A married couple seeks counseling from the village pastor. They are obviously upset. They stand before the pastor, and the pastor asks what brings them over. The man says that they just had a baby boy, and they can’t agree on a name. The husband wants to name him after his father, and the wife wants to name him after hers. The pastor asks the husband what his father name was. “Jacob” comes the answer. Then he asks the wife for her father’s name, and the wife says “Jacob”. Then the pastor asks the husband what was his father’s occupation, and he says “my late father, may he rest in peace was a petty thief”. To the same question, the wife answers “he was a good-for-nothing bum and drunk”. The pastor then says to the frustrated couple: “why don’t you name him Jacob and wait”. He takes a sip of his hot tea and adds: “if he turns out to be a petty thief, then he was named after your father” he says to the husband. He turns to the wife and says: “And if he turns out to be a good-for-nothing bum and drunk”, then he certainly is named after yours.
Funny? Arguably so. Hilarious? Probably not. But try to tell this joke to a lady I love with all my heart: my mother. Her facial expression will not change even a little, she will most certainly not laugh. She will, however, start an inquiry: “but they both had the same name, didn’t they?”, “what if the boy turns out neither a thief nor a bum?”. And then the following statement will come: “this joke isn’t funny”.
It’s quite discouraging to tell a joke to an audience made up of people like my mother. For sure, there’ll be no laughter. There may be a lot of questioning, with a conclusion at the end that may encourage you to become a stamp collector rather than a comedian. My mother-in-law is not too far behind. In fact, I was thinking, if I could get both of them into Carnegie Hall, with no choreography and no script, and absolutely no preparation, sell tickets and just let them tell jokes to each other, I would be the proud owner of an over night smash hit. I can imagine people laughing out of breath.
But seriously, what constitutes a good joke? And even more interesting, what constitutes a sense of humor?
I found two definitions. Humor: the trait of appreciating (and being able to express) the humorous; (http://wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=sense%20of%20humor)
Humor: the ability or quality of people, objects, or situations to evoke feelings of amusement in other people. The term encompasses a form of entertainment or human communication which evokes such feelings, or which makes people laugh or feel happy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sense_of_humor)
In short, the ability to tell jokes in a way that makes people laugh, and to laugh at a good joke (agreeably a subjective issue), constitutes the presence of a sense of humor. Clearly, some have it, some don’t.
And what constitutes a good joke? I really can’t tell. But it may have something to do with expectations. Read this (http://www.maddogproductions.com/ds_expectations.htm), you may find it funny, or at least interesting.
Last but not least: would you consider the following a good joke? A married couple is having a conversation. Out of nowhere the husband asks his wife if she would consider changing positions. She goes: “of course, love! why don’t you come here and do the ironing, while I sit and burp in front of the TV…”
Have a funny day!
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