Uncle Sam is My Daddy

©Sebastian Kaulitzki
(licensed to Bill Graham by Fotolia)

Today, I found out President Obama munched lunch with Mitt Romney. I heard they had white turkey chili and grilled chicken salad with all the fixins. Them’s good eats and all, but I’d like to know why they didn’t invite me. You’d think with all his money, Uncle Sam could buy me lunch. Well I’m here to tell you, he left me out in the bitter cold. I felt downright neglected until I saw a bumper sticker that said, “Uncle Sam ain’t your baby’s daddy.” That’s when I got the idea to adopt Uncle Sam as my daddy.

My ex-dad, Fuller Plate, said he didn’t mind me disowning him. He disowned me several decades ago, and he’d be happy to give me up to Uncle Sam. Then he started to look around. When I asked why he was lookin’ this away and that, he asked where mom was. I told him she was at the grocery store. As if he were in a hurry, he smiled, asked for my papers and said he wanted to put his John Hancock on the dotted line right away. For the first time in my life, Mr. Scrooge gave me something I wanted. He said it was an early Christmas present.
I wrote the document earlier today, so I was able to produce it immediately. It said:

I, Fuller Plate, do hereby give away my boy, Empty Plate, to Uncle Sam. Hereafter, Empty Plate shall be the son of Uncle Sam, and the same shall henceforth and hitherto be his daddy. Whereof, the provisions of this declaration of dependence shall take effect immediately upon the signing of the same under my hand on this twenty-ninth day of November, 2012.

Yours truly,

Fuller Plate

Before the ink dried, old Grumpy told me to get out of his house.

I told him I needed time for my new daddy to pick me up. He said that wasn’t his problem. I was a stranger, and I was trespassing on his property. I argued that mom wouldn’t be happy. He said she was no longer my mother. She still had his last name, and I didn’t. He threatened to call the police if I didn’t leave immediately. To drive the point home, he picked up the phone and called 9-1-1. Luckily, Delbert Collins, our 9-1-1 Dispatcher, was on vacation. The Grinch had to leave a message.

While that old buzzard was still on the phone, mom walked in and heard the whole thing. After he hung up, mom lit into him like white on rice. She was furious. I told her everything that happened, and said Mr. Malcontent told me he didn’t want me around anymore. When I showed her the document he signed, she stomped into her room, slammed the door behind her and refused to talk to Grumpy McGrumperton. Later, when he asked her about dinner, mom said he was on frozen dinners for the next year, and I can stay as long as I want.