Our conversation about goofy German antiwitze prompts listeners to send in their own silly jokes. For example: What’s the difference between a duck? A pencil, because a duck has no sleeves! This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Another Antiwitz”
You’re listening to A Way with Words, the show about language and how we use it.
I’m Grant Barrett.
And I’m Martha Barnette.
Grant, I have a joke for you.
Yes, please.
Ask me if I’m a tree.
Are you a tree?
No.
Is this more anti-wits jokes?
Yes.
The anti-jokes?
The German anti-jokes.
Okay.
Yes, this is an example of an anti-joke.
We talked about these a couple of weeks ago, which opened the floodgates.
Oh, yes.
And we got all of these jokes.
Email, phone calls, Facebook group, everywhere.
And that one about the tree came from Aaron in Indianapolis, but we got a ton of these.
Did you enjoy them?
Yes, I did, actually.
People’s enthusiasm is pretty clear, particularly the ones they’ve been holding onto for a very long time and I can’t wait to share.
Well, yes, exactly.
We got another one from Ray Carlberg in San Diego, and he was talking about the fact that when he heard us talking about these things, he was instantly transported back to childhood.
He said, I could clearly remember this exchange with my sister.
She would have been in high school and I was in fifth or sixth grade.
And the gist of the joke is, what’s the difference between a duck?
And the answer is a pencil, because a vest has no sleeves.
And Ray writes, it was amazing to have this memory come back so clearly after all these years, decades really.
What strikes me most is remembering the instant when I switched from being the whiny, impatient victim, if you will, to the anticipation of perpetrating this new, completely off-the-wall kind of joke telling on my friends.
And I think that’s some of the joy of these things is that you get that the joke is completely stupid.
And then the next thing you do is think of the next person you want to tell.
Yeah.
Many things are like that.
Practical jokes are like that, too.
Right.
Right.
Who’s next?
Yeah.
OK.
Oh, I’ve got flour on my face and in my hair, but I can’t wait to do this to somebody else.
Exactly.
Exactly.
So I may have another anti-wits.
Just one or 50.
Later in the show, I may bring up another one or two.
Well, you know, we talk about everything related to language.
Jokes are part of it.
Words and books and speaking and writing and things that someone said and half memories and full memories and anything related to communication.
Email words@waywordradio.org.
Talk to us on Twitter @wayword.
And go to our website at waywordradio.org.
