The Serious Guide to Joke Writing: How To Say Something Funny About Anything pdfdrive com

Tuesday am

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We’re  running  out  of  time  on  this  now.  I  decide  to  do  the  Surrealist
Inquisition
xxxii
Question Sheet on ‘building site inspectors’. I feel a bit daunted so
I set myself the target to write for half an hour but then got on a bit of a roll so
wrote for 45 minutes.
I  start  with  ‘Describe  the  situation  to  Aliens.  Don’t  mention  any  of  the  key
words.’
After  a  bit  of  thought  I  come  up  with  the  idea  that  people  who  set  buildings
regulations are Lords of the Dwellings standards (I always imagine what a Star
Trek alien would say).
I  like  the  word  ‘dwellings’  it  makes  me  think  of  mud  huts  and  igloos.  I  try  to
imagine what a site inspector would think of mud huts...
Site inspectors have a terrible time on holiday.
‘Oh that mud hut needs better foundations!’
‘Look at the state of that igloo!’
Can you imagine them seeing the leaning tower of Pisa, it could ruin the
whole holiday.
Then I move onto ‘Describe the situation to a young child’.
How  could  a  young  child  cope  with  building  standards?  I  think  very  hard  and
realise they have their own building disaster fable in the Three Little Pigs (which
I’d thought about yesterday). I get quite excited about this because I am starting
to see how I can use it.
The comedienne I’m writing for has a daughter so it might fit in with other stuff
she is doing?
Would  the  executive  from  the  building  company  insist  their  kids  read  the
Three
Little Pigs
story over and over?
I  try  rewriting  the  fairy  tale  so  the  buildings  inspector  comes  along  while  the
three little pigs are building their houses and makes them build it again so that
the wolf goes hungry.
I explained to my daughter that building regulations were introduced after
the three little pigs housing disaster...
In the modern version we have the straw house, the brick house and the
really stupid house built on a flood plain.
Next I do: ‘See if you can find an analogy’.
Do animal dens (rabbits’ warrens, birds’ nests etc.) have building

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regulations? And building inspectors? Do birds wolf whistle each other
when they are building their nests (because they have become builders)?
And finally: ‘Think about it from the point of view of the objects/things/people
who are indirectly involved.’
I  think  of  it  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  land  being  built  on.  The  animals’
houses  are  displaced  so  people  can  have  houses...  I  realise  a  new  homes
company is not going to want jokes about that so I stop that train of thought!