Jokes (this is not a request)

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I was going to say this on Alan's thread about hilarious war-related email jokery, but didn't. (With some caveats) I do not like (formal) jokes. If people are going to send them unsolicited to my inbox they had better be killingly funny. I like funny people, funny things, and contextual humour, but usually my first response when someone says 'Do you want to hear a joke?' is 'No. You telling me your joke badly will be me nodding tormentedly through a lame set up to get to a punchline that, even if it's funny, will be undermined by the painful artificiality of the situation and my laugh will not be authentic.'.

Am I humourless, are my friends/acquaintances inept and/or humourless, or are jokes generally dud in the hands of amateurs?

― Ellie, Tuesday, 13 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

i'd love it if you really did say precisely that each time.

― Alan Trewartha, Tuesday, 13 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Before decking them.

― Will, Tuesday, 13 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

So a bloke walks into a bar and goes up to this woman and says "Do you want to hear a joke".

She turns to him and says "No. You telling me your joke badly will be me nodding tormentedly through a lame set up to get to a punchline that, even if it's funny, will be undermined by the painful artificiality of the situation and my laugh will not be authentic."

He shrugs his shoulder and says "Alright, but it may have enriched your life for like, the twenty seconds it would take or me to tell it. Now you will be nagged forever with the gnawing uncertainty that maybe, just this once, the joke would have been hilarious and truly enriched my life with laugher and that fleeting taste of true happiness."

The woman, chastised by such a speech places her glass down, and looks back to the man. "You are right. I apologise. Tell me your joke."

The man clears his throat and with stentorian delivery says: "What's brown and sticky."

― Pete, Tuesday, 13 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

i don't get it :)

― katie, Tuesday, 13 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I don't know any proper jokes except one about michael jackson and a mcdonalds burger... usually they are tedious

― Menelaus Darcy, Tuesday, 13 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

A STICK!! I like the stick joke genre (see also what do you call a boomerang that doesn't come back?). Also meta-jokes. Chastened, I have now resolved to put a lifetime's bad jokes told badly behind me. I will lower my standards, and remain open to the possibility that perhaps just once in my lifetime that special moment will arrive, and true hilarity will come to me through the staged joke as conversation piece.

― Ellie, Tuesday, 13 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

This is also a good thing to say:
"Knock Knock, Ellie." "I will lower my standards, and remain open to the possibility that perhaps just once in my lifetime that special moment will arrive, and true hilarity will come to me through the staged joke as conversation piece. Who's there?"

― mark s, Tuesday, 13 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Can it please be a stick?

― Ellie, Tuesday, 13 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

surely the best knock-knock joke is the one they tell near the start of american werewolf in london. you start by saying to someone "say knock knock". marvellous

― Alan Trewartha, Tuesday, 13 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

There is one genre of joke which reigns supreme over all others and that is the placename joke.

― Tom, Tuesday, 13 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

eg?

― Graham, Tuesday, 13 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

You mean like "where did Ted Bundy like to hang out" - A: Hackensack? Cause that joke's shite.

― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, 13 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

No, the placename joke obeys a strict conversational form.

My wife went to the Caribbean.

Jamaica?

No, she went of her own accord.

being I think the ur-version.

― Tom, Tuesday, 13 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

My wife went to Indonesia

Jakarta?

No, she went in an aeroplane.

― james, Tuesday, 13 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

My wife joined a 90s disco-funk band fronted by a rich twat wearing a silly hat

Jamiroquai?

No she went of her own accord.

― Alan at home, Tuesday, 13 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

My wife went to Poole on her holidays

In Dorset?

Yes, she heartily recommends it!

boom! boom!

― Bill E, Tuesday, 13 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Pupil: Miss, what's the capital of Quebec?
Geography Teacher: Juneau?
Pupil: No, silly! That's why I'm asking you!
Sorry Ellie, I think you knew that a thread about jokes would have become a list of stupidity before too long...

― Will, Wednesday, 14 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I'm all for stupidity. Bring it on!

― Allen, Thursday, 15 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

seven years pass...

I went sifting for gold in the western United States.

Oregon?

No, I managed to find some.

― weatheringdaleson, Sunday, 23 November 2008 16:09 (seventeen years ago)

My wife and I are looking for a house in the United Arab Emirates.

Dubai?

Nah, at this point we really just want to rent something.

― dromedary farsi (unregistered), Sunday, 23 November 2008 16:49 (seventeen years ago)

My friend Conetta was thinking about leaving Hartford.

Connecticut?

No, she stuck around.

― Indiespace Administratester (Hurting 2), Sunday, 23 November 2008 16:51 (seventeen years ago)

I like to take my dog Egan to the suburbs of Chicago.

Waukegan?

No, I just carry him around in a little bag.

― Indiespace Administratester (Hurting 2), Sunday, 23 November 2008 16:57 (seventeen years ago)

I recently sold my camels in a city in the middle east.

Jerusalem?

No, I parted with my goods willingly.

― caek, Sunday, 23 November 2008 17:41 (seventeen years ago)

Agh, this all reminds me of a terribly laboured joke at my mother-in-law's after-wedding party. They had gone to New England for their honeymoon, and her name is Nan. There was a big long story which ended with something about how there's a little bit of New England back home with them because Nan Took It.

― ailsa, Sunday, 23 November 2008 17:57 (seventeen years ago)

Where'd you get that shirt?

Trenton.

New Jersey?

No, had it since high school.

― Indiespace Administratester (Hurting 2), Sunday, 23 November 2008 18:04 (seventeen years ago)

http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y280/etrizz/groan.jpg

― stone cold all time hall of fame classics (internet person), Sunday, 23 November 2008 18:44 (seventeen years ago)

if the joke "Egan"s, you must ban

― gabbneb, Sunday, 23 November 2008 18:49 (seventeen years ago)

WHY DID THE CHICKEN CROSS THE ROAD?

― ian, Sunday, 23 November 2008 18:54 (seventeen years ago)

TO GET THE CHINESE NEWSPAPER!!!!

― ian, Sunday, 23 November 2008 18:54 (seventeen years ago)

do you get it????

― ian, Sunday, 23 November 2008 18:57 (seventeen years ago)

no?

well, neither do i. i read the new york times.

― ian, Sunday, 23 November 2008 19:34 (seventeen years ago)

My sister just got out of alcohol counseling at a detox center down south.

Mississippi?

Not anymore!

― weatheringdaleson, Monday, 24 November 2008 05:20 (seventeen years ago)

I entered a contest and won a free trip to Manitoba!

Winnipeg?

No, a TRIP TO MANITOBA! Weren't you listening?

― Myonga Vön Bontee, Monday, 24 November 2008 05:42 (seventeen years ago)

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