Ever wonder how Otis and Gabby met? Yeah, me neither, but I’m going to tell you anyway.

Otis was riding his bicycle one day down the East Andover road and low and behold staring him in the face is a big sign sticking up out of the ground in front of an old house. The sign said, “Talking Dog For Sale”. Otis was enthralled and couldn’t resist knowing what this was. He parked his bike and went and knocked on the front door of the house.

When the door opened, there stood Gabby, looking dapper as one might imagine he could.

“The sign says you got a talking dog for sale. Is that true?” asked Otis.

“Yup,” said Gabby.

“Where is this talking dog anyway? Can I take a look at him before I think about buying him?” inquired Otis.

“Oh, sure! He’s out back. Go see him if you want,” replied Gabby.

So Gabby showed Otis the back door and Otis went out to see the dog. Gabby stayed inside. Otis approached the dog cautiously and looked him all over. The dog certainly didn’t look any different than any other dog he had ever seen.

He approached the dog house where the dog was laying. Otis stopped, looked all around to make sure no one was watching him and then says to the dog, “So, uh, like, uh, you can talk?”

Otis quickly looked all around to make sure nobody was watching as he assumed this was a joke.

The dog picked his head up and looked at Otis, yawned, stretched his front and back legs, shook himself off and says, “Yeah, I can talk! So what!”

Otis couldn’t believe it. A real live talking dog.

“If you’re so smart and can talk, why are you with this guy Gabby?” Otis asked.

“Well,” says the dog. “It’s a long story.”

“I’ve got time,” said Otis as he still couldn’t believe this dog could talk.

The dog began telling his story, “Yeah, I am retired now. I use to work for the FBI many years ago. No one knew I could talk except my master who worked for the FBI. He would send me in under cover. Because nobody knew I could talk, they didn’t pay any attention to me. I would go back to the office and tell my boss everything that happened.”

“Wow,” said Otis. “That’s impressive.”

“Then my master retired, so I went to work for the CIA, and then from there I was actually assigned to keep the President of the United States informed as to what the Democrats where up to in Congress,” the dog went on.

“Really?” asked Otis. “I can’t believe this stuff. But how did you end up with Gabby?”

“I’m getting to that!” said the dog. “After I worked for the President, he was afraid that if anyone found out what I did, they might have to kill me, so he sold me to this guy who worked for the TSA – you know, airport security. I would run around sniffing suitcases and strange looking packages and then go tell my master what was in them. Made him look like a genius.”

“But how did you end up here?” Otis insisted.

“One day, I woke up and my master was dead.” the dog replied. “He was the last person on earth that knew I could talk. I figured that this was my chance to become a regular dog, so I retired. No body wanted an old regular dog, so I ended up at the Humane Society down in Rumford where Gabby found me. He brought me home and took good care of me. After a while, I felt comfortable with him and I figured he wasn’t too bright, so I told him my whole story. Next thing I know, he’s got me up for sale.”

“You just wait here. I’ll buy you and take you home. I’ll be right back.” Otis said to the dog and proceeded to go inside and find this guy Gabby.

Gabby was sitting on the front steps eating a piece of chocolate creme pie. Otis came out the front door trying to act non-chalantly about this talking dog.

He says to Gabby, “Uh, er, you know that dog can talk right?”

“Yup!” said Gabby.

“Okay,” said Otis. “How much you want for him?”

Gabby thought for a minute and says, “Ten bucks.”

Otis reached in his pocket and quickly pulled out ten bucks and handed it over to Gabby. After Gabby had put the ten bucks in his pocket, Otis says, “I don’t get it! You have a dog that can talk. He seems like a good dog, well behaved and you want to sell him for ten bucks. WHY?”

Gabby replied, “I know he can talk, but he didn’t do all them things he said he did!”

Otis showed up at the bandstand on the common in Andover one warm morning and sat down next to Gabby.

“Chewdoin?” ask Gabby.

“Nuttin,” replied Otis.

“What you got stuck in your ear there, Otis?” inquired Gabby. “It looks like a hearing aid.”

“It is!” said Otis. “But it don’t work.”

“Why do you have it in your ear then, Otis, if it don’t work?” came the next question from Gabby.

“When people see it, they’ll think I’m hard of hearing and they’ll talk louder,” answered Otis.

Would you believe it? Otis and Gabby were standing down beside the bridge that crosses over the Ellis River, doing not much of anything when a BMW came to a screeching halt right beside them.

The driver yells out, “Do you know how to get to Route 17?”

Otis took off his hat and scratched his head for a second and answers, “Nope.”

“Do you know how to get to the Maine Turnpike?” asked the driver again.

Otis continued to scratch at his head, “Nope.”

The driver looking a bit perplexed asks, “Do you know which road will take me south toward Portland?”

Otis looked at Gabby and Gabby looked at Otis and then Otis replied, “Nope.”

Mad as all heck, the driver says, “You don’t know anything do you, you fool!”

Just then Gabby spoke up and said, “Maybe Otis don’t know nothin but he ain’t lost now is he!”

Most people don’t know that Gabby spent some time in the nut house in Augusta. After spending quite a bit of time there, they were considering letting Gabby go home.

What they didn’t realize from day one was Gabby grew up hanging around Otis and much of Otis had rubbed off on Gabby. Gabby had learned to be a pretty good bullshitter.

Before they were to let Gabby go, the head physician needed to interview Gabby one last time to make sure he felt certain that he would be alright.

The interview went like this:

Doc: “What are you going to do with the rest of your life?”

Gabby: “It would be wonderful to get back to real life and if I do, I will certainly refrain from making my former mistake.

I was a nuclear physicist, you know, and it was the stress of my work in weapons research that helped put me here. If I am released, I shall confine myself to work in pure theory, where I trust the situation will be less difficult and stressful.”

Doc: “That’s excellent! Good idea.”

Gabby: “Or else I might teach. There is something to be said for spending one’s life mentoring a new generation of scientists.”

Doc: “What a fantastic solution.”

Gabby: “Then again, I might write. There is considerable need for books on science for the general public. Or I might even write a novel based on my experiences in this fine institution.”

Doc: “I guess that would be a good choice if you think that is what you want to do.”

Gabby: “But if I find that none of these things I like and I don’t want to really do, I’ll keep on being a tea cup!”

One night Otis was sound asleep in his saddleback cot that he sleeps on in one corner of his one room cabin, when the telephone rang and precisely 3:30 a.m.

“Hello?” Otis said barely able to comprehend anything before him.

“This is your neighbor! I just called to let you know that your dog is barking and it is keeping me and my wife awake,” the nasty neighbor yelled into the phone and then abrupty hung up on Otis.

Otis crawled back into his bed and went to sleep.

The next night as Otis was getting ready for bed, he dug around among the dirty clothes, etc. and located his alarm clock. He set it for precisely 3:30 a.m.

At precisely 3:30 a.m., his alarm sounded and Otis quickly got up, walked over to his phone and dialed up his neighbor.

Waking the neighbor and of course enjoying every minute of it, Otis quickly said to his irate listener, “This is your neighbor! I just called to let you know that I don’t have a dog!”

Jean Larouix from Lewiston run an ad in the Lewiston Daily Sun. He wanted to sell his old horse. Jean was well into his 80s and had migrated down to Lewiston many years ago from Canada.

He placed his ad in the “for sale – livestock” section. The add read something like this”

“For Sale. One faithful old horse. She no look too good though”

The next day he got a phone call from someone interested. After talking for a short bit on the phone, the caller showed up at Jean’s house to see the horse.

“That horse looks good enough to me,” he said. “How much you want for her?”

“I’ll take $100.00. No less,” said Jean.

The man paid Jean, loaded the horse into the trailer and headed on home. The next morning Jean got a phone call from the new horses owner.

“Geez um crow!” the man yelled. “You didn’t tell me the horse was blind!”

“It said right in the newspaper,” Jean exclaimed. “I show you!”

Jean went inside and emerged shortly with a copy of the ad, “Right here! I say “She no look too good.”

Hard to believe but it might actually be true.

You see, Otis and Gabby were sitting in front of Mill’s Market looking for something to do. Otis says to Gabby, “Gabby I heard that fella that just moved here from New Jersey, ain’t feelin too good.”

“What’s the matter with him, Otis?” asked Gabby.

“I heard he had cancer real bad and he’s only got about 6 weeks left to live”, said Otis.

“Well,” replied Gabby. “I think he better go on back down to New Jersey and spend the rest of his days there.”

To which Otis sat in pure amazement at what Gabby said and barked back, “Why on earth would he want to leave such a lovely place as Andover, Maine?”

“Well,” said Gabby. “I heard that living in New Jersey, six months seems like six years!”

An anonymous reader sent me this bit racey tidbit about a few humanpeeves? as viewed by your pet dog.

I’ve Got 10 Human Peeves To Talk About:

1. Blaming your farts on me… not funny… not funny at all !!!

2. Yelling at me for barking . . . I’M A FRIGGIN’ DOG, YOU IDIOT!

3. Taking me for a walk, then not letting me check stuff out. Exactly whose walk is this anyway?

4. Any trick that involves balancing food on my nose . . . stop it!

5. Any haircut that involves bows or ribbons. Now you know why we chew your stuff up when you’re not home.

6. The sleight of hand, fake fetch throw. You fooled a dog! Whoooo Hoooooooo – what a proud moment for the top of the food chain.

7. Taking me to the vet for “the big snip”, then acting surprised when I freak out every time we go back!

8. Getting upset when I sniff the crotches of your guests. Sorry, but I haven’t quite mastered that handshake thing yet.

9. Dog sweaters. Hello ???, Haven’t you noticed the fur?

10. How you act disgusted when I lick myself. Look, we both know the truth . . . you’re just jealous.

Now lay off me on some of these thing’s.

We both know who’s boss here . . .

You don’t see me picking up your poop do you ?

Gabby says to Otis, “Otis, the other day I saw my cousin Fred’s drivers license and one thing they put on your license is what color your hair is.”

“That’s right,” said Otis. “They want to know all that kinda stuff about you. How tall you are, how much you weigh, you know.”

“Hey, Otis,” asked Gabby. “What do you put down if your bald?”

“Oh shut up, Gabby, will ya!”

When this tactic, played out in many places across America, rears its ugly head, I head in the other direction. You see, it is one of them touchy-feely things. “If you were an animal, what kind would you be?” That sort of garbage.

One time I recall being at a camp with a bunch of people, including three women visiting the area from northern Ireland. Sure enough, even with no alcohol present, the weirdos got into the “If you were an animal” thing and that’s when I made like a dog that had to pee real bad and went outside.

Shortly thereafter, I was joined by two of the three ladies from Ireland. The conversation was light for a bit until one lady named Kate says to me in a thick Irish accent, “Tom, what the hell’s up with that sh$@? Why are they doing those f&*@%&! things, Tom?”

I just shook my head in disgust. Kate then blasted back with, “You f^#*^@% Americans! You always have to analyze everything to death!”

Which is the case and leads me to the events of 1969 in the deep woods north of Andover, Maine. When deer hunting season came around, Otis would head back, deep into the woods well beyond the Sawyer Brook Road. It was nearly an all day trek to get into the camp his grandfather had left him years ago. Otis doesn’t hunt anymore and he hasn’t been to that camp for years.

It was a very cold, snowy day. Otis had been out hunting earlier in the day and had come back to camp for some lunch and a nap before trying his luck again before dark. He threw a couple of logs in his stove, grabbed his single shot 30-30 Winchester, and headed out. No one ever came around there so Otis never locked the place up.

What Otis didn’t know was not too far away three Massachusetts hunters (and I am using that term loosely) were lost. Of the three lost men, one was an engineer, one a psychologist and the other a professor of theology.

Tired, scared and hungry, the three men trudged on thinking the were headed in the right direction. Soon, they came upon Otis’ camp. They looked around for a moment and saw noone, so they knocked on the door – no answer. They checked and door was unlocked, so they went inside.

Upon entering the camp, the three men quickly noticed that the wood stove that Otis used to stay warm was suspended from the beams supporting the roof of the camp. Long strands of wire wrapped around the stove and went up to the rafter beams leaving the stove about 3 feet off the floor. All three men were quite fascinated by the wood stove.

The shrink began first, “Very interesting. It is obvious that the old man, perhaps a trapper or just a recluse from society, a loner, has done this in order to lie down underneath the stove, probably does so in the fetal position, in order to vicariously experience the return to his mother’s womb.”

“Nonsense!” said the engineer. “This man is without a doubt, and extremely brilliant man. Perhaps so brilliant that he has difficulty fitting in with our complex society. He is indeed practicing the laws of thermodynamics. I believe by looking at this he may have actually discovered a new way of more evenly dispursing heat throughout his humble living quarters.”

“No,no,no! You both have it all wrong!” piped in the professor of theology. “Have you no sense of religious wonder. We have known since the beginning of time that the “lifting up of fire” is symbolic of placing God above all else. This man has come here to get closer to his God.”

Just then the door flew open and in walked Otis. He was a bit surprised and the three men quickly explained to Otis why they were there.

“Fine” said Otis. “I’ll take you out in the morning. It’s too late now to go.”

Still fascinated by the stove and each educated man wanting to prove himself right, the engineer first spoke up about the stove.

“Say, Otis” he began. “Did you suspend your stove like that because you have found a new way of equally dispersing energy that comes from the combustion of fuels like your wood?”

“No! said the shrink.”He did it because he is trying to re-live his moments just prior to birth.”

“Not true” yelled the professor. “He’s more in touch with God!”

“Actually” said Otis. “I had a lot of wire laying around and not much stove pipe.”

Again, my friends over at the “Wizbang” blog have posted yet another story of stupid bank robbers. Go check it out. This one’s a good un.

Otis and Gabby were engaged in heated conversation one day while sitting on the steps of the Town Hall. Otis always gets frustrated with Gabby because he just is too damned stupid. You’ve heard the expression, “He ain’t got a clue”? Well, in Gabby’s case, he don’t even suspect.

So, for some unbeknownst reason, Otis mentioned to Gabby something in one of his rantings about damned communists and of course Gabby got confused.

“Otis,” he said. “I don’t know what a communist is. I sure wished you’d stop using them big words. You know you are smarter than me.”

Well, Otis thought for a minute and said to Gabby, “I’m going to give you a lesson in politics that I think even a moron like you can get.”

With that, Otis began to explain to Gabby all about the different kinds of societies all over the planet. It went something like this:

“This is what socialism is Gabby,” he began. “If you have two cows, you keep one and have to give the other one to ya neighbor.

Now communism is different, Gabby. If you live in a communist country and you have two cows, they come and take em both away from ya and then give you back some of the milk.

Fascism ain’t any better, Gabby. With facsism, they come and take your two cows and then they make you buy the milk back from them if you want any milk for the kids.

Bureaucracy is really kinda hard to explain but I think you might get this. If you got two cows, the government comes and takes them both. Then they take one of them cows and they take it out and shoot it. The other one they milk it. Then they come to your house and pay you for the milk before they dump it out on the ground.

Hang in there with me Gabby. Now capitalism is good Gabby. With capitalism, you got two cows, you sell one and then go buy farmer Bailey’s old bull. That way you can have more cows to sell.

But if you live in the corporate world it’s kinda screwed up. In the corporate world, if you got two cows, they’ll make ya sell one of em and then make you get more milk out of the one cow than the old girl can handle. Then they wonder why the damned cow dropped dead.

When you live in a Demcracy it can be confusin too Gabby. In a democracy, if you got two cows, the government is going to make you pay taxes on both of them cows. They’re gonna charge you more than you can afford, so you have to sell em both in order to help pay for a man who lives half way around the world who only has one cow that was given to him by our government.”

“Wow!” said Gabby. “Which one we live in, Otis?”

“Oh, shut up will you!” answered Otis

This “over coffee” joke was sent to me by Rod Davis in West Virginia!

A man and his wife were sitting in the living room and he said to her, “Just so you know, I never want to live in a vegetative state, dependent on some machine and fluids from a bottle. If that ever happens, just pull the plug.”

His wife got up, unplugged the TV and threw out all of his beer.

Otis and Gabby had nothing to do one day – no really, they didn’t – so they thought they’d wander on down to Marston’s Garage and see what Gary was up to. When they arrived, they saw Gary tinkerin on a nice Mercedes that belonged to old Doc Willis.

Otis and Gabby grabbed a coke from the cooler and sat down in Gary’s old metal Adirondack chairs and watched. Pretty soon Doc Willis arrived back at the garage wanting to get his car. He was in a bit of a hurry.

Doc Willis asked, “Is my car ready yet?”

To which Gary replied, “Almost. I just got to finish buttonin it back up.”

Old Doc Willis began to walk away and then turned back to Gary and inquired, “Do you know how much this is going to cost me?”

Gary replied, “Ayuh, I got a good idea!”

“Well, how much? I’ll write you out a check while I wait,” said Doc.

“It’s gonna be fifteen hundred dollars by the time I git er done!” exclaimed Gary.

“Fifteen hundred dollars!” yelled ole Doc. “That seems pretty expensive to get my valves ground down and a couple a new pistons!”

About then Otis pipes up, “Not really, Doc. You see, Gary’s about as good a mechanic as there is and his job is just as important as your job. Why, them cars is pretty technical and complicated these days you know. Now, we know you charge a lot for a fixed heart and we know a man can’t live without a workin heart and you can’t drive your car without a fixed up motor. I guess Gary’s got the right to charge just as much. He’s just as smart as you are!”

And of course Gabby agreed completely with Otis’ assessment of things. I’m not sure Gary did but he really didn’t care much one way or the other.

After hearing that bull from Otis, Old Doc Willis chimed in one last time, “Is that a fact, Otis? Well, then if Gary’s such a good mechanic and if he is a smart as I am and can do the same technical and scientific things I can do, then I want to see him grind those valves and replace them pistons while the car is running!”

An “Old Geezah” sent me this story yesterday. I don’t think he wanted me to use his name and after you read the story, you may better understand why.

“An out of stater was visiting in Maine, and was having a discussion with an old time Maine native. The visitor struck a sore spot when he said: “You Mainers never pronounce your “R’s”. The old fellow replied. “Oh yes we do, and I’ll tell ya why!” “If you leave the “r” out of s-h-i-r-t, what would you have left?”

Credit this to: The Old Geezer