Jokes

I had a literary post on tap but honestly it was a draining weekend—not bad but it took a lot out of me. So here is a post of the funny things various people said throughout the weekend to bolster each other through it. Kindness is the antidote to most things, but silliness is up there too.

1. Rosenblum siblings walk late at night through a crowded street in downtown.
   BR: Have you ever seen the video for “Psycho Killer Qu’est-ce que c’est?”
   RR: No. I don’t know that song.
   BR: It’s from the 70s…maybe 80s.
   RR: Ah. I don’t know. Will you please sing a little bit?
   BR (sings) Psycho killer, qu'est-ce que c'est?
   Fa-fa-fa-fa, fa-fa-fa-fa, far better
   Run-run, run-run-run away
   Oh-oh-oh
   RR: That does not sound like a real song. That sounds like nonsense.
   BR: It’s a real song. It’s famous. And it has a very good music video.
   RR: I think you made up this song!
   BR: No!
   RR: I never heard it on the radio in the 80s, when it was allegedly released
   BR: What, when you were 9? (takes out phone) This is going to kill my battery, but I’ll play it for you. (does something to his phone and music begins to play but at this point in the walk we pass by a schwarma stand where everyone is standing outside yelling, and music is inaudible. After schwarma place, an ambulance passes and the siren drowns out the music. Finally Ben gives up and puts phone away.) It’s a real song. It’s by the Talking Heads.
   RR: Well, that’s a real band anyway…
   (It turns out to be a real song.)
   

2. Mark struggles to put on a tie in the back seat of a moving vehicle.
   MS: Does it look ok?
   RR (turning from front seat) Um, are you done? Are you going to do anything more to it?
   MS: No, this is the final form.
   RR (concerned, gestures to pal also in the backseat): Well…how does it look to you?
   Pal: It looks like he made the effort to put on a tie.
   MS (removes tie)

3. There was tremendous debate about the following joke throughout the weekend. Mark’s pal a couple times introduced himself to new people as being from Summerside. I, nearby, but not really involved in the conversation, would be unable to resist adding, “the Chicago of PEI.” Sometimes people laughed, sometimes they didn’t—often they weren’t listening. Once Mark felt compelled to explain the joke (“if Charlottetown is the main city in PEI, and Summerside is the second biggest, then analogously…”) suggesting to me that the joke is terrible because that is too much explanation for a little gag. The next day I asked my mominator and brother if they thought it was funny, and both were stone-faced. Eventually Ben suggested that Chicago isn’t even the second biggest city in the US by population anymore (I don’t think it ever was by landmass). I asked if the joke would work better if I said Summerside was the Los Angeles County of PEI and he assured me it would not.

4. A bonus, from this morning:
   RR: I sent you a reel on Instagram.
   MS: Did you? Did you email it?
   RR: No…I sent it on Instagram.
   MS: I don’t think I can receive things on Instagram. Can you really send media on Instagram?
   RR: Can you… I think that’s the point of Instagram.
   MS (takes out his phone, peers into Instagram, eventually has to sit down, finally finds video. At least the video was pretty funny)
   RR: “Can you send media on Instagram??” Oh my god.

5. If these goofs have not raised your spirits, may I offer the good news that Motherland has come CBC Gem? I watched it with my friend Kim when I was in England two years ago and it has that lovely English TV madcappery we don’t have here. It also has the English quality of letting characters be the actual worst on occasion, instead of troubled souls with hearts of gold and blah blah blah. I love all the running around and yelling—just good fun! Can’t wait to start from the beginning and watch it all the way through.