Fantastic! I hope you get the opportunity.
Go for it! Twenty years ago I had the chance to use that line, and…it was beautiful. Even today I get misty-eyed when I think about it.
[GEEK ALERT]
Similarly usable, almost anywhere, would be…
YOU!!! What planet is this??
[/GEEK ALERT]
I want to walk past a mirror into which someone is staring forlornly, glaring at a pimple. “Give it up,” I’ll say comfortingly. “A watched boil never pops.”
I’ve been wanting that since I was fourteen.
Daniel
I’m just waiting for a buxom blonde to ask “Do you have the time?”
“If you have the energy”
A seriously religious 11yo boy was trying to convince me of the truth of the bible by quoting stories from it (I guess they hadn’t covered “circular reasoning” in Sunday School yet), and out of nowhere came this golden opportunity:
“and when Moses and the chosen people were wandering in the desert for 40 years, manna fell from heaven! If there is no god, how did they get anything to eat in the desert?”
Grinning so broadly I had a little trouble talking, I said “There was plenty to eat … because of all the sand-which-is there!”. He floundered for a reply for some time, then "got it’ and started laughing. And laughing and laughing. He hasn’t been so serious (or religious) since!
My advice for anyone wanting to engage in as much situational humor as they can handle is to join the SCA. I can’t go 1/2 an hour without being subjected to lines from Monty Python, The Princess Bride, Star Wars, etc.
Of course, this could be because I know a guy who juggles named “Tim”, and I have a friend who is a Rapier Fencer with a Spanish persona.
“Hey, who’s that guy over there juggling the scarves?”
“There are some who call him…Tim.”
You don’t have to be named “Tim” for that to be fun. I was emailing IT about something or other, when they made the mistake of asking for my name (which is the same as my email address, freakin’ contractors), to which I was unable to resist responding “There are some who call me… Bob”
One day when Mama Zappa called me at work, I got the call from the receptionist. When I picked up, I heard my beloved saying “Damn, damn, damn!!” What was wrong? It seems the receptionist thought she recognized my bride’s voice when she asked for me. So the receptionist said “Is this his wife?” To which my wife said “Yes,” and the receptionist transferred the call to me.
In the next nanosecond, Mama Zappa realized what she should have said was:
“Wife? WIFE! That son-of-a-bitch has a WIFE!!?”
We got a good laugh out of it. I told the receptionist about it later, and she laughed too. I think if she had the exchange over the phone, she would have been shocked and offended. (She’s pretty religious, but has a great sense of humor.)
It’s been over ten years, and we’re still waiting for the chance to use it again!
At one point in NewsRadio Bill is the boss and Lisa and Dave come in to see him. Bill easily turns what they are talking about into something about their sex lives. They reply that they weren’t talking about their sex lives and Bill replies “Well I was. Sex people! Exuut!”
I’ve been waiting and waiting to use that but I just don’t throw people out of a room often enough. In fact at all. Of course it doesn’t have to be sex, I just want to say “____ people! Exuut!”
Dang. I went to her site but it’s not there.
At a Con in January I bought from an artist, Sarah Clemens a print, Manuscript Gremlin It has a gremlin (naturally) dangling from some scroll work in front of the following:
*She said only after the print run did she think it really ought to be XLIV
Here are a couple of situations from back in the day that I thought were hi-larious. Not everyone present agreed.
One day I was at lunch with several co-workers, one of whom (Caroline) was very tiny, only about 4 ft. 8 inches tall. When the bill came, everyone chipped in. Our boss counted the money and then declared, “Someone is a little short.” I replied, “Caroline?”
I was assigned to work on a personal injury case involving a man who had lost a leg in a city bus accident. (We were hired to represent the city.) My boss gave me the case file to analyze and report back to him on my initial impressions. My reponse: “He doesn’t have a leg to stand on.”
Here’s a real time saver. Rosebud is the sled.
I have a friend I only see very occasionally, once every few years (we were in the same club in college). He’d been chubby all through college, but dramatically slimmed down later and kept the weight off.
Whenever we were in a group of people together, someone would ask him how and why he finally lost the weight. He’d always respond the same way, and during one of the times between our encounters I thought up this conversation:
(anyone): So why did you lose all that weight, again?
HIM: I got turned down for a date and couldn’t be sure it wasn’t because I was fat. Basically I slimmed down because I was tired of being single.
ME: Aren’t you still single?
HIM: Yeah…
ME: So it must have been your personality all along.
I waited years to deploy this joke, and by the next time I saw this friend, he’d gotten married. Curses!
But then, serendipitously, I was in a completely different group of people with another formerly-fat friend, and he piped up with the same “tired of being single” line.
My comeback was ready and it worked beautifully. It was totally worth the wait!
In the same vein:
I fly balloons. It’s not uncommon for me to talk to/yell at the people on the ground as we fly by them. “Can I land in your field?” etc.
My favourite, if I’m in an antagonistic mood is “Hey! You! Where are we?”
I’m still waiting for someone to respond “Earth!” or something else equally useful. they usually respond with where we actually are.
I’ve always wanted to find someone looking at an ad for the sale of poor-quality land. “Don’t bother,” I’d say, “a waste is a terrible thing to mind.”
The McDonalds next to work tends to serve quickly, so instead of lines to the registers people congregate in the back and come forward in order; it works pretty well most of the time.
One evening a young fellow jumped the que in front of myself and a pair of older ladies. They were mildly put out until I reminded them “To the bold go the fries…”
I’ve used this one:
When in line with a friend at a cafeteria, the cashier asks, “Are you together?” I respond, “She is, but I’m not.”
“I came in here to complain!”
“Oh, I’m sorry, that’s next door! It’s Being Hit on the Head lessons in here!”
Actually (and not to move it around too much), I think this is better fodder for MPSIMS. I’ll move it there for you.