I had a similar experience. Me and my buddy were cruising down route 80. He was driving, I was in the passenger seat. He nudges me and points his thumb out the drivers side window saying, “Can you believe this clown is trying to pass us?”
I looked over and saw a clown in full costume trying to pass us in the left hand lane. I laughed for a good ten minutes, not understanding how my friend could have given such a deadpan setup without cracking up himself.
This one made me LOL for realsies but when I told it to my husband he just stared at me.
I believe it was E.B. White who said “you can dissect a frog or a joke, but both die in the process.”
I worked a job with some roadies who had just come from working the Phillip Glass opera “Einstein on the Beach.” They said the following was Phillip Glass’s favorite joke in the world and he never got tired of telling it:
knock knock
who’s there?
knock knock
who’s there?
knock knock
who’s there?
–keep repeating “knock knock,” prompting the knockee to say “who’s there” until the knockee either laughs because they get it* or gives up in frustration–
*Creating a repetitive exchange IS the joke. This is an anti-joke that’s transformed into a real joke when you know something about the joke teller – here, that Phillip Glass writes very repetitive music.
This usually gets an explosion of laughter during the second iteration if your audience knows Glass’ work. Although it isn’t really anti-humor, it’s a real joke with a diffused punch line.