The Construct of Joke-Space

I've noticed that for most people, the popularity of little "in-jokes" tends to follow an inverted u-shaped function. Someone says something funny, the comment gets picked up by more people, the comment gets used by these people for a couple of weeks (or months), and then gets put back in the vault. Jokes tend to be "over-done".

Not so with my friends. We push through to the point where its so not funny anymore that its funny.

Example: This would be the transcript of the beginning of every bi-weekly phone conversation that I have had with Hessels since October, 2003:

One of us: Hello?
Other: Dipshit.
One: Dipshit.
Other: What's up?
One: Not much. You?
Other: Not much
[5-7s of silence]
Other: Okey Dokey! Well, good talking to you.
One: Righty Roo! Talk to you next week.

Every single fucking time. And we laugh hysterically every time. And really, is it that funny? I read it, think of someone else reading it, and I think "that's gayer than the time I saw 2 guys kissing on a bench." But I still laugh my ass off. Why?

Because we find a ridiculous amount of humour in redundancy.

'Nother Example: The very first week that we met in grad school (September, '97), we made plans to do something over the weekend. I believe it was a Saturday. One of us walked into another's office and said "Hey, what are you doing Saturday?" The other said, "I've got plans to do [X], but how about Saturday?" This, of course, resulted in a running joke when it comes to making plans. You can keep it going forever: "Well, Saturday is OK, but Saturday works much better for me." or "Saturday is out, but...Hey! Why not Saturday?" This joke is particularly funny because it is doubly redundant: 1) we can literally keep it going for several minutes with new permutations of plan-making sentences, and 2) we have been using the same goddamned joke for 8 YEARS. I repeat: 8 YEARS. That has GOTS to be some sort of record. Even Seinfeld "Told Us for the Last Time".

There was a joke that ran the risk of running its course. In 2002, Gilette came out with a horrible series of deodorant commercials where men would ski down slopes, sniff their armpits at the bottom of the hill, and turn to the camera with a cheesy grin and say "Nice!" or "Sweet!" Worst. Commercial. Ever. But again, funny as hell. So, instead of saying "Great!" or "Good Job!", we resorted to smelling our armpits and saying "Nice!" or "Sweet!". We would use that joke with whoever we could, and it would usually be received with eye-rolling or groaning. People actually started to hate us.

Unfortunately, geography limited us from using that joke for over a year.

However, during a Euchre game at the Hessels' family home over the Christmas vacation, Hessels took a trick in a rousing come-from-behind fashion. It was as if distance had never been an issue: my reaction, [*armpit sniff*] "Nice!" Hessels: [*armpit sniff*] "Cool!" Never forgot that joke again.

And the really good thing is, both Michelle and Kevin will now sniff their armpits and say "Sweet!". Much to their chagrin. Well, Michelle ain't sniffin' her armpits yet, but she'll be there very, very soon.

Conclusion: Our interest in personal jokes tends to follow an exponential function. And that saves valuable time in coming up with new material.