Sources of the Self Puns

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

A man is driving down the road and his car breaks down near a monastery. He goes to the monastery, knocks on the door, and says, "My car broke down. Do you think I could stay the night?"The monks graciously accept him, feed him dinner, even fix his car. As the man tries to fall asleep, he hears a strange sound. A sound unlike anything he's ever heard before. The Sirens that nearly seduced Odysseus into crashing his ship comes to his mind. He doesn't sleep that night. He tosses and turns trying to figure out what could possibly be making such a seductive sound.The next morning, he asks the monks what the sound was, but they say, "We can't tell you. You're not a monk." Distraught, the man is forced to leave.Years later, after never being able to forget that sound, the man goes back to the monastery and pleads for the answer again.The monks reply, "We can't tell you. You're not a monk."The man sa,ys, "If the only way I can find out what is making that beautiful sound is to become a monk, then please, make me a monk."The monks reply, "You must travel the earth and tell us how many blades of grass there are and the exact number of grains of sand. When you find these answers, you will have become a monk."The man sets about his task. After years of searching he returns as a gray-haired old man and knocks on the door of the monastery. A monk answers. He is taken before a gathering of all the monks."In my quest to find what makes that beautiful sound, I traveled the earth and have found what you asked for: By design, the world is in a state of perpetual change. Only God knows what you ask. All a man can know is himself, and only then if he is honest and reflective and willing to strip away self deception."The monks reply, "Congratulations. You have become a monk. We shall now show you the way to the mystery of the sacred sound."The monks lead the man to a wooden door, where the head monk says, "The sound is beyond that door."The monks give him the key, and he opens the door. Behind the wooden door is another door made of stone. The man is given the key to the stone door and he opens it, only to find a door made of ruby. And so it went that he needed keys to doors of emerald, pearl and diamond.Finally, they come to a door made of solid gold. The sound has become very clear and definite. The monks say, "This is the last key to the last door."The man is apprehensive to no end. His life's wish is behind that door!With trembling hands, he unlocks the door, turns the kno