[lit-ideas] Re: Tuesday Joke
- From: Robert Paul <rpaul@xxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 06 Mar 2007 10:42:24 -0800
Two electrons were walking down te street.
One says, I've lost one of my electrons.*
The other asks, Are you sure?
To which the first replies, I'm positive.
*Alternatively: I've lost an electron.
This is the echt version, and the only one that exhibits jokiness.
Simon's version, alas, lacks jokiness because there's nothing
especially funny about the reply 'You're positive.' The version above
gets whatever humor or humour it has from the play on 'positive' to
mean 'positive charge' and 'positive to mean 'I'm sure (certain,'
etc.), and from the double meaning of 'lost' (misplaced vs. physically
changed),
Of course, if Omar's right, 'I'm positive,' used to mean 'I'm sure,'
etc. is an idiom peculiar to American English. So? It's an American
joke, right?
Simon's version was
Two atoms walking down the street.
One loses an electron.
The other says: "You're positive."
What's odd about all this is that I only heard this joke a couple of
months ago, and I'd swear I heard it on lit-ideas.
Robert Paul,
beating the obvious over the head,
somewhere south of Reed College
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