Colonic degradation
TOMORROW is Guy Fawkes Night, which is never the favourite date in the Diary calendar, for our timorous reporters can’t abide explosive noises.
Fortunately, those same reporters won’t be able to hear the fireworks, for they permanently have cotton wool jammed in their ears, so they don’t get a nasty fright when the Diary Editor yells at them. (Which he does fairly often.)
The cotton wool has its downside, alas. It prevents unsuspecting reporters from hearing the Editor tiptoe up behind them.
Thus they’re entirely unprepared when he grabs them by the earlobes, hoists them aloft, spins them upside down, shakes them vigorously by the ankles, then politely enquires why the ankle-dangling reporter foolishly used a colon in a recent article, when it clearly merited a semicolon.
Thankfully you’ll find no stray colons in the following classic yarns from our archives.
Just a series of pyrotechnic punchlines; a feisty firework display of fizz, fun and frolics…
Work versus shirk
STUDENTS are rarely passionate about getting part-time jobs. A reader encouraged his daughter to buck this trend by reading out a newspaper advertisement where a local pensioner was looking for someone to do some light housekeeping.
His daughter snippily replied that she didn’t know anything about lighthouses.
Grave humour
THE strange thoughts of aged aunts. A West of Scotland reader revealed: “I was back in the Gaidhealtachd for my Auntie Katie’s funeral.
I was following the hearse for the mile’s drive to the graveyard, when from our back seat, another of the aunties broke the silence: “Katie’s never been to the new cemetery before.”
Lactose intolerant
A LORRY caught fire on the A75 near Castle Douglas.
The BBC quoted the Lancashire lorry driver as saying that when he phoned his boss to say that the load of milk cartons and pressurised cream containers had caught fire, his boss replied that it was no use crying over spilt milk.
Hot and bothered
‘TWAS a lovely day in Glasgow, with temperatures soaring, and the sun shining. A reader at the Fort shopping centre heard an angry mother tell her whining young child: “See that big yellow thing in the sky? The Earth revolves around it, no' around you!”
Do the math
A KILWINNING lady had to cancel her lavish 50th birthday party. It was pointed out to her that having it just four months after her parents’ equally lavish Golden Wedding anniversary celebrations might raise an eyebrow or two amongst the more arithmetically numerate.
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Heavenly grub
A READER told us about a woman who came to his front door, and for half an hour told him about the benefits of eating brown bread.
Added our reader: “She must have been a Hovis Witness.”
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