A TLC Publication Volume 1, Issue 14 June 9, 1999

My grandfather worked in a blacksmith shop when he was a boy, and he used to tell me, when I was a little boy myself, how he had toughened himself up so he could stand the rigors of blacksmithing.

One story was how he had developed his arm and shoulder muscles. He said he would stand outside behind the house and, with a 5 pound potato sack in each hand, extend his arms straight out to his sides and hold them there as long as he could. After awhile he tried 10 pound potato sacks, then 50 pound potato sacks and finally he got to where he could lift a 100 pound potato sack in each hand and hold his arms straight out for more than a full minute!

Next, he started putting potatoes in the sacks!

After months of negotiation, a Jewish scholar from Odessa was granted permission to visit Moscow. He boarded the train and found an empty seat.

At the next stop a young man got on and sat next to him. The scholar looked at the young man and thought: "This fellow doesn't look like a peasant, and if he isn't a peasant he probably comes from this district. If he comes from this district, he must be Jewish because this is, after all, the Jewish district."

"On the other hand, if he is a Jew where could he be going? I'm the only one in our district who has permission to travel to Moscow. Wait - just outside Moscow there is a little village called Samvet, and you don't need special permission to go there."

"But why would he be going to Samvet? He's probably going to visit one of the Jewish families there and there are just two of them - the Bernsteins and the Steinbergs. The Bernsteins are a terrible family, so he must be visiting the Steinbergs."

"But why is he going? The Steinbergs have no sons and three daughters, so maybe he's their son-in-law. But if he is, then which daughter did he marry? Sarah married that nice lawyer from Budapest and Esther married a businessman from Zhadomir, so it must be Sarah's husband. Which means that his name is Alexander Cohen, if I'm not mistaken."

"But if he comes from Budapest, with all the anti-Semitism they have there, he must have changed his name. What's the Hungarian equivalent of Cohen? Kovacs. But if he changed his name he must have some special status. What could it be? A doctorate from the University."

At this point the scholar turns to the young man and said,

"How do you do, Dr. Kovacs?"

"Very well, thank you, sir" answered the startled passenger.

"But how is it that you know my name?"

"Oh," replied the scholar, "it was obvious".

The little boy greeted his grandmother with a hug and said,

"I'm so happy to see you grandma. Now maybe daddy will do the trick he has been promising us."

The grandmother was curious. "What trick is that my dear?"

The little boy replied, "I heard daddy tell mommy that he

would climb the walls if you came to visit us again."

A patient says, "I think I'm an umbrella."

The psychiatrist says, "A cure is possible if you'll open up."

The patient says, "Why? Is it raining?"

People always say that hard work never killed anybody. Oh yeah ???

When's the last time you ever heard of anyone who "rested to death".