You need to have a British sense of humor (ahem – that would be humour) to fully understand this joke about the ice cream man. There is an explanation of some of the terms following the joke and we hope you enjoy it…..
The ice cream van belonging to Angelo, one of the Italian family’s fleet of ice cream vans, was parked at the side of the road. The lights were flashing, the music was playing, but there was no sign of Angelo anywhere.
Meanwhile, a big queue of excited kids was starting to stretch down the street.
A copper who was walking down the road wondered what was going on.
“Where is Angelo”, he asked the people, “why is he not dishing out the ice-cream?”
He went over to the ice cream van and peered through the open window and over the high counter.
On the floor he spotted Angelo. He was lying very still, and was covered in chocolate sauce, strawberry sauce, nuts, hundreds and thousands and those little jelly bits.
“Get back kids, quickly”, he shouted.
Moving away, so the bemused kids could not overhear him, he got on the radio to the police station.
“Sarge, get someone down here quick,” he stuttered, “It’s Angelo the ice-cream man… He’s topped himself.”
Being English myself I don’t have any problems understanding this joke, but if you are not familiar with the English way of life, then you probably are not aware that we have ice cream vans everywhere, much more than the USA, and many are run by Italians. We still have coppers (policeman) who walk the streets, rather than drive around in cars, and the phrase “to top oneself” means to take your own life. Cor blimey – does it make sense now mate?
Image used under a Collective Commons License from: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ford_ice_cream_van_(34632108535).jpg
