Saturday, January 27, 2007

If You Don't Get the Joke, You Might Be an Alcoholic



















According to German researchers. Here's a quick, simple test for you. Read the following set-up to a joke then see if you can identify what the punchline should be. Ready? Go.

It was Mother's Day. Anna and her brother had told their mother to stay in bed that morning. She read her book and looked forward to breakfast. After a long wait she finally went downstairs. Anna and her brother were both eating at the table.

Here are the punchlines:

a) Anna said: "Hi mum, we didn't expect you to be awake so early."
b) Anna picked up an egg and smashed it on her brother's head.
c) Her brother said: "We have a new teacher at our school."
d) Anna said: "It's a surprise for Mother's Day. We cooked our own breakfast."
e) Her brother said: "Your breakfast, like the holocaust, never happened."

Before I tell you the correct answer, here's an excerpt from the article, entitled "Alcoholics Can't Take Jokes.

Problem drinkers often don't know how to take a joke or understand a punchline, according to German researchers...The researchers found a marked difference in the responses of the two groups, with less than 68 per cent of the alcoholics able to pick the right punchline, which the researchers said was option [DELETED], versus 92 per cent in the healthy control group.


I am not disputing the research that 68 percent of GERMAN alcoholics have problems finding humor in jokes, but I'm wondering if alcoholics of, say, Italy or the UK would have the same inability to comprehend the funny. You know, cause when you think of Germans you don't tend to think "funny". I've been to Germany. Twice. My overall sense of the people? Not funny, and fairly uptight. Great worriers, though.

Here's the correct answer to that hilarious joke: D

If you picked A, B or C you're an alcoholic. If you picked E, you've proved you're not German.

How'd you fare?

4 comments:

duboisist said...

This contradicts my personal observations.
I've often seen alcoholics find everything funny; including things others don't even understand, much less "get".

VagabondLoafer said...

I picked answer ‘d’. That’s The Simpson’s choice. If I had a couple of beers in me though, my answer might have been ‘e’, the Southpark choice.

And Laura, you swiped that image from my profile posted at Match.com.

Tim said...

I guessed right. I dated a bartender in college and that pretty much put the kaibash on any future career in being drunk I was to have. She wasn't German though, she was Portugese. Somewhere right now she is having a coctail with breakfast.

In Vegas.

Hi Sara.

Butternut said...

I laugh at German jokes out of fear.

The alcoholics I know are quite funny, unless they are angry or sober, which is usually the same thing.