Caveman curator

OUR more observant readers may have noticed some kind of a Platinum Jubilee going on around these parts. In England the celebrations involve flag waving, cap doffing and forelock tugging. In Scotland we prefer eye rolling, tongue tutting and clenched fist shaking. It’s much the same thing really, which is why the United Kingdom is such a harmonious group of nations.

Meanwhile, literary afficionados are now demanding a Jubilee to celebrate the date when the Diary was first published. Unfortunately there’s a problem – the Diary’s roots stretch further back than human memory.

Mysterious daubs have been discovered in the cellar of a Sauchiehall Street watering hole. These rough-hewn scrawls are of woolly mammoths getting up to all sorts of amusing hijinks. Eminent archaeologists – by which we mean the boozers in the upstairs pub – believe the images to be ancient precursors of the shaggy dog story. Near them are scribbled antiquated jokes and palaeolithic puns. All of this artistry was undoubtedly compiled by the very first Diarist, a truly cultured caveman.

Regrettably we don’t have any of that fellow’s tales to publish today, though we can entice you with some equally thrilling yarns from our archives…

Picture (im)perfect

A GLASGOW chap was at a sales conference in Switzerland. When he phoned home his girlfriend asked what the view from the hotel was like.

“Picturesque,” he replied.

“But I don’t know what Esque looks like,” confessed the girlfriend.

Basket case

A READER was passing a prestigious building in the city centre where he spotted a woman carrying a basket with a cat in it being escorted off the premises by two security personnel.

She was loudly yelling: “I did see the sign. It only said ‘No Dogs’.”

Training day

AN East Kilbride reader’s daughter was moving to Spain and planned to take her pet dog with her. She was reading the British Airways website about containers to transport pets in when she suddenly wailed: “It says here that the container must be large enough for the pet to stand up, turn around and lie down.”

She added: “I’ll never be able to teach him all that in time.”

Driven to distraction

A READER travelling on a Glasgow bus overheard a young girl telling her pal: “I don’t think my driving instructor likes me.”

She then explained: “When he asked me what do you do at a red light, I told him I usually check my text messages.”

Cop caper

A READER in America accidentally locked herself out of her car but was rescued by a police officer who sprung the door open with a Slim Jim – a long piece of thin metal.

Impressed by his skills, she told him that they should make versions small enough to fit in your handbag.

“They do, ma’am,” he replied. “We call them keys.”

Unbalanced response

VISITING a bank in Glasgow’s east end, a reader noticed one of the positions was closed, with a large sign stating: ‘Teller balancing.’

Another frustrated chap in the queue muttered mutinously: “Is he auditioning for the circus?”