The Lemon Cake Story

Fine fine fine.

When my FIL, The Playboy Of The Western World passed on, instead of a eulogy, the Biker asked people to come up and share their favorite stories about the Playboy.

 The funeral parlor was SRO that day, folks.  Not just the family - and there was a lot of family; but also strangers, people who saw the death notice in the papers and came to pay their respects to a man they'd known when they were children and he was their DeMolay leader, their school chef, the man who raised Morgan horses on the family homestead and hosted Halloween parties for all the neighbor kids.  He was well loved, he was a four-times Past Master of the Masonic Lodge, and he never met a stranger.

One after another people came up.  People began to smile, and then to laugh at some of the stories.  One man acted out a time when the Playboy had gone off in a rage because the only boat to the mainland from Sucia Island had been left untied and floated away, leaving the whole DeMolay group stranded overnight.  The laughter was becoming more unrestrained by this point.

Then Mailman Mark, a dear, dear friend of the family, stood up and said "I'd like to tell you a little story that The Playboy used to tell.  It was his favorite joke, and the way he told it was half the fun.  I think I can get away with it.  It's a little off color, but not terrible, you know.  What do you think?"

"It's the story about the Lemon Cake," hollered a man from the front row, and just about everyone in the room applauded and laughed.

"It sure is!" said Mailman Mark, smiling big.

The funeral director looked in, and he seemed a little surprised.  People are laughing?  Huh? This is a funeral, you barbarians!

And then Mailman Mark told...

The Lemon Cake Story.

(Now you have to imagine that the people in this joke are country yokels from way, way back in the old days.)

A man comes walking down the road, an old dirt road way out in the country.  He's tired and he's hungry.

Up ahead he sees a farmwife, a farm, and the wife is hanging laundry on the line.

"Well, she looks nice," he thinks.  "I'll ask her."

"Excuse me, ma'am," he calls to her.  "I've been walking a long time and I have to admit, I'm really hungry.  Thirsty too.  If you have any wood I could split for you, or a job to do, you see, I'm a carpenter and I will do that job for you in, you know, exchange for a meal."

"Why sure, that would be just fine," the farmwife says. "You just come right in here.  You can do this and that, split firewood or whatever."

And that man, he sets right to it and he really is working away there in the hot sun, splitting firewood, stacking it up nice and neat, and then he fixes the fence, and this and that, and finally hours have gone by and he just can't go on any longer.

He sits on the step there and here comes the farm wife.  She's got a big, cold glass of milk, fresh from the icebox, and a plate, and on that plate is a great big slice of cake.  "I hope you like lemon cake," she says.  "I just made it this morning."

Well that man sets to.  He's drinking that cold milk, and he takes a bite of that cake and it's just Heaven. Oh my goodness, he thinks.  This is great! The best cake he's ever eaten!  It's yellow and it's so pretty and perfect and it's just delicious.

He eats and he eats and finally he's done, and he says "Ma'am, I believe that's about the very best lemon cake I've ever had in my life.  I truly mean that.  That is the best lemon cake I've ever put in my mouth!"

"Oh I'm so glad," she says, all pleased.  "And there wasn't a thing wrong with it?"

"No ma'am, that was the best lemon cake I ever ate in my whole life, that was."

"Oh good!"  she says.  "I did my best with that old flour there, and sure enough, it worked just fine, once I'd strained out all the rat shit."
________

That's how my FIL was sent on to that Big Gay Bathhouse In The Sky, folks.  It was awesome.