Deeper Than the Night Puns

One cold winter's morning he was walking along a country road, when he heard a cry for help from a nearby lake.

He turned to see a little girl struggling in the broken ice in the middle of the lake. She'd been skating and had fallen into the icy water. Without a moment's hesitation the tramp ran onto the ice and slipped and slided over to the little girl. He managed to pull her out without breaking the ice further and he carried her back to the road.

He took off his coat and wrapped the little girl in it and began looking for a car to flag down. A few moments later a huge chauffeur-driven limo pulled up, and who stepped out but the little girl's father - the mayor of the nearby town and a multi-millionaire.

"How can I ever thank you sir?" says the father after putting his daughterinto the warmth of the limo.

"Just name your price - I'm a wealthy man."

"Ahem, well ..." stammered the tramp "...eh I'm a little short of cash, perhaps you could help me out"

"Certainly" says the girl's father and he pulls out his wallet.

"Oh dear" says the father, "I don't carry much cash with me, I only have ten dollars - but come home with me and I'll get more from the safe"

"No! No!" says the tramp, "Why ten dollars is more money than I've seen in my whole life - that will be plenty".

"Well, if you insist" says the father - "now what will you do with your money?"

"Oh that's easy" says the tramp "I've not had a rest in 20 years. I think I'll buy myself a holiday"

"Well good luck" says the father, and he gets into the car and signals his chauffeur to drive home.

"Ten Dollars" thinks the tramp, "I'm rich! I'm rich!", and off he goes to the town, to buy himself a holiday.

He finds a travel agent, walks in - much to the disgust of the staff - and goes up to the desk.

"I'll have one holiday please!"

"Ahem, which holiday would sir like" asked the girl at the desk, forcing a smile.

"Oh, any holiday I don't mind" replied the tramp.

"Well how much money does sir have to spend on sir's holiday?"

"Oh lots - anything up to ten dollars"

"TEN DOLLARS!! You'll never get a holiday for ten dollars" says the girl incredulously.

"Oh dear" said the tramp, "and I was so looking forward to a holiday - I'll probably never get another chance - isn't there anything you can do?"

"Well I don't think so sir, but hold on and I'll check"

The girl goes into the back of the shop, and searches in the deepest, dustiest filing drawers she can find. There - to her amazement -

Back in the before times, when sit-down restaurants existed, I used to order boneless cheese sticks and would just throw the word "boneless" in front of any appetizer with 100% corniness. The purpose of this isn't to make a good joke. It's not a good joke. The purpose is to make my dining companions catch some cringe splash damage and want to crawl into a hole and die out of embarrassment for my being horribly corny.

But there is a real, deeper purpose that I've discovered entirely by accident. People, especially young people, are so self-conscious and worried about saying or doing something embarrassing that it taints a lot of social gatherings. They go to a restaurant and are afraid to speak up even when their order is blatantly wrong. They'll tip well even when the food took an hour to arrive and the server has disappeared into the corn stalks behind a baseball field. It takes 2 hours of hanging out together before some friends finally stop nitpicking themselves, uncomfortable in their own bodies and brains, feeling perpetually judged, and begin to relax. These are the kinds of people who go to sleep every night replaying cringey moments from high school. Their last thought of the day is when the Burger King girl said, "Enjoy your meal!" and they said, "Thanks, you too."

It takes 2 hours and/or a lot of booze before they're comfortable enough to take conversational risks and truly reveal themselves. But if I come right out of the gate with a really dumb joke, then we can cut to the chase. There's less danger because someone in the group already shot themselves in the foot, right off the bat. They pulled a pin on the cringe grenade and then jumped on it.

You cringe at my dumb joke and then we're over the hump. Someone has already done something pretty stupid, so go ahead and order the hubcap of nachos and a massive chocolate shake because nobody is going to judge you poorly while they're all judging me.

In terms of price negotiations (haggling), there is a psychological concept called "anchoring". You throw out the first number and all subsequent numbers are compared to that number. This is the same idea. We've already set the humor standard pretty low at "boneless cheese sticks", so you can say the dumbest shit you want and, as long as it's not worse than my cheesy joke, it won't matter.

This is why, when you were a teenager and your dad took you and some friends out, your dad made corny jokes. He knew they were corny jokes. You and your friends un

Being tired and weary, the lawyer-onion isn't sure whether to go, but decides he needs cheering up.

So he dresses smartly, puts on his favorite aftershave and heads over to his friend's.

He gets to the party to find it quite a packed affair and heads over to the bar - fighting through crowds of reveller-onions - to get a drink.

As he gets to the bar, he notices in one corner a slightly out-of-place female onion.

She looks a bit sad and being the compassionate onion that he is, he heads over to talk to her.

This is quickly affirmed as a good move, as they hit it off immediately; she was abandoned by her friends shortly after arriving and had been minding her own business ever since, but over a night of drinks and talking, they quickly fall into an infatuation and soon end up spending an oniony night of passion together.

When they awake in the morning, they don't find it awkward and a steady relationship between the two is struck.

This lasts a good while, having its ups and downs like any college relationship, but eventually the day comes when they both graduate.

The two couldn't be happier!

They both get jobs close to one another and move into an apartment together.

One day, the partner-onion is anxiously awaiting the lawyer-onion at home.

She's been ill all day and checking has confirmed her suspicions.

She tearfully - and joyfully - breaks the news to the lawyer-onion; they're going to have a tiny baby-onion together.

A shallot, if you will.

A few days later, this prompts the lawyer-onion to propose to his heretofore girlfriend-onion.

They are soon wed, having a fantastic wedding-day and husband and wife-onions are on top of the world.

The day comes of the birth and no complications - a tiny, healthy baby onion is born to two proud parents.

Seeing this little bundle of oniony love in their arms causes them to fall deeper in love than ever.

Over the next few years, husband-and-wife-onions' lives are fantastic.

He's prospering at work, she's really enjoying taking some time to raise the baby-onion and over time the baby-onion grows into a hale and hearty toddler-onion, who then becomes a child-onion.

One day, the idyll of the onions' lives is shattered when tragedy strikes.

The lawyer-onion (now a partner-onion in a prestigious law firm due to chance and hard work) is at work, and mother-onion is washing dishes and watching her child play in the yard.

She glances away to take another plate and turns her vision back to