"er" jokes
Jun. 25th, 2006 02:03 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
flexagonLast week I found myself having to explain an entire subgenre of puns to people.1 These jokes are -er jokes, which generally depend on hearing the ending of a word as "her" instead of "er".2 All of them are spoken incredulously, and have the follow-up line of something like "But I just met her!" As in:
"Fiddler on the Roof? ... but I just met her!"
People who are in a culture where a lot of these are told can get away with extreme conciseness.
Person A: One cup of butter... two cups flour... 1 cup bittersweet chocolate...
Person B: Bittersweet chocolate! But...
Person A: *smack*
Consumer awareness? But I... *smack*
Inspector Gadget? But ... *smack*
Rubber gasket? But I... ow, ow, stoppit!
Okay, so they're a low sort of humor, and most of them are dirty, but I sort of miss er-jokes (or -er jokes, or "but I" jokes, or whatever they are). I never knew they weren't widespread, but apparently they're fairly localized. Consider this my attempt to educate the rest of the world. A few more can be found here... on an MIT site, no surprise there.
1I was explaining the genre to my coworkers in order to explain the most hardcore one of all, which is clean, but which you were probably course 6 if you even understand. Metacircular evaluator? But I just metacircular evaluator? But I just metacircular evaluator? But... Yes, yes, I know. Sigh. :)
2There are a few "but I just met him" jokes. Interim? Geez, I just met him. However, a lot more words end in -er than -im or -em or -um. It's just a feature of the language.
"Fiddler on the Roof? ... but I just met her!"
People who are in a culture where a lot of these are told can get away with extreme conciseness.
Person A: One cup of butter... two cups flour... 1 cup bittersweet chocolate...
Person B: Bittersweet chocolate! But...
Person A: *smack*
Consumer awareness? But I... *smack*
Inspector Gadget? But ... *smack*
Rubber gasket? But I... ow, ow, stoppit!
Okay, so they're a low sort of humor, and most of them are dirty, but I sort of miss er-jokes (or -er jokes, or "but I" jokes, or whatever they are). I never knew they weren't widespread, but apparently they're fairly localized. Consider this my attempt to educate the rest of the world. A few more can be found here... on an MIT site, no surprise there.
1I was explaining the genre to my coworkers in order to explain the most hardcore one of all, which is clean, but which you were probably course 6 if you even understand. Metacircular evaluator? But I just metacircular evaluator? But I just metacircular evaluator? But... Yes, yes, I know. Sigh. :)
2There are a few "but I just met him" jokes. Interim? Geez, I just met him. However, a lot more words end in -er than -im or -em or -um. It's just a feature of the language.
