PARADOKE CORNER - #11 The Incomparable Junior Samples' Paraprosdokian Top Twenty

Paraprosdokian, two phrases, the second changing the meaning of the first, usually in a funny or humorous way. 

Folks around Sandtrap, Jawja, are right fond of their Favorite Son, Junior Samples. He was a big star on the Hee Haw television program way back when and still on cable. Junior is dead now, but he was Mercer County’s Barnyard Bard and did us proud.

Junior deserves a Top Twenty in the Paradoke Corner:

20) We been gettin’ a whole lot more aigs. Tacked us up a sign on the henhouse thet sez, ‘An aig a day keeps Col. Sanders away.’”

19) “Most of the Mayor’s speeches is like the horns of a steer. A point here. A point thair. Wid a lot of bull in between.”

18) Hiram Bell tole me, ‘My wife haz done run off wid my new best friend!’ I asks him, ‘Iz he a gud lookin’ fella?’ Hiram sed, “I don’t know. Ain’t never met the man.”

17) “Miz Tompkin’s baby pitched a big fit in town the other day. I sez, ‘Ain’t that youngun a mite spoilt?’ She sez, ‘Naw, that’s jist the way it smells.’”

16) “I dun lost mah last job ‘cauz of illness ‘n fatigue. Mah boss sed he jist plain sick an’ tired of me.”

15) “How’s yore wife?” I asks Tobe Hawks. He sez, “Compared to what?”

14) If’n you learn from mistakes, why is it some folk have more than one youngun?

13) “Roscoe wuz in the hospital fer three weeks. Then he taken a turn fur the nurse.”

12) “I sez, ‘I reckon I’ll go outside an’ see if‘n it are rainin’.’ Uncle Gus sez, ‘Thet’s a waste of time. Jist whistle fer the dog an’ see if he’s wet.’” 

11) “Mah memory is reel gud. They’s jist two thangs I cain’t recall. One is people’s names. I forgits whut the other one wuz.”

10) I asked the widow, “What wore yo’ husband’s las’ words?” She sez, “They wuz, ‘I jist don’t see how they kin sell this here fine corn likker fur two bits a quart.’”

9) “They dun served me a steak up in New Yawk thet were so rare, I seed cows back home hurt worse than that an’ git well.”

8) I tole the Doc he needed to fix up my son-in-law whut I’d just shot. Doc sez, ‘Why’d you go an’ do that to your own kin?’ I said, ‘Well, he warn’t my son-in-law when I shot him.’”

7) They had a cuttin’ an’ near riot over at the hog killin’. Ole Mac was bleedin’ bad. I sez, ‘Did you git cut in the fracas?’ He sed, ‘Nope. Hit war right here above my navel.’”

6) “Lawyer Crum iz a gud lawyer. He got Calib Swan a suspended sentence. They hung him.”

5) “Young fella asks me, ‘Kin I have yore daughter fur mah wife?’ I sez, ‘Might be interested. But I’ll have to see yore wife furst.’”

4) “They all laffed when ole Precious dun come to the party dressed lak a bird. They didn’t know he’d jist been tarred an’ feathered.”

3) “We found us a fishin’ spot that wuz real gud. We marked it for next time. Put us a big ole ‘X’ on the bottom of the boat.”

2) Det story ‘bout Jonah an’ the whale proves one thang. You jist cain’t keep a gud man down.”

And the Paradoke Corner Winner in the “Incomparable Junior Samples” Category:

1) “There ain’t much a’ goin’ on in a small town. But what you hears makes up fur hit.”

Next up in Paradoke Corner:

The Lucille Ball Tasty Bakers' Dozen (go!)

Or, check out Sandtrap, Jawja’s latest.  (Go!)

Compiled by Nick Adams, ranked and translated into near-English by Phil “Bud” Comer. Photo by Bud. Unless stated otherwise, links are for information and not the property of the author.