Monthly Archives: December 2021

Joke About the Webb Space Telescope

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The joke:

Yesterday was the launch of the $10 billion Webb Space Telescope. Astronomers say it’s so powerful that it’ll be able to scan the universe and find someone who actually went to see Steven Spielberg’s “West Side Story.”

How I wrote it:

I wanted to write a joke about the Webb Space Telescope because it was a big news story. Plus I thought I could use my Punch Line Maker #2: Link the topic to pop culture.

To do that, I thought of associations of the topic handle “Webb Space Telescope.” One association, which was highlighted by the news coverage, is “very powerful.” Then I tried to think of somebody or something in pop culture that you’d need a really powerful telescope to see.

Steven Spielberg’s “West Side Story” is part of pop culture. A friend told the story of how he and his wife went to see it and were only two of six people in the theater. A quick search online confirmed that multiple sources said the movie is a bomb in terms of ticket sales. So I linked the topic to pop culture via a punch line stating that very few people went to see the movie.

Were attendees at the movie so scarce that you’d need an incredibly powerful telescope to spot even one of them? Of course not. But my Joke Maximize #8 is “Wildly exaggerate.”

I added “scan the universe and” to emphasize how hard it would be to find someone anywhere who had seen the movie. I also thought that phrase would help misdirect the audience into thinking that the joke would be about finding astronomical features. That misdirection would heighten the surprise, and funniness, of the punch line.

Is the joke too mean? No. Steven Spielberg is one of the most successful directors in history. So this joke is “punching up,” and therefore almost certainly acceptable to most people.

Joke About Kim Kardashian’s Law Exam

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The joke:

Congratulations to Kim Kardashian, who just passed California’s First-Year Law Students’ Examination. You can tell she didn’t have a cheat sheet on her because during the exam she posted a nude selfie.

How I wrote it:

This news item caught my attention because it surprised me: I wouldn’t have expected that reality TV star Kim Kardashian could pass what must be a difficult exam.

Also, as a topic handle Kim Kardashian has some associations that I thought would be useful in writing a joke. That is, I thought I could use this news item with my Punch Line Maker #1–Link two associations of the topic.

But some associations of Kim Kardashian that I’ve used in the past were hard to link to the other topic handle, “First-Year Law Students’ Examination.” For example, how could I link “excessive bikini waxing” to a law exam? And I couldn’t easily link “not very smart” or “doesn’t do any real work” to the exam. That’s because she did pass the exam, which must have required some brains and studying.

Then I thought of the Kim Kardashian association “takes nude selfies” and asked myself how I could link that to taking the exam. And it occurred to me that one association of “taking a difficult exam” is “using a cheat sheet.” That’s when I realized that I could link those two associations by basing a punch line on the idea that a nude selfie would prove she wasn’t hiding a cheat sheet.

Because my Joke Maximizer #2 is “End on the laugh trigger,” I worded the joke to put “nude selfie” at the very end.

Finally, the original news item called the exam the “baby bar exam,” which is apparently how it’s usually referred to. But I used the full name of the exam to make the topic as clear as possible, per my Joke Maximizer #4.

Joke About a Camel Beauty Contest

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The joke:

Forty-three camels have been disqualified from a popular camel beauty contest in Saudi Arabia for getting Botox injections and other cosmetic enhancements. The news about the camel beauty contest was announced by Saudi Arabia’s Minister of Stereotypes.

How I wrote it:

This news item caught my attention because it’s so odd. Plus my Punch Line Maker #3–Ask a question about the topic–could take the joke in many directions. Why is there a camel beauty contest? What do the judges look for? What does the winner get?

But then I considered my seldom-used Punch Line Maker #6–State the obvious about the topic. The news item suggests the obvious question, “Doesn’t a camel beauty contest fit everybody’s stereotypical image of Saudi Arabia?” So in my punch line I could state the obvious answer to that question: “Yes.”

But my Joke Maximizer #11 is “Don’t be too on-the-nose.” So I didn’t want a punch line that’s too direct, something like “The good news is that the contest itself won a prize: Biggest Saudi Arabian Stereotype.”

Instead I stated the idea of stereotype more indirectly. I had the news announced by an official whose title includes that word. Maybe I got that idea from jokes of the form “You can read all about it in the magazine ‘Stereotypes Weekly.'”

I liked the dignity of the title “Minister.” But before using it I made sure that Saudi Arabia actually has Ministers in its government. If the lead-up to the laugh trigger sounds more credible, the laugh trigger will be more surprising.

I wanted to include the details about the Botox and so on in the topic because I thought the audience would want to know why the camels had been disqualified. But that made the topic sentence pretty long. So I repeated “camel beauty contest” in the angle, to make sure the audience would understand the laugh trigger “Stereotypes.”

Joke About Stealing Legos

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The joke:

In Germany over the weekend, burglars broke through the wall of a toy store and stole dozens of Lego sets. Luckily they left behind the 12,000-piece Lego Ultimate Collector Series Wall Hole Repair Set.

How I wrote it:

I thought this news item would make a good topic for a joke because it has handles–“burglars,” “toy store,” “Lego”–that have plenty of associations. And I often use my Punch Line Maker #1–Link two associations of the topic–to create a punch line.

But the phrase “burglars broke through the wall of a toy store” called to my mind an image of that happening. So I turned instead to my Punch Line Maker #5–Visualize the topic.

I visualized a pile of bricks cascading to the floor of the toy store as the burglars broke through. Then, because the topic also mentions Lego, I adjusted that mental image to include a pile of Lego bricks. That’s how I arrived at the idea for my punch line, that the hole in the wall could be repaired using Legos.

But I didn’t just write a generic punch line like “luckily they left behind enough Legos to repair the hole in the wall.” Instead I used my Joke Maximizer #9–Get specific. I did some research online to come up with a detailed name of a Lego set designed for that particular repair task; I took the phrase “Ultimate Collector Series” from the Lego “Star Wars” sets.

I also used my Joke Maximizer #8–Wildly exaggerate–when I specified 12,000 pieces. That’s considerably more than the largest number of pieces I saw for any real Lego set. But it’s not such a ridiculously large number that it diverts the audience’s attention from the laugh trigger.