Here is a joke that I
remember from elementary school:
After a long day of travelling and selling, a traveling
salesman pulls off the road into the first hotel he’s seen in many miles. Relieved and weary, he asks the front
desk person for a room. “Sorry stranger,
all we got is room 13, and no one wants to stay there.”
“Oh I think Room 13 would be just perfect, I’ll take it.”
“Sir, room 13… it’s… well it’s haunted sir.”
“Listen, I’ll be in and out so quick I promise you I won’t notice anything, please just let me have the room.”
“Alright sir, but don’t say I didn’t warn you!”
“Oh I think Room 13 would be just perfect, I’ll take it.”
“Sir, room 13… it’s… well it’s haunted sir.”
“Listen, I’ll be in and out so quick I promise you I won’t notice anything, please just let me have the room.”
“Alright sir, but don’t say I didn’t warn you!”
Entering Room 13, the salesman finds nothing out of the
ordinary, just your average dingy American hotel room. Quickly disrobing, he gets into
bed. As his thoughts begin to fade
away into blissful sleep, he is brought back to full alterness by a faint
whisper, “When… over… die…”.
Sitting up, he thinks that he is delirious with exhaustion
and it must be his head playing tricks on him. He rolls over, settles in again, and makes another go of
sleeping. He begins to drift again
but now hears, a bit louder this time, “When
the… over… must die…”
Convinced he really just needs to be with the sandman tout
suite, he rolls to the other side and places multiple pillows over his
head. It’s no use, the same eerie
sound comes forth again, stronger still: “When
the… rolls over all must die…”.
At this point the salesman is fully convinced it’s not just
in his head. He searches the hotel
room – under the bed, in the side table by the bible, behind the curtains, and
he finds nothing. A surprisingly
clean room. Now delirious with
exhaustion and skeptical of his sanity, he hesitantly creeps back under the
covers. Before his head even hits
the pillow, it returns! “When the log rolls over, all must die.”
Without hesitation, he dresses and goes to the front
desk. Before any words are out of
his mouth, the reception clerk says, “I tried to warn you!”. The salesman pleads with the clerk to
help him inspect the room, and the clerk laconically obliges, making a brief
search of the room before patting the salesman on the back, offering him some
ear plugs, and returning to his post.
Trying to calm himself and avoiding direct eye-contact with
the clock, the salesman returns to the bed. He assures himself he can get through whatever challenges
this log and its rolling might present.
He steadies himself and lies down.
Not a minute later he hears, louder than ever, “WHEN THE LOG ROLLS OVER ALL MUST DIE!”, and again and again, with increasing
intensity and volume. He moves
towards the sound, and he finds himself kneeling the bathroom, gazing at the
closed toilet bowl which he has up to know somehow failed to investigate. Shaking, he cracks the lid and peers
in. He beholds a horrible site: a
line of ants, single file, marching astride a giant, slowly rotating turd,
chanting in unison WHEN THE LOG ROLLS
OVER ALL MUST DIE!!!!
There was a similar
joke with a gorilla in a linen closet, picking his nose and saying to his
booger, “I gotcha where I want ya and now I’m gonna eatcha!”. Why gorillas? Why ants? Who
knows.
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