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The Benevolent Society|
Ratings G --- Anyone in the family who can read PG --- Cool kids only PG13 --- Not good for kids under 13, even cool ones I --- Intellectual P --- Puzzling R --- Not recommend for those under 18 X --- You must be over 18 |
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The world's oldest recorded joke has been traced back to 1900 BC and suggests that toilet humour was as popular with the ancients as it is today. It is a saying of the Sumerians, who lived in what is now southern Iraq and goes: "Something which has never occurred since time immemorial; a young woman did not fart in her husband's lap." It heads the world's oldest top 10 joke list published by the University of Wolverhampton on Thursday. A 1600 BC gag about a pharaoh, said to be King Snofru, comes second -- "How do you entertain a bored pharaoh? You sail a boatload of young women dressed only in fishing nets down the Nile and urge the pharaoh to go catch a fish." The oldest British joke dates back to the 10th Century and reveals the bawdy face of the Anglo-Saxons -- "What hangs at a man's thigh and wants to poke the hole that it's often poked before? Answer: A key." "Jokes have varied over the years, with some taking the question and answer format while others are witty proverbs or riddles," said the report's writer Dr Paul McDonald, senior lecturer at the university. "What they all share however, is a willingness to deal with taboos and a degree of rebellion. Modern puns, Essex girl jokes and toilet humour can all be traced back to the very earliest jokes identified in this research." The study was commissioned by television channel Dave. The top 10 oldest jokes can be viewed at www.dave-tv.co.uk. Reporting by John Joseph; Editing by Steve Addison |
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Erma Bombeck was an American humorist who achieved great popularity for her newspaper column that described suburban home life humorously from the mid-1960s until the late '90s. Bombeck also published 15 books, most of which became best-sellers. From 1965 to 1996, Erma Bombeck wrote over 4,000 newspaper columns chronicling the ordinary life of a midwestern suburban housewife with broad, and sometimes eloquent, humor. By the 1970s, her witty columns were read, twice weekly, by thirty million readers of 900 newspapers of the U.S. and Canada. Here are a few quotes from Erma Bombeck. Never go to a doctor whose office plants have died. One thing they never tell you about child raising is that for the rest of your life, at the drop of a hat, you are expected to know your child's name and how old he or she is. I do not participate in any sport with ambulances at the bottom of a hill. Anybody who watches three games of football in a row should be declared brain dead. Never lend your car to anyone to whom you have given birth. I come from a family where gravy is considered a beverage. It is fast approaching the point where I don't want to elect anyone stupid enough to want the job. (on the US presidency) When humor goes, there goes civilization. The art of never making a mistake is crucial to motherhood. To be effective and to gain the respect she needs to function, a other must have her children believe she has never engaged in sex, never made a bad decision, never caused her own mother a moment's anxiety, and was never a child. You hear a lot of dialogue on the death of the American family. Families aren't dying. They're merging into big conglomerates. Thanksgiving dinners take eighteen hours to prepare. They are consumed in twelve minutes. Half-times take twelve minutes. This is not coincidence. Don't confuse fame with success. Madonna is one; Helen Keller is the other. |

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