05/01/2026 from Daily Jokes
#22103
It was a Friday evening, and Harold was looking forward to nothing more than kicking off his shoes, pouring a glass of iced tea, and settling into his favorite armchair with the evening paper. He unlocked the front door, stepped inside with a contented sigh… and was immediately met with the sight of his wife, Eleanor, sitting on the hallway bench, shoulders shaking, tears streaming down her face.
Harold’s heart dropped. He rushed to her side, kneeling beside her.
“Eleanor! Honey, what’s wrong? Are you hurt? What happened?”
Eleanor looked up, her eyes red, her voice trembling with wounded pride.
“It’s… it’s the druggist, Harold. Mr. Henderson. He… he insulted me terribly this morning on the phone. I’ve never been spoken to like that in my life!”
Harold’s protective instincts kicked in instantly. His jaw set. His eyes narrowed. No one upset his Eleanor and got away with it.
“Say no more,” he said firmly, helping her to her feet. “I’m going downtown right now. He’s going to apologize, or he’s going to answer to me.”
Without another word, Harold grabbed his keys, kissed Eleanor’s forehead, and stormed out the door. He drove downtown with purpose, parked in front of Henderson’s Pharmacy, and marched inside, ready for a confrontation.
Mr. Henderson, a weary-looking man with glasses perched on his nose and a name tag that had seen better days, looked up from counting pills. He saw Harold’s determined expression and held up a hand preemptively.
“Now, just a minute, sir,” the druggist said, his voice calm but exhausted. “Before you say another word… please.
Listen to my side of it.”
Harold paused, arms crossed. “Go ahead.”
Mr. Henderson took a deep breath and began, his words tumbling out like dominoes:
“This morning, the alarm failed to go off. I was late getting up. I went without breakfast and hurried out to the car—but I’ll be darned if I didn’t lock the house with BOTH the house keys AND the car keys inside. I had to break a basement window just to get my keys back.”
He rubbed his temple, continuing:
“Driving a little too fast to make up time, I got a speeding ticket. Then, about three blocks from the store, I had a flat tire. By the time I finally got to the pharmacy, there was already a line of people waiting for me to open up.”
He gestured around the store, his voice gaining momentum:
“I got the store opened, started waiting on these folks, and all the time, the darn phone was ringing its head off.
Ring-ring-ring! I finally got a break, tried to make change, and had to break a roll of nickels against the cash register drawer. They spilled EVERYWHERE—rolling under shelves, bouncing into corners.”
Mr. Henderson mimed getting down on the floor.
“I got down on my hands and knees to pick up the nickels—the phone is STILL ringing. When I finally stood back up… I cracked my head on the open cash drawer. That made me stagger backward… right into a showcase full of perfume bottles. Half of them hit the floor and SHATTERED. Glass everywhere. Perfume everywhere.”
He paused, looking Harold dead in the eye, his voice dropping to a whisper of pure, exhausted sincerity:
“The phone is STILL ringing. No letup. I finally stumble back, grab the receiver, and answer it. It was your wife.”
Harold blinked. “My wife?”
“Yes, sir. She wanted to know… how to use a rectal thermometer.”
Mr. Henderson leaned forward slightly, his expression utterly deadpan, and delivered the final line with the weight of a man who had endured too much:
“And Mister… I TOLD HER!”
