Oh, kindergarteners have no sense of humor.
See, in that case I’d be one of the stiffs. It’s not that I wouldn’t understand it was a joke, but the idea of being led to think about my co-worker’s penis? No thanks.
I am ashamed to admit (and yet I am admitting) I had to think 1.5 times about this one. :smack:
-FrL-
I over reacted to an innocent joke by Quasimodem, and dissed him rapaciously.
I am ashamed and aplologize.
Yesterday, when me and some colleagues at work went through some kind of team building class. The psychologist leading the class asked if we knew of any imprinted behaviours we had. I said “yeah, I start drooling when someone turns on a lamp”. Me and the psychologist giggled. Everyone else went very quiet. I later had to explain that I don’t actually start drooling when the light comes on. That was awkward.
Ha! Well played (and I am being sincere). 
Glad to hear it! Here is the relevant pit thread which you might want to also aplologize again: Why is BarnOwl a PMSing psychopath? - The BBQ Pit - Straight Dope Message Board
(Yes I deliberately copied the typo, because I think it should be a new word; it could mean ‘apologizing over a funny incident.’)
Reminds me of the time – and I’m just waiting for someone to post the obvious thread “ever say something seriously and have someone take it as a joke” – when I seriously got shot – with an air pistol in a drive by random attack – while running. It wasn’t hospital-necessitating, but it did draw blood so I took the next day off to see if the bb was still in there the thinking being that punk hooligans probably don’t have the highest standards of hygiene.
So the next day a co-worker asks where I was, I said “oh, I got shot.” It was the only thing to say, really. He laughed it off of course, and that was fine. If I hedged on what happened, he would have only inquired more, and I didn’t want people to make a big deal out of it. But I technically didn’t lie or make a joke when he asked where I was 
You do know that people eat squirrel, right? I mean, there’s even a squirrel-hunting season. (It doesn’t taste bad, for the record, though I wouldn’t go out of my way to eat it).
I took yourr advice and apologized over there, too.
I’m confused - what typo?
Edit: I see it now!
I am usually the one who takes jokes too seriously. I am the world’s most gullible person ever. But one time, I was on the delivering end.
Background: Six years ago when my husband was studying abroad in Spain, I gave him a stuffed moose because I ‘‘moosed’’ him while he was away. (Yes, welcome to my world.) Since then we always make sure to say that we moose one another. Recently when I was out of state for job training, he mailed me the very same moose along with a few items I had requested he send from home. His way of telling me I was missed.
So one Friday evening I was on a packed commuter train coming home from work, and I moosed my husband. I always text him the time I anticipate arriving at the train station so he can pick me up. We were stalled because of some mechanical issue, so I texted him,
‘‘We have a delay. Mooses on the train tracks!!!’’
I thought it would be pretty clear by the subtext that I was telling him I missed him and was anxious to get home.
‘‘O noes!’’ he replied, apparently immediately getting the reference.
‘‘They’re chewing up the tracks!’’ says I, etc.
Finally I arrived at the train station and jumped into the car. ‘‘Whew!’’ I said, in my most nauseatingly lovey-dovey voice. ‘‘That was terrible! They had to send one of the conductors out there with a pointed stick to shoo the mooses away. Then they started ramming into the train car and we all had to move to the rear of the train…’’ I just kept saying more and more outlandish things, waiting for the inevitable eyeroll where he would tell me what a weirdo I am.
Instead, he pulled his head back with an expression of horror and said, ‘‘Oh god!’’
:dubious:
‘‘Uh… you don’t really think I’m serious, do you? That a commuter train from Newark to New Brunswick would encounter actual moose on the tracks? Husband?’’
‘‘Um… No!’’ The expression on his face? Best Moment Ever.
A room full of Dopers, on the other hand, is prime real estate. GingeroftheNorth and Hamadryad, if she’s still around, know what I’m talking about.
I tend towards the dry and sarcastic side myself and I’m sure I’ve been taken seriously when I wasn’t being, but I can’t think of any particular episodes at the moment…
By the graces! You actually lived through (or perhaps inspired) a Dilbert comic.
I actually did too, the first time I saw it. Of course, I’m sure if someone ran actual stats on it, the number for M and F call-ins would be much higher than 40%.
ETA: Wait, crap. I mean a higher percentage of people would call in. Ahh, ta hell with it. I’m sleep deprived. Taking my break from the dope now.
But that’s the thing, and the point of the joke: you think “Really? 40%? That many?”, then run the numbers in your head and do a “D’oh!”. But Stupid Boss just COULD NOT GET that any two days out of five are going to be 40%, whether they’re Mondays and Fridays or Thursdays and Tuesdays, and regarded any attempts to prove same with the sort of bewildered belligerence you’d get trying to teach a chimpanzee to knit.
I have a whole routine worked out. It’s a minor stomach ache, not something life-threatening; it’s something I’ve had since I was a kid; no, I really don’t miss salads because I don’t remember them; sure, I love grapes and apples, just not green ones; yes, I eat vegetables, like carrots; no, I’m still healthy. I did it so well once that the most skeptical person I know didn’t believe that anyone could be allergic to chlorophyll, but she believed that I believed it.
Happy to inspire!
a couple friends and I had a game store and we sere in the middle of a meeting when the phone rings. I answer and its for partner A so I say its for you but dont move the phone from my face since he will have to get up to answer anyway…they both ask who it is and with the phone still right next to my face I say “its yer mom…fat bitch”
the looks on these 2 guys faces is still a memory that makes me smile, his mom is the sweetest nicest lady on planet earth and the 2 of them are notorious practical jokers so yeah them taking me serious was fantastic.
I also have that deadpan delivery where people have a very hard time figuring me out, I have 2 ex gf’s who hated me on first meeting cause they thought I was an asshole then around a year later we are dating.
(edit, it wasnt his mom on the phone just to be clear)
I often tell outlandish and unbelievable stories in which I myself am the butt of the joke. Just recently I apologised to many of my cow- etc for confusing Tiger Woods with B. Obama. One lady whom I had known for months finally realized that some of the information I was imparting was not the truth. She confronted me and told me that she was from the country and was raised to believe everything I said. I realized that telling jokes in front of this person would be the same as telling a lie. We agreed that if I was telling a joke, I would wink at her. It worked.
I like having fun by taking people’s jokes seriously.
Took a beginning Calculus class this summer and our professor was talking for weeks about the day we’d learn the Chain Rule. “It’s the most important thing in Calculus. It’s a big day. Someone bring pizza. We should celebrate. We need to know this.”
Sure enough, Chain Rule day comes around…I walk into class with 5 pizzas.