The Ultimate Light Bulb Joke

Years ago I worked in a small-town grocery store with Dwight, a young man who loved to play jokes on people. If a customer was someone he knew well, he would carry their groceries to their car while they were paying for them, and finding the car unlocked, would proceed to turn on the controls to the radio, air conditioner or heater, wipers, and everything else he had time to turn on before the car's owner came out. Then, when the owner would turn on her key, everything would come on at once. This was supposedly a very amusing thing for him to see. He was distressed that there was no way he could cause the horn to start honking when the key was turned on.

If he returned to the store before the owner went outside, he would often ask,"Do you have a spare tire?"

Usually the reply would be, "Oh no! Don't tell me I have a flat!" to which he would explain, "No, I just wondered if you had a spare."

One day the son of the store's owner, who was very tight with Dwight, came to the front of the store and started looking for some kind of medication among those stocked there. When I asked if I could help him find something, he said, "I'm looking for Midol." Puzzled, I asked why he needed it and he said, "Dwight said it would help my headache."

I told him,"You might do better to take an aspirin or Tylenol tablet. Midol is usually considered a remedy for ladies' problems."

Muttering something under his breath about a murder he had planned in the stockroom, he stalked away. Dwight the joker had struck again.

Eventually, after graduating from high school, Dwight took a job with the railroad. He explained that his job would be changing light bulbs in diesel engines. Several months later Dwight came into the store as a customer. Suddenly I was inspired! I thought of the old light bulb joke, "How many idiots (or other derogatory names) does it take to change a light bulb? Answer: Four. One to hold the bulb and three to turn him."

So I asked Dwight if he still had the railroad job.

Dwight: "Yes."

Me: "Still changing light bulbs?"

Dwight: "Yes."

Me: "Still have those three guys working with you?"

Dwight: "Yes."

This was going way better than I had dared hope.

Dwight, after thinking a minute: "What three guys?"

Me: "The ones who turn you while you hold the light bulb."

Dwight sputtered for a minute but never managed to get a word out. Then he turned around and slunk out of the store.

It just goes to prove that sometimes one can dish it out but can't take it when it comes his turn to be the butt of a joke.