An employer didn’t want to hire a particular applicant, so he decided to give him a nonsense test, hoping the man wouldn’t be able to answer the questions. The employer figured that when the man couldn’t figure out any sensible answer, he would just give up without an argument.
So the employer gave the man his first question: “Without using numbers or letters or hash marks, write down a way to represent the number 9.”
The applicant said, “That’s easy” and proceeds to draw three trees.
The employer responded, “What the hell is that?”
The man said, “Tree ‘n tree ‘n tree makes nine.”
“Fair enough,” said the employer. “Your second problem is to use the same rules, but represent the number 99.”
The man stared into space for a while, then made a smudge on each tree. “There you go sir,” he said confidently.
The employer scratched his head and said, “How on earth is that supposed to represent 99?”
The job seeker explained, “Each tree is dirty now! So it’s dirty tree, ‘n dirty tree, ‘n dirty tree. That’s 99!”
The employer was getting worried that he’d have to hire the guy, so he said, “All right, question three. Same rules again, but represent the Number 100.”
The man stared into space again, then shouted, “Got it!” He made little marks at the base of each tree, and said, “There you go sir, 100.”
The employer looked at page and said, “You must be mad if you think that represents a hundred!”
The man leaned forward and pointed to the marks at the tree bases, and said, “A little dog came along and pooed by each tree, so now you’ve got dirty tree an’ a turd, dirty tree an’ a turd, dirty tree an’ a turd, which makes one hundred. Now when do I start the job?”
The town had been overrun by squirrels. Desperate, the Mayor brought in dozens of stray cats. Unfortunately the cats made things worse, pooping in people’s gardens, killing songbirds, and overturning trashcans. The mayor had to get rid of the predators, and soon the squirrels were back.
The owner of the hardware store humanely trapped the squirrels and set them free outside town. But three days later, the squirrels were back again, and this time they brought some of their friends from the forest.
Finally the church came up with an effective solution. They baptized the squirrels and made them members. So now the squirrels only come around on Christmas and Easter.
A lawyer had just successfully defended a major crime lord of all charges stemming from racketeering, dealing drugs, murder, kidnapping, and selling arms.
As he was leaving the courtroom, an indignant old woman grabbed him by the arm and scolded, “Young man, where are your Christian scruples? I’ve never seen such a shameless display. Why, I believe you would defend Satan himself!”
“Well, I don’t know about that,” the lawyer replied casually. “But tell me, what has your boy done?”
A man walked into a bar on a slow night and sat down. After a few minutes, the bartender asked him if he wanted a drink. The man replied, “No thanks. I don’t drink. I tried it once, but I didn’t like it.”
The bartender then asked, “Would you care for a cigarette?”
The man replied, “No thanks. I don’t smoke. I tried it once, but I didn’t like it.”
Not giving up, the bartender invited the man to play a game of pool, but again the man responded with, “No thanks. I don’t like pool. I tried it once, but I didn’t like it. As a matter of fact, I wouldn’t be here at all, but I’m waiting for my son.”
The bartender remarked, “Let me guess… Your only son?”
Sandy invited Mitch to her house for dinner. When he arrived he saw that she had a couple of dogs. As the dogs greeted the young man, he asked, “What are their names?”
“Well oldest is named ‘One’ and the other is called ‘Two'” explained Sandy.
As Mitch petted the furry critters he asked, “Why did you name them that?”
With a gleam in her eye she said, “Well I figured that when One dies, I’ll still have Two.”
In the Army, Airborne soldiers attend special training to parachute out of planes. During one particular class, the topic was on what to do in the event that the main parachute fails. After covering the basics on the reserve parachute, one soldier raised his hand.
After the instructor acknowledged the young private, he asked, “How long do we have to deploy the reserve if the main parachute malfunctions?”
Looking the troop square in the face, the instructor replied, “The rest of your life.”
The printer output on the work center began to grow faint, so the business owner called a local repair shop where a friendly man informed him that the printer probably needed only to be cleaned. Because the store charged $50 for such cleanings, he told the business owner he might be better off reading the printer’s manual and trying the job himself.
Surprised by the candor, the business owner asked, “Does your boss know that you’re discouraging business?”
“Actually, it’s my boss’s idea,” the employee replied sheepishly. “We usually make more money on repairs if we let people try to fix things themselves first.”
It seemed like the honeymoon was over before it started, and the unhappy couple decided to end their marriage after a very short time. They had already went to a marriage counselor in an attempt to reconcile, but to no avail the couple ended up in court to finalize their divorce.
The judge asked the husband, “What has brought you to this point where you are not able to keep this marriage together?”
The husband said, “In the six weeks we’ve been together, we haven’t been able to agree on a single thing.”
I suppose I should start by telling you how it happened. It was an otherwise nondescript day back in February. I went to get out of my rocker-recliner and when I scooched forward to get up, the front armrests bottomed out on the floor as they always do. Unbeknownst to me, Alex just happened to be laying down there that fateful day, and his left arm managed to get pinched.
Of course he yowled the loudest I'd ever heard him yell in his entire life and shot off into the basement. I felt terrible about it, but then I had no way of knowing he was down there when I went to get up. After a short while, Alex came back upstairs, and I was able to check for injury.
Shockingly, there were no broken bones, no blood, and Alex was able to walk just fine. It almost seemed cartoonish at the time, but down the left side of his left arm was a ribbon of flattened fur. He seemed somewhat indifferent to this, and acted like he just wanted to put the whole thing behind him. Seeing as Alex didn't appear to be in immediate danger, I took a "wait and see" position.
Over the next month, the "ribbon" began to shrink inward towards his elbow. I took this as a good sign that his injury was healing naturally and everything would be fine... But things were not fine. After a month and a half, his elbow began to swell. By mid-April I had to take him in to the vet for an exam.
The vet did a fair bit of Hmmm'ing and scrunched her face a lot. She didn't want to poke it with anything for fear it might introduce something. She took some measurements and expressed a "wait and see" attitude. I then scheduled a follow up appointment two months out.
Only a month later in mid-May, the swelling on his elbow had increased to the point that it started to ulcer. I called the vet and got him in immediately. This time they tried to drain it, but it went horribly. After the first stick, Alex started squirting blood all over the place, and the vet and technician freaked out and were running around looking for towels while I had to hold my cat down in a growing pool of his own blood.
After they got things back under control, she tried again with a larger needle, and went in from a different direction. After plunging to the center of the mass, she remarked that it was solid and that the fluid had probably dispersed into the surrounding tissue. She then went on to suggest that it might even be "malignant" and recommended a biopsy. They gave me an estimate for the procedure that ran from $500 to $800. I immediately left and made an appointment with another vet that I had gone to in the past.
The next day, my alternate vet didn't have any good news. By now, Alex's arm was very infected. At first he suggested that the arm would have to come off, but after noting Alex's age, he pulled back and recommended palliative care. I pushed for a quote on the cost of an amputation, and he informed me it would be around $3500 at the lowest, and that at his age, Alex would only live another 6 months after the surgery, and to just stick with palliative care.
They gave Alex a shot of antibiotics, a shot for long term pain management, prednisolone tablets and a liquid antibiotic, along with an appointment to come back about a month later.
Over the memorial day weekend, I cleaned Alex's wound and administered his meds. Alex was still Alex though. He obviously wanted to live, so I began making phone calls. Eventually I got in touch with the Humane Society. It took week and a half to finally get in, but after looking at Alex's arm, their surgeon said that the arm was "not compatible with long term survival" and agreed to amputate it... in two weeks.
That was the longest two weeks of my life.
Every day that thing on his elbow grew bigger and bigger. In the final week, it started to split open. It looked like something out of a horror movie. The outer layer of skin died off and eventually I had to cut the hard chunk of dried flesh off with scissors. Fortunately the antibiotics prescribed by the second vet kept the wound site free from infection.
And through all of this, Alex was still Alex. He just kept on living his life like nothing was wrong. Even with that thing on his arm, he still walked normal, climbed up and down the stairs, jumped on the bed, table, dresser, et cetera. Part of me knew this cat was gonna make it, but part of me was scared that his arm was going to go septic and Alex would die.
I felt relieved on the day of the surgery. We made it through to this day! Alex would be a tripod, but he was going to live! I dropped Alex off at the Human Society and went to work expecting to pick him up between 4:00 pm and 5:00 pm.
My phone rang a little before noon. The voice on the other end informed me that the surgery had gone fine, and they didn't notice anything wrong during the procedure, but in the recovery room, Alex's heart rate began to drop, he went non-responsive, and his pupils dilated. The surgeon explained that sometimes a blood clot will break free during the surgery and make its way into the brain. Alex had had a stroke. There was nothing more they could do.
Moments later, Alex died.
Usually I show off pictures of Gail here, (she's doing find by the way). Gail is a fun dog who loves to constantly run and play, but Alex was the one that I could really count on for affection. He would hop up on my chest when I was resting in my recliner and purr. He would be there at the door to greet me when I came home. He would keep me company when I pooped. He would wake me in the morning, and insist I gave him a thorough petting before I went to sleep at night. He talked to me with his incessant meows, and made sure I never left the house without filling the food and water bowls. Alex loved to get his "full kitty massage" complete with belly rubs, and he was the kind of cat that would walk up and headbutt me to let me know I was his as much as he was mine.
Flush Twice has been around since May of 2003. It started out as a JOTD (Joke of the Day) website. New jokes were published every weekday. Over the years, good jokes were increasingly hard to come by, and eventually they got so rare that I just stopped trying to publish them.
Since 2004 there has also been an eponymous comic. I still occasionally publish a new one on Saturdays. It’s also rare anymore, but sometimes it happens.
Here lately I’ve been posting a “Link of the Day”. For the time being, I will be featuring a new website from my enormous collection of bookmarked websites every weekday. None of it is solicited promotions, and no one is paying me to feature their site. These are just websites that at one time I thought were interesting enough to add to my bookmarks folder.
I highly encourage using some kind of ad blocking extension before clicking on any of these links. You’ll also hear me say this phrase a lot about these posts: “They can’t all be winners.” But it’s better than just leaving the site abandoned.
The jokes were generously provided by friends and visitors such as yourself. I want to express my eternal thanks to everyone over the years who helped contribute to the collection.
So what is it that makes a joke funny?
It all boils down to a sudden shift in perception. The story starts you thinking one way, then the punchline turns that thinking on its ear. The art of the joke is to craft a short story that isn’t overly contrived, then deliver a punchline that suddenly shifts your perception about the story you were being told.
Many of the jokes on this site are offensive, and I make no apologies for it. Offensive jokes work by making the reader uncomfortable through the use of a taboo subject thus enhancing the underlying humor. Without the offensive element, the joke would simply not be as funny.
