Odd Man Out 28

Surely you, the worldly, sophisticated reader of things trivial and useless know that time flies like an arrow, while fruit flies like bananas. And so, here it is, another alternate Tuesday. That can mean only one thing: tomorrow is Wednesday!

To take your mind off such a nettlesome prospect, let's play a little Odd Man Out. You have my solemn promise, this one will be even more user-friendly than the ridiculously-easy Odd Man Out 22.

Now, let the winning begin!

Group 1

Before the NextTeardropFalls, Freddy Fender
Oh What a Circus, David Essex
Shine On Harvest Moon, Oliver Hardy
My Melody of Love, Bobby Vinton

Group 2

Lake Erie
Lake Michigan
Lake Ontario
Lake Superior

Group 3

Marisa Tomei
Frances McDormand
Roberto Begnini
Eddie Murphy

Group 4

Zorro
Porgie Tirebiter
Wonder Wart Hog
Mr. Ed

Group 5

Deuteronomy
Ecclesiastes
Genesis
Hebrews

Now, he wearily sighed, we come to the only part of the feature most of you can get: the space-wasting joke. Well, to celebrate Odd Man Out's autumnal return to the citruslight, I am giving you two → 2 ← jokes instead of one, because they fall into a similar category.

They are both "Aggie" jokes, told to commemorate the dedicated scholars who attend and play sports for Texas A&M University. These are the standouts of the series because they are not just refurbished Polish jokes or blonde jokes, but, rather, are specific to the target group. I will demonstrate.

Here is the short joke: How do they punish Aggies they have caught having improper relations with barnyard animals?

They make them stand up for the entire game. (Ask a Texan if you don't get it).

Now here's the long one, involving A&M's former high-profile football coach, Jackie Sherrill. It is, of course, apocryphal...at least to an extent.

The chairman of the Texas A&M English department is quietly sitting at his desk, grading papers, when Coach Sherrill comes bursting through the door.

"Now, lookahere, BOY," he rages to the professor, "you got my two best linemens flunkin' your crappy little English course. They're about to be made ineligible, with the Texas game comin up! If we lose to them damn tea-sips again, somebody's gonna be in deep trouble. Now whata yew got to say for yourself, BOY?"

"I beg your pardon, Coach Sherrill. I certainly did not mean to cause you any distress, Coach Sherrill," the professor carefully explained.

"YEAH? Well what choo gonna do about it, BOY?" the coach inquired.

"Please, forgive my carelessness, Coach Sherrill," the teacher went on to say. "I do have a solution, sir, if you will kindly bear with me."

"Well, spit it out, BOY! I'm a busy man."

"Here's what I'll do for the two gentlemen in question, Coach Sherrill, sir. If you will have them report to my classroom each evening after practice, for the rest of the week, I will provide them with my personal, one-on...er..two intense instruction, then give them a test this coming Saturday morning on the tutoring I gave them. I'm sure they'll pass it easily, and I'll gladly weight it as...oh... 95% of their grade for the semester. Will that do, Coach Sherrill, sir?"

"IT DAMN WELL BETTER, BOY!"

The two star linemen, a sophomore and a junior, reported to the professor that first evening after the day's practice had ended.

"Gentlemen, I trust your coach has acquainted you with the cause and nature of these academic sessions." the professor informed them. "Now, I hope you brought your pencils and a notebook with a lot space. Please pay close attention, and take numerous notes as we go along."

With that, the professor put a small children's record on a turntable and proceeded to play it. The song began:

"Old McDonald had a farm, E-I-E-I-O. And on the farm he had some ducks, E-I-E-I-O," and so it went to the end of the song. At that point the professor put the needle back to the start of the record and played it again...and again...and again, for the entire two hours.

Over the next four evenings, he did exactly the same thing.

Finally, it was Saturday morning, and the two linemen reported to the professor's classroom to take their "special" test.

He placed a bluebook on each of their desks and told them: "Gentlemen, this test will be given under the honor system. The test is written on the blackboard, behind this map. I will roll the map up and leave the room. Then, you will have one hour to complete the test, at which time, I will come in and collect your exam books. Any questions?

The professor put the covering map up to reveal the test, then left the room. The sophomore and the junior took a good long look at the blackboard. It read:

Old McDonald had a ____.

The junior furrowed his brow and began the process of concentrating. Then, as a look of enlightenment played over his features he hunkered down and laboriously began to write.

Meanwhile, the sophomore was in a state of panic. After a minute or two, he looked carefully around the room and whispered to his teammate, "Psst, Billy-Bob. Psst, Billy-Bob!"

"What thee hail you want?" Billy-Bob whispered back.

"I cain't remember the answer. What's the answer?"

Billy-Bob sighed and whispered, none too quietly, "It's 'farm,' ya idjit!"

"That's right, that's right!" the sophomore agreed. "I knew it." He picked up his pencil, then stopped dead,

"Psst, Billy-Bob. Psst, Billy-Bob!"

"What now?" the exasperated junior answered.

"I cain't spell that word. How do you spell it?"

"It's E-I-E-I-O, ya damn fool!"

Group 1

Before the NextTeardropFalls, Freddy Fender
Oh What a Circus, David Essex
Shine On Harvest Moon, Oliver Hardy
My Melody of Love, Bobby Vinton

In an earlier edition, Odd Man Out 26, I dropped you inquisitive readers a huge hint, remember? It was regarding groups with a musical bent. Before you blurt out an answer and a reason for it, you may want to study that link again. Meanwhile, I'm going to move on to the next group to let you think that hint over. I'll come back and capsize the beans in a little while.

Speaking of the above-noted (and, I trust, studied) link, you may have noticed it contains an as-yet unanswered riddle. What is the answer to the equation, frcc + efds + hnr =? Helpful hint: y = 0 (zero).

I'll reveal the answer at the end of this painful exercise, okay?

Group 2

Lake Erie
Lake Michigan
Lake Ontario
Lake Superior

Which Great Lake is the oddity? Why, it's Lake Michigan. And why might that be, Mr. Know-it-all? Because that's the only one of the four (and, in fact, of the five) that is not contiguous to Canada. It, like the bustling city of Secaucus, New Jersey, resides entirely within the U. of S. A.

Group 3

Marisa Tomei
Frances McDormand
Roberto Begnini
Eddie Murphy

You'll hear it, probably more than once, every award season: whoever wins the Golden Globe that year is likely to win the Oscar as well. In fact, that is the way the situation has gone down most of the time, but not all the time.

Marisa Tomei (Best Supporting Actress, 1993), Frances McDormand (Best Actress, 1997) and Roberto Begnini (Best Actor, 1999) all managed to win the Academy Award in their respective categories without having picked up a Gold-plated Glob beforehand. That would make Eddie Murphy the oddity, not because of his race (Remember, it's never about race...or gender.), but because he did the exact opposite. While his performance in Dreamgirls got him a best supporting Golden Globe, he missed out on the Oswald, later that year.

Group 1 Revisited

Before the NextTeardropFalls, Freddy Fender
Oh What a Circus, David Essex
Shine On Harvest Moon, Oliver Hardy
My Melody of Love, Bobby Vinton

You've had ample time to study those dandy-handy YouTube resources I provided you with, and now it's time to start spittin' out some answers.

If the question were, who is the fattest singer, I'm not altogether sure Oliver Hardy would have beaten out that first guy, but, in terms of being odd and out, he takes the cake (and probably wolfs it all down in five minutes).

All of the words he sings to Shine on Harvest Moon are in English. The other three sing their songs mostly, but not entirely in English. Freddy Fender throws in some Spanish, David Essex, a little liturgical Latin and Bobby Vinton, a few lines of Polish. And there you have it.

(And now, before I was so rudely interrupted)

Group 4

Zorro
Porgie Tirebiter
Wonder Wart Hog
Mr. Ed

Well, well, it seems we're stuck on some sort of a musical kick. The oddment in this group is that one of the four does not have a theme song to accompany him. Is it Zorro? Nope. How about Porgie Tirebiter, a recurring character of the Firesign Theater's invention? Sorry, he's got one too. And as for Mr. Ed, well, after all, a horse is a horse, of course, of course. I guess that leaves Wonder Wart Hog, who has always been odd, but now is out.

Group 5

Deuteronomy
Ecclesiastes
Genesis
Hebrews

Guess what all you serious Biblical scholars, who, I am very sure, make up the overwhelming majority of my readership? This is the bone question! As any Bible-thumbing fool knows, the OMO is the fourth book, Hebrews, due to the bright shiny newness of the Testament wherein it resides, unlike the first three, which are Old Testament members. But, of course, you the devout whatever-you-are, knew that all the time.

And now, to tie things up in a neat little bowline hitch, here is the answer to that cryptic riddle: 5,042. If you want the answer in letters, it's hysr. How did your narrator come to arrive at this code? When he was a teenager in Ohio, he had three girl cousins, all of whom worked summer jobs in three different retail establishments. All three stores used the same code for their receipts: "fresh candy," a term I used in the OMO where I first sprang the riddle. It lends itself to such a function because it contains ten letters, none of which are the same. I guess compared to this confounding nonsense, the OMOs aren't that difficult after all.

Hey, at least you got two jokes again. Now, that kind of wasteful nonsense will have to stop. Bonsoir.

Sources

Wikipedia

YouTube

The Bible

Other stuff too numerous to mention