The Gathering Puns

Thank you for coming to my Tết talk.

.. last year I raked it in.

They’re supposed to isolate themselves from corvid nineteen.

I had never met herbivore

At the Sir-conference

It really turned into a huge Snoo's fest.

Son: Hey, what's up? Dad: How many times do I have to tell you not to talk to your food?

"So I'll attack with these two guys."

"Okay. I'll take five."

"That's fine, but when you come back we need to figure out how much damage this is."

I could have made a Commander Shepard deck.

My mother: Does my jacket smell like mothballs to you?

Uncle: I don't know, have you ever smelled mothballs?

Mother: yes they're terrible!

Uncle: really? how did you get them to spread their legs?

Nearly choked on my funeral potatoes.

So, she walks over and takes a seat next to him on the bench, turns to him and says, "Sorry to bother you. I know this may be a little forward but I would love to grab coffee with you some time."

Flattered, the man responds, "Sure... but what makes you so certain you and I would get along so well?"

"Well..." the woman says. "A couple things, actually. I noticed you were wearing an Iron Maiden t-shirt. Iron Maiden are my favorite band of all time. When they went on their reunion tour in 1999, my parents took me to see them in Cleveland. I was 12 years old and it was the first concert I ever went to. I absolutely love Iron Maiden."

The man can't believe it.

"I saw them play Cleveland in '99! First concert I ever went to on my own. My best friend Jimmy Spitz and I told our parents we were sleeping at each others' houses, snuck out, took a bus into the city and saw them play at the Plain Dealer Pavillion!"

Naturally, they're both shocked.

"If that isn't weird enough..." says the woman. "I noticed you're reading Mark Twain. I was a communications major in university and I actually wrote my thesis on Mark Twain and how he used satire as a lens to comment on current events of the time, comparing him to satirical news sources of today. He's my favorite author."

Now the man is really taken aback, "Get out of here! I was an English major in university! I specialized in 19th century American literature and this is like my fourth or fifth time reading Tom Sawyer, I absolutely love Mark Twain."

They both can't believe it...this has got to be a match made in heaven.

"Ok..." the woman says. "Well, buckle up because here's the icing on the cake. I noticed you're eating a prune. Prunes are my absolute favorite fruit. When I was a kid, my grandfather lived on a farm. He had an orchard that mainly grew apples and some lemons, but he knew how much my sister and I loved prunes so he kept a couple of plum trees. Every year at the end of the summer, we'd go up and harvest the plums with him. He'd dry them and by the time we'd go back to his place for Thanksgiving he'd always have those prunes saved just for us. They're my favorite fruit! I love prunes, you're eating a prune, this has got to be fate. What do you say?"

The man puts down his fruit and responds,

"It's a date!"

... One of them isn’t Happy.

Lettuce pray

They loved chalk lit.

"Once a pawn a time..."

I went to play station 5

The lumberjack responded, “And you will dialogue.”

It's called Tallinn

We call it our Con Den session.

"I've rounded them up"

The leader donkey got shot and killed.

Ass-as-a-nation

6 couldn't believe it. 7 had finally gone off the deep end. 7 had long offended 6. A repeat 6 offender if you will. But this was unforgivable. 9 was his best friend. How could he do this to his best friend? How could it be that 7 ate 9?

6, filled with fury, called his friends 2 and 4. They would get even. 10 was the best friend of 7 you see. 2, 4 and 6 ate 10 to get even. They then began plotting further revenge, but 7 acted first. He gathered 1, 3 and 5 together to take down 6.

Realizing that the odds were against them, 2, 4 and 6 retreated. Their only option was to turn to 12 who had twice the resources 6 had. 7 couldn't follow.

12 quickly called 3 to find out what the root of 7's attack on 9. 3 wasn't sure. He had only supported 7 because of a long standing friendship. But 3 promised to get to the root cause.

Meanwhile, 7's scheming was not yet done. 12 was powerful, but there was one who could reverse his decision to harbor 6. If he could just convince 21, nicknamed blackjack, to reverse 12's decision, it would all be over.

Three times 7 went to 21's compound. On the third try he was able to get through. After explaining that 6 had masterminded the elimination of 10, a grand meeting of the numbers was called.

Both 6 and 7 argued over the whole thing. 13 had the unlucky task of adjudicating the meeting. Each time 13 made an argument, 6 and 7 would add to it by shouting over each other.

Finally, 21 had had enough. "7, why did you eat 9"

7 responded "I just wanted to get 3 square meals." 21 had 7 eliminated for initiating the battle and 6 jailed for masterminding 10's death. And the war was over.

There are thousands of snowflakes gathering in DC, crying because they lost the election and they can't con their way to victory.

So, I decided to sell my vacuum cleaner the other day. It was just gathering dust!

What kind of bagel can fly? A plane one!

I went to a graveyard the other day, it was really crowded. I figure people are dying to get in.

Didja hear about the guy who invented the knock-knock joke? He won the no-bell prize!

What do you call a pointless pachyderm? An Irrelepahnt!

Why couldn't the bicycle stand up by itself? It was two-tired!

Ever hear about the restaurant on the moon? No atmosphere at all.

And to end it all: "I bet if I gave you some thyme you could mustard a response to this complete a-salt on language, but for now we're just beefing around!"

One of the villagers turned and asked another, "what happened?"

She told him, "he's been arrested for forgery."

And as the groans begin, I'll screech, "The letter G!"

...and ends up on the Island of Trid. The people there are starving and explain to the pastor that it’s because whenever they try to harvest the fruit at the top of the mountain, the nasty giant comes out of his cave and boots them all back down the hill. This infuriates the pastor who then declares that tomorrow he will join them on their next attempt. The next day they all march up the mountain together, and sure enough, out comes the giant who proceeds to kick all of the locals back down the hill leaving only the new guy to gather fruit at his leisure. Finally, he stops and asks the giant, “Well, aren’t you going to knock me off the mountain?”. Shaking his head, the giant says, “Silly rabbi, kicks are for Trids”.

That was enough forum.

I set my items on the counter, and the cashier starts ringing them up one after another while I wait patiently. I notice the guy in line behind me a few people still acting a little weird, antsy is how I would describe it.

Anyways, the cashier snaps me out of my thoughts by telling me my total and as I go to reach for my wallet, I see the guy dashing out the door.... as in transfixed on his fleeing image, my hand reaches my pocket and I realize he's stolen my wallet!

I make a mad dash for him, chasing him down in the middle of the parking lot. He reaches his vehicle at the other end and as he hops in, I catch up to him and I'm able to grab his leg. I start pulling his leg and pulling his leg harder and harder trying to get him out.

I keep pulling his leg very similarly to how I've been pulling your leg for the last minute.

Watch me cut this deck of cards.

Trevor loved tractors. And I mean, really loved tractors. Forget any obsessions or high-level interests you may have, chances are they pale in the face of Trevor’s love for tractors.

Every day Trevor would get up, in his tractor-themed bedroom in his tractor-themed house, with its tractor-themed wallpaper and tractor-themed carpets, and he would make his bed with its tractor-themed duvet and tractor-themed sheets. He would go downstairs in his tractor-themed pajamas into his tractor-themed kitchen, with its tractor-themed tiles and cupboards, and he would eat his breakfast while perusing the latest tractor-themed magazine or annual.

Trevors’s degree in Agricultural Engineering hung on his living room wall, along with a copy of his thesis, which centred around (you guessed it) tractors. The living room was decorated with all sorts of tractor-related trinkets, including die-cast models, paintings and drawings.

The hedges in Trevor’s front garden were trimmed in the shape of tractors. His lawn was vividly decorated with tractor-driving garden gnomes, and his garden furniture was constructed from various parts from vintage tractor designs.

Trevor just had one thing missing from his otherwise tractor-centric life; he had never actually owned, nor driven, a real tractor.

Not for his lack of trying, of course. Trevor had been to many tractor shows over the years, and visited many farms with friends of his, but none of the tractors he had seen had ever been quite right. Trevor was so knowledgeable about tractors that every single one he had come across had possessed some hidden trait that he wasn’t keen on. His first experience of driving a real tractor had to be perfect.

One day, Trevor was flicking through one of his favourite publications, Powertrain Quarterly, when there was a knock at the door. Trevor answered, and it was his friend and fellow tractor enthusiast, Jeff.

Trevor welcomed Jeff in, and over tea and crumpets served on tractor-themed crockery, they discussed the merits of aluminium drawbars and front-end loaders. Eventually Trevor pressed Jeff to explain the reason for his visit.

“Well” said Jeff, “As I’m sure you know the convention comes to town later”.

The convention. Trevor had been thinking of little else the past three weeks. The neighbouring town annually threw a convention for farmers, particularly farmyard machinery. There would be combine harvesters, lawnmowers, and of course, tractors.

“Yes of course” replied Trevor

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

inviting several prostitutes to the same party is gathering your thots.

As my coworkers gathered round, she sobbed loudly, "Daddy, where are all the clowns that you said that you worked with?!"

Jesus was with Peter at a gathering (or something), and pointed to a bucket filled to the brim with water.

“Do you see that bucket over there, Peter?” Jesus asked.

“Yes, what about it?” Peter replied.

“I can turn it into wine.”

“No way!” Peter said, astonished.

Jesus smiled, “Yahweh.”

Did you hear about the Cockatiel that was trying to find a new home for his family? He zipped back and forth everywhere, but couldn't find a good spot anywhere. Then he came across a bear, sleeping flat of his back with his mouth wide open. Not recognizing what it was, he thought the bear's mouth would be the perfect spot for a nest. He gathered his family and they all got to work building a new home for themselves, but then the bear woke up. Realizing what was going on, he politely informed them that he couldn't let them nest in his mouth. He hated to do it, but it was quite the bird den to bear.

But Happiness is just not in the cards

Came up with this one myself. I learned today there is not a single card in Magic the Gathering named Happiness.

Whilst gathering food, they find a magical golden lamp. The Englishman says “rub the lamp!” They do, and a genie appears. “I only have three wishes to offer,” he says, “so I’ll give you one wish each.

The Englishman says, “I’d like to be living in a penthouse in London with £1,000,000 in my bank account.” His wish is granted.

The Scotsman says “I’d love to live in a renovated Scottish castle with £2,000,000 in my bank account.” His wish is granted.

The genie then turns to the Irishman: “And what do you wish for?” The Irishman says to the genie, “It’s getting a bit lonely here, can I have the other two back?”

It is a known fact that the penguin is a very ritualisticbird which lives an extremely ordered and complex life.

The penguin is very committed to its family and will mate for life, as well as maintain a form of compassionate contact with its offspring throughout its life.

If a penguin is found dead on the ice surface, other members of the family and social circle have been known to dig holes in the ice, using their vestigial wings and beaks, until the hole is deep enough for the dead bird to be rolled into, and buried.

The male penguins then gather in a circle around the fresh grave and sing:

"Freeze a jolly good fellow." "Freeze a jolly good fellow."

"Welcome everyone to Dads Anonymous. Again my name is Bill and you will notice that we have a new member, please welcome Gary -- Can you tell us what brought you to us today?"

"Well I have a very embarrassing confession. It's even hard to get the words out."

Bill reassures him, "We are all dads here and have been meeting for decades, we've been through all the highs and lows, births and deaths, tragedies, we've heard it all. Just tell us what's on your mind son, we are here to support each other."

"Well, a couple months ago, I broke both my legs in a motorcycle accident and couldn't walk, so I let my wife use the lawnmower." He says through the sobs...

Bob, one of the other dads, starts to get pale. "...and she didn't even cut it in a crisp geometric pattern, it was just random..." Bob starts to sweat and get dry heaves. "YOU BASTARD", he screams. "HOW COULD YOU LET THAT HAPPEN." The dads rise and get ready to beat the crap out of Gary, when Bill stands between them and breaks it up.

"Guys! Guys, we all get weak sometimes and things happen outside our control. Doug, you remember when you were in recovering from Chemo and you gave your wife a hammer, and she used it to hammer a roofing nail into the drywall to hang a picture!" Doug, looks down in shame, "Yes, that was a bad day, I was so weak. She missed the stud and left a dent in the wall, and she just hung the picture over it, crooked!" There was dead silence. "Thats ok Doug, it was twenty years ago, you were young and foolish, you can let it go". Then all the dads shook hands and sat back down.

Bill starts the meeting up again. Then Gary says, "..theres one more thing, Right after I got out of the hospital, she wanted to make a special dinner for us, so I let her grill the steaks..." "OH LORD THIS CAN'T BE HAPPENING!" screams Dave, another dad, his face turning red. Gary continues "...she burnt them one one side and they were dry and chewy." Now there is a bedlam, one dad immediately passes out cold, chairs are thrown, broken bottles, Gary is on the ground being kicked in the ribs. After a few tense minutes Bill managed to get the dads off of Gary. "Stop it, Dave you're killing him. Come on, you remember that time you let your wife go to the repair shop for an oil change?" Dave hung his head, and muttered yeah. "They convinced her to change the cabin filter, wiper blades and the radiator collant..." Bill kept prodding "and, aaand" ...Dave broke down, "and she bought a jug of blinker fluid!" T

..Raked it in last year.