A Christmas Story/WMG

The employees of the Chinese restaurant at the end were being deliberate in their Japanese Ranguage.
They knew how to say the "L" sound, they just knew the Parkers had just had an unpleasant experience losing their turkey and were being silly to cheer them up. Why else would they immediately switch over to a Christmas song that obviously also used lots of "L"'s?
 * Another possibility: to yank the maitre d'/boss figure's chain? (Would explain why he's the only one with gray hair besides age....)

The film was made to promote Leg Lamps.
It took a decade or two for the gambit to pay off.

The Old Man wants Ralphie to shoot the Bumpus Hounds.
When Ralphie receives the BB gun for Christmas and goes outside to use it, his mother tells him not to shoot any animals, and his father puts in, "Except for the Bumpuses' dogs!" Yes, he may be joking, but he's the kind of person who would likely half-jokingly say something he means, and he is the one who got Ralphie the BB gun. He says it's because he had one as a kid and thinks Ralphie should have one, but there's the possibility that his ulterior motive was getting his son to shoot the dogs.

The Old Man knew about Ralphie beating up Scut Farkus all along
He was secretly proud of his son for standing up for himself and taking down the much bigger school bully but didn't feel it was right to actually encourage violence and knew Mother wouldn't approve anyway.

The Old Man bought Ralphie the rifle to get back at Mother
Ralphie's Mother breaks his precious major award. The only way he can get back to her is to directly defy her orders and buy Ralphie the BB gun.