Current favourite jokes

[gamba]

Poor old Gustav, he should have gone to the Victoria Falls - he'd have have got fff instead of a paltry f.

[salymap]

Malcolm Sargent and the BBCSO were at a formal reception in the USSR, as it was then. An attractive Soviet woman official shook hands with him and said "Would you blush if I flipped your carnation? " He quickly retorted looking at the chain round her neck "Would you flush if I pulled your chain?"

[ahinton]

Malcolm Sargent and the BBCSO were at a formal reception in the USSR, as it was then. An attractive Soviet woman official shook hands with him and said "Would you blush if I flipped your carnation? " He quickly retorted looking at the chain round her neck "Would you flush if I pulled your chain?"

Which conductorial anecdote reminds me of Beecham who is said to have described the young Herbert von Karajan as "a kind of musical Malcolm Sargent".

[salymap]

Beecham made a lot of Sargent jokes but they were actually very good friends, helping each other out at various times in their lives.

[Chris Newman]

A reporter, out to stir, told Beecham that Sargent was receiving good reviews on a tour in the Far East.

"Oh! That's just Flash in Japan" he retorted.

[Al R Gando]

Mention of getting the chance to play on a borrowed Strad (on another thread) reminds me of this one from Ceausescu's Romania...

... two Romanian violinists go to an international music competition. One comes second. The other comes 47th. They go to the pub, where the 2nd-prizewinner becomes sad and withdrawn. "Why so sad? Second is not bad! It's almost first! Almost no difference! The prize-money is almost the same!"

"No difference? The first prizewinner also gets to play on a Stradivarius on loan for five years! You call that no difference?"

"True, but if I'd come 50th, then I'd get to shoot myself with Ceausescu's own pistol!"

[EdgeleyRob]

A man takes his cross-eyed St Bernard to the vet.
The vet picks up the dog and says " I'm afraid I am going to have to put him down".
"What! because he's cross-eyed ? " said the owner.
"No" the vet said, "because he's very heavy".

[Serial_Apologist]

Mention of getting the chance to play on a borrowed Strad (on another thread) reminds me of this one from Ceausescu's Romania...

... two Romanian violinists go to an international music competition. One comes second. The other comes 47th. They go to the pub, where the 2nd-prizewinner becomes sad and withdrawn. "Why so sad? Second is not bad! It's almost first! Almost no difference! The prize-money is almost the same!"

"No difference? The first prizewinner also gets to play on a Stradivarius on loan for five years! You call that no difference?"

"True, but if I'd come 50th, then I'd get to shoot myself with Ceausescu's own pistol!"

Reminds me of another apocryphal yet probably true story from the Soviet Union.

A group of Western journalists were being shown around the latest Aeroflot plane. "Here we have the first class compartment", says the guide; "and here, the second class". "Excuse me", says one of the reporters, "You have first and second class compartments? I thought the Soviet Union was supposed to be a classless society!". "The Soviet Union is a classless society", confirmed the guide. "Then, how come you have first and second class in your transport systems?" "Perfectly simple", replies the guide; "in first class, people pay more!"

[Flay]

Susie's husband had been slipping in and out of a coma for several months. Things looked grim, but she was by his bedside every single day.

One day as he slipped back into consciousness, he motioned for her to come close to him. She pulled the chair close to the bed and leaned her ear close to be able to hear him.

"You know" he whispered, his eyes filling with tears, "you have been with me through all the bad times. When I got fired, you stuck right beside me. When my business went under, there you were. When we lost the house, you were there. When I got shot, you stuck with me. When my health started failing, you were still by my side. "And you know what?"

"What, dear?" she asked gently, smiling to herself.

"I think you're bad luck."

[Flay]

Marriage is like a game of playing cards: In the beginning you have two hearts and a diamond.

After a few years you wish you had a club and a spade.....

[mercia]

Which cheese would you use to entice a grizzly down from a mountain? Camembert.
What cheese would you use for hiding small horses? Mascarpone

[Al R Gando]

Which cheese has been mother's ruin? Maasdam
Which cheese cheers on one of this messageboard's most tendentious posters? Gruyere.

[EdgeleyRob]

A bloke in the pub offered me 2 venison steaks for £10 the other day.
I said no that's dead dear.

[Anna]

Cheese jokes? You're on dangerous ground here. I advise you to tread very Caerphilly.

[Petrushka]

Another Soviet Union joke:

At the height of the Stalin terror years a man goes up to a newspaper seller buys a copy of Pravda looks at the front page and throws the paper in the bin. This goes on every day until the curious seller plucks up the courage to ask: 'Comrade, why do you buy the paper, look at the front page then throw it away?' The man replies: 'I'm looking at the obituaries.' 'But, Comrade,' retorts the seller, 'the obituaries are not on the front page.' 'Believe me', says the man, 'the obituary I'm looking for will be on the front page!'