JUST INCIDENTAL AND ACCIDENTAL
Being Merely Little Quips and Jests About People You Know. Mostly Sent in over the Phone
But a Few Evolved from Dreams and Visions
In a Far Country.
Councilman Mike Bauer returned a couple
of weeks ago from his visit to the Father
land, lie confesses that after having visited
with his good old mother, and renewed a
few boj-hood acquaintances, he began honing
for the little old United States.
"I was walking up a busy strreet in Ber
lin one day," says Mr. Bauer, "when a man
noticed that I was using a cigar lighter in
a way to conflict with the rather strict re
gulations of that country. He stopped me
and gave me a caution and then said:
"I judge you are from the United States."
"I said I was and added that I was from
Lincoln, Nebraska.
"Why, I'm from Geneva," exclaimed my
new found acquaintance. 'I was born in
Fillmore county. Do you know Frank
Brown of Lincoln?'
"Sure," I said.
"Say, it was good to meet somebody from
home, and we two stuck closer together than
a cockleburr to a sheep's pelt after that. We
were together in France, and we sailed for
home on the same boat. And when we
caught sight of the Statute of Liberty in
New York harbor, and saw the old flag
floating near by, we just shook hands, wiped
a few tears from our eyes and declared with
emphasis that there wasn't a prettier flag
anywhere, nor a country half so great and
neither is there any particular force in thf
good as this good old United States of ours."
Good Enough Mroagn.
Col. Al Sorensen of Omaha still continues
his bushwa about being the will-be senator.
The other day a friend who seems deficient
in the sense of humor met Col. Sorensen on
Farnam street and said:
" 'Al, you really don't stand any show
of ever being senator from Nebraska. Why
do you keep that sort of thing up so long?'
"Great Scott!" exclaimed Colonel Soren
sen. "Did you ever try to fill the
columns of a weekly newspaper with bright
stuff every week?"
" 'No, I never did,' confessed the jour
nalist's friend.
"Then that explains your fool question!"
said Colonel Sorensen. "When I can't think
of anything else to fill up I can always fill
a lot of space with stuff about being the
will-be senator"
Great Parade.
An inebriated individual who had ac
cumulated his load by -drinking the usual
kill-at-forty-rods brand of whisky retailed
by "bottleggers" in this drouth-stricken
city, was weaving westward on O street the
other evening, just as the ornamental street
lights were turned on.
"B'gosh, here comes political . prosljgs
sion," murmured his jaglets. "Reg'lar F--fashioned
torshlight p'rade. Guessh I'll
have t' watch it."
Leaning up against a letterbox his jaglets
watched the ''parade" for quite a bit, then
he balanced himself precariously on his un
steady legs, and started on with the re
mark :
"Won'ful prade. Ish already taken hour
to pash given point an' still eomin'. I got
ter fin' out whosh candidate it th' club's
btfoshin."
Statistical.
"I noticed your article about the Bea
trice Creamery Co. having sold 5,000,000
pounds of butter in one sale," remarked
Fred Kind the other day. "Having some
little knowledge of figures I got out my pen
cil and Avent to work.
"Now I calculate that a pound of butter
will butter 120 buskwheat cakes, and that
buckwheat cakes, such as we get at the re
staurants, will average about six to the inch
in thickness. Therefore a pound of butter
will lubricate just twelve inches of buck
wheats. Five million pounds of butter
would lubricate sixty million inches of
buckwheate. That would be a stack of Mea
dow Gold lubricated buckwheats 947 miles
high. If each cake averaged six inches in
diameter this bunch of cakes .would, if laid
edge to edge in a straight line, reach 56,810
miles. This would put a girdle of cakes
twice around the earth, and leave a few
thousand miles of cakes over to form a bow
knot. There 's something fascinating about
this statistical game, especially when one is
dealing with such a toothsome dainty as
buckwheat cakes properly spread with Mea
dow Gold butter."
Digital Voci;'ration.
Here is a good story that is worth re
peating, and it will be enjoyed by all lovers
of the good ones, regardless of race, creed
or color:
A couple of Hebrews starrted down town
one bitterly cold morning, and found to their
dismay that cars were not running. So they
started off on their long walk, hands thrust
in pockets and heads bent over to avoid the
chilling wind. Not a word was said for
several blocks, then Ikestein turned to
Blockstein and said :
"Vy don't you said something. Block
stein?" - ,
"Say it yourselluf an' freeze your own
hands," growled Blockstein.
The Point of View.
"That good luck or ill luck depends whol
ly upon the point of view is illustrated by a
true story," remarked Pell Barrows th;
other day. "Last Sunday in the game be
tween the Antelopes and the Detroit Tigers
i t Capital Beach, Jack Thomas slammed the
I all into deep left. 'Wild Bill' Donovan
Avent after it. The ball lit near the fenc?
and rolled nearer. There happened to b?
a hole under the fence. Just as Donovan
reached for the ball a boy's hand was thrust
through the hole and grabbed it. The boy's
hand was quickly withdrawn and Donovan
was compelled to get back to position with
out it.
"Now that was a bit of luck for Jack, for
it allowed him a home run. It was hard
luck for Donovan, for it deprived him of
an opportunity to hold Jack at third base."
Delayed in Transmission.
A few weeks ago Will Maupin's Weekly
quoted Leo Soukup as a witness for the
prosecution in the charge that the average
Englishman is slow to catch the point of a
joke, Soukup 's partner, Truman, being used
as an example. Now here is another one
that Soukup tells on Truman, and says that
Truman is the one who confessed it.
While an apprentice boy in a London in
stitution years ago Truman was stricken
with a severe toothache. The landlady where
he roomed told him that rum held in the
mouth would cure the ache, and kindly gave
him a bottle of it. Truman wouldn't use
liquor, but he had a roommate who would.
The next morrning the' rum was gone, and
Truman's roommate and declared that rum
evaporated something frightful.
"Yes, sir," said Truman's roommate,
"that rum just naturally evaporated last
night. It's ust awful the way rum will eva
porate." Truman accepted the explanation. Just
eight years later, while Truman was work
ing in a shop in Baltimore, he suddenly laid
down his tools and began laughing.
"What's the matter?" asked a fellow
workman.
"Why, that fellow drank that rum!"
shouted Truman.
Battling for Governor
Unconsciously, perhaps, Senator Bartling
has launched a rather promising guberna
torial boom for himself. Not only has he
made a host of friends among the lovers of
clean and healthy sport, but he has added
to the hold he already had upon the organ
ized wage earners of the state. Senator
Bartling introduced the Sunday baseball bill
and made a gallant fight for it. Had it not
uecJl l.vi pcLbv puiiuus un liic uuc isiuc auu
on the other side an executive search for
any old excuse to defeat the measure, it
would have carried. That the bill meets
with the approval of two-thirds of the peo
ple of the state is beyond question. In ad
dition to making staunch friends of the
lovers of the national game, Senator Bart
ling already has a, host of friends in the
ranks cf organized labor. He is a member
of the Brotherhood of Railway Trainmen,
1 jl i.' i ci? j. ' J.T. . ;i i
a; id iiiiuugxi ins exj-uns uie raiiiuau.iueu
hnv? secured several beneficial measures.
Notable among these is the ''service card"
la-v and the sixteen'-hour- law: Senator
Bartling is a virile upstanding young man
of more than ordianry ability, who has a
happy knack of making friends and hold
ing them. lie is going to be talked about
in connection with the republican nomina
tion for governor in 1912.