Random Acts of Silliness

"I've asked you never to call me that."

Yesterday I was standing on the corner, talking to my neighbor Joe, while Dusty, the elderly pup, rested on the sidewalk, worn out from our one-block walk. As Joe and I discussed movies, as we often do, and the Golden Globes, and other highly intellectual, important cultural stuff like that there, an old guy drove up and stopped. Long white hair. Long beard. Looked kinda like a mall Santa out of uniform. The old guy rolled down the window, and yelled, "What do you call a smart blond?" In unison, we said, "What?" The old guy yelled, "A Golden Retriever!"

Dusty looked up at me, as if to say, "Hey! I'm a Yellow Lab, not a Golden Retriever." I could've pointed that out. I could've said, "What a lame sexist joke!" But all I did was laugh like it was the funniest joke ever. I needed a good laugh, even if the joke was dumb. Joe and I both laughed at the random silliness of it all. It's not often someone yells a joke out the car window. They might yell other things that tell you where to stick it. They might flip you off in traffic. But a joke? That's pretty rare. On top of which, the old guy's timing wasn't half-bad. He gets extra points for that. Now he just needs to work on the material.