#fatterday

WHAT’S THE HOLD-UP?

  THE HOLD-UP MAN’S DIET ALLOWED HIM ONE DAY A WEEK WHEN HE COULD EAT ANYTHING HE WANTED. HE CELEBRATED WITH A FATTERDAY NIGHT SPECIAL.

  What’s so funny about this? This pun is kind of complicated. It involves a new pun I heard yesterday for the first time and a couple of slang expressions that may not even be in use anymore.  A “hold-up man” is a guy who specializes in holding up people and business establishments.  No, he’s not the guy who will hold up your car while you change a tire because you don’t have a jack. A “hold-up” is a robbery of a person or a place. Yes, it can also mean a delay, but not in this case. Usually a hold-up guy will use a weapon to commit the hold up, threatening violence if there is resistance.  Frequently his weapon of choice is a gun. Back in the day when guns weren’t so sophisticated, you could get a cheap low-caliber weapon, like a .22, practically for pocket change. But as with most things, you get what you pay for and these cheap guns often didn’t work but were still scary enough to do the job.  They were known as “Saturday Night Specials.” Now in this joke we not only have a fat hold-up guy but a vain one who wants to lose weight and has gone on a diet. It’s a pretty strict and restrictive diet, severely limiting what he can eat. But it does allow him to take one day off a week to indulge hmself a little. This day off is called “Fatterday” by some people. It’s a relatively new term. It rhymes with Saturday. So our guy is making good use of his Fatterday by using a Fatterday Night Special. This could mean a robbery with a cheap gun or a hot fudge peanut butter banana split with marshmallow sundae. And THAT’s what’s so funny!

  This joke was inspired by a conversation I had with my son Ezra, and wife Irene.