Holiday Gems from My Grandfather

When you get my grandfather to sit down at the dinner table on a holiday, you can never really tell what you're going to get. Still, one thing is for sure: what you get is usually inappropriate. And while my brother made it his mission to say the word nipple as many times as humanly possible in the span of twenty-four hours, my grandfather decided to give us his arsenal of responses to insults. Nothing celebrates the birth of Christ quite like my grandfather saying the words fuck, ass, shit, and dick while his family pours wine and assembles slabs of roast beef and neat piles of horseradish on their plates. Here are some of the highlights:

(1.)

Grandpa: When people say "Fuck you!" to me this is what I say to them. I say, "If you did, you'd never want to go back to sheep."

(2.)

Grandpa: When I was at the home, there was this woman Irene who didn't like me very much. One day Irene told me to go straight to hell, and I turned right around and I looked at her and said, "Now, Irene, I will never go to your house."

(3.)

Grandpa: Goddamn this dog! He's got his nose in my ass.

Mom: Sorry, Dad. He's just a puppy. He's just trying to play.

Grandpa: Well, I don't like it. He's acting like that dog your brother had down in Texas. That dog was always running up behind you and sticking his nose in your ass. After a few days, I'd had quite enough of that. So there was this time I could hear the dog coming--he was running right up behind me, ready to stick his nose in my goddamned ass--and I was ready for him. I waited until he had his snout buried as far up in there was it would go, and then I let a fart rip as loud as I could. And you know what? That dog backpedaled so fast it was like he'd been shot. He never put his nose in my ass again after that.