What's So &%#@ Funny ? (Humor and How it Gets That Way)

By Agnes Franz

Why smile? Why laugh? Why chuckle? Because it is so darn important.

We all enjoy joy. This book talks about how friendly humor can be and how good it tastes. There’s a place for humor in a wide and diverse range of the human experience. We take a look at humor from the perspective of how exciting it is. For example, kids are naturally fun. Writers, parents, instructors, salespeople, business types and curious intellectuals, and just ordinary folk get an important lift out of a good chuckle. It can be a life saver, not just fun.

Here we are, let’s examine the exploitation, adventures and fun humor has experienced over time.

Funny stuff just happens. There’s the classic where an unaware guy slips on a banana peel. There’s a bit of trickster in most of us. No necessarily nastiness, but young-at-heart playfulness. “You will live—but not long,” a veiled threat that usually passes as a joke.

So much of our communication is colored with witty stuff that innocently strays into conversations, writing, and our thoughts. These sixteen chapters address most of those topics, rather than follow fun chronologically through the decades. Gallows Humor, Clowns, How High is School, Kids, Show Biz, Words, Business, and lots of Sarcasm and Satire. We dig deeply into sarcasm, that beloved form of satire that graduates from snobbery.

We also look at the black side of things. Why hesitate to show friends and family how completely we’re surrounded by evil and deceit, lousy crooks and grumpy salespeople? Do something about it. Why not lighten up? We can tell a joke, play a prank or sing a funny song left over from elementary school. “My old sneakers are friends of mine, You can’t trust any shoes that shine....” Just like Sandra Boynton, humorist, songwriter etc., tells kids. Making jokes and witty pleasantries is an excellent way to spread happiness and make friends. Unfortunately, not everyone has the knack.

There’s water cooler wit, that’s where there’s some insight into how business tension is dispelled with a light or even dark, nasty touch of humor. Everyone is a specialist and supposedly hates The Boss, so some pretty scathing steam gets blown off right there. Not every working person has a desk, or even a water cooler. Take the rodeo clown who diverts the bull from injuring the bull riders as well as clown around to entertain the crowd. There are many well-trained and often over-educated, bartenders with good ears, a ready smile, and off-all color jokes.

"What’s So &%#@ Funny?" examines the adventures and fun humor has undergone over time. From “Knock, knock” through back stage burlesque to Bob Hope’s USO tours, and bankable comedy club performers. What does go on between the actor and the audience, anyway? What is funny on one side of the mountain is not necessarily funny on the other side. Same darn thing from one part of town to the other or from one social level to another.

Puns have a short lifetime and are a one-time thing. Jokes can be retold. Cemeteries are places where literary humor can become eternal. Written in stone, as in gravestones. Humorist Erma Bombeck started her humorist career working as a newspaper obituary writer. We’ve heard that she also wrote her own epitaph, “I told you I was sick.”

Wit wins when people simply surrender with a good laugh. Witty folks do their best to bring the audience to its knees. Humor can also calm tempers, soothes jagged nerves, break the gloom of growing old and achey.

The writer has seen the pains of people buffered and soothed by a lighthearted remark or twinkle in the eyes of a stranger. She’s experienced a great deal of anger diminished through a witty retort or a heavenward roll of the eyes along with a tiny, gentle smile. This sort of thing has been used since the beginning of time. That’s why this book has been written.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Agnes Franz
• Release date: Oct 21, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301287390

Agnes Franz

A love of laughter and intense interest in the many aspects of American discourse drives author Agnes Franz in her writing pursuits. Her accomplishments include research, composition, publishing, and consulting in the advertising field. Her books are characterized by an affinity for brief, pithy phrases—a skill honed from over 20 years work as an advertising director at Rodale Press.While managing a publishers’ advertising representative business in Prescott, Arizona, she wrote and published the business-to-business newsletter, Classified Communication, addressing advertising trends. Some of the newsletter material popped up in her books SMIRK Volume #1 and SMIRK, Volume #2, both compiled through some strategic literary litter lifting.Agnes researched and wrote Historic Prescott (AZ), now in a second printing. She volunteered as a Prescott SCORE (Service Corps of Retired Executives) business counselor for ten years, working with small-business people and entrepreneurs in their marketing and advertising efforts. She also supported Prescott Art Docents.The author studied journalism at Charles Morris Price School of Journalism and Bethany College. From her brief career as a small town newspaper reporter, she continued to editor of a multi-language magazine, reviewing books, composing political campaign promos, and later turned to advertising, the love of her career life.Her studies, writing, and interests address many aspects of American communication.

Book preview

What's So &%#@ Funny ?

Humor and How it Gets That Way

by

Agnes Franz

2013 Agnes Franz All Rights Reserved

Smashwords Edition

Formatted for this medium by House of Lit, Dewey, AZ

Smashwords Edition License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

With writerly love to Joseph and Eriko Kascmer

Acknowledgments

With thanks to all the good, wise wits who enrich our lives

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Preface

Business

Gallows Humor

How High is School

Joshing Around

Kids

Laughter

Lifestyles

Oh Boy, Here Come the Clowns

People Watchers

Reading and Writing

Sarcasm and Satire

Show Biz

Tell Me the Truth, Doc

The Softer Side of the Funny Side

Words

What a Lovely Gesture

Bibliography

About the Author

Preface

There was once a day without any trace of humor. No giggling children, no dogs chasing their tails 'round and 'round, no bawdy revelers pounding tables as stand-up comedians plod through their gigs. And the leaves fell off the trees, the sky was dark, and computers crashed all over town. What a wasted day!

Each chapter of this lighthearted book is pretty full and can stand on its own. Read chapters individually and out of sequence according to and toward your own mood and your pleasure.

Why smile? Why laugh? Why chuckle? Because it’s fun. It depends on who you are, where you are and what the IT does, and a lot of other stuff.

The most snarky, smiley, sanctimonious, sentimental, sacred, irreverent, tender, cheeky and enduring short, funny remark can make us smile. Offbeat ideas that might cover weird viewpoints can do the trick.

Cemeteries are places where literary humor can become eternal. Written in stone, as in gravestones. Some epitaphs are the words of the deceased, composed in anticipation of their demise. Others, the inspirations of silver-tongued friends or family. The British display a knack for schemes to get in the last word, such as:

Stranger, treat this ground with gravity,

Dentist Brown is filling his last cavity

Where would we be without the pleasure of a smile, whether it is on our own face or that of a companion? Particularly on the face of a stranger or a casual acquaintance.

What fun it is to see how eyes can brighten and the corners of lips turn up when we make a supportive and successful effort to perk up someone.

Then there’s the rib-busting blunder, the joke, or the prank we don’t plan but must face any way. The classic slip on a banana peel. There’s a bit of trickster in most of us. Not necessarily nastiness, but youth-at-heart playfulness. Lucky recipient and impish presenter; each gains some taste of humor.

Your writer has seen the pains of many people buffered and soothed by a lighthearted comment or twinkle in the eye of a stranger. She’s experienced a great deal of anger diminished through a witty retort or a heavenward roll of the eyes and a smile. It can be done. It’s been effective since the beginning of time. That’s why this book was written. To take the ouch out of the dayout of the less-than-perfect day, at least.

It is not necessary to be out-and-out pleasant in dispersing humor; it might be it a tiny smile, a laugh, or an extended foot to trip up a passerby. We get the feeling that sometimes comedy submerges us in human weakness and stupidity, so either these qualities smear off on our self-righteous holiness, or we act condescendingly to other incompetent human beings. Don’t you think?

Once in a while take a look at the black side of things. Don’t hesitate to teach friends and family how we’re completely surrounded by evil and deceit and lousy crooks. Kick-start your own meanness and put some vigor behind that sneer. Apply the word smirk, which does not mean a small smile. It means a nasty little grin that says, I know something you don’t.

Ready for this book? Consider the many flavors that humor comes in, and see how they get that way.

<^>

BUSINESS

"You’re fired!"

"But why? I work hard and I’m always on time. Anyway, I’m an intern, I don’t even get any pay."

"Yeah, I know. By the way, your dad, who was head of research; we fired him this morning."

"OK, I get itnepotism. It’s that family thing."

When you and a coworker are ping-ponging slurs about the boss, one of you may come up with a little goody like: He’s so stupid he would be out of his depth in a mud puddle. It also might fit in nicely if you were in a start-up business and management was still sucking its thumb about the color of No Parking signs out front. Or this might apply to any dull-witted office acquaintance who stays glued to the snacks vending machine.

Professionals as well as self-effacing keyboard punchers have their own jargon. Consider lawyers. Even though legal terms may seem to have been developed to keep laypersons in the dark so these fine friends can calculate hefty ritual fees, there is a valid need for them. In a field where a single word can make a world of difference, a succinct, readily recognizable vocabulary is essential. May you never consult a lawyer (or barrister, solicitor, attorney, advocate, or whatever they are called in your neighborhood), but it is good to know some of that legal jargon. There’s also the matter of barratry, a tradition of stirring up groundless lawsuits. Of course, a few do get straight to the point without any fancy terminology:

Lawyer: Judge, I wish to appeal my client's case on the basis of newly discovered evidence.

Judge: And what is the nature of the new evidence?

Lawyer: "Judge, I discovered that my client still has $3,000 left.

Other professionals like an ophthalmologist, a dermatologist, an auto mechanic, or a chef don’t come dashing at us with sharp instruments. These miracle makers scan and probe and peek and take their sweet time before they deliver an opinion or verdict. That’s not just their specialized know-how at work, it’s their knowledge of human frailty, and it is good businesswith an edge of show business, as well.

Late night TV shows ask a heck of a lot of comedy hosts. They skirted around ‘the cry time and crime time’ of ten o’clock shows. Jay Leno, Conan O’Brien, and Jon Stewart slugged it out in the early 2000s fighting for those good ratings. Amazingly, the shows were great fun, although a few late-night viewers sooner or later did fall asleep.

Some members of what has been dubbed the oldest profession did and do call themselves professionals. Way back when the word academy was a euphemism for brothel, those who worked there were quite logically called academicians. Another accepted expression, tart became the word to describe a promiscuous woman, not necessarily a professional. Finally, people decided to call women who charged for sexual services tarts. Quite benevolently they said, a tart with a heart.

Lifestyle business is considered a slightly uncomplimentary definition of an entrepreneurial venture whose head isn’t really interested in a huge bottom line. Does that seem realistic? The Small Business Administration identifies any business with fewer than 500 employees as one of the family. A payroll of less than 500 might cover the guys who maintain the neighbor’s lawn. There are those businesspeople who proclaim, I could open another location, but I don’t want to work that hard. OK for you, fella. We’re more enthused about the person who passionately does what he or she loves and is good at. There’s likely some fun and a few laughs there.

Investing in the stock market during the 2010-2011 years was a nervous and somewhat heartless sport. If I’d only followed CNBC’s advice I’d have a million dollars today … provided I invested a hundred million dollars, said Jon Stewart, political satirist and media critic. Although business had its difficulties as well, Mr. Stewart might have put some of his talents in ad campaigns. His tongue-in-cheek drollness fits in with commercials that tend to be off-tack anyway. There were some charming ideas put into memorable ads. A cat food company launched a TV commercial that was specifically targeted not to the cat ownerbut to cats in the viewing audience. Tweeting, twittering birds would attract the attention of most cats in the vicinity of the television monitor. They were expected to rush over to see the commercial and be mesmerized by the images and sounds. A few meooows and a bird fluttering across the monitor did seize feline attention! The felines’ owners were then expected to see the cats watching a commercial for a particular brand. That name came on the monitor at the end of the commercial. After Fluffy rushed over to the TV and became transfixed owners were expected to squeal, Ah, Fluffy wants this brand! Keep in mind that these ads target the resident cat, not the cat’s owner. Cat owners by the hundreds of thousands were programed to rush out and buy at least a half a dozen cans. Taste testing came after the sale.

True Value Hardware stores dubbed the many store sales associates as masters of all things ‘hardwarian.’ The campaign, with a generous $15 million budget, used a theme that had appeared in True Value ads: Start right. Start here. Earlier ads for True Value Hardware stores focused on the experience of sales associates who boasted, We’ve been there. They had. Many lived through completion of their own do-it-yourself projects and both the people and the products survived. The men and women on the sales floor knew not only the nuts and bolts inside and out but knew the correct sizes."

Many homeowners and apartment dwellers think about calling plumbers, electricians, painters, or roofers when there is something to be fixed, but then decide It can’t be all that difficult. Instead they roll up their own sleeves to repair what is broken. That fresh need for help and DIY effort sends them into hardware stores, where they expect to find that super knowledgeable salesperson. Whether the customer is a first-time homeowner or a weather-beaten, veteran property holder, customers expect stores to have every piece of equipment that’s needed in addition to handy, dandy instructions on how to use the gizmos.

During the economic meltdown, True Value hardware stores puffed up the immodest slogan: Masters of All Things Hardwarian. Budgetary constraints stopped consumers from starting major projects like adding a deck, a family room, or a constructing a bell tower. They headed for the hardware store to ask the Hardwarian Masters for oh-m’gosh-advice and product suggestions to fix it.

Think about the Marlboro Silent Water Waste Preventer, a great invention. In the 1800s, Thomas Crapper made a few plumbing refinements over earlier inefficient and odiferous styles of what was tactfully called the water closet. He designed the plumbing so that a little reservoir of water returned to the bottom of the bowl after each flush of the toilet. The man was a hero. Hence the word crap has an honored spot in our casual conversation and the inventor’s name is honored in matters of modern hygiene.

Consider the veterinarian whose patients don’t give an explanation of their maladies or tell where it hurts but instead may snap, snarl, or whimper. Just try kidding a 165-pound Tibetan Mountain dog into swallowing a huge pill. Vets also have a few legal issues to note. Pity the vet who sets up practice in Quitman, Georgia, and the first patient is a pet chicken whose feathers were rearranged while crossing the road. It’s illegal for a chicken to cross a road within that city limits, anyway. Should the veterinarian turn the fowl in to the police? In Atlanta, it’s against the law to tie a giraffe to a telephone pole or a street lamp. Most important is a New York restriction that does not allow donkeys to sleep in bathtubs.

A leader without a sense of humor is apt to be like the grass mower in the cemeteryhe has lots of people under him, but nobody is paying him much attention this from the teachings of the Bob Ross book, The Corporate Comic. We tend to think that one large real estate firm, Long Realty, coerced their sign painter to read that book. When the company sold a house or business, the For Sale sign in front of the purchased building gets an additional sign hung beneath the company name. It reads Long Gone. It’s a neat way to boast about the finalized sale and adds an affable touch of humor to real estate success.

Fortune 500 companies tend to look for a sense of humor in their search for middle management staff as well as top executives. It reminds us of a company announcement: I have a stressful order of business, the Chairman of Something said, we’re looking for a treasurer. But we appointed a treasurer just six months ago. Yes, said the Chairman of Something, that’s the treasurer we’re looking for.

How about the kidding around and sense of humor flight attendants on some airlines use to make up for lack of hot meals and lifesaving free coffee? Those were the days. Things were done to improve the joy of flying. How much more encouraging to trigger some captive passenger’s mirth for anticipating overpriced, under salted peanuts.

Land travelers who get pulled over by a cop find it’s no fun being sentenced to traffic school where they are required to pay for driving sins and speed excesses. The outspoken and amazing instructors have learned that a little humor helps hold miscreants’ attention. Many of these driver’s-ed schools recruit aspiring comics to work as instructors. These performers are pretty resistant to hecklers and the panorama of a hostile, captive, glazed-eyed audience. After a few hours or so, guilty traffic violators become involved and even somewhat sincere in deferring to the rules of the road. We tend to remember things that are fitted with humor. Certainly when we are threatened with having our wheels taken away. A great motivator.

Who is really sure about the authenticity of something that may initially have seemed hysterically laughable? The funny stuff can fit into everyday life in peculiar ways. It may help one escape a mind-dulling routine for just a moment, and in some cases, permanently. A little humor may also defy the boring job of painting a garage door dull gray, the endless political jokes, and the monotonous routine of folding laundry.

Because the jars had the same shape when Mr. Prospective Buyer was a kid, the taste of how yummy peanut butter mixed with mustard tasted still remains (Don’t try this at home). Salespeople sometimes get lucky and stumble on information about things like that about their probable buyer. If that taste brought happiness to the prospect’s life during childhood, it just may still be a happy memory. A casual reference could create a pleasurable mood and move a pen to the signature line on a triumphant business deal. Find out what makes a prospect feel content. Cozy up to that receptive banana and horseradish sandwich memory, and get closer to making the sales call a success.

If you run a business, the folks in customer service may budget a few bucks for a courtesy jar of lime green candy to placate livid customers. It’s useful to surprise that person who bitterly complains about the delivery truck driver’s baggy uniform. Rather than try to boost an apology with flowering nothings, a smart adjuster can simply respond, You know what, you may be right. What a surprise! Just a light tone with no serious commitment. If nothing else, it sometimes knocks whiners and unrelenting grumps off their pedestals. What do you know, the company agreed with me!

The author of What They Don’t Teach You at Harvard Business School, Mark H. McCormack, writes, Laughter is the most potent, constructive force for diffusing business tension. If you can point out something that is humorous or absurd about a situation or confrontation, you will be guaranteed the upper hand. Laughter is the best way to start a meeting. You don’t need to have them falling in the aisles. A mildly pleasant remark at the outset will create the right environment for everything that follows. Sort of a cliché, but this sure makes sense. People should be able to have some fun at work.

Yoram Bauman is known as a comedian as well as an economics professor at the University of Washington. He calls himself the world's first Stand-Up Economist. One of the advantages of the comedy scene is that wages are flexible, he said. Maybe two years ago, headliners were getting $2,000 per weekend, and now maybe they're just getting $1,500. That kind of flexibility helps the whole industry adjust to changes in overall economic conditions. Not every humorist has a reserve of economics’ logic to figure that out.

Hostile, genuinely sarcastic humor, on the other hand, is usually directed upward, not straight out toward an equal or to a subordinate. Save the piercing stuff for corporate gossip and serious backbiting. College freshmen ridicule upper classmen. In the military echelons of command, noncoms gripe about junior commissioned officers, who, in turn, ridicule the major support staff, who in turn deride