Corny Dad Humour

When I'm not making dirty innuendoes I love me a good pun. Did you hear about the agnostic, dyslexic insomniac? He laid awake at night wondering if there was a Dog.

Failing that, gimme the kind of cornball humour I grew up with. Yesterday, father and I shovelled a ton (literally 2240lbs) of gravel back into a big bag and we wise-cracked back and forth to pass the time. Anyone dropping their eaves would have doubled over in pain, but we have an understanding that you can tell the absolute worst jokes in the world as long as you don't pretend they're any good.

Dad's teasing I'm less comfortable with. The same teases grate after the tenth time but he's 74 years old and doesn't always remember that he did the flab comment nine times already. Last night, I thought the honeymoon was over when I offered to set up his new multi-region DVD player. All I had to do was replace one component in his entertainment system but a bunch more connections fell out when I pulled the stack forward and I got in a real mess trying to put them back together again. I was frustrated with my lack of success because I sold and installed home A/V equipment professionally three student summers running (though that was ten years ago). "It worked before, son..." did not a happy Marcus make!

But I got coffee in bed at 0930 BST this morning and, still bleary-eyed, he dropped the following J-bomb on me:

"Did I tell you about the man I saw lying down eating the grass last week? I pulled over to the side of the road to see if he was O.K. and he said he was hungry. I told him to get up and come back to my place. He said, 'I've got a wife, three daughters, a son from a previous marriage, parents, a mother-in-law, cousins, grandchildren...'

"'Whoah!' I said. 'My lawn isn't THAT big.'"