Stories, Lies and Jokes
There exists a segment of the population that doesn't see me as introverted, which astounds me everytime. I'm not used to being known as either funny or outgoing. Or maybe my Mennonite upbringing has just ingrained a humility in me that doesn't allow me to remember that I am actually funny. I do however see myself as a bit of a comedy connoisseur.
I was at a concert tonight, and the two bands House of Doc and Five on the Floor, both had a bit of a repertoire between songs that elicited laughter from the audience. Both groups were phenomenal musicians, and their senses of humour were both pretty formulaic given their group dynamics. The first group was made up of grey and greying haired men, many of whose jokes revolved on their age, them not getting along, and them not being all that good. What made it work was that they seemed to be genuine. Each joke was almost as if the others had never heard it before, so the people looked sincerely funny. The second group was younger, and one of their members was the son of one of the other men. Their jokes were mostly about them having weird ideas, their old parents, and their even weirder friends. It didn't work for me for some reason. They may as well have introduced their jokes with lines like, "Here's another joke about my dad being old ...", "Here comes a joke about how so terribly creative we are ... ", and "Here's a joke that we've told a million times before, so you'll obviously laugh at it ...". I understand and appreciate that it's tough to always have new jokes to tell, and I re-use material myself, but you have to earn my laughter.
I won't just criticize other people's humour, I'll analyze some of my own as well. Today I was getting fitted for a tux for my brother's wedding. The fitter asked for my height, and I said, "6 feet", to which my brother laughed and said, "Yeah, right!" I responded by saying, "Come on, I'm just rounding up to the nearest foot." His comment got more laughs than mine, even though I am a touch more than 5'11.5", so I'm more than qualified to say that I am. My joke however was borrowed from a Seinfeld episode.
One of the songs tonight was called "Green Pastures". I'm worship leading at church tomorrow. At some point I am going to mention this concert, mention this song title, and say how I thought it was about people in my line of work. (Green is a slang adjective for being inexperienced, and pastures sounds a lot like pastors, which I have recently become). I know there will be some laughs, some groans, and mostly silence. I'm not up there to tell jokes, but stuff like that is part of my repertoire.

   [ posted by William @ 12:42 AM ]