Quips and Quotes
The Tr Trimmers
Who'll decorate the Christmas tree
With gayly colored spheres?
Everybody!
Who'll drape the ropes of silver beads
Round and round in tiers?
Everybody!
Who'll put the twinkling star on top
And spray the limbs with snow?
Everybody!
Who'll string the lights from branch to branch
To set the tree aglow?
Everybody!
Who'll hang the shimmering tinsel
On its houghs from base to crown?
Everybody!
And on the second of January,
Who'll help Mother take it down?
Nobody!
Suaanne Douglat
Snowbound
Although the streets and walks are clear
And passable, my little dear
Plows bravely home from school through all
The drifts and piles of last week's fall;
And barring thaw or freakish parch,
He'll keep on doing it through March!
Betty Isler
it?
-A
1L
"Good heavens! Throw me your wallet!"
A wife had been busily reading the Sunday
newspaper when she suddenly looked up. "This
is very interesting," she said to her husband.
"This article says scientists predict that in 10
years people will wear clothes which can be dis-
carded after being worn only once."
"That guy is way off schedule," the husband
replied sourly. "Why, you've got a closetful of
that kind right now!" Jim Henry
You're an old-timer if you can remember when,
around this time of year, you counted your bless
ings instead of your calories. Anna Herbert
An elderly matron purchased a used car to do
her shopping in and stopped by to have her
friend's husband look it over.
The man inspected it with some doubt and
finally asked: "Well, it may be all right. What's
the most you ever got out of it?"
The woman thought a moment and replied:
"Six times in one mile." Wilfred Beaver
BOB HOPE
(Continued from page 5)
box stuffed with goodies. A sign on it read:
"Merry Christmas, Bob."
Everywhere, the fellows have treated the girls
in our troupe with tremendous respect and that
is rare for guys who have not seen a woman in
months! I'll never forget Jayne Mansfield's ar
rival at Wake Island when 2,000 voices sang out
with joy as she bounced off the plane. Three min
utes later the airfield was deserted. Everyone
had followed Jayne to the beach to watch her
take a dip in her ermine bikini.
There have been a few close calls on our Christ
mas trips. I suppose the worst was over Anchor
age, Alaska, when our plane was caught in a sleet
storm at 13,000 feet. Our radios went dead and
all contact with the field was lost. As we circled
around, hoping for a break in the weather, the
pilot told us to put on our parachutes and Mae
West jackets.
Down below. General Bruckner, commander of
the base, was getting pretty nervous, too. He
knew we didn't have enough fuel to make another
airstrip, so he ordered every antiaircraft search
light on the base turned on. The beam of just one
light penetrated the heavy cover, but it made it
possible for our pilot to drop down quickly
through the clouds for a landing.
I'm sure that if it hadn't been for that split
second glimmer of light, I would not have been
around to win $15 putting against Arnold Palmer
a few weeks ago in our golf sequence for the
film, "Call Me Bwana."
There was another flying incident I'd just as
soon forget. We'd been performing at the Bayo
net Bowl in Korea, and I hated to leave those
marvelous guys who kept pleading for us to go
on. I must have been on the 15th chorus of "But
tons and Bows," singing to guitar accompaniment
while the rest of the band members were pack
ing their instruments into the big helicopter
parked a couple of hundred feet behind the stage.
OFF stage, I could see the pilot was beginning
to worry because the weather was closing in.
Finally, he held up a crude sign telling me to get
into the copter fast When I did, the rotor
blades wouldn't move until someone kicked the
shaft a couple of times. When we finally did take
off, the visibility was practically zero. "I just
hope you can still find your way back," I apolo
gized to the pilot.
"Don't worry. Bob," he smiled. "We'll fly in
this direction, and if we hear shots we'll know
it's the wrong way."
We got through all right. But the very next
day, we lost a copter to enemy ground fire in the
same area.
The only real embarrassment I've ever had was
purely a technical problem. One Christmas in
Hollandia, New Guinea, we were out in front of
2,000 men when the mikes went dead. Everyone
in the audience started yelling, and I felt terri
ble: who can be funny when nobody is able to
hear you? Since then, I have always insisted that
our engineers check the equipment ahead of time.
If they find a bug, they can fix it before it's too
late. Sometimes, that in itself has been pretty
funny.
During the Christmas of 1960, we were with
the garrison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba (see
photo on page 5). On Christmas Eve I attended
midnight Mass and watched with surprise as the
priest came down the aisle giving short sermons
at each individual row of worshipers.
I turned to Jack Shea, our director, and whis
pered: "Look at that. He's working like Billy
Graham I've never seen a priest do that before."
"He has no choice," Jack whispered back. "We
swiped his P.A. system for the show."
But because it was Christmas, I knew that he
wouldn't mind.
ram. Ill nvrfcly. Drctmbtr 13, IM2