A professional carpet-layer stepped back to survey a newly installed carpet. Reaching into his shirt pocket for a cigarette, he realized the pack was missing. At the same time he noticed a lump under the carpet in the middle of the room, about the size of the missing cigarette pack.

There was no way to retrieve his cigarette pack from under the attached carpet without ripping everything up and starting over. Finally, he decided to beat the object flat, thereby destroying any evidence of his mistake.

Gathering his tools, the carpet layer walked out to his truck. There on the seat of his truck was the mislaid pack of cigarette. As he lit one up, the homeowner hurried out of the house and asked, “Hey, have you seen my son’s gerbil?”

Braude’s Treasury of Wit and Humor, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Hills, NJ.