By Dennis McLaughlin

Today, as I usually do, I give you some jokes sent to me by friends. Today it is for those of “a certain age.”

A young observation

A little girl was sitting on her grandfather’s lap as he read her a bedtime story.

From time to time she would take her eyes off the book and reach up to touch his wrinkled cheek. She was alternately stroking her own cheek, then his again. Finally, she spoke up, “Grandpa, did God make you?”

“Yes, sweetheart,” he answered, “God made me a long time ago.”

“Grandpa, did God make me, too?”

“Yes, indeed, honey,” he said, “God made you just a little while ago.”

Feeling their respective faces again, she observed, “God’s getting better at it, isn’t he?”

Exercises for seniors

You know how important exercise is, as we grow older. Here are a few suggestions. I start by standing outside behind the house and, with a 5-pound potato sack in each hand, extend my arms straight out to my sides and hold them there as long as I can.

After a few weeks, I moved up to 10-pound potato sacks, then 50-pound potato sacks and finally I got to where I could lift a 100-pound potato sack in each hand and hold my arms straight out for more than a full minute!

Next, I started putting a few potatoes IN the sacks, but I would caution you not to overdo it at this level.

Grim fairy tale

A married couple in their early 60s were out celebrating their 35th wedding anniversary in a quiet, romantic little restaurant.

Suddenly, a tiny yet beautiful fairy appeared on their table and said, “For being such an exemplary married couple and for being faithful to each other for all this time, I will grant you each a wish.”

“Ooh, I want to travel around the world with my darling husband,” said the wife. The fairy moved her magic wand and - abracadabra! - two tickets for the new QM2 luxury liner appeared in her hands.

Now it was the husband’s turn. He thought for a moment and said: “Well, this is all very romantic, but an opportunity like this only occurs once in a lifetime, so, I’m sorry my love, but my wish is to have a wife 30 years younger than me.”

The wife and the fairy were deeply disappointed, but a wish is a wish …

So the fairy made a circle with her magic wand and - abracadabra! the husband was 92 years old.

The moral of this story: Men are ungrateful idiots. Fairies are female!

Reality check

1. Eventually, you will reach a point when you stop lying about your age and start bragging about it.

2. Don’t let anyone tell you that you’re getting old. Squash their toes with your rocker.

3. The older we get, the fewer things seem worth waiting in line for.

4. Some people try to turn back their odometers. Not me. I want people to know why I look this way. I’ve traveled a long way and some of the roads weren’t paved.

5. Maturity means being emotionally and mentally healthy. It is that time when you know when to say yes and when to say no, and when to say WHOOPPEE!

6. How old would you be if you didn’t know how old you are?

7. When you are dissatisfied and would like to go back to youth, just think of algebra.

8. You know you are getting old when everything either dries up or leaks.

9. I don’t know how I got over the hill without getting to the top.

10. The golden years are really just metallic years: gold in the tooth, silver in your hair, and lead in the rear.

11. Life would be infinitely happier if we could only be born at the age of and gradually approach 18.

12. One of the many things no one tells you about aging is that it is such a nice change from being young.

13. Age seldom arrives smoothly or quickly. It is more often a succession of jerks.

14. Yeah, being young is beautiful, but being old is comfortable.

15. Old age is when former classmates are so gray and wrinkled and blind that they don’t recognize you.

16. If you don’t learn to laugh at trouble, you won’t have anything to laugh at when you are old.

17. First, you forget names, then you forget faces. Then you forget to pull your zipper up, then you forget to pull your zipper down.

18. One must wait until evening to see how splendid the day has been.

19. When a woman steals your husband, there is no better revenge than to let her keep him.

Hope you enjoyed. Have a Merry Christmas. and Happy New Year.