Time To Relax 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

One evening Jake stole Joke’s bag and hid it just at the edge of a forest nearby. Next morning he told him what he had done and to be careful not to go far into the forest since it’s riddled with bears once you go into the deep forest part and you are sure to get eaten.

Since Joke didn’t return for a long period of time, Jake went looking for him. However, he couldn’t find his friend. Jake, feeling remorse, called the police and told them what had happened.

Unfortunately, the police were no help and the case started to gain traction with the media. Reporters from all the nearby villages wanted to be the one to crack the case and find Joke.

Jake slowly spiraled into despair, not knowing what happened, thinking he killed his friend and all he wanted was some answers, buying all the local newspapers every day hoping to read something new and gain some answers.

Day after day the event slowly slipped out of his mind as time went by with no new information whatsoever. Until one day, Jake decided to put this whole thing behind him and found a therapist to help him move on.

The therapy was a huge success, he completed all but one meetings and he had just one more to go. He arrived on time as always, but the therapist’s office was locked this time. Jake checked his mobile phone and he saw a message from his therapist that he’s gonna be a few minutes late and that he should sit down in the waiting room, relax, and wait for him.

Jake, as any reasonable person, sat down in the waiting room and started waiting. It was at this moment that his phone battery ran out and he became bored, very bored, so he picked up a random newspaper from the table in front of him and then he saw it, the headline he was waiting for for so long:

Joke gone too far.

Relax, it was only a hot wheels!

Back story: So my one son threw a hot wheels car at my other son and left a pretty good gash on his face. This wouldn't have been a big issue except we had a family gathering to go to. People were a little surprised about how calm I was when they asked what happened and all I said was "he got hit by a car" like it has happened a bunch of times.

Not sure if it really belongs here but it was pretty funny to see people's reactions.

OK... so did you ever notice how every time you spend 4 days alone in the woods and you make it out without a scratch or even a mosquito bite, and you're feeling all peaceful and relaxed and at one with the universe, you're not home 20 minutes and unloading the back of your truck when you slam your right shin into the trailer hitch... and amid the flashing white stars around you, your fists clench, your teeth grit, your body tenses and every "mean, nasty and ugly" word you ever read, heard, uttered or even imagined ("Wait... is #*&%#@!!! even a word??? Oh what the heck? It works!") goes tearing through your brain.... and eventually it passes and you keep working, surprised you're not even limping and it doesn't hurt more than it does... and almost an hour later, when you're finished and getting undressed to take your first hot shower in days, you see a lump on your shin the size of Rhode Island... and the first image that pops into your head is John Merrick yelling "I AM NOT AN ANIMAL!!!... in fact, it literally looks like a second knee on your right leg... so you spend the rest of the evening keeping it elevated and icing it on and off, alternating between a blue gel pack and a bag of frozen peas.... and when you go to bed, you keep the gel pack on while you read and then take it off before you go to sleep... and then you wake up around 3AM and decide to check your shin and the swelling has gone down quite a bit... but since you still have several hours before you get up, you decide to ice it again... but the gel pack on the floor is no longer cold so you get up, walk to the kitchen and open the fridge... and after taking a bite of leftover pizza from last night (because... well, you're here and what the heck?), you go into the freezer, grab the bag of frozen peas and take them back to bed with you... but they're all frozen into one big solid ball and well, that won't do... so you lay the bag on the bed to pound it once or twice to break them up, but instead the bag bursts open and suddenly there are frozen peas sprayed all over the bed and rolling onto the floor... and all those words from yesterday come rushing back into your head as you kneel to gather them all up... but suddenly your anger completely vanishes and you can't help laughing to yourself as you think, "gee, I can't remember the last time I pea'd the bed in the middle of the night"???

I'm a dad, and I told my dad this, so I think it counts. It got a lot of groans, so I think it's great, if a bit long.

I once lived near a small, simple town where there lived named Hugh.

Hugh was a very smart man stricken with a series of personal tragedies earlier in his life. As a result, he moved to this small town and took a job in his local florist shop, relaxing the days away arranging flowers and trying not to think of times past. Hugh grew to love working there.

One day, a disaster struck the town. A small, single engine airplane crashed a block from Hugh's shop, killing those on the plane and setting fire to several buildings, both occupied and empty.

The impact ruptured a gas line, which ultimately exploded, creating a shock wave that caused part of the building next to the florist shop to collapse and trap several of Hugh's customers and co-workers inside. The situation was desperate, as the shop would be burned to the ground at any moment.

Acting quickly, Hugh located the gas main, shutting it down. Next, Hugh noticed a water storage tank nearby, and opened a release valve that suffocated the fire before it reached his beloved shop.

With the fire out, and the florist shop saved along with those trapped inside, Hugh was a hero. The town presented him with a plaque in honor of his courageous deeds. On this plaque was a detailed etching of a bear, and Hugh was touched because he loved bears. But it was the words etched beneath that truly touched him.

"Only Hugh could prevent florist fires."