Great post by Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun Times regarding telling jokes:

Parrot asks, “What’d the frozen turkey want?”

A joke should have the perfection of a haiku. Not one extra word. No wrong words. It should seem to have been discovered in its absolute form rather than created. The weight of the meaning should be at the end. The earlier words should prepare for the shift of the meaning. The ending must have absolute finality. It should present a world view only revealed at the last moment. Like knife-throwing, joke-telling should never be practiced except by experts.

And this one you just have to see;

Old Jews Telling Jokes

An interesting piece from The Oracle – Henderson State University’s Student Newspaper

Humor Today by Arsala Khan

We follow lots of trends. Obviously, as trends are, well, trendy, they get a lot of attention. There is one such trend that I partake in quite a bit, but I don’t necessarily understand.

As of late, humor in America has taken an interesting turn. Slapstick and sitcom-type jokes are so yesterday, and Americans have found a brand new way to make people laugh: using dangerous, depressing or horrific events and portraying them as comedy.

And this from Jane Lasky in The Examiner

Egg on your face, and that’s no joke when told in the wrong country

I consider myself a person with a good sense of humor but that doesn’t mean I can tell an effective joke. In fact, when I do I fall flat.  I either reveal the punch line too early or I forget what it is by the time I am supposed to tell it, leaving me without the desired effect:  laughter.

Maybe that’s a good thing.

Or to clarify: Maybe that’s a good thing when cavorting with colleagues and friends from other countries.

More later. Enjoy.

The Great Day of His Wrath by John Martin

JJ Kennedy at EvilGenius has a great post today that addresses the issue of poor timing.

This prompted me to think about some of my ill-advised attempts at humor.

In eighth grade the bus stopped about a block from my home, a fact that will be important in just a moment. I had just heard what I thought was a great joke and was looking for a place to tell it.

I got off the bus with Jimmy, who was six inches taller and fifty pounds heavier than me. Jimmy was a nice guy, but had a temper, and didn’t play football anymore because of these anger management issues.

As we stepped off the bus I turned to Jimmy and asked “Hey! Is your Mom pregnant?”

Jimmy said “No.”

I replied, “Wow! You’re a lucky motherf***er”

At this moment I realized I had made a mistake, a big mistake.

Jimmy did not think this joke was funny at all.

I noticed the look in his eyes, and suddenly, the short walk home seemed like a marathon. I heard the pounding of his feet as I ran for my life down the block. He was yelling something, but I chose not to stop and ask him to repeat it.

Jimmy moved pretty fast for a big guy, and with my joke as inspiration, he was making good time. I gained a few feet on him making the corner into my driveway, his greater mass carried him past the turn. I prayed Mom had left the garage door unlocked. I wondered how I would explain the broken door if Jimmy failed to stop, but then realized my dead broken body would be explanation enough…

I slammed the door behind me and leaned against it, thinking at least I could protect my Mother from the raging, out of control Jimmy. His face appeared at the little window in the door, but thankfully, he did not see me. (Cowering in abject fear has its advantages.)

It grew silent outside, and I slowly peeked out the window, expecting at any moment the crashing of a fist through the thin door panels, the feeling of fingers around my throat and the scraping of my body as he pulled me out through the small hole his fist had made.

He was gone.

So the lessons to be learned are:

1. Consider your audience.
2. Consider the appropriateness of your material.
3. And consider how far you will have to run to safety.

Share your humor mis-fires in comments. And dog-gone-it subscribing is still free!

Falstaff - Ancient Funny Guy

As much as I want to believe, and despite what my fawning minions proclaim,

I am not the only expert in Using Humor.

GASP!

Today on TweetGrid (if you are on Twitter and don’t have it. You need it.) I found EvilGeniusTV a truly warped individual… I feel like we are long lost brothers.

EvilGeniusTV covers a wide range of topics. His latest post is: 6 Tips for Using Humor in your Marketing, well written, informative, highly recommended.

For another great source of using humor tips check out  John Kinde’s Humor Power. John has years of experience and has distilled it into some excellent articles.

And no listing of the best in humor on the web would be complete without recommending the crazed individuals at Humor Bloggers Dot Com. You would have to search several large mental institutions to find a group such as the one at HBDC. And that’s probably a good thing.

Share your sources in comments.

I’ll share my posts if you subscribe, (It’s free, so what the heck!)

This is a blog about Using Humor, so at the risk of spoiling what mystery there is, here is some of the background that went into the last post Happy Birthday, Scofflaw. Please read it first. We’ll wait….

OK, Ready?

Here is the truth behind the post:

I really have taken 14 Defensive Driving courses (or more) The whole idea of someone who has taken 14 courses is humorous and a little absurd.

Texas only allowed one course, to dismiss a ticket, every other year, this was later modified to allow one per year. And for six or eight years I got a speeding ticket about every 24 months. Later on, to stay in step with the state, I managed to pick-up a ticket every 12 months. Just trying to do my part.

DefensiveDriving.com really does send out birthday greetings, originally by snail mail and more recently by email.

One of my best instructors was an eighty year old man. And he really made the comments about backing-up and hitting things.

Florida does have a lifetime limit on the number of Defensive Driving courses you can take. Texas does not.

After choosing the parts, it was just a matter of crafting the narrative.I always ask myself a couple of questions when doing this:

• What is the natural outcome of this?
• What else could happen?

For example, my father in law, I could say he drives fast, gets a lot of speeding tickets and spends a lot of money on attorneys. True. But not humorous. So I ask myself about natural outcomes and alternate events, add back in the topic and the paragraph becomes:

My father in law does not believe in seat belts or speed limits, and has helped send his traffic attorney’s children to college. I have witnessed Arlene sitting calmly in the passenger seat while her Dad used the left hand shoulder to pass a slow moving pickup truck. On the other hand, even with my vast Defensive Driving credentials, she will tense up and grab the armrest when I don’t brake quickly enough to suit her. Go figure.

You too, have experiences, that with a little thought can be made into a humorous narrative. Will Rogers said, “I don’t make jokes. I just watch the government and report the facts.” So, to paraphrase, just watch your own life and report on it. This seems too simple, but most people don’t take the time to notice what is right in front of them. Part of our duty as humorists could be to report on all this stuff we should have noticed anyway.

The more personal we get, the more universal we become.

Carnegie Hall image via IgoUgo

Today we address one of those things that is so obvious, I forget it all the time.

Practice.

That’s the answer to the old vaudeville joke in the title and a key to using humor.

Practice.

I have been guilty of thinking that new material can make a difference, but even the best material fails when delivered poorly. One of the reasons Jay Leno, Bill Cosby, Chris Rock and others are so good is because they slugged it out on the comedy circuit for years before many people heard of them. Six shows a week, forty weeks a year, to all types and sizes of audiences, year after year – tends to hone your skills.

And for the writers, Dave Barry and others write daily and publish more than once a week, month after month after month.

How will you know what will work until you try it out? How will you know what stinks, until you smell up the place?

Practice.

My son is blessed with a lot of natural athletic and musical talent. He and I have discussed many times how the people who work hardest. The people who practice. nearly always come out ahead of everyone else no matter how talented. (Does he listen? NO. Teenagers!)

In sports it has become a cliche to talk about how the stars are usually the first to arrive at practice and the last to leave. Jerry Seinfeld, a multimillionaire now, still does his act at small clubs around the country. Even in blogging, a daily update will almost always trump a weekly one.

Practice.

So the point today is brought to us courtesy of Nike, “Just Do It.”

If you speak, then speak as often as you can.

If you write, write daily.

Practice.

Another benefit is, over time, we learn that failure doesn’t hurt, won’t kill us, and is temporary.

Practice.

Practice your writing skills by dropping me a comment or two. You can always subscribe For Free! just press the button upper right.

And remember, I am available for your corporate and association humorous speaking needs.