No Soap Radio
Jim Butterfield
Is it really a joke? Or is it in fact an urban legend that will continue
to mystify generations to come?
I first heard a version of this story in 1953 (yes! over 40 years
back!). At that time, it was explained to me that it was a marvellously
subtle but hilarious joke, that it could be worked out with a little
thought, and that it would spoil things to even offer a hint as to the
point of the joke. And the teller assured me: no, it had nothing to do
with soap operas.
Every half dozen years it crops up again in some new form. About ten
years back, there was a short-lived sitcom on television entitled "No
Soap - Radio!". There are slight changes in the form of the "joke", but
I've never found a teller who actually knew what it meant. The last
straw was a recent Simpsons episode; Homer is singing in the shower and
reaches to turn down the volume; the devices bears the legend, "No Soap
Radio".
After 43 years, I'm tired of waiting. If it's a joke, would somebody
tell me the point? If it's a hoax, can somebody confirm it to be that?
In case any readers have not run across this <thing, whatever it is>,
here's the first version I heard, as told by someone who claimed that
they got the point:
"There are two lions in the bathtub. One lion says to the other, 'Would
you please pass the soap?', to which the other lion replies, 'Sorry, but
we have no soap'. The first lion says, "In that case, turn on the radio".
That's it. If you are currently laughing hysterically, post or email the
point (label it SPOILER if appropriate). Do something similar if you
know it to be a hoax.
--Jim
Justin Thyme
f...@torfree.net (Jim Butterfield) wrote:
> --Jim
Well, I heard it differently. I heard it in the mid-60s as a kid, and
it went "There were two monkeys sitting in a bathtub. One monkey said
'Pass the soap'. The other monkey said 'No soap, radio!'
The joke behind this was that the joke was absolutely nonsensical, had
no meaning, and was in no way funny. It was usually told by a group
of kids to a younger kid, and after telling it the older kids would
laugh hysterically as though they understood it. Just to get a
confused reaction out of the younger kid. And, of course, if the
younger kid laughed, you knew that he was just pretending to
understand it so that he wouldn't look stupid.
A silly kids' prank as I remember it. And actually, it's possible
that your version is the correct one! I'm sure that the baby boomers
responsible for those TV shows had heard the version that I had heard
as kids in the 60s, also.
Nick Spalding
.f...@torfree.net (Jim Butterfield) wrote:
> "There are two lions in the bathtub. One lion says to the other, 'Would
> you please pass the soap?', to which the other lion replies, 'Sorry, but
> we have no soap'. The first lion says, "In that case, turn on the radio".
>
Surely the point is that the Soap Opera originated on radio, and
probably as late as the early 50's still occupied a great deal of
air-time there, so switching on the radio almost guaranteed a supply
of soap. For an entertaining history of the radio soap see James
Thurber, The Beast in Me and Other Animals. Sorry no ISBN, my copy
was printed in 1949, was the ISBN around then?
--
Nick "lathered" Spalding
Matthew P Wiener
In article <Ds1Ay8.E1E...@torfree.net>, fjb@torfree (Jim Butterfield) writes:
>Is it really a joke? Or is it in fact an urban legend that will continue
>to mystify generations to come?
It's not a joke.
Why does a mouse when it spins?
--
-Matthew P Wiener (wee...@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu)
john l williams
i heard this joke before!
two elephants were taking a bath. one elephant says pass the soap and
the other elephant says "no soap radio"!
crs
Jim Butterfield wrote:
>
> Is it really a joke? Or is it in fact an urban legend that will continue
> to mystify generations to come?
[snip]
The other replys are correct (read 'em).
Here's a similar joke.
Two nuns were bathing together. The first one says "Where's the soap?" The second says
"Yes, it does, doesn't it."
crs
Nick Spalding
The higher the fewer
Nick "That's what my Dad used to answer" Spalding
catherine yronwode
Jim Butterfield wrote:
[the frustration of being told the "no soap- radio" jokein 1953.]
I have a feeling that others will cover this from an academic and
citation-heavy point of view -- but here is what i know from personal
experience.
My ex-partner Peter Yronwode was born and raised in Manhattan and
attended Hunter College Elementary School there in the early 1950s (this
is the "40 years ago" of your post, and although you don't say where you
were then, location IS important to the story).
When i met Peter in Berkeley in 1967, he mentioned that he had been
mentally tormented for years by his inability to "get" this joke. He
told the same "two lions in a bathtub...one lion says to the other,
'pass the soap,' the other says, 'no soap, radio'" story that you
recounted -- and he asked me if he was "missing" some subtle point. I
didn't get it either and i told him so. We used to kid each other about
our denseness and he took to muttering (or revealed that he often
muttered) "no soap -- radio" as a kind of mental place-marker when he
was baffled about anything. When we bathed our little daughter Althaea,
we would say, "no soap -- radio" as we handed her the soap to hold. It
became sort of a family reference point.
We lived in several communes during the 1960s and 1970s and we ALWAYS
asked people if they had heard this story. Peter had come to believe
that he had heard it as a child, while at school, so he asked people if
they had heard it at school. Not one person had.
Years went by before we stumbled upon the answer to the mystery joke --
in a book on psychology. When we found it, it blew our minds. Peter had
unwittingly been part of a psychological test population while he was in
elementary school. The test was administered by a pair of psychologists
who were trying to determine how children learn "conformity" and
"socialisation" and the role that humour plays in this process.
The researchers created an unfunny non-joke -- "no soap, radio" -- and
told it to children in New York City schools during the early 1950s.
They displayed typical "joke-like affect" while telling the non-joke --
announcing that the joke was funny before relating it and giggling
"uncontrollably" as they got to the punchline. They wanted to measure
how "socialized" the children were by seeing whether they laughed along
with the non-joke. They found that the most eager-to-please children
laughed hilariously, even inappropriately, while the average
"conforming" children simply giggled, as if they "got" it -- which they
could not, since there was nothing to get. Few if any children protested
that the joke wasn't funny: most of the kids had been socialized to
believe that since the joke was being told to them by giggling adults,
it "must be funny" -- and they went along with the sham.
The effect of learning that this was what he had been subjected to was
pretty funny on Peter. He started cursing and yelling (not angrily, but
VERY, VERY excitedly) and screaming "AAAARRRGH! THEY FUCKED WITH MY
MIND!!!" snd then he laughed and laughed. A smart little boy, he had
figured there was something wrong with **him** for not getting a joke
that he had been told was hilarious and which had caused two growups to
crack up when they told it -- and he had thought about this anomaly at
odd moments, trying to "solve the problem" of the joke, for the next
several decades. (As did you.) Once he knew he had been a psychological
research subject, he saw a far, far different joke in the situation. (As
might you.)
You posted from Toronto. I do not know the location of all the
psychological tests given in which the "no soap -- radio" joke was a
part of the scenario, nor where you lived in 1953, but as far as i know,
the origin of the joke given above is accurate. You may have heard the
joke from children, not in a test setting. I would not be surprised to
learn that test-subject children spread the "joke" around, thinking that
since it had made two grownups laugh, it must be really funny.
Now, as i said, let someone else supply the citations. That's the story
as i know it.
cat "no soap -- psychology" yronwode
catherine yronwode -------------------- mailto:yron...@sonic.net
news:alt.lucky.w -- discussion of folkloric amulets and talismans
LUCKY W Amulet Archive: http://www.sonic.net/yronwode/LuckyW.html
Will Wheeler
[joke eliminated]
This type of joke has a fairly long history, and is covered well by G.
Legman in _Rationale of the Dirty Joke_. Legman notes that jokes
express dislike for the butt of the joke, in this case the listener.
This expression can easily be seen in the earlier poster's example of
older kids telling the joke to younger kids. The point is to embarass
and confuse the younger children; if the younger child pretends to get
it, so much the better. This type if behavior can also be seen in snipe
hunts, missions to find left-handed smokeshifters, and TEGWAR.
Legman discusses earlier examples: the Sleeve Job and Shaggy Dog
stories. The library is closed (Merkin Holiday), but Lee Rudolph can
tell you more than you want to know.
Will Wheeler
Penn State University Tip: Garbage bags make handy snake
wj...@psuvm.psu.edu oxygen tents.
whe...@po.aers.psu.edu --Ian York
Nick Spalding
.catherine yronwode <yron...@sonic.net> wrote:
How come I who was brought up in England without any exposure to radio
soaps got the point of it straight away, the first time I heard it a
couple of days ago? The radio soap had been around since circa 1928
and was still flourishing into the 50s at least so it just _couldn't_
have been incomprehensible then.
Nick "I don't watch TV soaps either" Spalding
--
Nick
Powwow/Email to spal...@iol.ie
war...@borg.com
In <31A9A2...@sonic.net>, catherine yronwode <yron...@sonic.net> writes:
>Jim Butterfield wrote:
>
>[the frustration of being told the "no soap- radio" jokein 1953.]
>
>I have a feeling that others will cover this from an academic and
>citation-heavy point of view -- but here is what i know from personal
>experience.
>
>Years went by before we stumbled upon the answer to the mystery joke --
>in a book on psychology. When we found it, it blew our minds.
>
>cat "no soap -- psychology" yronwode
Plausible. But a cow orker's friend of a friend said it was a book on humor.
Warren
http://www.borg.com/~warren
Walter Eric Johnson
catherine yronwode (yron...@sonic.net) wrote:
: I have a feeling that others will cover this from an academic and
: experience.
: <mucho verbage snipped>
:
: Years went by before we stumbled upon the answer to the mystery joke --
: unwittingly been part of a psychological test population while he was in
: elementary school. The test was administered by a pair of psychologists
: who were trying to determine how children learn "conformity" and
: "socialisation" and the role that humour plays in this process.
:
: The researchers created an unfunny non-joke -- "no soap, radio" -- and
: told it to children in New York City schools during the early 1950s.
: They displayed typical "joke-like affect" while telling the non-joke --
: announcing that the joke was funny before relating it and giggling
: "uncontrollably" as they got to the punchline. They wanted to measure
: how "socialized" the children were by seeing whether they laughed along
: with the non-joke. They found that the most eager-to-please children
: laughed hilariously, even inappropriately, while the average
: "conforming" children simply giggled, as if they "got" it -- which they
: could not, since there was nothing to get. Few if any children protested
: that the joke wasn't funny: most of the kids had been socialized to
: believe that since the joke was being told to them by giggling adults,
: it "must be funny" -- and they went along with the sham.
I took part in an experient along the same lines in 1974. The
experiment used ink-blots instead of a joke. Each person in the
group was asked what they thought it looked like. Surprisingly,
most of the people in the group agreed on what it looked like.
The problem was that if someone asked my opinion, I gave them my
opinion and I never thought it looked like what the rest of the
group saw. The psychologist got rather upset. After it was over,
I found out that the others in the group were in cahoots with the
psychologist who claimed I was the most anti-social person he ever
met. (I just laughed at that.)
Eric Johnson
Denise Kelleher
crs <chu...@ultranet.com> writes:
>Here's a similar joke.
>Two nuns were bathing together. The first one says "Where's the soap?" The second says
>"Yes, it does, doesn't it."
It even made it across the Atlantic, where we heard this:
Two ducks are in a bath. One says "Pass the soap please." The
other says "What do you think I am, a typewriter?"
ELaytonfel
Oh Wow!
Thank you so much! I went to school in NYC in that era, and heard the
joke then, and didn't get it, of course. I felt someone was making fun of
me. It's bothered me for years. I don't remember a teacher telling it
though - mostly it was "friends" of mine - but then, I cut school an awful
lot :-).
Thanks for clearing up an old, old not-so-funny mystery...
Dale Leatherwood
watching an episode of the Simpsons Monday night, and Homer was taking a
shower. What should be on the shower wall but a radio with a logo
that says:
"NO SOAP,RADIO!"
Pretty wild.
-Dale
Andrea Lynn Leistra
In article <4oeked$m...@bell.maths.tcd.ie>,
I've seen this sort of joke (with penguins in the bathtub) used to
humiliate someone who laughs at jokes they don't get; someone will tell
it, the clueless person will laugh, and everyone will ask the clueless one
to explain exactly what's funny about it.
--
Andrea Leistra http://www-leland.stanford.edu/~aleistra
-----
Life is complex. It has real and imaginary parts.
Mike Czaplinski
spal...@iol.ie (Nick Spalding) wrote:
My dad always used to ask me:
How many wells make a river?
For years he never told me the answer, but when he did, it was
"27. With you standing it it, 28".
He said HIS mother tortured him with it as well, which means
it dates back to at least the late 1930's/early 1940's.
Mike "He still hasn't explained the damn thing, either" Czaplinski
mike.cz...@washingtondc.ncr.com
Stephan Zielinski
catherine yronwode (yron...@sonic.net) wrote:
: Now, as i said, let someone else supply the citations. That's the story
: as i know it.
The Vanishing Hitchhiker is actually a *group* of young women--
cheerleaders from Lowell High School. They were killed in June 1968
when their bus was obliterated by an ancient steam-powered Southern
Pacific locomotive on what now is the SF Penninsula's CalTrain line.
I see them all the time; I can't keep a sweater for more than a week.
I have the phone numbers of every graveyard in Colma; they maintain
boxes for me, and I stop my and reclaim my stuff every Day of the
Dead.
--
Stephan "What was that noise? And where'd my cactus go?" Zielinski
Jim Butterfield
I'm adding newsgroup sci.psychology.misc to this thread in the hopes that
someone can provide the definitive reference. Here's a response I got:
Date: Mon, 27 May 1996
From: catherine yronwode <yron...@sonic.net>
Subject: Re: No Soap Radio
Jim Butterfield wrote: [the frustration of
being told the "no soap- radio" jokein 1953.]
I have a feeling that others will cover this from an academic and
citation-heavy point of view -- but here is what i know from personal
experience.
My ex-partner Peter Yronwode was born and raised in Manhattan and
attended Hunter College Elementary School there in the early 1950s (this
is the "40 years ago" of your post, and although you don't say where you
were then, location IS important to the story).
When i met Peter in Berkeley in 1967, he mentioned that he had been
mentally tormented for years by his inability to "get" this joke. He told
the same "two lions in a bathtub...one lion says to the other, 'pass the
soap,' the other says, 'no soap, radio'" story that you recounted -- and
he asked me if he was "missing" some subtle point. I didn't get it either
and i told him so. We used to kid each other about our denseness and he
took to muttering (or revealed that he often muttered) "no soap -- radio"
as a kind of mental place-marker when he was baffled about anything. When
we bathed our little daughter Althaea, we would say, "no soap -- radio"
as we handed her the soap to hold. It became sort of a family reference
point.
We lived in several communes during the 1960s and 1970s and we ALWAYS
asked people if they had heard this story. Peter had come to believe that
he had heard it as a child, while at school, so he asked people if they
had heard it at school. Not one person had.
Years went by before we stumbled upon the answer to
the mystery joke -- in a book on psychology. When we found it, it blew our
minds. Peter had unwittingly been part of a psychological test population
while he was in elementary school. The test was administered by a pair of
psychologists who were trying to determine how children learn "conformity"
and "socialisation" and the role that humour plays in this process.
The researchers created an unfunny non-joke -- "no soap, radio" -- and
told it to children in New York City schools during the early 1950s. They
displayed typical "joke-like affect" while telling the non-joke --
announcing that the joke was funny before relating it and giggling
"uncontrollably" as they got to the punchline. They wanted to measure how
"socialized" the children were by seeing whether they laughed along with
the non-joke. They found that the most eager-to-please children laughed
hilariously, even inappropriately, while the average "conforming" children
simply giggled, as if they "got" it -- which they could not, since there
was nothing to get. Few if any children protested that the joke wasn't
funny: most of the kids had been socialized to believe that since the joke
was being told to them by giggling adults, it "must be funny" -- and they
went along with the sham.
The effect of learning that this was what he had been subjected to was
pretty funny on Peter. He started cursing and yelling (not angrily, but
VERY, VERY excitedly) and screaming "AAAARRRGH! THEY FUCKED WITH MY
MIND!!!" snd then he laughed and laughed. A smart little boy, he had
figured there was something wrong with **him** for not getting a joke
that he had been told was hilarious and which had caused two grownups to
crack up when they told it -- and he had thought about this
anomaly at odd moments, trying to "solve the problem" of the joke, for the
next several decades. (As did you.) Once he knew he had been a
psychological research subject, he saw a far, far different joke in the
situation. (As might you.)
You posted from Toronto. I do not know the
location of all the psychological tests given in which the "no soap --
radio" joke was a part of the scenario, nor where you lived in 1953, but
as far as i know, the origin of the joke given above is accurate. You may
have heard the joke from children, not in a test setting. I would not be
surprised to learn that test-subject children spread the "joke" around,
thinking that since it had made two grownups laugh, it must be really
funny.
Now, as i said, let someone else supply the citations. That's the
story as i know it.
cat "no soap -- psychology" yronwode
catherine yronwode
--------------------
Citation information will be welcome.
--Jim
Rich Veraa
In article <4ochld$9...@netnews.upenn.edu>,
wee...@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener) wrote:
>>Is it really a joke? Or is it in fact an urban legend that will continue
>>to mystify generations to come?
>It's not a joke.
>Why does a mouse when it spins?
Because the more you polish it gets.
Do you walk to school or carry your lunch?
Cheers,
Rich
Have you kissed your parrot today? 0
rve...@netside.net rve...@newssun.med.miami.edu ///{|}\\\
http://www.netside.net/~rveraa FIDONET (1:135/907) /|\
GE/L/FA H+>+++ g+ w+ v+@ C+++ OS/2 Y++ b+++ e+++ u** r++(---)>+++ y+>+++
Angus Johnston
> catherine yronwode (yron...@sonic.net) wrote:
> :
> : Years went by before we stumbled upon the answer to the mystery joke --
> : unwittingly been part of a psychological test population while he was in
> : elementary school. The test was administered by a pair of psychologists
> : who were trying to determine how children learn "conformity" and
> : "socialisation" and the role that humour plays in this process.
> :
> : The researchers created an unfunny non-joke -- "no soap, radio" -- and
> : told it to children in New York City schools during the early 1950s.
> : They displayed typical "joke-like affect" while telling the non-joke --
> : announcing that the joke was funny before relating it and giggling
> : "uncontrollably" as they got to the punchline. They wanted to measure
> : how "socialized" the children were by seeing whether they laughed along
> : with the non-joke. They found that the most eager-to-please children
> : laughed hilariously, even inappropriately, while the average
> : "conforming" children simply giggled, as if they "got" it -- which they
> : could not, since there was nothing to get.
Just for the record, my spidey sense is tingling. I'm going to need
serious cites before I buy this one.
--
Angus Johnston
http://www.panix.com/~angusj
Mike Holland
Andrea Lynn Leistra (alei...@leland.Stanford.EDU) wrote:
: In article <4oeked$m...@bell.maths.tcd.ie>,
: Denise Kelleher <ali...@maths.tcd.ie> wrote:
: >crs <chu...@ultranet.com> writes:
: >
: >>Here's a similar joke.
: >
: >>Two nuns were bathing together. The first one says "Where's the soap?" The second says
: >>"Yes, it does, doesn't it."
: >
: >It even made it across the Atlantic, where we heard this:
: I've seen this sort of joke (with penguins in the bathtub) used to
WAIT! The nun joke is real. A simple homonym double entendre.
It's also fun to watch people trying to get this one. Somebody usually drops
a hint. Difficult jokes are more fun than non-sensical jokes, I think.
Another example:
"Why did the architect have his house made backwards?"
"So he could watch television."
NOTE: these jokes must be read out loud, as correct spelling would give the answer away.
--
Mike Holland <m...@cygnus.uwa.edu.au> (UWA is just my ISP)
Quotes are a burden to others, .signatures are a prison for one's self.
Finger for PGP. f'print = 31 3B D9 E9 DA 07 14 8B 5D A4 8B 25 FC 6B B8 55
Will Wheeler
In article <4og92t$e...@news1.panix.com>, ang...@panix.com (Angus Johnston) says:
>> catherine yronwode (yron...@sonic.net) wrote:
>> :
>> : Years went by before we stumbled upon the answer to the mystery joke --
>> : in a book on psychology. When we found it, it blew our minds. Peter had
[...]
>Just for the record, my spidey sense is tingling. I'm going to need
>serious cites before I buy this one.
I've run several searches on article and book databases and come up with
absolutely nothing.
You remember the name of the book? Lee, does Legman talk about this?
Will Wheeler
Penn State University Pike: "Let's go."
wj...@psuvm.psu.edu Lyle: "Why not?"
whe...@po.aers.psu.edu ---The Wild Bunch
Andy Holden
A friend of mine used to tell a non-joke, something like -
"What's the difference between an apple and a bicycle?"
Answer "You can't brush your teeth with a canoe".
The whole point was that it was a non-joke, and it was meant to
mystify/confuse/enrage rather than amuse the victim (although the
teller was amused by the victims reaction).
Andy.
Will Wheeler
In article <4og03i$p...@inet-nntp-gw-1.us.oracle.com>, szie...@us.oracle.com
(Stephan Zielinski) says:
>The Vanishing Hitchhiker is actually a *group* of young women--
>cheerleaders from Lowell High School. They were killed in June 1968
>when their bus was obliterated by an ancient steam-powered Southern
>Pacific locomotive on what now is the SF Penninsula's CalTrain line.
>I see them all the time; I can't keep a sweater for more than a week.
>I have the phone numbers of every graveyard in Colma; they maintain
>boxes for me, and I stop my and reclaim my stuff every Day of the
>Dead.
>Stephan "What was that noise? And where'd my cactus go?" Zielinski
This is, I think, the best post ever to AFU.
Will "we can all go home now" Wheeler
Penn State University '' " 'You want vicious? Go play with PTT.
wj...@psuvm.psu.edu No, not the Swiss postal service---Page
whe...@po.aers.psu.ed Teasley & Tepper.' -SW" - HET3 '' - M"SC!"T
Sanford E. Walke IV
Nick Spalding (spal...@iol.ie) wrote:
: How come I who was brought up in England without any exposure to radio
: soaps got the point of it straight away, the first time I heard it a
: couple of days ago? The radio soap had been around since circa 1928
: and was still flourishing into the 50s at least so it just _couldn't_
: have been incomprehensible then.
Possibly because I'd never heard the one worded "We're out of soap" "Oh,
turn on the radio then" until here in this newsgroup. It's always been
done "No soap, radio" when I've heard it, which makes *much* less sense.
--
Sandy se...@izzy.net
Normally when a core is dumped it's because of a matter/antimatter containment
breach. That's what I was taught at Starfleet anyways. -- mcp...@izzy.net
Be a trend-setter, take responsibility for the results of your actions.
I don't speak for anyone but myself, and sometimes not even that.
Larry Horn
In article <4og92t$e...@news1.panix.com>
ang...@panix.com (Angus Johnston) writes:
>
>> catherine yronwode (yron...@sonic.net) wrote:
>> :
>> : The researchers created an unfunny non-joke -- "no soap, radio" -- and
>> : told it to children in New York City schools during the early 1950s.
>
>serious cites before I buy this one.
>
Which researchers? What journal?
I recall a similar version from my own childhood (b. 1945, N.Y.C.) involving
two penguins in a bathtub and the exchange
--Please pass the soap.
--No soap, radio.
I, of course, pretended to get it, thinking there must be some sexual reference
I didn't understand. There was a variant nobody here mentioned: two polar
bears on icebergs, passing each other at the Equator, one calling to the other,
"Make mine vanilla!" Finally, one more version of the mini-shaggy-dog joke
someone else mentioned:
--Why is a duck that flies?
--The higher the fewer.
How did we ever survive childhood?
Larry
Matthew P Wiener
Anybody remember the "rickety-rackety staircase joke"? It consisted
of a long--and it could be made arbitrarily long--lead up with the
teller sadistically repeating "up one flight of rickety rackety
staircases, two flights ..." and then "down one flight ..." and
so on, for however many iterations are involved in the rather
peculiar story that was taking place at the other end of those
stairs, and at the end there was the question, "what is the moral
of this story?" and there was indeed a moral, but it referred to
exactly one rather trivial aspect of the story, having nothing to
do with the stories or the rather peculiar story.
I haven't told it in years.
Susan Mudgett aka little gator
Jim Butterfield (f...@torfree.net) wrote:
: In case any readers have not run across this <thing, whatever it is>,
: here's the first version I heard, as told by someone who claimed that
: they got the point:
: "There are two lions in the bathtub. One lion says to the other, 'Would
: you please pass the soap?', to which the other lion replies, 'Sorry, but
: we have no soap'. The first lion says, "In that case, turn on the radio".
: That's it. If you are currently laughing hysterically, post or email the
: point (label it SPOILER if appropriate). Do something similar if you
: know it to be a hoax.
Furrfu! *That* isn't funny. This is the *funny* version:
"A king and an elephant are sitting in a bathtub. The king says, "pass
the soap," and the elephant says "no soap, radio!"
Why would anyone laugh if it was lions?
catherine yronwode
Will Wheeler wrote:
>
> In article <4og92t$e...@news1.panix.com>, ang...@panix.com (Angus Johnston) says:
>
> >> catherine yronwode (yron...@sonic.net) wrote:
> >> :
> >> : in a book on psychology. When we found it, it blew our minds. Peter had
>
> >Just for the record, my spidey sense is tingling. I'm going to need
> >serious cites before I buy this one.
>
> absolutely nothing.
>
> You remember the name of the book? Lee, does Legman talk about this?
I cannot recall the name of the book or magazine (i think q book
-- but it may have been a popular science mag like Psychology
Toaday, Scientific American, Nature, or Omni -- all of which i
read -- and it may sound weird, but i have a strong memory that it
was on a right hand page, near the top, and i also strongly recall
that the psych team included or was headed by a husband and wife.
In posting, i included the data on Peter having attended school at
Hunter College Elementary in Manhattan because although i am not
sure that Hunter College Elementary was mentioned by name, i am
100% sure that "New York City" was named. We found the cite back
in the late 1970s or early 1980s, but i am not sure that it was
brand new then. I know, i know, this sounds too vague -- and you
are right to question it -- but i am not pulling your leg; it was
in print. Hope this helps -- i would try to track it down m,yself
but i am swamped with work right now. I hope someone finds it -- i
would like to refresh my own memory of it, actually.
crs
Mike Holland wrote:
>
> Andrea Lynn Leistra (alei...@leland.Stanford.EDU) wrote:
> : In article <4oeked$m...@bell.maths.tcd.ie>,
> : Denise Kelleher <ali...@maths.tcd.ie> wrote:
> : >crs <chu...@ultranet.com> writes:
> : >
> : >>Here's a similar joke.
> : >
> : >>Two nuns were bathing together. The first one says "Where's the soap?" The second says
> : >>"Yes, it does, doesn't it."
> : >
> : >It even made it across the Atlantic, where we heard this:
> :
> : I've seen this sort of joke (with penguins in the bathtub) used to
>
> WAIT! The nun joke is real. A simple homonym double entendre.
> It's also fun to watch people trying to get this one. Somebody usually drops
> a hint. Difficult jokes are more fun than non-sensical jokes, I think.
>
> Another example:
> "Why did the architect have his house made backwards?"
> "So he could watch television."
>
> NOTE: these jokes must be read out loud, as correct spelling would give the answer away.
>
It was funny to watch people assume that the nun joke didn't make sense
and carry on from there. ;-> Congrats, Mike - you got it.
crs
Stuart A. Bronstein
In article <31ACCF...@ultranet.com>, crs <chu...@ultranet.com> wrote:
>Mike Holland wrote:
>>
>> Andrea Lynn Leistra (alei...@leland.Stanford.EDU) wrote:
>> : In article <4oeked$m...@bell.maths.tcd.ie>,
>> : Denise Kelleher <ali...@maths.tcd.ie> wrote:
>> : >crs <chu...@ultranet.com> writes:
>> : >
>> : >>"Yes, it does, doesn't it."
>> : >
>> It's also fun to watch people trying to get this one. Somebody usually drops
>> a hint. Difficult jokes are more fun than non-sensical jokes, I think.
>>
>and carry on from there. ;-> Congrats, Mike - you got it.
I originally heard the Nun joke from someone who told me two others too,
all of which he said were examples of Swedish (his heritage) humor:
1) A panhandler looks into a store window which has a display of
mirrors for sale. One has a sign that says $10. Another has a sign that
says $5. And a third has a sigh that says, "This size for $1." The
panhandler said, "So do I."
2) A man goes to a lake and sees a sign which says, "Don't Fish
Here." The man says, "Gosh, I don't know."
Stu
Charles D. Kincaid
In article <4ochld$9...@netnews.upenn.edu> wee...@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu
(Matthew P Wiener) writes:
> In article <Ds1Ay8.E1E...@torfree.net>, fjb@torfree (Jim
> >Is it really a joke? Or is it in fact an urban legend that will
continue
> >to mystify generations to come?
>
> It's not a joke.
>
> Why does a mouse when it spins?
Because ants have no bones.
Q: Is it farther to New York or by bicycle?
These three mice were on top of a hill. The first mouse slides down the
hill going "Ooo woo woo wooo!" The second mouse slides down the hill
going "Wee wee wee weee!" The third mouse slides down the hill going
"Radio radio radio!"
Or then there's this hunter in the woods hunting for bear. He spies this
bear taking a shower under a waterfall. He decides to have a little fun
with the bear before he shoots him. He hollers out "Hey Bear! Do you
need any soap?" The bear shouts back "No thanks. I already have a
typewriter."
Go figure.
Charles D. Kincaid
Marko Zagar
> >"Yes, it does, doesn't it."
>
it as wears (as in wears out) the soap and so the twist could be a bit
rude since we all know nuns don't do that kind of thing with soap on a
rope.
I must admit this is the first time I've ever bothered to anal-yse (or
in this case pussy-yse) a joke either its funny or its not.
Mike Holland
On Wed, 29 May 1996, Paul Khangure wrote:
> In an Age long past, an Age yet to come, you wrote:
>
> : Another example:
> : "Why did the architect have his house made backwards?"
> : "So he could watch television."
>
> Help.
As I said, say it out loud (verbatim!). Ask your friends :)
Repeat...
Mike Holland <m...@cygnus.uwa.edu.au> (UWA is just my ISP)
http://cygwww.uwa.edu.au/user/myk
Arne D Halvorsen
LH...@yalevm.ycc.yale.edu (Larry Horn) wrote:
<snip>
>I didn't understand. There was a variant nobody here mentioned: two polar
>bears on icebergs, passing each other at the Equator, one calling to the other,
>"Make mine vanilla!"
LOL. ROTFL. That, actually, is hysterical.
> Finally, one more version of the mini-shaggy-dog joke
>someone else mentioned:
> --Why is a duck that flies?
> --The higher the fewer.
I know it as :
--Why is a mouse when it spins?
--Because the higher, the fewer.
(Yes! I can cite! CITE! )
That is the version given in Eric Partridge: a Dictionary of
Catchphrases)
>How did we ever survive childhood?
Beats me.
>
>Larry
There was one which was almost like a UL (ObUL) in Norway, telling the
story of an Norwegian-American who didn't understand Norwegian, going
to Norway to visit his familiy, on the boat trip there, he is given a
card with some Norwegian text written on it by a secretive lady whom
he never sees again, gets to a hotel in Norway, tries to ask some
local what the card is about, is thrown out of the hotel, has a few
more bizarre experiences with the card. The same ting happens with
his family in Norway: he shows them the card, and is angrliy kicked
out. He gets on a boat back to the USA, discusses the card with the
captain and after much pleading the captain is allowed to see the card
on the condition the he give a full translation. Within sight of the
Statue of Liberty, so that the Norwegian might be able to swim to
shore if he is thrown overboard, the card is handed to the captain.
The wind blows the card out of their hands, and the card is never seen
again.
No point to the story. Only the annoyance of people who have listened
to a suitably embellished version over the last half hour, and were
expecting to know what was on the card.
Arne
Mike Holland
Marko Zagar (Marko...@REGATE.dpie.gov.au) wrote:
: > >Two nuns were bathing together. The first one says "Where's the soap?" The second says
: > >"Yes, it does, doesn't it."
: >
: This of course could make sense. The second nun could have understood
: it as wears (as in wears out) the soap and so the twist could be a bit
: rude since we all know nuns don't do that kind of thing with soap on a
: rope.
If you want to analyse, I suspect a bar of soap up there would be very
irritating. Any ladies care to comment?
--
Mike Holland <m...@cygnus.uwa.edu.au> (UWA is just my ISP)
Nick Spalding
.a...@cx.dnv.no (Arne D Halvorsen) wrote:
>
> I know it as :
> --Why is a mouse when it spins?
> --Because the higher, the fewer.
That's it! Someone else quoted it as 'Why does a mouse...' and I knew
it looked wrong.
The other one I like is
Q How long is a piece of string?
A The more you push it, it doesn't.
--
Nick
Powwow/Email to spal...@iol.ie
Phil Edwards
I think we've got two, maybe three, different types of joke here. There's
the logical / grammatical absurdity, generally told as a riddle, which
raises a smile when you realise it doesn't make sense...
Why is a mouse when it spins?
Because the higher the fewer
What's the difference between a duck?
One of its legs is both alike
...then there's the pointless and completely unfunny story told to
torment the uninitiated, such as this "No soap, radio" thing.
Then there are "shaggy dog" stories (mentioned by M. P. Weiner) which set
up an elaborate situation & then collapse it - again, not funny (if
you're on the receiving end) but not pointless
And then there are ULs, like that one about "No soap, radio" being a huge
psychological experiment...
Phil "sorry catherine" Edwards
Bo Bradham
Phil Edwards <new...@dircon.co.uk> wrote:
>I think we've got two, maybe three, different types of joke here. [...]
>
>And then there are ULs, like that one about "No soap, radio" being a huge
>psychological experiment...
Then theres the history of "no soap" as a figure of speech. There
was an English actor called Samuel Foote in the late 18th
century. A rival of his (Mumble Macklin) claimed he could
memorize any speech on one hearing. Foote improvised a string of
absolute non-sequiturs which made no sense, and Macklin admitted
defeat. At some point in the soliloquy a bear sticks his head
into a shop,looking for something. "What? No soap!" meaning it's
not there appears in the speech.
The speech also includes some nonsense words, chief among them
"the Grand Panjandrum" which along with "no soap" has entered the
language. From the OED:
panjandrum In origin, a nonsense word (simulating
compounds of PAN-, and burlesquing a title), occurring in the farrago of
nonsense composed by S. Foote to test the memory of old Macklin, who had
asserted that he could repeat anything after once hearing it.
The Foote-Macklin story, and the entire speech are found in "The
Little, Brown Book of Anecdotes" which credits
LITERARY LIFE AND OTHER CURIOSITIES. HENDRICKSON ROBERT <1981>
ISBN 0670430293
I'm a bit curious as to how, if the speech was so blooming hard
to memorize, and if the scene was some sort of social gathering,
the speech surivived in such detail.
I'm also curious because the OED lists "no soap" as being USAn:
f no soap: an announcement of refusal of a request or offer, failure
in an attempt, etc.; `nothing doing'. slang (orig. and chiefly U.S.).
Bo "curiouser and curiouser" Bradham
--
"We consider that any man who can fiddle all through one of
those Virginia Reels without losing his grip, may be depended
upon in any kind of musical emergency."
-- Mark Twain.
Mike Holland
On Thu, 30 May 1996, Lee Rudolph wrote:
> >> : "Why did the architect have his house made backwards?"
> >> : "So he could watch television."
>
> for "he".
That would be a dead giveaway.
> But the normal accenting of "house made" and "housemaid" in
> American English (at least) is very different, so the joke
only a different stress, isnt it?
> doesn't work quite as well as you'd like (and in fact we
> don't use the word "housemaid" very much), anyway. Alas.
Perhaps it is a cultural difference. Americans, to judge from their
movies etc. are perhaps not accustomed to subtlety. The humo(u)r
comes from it being very difficult. It helps if you have a few people
about who know the answer, and a few who dont. Its a teaser.
yours baitingly,
Mike Holland <m...@cygnus.uwa.edu.au> (UWA is just my ISP)
http://cygwww.uwa.edu.au/user/myk
Nick Spalding
.bra...@panix.com (Bo Bradham) wrote:
> I'm a bit curious as to how, if the speech was so blooming hard
> to memorize, and if the scene was some sort of social gathering,
> the speech surivived in such detail.
It was a set-piece occasion and Foote had it prepared on paper in
advance. I used to be able to recite it myself but a lot of it has
gone now. Started something like:
She went into the garden to cut a cabbage leaf to make an apple pie.
While she was there a great she-bear came into the shop, "What? No
soap?" so he died and she very imprudently married the barber ....
(description of wedding party, including 'The Grand Panjandrum
himself' forgotten)
... and they all fell to playing catch-as-catch-can til the gunpowder
ran out of the heels of their boots.
Andy Holden
wee...@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener) wrote:
>Anybody remember the "rickety-rackety staircase joke"? It consisted
>of a long--and it could be made arbitrarily long--lead up with the
>teller sadistically repeating "up one flight of rickety rackety
>staircases, two flights ..." and then "down one flight ..." and
>so on,
This reminds me of something similar, which starts off "There was once a
purple man who lived in a purple village in a purple kingdom. One day he
was walking along looking at the purple trees ..." etc. etc. with any
amount of random purple related story telling. It ends with "so the other
purple man opened the purple door for him and said "indigo!""
Andy.
Keith Willoughby
Matthew P Wiener <wee...@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu> wrote on Mon, 27 May
1996,
>In article <Ds1Ay8.E1E...@torfree.net>, fjb@torfree (Jim Butterfield)
>writes:
>>Is it really a joke? Or is it in fact an urban legend that will continue
>>to mystify generations to come?
>
>It's not a joke.
>
I heared this as -
How high is a mouse when it spins?
Because the higher the fewer.
And I laughed.
--
Keith Willoughby, Swansea, Wales.
"Infamy. Infamy. They've all got it infamy."
Keith Willoughby
crs <chu...@ultranet.com> wrote on Mon, 27 May 1996,
>Jim Butterfield wrote:
>>
>> Is it really a joke? Or is it in fact an urban legend that will continue
>> to mystify generations to come?
>
>
>The other replys are correct (read 'em).
>
>Here's a similar joke.
>
>second says
>"Yes, it does, doesn't it."
>
If it's of any interest - a friend told me this.
Two nuns in the bath - on says "where's the soap?", and the other says
"what do you think I am, a radio?"
He had been told it by a friend, and he thought it was a mix up of two
jokes (we knew the "Yes it does" joke). Now I can see different.
Incidently, I found it hilarious, and still do. I *like* meaningless
humour.
Keith Willoughby
Andrea Lynn Leistra <alei...@leland.Stanford.EDU> wrote on Tue, 28 May
1996,
>In article <4oeked$m...@bell.maths.tcd.ie>,
>Denise Kelleher <ali...@maths.tcd.ie> wrote:
>>crs <chu...@ultranet.com> writes:
>>
>>
>>>Two nuns were bathing together. The first one says "Where's the soap?" The
>second says
>>>"Yes, it does, doesn't it."
>>
>>
>>other says "What do you think I am, a typewriter?"
>
>I've seen this sort of joke (with penguins in the bathtub) used to
>it, the clueless person will laugh, and everyone will ask the clueless one
>to explain exactly what's funny about it.
>
(see my previous post about nuns)
This is unfair! I (and my friends) found it hilarious. No, I can't
describe why, but I like that sort of humour. You can't explain it any
more that you can explain a lot of Monthy Python.
Stuart A. Bronstein
Larry Horn <LH...@yalevm.ycc.yale.edu> wrote:
>In article <4og92t$e...@news1.panix.com>
>ang...@panix.com (Angus Johnston) writes:
>>> catherine yronwode (yron...@sonic.net) wrote:
> --Why is a duck that flies?
> --The higher the fewer.
Why is a crow?
Caws.
Stu
Lee Jones
In article <31AE05...@dircon.co.uk>,
Phil Edwards <new...@dircon.co.uk> wrote:
>...then there's the pointless and completely unfunny story told to
>torment the uninitiated, such as this "No soap, radio" thing.
On that note, how many of you are familiar with the purple brick joke? It
has the same necessity - you need a "mark". The first half goes like
this:
The story teller describes a throwing contest among three guys, where they
are throwing bricks. The first two throw their bricks some distance. The
third somehow finds a *purple* brick, and heaves it into the air. It
continues in flight, and disappears from sight.
At this point, the fellow pranksters are all but ROFL, pronouncing it the
funnies thing they ever heard. The mark, of course, doesn't get it.
Now you wait. This is best done on a multiple day camping trip or some
such thing.
N days later, some *different* story teller starts up a joke about a
guy in an airplane smoking a cigar, and a lady next to him with a yapping
dog. They become very annoyed with each other, this leading to the lady
grabbing the guy's cigar and throwing it out the window. The guy responds
by heaving the lady's dog out the window.
The airplane eventually lands, and lo and behold, up comes running the dog,
and guess what he's got in his mouth?
"The cigar?", asks the mark.
"No - the PURPLE BRICK!" shrieks the teller, and all the pranksters
collapse with laughter.
Regards, Lee
"Did this twice - hysterical both times."
--
Lee Jones | "Your friend is close by your side
le...@sgi.com | And speaks in far Asian tongue."
415-933-3356 | -Jon Anderson/Vangelis ("Find my way Home")
Randy Kaelber
Phil Edwards (new...@dircon.co.uk) wrote:
> I think we've got two, maybe three, different types of joke here. There's
> the logical / grammatical absurdity, generally told as a riddle, which
> raises a smile when you realise it doesn't make sense...
> Why is a mouse when it spins?
> Because the higher the fewer
> What's the difference between a duck?
> One of its legs is both alike
One weird joke a friend used to tell, was in two parts, usually hours
removed from each other.
1st joke: "Why do ducks have webbed feet? To put out forest fires."
-time passes-
2nd joke: "Why do elephants have big, flat feet? To put out burning ducks."
It's funnier if you're drunk.
Randy "I'm truly sorry" Kaelber
Maggie Newman
Angus Johnston <ang...@panix.com> wrote:
>> catherine yronwode (yron...@sonic.net) wrote:
>> :
>> : The researchers created an unfunny non-joke -- "no soap, radio" -- and
>> : told it to children in New York City schools during the early 1950s.
>
>serious cites before I buy this one.
>
Same here. But a data point: I was told this "joke" as a young
(first-grade, I think) child, by a girl my age. 1956 or thereabouts. In
Bergen County, NJ, near NYC. The girl who told it to me had a lot of
relatives in the NYC area. For what it's worth.
Maggie
catherine yronwode
Larry Horn wrote:
>
> I would also be interested in objective (non-urban-legendary) corroboration.
> Which researchers? What journal?
> I recall a similar version from my own childhood (b. 1945, N.Y.C.) involving
> two penguins in a bathtub and the exchange
> --Please pass the soap.
> --No soap, radio.
Larry, as you noted to me in e-mail, you and my ex-husband Peter
Yronwode (ne peter Paskin) were born the same year (1945) and attended
Hunter College Elemenatry School in New York City at precisly the same
time. And you both heard the "no soap, radio" story. That's way cool. I
was born in 1947, went to Whittier Elementary in Berkeley, California
and never heard it until i met him in 1968.
That's no proof of anything -- just a note...
catherine yronwode
Lee Jones wrote:
> "No - the PURPLE BRICK!" shrieks the teller, and all the pranksters
> collapse with laughter.
This is a great joke, if you do it right. Even tougher than having
cohorts is doing it cold, all by yourself, to a group. You look like an
idiot, then apologize and offer to tell a better one...
I did not learn it as the "purple" bribkm,, by the way. The bare bonees
i lgot (in 1962 on KEWB radio, on the all-night Michael London show, as
told to him by a woman caller) was:
part 1)
man wants to build patio...requires exactly 100 brinks...orders exactly
100 brinck...truck driver loads exacty 100 bricks...drives over a RR
crossing, one brick fralls out...man receives only 99 bricks (big fake
laugh).
part 2
man gets on a bus...old lady gets on bus with little white poodle
dog...man lights cigar...woman asks him to stop...he refuses but opens
window...woman says that's not good enough and tells bus driver to make
him stop...man says, what the hell, i was almost done weith it
anyway...tosses cigar out window. Woman and dog get off bus, dog runs
away...woman searches for him =in vain all day, calls the SPCA
etc...that night dog comes home, very bedraggled and guesss what it has
in tis mouth?...[listener says, "The cigar" ...triumphant reply: "no --
THE BRICK!!!"
K. Cook
: A friend of mine used to tell a non-joke, something like -
: "What's the difference between an apple and a bicycle?"
: Answer "You can't brush your teeth with a canoe".
: The whole point was that it was a non-joke, and it was meant to
: mystify/confuse/enrage rather than amuse the victim (although the
: teller was amused by the victims reaction).
I've heard a couple of similar jokes. They can be quite amusing
simply because they don't make any sense.
My kid brother came home from grade 1 one day with "How many
pancakes does it take to cover a dog house? -- None, because snakes don't
have arm pits" I always thought that in his mind he'd mixed up punch
lines.
michael lepore
Here's one that was being told around 1959 or 1960 --
Why is an orange?
Because a vest has no sleeves.
Judes
In article <31ad810d...@news.iol.ie> Nick Spalding, spal...@iol.ie
writes:
>.a...@cx.dnv.no (Arne D Halvorsen) wrote:
>>
>> I know it as :
>> --Why is a mouse when it spins?
>> --Because the higher, the fewer.
Hmm. I have a nasty feeling that there was a long and rambling discussion
about this, possibly on this very newsgroup (or possibly on
alt.usage.english). Some claims were made pertaining to a machine with a
regulator on it (called a 'mouse') which rises up and somehow causes a
reduction in the number of actions that the machine is performing
(possibly something to do with spinning?).
This sounds either like a retrospective 'explanation' for a joke which
doesn't have one, or else it really does pertain to an 'in-joke' made by
people in a certain trade.
Or else I was trolled.
Judes "Why is a mouse when it spins?
Yes, it does, doesn't it?"
-----
judith_...@ncet.org.uk|So convenient a thing it is to be a *reasonable
|Creature*, since it enables one to find or make
|a Reason for every thing one has a mind to do.
| Benjamin Franklin
Phil Edwards
Nick Spalding wrote:
> She went into the garden to cut a cabbage leaf to make an apple pie.
> While she was there a great she-bear came into the shop, "What? No
> soap?" So he died and she very imprudently married the barber ....
> (description of wedding party, including 'The Grand Panjandrum
> himself' forgotten)
> ... and they all fell to playing catch-as-catch-can til the gunpowder
> ran out of the heels of their boots.
I love the last bit. I knew this passage but not the source - thanks, Bo.
Looking for "soap" references in Brewer, I discovered he cites it under
Panjandrum (word invented by Foote). Brewer rather charmingly takes the
side of "Old Macklin" (nobody seems to know the guy's forename) who he
said _refused_ to repeat such a farrago of nonsense.
Brewer also cites a C19 "street saying" "How are you off for soap?" with
which street urchins would torment the well-to-do passer-by. I don't know
the precise date of the Macklin encounter, but I'd guess 1760s or early
1770s (Foote died in 1777). It seems at least possible that "What, no
soap?" could be an alternative form of this saying (rather than a serious
inquiry on the she-bear's part).
In short, "No soap?" and related phrases, in the form of deliberately
meaningless badinage, go back to C19 and possibly as far as mid-C18.
--
Phil "best sort of farrago in my opinion" Edwards
jeff tiedrich
In the version I heard, the woman complains the dog is suffering from the
cigar smoke. The man not only refuses to put out the cigar but blows a
huge cloud of smoke at the dog. The woman grabs the cigar and throws it
out the window. The man then grabs the dog and throws -it- out the window.
Minor variant but IMHO makes the joke funnier.
.tiedrich
Phil Edwards
Judes wrote:
>
> >> --Why is a mouse when it spins?
> >> --Because the higher, the fewer.
>
> Hmm. I have a nasty feeling that there was a long and rambling discussion
> about this, possibly on this very newsgroup (or possibly on
> alt.usage.english). Some claims were made pertaining to a machine with a
> regulator on it (called a 'mouse') which rises up and somehow causes a
> reduction in the number of actions that the machine is performing
> (possibly something to do with spinning?).
>
This explanation was given in the Guardian's Notes and Queries. As I
understand it (i.e. poorly) a regulator on a steam engine works by
spinning a pair of weights, which rise by centrifugal force as they spin
faster. The energy required to lift the weights effectively slows down
the, er, spinning thing.
It all _could_... **could**... have a sensible explanation, assuming (a)
that the weight on a regulator actually is called a mouse and (b) that
the original question was in fact "Why use a mouse when it spins?" In
this case it would come into the category of apparently meaningless but
actually sensible questions used to baffle the uninitiated. But this is
all hypothetical in the extreme.
--
Phil "hope someone's counting all these categories" Edwards
jrq
Keith Willoughby wrote:
>
> crs <chu...@ultranet.com> wrote on Mon, 27 May 1996,
> >Jim Butterfield wrote:
> >>
> >> Is it really a joke? Or is it in fact an urban legend that will continue
> >> to mystify generations to come?
> >
> >[snip]
> >
> >The other replys are correct (read 'em).
> >
> >
> >Two nuns were bathing together. The first one says "Where's the soap?" The
> >second says
> >
> >crs
>
> Keith Willoughby, Swansea, Wales.
> "Infamy. Infamy. They've all got it infamy."
Actually, the nun joke is a joke. And it can also be used as
an American / English detector. Americans do not get this joke,
whereas English do. I would have thought a Welsh person would
have got it as well but I guess I'm wrong.
Jerry Quartley
Terry Van Belle
Bo Bradham wrote:
> I'm also curious because the OED lists "no soap" as being USAn:
>
> f no soap: an announcement of refusal of a request or offer, failure
> in an attempt, etc.; `nothing doing'. slang (orig. and chiefly U.S.).
The expression was used in an old Bugs Bunny cartoon. Elmer Fudd, aka
Dr. Jekyll, has just force-fed his latest creation to Bugs, the
unwilling guinea pig. Bugs shudders, contorts, grimaces, makes hideous
noises, and then abruptly he turns back to normal and says "No soap, doc."
Terry
Matthew P Wiener
In article <31ADCD...@sonic.net>, catherine yronwode <yronwode@sonic writes:
>That's no proof of anything -- just a note...
For starters, WHAT WAS THE BOOK YOUR HUSBAND FOUND IT IN?
--
-Matthew P Wiener (wee...@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu)
Matthew P Wiener
In article <31AF5F...@dircon.co.uk>, Phil Edwards <news-uk@dircon writes:
>It all _could_... **could**... have a sensible explanation, assuming (a)
>that the weight on a regulator actually is called a mouse and (b) that
>the original question was in fact "Why use a mouse when it spins?" In
>this case it would come into the category of apparently meaningless but
>actually sensible questions used to baffle the uninitiated. But this is
>all hypothetical in the extreme.
Not so hypothetical is the use of "mouse" in set theory. Mice come,
as usual, in a linguistic range of varieties: "premouse", "pet mouse",
"squashed mouse", "real mouse". (A really big one is a "weasel".)
In one monograph that discusses mice extensively (Dodd THE CORE MODEL),
the author breaks down for just a moment, when he gets to "real mice".
"Real" here is naturally in reference to the real numbers, not the
real world. But the author can't ignore this contradiction between
mathematical and ordinary meaning, and includes a parenthetical comment
that the reader of course is not bothered by the absurd terminology any
more.
I have also seen a paper where the the plural of "premouse" was
apparently spell-checked-and-corrected from "premice" to "premise".
Charles Wm. Dimmick
K. Cook wrote:
>
> My kid brother came home from grade 1 one day with "How many
> pancakes does it take to cover a dog house? --
Much older version, told by Byron O. Dimmick in 1943. "If a man and a
half can dig a hole and a half in a day and a half, how many pancakes
does it take to shingle a doghouse?" Also, about the same vintange,
was "If a centipede a pint and a millipede a quart, how much would a
precipice?"
Charles Wm. Dimmick (I couldn't resist)
stebain
jrq wrote:
>
> > >
> > >Two nuns were bathing together. The first one says "Where's the soap?" The
> > >second says
> > >"Yes, it does, doesn't it."
> > >
\/\/\SNIP/\/\/
> Actually, the nun joke is a joke. And it can also be used as
> an American / English detector. Americans do not get this joke,
> whereas English do.
> Jerry Quartley
What on earth do you mean? We have heard of nuns here. nun-none does nothing
for the joke. You implying that two nuns were bathing together as the colourful (I put
the u in for you. I'm so nice.) bit of the joke. But that would make the rest of the
joke humourless.
Please explain.
Your American Cousin
Jim Butterfield
: > Why does a mouse when it spins?
: The higher the fewer
There were a lot of jokes of that sort going around in the 1950s. Here's
one of the better (?) ones:
What's the difference between a duck?
One of its legs is both the same.
Pointless jokes continue to this day; the 60s, for example, got cranked
up on elephant jokes. (One email suggested that perhaps the lions were
really elephants).
It seems to me that 'no soap radio' rates a little differently. It's
persistent, reappearing in one form or another every few years. And it's
likely a hoax.
--Jim
Joachim Lous
Quoth Andrea Lynn Leistra:
: I've seen this sort of joke (with penguins in the bathtub) used to
: humiliate someone who laughs at jokes they don't get; someone will tell
: it, the clueless person will laugh, and everyone will ask the clueless one
: to explain exactly what's funny about it.
That's the nicey nicey way. The best part is swooping in for the kill
when everyone suddenly go serious and face the unfortunate victim to
say:
What are _you_ laughing at? _We_'re all laughing at _you_.
It's also quite fun pulling that one with a _real_ joke. The 'victim'
gets very confused.
-Joachim Lous
Matt Ackeret
>--Because the higher, the fewer.
>That is the version given in Eric Partridge: a Dictionary of
>Catchphrases)
Weeeird, there's a Star Trek: The Next Generation episode where someone
keeps saying "the higher, the fewer". I don't even remember the context,
but it was just really weird and didn't seem to make sense..
--
unk...@apple.com Apple II Forever
These opinions are mine, not Apple's.
KarWV
In article <4olm29$b...@motss.newpaltz.edu>, lepo...@matrix.newpaltz.edu
(michael lepore) writes:
Ok...I live to lurk, but the version of this I heard:
What's the difference between an orange?
A bicycle, because a vest has no sleeves.
--kimberly
well, I was born in 1961...
Katherine Catmull
In article <31AF24...@ccgmetamedia.com>, jrq <jr...@ccgmetamedia.com> wrote:
> > >Jim Butterfield wrote:
> > >>
> > >Two nuns were bathing together. The first one says "Where's the
soap?" The
> > >second says
> > >"Yes, it does, doesn't it."
>
> Actually, the nun joke is a joke. And it can also be used as
> an American / English detector. Americans do not get this joke,
> whereas English do. I would have thought a Welsh person would
> have got it as well but I guess I'm wrong.
But I don't think this is so much because Americans are naturally
thick-headed (though, of course, we are), but because "wears the soap" is
not something an American would say. We'd say "wears down the soap" or
"wears the soap out" or something like that.
We do or would in a non-tricky context _understand_ the phrase "wears the
soap," but it has an alien (or "furrin") sound. Anyway, that's my
impression.
Kate "can I get coffee here she said vaguely" Catmull
--
"Be the voice of night and Florida in my ear."
Jay R. Ashworth
Ralph Ray Craig (rrc...@eos.ncsu.edu) wrote:
: I actually did this spontaneously on a camping trip. We
: decided to tell jokes and the first joke was told by our guide.
: "A man loads 100 bricks in a wheelbarrow and takes it to the site
: where he is to build a wall. When he gets there, he counts the
: bricks and finds only 99. What happened to the other brick?" After
: several people guessed ridiculous scenarios I gave the correct
: answer "It got lost" to the groaning dissatisfaction of the rest
: of the group.
: We continued telling jokes for a couple of hours. Finally,
: as we were getting ready to turn in for the night, I told one more
: joke about a man and woman on a train. The woman throws the man's
: cigar from the train and he retaliates by thowing her dog off the
: train. When they get to the station they look down the track and
: see the dog trotting happily along and what do you think was in
: his mouth? <Everyone guesses "the cigar."> The brick!
Vector...
A friend tells this pair of jokes, but, for some odd reason, the man
throws the woman's dog out of an airplane, and it is that that the
mason catches.
--
Jay R. Ashworth j...@scfn.thpl.lib.fl.us
Member of the Technical Staff Junk Mail Will Be Billed For.
The Suncoast Freenet "The world will remain dangerously unstable
Tampa Bay, Florida as long as it is populated." --me +1 813 790 7592
Hans Derycke
Mike Holland <m...@cygnus.uwa.edu.au> cost the Net hundreds, if not
thousands of dollars by writing:
[snipperoo]
Am I the only one thinking this thread is getting way out of AFU's
scope? Follow-ups set.
Hansje
"No legend, stop it"
-------------------------------------------
Hans Derycke -- us02...@pop3.interramp.com
-------------------------------------------
>I still need to work on creative spelling, abyssmal
>punctuation, and random elected-official-bashing. -- Andy Walton
M. Price
>In article <31AF24...@ccgmetamedia.com>, jrq <jr...@ccgmetamedia.com> wrote:
>> > >Jim Butterfield wrote:
>> > >>
>> > >Two nuns were bathing together. The first one says "Where's the
>soap?" The
>> > >second says
>> > >"Yes, it does, doesn't it."
>>
>> Actually, the nun joke is a joke. And it can also be used as
>> an American / English detector. Americans do not get this joke,
>> whereas English do. I would have thought a Welsh person would
>> have got it as well but I guess I'm wrong.
I'd just like to say, as a Welsh person, that I didn't get this joke
for years and years. And one day, out of the blue...Of course!
>But I don't think this is so much because Americans are naturally
>thick-headed (though, of course, we are), but because "wears the soap" is
>not something an American would say. We'd say "wears down the soap" or
>"wears the soap out" or something like that.
It's not something anyone would tend to say.
>We do or would in a non-tricky context _understand_ the phrase "wears the
>soap," but it has an alien (or "furrin") sound. Anyway, that's my
>impression.
F'naar, f'naar.
--
"A woman is not a basket you place your buns in to keep them warm, not a
brood hen you can slip duck eggs under, not a purse, holding the coins
of your descendants till you spend them in wars." (Marge Piercy)
mp
Phil Edwards
Ralph Ray Craig wrote:
>
> Bo Bradham wrote:
>
> >
> > to memorize, and if the scene was some sort of social gathering,
> > the speech survived in such detail.
>
> perhaps the author had written it down?
>
Maybe he had. Alternatively, maybe he wrote it down afterwards, when
everyone was asking him for a copy; Brewer reckons there are a number of
variants. I've seen it in four places with only very minor differences,
though.
The date, in the unlikely event that anyone's still interested, was 1755.
Phil "duh me no duhs" Edwards
buck...@nandy.com
After much discussion of the jokes (putative non-jokes) that
carry punchlines like "No soap. radio", "Wears the soap doesn't it",
and "Carrying the BRICK!" [Explanations found in alt.folklore.urban
and elsewhere -- for those who read the Follow-ups: line] I feel
compelled to add a joke (true joke) that troubled me for over a decade.
Q: How do you get down off an elephant?
A: You don't, you get down off a duck!
This joke troubled me every since I first read it in a '10,000
jokes for every occassion' book as a young child (ca. 8 years old). In
fact, I didn't get it until my 18th birthday (I was packing to leave
for Germany -- I can't explain the sudden revelation). During that lost
decade, I carried some vague image of a man climbing down from an
elephant onto a rhino, thence onto a ... and finally stepping off a duck
onto the ground.
When I went to college, I told the joke to many people from
freshmen to grad students, and they all laughed heartily -- but rarely
could a single one explain the joke to me when pressed. I was my test
for a "true" sense of humor for a decade -- few got it, but the true
humorists could run a fascinating conversation from the premise...
I hereby share this pallid riddle (or spread the virus as you
may prefer) to all those of like mind who have persevered thus far in
this thread.
I would certainly enjoy hearing (by e-mail) from those who
a) have similar experiences
b) have also found the necessity to employ a discriminating
test for a 'true sense of humor' -- especially when
evaluating potential romantic partners and/or mates
c) can emphathize with anyone posting a message such as this,
without dismissing it as a mere failure to use the
"cancel message" button
catherine yronwode
Matthew P Wiener wrote:
>
> In article <31ADCD...@sonic.net>, catherine yronwode <yronwode@sonic writes:
> >That's no proof of anything -- just a note...
>
> For starters, WHAT WAS THE BOOK YOUR HUSBAND FOUND IT IN?
> -Matthew P Wiener (wee...@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu)
i answereed this previously 00 i don;t know -- and it may have been a
popular science mag like Omni, Scientific American, or Psychology Today.
I do recall reading it myself, not just hearing it from him.
Solomon Fernblatt
In article <4oeked$m...@bell.maths.tcd.ie>, ali...@maths.tcd.ie says...
se
>cond says
>>"Yes, it does, doesn't it."
>
>
>Two ducks are in a bath. One says "Pass the soap please." The
>other says "What do you think I am, a typewriter?"
Almost like the motto of the American National Non-Sequitor Society.....
Tom "We dont make much sense, but we like Pizza" Norris
Tez McKittrick
>
>Anybody remember the "rickety-rackety staircase joke"? It consisted
>of a long--and it could be made arbitrarily long--lead up with the
>teller sadistically repeating "up one flight of rickety rackety
>staircases, two flights ..." and then "down one flight ..." and
>so on, for however many iterations are involved in the rather
>peculiar story that was taking place at the other end of those
>stairs, and at the end there was the question, "what is the moral
>of this story?" and there was indeed a moral, but it referred to
>exactly one rather trivial aspect of the story, having nothing to
>do with the stories or the rather peculiar story.
>
>I haven't told it in years.
I remember something like this from when I was a kid:..
A man goes to a hotel and gets a room. In the night he is unable
to sleep because the person in the room next to his is making a
strange noise. In the morning he asks the manager what the
noise was in the next room... the manager answers "sorry, I can't
tell you, you're not a monk".. The man is puzzled but continues on
his travels.
a year later the man returns to the hotel and the same thing
happens (though the teller of the story should just repeat the first
part).
About three or four years later the man returns, he now trained
to be a monk so he can find out about the noise... in the night
there is the same noise again.. so the man goes to the manager
and demands to know what is going on.
The manager agrees to show the man (as he is now a monk)... the
manager leads him up flights of stairs, around a corner, through a
door (continue with this for at least five minutes) and they
eventually come to a door.... the man enters the room and finally
sees what has been happening........
(stop the story there... take a drink, light a cigarette, anything just
don't say anything)
the person you were telling it to will ask what was happening.. to
which you say:
"sorry, I can't tell you, you're not a monk"
of course, if you're telling the story to a monk you'll have to
improvise:)
--
Tez McKittrick
(can't believe he spent the time to type that shitty, unfunny thing above)
Chris Borg
A duck?? I don't get it!!
buck...@nandy.com wrote:
: After much discussion of the jokes (putative non-jokes) that
Chris_F...@cup.portal.com
The entire contents of this post are true, which MAY be more than can be
said for the psychological-test theory...
>[the frustration of being told the "no soap- radio" jokein 1953.]
>
>I have a feeling that others will cover this from an academic and
>citation-heavy point of view -- but here is what i know from personal
>experience.
>
>[fascinating, if true, amusing in any case, story of the "no soap -
> radio" joke being part of a psychological experiment in the 1950s]
Interesting... very interesting. I heard the "no soap - radio" joke
from my peers (i.e. not adults) at Irondequoit High School (in a suburb
of Rochester, NY) around 1978. In our version it was penguins, not ele-
phants.
The first time I heard it, I immediately knew it wasn't funny, and said
so. I had a pretty solid ego for a kid, at least where matters of in-
tellect were concerned, and never once even CONSIDERED that there was
anything wrong with ME for "not getting it." It turned out that my peers'
take on it (which quickly became mine, and has remained so), was that
this thing wasn't so much a "joke," as a "trick" which one group of
kids (the "insiders") played on another kid or group (the "victim(s)"),
either for innocent amusement or out of maliciousness.
The way it worked was, the "insiders" did as the psychologists are al-
leged to have done: exhibit amusement, and tell the "joke" to the victim.
At that point the kids' technique differed; the next step was to make
fun of the victim for "not getting it," which was of course the whole
POINT. If the victim wised up, figured out the trick, and accepted his
victimization with good humor, it was possible for the victim to become
an "insider" and to participate "on the other side" the NEXT time the
trick was pulled.
I'm reminded of the Green Golf Ball joke that has floated around this
newsgroup for the past seven or eight years (I have a copy around here
SOMEWHERE).
Incidentally, and interestingly, I, too, developed the habit of
using the phrase, "no soap- radio" in conversation -- most recently,
about three weeks ago, confusing the HELL out of my girlfriend (who
had never heard the joke / been a victim of the trick). In my case,
I use it, somewhat unconsciously really, as a non-answer in response
to questions for which I have no REAL answer(s). The fact that Mr.
Yronwode and I BOTH took up this phrase as part of our lifelong men-
tal makeup, is interesting, because it suggests that the phrase, "no
soap- radio" (or, "the 'no soap- radio' meme") is a thought-form with
almost a "life of its own," and a "viral" type of life at that. Con-
sider: the "no soap- radio" meme was dropped into the verbal "gene
pool" by 1950s psychologists (if we choose to believe that theory),
with the intent of its being temporary and local. In a chilling ana-
logy to the classic horror theme of a "medical experiment gone hor-
ribly wrong," the meme escaped the 'lab' and got into the outside
world's verbal gene-pool (perhaps I should say "the meme-pool"). For
over FORTY YEARS since, the "no soap- radio" meme has survived, using
the brains and vocal apparatus (and now the fingers, typing skills, and
Internet resources) of host minds to copy itself to OTHER host minds
in what can ONLY be considered a "viral" manner. It mutated a little,
evidently -- the "elephant" and "penguin" versions -- but retains its
ability to function. Scary, no?
(The videogame "Tetris" has a similar "viral" effect on the mind; many
people, after playing many rounds of the game, report experiencing a
strange after-effect: mental imagery of Tetris pieces falling down onto,
and having to be fit into place around, objects and people in the real
world. I.e., you're talking to someone and mentally fitting Tetris pie-
ces into place around his/her shoulders... I've experienced this myself.)
Veddy, veddy intedesting. :-)
Chris Chiesa
Chris_F...@cup.portal.com
Chris_F...@cup.portal.com
My Dad told this one:
Q: "What's the difference between a duck?"
A: "One of his legs are both the same as itself."
and asked these two "questions:"
"Is it further to Chicago, or by bus?"
"Do you walk, or carry your lunch?"
My seventh-grade math textbook (yes, this was in an official educational
resource) contained the classic
Q: "If you were riding down a hill and your pedal fell off, how many
frogs are in your oven?"
A: "Wrong, because ice cream doesn't have bones!"-
Keith Willoughby
>
> Q: How do you get down off an elephant?
> A: You don't, you get down off a duck!
>
> This joke troubled me every since I first read it in a '10,000
> jokes for every occassion' book as a young child (ca. 8 years old). In
> fact, I didn't get it until my 18th birthday (I was packing to leave
> for Germany -- I can't explain the sudden revelation). During that lost
> decade, I carried some vague image of a man climbing down from an
> elephant onto a rhino, thence onto a ... and finally stepping off a duck
> onto the ground.
If I have just been sucked into some netwide piss take, then laugh at me.
If not - "down" = duck feathers.
"eiderdown" = feathers of the Eider duck.
Still a funny joke though.
--
Keith Willoughby, Swansea, Wales
"Better drowned than duffers.
If not duffers, won't drown"
Gregor Ronald
Q. "If a centipede a pint and a millipede a quart, how much would a
precipice?"
A. One long drop.
==============================
Gregor Ronald
Christchurch, New Zealand
64-3-385-0577
==============================
"Skiing is like flying, driving, hiking,
and surfing, all rolled into one. How
can you NOT do that?" -Jerry Seinfeld
Newton Love
wej...@tam2000.tamu.edu (Walter Eric Johnson) wrote:
>I took part in an experient along the same lines in 1974. The
>experiment used ink-blots instead of a joke. Each person in the
>group was asked what they thought it looked like. Surprisingly,
>most of the people in the group agreed on what it looked like.
>The problem was that if someone asked my opinion, I gave them my
>opinion and I never thought it looked like what the rest of the
>group saw. The psychologist got rather upset. After it was over,
>I found out that the others in the group were in cahoots with the
>psychologist who claimed I was the most anti-social person he ever
>met. (I just laughed at that.)
>Eric Johnson
Well, Eric, if pshycologists made us all the same, then we wouldn't
invent new toys and gadgets, and they wouldn't have a job!
(ob joke)
True story:
I was on vacation in Walt Disney World, Orlando Fla, when a really
funny
thing happened in the World Showcase of the Epcot Center.
To set the stage, please recall the NBC Saturday Night Live skit of
the
ultimate sports fans from Chicago, who worship "Da Bears", (Chicago
NFL).
I was in the German Village in Epcot, and as I approached the
restrooms,
a very red faced man came out of the ladies' room, and walked with me
into the men's room. He saw that I had seen him come out of the wrong
room,
and told me in a Chicago accent:
"I am so embarrassed! I saw da sign over da door what said 'DAMEN'
and thought the guy what made da sign was ay guy from Chicago. How
was I to know that 'DAMEN' was German for women? I thought it was
DA MEN like DA BEARS. And wot with the other sign that said HERREN?
I thought it was like da HERs go EN here." I politely nodded and
grunted (and fought to keep a straight face).
Only in America!
-Newton
Stuart A. Bronstein
Gregor Ronald <g_ro...@tpnet.co.nz> wrote:
>"Charles Wm. Dimmick" <dim...@ccsu.ctstateu.edu> wrote:
>
>>"If a centipede a pint and a millipede a quart, how much would a
>>precipice?"
>A. One long drop.
Reminds me of this exchange:
Q: "What did you have for breakfast?"
A: "Pea Soup."K"
Q: What did you have for lunch?"
A: "Pea Soup."K"
Q: "What did you have for dinner?"
A: "Pea Soup."
Q: "What did you do all night?"
A: "Pee Soup."K"
Stu
Jim Butterfield
Bo Bradham (bra...@panix.com) wrote:
: I'm also curious because the OED lists "no soap" as being USAn:
: f no soap: an announcement of refusal of a request or offer, failure
: in an attempt, etc.; `nothing doing'. slang (orig. and chiefly U.S.).
There is indeed such an expression, little used today (I seem to recall
it mostly from gangster movies).
I tend to doubt that it's related to the "No Soap, Radio" anecdote,
however. The original teller of the story, who claimed to get the point,
ended it with the following wording: .. "But we have'nt any soap". "In that
case, turn on the radio".
It's possible, of course, that this teller (in 1953!) didn't understand
it himself and got the wording wrong. But I cling to the hope that
somebody, somewhere, knows the background of this oft-repeated story.
--Jim
Maxx
buck...@nandy.com wrote:
> Q: How do you get down off an elephant?
> A: You don't, you get down off a duck!
This joke was told to me in high school with the slight alteration of
Q: How do you get off an elephant?
A: You don't you get off a duck!
Which of course makes no sense!
The girl who told it laughed along with all of us for about a minute
before saying
"But I don't get it!"
_________________________
THE TRUTH IS OUT THERE!
_________________________
Lorelei David
In article <31B4A6...@eos.ncsu.edu>, Ralph Ray Craig
<rrc...@eos.ncsu.edu> wrote:
> buck...@nandy.com wrote:
>
> > Q: How do you get down off an elephant?
> > A: You don't, you get down off a duck!
>
> > When I went to college, I told the joke to many people from
> > freshmen to grad students, and they all laughed heartily -- but rarely
> > could a single one explain the joke to me when pressed.
>
> This reminds me of a friend of mine who was in ROTC. Her instructor
> showed the class a Far Side cartoon with the caption "Hannibal's
> first ill-fated attempt at crossing the Alps." The cartoon showed
> a column of soldiers trying to ride kangaroos. Everyone in the room
> laughed but when the instructor pressed them it turned out that with
> the exception of my friend, no one in the room had any idea who
> Hannibal was nor that the kangaroos should have been elephants.
>
> So, why were they all laughing?
OK!! I give in... As long as we're speaking of inexplicable Far Side
cartoons, I'll throw mine in. For two years, this panel waited on our
refrigerator for a suitable explanation, but nobody has been able to
enlighten us.
The image is a mechanic standing over a car in a garage. The mechanic
looks quite startled. The name of the body shop is "John Brown's Body
Shop". Upon first glance, the cartoon wasn't funny. Upon a second, third
and nth amount of glances, the joke still wasn't funny.
Is there something hilarious about John Brown that I should be aware of?
Wasn't he a decidedly unfunny person during the Civil War?
Stumped,
---Lorelei
--
Minor Deity, Level III
Women's Sewing Circle & Terrorist Society
Mlkbirder
>[the frustration of being told the "no soap- radio" jokein 1953.]
>
>I have a feeling that others will cover this from an academic and
>citation-heavy point of view -- but here is what i know from personal
>experience.
>
>[fascinating, if true, amusing in any case, story of the "no soap -
> radio" joke being part of a psychological experiment in the 1950s]
I heard this joke in l964 when I was in high school in a New York suburb
told by my older sister's English teacher who was maybe five or six years
older. The joke always bothered me as it seemed mean spirited in setting
up an in and out group. It does seem to belong to a "theater of the
absurd" or "beat" mentality. I can't believe I just read 81 messages on
this subject and am still as confused as I was when I was 15 years old.
Maybe there is some Zen message in the joke? The psych experiment theory
is not too convincing.
Paul Bogrow
lda...@cisco.com (Lorelei David) wrote:
>The name of the body shop is "John Brown's Body Shop".
There was (and undoubtedly still is) a poem by the now-forgotten
Thomas Brigham Bishop (1835-1905) often sung to the tune of "The
Battle Hymn of the Republic" that includes the lines:
John Brown's body lies a-moldering in the grave.
His soul is marching on.
A popular parody ran, "John Brown's baby had a cold upon its chest",
etc.
The extremely famous American literary figure Stephen Vincent Benet
(1898-1943) wrote "John Brown's Body" (1928), an epic poem about the
Civil War. It (the poem, not the war) won the Pulitzer Prize in 1929.
Lindsay Berger
Down is the name used to describe the warm, insulating inner feathers
of a duck or goose. These are used to make down parkas and other warm
outerwear, as other people from colder climes will attest. These
feather coats are usually quite bulky, and will often protect you
when you fall DOWN after slipping on ice. Elephants live in warmer
climes, rarely have problems with slipping on ice, and don't have
enough feathers to make a decent coat.
Thus, you don't get down from an elephant, you get down from a duck!
Farshteist?
Don Erickson
lda...@cisco.com (Lorelei David) wrote:
>OK!! I give in... As long as we're speaking of inexplicable Far Side
>cartoons, I'll throw mine in. For two years, this panel waited on our
>refrigerator for a suitable explanation, but nobody has been able to
>enlighten us.
>The image is a mechanic standing over a car in a garage. The mechanic
>looks quite startled. The name of the body shop is "John Brown's Body
>Shop". Upon first glance, the cartoon wasn't funny. Upon a second, third
>and nth amount of glances, the joke still wasn't funny.
This has to be a somewhat oblique reference to that cheerful and
upbeat civil war ditty, "John Brown's Body Lies a Moulderin' in the
Grave." To the tune of "Battle Hymn of the Republic."
>Is there something hilarious about John Brown that I should be aware of?
>Wasn't he a decidedly unfunny person during the Civil War?
That would depend which side you were on.
-Don 'Yup! Yer choke's a hangin' up' Erickson
Eleaticus
In article <ldavid-0506...@ldavid-mac.cisco.com>,
lda...@cisco.com (Lorelei David) wrote:
> The image is a mechanic standing over a car in a garage. The mechanic
> looks quite startled. The name of the body shop is "John Brown's Body
> Shop". Upon first glance, the cartoon wasn't funny. Upon a second, third
> and nth amount of glances, the joke still wasn't funny.
> Wasn't he a decidedly unfunny person during the Civil War?
> ---Lorelei
Clearly, John Brown's body is not
amouldering in the grave.
Eleaticus
!---?---!---?---!---?---!---?---!---?---!---?---!---?---!---?---!---?
! Eleaticus Think Tank Eleatic ?
! "Anything that requires or encourages systematic examination of ?
! premises, logic, and conclusions" ftp.infohaus.com:/infohaus ?
! Thnk...@cris.com http://www.infohaus.com/infohaus.html ?
!---?---!---?---!---?---!---?---!---?---!---?---!---?---!---?---!---?
Alan J Rosenthal
buck...@nandy.com writes:
> Q: How do you get down off an elephant?
> A: You don't, you get down off a duck!
You blew it. "off" should be "from". Ducks are the source of the clothing
material known as "down".
Dave Dubeau
In article <4p5kuc$l...@alpha.sky.net>, Don Erickson <der...@sky.net> wrote:
>lda...@cisco.com (Lorelei David) wrote:
[snip snip] incomprehensible Far Side Cartoons.
>>The image is a mechanic standing over a car in a garage. The mechanic
>>looks quite startled. The name of the body shop is "John Brown's Body
>>Shop". Upon first glance, the cartoon wasn't funny. Upon a second, third
>>and nth amount of glances, the joke still wasn't funny.
>
>This has to be a somewhat oblique reference to that cheerful and
>upbeat civil war ditty, "John Brown's Body Lies a Moulderin' in the
>Grave." To the tune of "Battle Hymn of the Republic."
Part of the clue to this is that the sign looks more like:
JOHN BROWN'S BODY
and fender shop.
>>Is there something hilarious about John Brown that I should be aware of?
>>Wasn't he a decidedly unfunny person during the Civil War?
>
>That would depend which side you were on.
It took me a while to find the joke in this one:
A bunch of cowboys are sitting around a campfire and
one is saying "Don't do that!"
(One of the others has his legs crossed. Subtle.)
Daniel L. Dreibelbis
To: g_ro...@tpnet.co.nz (Gregor Ronald)
Subject: Re: No Soap Radio
Newsgroups: rec.humor,alt.folklore.urban
g > Q. "If a centipede a pint and a millipede a quart, how much
g > would a precipice?" A. One long drop.
Q. "If it takes half a chicken half an hour to lay half an egg,
how long does it take a frog with a wooden leg to kick the seeds out
of a watermelon?"
A. "Ice Cream has no bones".
... "Hukt on foniks wurkt fer me!"
___ Mountain Reader II - #00000007
Jeff Newman
>OK!! I give in... As long as we're speaking of inexplicable Far Side
>cartoons, I'll throw mine in. For two years, this panel waited on our
>refrigerator for a suitable explanation, but nobody has been able to
>enlighten us.
>
>The image is a mechanic standing over a car in a garage. The mechanic
>looks quite startled. The name of the body shop is "John Brown's Body
>Shop". Upon first glance, the cartoon wasn't funny. Upon a second, third
>and nth amount of glances, the joke still wasn't funny.
>
>Is there something hilarious about John Brown that I should be aware of?
>Wasn't he a decidedly unfunny person during the Civil War?
>
>Stumped,
>
>---Lorelei
>
>--
>Minor Deity, Level III
>Women's Sewing Circle & Terrorist Society
Abolitionist anthem, to the tune of the chorus of the Battle Hymn of the
Republic ("glory, glory hallelujiah)." John Brown led a slave uprising and
was hanged when caught.
"John Brown's body lies a-moulderin' in the grave..."
So, a Wheel of Fortune-type before and after: John Brown's body plus body shop.
Now put down that darning needle.
Charles Wm. Dimmick
Lindsay Berger wrote:
>
> Thus, you don't get down from an elephant, you get down from a duck!
>
OK, I understand everything except why-a-duck? Why not a chicken?
Hey mister! You wanna buy a duck?
Charles Wm. Dimmick (Wire fence)
J.R. Hutto
Lorelei David wrote:
---===<snip>===---
>
> OK!! I give in... As long as we're speaking of inexplicable Far Side
> cartoons, I'll throw mine in. For two years, this panel waited on our
> refrigerator for a suitable explanation, but nobody has been able to
> enlighten us.
>
> The image is a mechanic standing over a car in a garage. The mechanic
> looks quite startled. The name of the body shop is "John Brown's Body
> Shop". Upon first glance, the cartoon wasn't funny. Upon a second, third
> and nth amount of glances, the joke still wasn't funny.
>
> Is there something hilarious about John Brown that I should be aware of?
> Wasn't he a decidedly unfunny person during the Civil War?
>
> Stumped,
>
> ---Lorelei
It might help if you could scan the image and post it. I know there's been
several Far Side cartoons that I didn't understand at first, only to
suddenly see something later that I had missed.
Could it be that the mechanic has discovered a "body?"
Daan Sandee
The people who get the joke know that down is soft plumage of many
birds, including ducks (geese also produce down for clothing), but
explaining so spoils the joke.
On the other hand, you can certainly get down off a duck as you can
get wool off a sheep or (stretching it a bit) milk off a cow, so I
don't see what your problem is.
Daan "can I get some money off you?" Sandee
Burlington, MA san...@think.com