Fire Chief
 
 

"Say, Fred!"

"Yes, Charlie?"

"Will you kindly step over here a moment?"

"I can't I'm busy polishing the fire house."

"You've got this fire house polished up now until you’re endangering the life of the men. You almost killed Fred Simpson the other day, he couldn't get a grip on the pole!"

"I'm sorry."

"Oh, ho ho ho, that's marvelous, he's sorry, ha ha ha, come here!"

"Yes."

"Would you kindly explain to me, in heaven's name, what you possibly had in that brain of yours at that three alarm fire yesterday afternoon?"

"What's the matter? I was the first one to the top of the house."

"Oh ho ho ho. Isn't that marvelous, he was the first one to the top of the house. That makes everything fine! Will you kindly tell me, in heaven's name, why, when you were carrying that old lady, down from the third floor, why, in front of all those people, you dropped her from the second?"

"Well, to tell you the truth, the old lady was laughing and scratching like a schoolgirl, she hadn't had a bath for six months, and she annoyed me and I got mad and dropped her."

"Isn't that marvelous! He got mad and dropped her! Do you realize you sent the fire department back thirty-five years with that one move!?"

"You'll be sorry enough before I get through. I'm going to see the chief!”

from "Blowing His Mind (and yours too!)

transcribed by Michael Monteleone