Tom was telling us at breakfast about how, in a science class, there was a description of a blubbery, hairy animal and someone shouted “That’s yer mum Tom”.

“Oh,” said Richy, “that’s not very nice”.

“It’s a yer mum joke”, said Rosie and Owen in unison, chuckling into their pancakes.

Richy and I sat there with blank faces.

“You know, ‘yer mum this’ and ‘yer mum that’,” said Rosie.

“Yeah, like ‘yer mum’s so hairy she speaks wooky'”, chipped in Tom.

Neither Richy nor me had ever heard of yer mum jokes before. Turns out, the kids have grown up since primary school with regular yer mum jokes.

“James O’s the best. He told em all the way home from school on Friday,” said Tom, “like ‘I went for a five km run last night. It was two laps of yer mum’.”

“Yeah, you don’t even need a punchline”, said Rosie, “you just say ‘yer mum’ to people.”

“Oh,” said Richy, “Aren’t there ‘yer dad’ jokes?”

Rosie and Owen looked at each other.

“Nah, it doesn’t work”.