Joshua has been making his name as a designer of smart handbags, but even he is now finding times difficult, and his business is beginning to struggle. Then one day he gets some good news and immediately phones his wife Rebecca.
"Darling," he shouts down the phone, "I've done a brilliant deal. Mervyn Levy, the Handbag King no less, has just told me that he loves our handbags so much that he will buy every handbag we can make for him. I've invited him to have dinner with us tonight so that we can close the deal. What do you think about that?"
"Mazeltov, Joshua," replies Rebecca, "that's fantastic news. But how can we have Mervyn here for dinner when we pawned our best dinner service last month? We dont have two matching plates to our name."
"Don't worry," says Joshua, "I'm going to go to Abe the Pawnbroker right now. I know him well and he'll let us have our dinner service back if I pay him immediately. Just give me the number of our ticket."
"It's 946," replies Rebecca.
So Joshua goes to Abe's shop and pays the bill for ticket 946. Abe gives him a receipt and goes into the storeroom to look for the item held against the ticket. He returns with a canteen of silver plated cutlery.
"Abe, this isnt my item," says Joshua. "There's been a mistake."
Abe goes back into the storeroom and returns a few minutes later. "I've found out what the problem is, Joshua," he says. "Rebecca had ticket 964 not 946. I gave ticket 946 to Mervyn Levy."
"Oy Vay!" says Joshua, "and to think I was planning to get rich by relying on a knocker who has to pawn his property. And that shmuck thinks he's coming to my house for dinner tonight."
knocker (pronounced, k'noker): a big shot, a show off
Read all jokes from:Jewish (+6997)
