It occurred to me it might be a good idea to catalog the various knee-jerk “witticisms” that the tellers think are amusing but that the recipients have probably heard a thousand times.
Two more examples:
I’ve heard this a few times in convenience stores and gas stations, when somebody is buying a lottery ticket. The clerk asks what numbers they want, and the customer says “the winning ones.” Har har.
When I used to do IT support, I’d be sitting at some person’s desk trying to figure out their computer issue, and one of their co-workers would reliably walk by and say, “Hey (person), you look different.” Knee slap city.
Yep, if it is a perfect setup for a one line zinger, then it has been done a thousand times. If we care about the recipients’ emotional well-being, we need to resist the temptation. LOL
So, my contribution: We had an assistant principal here for 4 years whose name was Adam West. You can guess the rest from here. He was assailed on a daily basis by any number of one liners that the tellers felt were oh so clever but were, in reality, tired and overworked retreads of “jokes” told an untold number of times.
Our tech office is next door to the district office complex. One day, a man standing outside of district said, “Excuse me, I’m looking for Adam West.” I replied, “His office is 217 upstairs.” With glee he said, “Well, I’ll just swing by the Bat Cave!” He was grinning with self-satisfaction because he felt oh so clever.
I had to resist the urge to call Adam and warn him to run away. LOL
I went to high school with a girl whose last name was Wright. I expect her mom was treated to witticisms about “marrying Mr. (W)Right” for far too long.
Alfred Wight (James Herriot) frequently wrote in his books how, as a vet, he’d have farmers calling him over the phone about some ailment their cow or horse was having, and when Wight asked, “So, what’s the problem?” the farmers would say “Aye, that’s what I want YOU to tell ME!”
In one book, Wight wrote, “The fact that I had heard this joke ten thousand times did not prevent me from producing the forced polite laughter” (or something to that effect.)
Another friend of mine in the Navy went to boot camp with a guy whose surname was Hakuna. When the officers called out roll call the guy would just straight-away reply “Matata!” to save everyone the inevitable pun.
Heh. I once bought caulk for a project, then stopped at my friend Gilbert’s house knowing he’d be at work and his wife at home.
I rang the bell, then when she answered a slapped her across the face (gently) with my caulk. I told her when Gilbert got home she could tell him kayaker stopped over and slapped her across the face with his caulk.
For the people who restock ATMs, I would think that the fear of being robbed at gunpoint would not be nearly as dreadful as constantly having to hear the joke “got any free samples? Ha ha ha!”
but what if you’re making the joke SPECIFICALLY BECAUSE it’s been made a gawdzillion times before, as a self-deprecating comment? I will admit to making the
usually followed by “someone’s got to make the bad, old joke.”, more or less saying “Yes, I share your pain with the existence of old jokes.”
I’ve got the feeling that you’re throwing me a curve ball, here.
So, using my example, that would be like Adam West saying, “Sure, meet me in the Bat Cave in 15 minutes.” I can see that as being okay. That would be like me saying, “Hey, no Princess Jasmine jokes. I’ve been promoted to queen.”
In German, a number with recurring digits is called a “Schnapszahl”, literally a booze number, so 11, 666 or 5.55 are Schnapszahlen. I don’t know exactly where it comes from, but I think it has something to do with pub games like cards or dice where it used to be a tradition that any time such a number turned up, the player had to order a round of shots. Anyway, almost any time a supermarket customer is rang up with a sum that is such a number, they will inevitably blurt out “Hey, that’s a Schnapszahl!” and expect the cashier to laugh along, without realising that during a shift the cashier has hundreds of customers and this happens a few times a day.
One time that happened to me as a customer, when my order came to $66.66 and the cashier acted fake freaked-out. I said “at least it has that extra 6”, as a way to humor him and also to passively-aggressively point out that unless it’s actually 666, it isn’t really all that funny since a lot of numbers are pretty close to 666. Like if I said “Nice!” if my order came out to $4.21 or 0.68.
I used to work in environmental consulting, and sometimes would be out in the field working with the drill rig to collect soil samples or install a groundwater well.
Without fail, everyone who walked by: “Strike oil yet?”
