Books That Will Never Be Written. Again, a pretty simple format: an innocuous book title and a ridiculous author.

The ones I remember from middle school:

The Yellow River, by I.P Freely

Under The Grandstands, by Seymour Butts

Antlers in the Treetops, by Whogoosed Themoose (OK, that’s not a great author name)

The height of grade school hilarity:

“Say rubber balls and liquor after every question.”

“What did you have for lunch?”

“Rubber balls and liquor.”

“What did you have for dinner”

“Rubber balls and liquor.”

“What did you do last night with [at Beaumont elementary: Marilyn Monroe. At less imaginative elementary schools, Your Girlfriend]?

“Rubber balls and liquor.”

Of course this joke is stupid and pointless, except among elementary school boys who have not taken sex ed, or who have no sisters.

A search using Artificial Stupidity could find no other examples of this type of joke, no matter how specific my prompt. It could, however, return 500 references to the Gilbert Gottfried book of the same name, even when I asked it not to. And so, my question is: are there other versions of this joke? Is it a humor template, or a dead end?

It’s been a while since I’ve done a “joke format” item, but it is hard to resist Funny Names.

I was recently watching the HBO Max program Gilded Age. There is a ball, presented in the standard format of the time. As each group of guests arrives, the butler announces them: “Mr. and Mrs. Smith and their son John.” It’s been years since I heard one of these jokes. “Mr. and Mrs. Turner and their daughter Paige.” It has been a while since this humor template crossed my mind.

I’ve been trying to develop a new one, but finding a combination of a realistic last name to combine with a pun first name is difficult. Do you have one?

I was put in mind of this by a recent comic strip: “How many paranoids does it take to change  a lightbulb? Who wants to know!”

My personal favorite "How many therapists does it take to change a lightbulb? One, but the bulb has to really want to change."

There are literally hundreds of these. The format is seemingly simple, but it’s at its best when it makes fun of a stereotype.

Here’s my attempt at a new one.

“How many nine-inch pianists … none. He misunderstood you and tried to have sex in a lightbulb.”(requires knowledge of an obscure joke)

(In honor of April Fools’ Day, the last and longest entry in this series)

There are a number of humor templates that go in and out of style (mostly out). Most of those from my youth have disappeared. Feel free to rain down your examples, or any genres I may have missed.

According to Merriam Webster, “A Tom Swifty is a play on words taking the form of a quotation ascribed to Tom and followed by an adverb. The site offered several examples:

"The thermostat is set too high," said Tom heatedly.

Let's gather up the rope," said Tom coyly.

"Welcome to my tomb," said Tom cryptically.

"I can't find the oranges," said Tom fruitlessly.

"Don't you love sleeping outdoors," Tom said intently.

"Let's trap that sick bird," Tom said illegally.

"I lost my trousers," said Tom expansively.

"I just ran over my father," Tom said transparently.

"I just dropped the toothpaste," said Tom crestfallenly.

[From Daniel Dern: “I'll have another martini,” Tom said dryly. And a link to more templates]

This template is personal to me. By the time I was 14, I literally owned every Tom Swift book then in print (and a few from my father’s collection of 18 years earlier). Yes, the series did use too many adverbs.

And of course, in the Firesign Theater’s Adventures of Nick Danger, the announcer says, “doggedly, ruthlessly,” followed by a dog barking and Danger saying, “I wonder where Ruth is?”

Croakers
Tom Swifties with Verbs: “I spent the day sewing and gardening,” she hemmed and hawed.

Martini Jokes
Daniel Dern wonders if martini jokes are a template. This one’s for my MIT readers:

“I'll have a martinum.”
“Don't you mean martini?”
“If I wanted two, I would have said so.”

And this sexist one is for everybody:
Dorothy Parker almost surely didn’t say,
 “I wish I could drink like a lady.
Two or three, at the most.
But two, and I'm under the table
And three, I'm under the host.”

Elephant Jokes
Elephant jokes don’t deserve an entire essay, so check out the Readers Digest collection of elephant jokes.

There are a number of humor templates that go in and out of style (mostly out). Most of those from my youth have disappeared. Feel free to rain down your examples, or any genres I may have missed.

One perennial that never seems to go out of style is the “Walked into a Bar” template. Usually three somethings, sometimes two or one.

One of my all-time favorites:

A guy walks into a bar. He sets a tiny piano down at the bar, and the tiny pianist starts playing up a storm. The bartender looks at the man and says, "That's amazing, where did you get that?" The man replies, "There's a genie outside your bar that will grant you one wish."

The bartender runs outside and sure enough there is a genie. Without hesitation the bartender says "Genie, I wish for a million bucks!" The genie snaps his fingers and disappears. Instantly, a million ducks fly overhead.

The bartender walks back inside and says, "Hey man, I think there's something wrong with that genie. I asked for a million bucks, but he gave me a million ducks."

The man says, "You're telling me. You think I asked for a 12-inch pianist?"

Simon Rich wrote a humorous essay about this joke from the perspective of the pianist.

Other good ones:

A hippo, a priest and the number 7 walk into a bar.

The barkeep says, “What is this some kind of joke?”

A reliable sub-genre is the “Minister, Priest and Rabbi” joke.

A priest, a rabbit, and a minister walk into a bar. The rabbit says, "I think I'm a typo."

Next Week: Tom Swifties

There are a number of humor templates that go in and out of style (mostly out). Most of those from my youth have disappeared. Feel free to rain down your examples, or any genres I may have missed.

Are you smarter than the Internet? One Sunday in the spring of 1975, when I still read the New York Times religiously (in essence, as a wire-service reporter, I was paid to read it), the New York Times Magazine featured a whole page of these jokes; maybe by William Safire. Don’t send the letter to the editor. That’s easy to find.

One choo-choo joke that I am certain was on that list was the result of a talkative Indian religious leader coming to church:  “Pardon me, goy, is that the chatty guru’s new pew?”

These jokes often require a long shaggy-dog story to make complete sense, but here’s a few that I think stand alone.

“Pardon me, (James)Bowie, is that the captain who's accused you?”

“Pardon me, Roy (Rogers), is that the cat who chewed your new shoes?”

A luxury store offers Native American Moccasins so a customer inquires of a young clerk,  “Pardon me, boy, is this the tag on Gucci's Sioux shoe?”

A few weeks later, a letter to the editor of the Times asked, “Pardon me. Oy! Is this the rag to turn for news to?”

Next Week: Walked Into A Bar