We were rehearsing The Music Man and I was backstage as they did the tableau scene. That’s where the mayor’s wife says “One Grecian urn, two Grecian urns, three Grecian urns, and a fountain.”
After the line, I started to move on stage for my cue. One of the people playing the ladies stopped to ask, “What’s a Grecian urn?”
I said, “About a buck and a half an hour*.”
*This was back in 1971.
First: I can’t tell the difference between the best and the worst. My worst ones are spontaneous and really bad. Auntbeast’s example, for instance.
Like asking an electrician what the charge is gonna be.
But it’s naming things that really gets me going. I’ve only ever named one car, a Plymouth Horizon. It was blue. I called it “Beyond.”
I now have a betta named Sooner. He’s red, but that wasn’t the point.
I had a friend who had snakes as pets. Among them: Greta Gar-Boa and Karo Corn Serpent.
Now that must have been an event!
**
Mama Zappa**, on Saturday afternoon I was with a contingent from my Civil War roundtable, touring Little Round Top, Devil’s Den, the Wheatfield, and retracing the path of Pickett’s Charge. Sorry. I didn’t even know there was a Gettysdope.
My personal best/worst might have been something I wrote in a novel: “‘I can’t possibly perform an autopsy on a colleague,’ he said stiffly.”
A real Tom Swifty. This is the kind of thing my editor usually axes–apparently I have a certain limit of bad puns per book. But somehow either she missed it, or I had not yet exceeded my limit.
I did not do this intentionally. I generally don’t put qualifiers on dialog tags. I don’t know what happened. I think I caught it in page proofs. (I say “I think” because I’m more or less terrified about opening my books once they’re published.)
I thought of this on a long drive from Wisconsin to Mississippi 17 years ago.
New State Motto for MO:
Missouri loves company.
I googled it recently, and see that I am not the only one who has thought of it…there are t-shirts with that motto. Oh well.
I may have related this before: My kids went on a tour of the salt mines near Salzburg. When they came out, they were eager to relate the experience to me and told me all about the boat they took across a subterranean saltwater lake. My response: “Oh, so it was a saline ship?” Three ‘don’t get it’ looks and one resentful stare.
Friend: I love steaks!
Me: Meat too!
Yeah. lame 
My wife names her sheep/animals with bad puns.
Damned if I call remember any good ones just now. :rolleyes:
Well done. This was the first post I actually laughed at.
My best was delivered here on this very message board, in the “Eyeball King” thread (link). I awarded the OP the hereditary knighthood of Vey, and directed that he should henceforth be styled as the “Ruler of All Eyes, Sir Vey”. This effort was well received.
I noted that I had waited twenty years to use that joke. Upon being pressed for details, I provided the following history:
<Geek post ahead>
I love coming up with pun names for my City of Heroes characters. It’s a superhero tradition, after all.
Beau Narrow - my archer
Ray Pier - my duelist
Electrofyte - my villainous brute who punches things in the face with electricity
I always liked the French mime-like Bomb Voyage from The Incredibles. 
Sorry for the long setup: My work friends and I regularly have lunch at a Chinese restaurant called Peking. For some reason they treat it like rocket surgery to split up the check there, so we decided to take turns paying the bill. After much arguing about who should pay when, we drew straws and came up with a list of names which we kept on my white-board.
My comment upon finishing the list… Good, I’m glad we finally established the Peking order.
GROAN!!
Did you know they give out a Nobel prize for agriculture now?
It’s awarded to a farmer who is outstanding in his field.
Years ago I was dating a woman whose mother loved sewing, so she bought her a serger. When she opened it, I told her that just to be on the safe side, she should plug it into a surge protector.
Ever have an entire family turn away from you, simultaneously, and not even dignify a remark with a groan?
During rehearsals of the show I just closed:
Early in the play, I go off stage, grab a stool, bring it on, and put my briefcase on it. Later in the show, somebody else moves my briefcase to the floor, and sits on the stool. However, we didn’t have one at the beginning of rehearsals, so we just used a chair as a placeholder. A couple of weeks later, somebody dug into storage and found something more appropriate, and gave it to me to use during that day’s rehearsal.
The second actor noticed me bringing out the stool instead of the chair, and asked: “Is that what we’re going to use in performance?”
“No,” I said offhandedly. “It’s just a stool sample.”
Split second pause, followed by groans and thrown objects.
You people do know there’s a special circle in hell for people who engage in wordplay? It’s used to punish everyone else.
So there was this girl. Let’s call her Donna, because that was her name. She was kinda down on her luck, and needed a job. Turns out an odd little bakery was hiring. Her assignment was to add yeast to the dough. Unfortunately for her, the dough was made on the second floor, and the building lacked any way to walk up there. However, it just so happened…and mostly because I said so…that a travelling salesman came by, and he had exactly what she needed.
The owner observed the negotiations in process, and asked what she was doing.
My reply?
She’s buying the Stairway to Leaven
Read the question in the OP in this thread.
Then see my response, post #41.
I had to go in for some test on my hand and to rule out Carpal Tunnel.
I told the doc: “You really have a way of getting on people’s nerves.”