Something Funny

Watch this video and wait for it.

Okay. Now, I have to admit, the first time I watched this video with my roommates, I couldn't catch my breath. I couldn't catch my breath the second time we watched it either. Or the third time. And probably 10 more replays after that, all our abs were hurting from our hardcore laughing session. 

I showed this to multiple people, and some had the same response as my roommates and me, but others (including my mother) were almost as horrified at this girl hitting the wall as they were about the fact that I thought it was hilarious. 

For the people like my mother, this was not an funny thing because for her (being a mother and all) the little girl's pain is something wholly bad. The fact that the girl is in pain negates the physical humor of the situation, therefore rendering the video unenjoyable.

I guess for me the funny thing is the little girl's utter joy followed directly by a flying face full of wall. For a brief moment this strikes me as extremely hilarious. Of course, until she starts crying. But I tell myself she's okay because this video is on the internet and they don't put things on the internet if bad things actually happened to the participant of said video... right? Plus, kids cry at anything and they don't have all their grown-up teeth yet anyway.

Jokes aside, I feel that his video is probably only funny if you are able to suspend emotion about the little girl's pain, or if you are a sociopath. Otherwise, you actually start to feel really bad for the pink footie pajama'd child.

For my roommates and I, this was pure greatness captured by a hill billy family. We were apparently able to disregard the kid's pain. Perhaps it was a social phenomenon, but the fact that we all found it so strikingly funny only contributed to the incessant laughter. 

Hope you got a little chuckle from it. 

This is why, when a guy goes out on a date with a woman and finds himself really liking her, he often will demonstrate his affection by avoiding her for the rest of his life.

Dave Barry really had me laughing.
This story was relatable to me. I hate to admit it, but I've been an Elaine, and I've known some Rogers.

I'm sure some of us have been that girl (or guy, because hey, maybe some of them care... right? maybe?) that reads too much into things...
"Oh my gosh, Kristen... he put a smiley face in that last text. WHAT DOES IT MEAN?"
Maybe it meant he smiled in real life. Or maybe he wants to get married. Could be either.
In all likelihood, said text message sender is probably sitting at home playing Call of Duty and mindlessly typed a a parenthese and a colon next to each other. And I'm left to decipher the meaning of his maybe-but-probably-not-so-mysterious emotion.

But really, this story plays up women's tendency to overanalyze things and men's tendency to... not. Barry's writing got me in the "it's funny because it's true" kind of way.
For example, I highlighted this passage because I thought it was awesome:

"A lot of women have concluded that the problem is that guys, as a group, have the emotional maturity of hamsters. No, this is not the case. A hamster is much more capable of making a lasting commitment to a woman, especially if she gives it those little food pellets. Whereas a guy, in a relationship, will consume the pellets of companionship, and he will run on the exercise wheel of lust; but as soon as he senses that the door of commitment is about to close and trap him in the wire cage of true intimacy, he'll squirm out, scampers across the kitchen floor of uncertainty and hide under the refrigerator of nonreadiness."

I got a pretty good chuckle from this extended metaphor and the thought of a little hamster boyfriend skittering around. I'm really trying to avoid the word cognitive shift (so I will), but paralleling a men's commitment and a pet hamster has humorous mental implications, especially when Barry's comparison seems so... accurate.

I'll be interested to hear what the guys have to say about this passage.

Hughes: Vacation '58

The best laid plans of [Mickey Mouse] and men often go awry.

...Or in this story they really do.
(Sorry, I couldn't make myself pass that one up.)

I actually found myself a little stressed following this messed up family vacation (probably because I sympathize with the woes of long-distance car travel). But it was a quick read due mostly to the fact that I was interested what absurd thing would happen next. 

And Hughes' story did not disappoint. The dog died. The Aunt died. The car drove of a small cliff. Indians ransacked them. The dad robbed the hotel, followed by a car chase. Missiles? Disneyland was closed. All ending in a wounded Walt and some good old irony on the plane.

These outlandish situations serve to create a very humorous turn of events. There are definitely layers of exaggeration, understatement and, of course, the irony of the plane ride home that also contribute to the humor of the story. Granted, it is story that truly requires you to suspend disbelief at times. For example, the Dad's behavior is, on the whole, unsound. As well, I feel that, in reality, some of the events would only be funny in retrospect, or as a third person observer.

The whole things was a little ridiculous at times, but there were definitely moments of the story that had me laughing. This sentence, for example: "Dad told me that Aunt Edythe could hear an ant fart, but set an H-bomb off in her drawers and she wouldn't hear a thing" is one that actually got me. I guess that's funny to me because my grandmother is the same way. Plus the thought of an ant fart is just inherently humorous to me. I mean, just think about it.

I guess my last thought on this for now is that the opening sentence is actually much funnier after reading the whole story. "If Dad hadn't shot Walt Disney in the leg, it would have been our best vacation ever." I'll just let you sort that one out.

Haha-Hanan (1)

In my mind I tried to think of what she would look like. I wondered how I would pick out a face I had never seen.
I tried to conjure up all the notions of Saudi Arabia that I could and realized that I knew so little about this person. What could I assume from only a name and a country?

I saw a woman seated at a table wearing a nautical-striped blazer with long wavy dark hair and olive skin, and walked toward her, hoping I had made the right guess.

I have always had my reservations about approaching strangers, let alone someone with a supposed language barrier. But after raising my hand to wave hello and asking, "Hanan?" my fears were immediately dispelled. Her smile was incredibly kind, and as she demurely held her coffee she welcomed me to the table like a friend she had known for years.

We greeted each other and she graciously explained to me the correct way to pronounce her name. She said, "say the H like you are laughing." And I tried. We laughed.
She called me "Raschel," but I didn't mind. Her accent made me sound exotic.

Hanan asked me what I knew about her home country, and I admitted I knew little about Saudia Arabia except the stereotypes: Deserts, oil, maybe even camels. We laughed because there was obviously more to it.
I asked her to tell me more, and I listened attentively as she told me a little bit of her story.
Born in Jeddah, Saudia Arabia, she grew up along the seaside as the youngest of a family of 4 brothers and 1 sister. She spoke fondly of her close-knit kin, and the strong family community she grew up in. She and her husband came to Texas last January to pursue their doctorate degrees in business. She said it's different here, but that Texans are wonderful. I was inclined to agree.

I learned in the course of our conversation that Hanan loves to travel, and has spent a good amount of time vacationing. I marveled at the places she had been, confessing I had never left the country. She urged me to see the world, because some of her most cherished memories had been made in countries much different that her own.

We talked for the better part of an hour, just getting acquainted. We shared laughs about Texas's bipolar weather and I made her a list of some of the best places to get steak in Fort Worth. It was a very comfortable experience, surprisingly.
I told her I would have more questions next time, and told her I'd do my due diligence in learning a little about Saudi Arabia.

After parting ways I realized the whole thing was funny to me. Not funny haha, but funny interesting. There were some things so similar about the two of us, just sitting there being human, and some things that could not have been more different. Our experiences have shaped us into divergent people, and yet we were able to share a laugh. I think that's pretty cool.