Sometime after Sidney died, his widow, Tillie, was finally able to speak about what a thoughtful and wonderful man her late husband had been.
“Sidney thought of everything,” she told them. “Just before he died, Sidney called me to his bedside and he handed me three envelopes. ‘Tillie,’ he told me, ‘I have put all my last wishes in these three envelopes. After I am dead, please open them and do exactly as I have instructed. Then I can rest in peace.’”
“What was in the envelopes?” her friends asked.
“The first envelope contained $5,000 with a note, ‘Please use this money to buy a nice casket.’ So I bought a beautiful mahogany casket for him.
“The second envelope contained $10,000 with a note, ‘Pleas use this for a nice funeral.’ I made Sidney a very dignified funeral and bought all his very favorite foods for when we began shiva.”
“And the third envelope?” asked her friends.
“The third envelope contained $25,000 with a note ‘Please use this to buy a nice stone.’” Tillie held up her hand and pointed to her ring finger, on which there was a ten-carat diamond ring. “So,” said Tillie, “you like my stone?”
From Alan King’s Great Jewish Joke Book, by Alan King