Free What I'd Say to the Martians by Jack Handey Page A

my uncle Lou. I thought he could make me a vice president in his company. I had had trouble reaching him by phone, so I just showed up at his office. His secretary, Shirley, tried to keep me waiting, but I just barged right in. “Hey, Uncle Lou!” I shouted. But he was gone. I looked out through the open window, and shimmying down the trellis was Uncle Lou. Shirley and I looked at each other and, together, did the glug-glug-glug sign.
    We started dating. We did glug-glug-glug everywhere. If we went to the ballet, and the male dancer did a perfect pirouette, we did glug-glug-glug. If he slipped slightly, we also did glug-glug-glug. It didn’t matter. It worked either way.
    Of course, when Shirley and I got married and the preacher said “till death do you part,” we did a little subtle glug. Looking back, maybe we should have taken the whole thing more seriously.
    Glug-glug-glug got old. Shirley and I realized that we had little in common, and that we didn’t even like each other. One night I came home with lipstick on my collar. When Shirley asked about it, all I could do was the index-finger-through-the-circled-fingers sign.
    We tried counseling, but it was hopeless. In our last session, when the counselor suddenly got up and said, “I’ve got to go do something, right now, ” we didn’t even look at each other, let alone do glug-glug-glug.
    When I read the divorce papers, I did the blowing-out-my-brains sign. For a long time, friends would come by and do the let’s-go-fishing sign or the let’s-go-to-a-museum sign (where you put your hand to your chin and act like you’re looking at a painting). But I would just do the I’m-taking-a-nap sign.
    Finally, I went to a friend’s party. Someone was up on a table, doing a funny cowboy dance. Even though the dance was really hilarious, something made me look away. There was Wendy, also laughing. She looked radiant and beautiful. Somehow I caught her eye. We smiled and, instinctively, both did the glug-glug-glug sign. Then I did the how-about-a-drink sign, which is like glug-glug-glug, only your hand is holding a glass instead of a bottle.
    When Wendy and I walked home that night, hand in hand, I couldn’t help thinking that maybe, just maybe, some things are meant to last. Perhaps in the future, outer-space aliens will land on an Earth devastated by nuclear destruction, turn to one another and make the glug-glug-glug sign.

Fuzzy Memories
     
    I think the best Thanksgiving I ever had was the one where we didn’t even have a turkey. Mom and Dad sat us kids down and explained that business hadn’t been good at Dad’s store, so we couldn’t afford a turkey. We had vegetables and bread and pie, and it was just fine.
    Later I went into Mom and Dad’s bedroom to thank them, and I caught them eating a little turkey.
    I guess that wasn’t really the best Thanksgiving.
     
     
    When we would go for a drive in the family car, I used to love to stick my head out the window, until one time we passed an oncoming car and my head knocked off a dog’s head.
     
     
    When I was seven, I told my friend Timmy Barker I would give him a million dollars if he would eat an earthworm. He ate the worm, but I never gave him the million dollars. As of last week, all I had given him was $9,840.
     
     
    One day Dad asked me to go fishing with him. I got scared. I had the feeling he was going to try to drown me. I don’t know why I thought that, because so far he had never tried to kill me. But he had never taken me fishing either, so I was suspicious.
    When we got to the lake, he walked right up to it. “Hey, son, come here,” he said. “Look at these minnows.”
    “Nice try, Dad—if that’s your real name!” I yelled. Then I ran back to the car and locked myself in.
    Dad never took me fishing again. So I think that proves my case.
     
     
    I remember when we were kids, one of our favorite games was to play “pirate.” We’d dress up like pirates. Then we’d go find an adult