Sam Venable regaled the Authors Guild members at their February 6, 2020 meeting with tales of how he started writing and his experiences working as a columnist for the Knoxville News Sentinel. After his talk, members could browse through several of his sixteen titles he brought with.

His latest book is The Joke’s on You! Subtitled: All I did was clean out my files

A couple jokes from the book:

A Hindu holy man, a rabbi, and a newspaper columnist were traveling together and experienced car trouble far out of town. They hiked for miles and finally came upon a small farmhouse. The farmer welcomed them and offered them a place to stay for the night. “Only one problem,” he said. “We ain’t’ got but two extra beds. One of you is gonna sleep in the barn.”

The holy man said, “I’m humble and will be glad to sleep in the barn.” Off he went. A few minutes later, he was  back.”There is a cow in the barn” he explained. “It is against my beliefs to sleep that close to a cow.”

“No problem,” said the rabbi. “I’m humble and will take the barn.” A few minutes later, he too was back. “There is a pig in the barn,” he said. “It is against my beliefs to sleep that close to a pig.”

There was nothing the columnist could do but accept his fate. “See you both in the morning,” he said, setting out for the barn.

A few minutes later, there was a knock at the door. It was the cow and the pig.

---

When the doctor called Cal with test results, he said, “Brace yourself; I’ve got bad news and worse news.”

“Gimme the bad first,” Cal said.

“You’ve got an incurable disease and only have twenty-four hours to live.”

“My God! What could be worse than that?!” Cal yelled into the phone.

The doctor answered, “I’ve been trying to reach you since yesterday.”