment was “knocked out” when the woman grew up to marry a man whose last name was Bull. Weekly Journal-Miner in Prescott, Ariz., May 23, 1888

1899: A man got up one morning and couldn’t find his alarm clock, so he asked his wife what had become of it. She said, “It went off at 6 o’clock.” Salt Lake Herald, April 27, 1899

Have you played jokes on a sibling or friend? Have you a favorite joke? We’ve been having a great time with Bart and when he and Frankie have their film debut I’ll try to post it on my Facebook for all to see. I’ll also give a free e-book of mine of choice to one of the commenters below! I’ll be on the road when this posts but will drop in and comment when I can!

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USA Today bestselling author Kit Morgan is the author of over 180 books of historical and contemporary western romance! Her stories are fun, sweet stories full of love, laughter, and just a little bit of mayhem! Kit creates her stories in her little log cabin in the woods in the Pacific Northwest. An avid reader and knitter, when not writing, she can be found with either a book or a pair of knitting needles in her hands! Oh, and the occasional smidge of chocolate!

37 thoughts on “Jokes, a Fork, and a Give Away!”

  2. The only thing I ever done was to take a gift, put it inside another box, wrap it and continue putting it in other boxes for about six boxes or so. I also wrapped a gift with scotch tape everywhere on the gift.

    • Karen, I once did that with the key to the pickup we bought my daughter for Christmas. She unwrapped and kept unwrapping until she got to the very last tiny box. We’d parked the pickup at our neighbor’s house and she was so surprised. Best joke ever.

  3. Yes we use to do things like that all the time. My sister has a small Hallmark pig that disappears all the time. It would still be in her house but hidden. I use to be the one that done it but now my niece does it. We also do a lot of gag gifts at Christmas.

    • I love gag gifts at Christmas! Those are so much fun. We love to sneak things like someone’s shoes off and wrap them up just a few days before Christmas then give them to the person we swiped them from.

  4. what a wonderful post. hope you and your daughter continue to have fun and be safe. this is so fun with Bart and Frankie. our family really didnt play too many pranks. we told a lot of jokes when a prank one of my brothers played went way too far, mom put an end to it because the three boys just wanted to play pranks that were hurtful. sigh they are good men now
    quilting dash lady at comcast dot net

  5. Kit, you have me in stitches! I can’t wait for Bart’s and Frankie’s film debut. Should be a blast. I wish I was there with you. Years ago I met my sister in Deadwood for some fun times and loved every second. So much history in one place to soak up. Aladdin, Wyoming sounds like a ton of fun. Enjoy your time there and don’t get “held up.” 🙂

  8. Yes, when I was young we always played jokes on each other. And also my 2 children(when they were young ) and I would play jokes on each other also, and now it’s been passed along to our grandchildren.

  10. When I was a kid, I told some made up stories that my sisters and friends believed… but was never the one for playing jokes.

  13. My brothers and I didn’t really play tricks like that, we were more likely to fight. lol

    That Black Bart reminds me of the Best of the West toys we had as kids. And the fork reminds me of Forky in the last Toy Story movie. Have fun with your adventures.

    denise

  15. Made a “fake” birthday cake for a fun, good friend of my husband’s, some years ago. Cut a piece of foam, about 2 inches thick, the size of an 8 by 8 cake, and put canned frosting on top. It was hilarious when he tried and tried to cut it. No one else had a clue what was going on. Then, of course, later there were actual goodies. Enjoyed your post!

  16. Kit, I love this post of yours! My daughter and I had a rubber snake we hid from each other from time to time when she was growing up. I’d find him in my underwear drawer, and I’d hide him under her pillow, etc. We had such a good time with that for many years. I love good jokes, but I always screw up the punchline. I wish I was a better joke teller. LOL You must be having a wonderful time! Looks like fun!

  18. I love this. We have taken “creatures” on trips for pictures. As a children’s librarian, I took Flat Stanley with us on a trip out West. I was taking the pictures, so my husband and grandson were the ones holding him. My then 15 year old grandson did not really appreciate it. On other trips, we have taken a grandchild’s favorite stuffed animal with us and sent back pictures of it enjoying the trip.

    One of the few times I tried to repeat a (what I considered) a funny story, I totally blew it. They often ask me if I was raised in a convent and sometimes I wonder. There are phrases I had never heard, even after attending college and being married for several years. Lets just say it was about one of my husband’s bosses, his second wife who was a beautician, and a service beauticians do that can also be interpreted as something else all together. I repeated it at a party and was over heard by many. Things went silent and people sort of went away. I had no idea what I had said until we got home. No more telling jokes for me.

    We were in the Deadwood area several years ago, but never found Aladdin. We will have to look for it next time we are in the area.

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