When Adam Buxton and Joe Cornish hosted their show on BBC Radio 6 Music in the Noughties, there was a regular feature called Made-up Jokes. Listeners sent in witticisms they had devised themselves, such as: ‘Q: If you could have any superpower, what would it be?’ ‘A: I think it would probably be China.’ At Webster’s Autocentre, Kevin Webster is belatedly getting in on the act with a joke of his own. ‘What do you call a man sitting on the bumper of your car?’ he asks his wife Abi and Cassie Plummer. ‘Reg,’ is the punchline. Kevin thinks he made it up himself, although he admits he could have heard it somewhere. Cassie’s enthusiastic response encourages him, so a bit later he tries a follow-up gag. ‘What do you call a man sitting on your car bumper, dressed in camouflage gear?’ he asks. ‘Private reg.’ Cassie predicts a career in stand-up comedy, but an unimpressed Abi thinks she needs to go and lie down.
At The Rovers, Steve McDonald has a theory that also sounds like a joke, but he’s deadly serious. He reckons penalty-area manhandling on the football pitch would be resolved if players had their shirts painted on. Just check the opponents’ hands for paint, he explains, and that will reveal if a penalty should be awarded. Meanwhile, Summer Spellman has arranged for Paul Foreman to take a ride on a motorbike. He digs out his old leather jacket, admitting that his twin Gemma called him Fonzie when he wore it. Less kindly, it also resembles the one Gordon The Gopher sported on Going Live! and CBBC. At The Rovers, Steve is still promoting his body-paint football shirts idea. ‘What about shorts?’ asks a doubtful Ed Bailey. If Steve’s plan is ever adopted and includes below-the-belt clothing, Match Of The Day will need to come with a nudity warning. Ed changes the subject, complaining that time seems to pass so quickly these days. He says he heard about how time elapses in accordance with one’s age. He may mean proportionality theory, which was posited by the French philosopher Paul Janet in 1897. 1897? Wow, it feels like only yesterday.
Undertakers Todd Grimshaw and George Shuttleworth – who surely have their own interesting perspectives on the journey of life – are also in The Rovers, talking about one of their clients. Todd observes that the deceased woman’s wig made her look like Louis XIV. George struggles to recall what the French Sun King looked like, until Todd reminds him of Cher’s appearance in the video for her 1989 song If I Could Turn Back Time. As Doctor Who would say, shit just got timey-wimey. It’s no different at Roy’s Rolls, where Roy Cropper tells Evelyn Plummer about a lecture his late wife Hayley went to. It was on the subject of infinity, and he recalls how Hayley joked about it going ‘on and on and on’. Evelyn criticises Roy’s comic timing. Tough crowd.
Kevin should steer clear of Evelyn if he ever turns to doing stand-up. He has been glued to his phone for hours – not looking for open-mic slots, but trying to find someone to repair the bodywork on a damaged car. Kevin says he feels like JR Hartley, the character in a 1983 Yellow Pages TV ad. Hartley (played by Norman Lumsden) rang numerous bookshops in a quest to find a book called Fly Fishing, which – spoiler alert – he had authored. When Kevin’s son Jake turns up, caked in mud after football practice (not in a body-paint kit) Cassie flatters him by predicting that England manager Gareth Southgate will soon be in touch.
Evelyn has promised Roy she’ll listen to a classical recital, but she’s distracted by the prospect of being given jail time for nabbing Terry Fensley’s dog. Over at 19a Rosamund Street, Paul and Summer are sat in front of the telly. We don’t get to see their show of choice – which is a shame, because they both unleash a barrage of hate bombs at whatever they’re watching on the screen: ‘I hate him – and her.’ Sign them up right now, Gogglebox.
Coronation Street episode 11154/11155. Originally aired 2nd Jan 2024.
