I don’t think you and I would get along very well, Rigamarole. I try not to be cruel with humour, but I have an extremely dry sense of humour with very deadpan delivery, and I love to say the most absurd things I can think of. I try to make them so absurd that no one would think I’m serious, but I suspect you might.
You know, you do have some responsibility to listen critically as well. If someone says something ridiculous to you, chances are that they are kidding. You might also want to examine your own questions - do you really think about something and ask an honest question, or do you ask questions that you could have answered yourself with a little thought? These are my pet peeve people - it’s easier to ask someone than to think about something and figure it out for yourself, so some people just ask, ask, ask, ask.
Ah, this is an excellent and true observation. Now I understand why what the flyer guy did annoyed me - either he expects me to care enough about him to figure out what the hell he is trying to promote on my own (a grandiose sense of self), or he doesn’t really want me to read his book (in which case I perceive him as lacking in confidence and a failure)
I probably have some degree of these feelings about myself, or I wouldn’t be annoyed by the behavior. Very interesting.
Life needs absurdity. I live for it and if that makes me immature, then so be it. I don’t really have to be amture for a few more years anyway.
There is a difference between being absurd and being insulting. Telling someone a plausible lie and then laughing when they believe it is insulting. Saying something harmlessly absurd, while it may not be funny, is harmless.
When I do or say something absurd, it’s not because I’m trying to be a stand-up comedian. I don’t care if people laugh. If they do, that’s fantastic. If not, it didn’t hurt them. I do it either to amuse myself or just to do something unexpected- snap people out of their haze and make them say, “woah.” just for a second.
For example, I helped out with a fund raiser last summer. I worked in a parking garage taking people’s money. After about two hours of saying, “thank you, have a nice day” I got bored and started saying, “thank you, have a great Christmas.” or something (it was July.) A few people seemed to not notice (although I’m sure some of them got down the road and went, “huh?”) a few did a double-take and then smiled, and a few cracked up.
The thing is, when I say something totally absurd to a stranger (which isn’t all that often. I realize strangers wouldn’t recognize my sense of humor and might be confused.) or to anyone, really, it’s not so that I can laugh when they’re confused. It’s becuase I think highly enough of them that I think they’ll immediately (or relatively quickly) recognize it as absurd. If they’re initially confused, I don’t think any less of them (I’m confused most of the time. I’m notorious for getting the joke thirty seconds after everyone else has quit laughing.) and I’ll say, “no, that’s just a stupid joke” and apologize for being dumb and making stupid jokes if it seems to apply.
Absurtity is part of why I love entertaining kids. They have open minds. Everything is big and new and colorful and most things that are absurd and silly don’t annoy them the way they would an adult. A two-year-old who hands me a banana and watches me dial it and pretend to talk to a monkey on it isn’t going to say, “that’s just stupid. There’s no monkey on the other end of that banana. it’s not even a real phone, and I don’t appreciate you trying to trick me into thinking that it is. I don’t like being confused.” Most recognize that I’m just being silly and play along or laugh
Sometimes life just calls for wearing bunny ears to the mall, you know?
Or do you also feel you have no responsibility to avoid stepping in dog droppings? Assuming your city has a law against not scooping, those droppings are there because someone else was being an ass.
It’s possible to take your stand, but don’t complain when you have shit-encrusted shoes.
You need to at least put a disclaimer on your banana that says so. What if someone saw you dial the banana, and then went out and bought a banana thinking they could do the same thing with it? You would have such a lawsuit on your hands. IANAL, and of course it varies by jurisdiction, but I think that would fall under a false advertising claim.
I remember doing this bit once, on an evening I was driving a van for a bunch of musicians. After the gig, they were loading up and I said “Wait, this isn’t my van. [heartbeat] Just kidding.” They had paused, then chuckled.
It didn’t occur to me to try to drag the pause out by repeating the claim. That would’ve been stupid, and definitely not funny.
I told this story once in another thread, but it works here too. I was riding along with a musician friend to a gig. We had some trouble finding the right building, and when we thought we had the right one, I hopped out of the car to go see. The place was locked up, so I knocked and this guy came to the door. I said, “Hi, I’m here with Friend who’s playing here tonight. Are we at the right place?” He says something like, “Well, are any of us in the right place?” I gave a small chuckle and said something like, “yeah, well, is this where we should be?” “Who really knows where they SHOULD be?”
I wanted to strangle the guy, but I had to be nice because I was “representing” my friend. Look, buddy, we just want to know if we can park the car and unload our stuff. Time’s a-wasting. After a few more rounds of this nonsense I finally ascertained that yes, this was the place.
I run into this type of jerk far too often. Yes, hardy har har, you made your lame joke. Now can we conduct our business?
So, Rigamarole, if the guy in the OP had said “A piece of paper” and laughed, instead of “a survey”, would that have been better?
As **featherlou ** says, sometimes it’s all I can do to reign in my inner smartass when people can’t be bothered to find the obvious answer themselves. In this instance, you were looking with your lips and I personally hate when people do that, so I may very well have given you a smartass response to get you to do what I want–in this case, read the flyer. I would likely have said “It’s a piece of paper, with some kind of writing on it!” then maybe, depending on the level of interest I gauged in you, I might have gone on to explain or just moved on to the next person. The fact that it was a poorly written flyer doesn’t change my sense of humor; if you don’t think I’m as funny as I think I am, the the lack is completely on your part–I crack me right up!
I have to agree with Surrender… kids are perfect targets for this sort of thing, because they truly appreciate the spirit in which such an exchange is made. It’s one of the few things I like about my job- I’m incredibly sarcastic and dry, and not many people appreciate that. But I had a conversation several weeks ago that went something like this:
Kid who lives where I work: Ms. bobkitty, I think I left my water bottle at (area where I work). Have you seen it?
Me(well aware of exactly where in my work area the water bottle is sitting): Is it blue?
Kid (now excited): Yes!
Me (totally deadpan): No.
Kid: But… how did you know it was blue, then?
Other kids watching exchange: :dubious:
I thought it was hilarious. The other kids did too, and took great delight in telling everyone what had happened. Repeatedly. They couldn’t get enough of it. Even the “target” thought it was funny, once she “got” it.
I guess I don’t quite get the attitude of “I hate wasting those milliseconds on those people!”. For all the things we get stuck doing that are genuinely unpleasant, this seems pretty low on the scale.
She’s referring to a comedy routine that later got ripped off by someone on the Blue Collar Comedy Tour. The joke was basically about the comedian wanting to be able to give an “I’m Stupid” sign to people who said stupid things, ala “Did you just fall?”
See, I wouldn’t make that kind of joke, because it isn’t funny and it is somewhat cruel. If, however, I was sitting under a 20-foot tall, flashing neon sign and you came up to me and asked me the name of the club, I would look up at the sign, look at you, and tell you a completely absurd name with a straight face. And then we would both laugh. See, as Bryan Eckers has pointed out, people who actually have good senses of humour also have good senses of timing. I say absolutely outrageous things to guys at work and they bust a gut laughing, because I say it at the right time, to the right person.
Yes, I agree that stating the absurd with a straight face is funny. It’s when the person states something perfectly reasonable (or at least well within the realm of normalcy) and thinks it’s funny when you believe them that piss me off. I do try to listen critically, but why would I automatically disbelieve something that in no way appears to be false? And why would it be funny that I believed it?
But… how did you know it was blue, then?