Yes, it’s true: we have returned to our Monday of old jokes. For those teeming millions who have just joined us, these are selections from a quiz book I wrote eons ago, meant to test your knowledge of genuinely antique snippets of humor. (The first one here can be dated pretty specifically to the 1920s or thereabouts.) The answers, which you won’t need because you know them already, are left off and supplied at the end of the column.
Today’s excerpt comes from the chapter called Romance, something a wit once called “the most fun you can have without laughing.” Maybe laughing helps.
J1.The bandleader called to the audience for requests. A man in the front ca;;ed “Play a love song!”
“Got it,” said the conductor, and nodded to the band, which struck up “Hold That Tiger”. The man in the front roared, “That’s not a love song!”
The bandleader shrugged and said, “( )”
J2.”Have a good time at the movies?” asked Olivia.
“Men these days!” snapped Velvet. “I had to change my seat foru times!”
“Did someone try to flirt with you?”
Velvet snorted, “( )”
J3.Tim ran into Emmett at a class reunion. “I suppose you’re married now,” Tim said.
“Not so far,” said Emmett. “I’ve been proposing for years without avail.”
“Oh,” said Tim. “Well, maybe ) ).”
J4.”You’re dating Velvet? How’s it going?”
“Well, last week I took her candy and we went to the movies. Monday night I gave her flowers and took her to dinner. Do you think I should kiss her>”
“Heck, no. ( ),.”
J5.Jerry wasn’t all that interested in how his nails looked, but the manicurist at the barber shop was a stunner, so he agreed to have his nails done while he got a shave and a haircut. The more he looked, the more he liked, so he asked, “What time do you get off work? I know a little place off geothe Street….”
“Sorry, siir,” she said. “I’m married.”
“Why not ask your husband if he minds if you’re late getting home tonight?” Jerry said. “He might be a swingerm, too.”
“You can ask him yourself,” she told him. “( ).”
J6.Elroy found himself in an old-fashioned building where the elevators were still run by hand. The uniformed operator in his elevator was an attractive young woman, so he sidled up right next to her and struck up a conversation. “This job must be really tiring, with all the stops and starts all day long.”
“It’s not the stops and starts that bother me,” she told him, “( )”
J7.”I do worry about you since you moved into your own place,” said Ada’s mother. “When you go out on a date you don’t invite the man up to your apartment, do you?”
“Of course not,” said Ada. “Last night’s date took me to his place. ( ).”
J8.”Want to dance with me?” said Amanda.
“I’m a little stiff from bowling,” Roland replied.
“Oh,” said Amanda. “( ).”
J9.”O brought you this candy,” said Bob. Sweets to the sweet.”
“Thank you,” said Kathy. “) _”
J10.”How was your date with Phil?”
“Some date! I had to slap him five times!”
“To keep him from getting ftresh?”
“( )”
This is the place where you check to see whether you phrased the ANSWERS better than I did,
A1.It is to a tiger.
A2.Eventually
A3.you should try a veil
A4.You’ve done enough for her already!
A5.He’s shaving you
A6.It’s the jerks.
A7.Let HIS mother worry
A8.I don’t care where you’re from
A9.Have some nuts
A10.To keep him awake!
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