Best joke

[AshesOfOld]

Hey playground

What's the best joke you've heard?
I've heard a million jokes, but most of them are pretty bad. I've come across a few that's decent, but the ones I remember are very story-teller based so I'm not gonna tell them here.
But do you know any jokes, that actually made you laugh, and not just go "hah, yeah that's..."?

EDIT: Keep it clean, people. Kids read this comic.
But seriously, no dead baby jokes, racist or pornographic material, please. Keep it within forum rules and common decency. And don't forget to have fun :smallsmile:.

[Elemental]

Bacon and eggs walks into a bar.
The bartender says; "Sorry, we don't serve breakfast here."

My apologies, that's far from the best joke out there, and it is a bit old, but it's the first thing that came into my head, and it did make me laugh when I first heard it.

[Asta Kask]

Two hunters are out in the woods when one of them collapses. He doesn't seem to be breathing and his eyes are glazed. The other guy whips out his phone and calls the emergency services. He gasps, "My friend is dead! What can I do?" The operator says "Calm down. I can help. First, let's make sure he's dead." There is a silence, then a gun shot is heard. Back on the phone, the guy says "OK, now what?"

[Elemental]

That's going to be hard to top...

A snail had managed to make a fortune through an online business, and decided to fulfill one of his life-long dreams; professional drag-racing. So he purchased himself a high-powered dragster and painted a large S on the side for snail.
Down at the course, it was apparent he had gotten his money's worth as he outstripped the competitors. The spectators in the audience were very impressed, and remarked to themselves; "Look at that S car go!"

I should really learn how to properly tell jokes.

[erikun]

Remember, you asked for this.


So, there's a man crawling through the desert.

He'd decided to try his SUV in a little bit of cross-country travel, had great fun zooming over the badlands and through the sand, got lost, hit a big rock, and then he couldn't get it started again. There were no cell phone towers anywhere near, so his cell phone was useless. He had no family, his parents had died a few years before in an auto accident, and his few friends had no idea he was out here.

He stayed with the car for a day or so, but his one bottle of water ran out and he was getting thirsty. He thought maybe he knew the direction back, now that he'd paid attention to the sun and thought he'd figured out which way was north, so he decided to start walking. He figured he only had to go about 30 miles or so and he'd be back to the small town he'd gotten gas in last.

He thinks about walking at night to avoid the heat and sun, but based upon how dark it actually was the night before, and given that he has no flashlight, he's afraid that he'll break a leg or step on a rattlesnake. So, he puts on some sun block, puts the rest in his pocket for reapplication later, brings an umbrella he'd had in the back of the SUV with him to give him a little shade, pours the windshield wiper fluid into his water bottle in case he gets that desperate, brings his pocket knife in case he finds a cactus that looks like it might have water in it, and heads out in the direction he thinks is right.

He walks for the entire day. By the end of the day he's really thirsty. He's been sweating all day, and his lips are starting to crack. He's reapplied the sunblock twice, and tried to stay under the umbrella, but he still feels sunburned. The windshield wiper fluid sloshing in the bottle in his pocket is really getting tempting now. He knows that it's mainly water and some ethanol and coloring, but he also knows that they add some kind of poison to it to keep people from drinking it. He wonders what the poison is, and whether the poison would be worse than dying of thirst.

He pushes on, trying to get to that small town before dark.

By the end of the day he starts getting worried. He figures he's been walking at least 3 miles an hour, according to his watch for over 10 hours. That means that if his estimate was right that he should be close to the town. But he doesn't recognize any of this. He had to cross a dry creek bed a mile or two back, and he doesn't remember coming through it in the SUV. He figures that maybe he got his direction off just a little and that the dry creek bed was just off to one side of his path. He tells himself that he's close, and that after dark he'll start seeing the town lights over one of these hills, and that'll be all he needs.

As it gets dim enough that he starts stumbling over small rocks and things, he finds a spot and sits down to wait for full dark and the town lights.

Full dark comes before he knows it. He must have dozed off. He stands back up and turns all the way around. He sees nothing but stars.

He wakes up the next morning feeling absolutely lousy. His eyes are gummy and his mouth and nose feel like they're full of sand. He so thirsty that he can't even swallow. He barely got any sleep because it was so cold. He'd forgotten how cold it got at night in the desert and hadn't noticed it the night before because he'd been in his car.

He knows the Rule of Threes - three minutes without air, three days without water, three weeks without food - then you die. Some people can make it a little longer, in the best situations. But the desert heat and having to walk and sweat isn't the best situation to be without water. He figures, unless he finds water, this is his last day.

He rinses his mouth out with a little of the windshield wiper fluid. He waits a while after spitting that little bit out, to see if his mouth goes numb, or he feels dizzy or something. Has his mouth gone numb? Is it just in his mind? He's not sure. He'll go a little farther, and if he still doesn't find water, he'll try drinking some of the fluid.

Then he has to face his next, harder question - which way does he go from here? Does he keep walking the same way he was yesterday (assuming that he still knows which way that is), or does he try a new direction? He has no idea what to do.

Looking at the hills and dunes around him, he thinks he knows the direction he was heading before. Just going by a feeling, he points himself somewhat to the left of that, and starts walking.

As he walks, the day starts heating up. The desert, too cold just a couple of hours before, soon becomes an oven again. He sweats a little at first, and then stops. He starts getting worried at that - when you stop sweating he knows that means you're in trouble - usually right before heat stroke.

He decides that it's time to try the windshield wiper fluid. He can't wait any longer - if he passes out, he's dead. He stops in the shade of a large rock, takes the bottle out, opens it, and takes a mouthful. He slowly swallows it, making it last as long as he can. It feels so good in his dry and cracked throat that he doesn't even care about the nasty taste. He takes another mouthful, and makes it last too. Slowly, he drinks half the bottle. He figures that since he's drinking it, he might as well drink enough to make some difference and keep himself from passing out.

He's quit worrying about the denaturing of the wiper fluid. If it kills him, it kills him - if he didn't drink it, he'd die anyway. Besides, he's pretty sure that whatever substance they denature the fluid with is just designed to make you sick - their way of keeping winos from buying cheap wiper fluid for the ethanol content. He can handle throwing up, if it comes to that.

He walks. He walks in the hot, dry, windless desert. Sand, rocks, hills, dunes, the occasional scrawny cactus or dried bush. No sign of water. Sometimes he'll see a little movement to one side or the other, but whatever moved is usually gone before he can focus his eyes on it. Probably birds, lizards, or mice. Maybe snakes, though they usually move more at night. He's careful to stay away from the movements.

After a while, he begins to stagger. He's not sure if it's fatigue, heat stroke finally catching him, or maybe he was wrong and the denaturing of the wiper fluid was worse than he thought. He tries to steady himself, and keep going.

After more walking, he comes to a large stretch of sand. This is good! He knows he passed over a stretch of sand in the SUV - he remembers doing donuts in it. Or at least he thinks he remembers it - he's getting woozy enough and tired enough that he's not sure what he remembers any more or if he's hallucinating. But he thinks he remembers it. So he heads off into it, trying to get to the other side, hoping that it gets him closer to the town.

He was heading for a town, wasn't he? He thinks he was. He isn't sure any more. He's not even sure how long he's been walking any more. Is it still morning? Or has it moved into afternoon and the sun is going down again? It must be afternoon - it seems like it's been too long since he started out.

He walks through the sand.

After a while, he comes to a big dune in the sand. This is bad. He doesn't remember any dunes when driving over the sand in his SUV. Or at least he doesn't think he remembers any. This is bad.

But, he has no other direction to go. Too late to turn back now. He figures that he'll get to the top of the dune and see if he can see anything from there that helps him find the town. He keeps going up the dune.

Halfway up, he slips in the bad footing of the sand for the second or third time, and falls to his knees. He doesn't feel like getting back up - he'll just fall down again. So, he keeps going up the dune on his hand and knees.

While crawling, if his throat weren't so dry, he'd laugh. He's finally gotten to the hackneyed image of a man lost in the desert - crawling through the sand on his hands and knees. If would be the perfect image, he imagines, if only his clothes were more ragged. The people crawling through the desert in the cartoons always had ragged clothes. But his have lasted without any rips so far. Somebody will probably find his dessicated corpse half buried in the sand years from now, and his clothes will still be in fine shape - shake the sand out, and a good wash, and they'd be wearable again. He wishes his throat were wet enough to laugh. He coughs a little instead, and it hurts.

He finally makes it to the top of the sand dune. Now that he's at the top, he struggles a little, but manages to stand up and look around. All he sees is sand. Sand, and more sand. Behind him, about a mile away, he thinks he sees the rocky ground he left to head into this sand. Ahead of him, more dunes, more sand. This isn't where he drove his SUV. This is Nell. Or close enough.

Again, he doesn't know what to do. He decides to drink the rest of the wiper fluid while figuring it out. He takes out the bottle, and is removing the cap, when he glances to the side and sees something. Something in the sand. At the bottom of the dune, off to the side, he sees something strange. It's a flat area, in the sand. He stops taking the cap of the bottle off, and tries to look closer. The area seems to be circular. And it's dark - darker than the sand. And, there seems to be something in the middle of it, but he can't tell what it is. He looks as hard as he can, and still can tell from here. He's going to have to go down there and look.

He puts the bottle back in his pocket, and starts to stumble down the dune. After a few steps, he realizes that he's in trouble - he's not going to be able to keep his balance. After a couple of more sliding, tottering steps, he falls and starts to roll down the dune. The sand it so hot when his body hits it that for a minute he thinks he's caught fire on the way down - like a movie car wreck flashing into flames as it goes over the cliff, before it ever even hits the ground. He closes his eyes and mouth, covers his face with his hands, and waits to stop rolling.

He stops, at the bottom of the dune. After a minute or two, he finds enough energy to try to sit up and get the sand out of his face and clothes. When he clears his eyes enough, he looks around to make sure that the dark spot in the sand it still there and he hadn't just imagined it.

So, seeing the large, flat, dark spot on the sand is still there, he begins to crawl towards it. He'd get up and walk towards it, but he doesn't seem to have the energy to get up and walk right now. He must be in the final stages of dehydration he figures, as he crawls. If this place in the sand doesn't have water, he'll likely never make it anywhere else. This is his last chance.

He gets closer and closer, but still can't see what's in the middle of the dark area. His eyes won't quite focus any more for some reason. And lifting his head up to look takes so much effort that he gives up trying. He just keeps crawling.

Finally, he reaches the area he'd seen from the dune. It takes him a minute of crawling on it before he realizes that he's no longer on sand - he's now crawling on some kind of dark stone. Stone with some kind of marking on it - a pattern cut into the stone. He's too tired to stand up and try to see what the pattern is - so he just keeps crawling. He crawls towards the center, where his blurry eyes still see something in the middle of the dark stone area.

His mind, detached in a strange way, notes that either his hands and knees are so burnt by the sand that they no longer feel pain, or that this dark stone, in the middle of a burning desert with a pounding, punishing sun overhead, doesn't seem to be hot. It almost feels cool. He considers lying down on the nice cool surface.

Cool, dark stone. Not a good sign. He must be hallucinating this. He's probably in the middle of a patch of sand, already lying face down and dying, and just imagining this whole thing. A desert mirage. Soon the beautiful women carrying pitchers of water will come up and start giving him a drink. Then he'll know he's gone.

He decides against laying down on the cool stone. If he's going to die here in the middle of this hallucination, he at least wants to see what's in the center before he goes. He keeps crawling.

It's the third time that he hears the voice before he realizes what he's hearing. He would swear that someone just said, "Greetings, traveler. You do not look well. Do you hear me?"

He stops crawling. He tries to look up from where he is on his hands and knees, but it's too much effort to lift his head. So he tries something different - he leans back and tries to sit up on the stone. After a few seconds, he catches his balance, avoids falling on his face, sits up, and tries to focus his eyes. Blurry. He rubs his eyes with the back of his hands and tries again. Better this time.

Yep. He can see. He's sitting in the middle of a large, flat, dark expanse of stone. Directly next to him, about three feet away, is a white post or pole about two inches in diameter and sticking up about four or five feet out of the stone, at an angle.

And wrapped around this white rod, tail with rattle on it hovering and seeming to be ready to start rattling, is what must be a fifteen foot long desert diamondback rattlesnake, looking directly at him.

He stares at the snake in shock. He doesn't have the energy to get up and run away. He doesn't even have the energy to crawl away. This is it, his final resting place. No matter what happens, he's not going to be able to move from this spot.

Well, at least dying of a bite from this monster should be quicker than dying of thirst. He'll face his end like a man. He struggles to sit up a little straighter. The snake keeps watching him. He lifts one hand and waves it in the snake's direction, feebly. The snake watches the hand for a moment, then goes back to watching the man, looking into his eyes.

Hmmm. Maybe the snake had no interest in biting him? It hadn't rattled yet - that was a good sign. Maybe he wasn't going to die of snake bite after all.

He then remembers that he'd looked up when he'd reached the center here because he thought he'd heard a voice. He was still very woozy - he was likely to pass out soon, the sun still beat down on him even though he was now on cool stone. He still didn't have anything to drink. But maybe he had actually heard a voice. This stone didn't look natural. Nor did that white post sticking up out of the stone. Someone had to have built this. Maybe they were still nearby. Maybe that was who talked to him. Maybe this snake was even their pet, and that's why it wasn't biting.

He tries to clear his throat to say, "Hello," but his throat is too dry. All that comes out is a coughing or wheezing sound. There is no way he's going to be able to talk without something to drink. He feels his pocket, and the bottle with the wiper fluid is still there. He shakily pulls the bottle out, almost losing his balance and falling on his back in the process. This isn't good. He doesn't have much time left, by his reckoning, before he passes out.

He gets the lid off of the bottle, manages to get the bottle to his lips, and pours some of the fluid into his mouth. He sloshes it around, and then swallows it. He coughs a little. His throat feels better. Maybe he can talk now.

He tries again. Ignoring the snake, he turns to look around him, hoping to spot the owner of this place, and croaks out, "Hello? Is there anyone here?"

He hears, from his side, "Greetings. What is it that you want?"

He turns his head, back towards the snake. That's where the sound had seemed to come from. The only thing he can think of is that there must be a speaker, hidden under the snake, or maybe built into that post. He decides to try asking for help.

"Please," he croaks again, suddenly feeling dizzy, "I'd love to not be thirsty any more. I've been a long time without water. Can you help me?"

Looking in the direction of the snake, hoping to see where the voice was coming from this time, he is shocked to see the snake rear back, open its mouth, and speak. He hears it say, as the dizziness overtakes him and he falls forward, face first on the stone, "Very well. Coming up."

A piercing pain shoots through his shoulder. Suddenly he is awake. He sits up and grabs his shoulder, wincing at the throbbing pain. He's momentarily disoriented as he looks around, and then he remembers - the crawl across the sand, the dark area of stone, the snake. He sees the snake, still wrapped around the tilted white post, still looking at him.

He reaches up and feels his shoulder, where it hurts. It feels slightly wet. He pulls his fingers away and looks at them - blood. He feels his shoulder again - his shirt has what feels like two holes in it - two puncture holes - they match up with the two aching spots of pain on his shoulder. He had been bitten. By the snake.

"It'll feel better in a minute." He looks up - it's the snake talking. He hadn't dreamed it. Suddenly he notices - he's not dizzy any more. And more importantly, he's not thirsty any more - at all!

"Have I died? Is this the afterlife? Why are you biting me in the afterlife?"

"Sorry about that, but I had to bite you," says the snake. "That's the way I work. It all comes through the bite. Think of it as natural medicine."

"You bit me to help me? Why aren't I thirsty any more? Did you give me a drink before you bit me? How did I drink enough while unconscious to not be thirsty any more? I haven't had a drink for over two days. Well, except for the windshield wiper fluid... hold it, how in the world does a snake talk? Are you real? Are you some sort of Disney animation?"

"No," says the snake, "I'm real. As real as you or anyone is, anyway. I didn't give you a drink. I bit you. That's how it works - it's what I do. I bite. I don't have hands to give you a drink, even if I had water just sitting around here."

The man sat stunned for a minute. Here he was, sitting in the middle of the desert on some strange stone that should be hot but wasn't, talking to a snake that could talk back and had just bitten him. And he felt better. Not great - he was still starving and exhausted, but much better - he was no longer thirsty. He had started to sweat again, but only slightly. He felt hot, in this sun, but it was starting to get lower in the sky, and the cool stone beneath him was a relief he could notice now that he was no longer dying of thirst.

"I might suggest that we take care of that methanol you now have in your system with the next request," continued the snake. "I can guess why you drank it, but I'm not sure how much you drank, or how much methanol was left in the wiper fluid. That stuff is nasty. It'll make you go blind in a day or two, if you drank enough of it."

"Ummm, n-next request?" said the man. He put his hand back on his hurting shoulder and backed away from the snake a little.

"That's the way it works. If you like, that is," explained the snake. "You get three requests. Call them wishes, if you wish." The snake grinned at his own joke, and the man drew back a little further from the show of fangs.

"But there are rules," the snake continued. "The first request is free. The second requires an agreement of secrecy. The third requires the binding of responsibility." The snake looks at the man seriously.

"By the way," the snake says suddenly, "my name is Nathan. Old Nathan, Samuel used to call me. He gave me the name. Before that, most of the Bound used to just call me 'Snake'. But that got old, and Samuel wouldn't stand for it. He said that anything that could talk needed a name. He was big into names. You can call me Nate, if you wish." Again, the snake grinned. "Sorry if I don't offer to shake, but I think you can understand - my shake sounds somewhat threatening." The snake give his rattle a little shake.

"Umm, my name is Jack," said the man, trying to absorb all of this. "Jack Samson.

"Can I ask you a question?" Jack says suddenly. "What happened to the poison...umm, in your bite. Why aren't I dying now? How did you do that? What do you mean by that's how you work?"

"That's more than one question," grins Nate. "But I'll still try to answer all of them. First, yes, you can ask me a question." The snake's grin gets wider. "Second, the poison is in you. It changed you. You now no longer need to drink. That's what you asked for. Or, well, technically, you asked to not be thirsty any more - but 'any more' is such a vague term. I decided to make it permanent - now, as long as you live, you shouldn't need to drink much at all. Your body will conserve water very efficiently. You should be able to get enough just from the food you eat - much like a creature of the desert. You've been changed.

"For the third question," Nate continues, "you are still dying. Besides the effects of that methanol in your system, you're a man - and men are mortal. In your current state, I give you no more than about another 50 years. Assuming you get out of this desert, alive, that is." Nate seemed vastly amused at his own humor, and continued his wide grin.

"As for the fourth question," Nate said, looking more serious as far as Jack could tell, as Jack was just now working on his ability to read talking-snake emotions from snake facial features, "first you have to agree to make a second request and become bound by the secrecy, or I can't tell you."

"Wait," joked Jack, "isn't this where you say you could tell me, but you'd have to kill me?"

"I thought that was implied." Nate continued to look serious.

"Ummm...yeah." Jack leaned back a little as he remembered again that he was talking to a fifteen foot poisonous reptile with a reputation for having a nasty temper. "So, what is this 'Bound by Secrecy' stuff, and can you really stop the effects of the methanol?" Jack thought for a second. "And, what do you mean methanol, anyway? I thought these days they use ethanol in wiper fluid, and just denature it?"

"They may, I don't really know," said Nate. "I haven't gotten out in a while. Maybe they do. All I know is that I smell methanol on your breath and on that bottle in your pocket. And the blue color of the liquid when you pulled it out to drink some let me guess that it was wiper fluid. I assume that they still color wiper fluid blue?"

"Yeah, they do," said Jack.

"I figured," replied Nate. "As for being bound by secrecy - with the fulfillment of your next request, you will be bound to say nothing about me, this place, or any of the information I will tell you after that, when you decide to go back out to your kind. You won't be allowed to talk about me, write about me, use sign language, charades, or even act in a way that will lead someone to guess correctly about me. You'll be bound to secrecy. Of course, I'll also ask you to promise not to give me away, and as I'm guessing that you're a man of your word, you'll never test the binding anyway, so you won't notice." Nate said the last part with utter confidence.

Jack, who had always prided himself on being a man of his word, felt a little nervous at this. "Ummm, hey, Nate, who are you? How did you know that? Are you, umm, omniscient, or something?"

Well, Jack," said Nate sadly, "I can't tell you that, unless you make the second request." Nate looked away for a minute, then looked back.

"Umm, well, ok," said Jack, "what is this about a second request? What can I ask for? Are you allowed to tell me that?"

"Sure!" said Nate, brightening. "You're allowed to ask for changes. Changes to yourself. They're like wishes, but they can only affect you. Oh, and before you ask, I can't give you immortality. Or omniscience. Or omnipresence, for that matter. Though I might be able to make you gaseous and yet remain alive, and then you could spread through the atmosphere and sort of be omnipresent. But what good would that be - you still wouldn't be omniscient and thus still could only focus on one thing at a time. Not very useful, at least in my opinion." Nate stopped when he realized that Jack was staring at him.

"Well, anyway," continued Nate, "I'd probably suggest giving you permanent good health. It would negate the methanol now in your system, you'd be immune to most poisons and diseases, and you'd tend to live a very long time, barring accident, of course. And you'll even have a tendency to recover from accidents well. It always seemed like a good choice for a request to me."

"Cure the methanol poisoning, huh?" said Jack. "And keep me healthy for a long time? Hmmm. It doesn't sound bad at that. And it has to be a request about a change to me? I can't ask to be rich, right? Because that's not really a change to me?"

"Right," nodded Nate.

"Could I ask to be a genius and permanently healthy?" Jack asked, hopefully.

"That takes two requests, Jack."

"Yeah, I figured so," said Jack. "But I could ask to be a genius? I could become the smartest scientist in the world? Or the best athlete?"

"Well, I could make you very smart," admitted Nate, "but that wouldn't necessarily make you the best scientist in the world. Or, I could make you very athletic, but it wouldn't necessarily make you the best athlete either. You've heard the saying that 99% of genius is hard work? Well, there's some truth to that. I can give you the talent, but I can't make you work hard. It all depends on what you decide to do with it."

"Hmmm," said Jack. "Ok, I think I understand. And I get a third request, after this one?"

"Maybe," said Nate, "it depends on what you decide then. There are more rules for the third request that I can only tell you about after the second request. You know how it goes." Nate looked like he'd shrug, if he had shoulders.

"Ok, well, since I'd rather not be blind in a day or two, and permanent health doesn't sound bad, then consider that my second request. Officially. Do I need to sign in blood or something?"

"No," said Nate. "Just hold out your hand. Or heel." Nate grinned. "Or whatever part you want me to bite. I have to bite you again. Like I said, that's how it works - the poison, you know," Nate said apologetically.

Jack winced a little and felt his shoulder, where the last bite was. Hey, it didn't hurt any more. Just like Nate had said. That made Jack feel better about the biting business. But still, standing still while a fifteen foot snake sunk it's fangs into you. Jack stood up. Ignoring how good it felt to be able to stand again, and the hunger starting to gnaw at his stomach, Jack tried to decide where he wanted to get bitten. Despite knowing that it wouldn't hurt for long, Jack knew that this wasn't going to be easy.

"Hey, Jack," Nate suddenly said, looking past Jack towards the dunes behind him, "is that someone else coming up over there?"

Jack spun around and looked. Who else could be out here in the middle of nowhere? And did they bring food?

Wait a minute, there was nobody over there. What was Nate...

Jack let out a bellow as he felt two fangs sink into his rear end, through his jeans...

Jack sat down carefully, favoring his more tender buttock. "I would have decided, eventually, Nate. I was just thinking about it. You didn't have to hoodwink me like that."

"I've been doing this a long time, Jack," said Nate, confidently. "You humans have a hard time sitting still and letting a snake bite you - especially one my size. And besides, admit it - it's only been a couple of minutes and it already doesn't hurt any more, does it? That's because of the health benefit with this one. I told you that you'd heal quickly now."

"Yeah, well, still," said Jack, "it's the principle of the thing. And nobody likes being bitten in the butt! Couldn't you have gotten my calf or something instead?"

"More meat in the typical human butt," replied Nate. "And less chance you accidentally kick me or move at the last second."

"Yeah, right. So, tell me all of these wonderful secrets that I now qualify to hear," answered Jack.

"Ok," said Nate. "Do you want to ask questions first, or do you want me to just start talking?"

"Just talk," said Jack. "I'll sit here and try to not think about food."

"We could go try to rustle up some food for you first, if you like," answered Nate.

"Hey! You didn't tell me you had food around here, Nate!" Jack jumped up. "What do we have? Am I in walking distance to town? Or can you magically whip up food along with your other powers?" Jack was almost shouting with excitement. His stomach had been growling for hours.

"I was thinking more like I could flush something out of its hole and bite it for you, and you could skin it and eat it. Assuming you have a knife, that is," replied Nate, with the grin that Jack was starting to get used to.

"Ugh," said Jack, sitting back down. "I think I'll pass. I can last a little longer before I get desperate enough to eat desert rat, or whatever else it is you find out here. And there's nothing to burn - I'd have to eat it raw. No thanks. Just talk."

"Ok," replied Nate, still grinning. "But I'd better hurry, before you start looking at me as food.

Nate reared back a little, looked around for a second, and then continued. "You, Jack, are sitting in the middle of the Garden of Eden."

Jack looked around at the sand and dunes and then looked back at Nate sceptically.

"Well, that's the best I can figure it, anyway, Jack," said Nate. "Stand up and look at the symbol on the rock here." Nate gestured around the dark stone they were both sitting on with his nose.

Jack stood up and looked. Carved into the stone in a bas-relief was a representation of a large tree. The angled-pole that Nate was wrapped around was coming out of the trunk of the tree, right below where the main branches left the truck to reach out across the stone. It was very well done - it looked more like a tree had been reduced to almost two dimensions and embedded in the stone than it did like a carving.

Jack walked around and looked at the details in the fading light of the setting sun. He wished he'd looked at it while the sun was higher in the sky.

Wait! The sun was setting! That meant he was going to have to spend another night out here! Arrrgh!

Jack looked out across the desert for a little bit, and then came back and stood next to Nate. "In all the excitement, I almost forgot, Nate," said Jack. "Which way is it back to town? And how far? I'm eventually going to have to head back - I'm not sure I'll be able to survive by eating raw desert critters for long. And even if I can, I'm not sure I'll want to."

"It's about 30 miles that way." Nate pointed, with the rattle on his tail this time. As far as Jack could tell, it was a direction at right angles to the way he'd been going when he was crawling here. "But that's 30 miles by the way the crow flies. It's about 40 by the way a man walks. You should be able to do it in about half a day with your improved endurance, if you head out early tomorrow, Jack."

Jack looked out the way the snake had pointed for a few seconds more, and then sat back down. It was getting dark. Not much he could do about heading out right now. And besides, Nate was just about to get to the interesting stuff. "Garden of Eden? As best as you can figure it?"

"Well, yeah, as best as I and Samuel could figure it anyway," said Nate. "He figured that the story just got a little mixed up. You know, snake, in a 'tree', offering 'temptations', making bargains. That kind stuff. But he could never quite figure out how the Hebrews found out about this spot from across the ocean. He worried about that for a while."

"Garden of Eden, hunh?" said Jack. "How long have you been here, Nate?"

"No idea, really," replied Nate. "A long time. It never occurred to me to count years, until recently, and by then, of course, it was too late. But I do remember when this whole place was green, so I figure it's been thousands of years, at least."

"So, are you the snake that tempted Eve?" said Jack.

"Beats me," said Nate. "Maybe. I can't remember if the first one of your kind that I talked to was female or not, and I never got a name, but it could have been. And I suppose she could have considered my offer to grant requests a 'temptation', though I've rarely had refusals."

"Well, umm, how did you get here then? And why is that white pole stuck out of the stone there?" asked Jack.

"Dad left me here. Or, I assume it was my dad. It was another snake - much bigger than I was back then. I remember talking to him, but I don't remember if it was in a language, or just kind of understanding what he wanted. But one day, he brought me to this stone, told me about it, and asked me to do something for him. I talked it over with him for a while, then agreed. I've been here ever since.

"What is this place?" said Jack. "And what did he ask you to do?"

"Well, you see this pole here, sticking out of the stone?" Nate loosened his coils around the tilted white pole and showed Jack where it descended into the stone. The pole was tilted at about a 45 degree angle and seemed to enter the stone in an eighteen inch slot cut into the stone. Jack leaned over and looked. The slot was dark and the pole went down into it as far as Jack could see in the dim light. Jack reached out to touch the pole, but Nate was suddenly there in the way.

"You can't touch that yet, Jack," said Nate.

"Why not?" asked Jack.

"I haven't explained it to you yet," replied Nate.

"Well, it kinda looks like a lever or something," said Jack. "You'd push it that way, and it would move in the slot."

"Yep, that's what it is," replied Nate.

"What does it do?" asked Jack. "End the world?"

"Oh, no," said Nate. "Nothing that drastic. It just ends humanity. I call it 'The Lever of Doom'." For the last few words Nate had used a deeper, ringing voice. He tried to look serious for a few seconds, and then gave up and grinned.

Jack was initially startled by Nate's pronouncement, but when Nate grinned Jack laughed. "Ha! You almost had me fooled for a second there. What does it really do?"

"Oh, it really ends humanity, like I said," smirked Nate. "I just thought the voice I used was funny, didn't you?"

Nate continued to grin.

"A lever to end humanity?" asked Jack. "What in the world is that for? Why would anyone need to end humanity?"

"Well," replied Nate, "I get the idea that maybe humanity was an experiment. Or maybe the Big Guy just thought, that if humanity started going really bad, there should be a way to end it. I'm not really sure. All I know are the rules, and the guesses that Samuel and I had about why it's here. I
didn't think to ask back when I started here."

"Rules? What rules?" asked Jack.

"The rules are that I can't tell anybody about it or let them touch it unless they agree to be bound to secrecy by a bite. And that only one human can be bound in that way at a time. That's it." explained Nate.

Jack looked somewhat shocked. "You mean that I could pull the lever now? You'd let me end humanity?"

"Yep," replied Nate, "if you want to." Nate looked at Jack carefully. "Do you want to, Jack?"

"Umm, no." said Jack, stepping a little further back from the lever. "Why in the world would anyone want to end humanity? It'd take a psychotic to want that! Or worse, a suicidal psychotic, because it would kill him too, wouldn't it?"

"Yep," replied Nate, "being as he'd be human too."

"Has anyone ever seriously considered it?" asked Nate. "Any of those bound to secrecy, that is?"

"Well, of course, I think they've all seriously considered it at one time or another. Being given that kind of responsibility makes you sit down and think, or so I'm told. Samuel considered it several times. He'd often get disgusted with humanity, come out here, and just hold the lever for a while. But he never pulled it. Or you wouldn't be here." Nate grinned some more.

Jack sat down, well back from the lever. He looked thoughtful and puzzled at the same time. After a bit, he said, "So this makes me the Judge of humanity? I get to decide whether they keep going or just end? Me?"

"That seems to be it," agreed Nate.

"What kind of criteria do I use to decide?" said Jack. "How do I make this decision? Am I supposed to decide if they're good? Or too many of them are bad? Or that they're going the wrong way? Is there a set of rules for that?"

"Nope," replied Nate. "You pretty much just have to decide on your own. It's up to you, however you want to decide it. I guess that you're just supposed to know."

"But what if I get mad at someone? Or some girl dumps me and I feel horrible? Couldn't I make a mistake? How do I know that I won't screw up?" protested Jack.

Nate gave his kind of snake-like shrug again. "You don't. You just have to try your best, Jack."

Jack sat there for a while, staring off into the desert that was rapidly getting dark, chewing on a fingernail.

Suddenly, Jack turned around and looked at the snake. "Nate, was Samuel the one bound to this before me?"

"Yep," replied Nate. "He was a good guy. Talked to me a lot. Taught me to read and brought me books. I think I still have a good pile of them buried in the sand around here somewhere. I still miss him. He died a few months ago."

"Sounds like a good guy," agreed Jack. "How did he handle this, when you first told him. What did he do?"

"Well," said Nate, "he sat down for a while, thought about it for a bit, and then asked me some questions, much like you're doing."

"What did he ask you, if you're allowed to tell me?" asked Jack.

"He asked me about the third request," replied Nate.

"Aha!" It was Jack's turn to grin. "And what did you tell him?"

"I told him the rules for the third request. That to get the third request you have to agree to this whole thing. That if it ever comes to the point that you really think that humanity should be ended, that you'll come here and end it. You won't avoid it, and you won't wimp out." Nate looked serious again. "And you'll be bound to do it too, Jack."

"Hmmm." Jack looked back out into the darkness for a while.

Nate watched him, waiting.

"Nate," continued Jack, quietly, eventually. "What did Samuel ask for with his third request?"

Nate sounded like he was grinning again as he replied, also quietly, "Wisdom, Jack. He asked for wisdom. As much as I could give him."

"Ok," said Jack, suddenly, standing up and facing away from Nate, "give it to me.

Nate looked at Jack's backside. "Give you what, Jack?"

"Give me that wisdom. The same stuff that Samuel asked for. If it helped him, maybe it'll help me too." Jack turned his head to look back over his shoulder at Nate. "It did help him, right?"

"He said it did," replied Nate. "But he seemed a little quieter afterward. Like he had a lot to think about."

"Well, yeah, I can see that," said Jack. "So, give it to me." Jack turned to face away from Nate again, bent over slightly and tensed up.

Nate watched Jack tense up with a little exasperation. If he bit Jack now, Jack would likely jump out of his skin and maybe hurt them both.

"You remember that you'll be bound to destroy humanity if it ever looks like it needs it, right Jack?" asked Nate, shifting position.

"Yeah, yeah, I got that," replied Jack, eyes squeezed tightly shut and body tense, not noticing the change in direction of Nate's voice.

"And," continued Nate, from his new position, "do you remember that you'll turn bright purple, and grow big horns and extra eyes?"

"Yeah, yeah...Hey, wait a minute!" said Jack, opening his eyes, straightening up and turning around. "Purple?!" He didn't see Nate there. With the moonlight Jack could see that the lever extended up from its slot in the rock without the snake wrapped around it.

Jack heard, from behind him, Nate's "Just Kidding!" right before he felt the now familiar piercing pain, this time in the other buttock.

Jack sat on the edge of the dark stone in the rapidly cooling air, his feet extending out into the sand. He stared out into the darkness, listening to the wind stir the sand, occasionally rubbing his butt where he'd been recently bitten.

Nate had left for a little while, had come back with a desert-rodent-shaped bulge somewhere in his middle, and was now wrapped back around the lever, his tongue flicking out into the desert night's air the only sign that he was still awake.

Occasionally Jack, with his toes absentmindedly digging in the sand while he thought, would ask Nate a question without turning around.

"Nate, do accidents count?"

Nate lifted his head a little bit. "What do you mean, Jack?"

Jack tilted his head back like he was looking at the stars. "You know, accidents. If I accidentally fall on the lever, without meaning to, does that still wipe out humanity?"

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure it does, Jack. I'd suggest you be careful about that if you start feeling wobbly," said Nate with some amusement.

A little later - "Does it have to be me that pulls the lever?" asked Jack.

"That's the rule, Jack. Nobody else can pull it," answered Nate.

"No," Jack shook his head, "I meant does it have to be my hand? Could I pull the lever with a rope tied around it? Or push it with a stick? Or throw a rock?"

"Yes, those should work," replied Nate. "Though I'm not sure how complicated you could get. Samuel thought about trying to build some kind of remote control for it once, but gave it up. Everything he'd build would be gone by the next sunrise, if it was touching the stone, or over it. I told him that in the past others that had been bound had tried to bury the lever so they wouldn't be tempted to pull it, but every time the stones or sand or whatever had disappeared."

"Wow," said Jack, "Cool." Jack leaned back until only his elbows kept him off of the stone and looked up into the sky.

"Nate, how long did Samuel live? One of his wishes was for health too, right?" asked Jack.

"Yes," replied Nate, "it was. He lived 167 years, Jack."

"Wow, 167 years. That's almost 140 more years I'll live if I live as long. Do you know what he died of, Nate?"

"He died of getting tired of living, Jack," Nate said, sounding somewhat sad.

Jack turned his head to look at Nate in the starlight.

Nate looked back. "Samuel knew he wasn't going to be able to stay in society. He figured that they'd eventually see him still alive and start questioning it, so he decided that he'd have to disappear after a while. He faked his death once, but changed his mind - he decided it was too early and he could stay for a little longer. He wasn't very fond of mankind, but he liked the attention. Most of the time, anyway.

"His daughter and then his wife dying almost did him in though. He didn't stay in society much longer after that. He eventually came out here to spend time talking to me and thinking about pulling the lever. A few months ago he told me he'd had enough. It was his time."

"And then he just died?" asked Jack.

Nate shook his head a little. "He made his forth request, Jack. There's only one thing you can ask for the fourth request. The last bite.

After a bit Nate continued, "He told me that he was tired, that it was his time. He reassured me that someone new would show up soon, like they always had.

After another pause, Nate finished, "Samuel's body disappeared off the stone with the sunrise."

Jack lay back down and looked at the sky, leaving Nate alone with his memories. It was a long time until Jack's breathing evened out into sleep.

Jack woke with the sunrise the next morning. He was a little chilled with the morning desert air, but overall was feeling pretty good. Well, except that his stomach was grumbling and he wasn't willing to eat raw desert rat.

So, after getting directions to town from Nate, making sure he knew how to get back, and reassuring Nate that he'd be back soon, Jack started the long walk back to town. With his new health and Nate's good directions, he made it back easily.

Jack caught a bus back to the city, and showed up for work the next day, little worse for the wear and with a story about getting lost in the desert and walking back out. Within a couple of days Jack had talked a friend with a tow truck into going back out into the desert with him to fetch the SUV. They found it after a couple of hours of searching and towed it back without incident. Jack was careful not to even look in the direction of Nate's lever, though their path back didn't come within sight of it.

Before the next weekend, Jack had gone to a couple of stores, including a book store, and had gotten his SUV back from the mechanic, with a warning to avoid any more joyriding in the desert. On Saturday, Jack headed back to see Nate.

Jack parked a little way out of the small town near Nate, loaded up his new backpack with camping gear and the things he was bringing for Nate, and then started walking. He figured that walking would leave the least trail, and he knew that while not many people camped in the desert, it wasn't unheard of, and shouldn't really raise suspicions.

Jack had brought more books for Nate - recent books, magazines, newspapers. Some things that would catch Nate up with what was happening in the world, others that were just good books to read. He spent the weekend with Nate, and then headed out again, telling Nate that he'd be back again soon, but that he had things to do first.

Over four months later Jack was back to see Nate again. This time he brought a laptop with him - a specially modified laptop. It had a solar recharger, special filters and seals to keep out the sand, a satellite link-up, and a special keyboard and joystick that Jack hoped that a fifteen-foot rattlesnake would be able to use. And, it had been hacked to not give out its location to the satellite.

After that Jack could e-mail Nate to keep in touch, but still visited him fairly regularly - at least once or twice a year.

After the first year, Jack quit his job. For some reason, with the wisdom he'd been given, and the knowledge that he could live for over 150 years, working in a nine to five job for someone else didn't seem that worthwhile any more. Jack went back to school.

Eventually, Jack started writing. Perhaps because of the wisdom, or perhaps because of his new perspective, he wrote well. People liked what he wrote, and he became well known for it. After a time, Jack bought an RV and started traveling around the country for book signings and readings.

But, he still remembered to drop by and visit Nate occasionally.

On one of the visits Nate seemed quieter than usual. Not that Nate had been a fountain of joy lately. Jack's best guess was that Nate was still missing Samuel, and though Jack had tried, he still hadn't been able to replace Samuel in Nate's eyes. Nate had been getting quieter each visit. But on this visit Nate didn't even speak when Jack walked up to the lever. He nodded at Jack, and then went back to staring into the desert. Jack, respecting Nate's silence, sat down and waited.

After a few minutes, Nate spoke. "Jack, I have someone to introduce you to."

Jack looked surprised. "Someone to introduce me to?" Jack looked around, and then looked carefully back at Nate. "This something to do with the Big Guy?

"No, no," replied Nate. "This is more personal. I want you to meet my son." Nate looked over at the nearest sand dune. "Sammy!"

Jack watched as a four foot long desert rattlesnake crawled from behind the dune and up to the stone base of the lever.

"Yo, Jack," said the new, much smaller snake.

"Yo, Sammy" replied Jack. Jack looked at Nate. "Named after Samuel, I assume?"

Nate nodded. "Jack, I've got a favor to ask you. Could you show Sammy around for me?" Nate unwrapped himself from the lever and slithered over to the edge of the stone and looked across the sands. "When Samuel first told me about the world, and brought me books and pictures, I wished that I could go see it. I wanted to see the great forests, the canyons, the cities, even the other deserts, to see if they felt and smelled the same. I want my son to have that chance - to see the world. Before he becomes bound here like I have been.


continued next post (too long)

[erikun]

...and the conclusion.


"He's seen it in pictures, over the computer that you brought me. But I hear that it's not the same. That being there is different. I want him to have that. Think you can do that for me, Jack?"

Jack nodded. This was obviously very important to Nate, so Jack didn't even joke about taking a talking rattlesnake out to see the world. "Yeah, I can do that for you, Nate. Is that all you need?" Jack could sense that was something more.

Nate looked at Sammy. Sammy looked back at Nate for a second and then said, "Oh, yeah. Ummm, I've gotta go pack. Back in a little bit Jack. Nice to meet ya!" Sammy slithered back over the dune and out of sight.

Nate watched Sammy disappear and then looked back at Jack. "Jack, this is my first son. My first offspring through all the years. You don't even want to know what it took for me to find a mate." Nate grinned to himself. "But anyway, I had a son for a reason. I'm tired. I'm ready for it to be over. I needed a replacement."

Jack considered this for a minute. "So, you're ready to come see the world, and you wanted him to watch the lever while you were gone?"

Nate shook his head. "No, Jack - you're a better guesser than that. You've already figured out - I'm bound here - there's only one way for me to leave here. And I'm ready. It's my time to die."

Jack looked more closely at Nate. He could tell Nate had thought about this - probably for quite a while. Jack had trouble imagining what it would be like to be as old as Nate, but Jack could already tell that in another hundred or two hundred years, he might be getting tired of life himself. Jack could understand Samuel's decision, and now Nate's. So, all Jack said was, "What do you want me to do?"

Nate nodded. "Thanks, Jack. I only want two things. One - show Sammy around the world - let him get his fill of it, until he's ready to come back here and take over. Two - give me the fourth request.

"I can't just decide to die, not any more than you can. I won't even die of old age like you eventually will, even though it'll be a long time from now. I need to be killed. Once Sammy is back here, ready to take over, I'll be able to die. And I need you to kill me.

"I've even thought about how. Poisons and other drugs won't work on me. And I've seen pictures of snakes that were shot - some of them live for days, so that's out too. So, I want you to bring back a sword.

Nate turned away to look back to the dune that Sammy had gone behind. "I'd say an axe, but that's somewhat undignified - putting my head on the ground or a chopping block like that. No, I like a sword. A time-honored way of going out. A dignified way to die. And, most importantly, it should work, even on me.

"You willing to do that for me, Jack?" Nate turned back to look at Jack.

"Yeah, Nate," replied Jack solemnly, "I think I can handle that."

Nate nodded. "Good!" He turned back toward the dune and shouted, "Sammy! Jack's about ready to leave!" Then quietly, "Thanks, Jack."

Jack didn't have anything to say to that, so he waited for Sammy to make it back to the lever, nodded to him, nodded a final time to Nate, and then headed into the desert with Sammy following.

Over the next several years Sammy and Jack kept in touch with Nate through e-mail as they went about their adventures. They made a goal of visiting every country in the world, and did a respectable job of it. Sammy had a natural gift for languages, as Jack expected he would, and even ended up acting as a translator for Jack in a few of the countries. Jack managed to keep the talking rattlesnake hidden, even so, and by the time they were nearing the end of their tour of countries, Sammy had only been spotted a few times. While there were several people that had seen enough to startle them greatly, nobody had enough evidence to prove anything, and while a few wild rumors and storied followed Jack and Sammy around, nothing ever hit the newspapers or the public in general.

When they finished the tour of countries, Jack suggested that they try some undersea diving. They did. And spelunking. They did that too. Sammy finally drew the line at visiting Antarctica. He'd come to realize that Jack was stalling. After talking to his Dad about it over e-mail, he figured out that Jack probably didn't want to have to kill Nate. Nate told Sammy that humans could be squeamish about killing friends and acquaintances.

So, Sammy eventually put his tail down (as he didn't have a foot) and told Jack that it was time - he was ready to go back and take up his duties from his dad. Jack, delayed it a little more by insisting that they go back to Japan and buy an appropriate sword. He even stretched it a little more by getting lessons in how to use the sword. But, eventually, he'd learned as much as he was likely to without dedicating his life to it, and was definitely competent enough to take the head off of a snake. It was time to head back and see Nate.

When they got back to the US, Jack got the old RV out of storage where he and Sammy had left it after their tour of the fifty states, he loaded up Sammy and the sword, and they headed for the desert.

When they got to the small town that Jack had been trying to find those years ago when he'd met Nate, Jack was in a funk. He didn't really feel like walking all of the way out there. Not only that, but he'd forgotten to figure the travel time correctly, and it was late afternoon. They'd either have to spend the night in town and walk out tomorrow, or walk in the dark.

As Jack was afraid that if he waited one more night he might lose his resolve, he decided that he'd go ahead and drive the RV out there. It was only going to be this once, and Jack would go back and cover the tracks afterward. They ought to be able to make it out there by nightfall if they drove, and then they could get it over tonight.

Jack told Sammy to e-mail Nate that they were coming as he drove out of sight of the town on the road. They then pulled off the road and headed out into the desert.

Everything went well, until they got to the sand dunes. Jack had been nursing the RV along the whole time, over the rocks, through the creek beds, revving the engine the few times they almost got stuck. When they came to the dunes, Jack didn't really think about it, he just downshifted and headed up the first one. By the third dune, Jack started to regret that he'd decided to try driving on the sand. The RV was fishtailling and losing traction. Jack was having to work it up each dune slowly and was trying to keep from losing control each time they came over the top and slid down the other side. Sammy had come up to sit in the passenger seat, coiled up and laughing at Jack's driving.

As they came over the top of the fourth dune, the biggest one yet, Jack saw that this was the final dune - the stone, the lever, and somewhere Nate, waited below. Jack put on the brakes, but he'd gone a little too far. The RV started slipping down the other side.

Jack tried turning the wheel, but he didn't have enough traction. He pumped the brakes - no response. They started sliding down the hill, faster and faster.

Jack felt a shock go through him as he suddenly realized that they were heading for the lever. He looked down - the RV was directly on course for it. If Jack didn't do something, the RV would hit it. He was about to end humanity.

Jack steered more frantically, trying to get traction. It still wasn't working. The dune was too steep, and the sand too loose. In a split second, Jack realized that his only chance would be once he hit the stone around the lever - he should have traction on the stone for just a second before he hit the lever - he wouldn't have time to stop, but he should be able to steer away.

Jack took a better grip on the steering wheel and tried to turn the RV a little bit - every little bit would help. He'd have to time his turn just right.

The RV got to the bottom of the dune, sliding at an amazing speed in the sand. Just before they reached the stone Jack looked across it to check that they were still heading for the lever. They were. But Jack noticed something else that he hadn't seen from the top of the dune. Nate wasn't wrapped around the lever. He was off to the side of the lever, but still on the stone, waiting for them. The problem was, he was waiting on the same side of the lever that Jack had picked to steer towards to avoid the lever. The RV was already starting to drift that way a little in its mad rush across the sand and there was no way that Jack was going to be able to go around the lever to the other side.

Jack had an instant of realization. He was either going to have to hit the lever, or run over Nate. He glanced over at Sammy and saw that Sammy realized the same thing.

Jack took a firmer grip on the steering wheel as the RV ran up on the stone. Shouting to Sammy as he pulled the steering wheel, "BETTER NATE THAN LEVER!", he ran over the snake.

[GolemsVoice]

Mein Hund hat keine Nase.
-Wie riecht er?
Schrecklich.

[Spiryt]

What was the difference between Woodrow Wilson and Lenin?

Wilson was collecting jokes people have been telling about him, and Lenin was collecting people that have been telling jokes about him.

[Starwulf]

...and the conclusion.



Such an epic build-up for a sub-par joke. by the time that story was over, I almost would have rather had more story then the joke ^^

[NoobForHire]

I read through all that, and then got to the joke.

I stared at it for about a minute, wondering how you could possibly end it that way.

And then I started laughing hysterically.

[Howler Dagger]

I am ashamed that no one has beaten me to this. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8gpjk_MaCGM)

[The Underlord]

Why did the chicken cross the road?
to get to the other side
For: Texas
to prove to the armadillo that its possible

[Suentis]

A little adult humor

One day a girl is going out to see some random guy she met online. Her brother noticing that she had been doing this quite a bit as of late warned her with a quick message, "Better be careful or people are going to think you are a slut!"

She stopped dead in her tracks, spun around and marched right up to him and said, "Why is it if a guy sleeps around he is considered a player but if a girl does it shes a slut?"

The brother looked at her with sympathy in his eyes and said, "Let me explain it this way. Guys are keys and women are locks. What do they call a key that opens any door?"

"A master key" she responds

"And what do they call a lock that opens using any key?" he asks

"I dunno, what?" she asks

"A ****ty lock"

[Yora]

Reminds me of that one xkcd comic (http://xkcd.com/887/).

Which is hilarious if you read through all of it, but there's a good chance you won't get the punchline (since it's a very small part of a not exceptionally well known meme that is easy to miss, even if you know the meme.)

[SDF]

A physics professor and his assistant are working on liberating negatively charged hydroxyl ions, when all of a sudden, the assistant says,
"Wait, Professor! What if the salicylic acids do not accept the hydroxyl ions?"
And the professor responds, "That's no hydroxyl ion! That's my wife!"

[Lanaya]

So this guy walks into a shop and asks "Do you have any helicopter flavoured chips?"
"Sorry sir, we only have plane."

[Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll]

JOKE

Aaaand, erikun got there before me. Freakin' love that joke. When I try and tell the joke by memory, it takes me half an hour. And I still miss a LOT of the nicer details.

[Androgeus]

Longest joke ever

That isn't shaggy dog story, it's a bloomin shaggy dog novelette.

[Balain]

Two hunters are out in the woods when one of them collapses. He doesn't seem to be breathing and his eyes are glazed. The other guy whips out his phone and calls the emergency services. He gasps, "My friend is dead! What can I do?" The operator says "Calm down. I can help. First, let's make sure he's dead." There is a silence, then a gun shot is heard. Back on the phone, the guy says "OK, now what?"

I remember reading something on the most funny jokes. That one was the top joke over many languages/country.

I think the top swedish joke went, "a dog walks up to the counter to senda telegram. The clerk says they have a deal going on. 10 words for $1. The dog says great, can you send this? 'woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof' the clerk says you can snd 1 more woof and it won't cost any extra. The dog looks at the clerk and sys, 'that wouldn't make any sense at all.'"

[Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll]

I remember reading something on the most funny jokes. That one was the top joke over many languages/country.

I think the top swedish joke went, "a dog walks up to the counter to senda telegram. The clerk says they have a deal going on. 10 words for $1. The dog says great, can you send this? 'woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof' the clerk says you can snd 1 more woof and it won't cost any extra. The dog looks at the clerk and sys, 'that wouldn't make any sense at all.'"

I woulda thought the Swedish joke would be much darker than that, having seen a little Swedish cinema...

[Balain]

Here are couple from my teacher, oh 25 years ago.

1. Johnny was born with no body. Johnny loved baseball. He would watch every game on tv. His mom would sit him next to the window, so he could watch all the neighbor kids play baseball in the park across the stret.

On his 12th birthday his fairy godmother appeared before him. She said she would grant him any 3wishes.

Well my first wish would be to have a body like everyone else. Poof he had a body.

My second wish would be to have a brand new baseball bat and glove. Poof he had a new bat and glove.

My third wish would be to have a brand new baseball uniform. Poof he was wearing a new baseball uniform.

Johnny was so xcited he ran across the street to go play baseball with all the other kids, when he got hit by a truck and died.

Johnny should have quit while he was a head.

2. Joe decides he can't stand his wife nagging him any more and hires a hit an named Arty. When Arty and Joe meet, joe describes his wife, and Arty realizes Joe's wife is Artie's ex-wife. Arty agrees to kill Joe's wife for $1.

The next day Arty follows his ex-wife into Safeway. When Arty thinks no one else is around he chokes his ex wife. sadly Arty didn't see the little girl watching him. He had no choice the choke the little girl too.

The next day all the headlines in the paper read, Arty chokes 2 for a dollar at Safeway.

[Balain]

I woulda thought the Swedish joke would be much darker than that, having seen a little Swedish cinema...

It s years ago, it could have been from another country.

[Kindablue]

Heh. Schrecklich.

[Pokonic]

Jim, Bob, and Mary are fishing out in the lake in the middle of winter. Mary, being slightly tipsy, eventualy falls out into the lake. Now, theres a bit of ice around the boat, so the boys think Mary can grab on and get back in after a bit. Then, Jim remembers Mary cannot swim, and tells Bob to jump in to find her. Jims down there for a bit, but brings up a girl. Bob starts the mouth-to mouth, and after a bit says "Woh, Mary's breath was not this bad when we left a few hours ago." Jim says "Well, she did'nt have that sweater on, ether!"

[Studoku]

Such an epic build-up for a sub-par joke. by the time that story was over, I almost would have rather had more story then the joke ^^

You wanted even more story, then the joke? :smalleek:

[Starwulf]

You wanted even more story, then the joke? :smalleek:

Lol, sorry for the wrong word ^^. I'd have rather had more story, than the joke at the end. :)

[Hiro Protagonest]

If you don't mind a bit of insult in the name of humor...

How many dyslexics does it change to take a lightbulb?

Did you know alchohol has female hormones? It's true. When you drink too much, you start to argue over meaningless things and can't drive.

[SaintRidley]

I'm partial to this old knock knock joke.

Knock Knock.

Who's there?

Interrupting coefficient of friction.

Interrupting coeff-

MU!

[The_Admiral]

Racist and lost in translation jokes seems like the only jokes here. oh and this old piece.


If fake bacon is called fakon, what is fake duck called? (It's stupid I know.)

[noparlpf]

Bacon and eggs walks into a bar.
The bartender says; "Sorry, we don't serve breakfast here."

My apologies, that's far from the best joke out there, and it is a bit old, but it's the first thing that came into my head, and it did make me laugh when I first heard it.

Argon floats into a bar. The bartender says, "Sorry, we don't serve your type here." Argon doesn't react.

A superconductor walks into a bar. The bartender exclaims, "Hey, get out of here! We don't serve your type around here!" The superconductor offers no resistance.

Why's there so much mercury on Mars?
Because of all the H.G. Wells!

Edit:

I'm partial to this old knock knock joke.

Knock Knock.

Who's there?

Interrupting coefficient of friction.

Interrupting coeff-

MU!

You just made my day!

[AshesOfOld]

I liked the Johnny joke. And the swedish joke as well. Of course Monty Python's "Killing Joke" is the best, but it's kinda hard to narrate :smallsmile:.

I'm kinda partial to Knock-jokes as well.
If any of you are following Day9's stream, he just told an old classic in a funny way on his youtube-stream (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N990_gnWssI&feature=g-u&context=G220080eFUAAAAAAACAA). (11:00)

"Knock knock"
"Who's there?"
"to"
"to who?"
"to whom!"

And any knock-jokes where you sing are hilarious as well.

"Knock knock"
"Who's there?"
"Abba"
"Abba who?"
"ABBALIEVE I CAN FLY! ABBALIEVE I CAN TOUCH THE SKY!"

[noparlpf]

I read through all that, and then got to the joke.

I stared at it for about a minute, wondering how you could possibly end it that way.

And then I started laughing hysterically.

WOW.
Same here.

Ooh, here's one!
Knock knock.
Who's there?
Little old lady.
Little old lady who?
I didn't know that you could yodel!

Knock knock.
Who's there?
Who.
Who--who who?
I didn't know that you could yodel!
That doesn't even make sense.

...If you get the reference, don't judge me.

[Blue Bandit]

A woman discovers a lamp with a genie in it. The genie proclaims " I will grant you three wishes, but with a catch. Whatever I grant you, your husband will be given ten-fold." The woman thought for a second and said, " for my first wish, I want to be the richest woman in the world." The genie said " OK but remember, your husband will be given ten times as much wealth as you." "that's alright" said the woman, "because we're married so what's his is mine. Now for my second wish, I want to be the most beautiful woman in the world." "Not a problem" replied the genie. "But again remember, your husband will be ten times more beautiful than you." "I understand" said the woman. "But I'll still be the most beautiful woman so he'll only have eyes for me" After a few minutes passed, the genie asked, "are you ready to make your final wish?" The woman smiles at him and says, "I wish for mild heart attack.":smallbiggrin:

[GolemsVoice]

A pregnant woman walks into a bakery. The baker ask her "So what do you get?" The woman answers: "I'll get a bread." The baker: "Wow, your husband will be suprised"

(I think it works better in German)

I have one I love, and it only works in English:
A new monk is lead into the scriptorium. He sees a lot of monks working over texts, so he asks the prior: "Father, how do these people know when they've made a mistake?" The prior answers: "Oh, we have the original in the vault, would you like to see it?"
THe monk wants, and is given the key to the vault. A few hourse later, he runs out, crying and tearing at his hair. "What's going on? What did you read?"
"Father" answers the monk "the word is CELEBRATE!"

[SaintRidley]

A pregnant woman walks into a bakery. The baker ask her "So what do you get?" The woman answers: "I'll get a bread." The baker: "Wow, your husband will be suprised"

(I think it works better in German)


It probably does. If I'm guessing right, it seems that it's playing on the euphemism of a "bun in the oven" for being pregnant.

I'm guessing Germans use a loaf of bread in their version, then?

[TechnoScrabble]

A pregnant woman walks into a bakery. The baker ask her "So what do you get?" The woman answers: "I'll get a bread." The baker: "Wow, your husband will be suprised"

(I think it works better in German)

I have one I love, and it only works in English:
A new monk is lead into the scriptorium. He sees a lot of monks working over texts, so he asks the prior: "Father, how do these people know when they've made a mistake?" The prior answers: "Oh, we have the original in the vault, would you like to see it?"
THe monk wants, and is given the key to the vault. A few hourse later, he runs out, crying and tearing at his hair. "What's going on? What did you read?"
"Father" answers the monk "the word is CELEBRATE!"

I get them both and they both made my day.

[Goosefeather]

A pregnant woman walks into a bakery. The baker ask her "So what do you get?" The woman answers: "I'll get a bread." The baker: "Wow, your husband will be suprised"

(I think it works better in German)


Pretty sure I've heard it, or something similar, in English. Maybe rephrase it to sound more natural:

A pregnant woman walks into a bakery. The baker asks her, "So, what will you have?" The woman answers, "I'll have some bread". The baker says, "Wow, your husband will be surprised!"

('To have a baby' is the idiom, and 'what will you have' makes sense in both ways, keeping the ambiguity)

[Maxios]

Not the best joke, but a joke:
Knock Knock
Who's there?
Impatient Lion
Impat-
ROOOOOOOOAR!

[Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll]

An Englishman, a Frenchman, a Fräulein and a Russian Hussar are all aboard an airplane. Suddenly the plane starts falling and it is revealed that there is only one parachute. The Hussar starts putting the parachute on. The Englishman and the Frenchman exclaim: "Sir, there is a lady here!". The Hussar, looking at his watch nervously, says: "Think we'll have enough time?".

[Aedilred]

Pretty sure I've heard it, or something similar, in English. Maybe rephrase it to sound more natural:

A pregnant woman walks into a bakery. The baker asks her, "So, what will you have?" The woman answers, "I'll have some bread". The baker says, "Wow, your husband will be surprised!"

('To have a baby' is the idiom, and 'what will you have' makes sense in both ways, keeping the ambiguity)
How about "what are you having?"/"I'll have some bread"?

Here's my contribution:
A man walks into a butcher's shop, and says, "I'll bet you a tenner you can't reach that meat over there."
The butcher looks to where he's pointing and says, "Sorry, the steaks are too high."

And another:
A pirate walks into a bar with a steering wheel stuffed down the front of his pants.
Barman: Excuse me, do you know you have a steering wheel in your pants?
Pirate: Arr, it's touchin' me balls!

To explain the second one, that is the version of the joke that was sent to me when I was presenting a radio show a few years ago and it has made me laugh ever since just thinking about it. Obviously it is not the correct punchline, but I think to provide it would spoil the joke now...

I love erikun's joke. That one will be widely propagated.

[comicshorse]

The Buddha goes up to a hotdog seller and say's : "make me one with everything "

[erikun]

This is for you guys. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jzHBszZn6uo)

[No brains]

"I am Pagliacci!"

[Lord Raziere]

A rich sheltered guy gets told some rumors about the safari.
So he goes out and gets a guide, who tells him about the safari.
Finally he comes to an elephant, that trumpets really loudly in his face.
"Thats an elephant!"
The guide tells him
"They trumpet really loudly!"
The rich guy responds:

"So I've heard."

How many software programmers does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
None, thats a hardware problem.

A husband in a DnD world dies.
The wife goes to the cleric, but can't resurrect him because she doesn't have enough money.
The wife goes to the druid, but tells her that he can only reincarnate him, not truly resurrect him.
The wife goes a strange man in red clothing and a feather in his hat, and asks if he can resurrect her husband.
His response:
"Sure, Phoenix Down!"

[Kallisti]

(This isn't a true war story, although I often pass it off as one; a friend of mine made it up, and it's brilliant.)

So there was this one campaign I played in once--the DM was pretty good about not railroading once the game started, but he came up with weirdly specific ideas for games. Like this one--he decided the whole party would be paladins belonging to an Order of the Golden Bough.

As you can guess, that went well. We were pretty much your typical gamers--rude, murderous presumptuous and astonishingly wealthy vagrants. Except not so much with the astonishing wealth in this game--we had terrible luck with treasure, and he rolled it in the open right off the table in the DMG, so we knew he wasn't just giving us terrible loot on purpose.

In fact, after about the seventh session in a row of sub-par treasure it was getting to the point where we were having trouble keeping up with the difficulty curve, because he'd planned all of his encounters assuming we'd have a typical array of magic items. Plus all of us were getting bummed out. So he decided to offer us a solid, in-story way to get rich quick: the Order tasked us with negotiating a really lucrative trade settlement with a nation of Earth Elementals on the Elemental Plane of Earth. They'd mine gems, sell them on to the Order, the Order would sell them to various Primes, make a killing and send back purchased magic items in exchange.

Here's the thing. The elementals already had a massive stockpile of various gems when we showed up. Typical gamers in a room with loot like that?

In five minutes flat we'd worked up a solid battle plan--we could take on the elementals and win, and then we'd make out like bandits. It went down something like this:

DM: "You're gonna straight-up murder them to steal centuries worth of their ancestral wealth?"
Us: "Looks like, yeah."
DM: "You guys are paladins."
Us: "Yeah, something like that. Anyhow, twenty-three for init, Maximized Fireball with Energy Substitution."
DM: [Exaggerated sigh] "Reflex saves, right?" [Rolls a fistful of d20s, and gets nothing higher than a five] "...how much damage is that?"
Us: "Umm, 15d6+19."
DM: "That...kills them all, you don't even need to bother rolling."
Us: "Seriously?"
DM: "Yeah. You know what? Fine. Fine, fine, fine; a bunch of paladins cold-bloodly murder the government of a peaceful nation in order to steal their entire GDP for the entirety of their existence."
DM: "Rocks die."
DM: "Everybody falls."

[Taffimai]

I am ashamed that no one has beaten me to this. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8gpjk_MaCGM)

Wow, I would've laid down good money that you were going to link this one (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oHg5SJYRHA0). People surprise me every day.

[Soylent Dave]

I'm partial to this old knock knock joke.

Knock Knock.

Who's there?

Interrupting coefficient of friction.

Interrupting coeff-

MU!


You just made my day!

Along the same lines, I always liked:

There's two cats sat on a roof, which one falls off first?
The one with the lowest Mu.

-

How many roleplayers does it take to change a lightbulb?
D10+1

-

A longer one:

Geoff really, really likes tractors. He subscribes to Tractor Monthly and What Tractor?, he collects model tractors, he wears T-shirts with pictures of tractors on, he drives a tractor to work...

So when the national Tractor exhibition comes to town he's first in the (not very long) line for tickets. He queues outside the door on the day, and rushes inside to gaze at all the lovely tractors... and then he sees it.

A Jackson PF 213. State of the art. He looks around. There's no security (mostly because it's a tractor exhibition). He'll never have an opportunity like this again... Geoff nimbly jumps over the ropes and he's on board the PF 213, playing with the gears, making vroom noises, really enjoying himself - when suddenly he hears a shout of "Oi, you!" and is unceremoniously dragged out of the exhibit and given a public dressing down by security and the sponsors (What Tractor? magazine).

As the final insult he's told "You're banned from all future events".

Geoff runs home, tears brimming in his eyes. He rips all his tractor posters down from his bedroom wall, and takes all his tractor magazines out from under his bed and throws them in the bin; this is IT, he's giving up tractors FOREVER.

After a bit of a cry he decides to go to the pub to try and cheer himself up - but he's only been at the bar 5 minutes when the landlord comes rushing out of the back, followed by a cloud of billowing smoke.

"We've had an accident in the kitchen, folks - it's nothing to worry about, but we're going to have to close early due to all this smoke"

"Hang on," says Geoff, and he hops onto the bar and drops his trousers. Before the astonished barman can say anything, all the smoke disappears right up his bum.

"H.. how did you manage that?"

"Oh it was easy," replies Geoff, pulling his pants back up,

"I'm an ex-tractor fan"

[noparlpf]

(This isn't a true war story, although I often pass it off as one; a friend of mine made it up, and it's brilliant.)

So there was this one campaign I played in once--the DM was pretty good about not railroading once the game started, but he came up with weirdly specific ideas for games. Like this one--he decided the whole party would be paladins belonging to an Order of the Golden Bough.

As you can guess, that went well. We were pretty much your typical gamers--rude, murderous presumptuous and astonishingly wealthy vagrants. Except not so much with the astonishing wealth in this game--we had terrible luck with treasure, and he rolled it in the open right off the table in the DMG, so we knew he wasn't just giving us terrible loot on purpose.

In fact, after about the seventh session in a row of sub-par treasure it was getting to the point where we were having trouble keeping up with the difficulty curve, because he'd planned all of his encounters assuming we'd have a typical array of magic items. Plus all of us were getting bummed out. So he decided to offer us a solid, in-story way to get rich quick: the Order tasked us with negotiating a really lucrative trade settlement with a nation of Earth Elementals on the Elemental Plane of Earth. They'd mine gems, sell them on to the Order, the Order would sell them to various Primes, make a killing and send back purchased magic items in exchange.

Here's the thing. The elementals already had a massive stockpile of various gems when we showed up. Typical gamers in a room with loot like that?

In five minutes flat we'd worked up a solid battle plan--we could take on the elementals and win, and then we'd make out like bandits. It went down something like this:

DM: "You're gonna straight-up murder them to steal centuries worth of their ancestral wealth?"
Us: "Looks like, yeah."
DM: "You guys are paladins."
Us: "Yeah, something like that. Anyhow, twenty-three for init, Maximized Fireball with Energy Substitution."
DM: [Exaggerated sigh] "Reflex saves, right?" [Rolls a fistful of d20s, and gets nothing higher than a five] "...how much damage is that?"
Us: "Umm, 15d6+19."
DM: "That...kills them all, you don't even need to bother rolling."
Us: "Seriously?"
DM: "Yeah. You know what? Fine. Fine, fine, fine; a bunch of paladins cold-bloodly murder the government of a peaceful nation in order to steal their entire GDP for the entirety of their existence."
DM: "Rocks die."
DM: "Everybody falls."

That was fantastic. XD

[Juggling Goth]

Why do anarcho-communists drink herbal tea?

Because proper tea is theft.

[The Durvin]

I like one of Jon Hodgman's jokes for Aspies:

A duck walks into a bar and asks for a drink. The bartender says, "we have nothing for ducks here."

Try telling it in the midst of a joke-telling contest; confuses the hell out of people. So it's multi-leveled, you see.

Anyway...a really long story that's really convoluted so that it can lead to a stupid pun is called a Feghoot. Look it up on Wikipedia; Asimov and Clark wrote some pretty impressive ones that I can't quite remember--something about a star-mangled spanner.

And, one of the few real jokes I know, which hopefully doesn't get me in trouble for its religious theme...
A Catholic priest and a rabbi were friends, and liked to hang out and try and convince one another to convert. One day, the priest said to the rabbi, "have you ever broken your vows and eaten pork?" The rabbi said, "yes, once when I was young, I tried some barbecue. And you, have you ever broken your vows and had sex?" The priest said, "yes, once in semenary-school, I had a one-night stand with a girl." The rabbi said, "a lot better than pork, isn't it?"

[noparlpf]

I like one of Jon Hodgman's jokes for Aspies:

A duck walks into a bar and asks for a drink. The bartender says, "we have nothing for ducks here."

Try telling it in the midst of a joke-telling contest; confuses the hell out of people. So it's multi-leveled, you see.

I don't get it. :smallconfused:


Anyway...a really long story that's really convoluted so that it can lead to a stupid pun is called a Feghoot. Look it up on Wikipedia; Asimov and Clark wrote some pretty impressive ones that I can't quite remember--something about a star-mangled spanner.

Huh. I think I remember reading that one, or hearing about it at least. I like Asimov and Clark.


And, one of the few real jokes I know, which hopefully doesn't get me in trouble for its religious theme...
A Catholic priest and a rabbi were friends, and liked to hang out and try and convince one another to convert. One day, the priest said to the rabbi, "have you ever broken your vows and eaten pork?" The rabbi said, "yes, once when I was young, I tried some barbecue. And you, have you ever broken your vows and had sex?" The priest said, "yes, once in semenary-school, I had a one-night stand with a girl." The rabbi said, "a lot better than pork, isn't it?"

I dunno, I'm Jewish and I prefer pork.

[TheFallenOne]

Remember, you asked for this.


So, there's a man crawling through the desert.

He'd decided to try his SUV in a little bit of cross-country travel, had great fun zooming over the badlands and through the sand, got lost, hit a big rock, and then he couldn't get it started again. There were no cell phone towers anywhere near, so his cell phone was useless. He had no family, his parents had died a few years before in an auto accident, and his few friends had no idea he was out here.

He stayed with the car for a day or so, but his one bottle of water ran out and he was getting thirsty. He thought maybe he knew the direction back, now that he'd paid attention to the sun and thought he'd figured out which way was north, so he decided to start walking. He figured he only had to go about 30 miles or so and he'd be back to the small town he'd gotten gas in last.

He thinks about walking at night to avoid the heat and sun, but based upon how dark it actually was the night before, and given that he has no flashlight, he's afraid that he'll break a leg or step on a rattlesnake. So, he puts on some sun block, puts the rest in his pocket for reapplication later, brings an umbrella he'd had in the back of the SUV with him to give him a little shade, pours the windshield wiper fluid into his water bottle in case he gets that desperate, brings his pocket knife in case he finds a cactus that looks like it might have water in it, and heads out in the direction he thinks is right.

He walks for the entire day. By the end of the day he's really thirsty. He's been sweating all day, and his lips are starting to crack. He's reapplied the sunblock twice, and tried to stay under the umbrella, but he still feels sunburned. The windshield wiper fluid sloshing in the bottle in his pocket is really getting tempting now. He knows that it's mainly water and some ethanol and coloring, but he also knows that they add some kind of poison to it to keep people from drinking it. He wonders what the poison is, and whether the poison would be worse than dying of thirst.

He pushes on, trying to get to that small town before dark.

By the end of the day he starts getting worried. He figures he's been walking at least 3 miles an hour, according to his watch for over 10 hours. That means that if his estimate was right that he should be close to the town. But he doesn't recognize any of this. He had to cross a dry creek bed a mile or two back, and he doesn't remember coming through it in the SUV. He figures that maybe he got his direction off just a little and that the dry creek bed was just off to one side of his path. He tells himself that he's close, and that after dark he'll start seeing the town lights over one of these hills, and that'll be all he needs.

As it gets dim enough that he starts stumbling over small rocks and things, he finds a spot and sits down to wait for full dark and the town lights.

Full dark comes before he knows it. He must have dozed off. He stands back up and turns all the way around. He sees nothing but stars.

He wakes up the next morning feeling absolutely lousy. His eyes are gummy and his mouth and nose feel like they're full of sand. He so thirsty that he can't even swallow. He barely got any sleep because it was so cold. He'd forgotten how cold it got at night in the desert and hadn't noticed it the night before because he'd been in his car.

He knows the Rule of Threes - three minutes without air, three days without water, three weeks without food - then you die. Some people can make it a little longer, in the best situations. But the desert heat and having to walk and sweat isn't the best situation to be without water. He figures, unless he finds water, this is his last day.

He rinses his mouth out with a little of the windshield wiper fluid. He waits a while after spitting that little bit out, to see if his mouth goes numb, or he feels dizzy or something. Has his mouth gone numb? Is it just in his mind? He's not sure. He'll go a little farther, and if he still doesn't find water, he'll try drinking some of the fluid.

Then he has to face his next, harder question - which way does he go from here? Does he keep walking the same way he was yesterday (assuming that he still knows which way that is), or does he try a new direction? He has no idea what to do.

Looking at the hills and dunes around him, he thinks he knows the direction he was heading before. Just going by a feeling, he points himself somewhat to the left of that, and starts walking.

As he walks, the day starts heating up. The desert, too cold just a couple of hours before, soon becomes an oven again. He sweats a little at first, and then stops. He starts getting worried at that - when you stop sweating he knows that means you're in trouble - usually right before heat stroke.

He decides that it's time to try the windshield wiper fluid. He can't wait any longer - if he passes out, he's dead. He stops in the shade of a large rock, takes the bottle out, opens it, and takes a mouthful. He slowly swallows it, making it last as long as he can. It feels so good in his dry and cracked throat that he doesn't even care about the nasty taste. He takes another mouthful, and makes it last too. Slowly, he drinks half the bottle. He figures that since he's drinking it, he might as well drink enough to make some difference and keep himself from passing out.

He's quit worrying about the denaturing of the wiper fluid. If it kills him, it kills him - if he didn't drink it, he'd die anyway. Besides, he's pretty sure that whatever substance they denature the fluid with is just designed to make you sick - their way of keeping winos from buying cheap wiper fluid for the ethanol content. He can handle throwing up, if it comes to that.

He walks. He walks in the hot, dry, windless desert. Sand, rocks, hills, dunes, the occasional scrawny cactus or dried bush. No sign of water. Sometimes he'll see a little movement to one side or the other, but whatever moved is usually gone before he can focus his eyes on it. Probably birds, lizards, or mice. Maybe snakes, though they usually move more at night. He's careful to stay away from the movements.

After a while, he begins to stagger. He's not sure if it's fatigue, heat stroke finally catching him, or maybe he was wrong and the denaturing of the wiper fluid was worse than he thought. He tries to steady himself, and keep going.

After more walking, he comes to a large stretch of sand. This is good! He knows he passed over a stretch of sand in the SUV - he remembers doing donuts in it. Or at least he thinks he remembers it - he's getting woozy enough and tired enough that he's not sure what he remembers any more or if he's hallucinating. But he thinks he remembers it. So he heads off into it, trying to get to the other side, hoping that it gets him closer to the town.

He was heading for a town, wasn't he? He thinks he was. He isn't sure any more. He's not even sure how long he's been walking any more. Is it still morning? Or has it moved into afternoon and the sun is going down again? It must be afternoon - it seems like it's been too long since he started out.

He walks through the sand.

After a while, he comes to a big dune in the sand. This is bad. He doesn't remember any dunes when driving over the sand in his SUV. Or at least he doesn't think he remembers any. This is bad.

But, he has no other direction to go. Too late to turn back now. He figures that he'll get to the top of the dune and see if he can see anything from there that helps him find the town. He keeps going up the dune.

Halfway up, he slips in the bad footing of the sand for the second or third time, and falls to his knees. He doesn't feel like getting back up - he'll just fall down again. So, he keeps going up the dune on his hand and knees.

While crawling, if his throat weren't so dry, he'd laugh. He's finally gotten to the hackneyed image of a man lost in the desert - crawling through the sand on his hands and knees. If would be the perfect image, he imagines, if only his clothes were more ragged. The people crawling through the desert in the cartoons always had ragged clothes. But his have lasted without any rips so far. Somebody will probably find his dessicated corpse half buried in the sand years from now, and his clothes will still be in fine shape - shake the sand out, and a good wash, and they'd be wearable again. He wishes his throat were wet enough to laugh. He coughs a little instead, and it hurts.

He finally makes it to the top of the sand dune. Now that he's at the top, he struggles a little, but manages to stand up and look around. All he sees is sand. Sand, and more sand. Behind him, about a mile away, he thinks he sees the rocky ground he left to head into this sand. Ahead of him, more dunes, more sand. This isn't where he drove his SUV. This is Nell. Or close enough.

Again, he doesn't know what to do. He decides to drink the rest of the wiper fluid while figuring it out. He takes out the bottle, and is removing the cap, when he glances to the side and sees something. Something in the sand. At the bottom of the dune, off to the side, he sees something strange. It's a flat area, in the sand. He stops taking the cap of the bottle off, and tries to look closer. The area seems to be circular. And it's dark - darker than the sand. And, there seems to be something in the middle of it, but he can't tell what it is. He looks as hard as he can, and still can tell from here. He's going to have to go down there and look.

He puts the bottle back in his pocket, and starts to stumble down the dune. After a few steps, he realizes that he's in trouble - he's not going to be able to keep his balance. After a couple of more sliding, tottering steps, he falls and starts to roll down the dune. The sand it so hot when his body hits it that for a minute he thinks he's caught fire on the way down - like a movie car wreck flashing into flames as it goes over the cliff, before it ever even hits the ground. He closes his eyes and mouth, covers his face with his hands, and waits to stop rolling.

He stops, at the bottom of the dune. After a minute or two, he finds enough energy to try to sit up and get the sand out of his face and clothes. When he clears his eyes enough, he looks around to make sure that the dark spot in the sand it still there and he hadn't just imagined it.

So, seeing the large, flat, dark spot on the sand is still there, he begins to crawl towards it. He'd get up and walk towards it, but he doesn't seem to have the energy to get up and walk right now. He must be in the final stages of dehydration he figures, as he crawls. If this place in the sand doesn't have water, he'll likely never make it anywhere else. This is his last chance.

He gets closer and closer, but still can't see what's in the middle of the dark area. His eyes won't quite focus any more for some reason. And lifting his head up to look takes so much effort that he gives up trying. He just keeps crawling.

Finally, he reaches the area he'd seen from the dune. It takes him a minute of crawling on it before he realizes that he's no longer on sand - he's now crawling on some kind of dark stone. Stone with some kind of marking on it - a pattern cut into the stone. He's too tired to stand up and try to see what the pattern is - so he just keeps crawling. He crawls towards the center, where his blurry eyes still see something in the middle of the dark stone area.

His mind, detached in a strange way, notes that either his hands and knees are so burnt by the sand that they no longer feel pain, or that this dark stone, in the middle of a burning desert with a pounding, punishing sun overhead, doesn't seem to be hot. It almost feels cool. He considers lying down on the nice cool surface.

Cool, dark stone. Not a good sign. He must be hallucinating this. He's probably in the middle of a patch of sand, already lying face down and dying, and just imagining this whole thing. A desert mirage. Soon the beautiful women carrying pitchers of water will come up and start giving him a drink. Then he'll know he's gone.

He decides against laying down on the cool stone. If he's going to die here in the middle of this hallucination, he at least wants to see what's in the center before he goes. He keeps crawling.

It's the third time that he hears the voice before he realizes what he's hearing. He would swear that someone just said, "Greetings, traveler. You do not look well. Do you hear me?"

He stops crawling. He tries to look up from where he is on his hands and knees, but it's too much effort to lift his head. So he tries something different - he leans back and tries to sit up on the stone. After a few seconds, he catches his balance, avoids falling on his face, sits up, and tries to focus his eyes. Blurry. He rubs his eyes with the back of his hands and tries again. Better this time.

Yep. He can see. He's sitting in the middle of a large, flat, dark expanse of stone. Directly next to him, about three feet away, is a white post or pole about two inches in diameter and sticking up about four or five feet out of the stone, at an angle.

And wrapped around this white rod, tail with rattle on it hovering and seeming to be ready to start rattling, is what must be a fifteen foot long desert diamondback rattlesnake, looking directly at him.

He stares at the snake in shock. He doesn't have the energy to get up and run away. He doesn't even have the energy to crawl away. This is it, his final resting place. No matter what happens, he's not going to be able to move from this spot.

Well, at least dying of a bite from this monster should be quicker than dying of thirst. He'll face his end like a man. He struggles to sit up a little straighter. The snake keeps watching him. He lifts one hand and waves it in the snake's direction, feebly. The snake watches the hand for a moment, then goes back to watching the man, looking into his eyes.

Hmmm. Maybe the snake had no interest in biting him? It hadn't rattled yet - that was a good sign. Maybe he wasn't going to die of snake bite after all.

He then remembers that he'd looked up when he'd reached the center here because he thought he'd heard a voice. He was still very woozy - he was likely to pass out soon, the sun still beat down on him even though he was now on cool stone. He still didn't have anything to drink. But maybe he had actually heard a voice. This stone didn't look natural. Nor did that white post sticking up out of the stone. Someone had to have built this. Maybe they were still nearby. Maybe that was who talked to him. Maybe this snake was even their pet, and that's why it wasn't biting.

He tries to clear his throat to say, "Hello," but his throat is too dry. All that comes out is a coughing or wheezing sound. There is no way he's going to be able to talk without something to drink. He feels his pocket, and the bottle with the wiper fluid is still there. He shakily pulls the bottle out, almost losing his balance and falling on his back in the process. This isn't good. He doesn't have much time left, by his reckoning, before he passes out.

He gets the lid off of the bottle, manages to get the bottle to his lips, and pours some of the fluid into his mouth. He sloshes it around, and then swallows it. He coughs a little. His throat feels better. Maybe he can talk now.

He tries again. Ignoring the snake, he turns to look around him, hoping to spot the owner of this place, and croaks out, "Hello? Is there anyone here?"

He hears, from his side, "Greetings. What is it that you want?"

He turns his head, back towards the snake. That's where the sound had seemed to come from. The only thing he can think of is that there must be a speaker, hidden under the snake, or maybe built into that post. He decides to try asking for help.

"Please," he croaks again, suddenly feeling dizzy, "I'd love to not be thirsty any more. I've been a long time without water. Can you help me?"

Looking in the direction of the snake, hoping to see where the voice was coming from this time, he is shocked to see the snake rear back, open its mouth, and speak. He hears it say, as the dizziness overtakes him and he falls forward, face first on the stone, "Very well. Coming up."

A piercing pain shoots through his shoulder. Suddenly he is awake. He sits up and grabs his shoulder, wincing at the throbbing pain. He's momentarily disoriented as he looks around, and then he remembers - the crawl across the sand, the dark area of stone, the snake. He sees the snake, still wrapped around the tilted white post, still looking at him.

He reaches up and feels his shoulder, where it hurts. It feels slightly wet. He pulls his fingers away and looks at them - blood. He feels his shoulder again - his shirt has what feels like two holes in it - two puncture holes - they match up with the two aching spots of pain on his shoulder. He had been bitten. By the snake.

"It'll feel better in a minute." He looks up - it's the snake talking. He hadn't dreamed it. Suddenly he notices - he's not dizzy any more. And more importantly, he's not thirsty any more - at all!

"Have I died? Is this the afterlife? Why are you biting me in the afterlife?"

"Sorry about that, but I had to bite you," says the snake. "That's the way I work. It all comes through the bite. Think of it as natural medicine."

"You bit me to help me? Why aren't I thirsty any more? Did you give me a drink before you bit me? How did I drink enough while unconscious to not be thirsty any more? I haven't had a drink for over two days. Well, except for the windshield wiper fluid... hold it, how in the world does a snake talk? Are you real? Are you some sort of Disney animation?"

"No," says the snake, "I'm real. As real as you or anyone is, anyway. I didn't give you a drink. I bit you. That's how it works - it's what I do. I bite. I don't have hands to give you a drink, even if I had water just sitting around here."

The man sat stunned for a minute. Here he was, sitting in the middle of the desert on some strange stone that should be hot but wasn't, talking to a snake that could talk back and had just bitten him. And he felt better. Not great - he was still starving and exhausted, but much better - he was no longer thirsty. He had started to sweat again, but only slightly. He felt hot, in this sun, but it was starting to get lower in the sky, and the cool stone beneath him was a relief he could notice now that he was no longer dying of thirst.

"I might suggest that we take care of that methanol you now have in your system with the next request," continued the snake. "I can guess why you drank it, but I'm not sure how much you drank, or how much methanol was left in the wiper fluid. That stuff is nasty. It'll make you go blind in a day or two, if you drank enough of it."

"Ummm, n-next request?" said the man. He put his hand back on his hurting shoulder and backed away from the snake a little.

"That's the way it works. If you like, that is," explained the snake. "You get three requests. Call them wishes, if you wish." The snake grinned at his own joke, and the man drew back a little further from the show of fangs.

"But there are rules," the snake continued. "The first request is free. The second requires an agreement of secrecy. The third requires the binding of responsibility." The snake looks at the man seriously.

"By the way," the snake says suddenly, "my name is Nathan. Old Nathan, Samuel used to call me. He gave me the name. Before that, most of the Bound used to just call me 'Snake'. But that got old, and Samuel wouldn't stand for it. He said that anything that could talk needed a name. He was big into names. You can call me Nate, if you wish." Again, the snake grinned. "Sorry if I don't offer to shake, but I think you can understand - my shake sounds somewhat threatening." The snake give his rattle a little shake.

"Umm, my name is Jack," said the man, trying to absorb all of this. "Jack Samson.

"Can I ask you a question?" Jack says suddenly. "What happened to the poison...umm, in your bite. Why aren't I dying now? How did you do that? What do you mean by that's how you work?"

"That's more than one question," grins Nate. "But I'll still try to answer all of them. First, yes, you can ask me a question." The snake's grin gets wider. "Second, the poison is in you. It changed you. You now no longer need to drink. That's what you asked for. Or, well, technically, you asked to not be thirsty any more - but 'any more' is such a vague term. I decided to make it permanent - now, as long as you live, you shouldn't need to drink much at all. Your body will conserve water very efficiently. You should be able to get enough just from the food you eat - much like a creature of the desert. You've been changed.

"For the third question," Nate continues, "you are still dying. Besides the effects of that methanol in your system, you're a man - and men are mortal. In your current state, I give you no more than about another 50 years. Assuming you get out of this desert, alive, that is." Nate seemed vastly amused at his own humor, and continued his wide grin.

"As for the fourth question," Nate said, looking more serious as far as Jack could tell, as Jack was just now working on his ability to read talking-snake emotions from snake facial features, "first you have to agree to make a second request and become bound by the secrecy, or I can't tell you."

"Wait," joked Jack, "isn't this where you say you could tell me, but you'd have to kill me?"

"I thought that was implied." Nate continued to look serious.

"Ummm...yeah." Jack leaned back a little as he remembered again that he was talking to a fifteen foot poisonous reptile with a reputation for having a nasty temper. "So, what is this 'Bound by Secrecy' stuff, and can you really stop the effects of the methanol?" Jack thought for a second. "And, what do you mean methanol, anyway? I thought these days they use ethanol in wiper fluid, and just denature it?"

"They may, I don't really know," said Nate. "I haven't gotten out in a while. Maybe they do. All I know is that I smell methanol on your breath and on that bottle in your pocket. And the blue color of the liquid when you pulled it out to drink some let me guess that it was wiper fluid. I assume that they still color wiper fluid blue?"

"Yeah, they do," said Jack.

"I figured," replied Nate. "As for being bound by secrecy - with the fulfillment of your next request, you will be bound to say nothing about me, this place, or any of the information I will tell you after that, when you decide to go back out to your kind. You won't be allowed to talk about me, write about me, use sign language, charades, or even act in a way that will lead someone to guess correctly about me. You'll be bound to secrecy. Of course, I'll also ask you to promise not to give me away, and as I'm guessing that you're a man of your word, you'll never test the binding anyway, so you won't notice." Nate said the last part with utter confidence.

Jack, who had always prided himself on being a man of his word, felt a little nervous at this. "Ummm, hey, Nate, who are you? How did you know that? Are you, umm, omniscient, or something?"

Well, Jack," said Nate sadly, "I can't tell you that, unless you make the second request." Nate looked away for a minute, then looked back.

"Umm, well, ok," said Jack, "what is this about a second request? What can I ask for? Are you allowed to tell me that?"

"Sure!" said Nate, brightening. "You're allowed to ask for changes. Changes to yourself. They're like wishes, but they can only affect you. Oh, and before you ask, I can't give you immortality. Or omniscience. Or omnipresence, for that matter. Though I might be able to make you gaseous and yet remain alive, and then you could spread through the atmosphere and sort of be omnipresent. But what good would that be - you still wouldn't be omniscient and thus still could only focus on one thing at a time. Not very useful, at least in my opinion." Nate stopped when he realized that Jack was staring at him.

"Well, anyway," continued Nate, "I'd probably suggest giving you permanent good health. It would negate the methanol now in your system, you'd be immune to most poisons and diseases, and you'd tend to live a very long time, barring accident, of course. And you'll even have a tendency to recover from accidents well. It always seemed like a good choice for a request to me."

"Cure the methanol poisoning, huh?" said Jack. "And keep me healthy for a long time? Hmmm. It doesn't sound bad at that. And it has to be a request about a change to me? I can't ask to be rich, right? Because that's not really a change to me?"

"Right," nodded Nate.

"Could I ask to be a genius and permanently healthy?" Jack asked, hopefully.

"That takes two requests, Jack."

"Yeah, I figured so," said Jack. "But I could ask to be a genius? I could become the smartest scientist in the world? Or the best athlete?"

"Well, I could make you very smart," admitted Nate, "but that wouldn't necessarily make you the best scientist in the world. Or, I could make you very athletic, but it wouldn't necessarily make you the best athlete either. You've heard the saying that 99% of genius is hard work? Well, there's some truth to that. I can give you the talent, but I can't make you work hard. It all depends on what you decide to do with it."

"Hmmm," said Jack. "Ok, I think I understand. And I get a third request, after this one?"

"Maybe," said Nate, "it depends on what you decide then. There are more rules for the third request that I can only tell you about after the second request. You know how it goes." Nate looked like he'd shrug, if he had shoulders.

"Ok, well, since I'd rather not be blind in a day or two, and permanent health doesn't sound bad, then consider that my second request. Officially. Do I need to sign in blood or something?"

"No," said Nate. "Just hold out your hand. Or heel." Nate grinned. "Or whatever part you want me to bite. I have to bite you again. Like I said, that's how it works - the poison, you know," Nate said apologetically.

Jack winced a little and felt his shoulder, where the last bite was. Hey, it didn't hurt any more. Just like Nate had said. That made Jack feel better about the biting business. But still, standing still while a fifteen foot snake sunk it's fangs into you. Jack stood up. Ignoring how good it felt to be able to stand again, and the hunger starting to gnaw at his stomach, Jack tried to decide where he wanted to get bitten. Despite knowing that it wouldn't hurt for long, Jack knew that this wasn't going to be easy.

"Hey, Jack," Nate suddenly said, looking past Jack towards the dunes behind him, "is that someone else coming up over there?"

Jack spun around and looked. Who else could be out here in the middle of nowhere? And did they bring food?

Wait a minute, there was nobody over there. What was Nate...

Jack let out a bellow as he felt two fangs sink into his rear end, through his jeans...

Jack sat down carefully, favoring his more tender buttock. "I would have decided, eventually, Nate. I was just thinking about it. You didn't have to hoodwink me like that."

"I've been doing this a long time, Jack," said Nate, confidently. "You humans have a hard time sitting still and letting a snake bite you - especially one my size. And besides, admit it - it's only been a couple of minutes and it already doesn't hurt any more, does it? That's because of the health benefit with this one. I told you that you'd heal quickly now."

"Yeah, well, still," said Jack, "it's the principle of the thing. And nobody likes being bitten in the butt! Couldn't you have gotten my calf or something instead?"

"More meat in the typical human butt," replied Nate. "And less chance you accidentally kick me or move at the last second."

"Yeah, right. So, tell me all of these wonderful secrets that I now qualify to hear," answered Jack.

"Ok," said Nate. "Do you want to ask questions first, or do you want me to just start talking?"

"Just talk," said Jack. "I'll sit here and try to not think about food."

"We could go try to rustle up some food for you first, if you like," answered Nate.

"Hey! You didn't tell me you had food around here, Nate!" Jack jumped up. "What do we have? Am I in walking distance to town? Or can you magically whip up food along with your other powers?" Jack was almost shouting with excitement. His stomach had been growling for hours.

"I was thinking more like I could flush something out of its hole and bite it for you, and you could skin it and eat it. Assuming you have a knife, that is," replied Nate, with the grin that Jack was starting to get used to.

"Ugh," said Jack, sitting back down. "I think I'll pass. I can last a little longer before I get desperate enough to eat desert rat, or whatever else it is you find out here. And there's nothing to burn - I'd have to eat it raw. No thanks. Just talk."

"Ok," replied Nate, still grinning. "But I'd better hurry, before you start looking at me as food.

Nate reared back a little, looked around for a second, and then continued. "You, Jack, are sitting in the middle of the Garden of Eden."

Jack looked around at the sand and dunes and then looked back at Nate sceptically.

"Well, that's the best I can figure it, anyway, Jack," said Nate. "Stand up and look at the symbol on the rock here." Nate gestured around the dark stone they were both sitting on with his nose.

Jack stood up and looked. Carved into the stone in a bas-relief was a representation of a large tree. The angled-pole that Nate was wrapped around was coming out of the trunk of the tree, right below where the main branches left the truck to reach out across the stone. It was very well done - it looked more like a tree had been reduced to almost two dimensions and embedded in the stone than it did like a carving.

Jack walked around and looked at the details in the fading light of the setting sun. He wished he'd looked at it while the sun was higher in the sky.

Wait! The sun was setting! That meant he was going to have to spend another night out here! Arrrgh!

Jack looked out across the desert for a little bit, and then came back and stood next to Nate. "In all the excitement, I almost forgot, Nate," said Jack. "Which way is it back to town? And how far? I'm eventually going to have to head back - I'm not sure I'll be able to survive by eating raw desert critters for long. And even if I can, I'm not sure I'll want to."

"It's about 30 miles that way." Nate pointed, with the rattle on his tail this time. As far as Jack could tell, it was a direction at right angles to the way he'd been going when he was crawling here. "But that's 30 miles by the way the crow flies. It's about 40 by the way a man walks. You should be able to do it in about half a day with your improved endurance, if you head out early tomorrow, Jack."

Jack looked out the way the snake had pointed for a few seconds more, and then sat back down. It was getting dark. Not much he could do about heading out right now. And besides, Nate was just about to get to the interesting stuff. "Garden of Eden? As best as you can figure it?"

"Well, yeah, as best as I and Samuel could figure it anyway," said Nate. "He figured that the story just got a little mixed up. You know, snake, in a 'tree', offering 'temptations', making bargains. That kind stuff. But he could never quite figure out how the Hebrews found out about this spot from across the ocean. He worried about that for a while."

"Garden of Eden, hunh?" said Jack. "How long have you been here, Nate?"

"No idea, really," replied Nate. "A long time. It never occurred to me to count years, until recently, and by then, of course, it was too late. But I do remember when this whole place was green, so I figure it's been thousands of years, at least."

"So, are you the snake that tempted Eve?" said Jack.

"Beats me," said Nate. "Maybe. I can't remember if the first one of your kind that I talked to was female or not, and I never got a name, but it could have been. And I suppose she could have considered my offer to grant requests a 'temptation', though I've rarely had refusals."

"Well, umm, how did you get here then? And why is that white pole stuck out of the stone there?" asked Jack.

"Dad left me here. Or, I assume it was my dad. It was another snake - much bigger than I was back then. I remember talking to him, but I don't remember if it was in a language, or just kind of understanding what he wanted. But one day, he brought me to this stone, told me about it, and asked me to do something for him. I talked it over with him for a while, then agreed. I've been here ever since.

"What is this place?" said Jack. "And what did he ask you to do?"

"Well, you see this pole here, sticking out of the stone?" Nate loosened his coils around the tilted white pole and showed Jack where it descended into the stone. The pole was tilted at about a 45 degree angle and seemed to enter the stone in an eighteen inch slot cut into the stone. Jack leaned over and looked. The slot was dark and the pole went down into it as far as Jack could see in the dim light. Jack reached out to touch the pole, but Nate was suddenly there in the way.

"You can't touch that yet, Jack," said Nate.

"Why not?" asked Jack.

"I haven't explained it to you yet," replied Nate.

"Well, it kinda looks like a lever or something," said Jack. "You'd push it that way, and it would move in the slot."

"Yep, that's what it is," replied Nate.

"What does it do?" asked Jack. "End the world?"

"Oh, no," said Nate. "Nothing that drastic. It just ends humanity. I call it 'The Lever of Doom'." For the last few words Nate had used a deeper, ringing voice. He tried to look serious for a few seconds, and then gave up and grinned.

Jack was initially startled by Nate's pronouncement, but when Nate grinned Jack laughed. "Ha! You almost had me fooled for a second there. What does it really do?"

"Oh, it really ends humanity, like I said," smirked Nate. "I just thought the voice I used was funny, didn't you?"

Nate continued to grin.

"A lever to end humanity?" asked Jack. "What in the world is that for? Why would anyone need to end humanity?"

"Well," replied Nate, "I get the idea that maybe humanity was an experiment. Or maybe the Big Guy just thought, that if humanity started going really bad, there should be a way to end it. I'm not really sure. All I know are the rules, and the guesses that Samuel and I had about why it's here. I
didn't think to ask back when I started here."

"Rules? What rules?" asked Jack.

"The rules are that I can't tell anybody about it or let them touch it unless they agree to be bound to secrecy by a bite. And that only one human can be bound in that way at a time. That's it." explained Nate.

Jack looked somewhat shocked. "You mean that I could pull the lever now? You'd let me end humanity?"

"Yep," replied Nate, "if you want to." Nate looked at Jack carefully. "Do you want to, Jack?"

"Umm, no." said Jack, stepping a little further back from the lever. "Why in the world would anyone want to end humanity? It'd take a psychotic to want that! Or worse, a suicidal psychotic, because it would kill him too, wouldn't it?"

"Yep," replied Nate, "being as he'd be human too."

"Has anyone ever seriously considered it?" asked Nate. "Any of those bound to secrecy, that is?"

"Well, of course, I think they've all seriously considered it at one time or another. Being given that kind of responsibility makes you sit down and think, or so I'm told. Samuel considered it several times. He'd often get disgusted with humanity, come out here, and just hold the lever for a while. But he never pulled it. Or you wouldn't be here." Nate grinned some more.

Jack sat down, well back from the lever. He looked thoughtful and puzzled at the same time. After a bit, he said, "So this makes me the Judge of humanity? I get to decide whether they keep going or just end? Me?"

"That seems to be it," agreed Nate.

"What kind of criteria do I use to decide?" said Jack. "How do I make this decision? Am I supposed to decide if they're good? Or too many of them are bad? Or that they're going the wrong way? Is there a set of rules for that?"

"Nope," replied Nate. "You pretty much just have to decide on your own. It's up to you, however you want to decide it. I guess that you're just supposed to know."

"But what if I get mad at someone? Or some girl dumps me and I feel horrible? Couldn't I make a mistake? How do I know that I won't screw up?" protested Jack.

Nate gave his kind of snake-like shrug again. "You don't. You just have to try your best, Jack."

Jack sat there for a while, staring off into the desert that was rapidly getting dark, chewing on a fingernail.

Suddenly, Jack turned around and looked at the snake. "Nate, was Samuel the one bound to this before me?"

"Yep," replied Nate. "He was a good guy. Talked to me a lot. Taught me to read and brought me books. I think I still have a good pile of them buried in the sand around here somewhere. I still miss him. He died a few months ago."

"Sounds like a good guy," agreed Jack. "How did he handle this, when you first told him. What did he do?"

"Well," said Nate, "he sat down for a while, thought about it for a bit, and then asked me some questions, much like you're doing."

"What did he ask you, if you're allowed to tell me?" asked Jack.

"He asked me about the third request," replied Nate.

"Aha!" It was Jack's turn to grin. "And what did you tell him?"

"I told him the rules for the third request. That to get the third request you have to agree to this whole thing. That if it ever comes to the point that you really think that humanity should be ended, that you'll come here and end it. You won't avoid it, and you won't wimp out." Nate looked serious again. "And you'll be bound to do it too, Jack."

"Hmmm." Jack looked back out into the darkness for a while.

Nate watched him, waiting.

"Nate," continued Jack, quietly, eventually. "What did Samuel ask for with his third request?"

Nate sounded like he was grinning again as he replied, also quietly, "Wisdom, Jack. He asked for wisdom. As much as I could give him."

"Ok," said Jack, suddenly, standing up and facing away from Nate, "give it to me.

Nate looked at Jack's backside. "Give you what, Jack?"

"Give me that wisdom. The same stuff that Samuel asked for. If it helped him, maybe it'll help me too." Jack turned his head to look back over his shoulder at Nate. "It did help him, right?"

"He said it did," replied Nate. "But he seemed a little quieter afterward. Like he had a lot to think about."

"Well, yeah, I can see that," said Jack. "So, give it to me." Jack turned to face away from Nate again, bent over slightly and tensed up.

Nate watched Jack tense up with a little exasperation. If he bit Jack now, Jack would likely jump out of his skin and maybe hurt them both.

"You remember that you'll be bound to destroy humanity if it ever looks like it needs it, right Jack?" asked Nate, shifting position.

"Yeah, yeah, I got that," replied Jack, eyes squeezed tightly shut and body tense, not noticing the change in direction of Nate's voice.

"And," continued Nate, from his new position, "do you remember that you'll turn bright purple, and grow big horns and extra eyes?"

"Yeah, yeah...Hey, wait a minute!" said Jack, opening his eyes, straightening up and turning around. "Purple?!" He didn't see Nate there. With the moonlight Jack could see that the lever extended up from its slot in the rock without the snake wrapped around it.

Jack heard, from behind him, Nate's "Just Kidding!" right before he felt the now familiar piercing pain, this time in the other buttock.

Jack sat on the edge of the dark stone in the rapidly cooling air, his feet extending out into the sand. He stared out into the darkness, listening to the wind stir the sand, occasionally rubbing his butt where he'd been recently bitten.

Nate had left for a little while, had come back with a desert-rodent-shaped bulge somewhere in his middle, and was now wrapped back around the lever, his tongue flicking out into the desert night's air the only sign that he was still awake.

Occasionally Jack, with his toes absentmindedly digging in the sand while he thought, would ask Nate a question without turning around.

"Nate, do accidents count?"

Nate lifted his head a little bit. "What do you mean, Jack?"

Jack tilted his head back like he was looking at the stars. "You know, accidents. If I accidentally fall on the lever, without meaning to, does that still wipe out humanity?"

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure it does, Jack. I'd suggest you be careful about that if you start feeling wobbly," said Nate with some amusement.

A little later - "Does it have to be me that pulls the lever?" asked Jack.

"That's the rule, Jack. Nobody else can pull it," answered Nate.

"No," Jack shook his head, "I meant does it have to be my hand? Could I pull the lever with a rope tied around it? Or push it with a stick? Or throw a rock?"

"Yes, those should work," replied Nate. "Though I'm not sure how complicated you could get. Samuel thought about trying to build some kind of remote control for it once, but gave it up. Everything he'd build would be gone by the next sunrise, if it was touching the stone, or over it. I told him that in the past others that had been bound had tried to bury the lever so they wouldn't be tempted to pull it, but every time the stones or sand or whatever had disappeared."

"Wow," said Jack, "Cool." Jack leaned back until only his elbows kept him off of the stone and looked up into the sky.

"Nate, how long did Samuel live? One of his wishes was for health too, right?" asked Jack.

"Yes," replied Nate, "it was. He lived 167 years, Jack."

"Wow, 167 years. That's almost 140 more years I'll live if I live as long. Do you know what he died of, Nate?"

"He died of getting tired of living, Jack," Nate said, sounding somewhat sad.

Jack turned his head to look at Nate in the starlight.

Nate looked back. "Samuel knew he wasn't going to be able to stay in society. He figured that they'd eventually see him still alive and start questioning it, so he decided that he'd have to disappear after a while. He faked his death once, but changed his mind - he decided it was too early and he could stay for a little longer. He wasn't very fond of mankind, but he liked the attention. Most of the time, anyway.

"His daughter and then his wife dying almost did him in though. He didn't stay in society much longer after that. He eventually came out here to spend time talking to me and thinking about pulling the lever. A few months ago he told me he'd had enough. It was his time."

"And then he just died?" asked Jack.

Nate shook his head a little. "He made his forth request, Jack. There's only one thing you can ask for the fourth request. The last bite.

After a bit Nate continued, "He told me that he was tired, that it was his time. He reassured me that someone new would show up soon, like they always had.

After another pause, Nate finished, "Samuel's body disappeared off the stone with the sunrise."

Jack lay back down and looked at the sky, leaving Nate alone with his memories. It was a long time until Jack's breathing evened out into sleep.

Jack woke with the sunrise the next morning. He was a little chilled with the morning desert air, but overall was feeling pretty good. Well, except that his stomach was grumbling and he wasn't willing to eat raw desert rat.

So, after getting directions to town from Nate, making sure he knew how to get back, and reassuring Nate that he'd be back soon, Jack started the long walk back to town. With his new health and Nate's good directions, he made it back easily.

Jack caught a bus back to the city, and showed up for work the next day, little worse for the wear and with a story about getting lost in the desert and walking back out. Within a couple of days Jack had talked a friend with a tow truck into going back out into the desert with him to fetch the SUV. They found it after a couple of hours of searching and towed it back without incident. Jack was careful not to even look in the direction of Nate's lever, though their path back didn't come within sight of it.

Before the next weekend, Jack had gone to a couple of stores, including a book store, and had gotten his SUV back from the mechanic, with a warning to avoid any more joyriding in the desert. On Saturday, Jack headed back to see Nate.

Jack parked a little way out of the small town near Nate, loaded up his new backpack with camping gear and the things he was bringing for Nate, and then started walking. He figured that walking would leave the least trail, and he knew that while not many people camped in the desert, it wasn't unheard of, and shouldn't really raise suspicions.

Jack had brought more books for Nate - recent books, magazines, newspapers. Some things that would catch Nate up with what was happening in the world, others that were just good books to read. He spent the weekend with Nate, and then headed out again, telling Nate that he'd be back again soon, but that he had things to do first.

Over four months later Jack was back to see Nate again. This time he brought a laptop with him - a specially modified laptop. It had a solar recharger, special filters and seals to keep out the sand, a satellite link-up, and a special keyboard and joystick that Jack hoped that a fifteen-foot rattlesnake would be able to use. And, it had been hacked to not give out its location to the satellite.

After that Jack could e-mail Nate to keep in touch, but still visited him fairly regularly - at least once or twice a year.

After the first year, Jack quit his job. For some reason, with the wisdom he'd been given, and the knowledge that he could live for over 150 years, working in a nine to five job for someone else didn't seem that worthwhile any more. Jack went back to school.

Eventually, Jack started writing. Perhaps because of the wisdom, or perhaps because of his new perspective, he wrote well. People liked what he wrote, and he became well known for it. After a time, Jack bought an RV and started traveling around the country for book signings and readings.

But, he still remembered to drop by and visit Nate occasionally.

On one of the visits Nate seemed quieter than usual. Not that Nate had been a fountain of joy lately. Jack's best guess was that Nate was still missing Samuel, and though Jack had tried, he still hadn't been able to replace Samuel in Nate's eyes. Nate had been getting quieter each visit. But on this visit Nate didn't even speak when Jack walked up to the lever. He nodded at Jack, and then went back to staring into the desert. Jack, respecting Nate's silence, sat down and waited.

After a few minutes, Nate spoke. "Jack, I have someone to introduce you to."

Jack looked surprised. "Someone to introduce me to?" Jack looked around, and then looked carefully back at Nate. "This something to do with the Big Guy?

"No, no," replied Nate. "This is more personal. I want you to meet my son." Nate looked over at the nearest sand dune. "Sammy!"

Jack watched as a four foot long desert rattlesnake crawled from behind the dune and up to the stone base of the lever.

"Yo, Jack," said the new, much smaller snake.

"Yo, Sammy" replied Jack. Jack looked at Nate. "Named after Samuel, I assume?"

Nate nodded. "Jack, I've got a favor to ask you. Could you show Sammy around for me?" Nate unwrapped himself from the lever and slithered over to the edge of the stone and looked across the sands. "When Samuel first told me about the world, and brought me books and pictures, I wished that I could go see it. I wanted to see the great forests, the canyons, the cities, even the other deserts, to see if they felt and smelled the same. I want my son to have that chance - to see the world. Before he becomes bound here like I have been.


continued next post (too long)

TLDRWWIHY
Too long, DID read. Wasn't worth it. Hate you.

[Yora]

Why do anarcho-communists drink herbal tea?

Because proper tea is theft.

Ha!

Took me a moment. :smallbiggrin:

[Yora]

A pirate walks into a bar with a steering wheel stuffed down the front of his pants.
Barman: Excuse me, do you know you have a steering wheel in your pants?
Pirate: Arr, it's touchin' me balls!
That's not funny.

And why not tell the punchline right away?
Arr, it's driving me nuts!
From QI:

"From an Irish newspaper: Cork man drowns!"
"His name was Bob."

[Juggling Goth]

My favourite pirate joke (and yes, it is a valid sub-category):

Why are pirates so cool?

I don't know, why are pirates so cool?

Me neither. They just ARRRRRRRRR!

[Reluctance]

An Englishman, a Frenchman, a Fräulein and a Russian Hussar are all aboard an airplane. Suddenly the plane starts falling and it is revealed that there is only one parachute. The Hussar starts putting the parachute on. The Englishman and the Frenchman exclaim: "Sir, there is a lady here!". The Hussar, looking at his watch nervously, says: "Think we'll have enough time?".

That reminds me of a nominally religious and very inappropriate joke. In it's place, I'll include a nominally religious and rather appropriate one:

A minister, a rabbi and an imam all walk into a bar. The bartender looks up and asks "Is this some sort of joke?"

[FearlessGnome]

I think the top swedish joke went, "a dog walks up to the counter to senda telegram. The clerk says they have a deal going on. 10 words for $1. The dog says great, can you send this? 'woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof' the clerk says you can snd 1 more woof and it won't cost any extra. The dog looks at the clerk and sys, 'that wouldn't make any sense at all.'"That's just awful. A proper Swedish joke:

A Dane, a Norwegian and a Swede walk into a bar. They order drinks and sit down. As they sip their beer the Dane suddenly frowns. "Say, isn't that Jesus there by the bar?"
The other two look over, and say "It looks like him..."
They sit for a minute more, but then the Dane stands up. He walks over to the bar and ask "I'm sorry, I just have to ask... Are you Jesus?"
Jesus smiles at him. "Yes I am."
The Dane stands in awe for a moment. "Could you... Could you touch my back? I have such aches..."
"Of course my child." Jesus touches the man's back and heals him.
The Dane returns to his friends and tells them what just happened. Immediately the Norwegian hurries over. "Excuse me, are you Jesus? Could you... Could you heal my hand? I used to play the piano, but I hurt my hand, and now I can no longer play like I used to."
"Of course, my child," Jesus says, and touches the Norwegian's hand. The Norwegian weeps with joy as he returns to his friends.
After being told about this, the Swede sits back and sips his beer. A few minutes pass, but he does not walk over to Jesus.
Eventually, Jesus comes to him instead.
"Hello, my child."
The Swede flies up from his chair and backs away. "Don't touch me, I'm on sickness benefit!"

[No brains]

Jesus came back and says he agreed with Hitler? I did Nazi that coming.

[noparlpf]

One hydrogen says to another, "I think I lost an electron!"
The second asks, "Are you sure?"
The first replies, "Yes, I'm positive!"

Edit: All of my jokes are bad chemistry jokes. I feel like a nerd.

[Elemental]

There's nothing wrong with a few bad chemistry jokes.

Drat... Now I have to come up with something funny.
Here goes:
A plane carrying a businessman, a politician, a hiker and a doctor were flying over the Swiss alps, when the pilot came out of the cockpit and informed them that they were soon going to crash, and that they only had four parachutes.
Apologising for being a coward, he put on one parachute, and threw the other three into the cabin.
The doctor at once claimed that he had many patients who required his aid, so grabbed the first parachute, put it on, and jumped out.
The politician claimed that he was the most important leader of the day, so grabbed the second parachute and jumped out.
The businessman and the hiker looked at each other, and the businessman said:
"I guess it's either you or me, and I have no children and my wife died several years ago, so I guess you can have it."
To which the hiker responded:
"Don't be silly. There's one for each of us. The most important leader in history grabbed my backpack."

[NoobForHire]

All of my jokes are bad chemistry jokes. I feel like a nerd.

I would tell a chemistry joke, but all the good ones argon.

:smalltongue: Sorry, had to.

[KoboldRevenge]

One of my favorite jokes.

Friend telling a joke: So a Irishman, a Swede, and a Pole walking a bar and-

Me: Hahhaha!

Friend: What are you laughing at? I didn't finish the joke.

Me: I just found It funny to picture a Pole walking!:smallbiggrin:

[noparlpf]

I would tell a chemistry joke, but all the good ones argon.

:smalltongue: Sorry, had to.

I love waking up to this thread.

[Elemental]

Hmm... A joke...

A drunk in the lobby of a hotel proclaims that he can take on anyone in the establisment.
The elevator man takes him up.

That was so incredibly lame.
*goes into self-imposed exile on Mercury*

[Dogmantra]

One hydrogen says to another, "I think I lost an electron!"
The second asks, "Are you sure?"
The first replies, "Yes, I'm positive!"

Edit: All of my jokes are bad chemistry jokes. I feel like a nerd.

Pair of ions talking in a bar, one's drowning its sorrows and tells the other "Ever since I lost my job I feel like I just can't support all these extra electrons I picked up."
The second replies "Oh come on, don't be so negative!"

[noparlpf]

Thank you, The Internet. Now I have some bad chemistry and bio pickup lines too.

"If I were an enzyme, I'd be DNA helicase so I could unzip your genes."

"I wish I were adenine because then I could get paired with U."

Same site gave me some really bad ones and then some that don't even make sense.

[Ashen Lilies]

Thank you, The Internet. Now I have some bad chemistry and bio pickup lines too.

"If I were an enzyme, I'd be DNA helicase so I could unzip your genes."



Okay, I NEED to remember this one. :biggrin:

[noparlpf]

Okay, I NEED to remember this one. :biggrin:

I'm almost feeling better enough to leave the dorm today (I had some nasty bug or something yesterday). I hope I run into my per-veterinary friend. I am 90% sure she'll kick me. The other 10% is on her hitting me.

[dehro]

an old one..and no, I don't believe that the south is riddled with racists. I hope we can all take the joke for what it is and laugh about it?
anyway, here goes:
Hymie Goldberg was a string salesman from New York. His boss sent him to the deep South in order to open some new accounts for the company, but Hymie encountered discrimination everywhere he went and was unable to do any business. Finally, in Mississippi, an anti-Semitic store owner said to Hymie, "Okay, Jew, I'll buy as much string as reaches from the end of your Jewish nose to the tip of your Jewish prick."

A month later, the same store owner was surprised to receive four hundred cartons of grade "A" string. Inside was a bill for twenty-five thousand dollars and a note which said: Thank you for your generous order. I hope we can do business again soon. Signed: Hymie Goldberg. Living in New York, circumcised in Warsaw.

[Othesemo]

This is the best music joke ever created-

C, E flat and G walk into a bar and the bartender says: “Sorry we don’t serve minors”, so E-flat leaves, and C and G have an open fifth between them. After a few drinks, the fifth is diminished and G is out flat. F comes in and tries to augment the situation, but is not sharp enough.

D comes in and heads for the bathroom saying, “Excuse me. I’ll just be a second.” Then A comes in, but the bartender is not convinced that this relative of C is not a minor. Then the bartender notices B-flat hiding at the end of the bar and says, “Get out! You’re the seventh minor I’ve found in this bar tonight.”

E-Flat comes back the next night in a three-piece suit with nicely shined shoes. The bartender says, “you’re looking sharp tonight. Come on in, this could be a major development.” Sure enough, E-flat soon takes off his suit and everything else, and is au natural.

Eventually C sobers up and realizes in horror that he’s under a rest. C is brought to trial, found guilty of contributing to the diminution of a minor, and is sentenced to 10 years of D.S. without Coda at an upscale correctional facility.

Also, here's an (adult) knock-knock joke. It's a bit juvenile, but it still makes people laugh (and or edge away nervously).

Knock-knock!
Who's there?
Interrupting serial rapist!

[Pheehelm]

A couple I've done before and one I haven't.

So Heisenberg is driving along when a cop pulls him over for speeding. The cop asks, "Sir, do you know how fast you were going?" And Heisenberg answers, "Yes, but I have no idea where I am!""So Dad, how do you like our cattle ranch?"
"Well, I like what you and your brothers are doing, but why'd you call it Focus?"
"'Cuz it's where the sons raise meat."Two guys walk into a chemistry bar. One says "I'll have some H2O." The other guy nods and says "I'll have some H2O too."

[noparlpf]

A couple I've done before and one I haven't.

So Heisenberg is driving along when a cop pulls him over for speeding. The cop asks, "Sir, do you know how fast you were going?" And Heisenberg answers, "Yes, but I have no idea where I am!"

Reminds me of the one on xkcd a while back, where Heisenberg's wife can't find the car keys or something, and he says she must know too much about their relative velocity.


Two guys walk into a chemistry bar. One says "I'll have some H2O." The other guy nods and says "I'll have some H2O too."

Ouch.

[Science Officer]

The Buddha goes up to a hotdog seller and say's : "make me one with everything "

The hotdog vendor provides the dog, with all the dressings, and asks for $3.75.
The Buddha gives him a five dollar bill and asks for his change. The hotdog vendor assumes a beatific expression and replies, "But Buddha, surely you know that change comes from within!"

This joke is just an excuse to say "The hotdog vendor assumes a beatific expression"

spoilered for length, sort of.

A bear walks in to a convenience store. He says, "I'd like two bags of jerky....


...

...

...

...

...and a Coke."
The man behind the counter asks, "Why the large pause?"
And the bear says, "I'm a bear."

They violate causality.
Have you heard the joke about tachyons?

and lastly,

Why are Floridians so bad at trigonometry?
Because Florida is the Shunsine state.

[Grue Bait]

One of my favorite jokes.

Friend telling a joke: So a Irishman, a Swede, and a Pole walking a bar and-

Me: Hahhaha!

Friend: What are you laughing at? I didn't finish the joke.

Me: I just found It funny to picture a Pole walking!:smallbiggrin:

I think this was in a Pearls Before Swine strip once.

And here's mine.

Two guys were walking through the woods when they came upon an abandoned mine shaft. They peer down into the darkness and they wonder how deep it is. One of them remembers a way to measure the depth. He turns to the othet and says "I'll just toss down this pebble and start counting. When I hear it land, I can figure out how deep it is."
So they toss down the pebble and listen.
...
They don't hear anything. The one says "Okay we'll just try something bigger" So he grabs a fist-sized rock and tosses it down.
...
Still nothing. So the two men gradually throw bigger and bigger rocks, and they don't hear a thing. The second man sees a log and he points it out to the first. So they drag it over to the edge and get ready to push it in. The first turns and says "Look if we don't hear anything, I give up" They tip it in and listen
...
Absolutely nothing. Frustrated, the two men turn around to continue their walk, but right as they turn, this goat flies through the air, and jumps down the shaft. The now very confused men look down the shaft, but they know there's nothing they can do. So they continue their walk. A few minutes later, they come upon a farmer, who's scratching his head.
"Is there anything we can help you with, sir?" asks the first man.
"Yeah," replies the farmer. "I had a goat here a minute ago, but when I turned my back, it disappeared."
"Well, we saw a goat a few minutes ago, but it flew past us and jumped down this mine shaft. Could that be it?"
"No, that couldn't have been mine. Mine was tied to a log."

Spoilered for length.

[The_Admiral]

A religious joke the old parish priest told


A Rabbi, an Iman and a Priest got into an accident. They got out of the car and began arguing. The priest went to his boot to check the shipment of sacramental wine. Seeing that it was not damaged in the accident, he said "Bother's look at this bottle, it is unbroken. I believe this is a sign from god that we should be reconciled. We shall each drink a third from this bottle."

He then passed it to the Iman who drank a third of the wine who passed it to the Rabbi who drank another third. When the bottle was passed to the priest, he took it, and sat on it. When asked what he was doing, he replied "waiting for the police."

[messy1349]

wow, most of these are terrible. :smallbiggrin:

so here's my terrible contribution:

a homeless man gets into the back of a taxi in new york city.

he says "is there room up there for two six-packs and a pizza?"

the driver says "sure."

BLLLLEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGHHHHH!!!!!!

[V'icternus]

I was really expecting a certain someone who I'm stealing this from to swoop in and deliver it, but as this has not occurred, I warn you. You will remember this. Please forgive me.

It is best read aloud, and best to another person.

There once was a soldier, a grizzled veteran of many wars against the foreign Dantar and Eppian tribes. And as he fought, he made many sacrifices--he lost an eye to a spear, his teeth to a gauntlet, and his trusty sword grew pitted and rusted. Then the war ended, and he was adrift, known everywhere as the one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword.

One day, he decides he needs something to complete him--a wife. He thinks on the matter, then decides that a soldier of his stature deserves only the best--the flaxen-haired daughter of the king himself. And so, determined as he was to win the king's daughter, he went to the castle.

As he arrived, he told the royal arranger, "I want to see the king."

The arranger said, "the king is seeing nobody."

And he said, "Not even the one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword?"

And the arranger asked: "Well, that depends. Are you the one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword?"

And the one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword said: "Yes. Yes, I am the one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword."

The arranger said, "Alright, then, he can see you."

And so the one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword stepped into the king's chambers. The king regarded him regally--as kings do--and asked him, "What business have ye here, o man of a single eye, a single tooth, and a withered blade?"

And the one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword said, "Well, my lord, I wondered if I might have your daughter in marriage."

The king said nothing at first, lost in thought. Finally, he said, "Well, soldier, this is quite a difficult request. Truly, you are valorous. You have slain many men of Dantar and Eppian in your day. Still...my daugher is a fair jewel. There are few of her like out there. There are, however, many suitors--many of whom have both eyes, and many teeth, and swords that gleam like sunlight."

And the one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword grinned his one-toothed grin, and winked his single eye. "Well, my lord, I may have one eye, and I may have one tooth, and my sword might be rusted and old, but my one eye is good, and my one tooth is sharp, and my sword has never failed me yet. I promise you, my lord--all of these may yet serve you well."

And the king thought on this. Finally, he said, "Well..."


"Very well, solider, I will give you your chance. I will let you try for the hand of my daughter. But before I am convinced of your worth, you must complete for me three tasks. Do you understand?"

And the one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword nodded, and grinned, and cried, "Yes!"

The king smiled benevolently, as kings do, and said: "Alright, then. Here is your first task.

"The Eppians have acquired a saintly relic--a chalice made of silver, once possessed by Saint Crane. You must go behind lines and retrieve for me this chalice."

And so, the one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword set off for Eppian lands.

It took him many days and nights to cross the dunes to Eppia. He would go days at a time without food or water, driven by love and honor alone. He avoided the soldiers of Eppia, careful not to be seen.

Finally, he came across the sacred chalice, being transported in a carriage. Strangely, the carriage was made of canvas, but the one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword paid this detail no heed.

He knew it would be difficult to acquire the chalice. It was guarded heavily. But he thought of the princess, and he mustered his courage, and he entered the carriage.


He raced past the guards, snatched the chalice of St. Crane, and dove out of the canvas carriage. Having accomplished this, he returned to the king.

He came to the king, the triumphant one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword, and said, "My lord, I have for you the Silver Chalice of St. Crane, taken from the Eppians!"

And the king smiled, as kings do, and took the chalice. "Well done. It seems I have underestimated the keenness of your one eye, and the truth of your rusted blade. Still, there are two more tasks. Are you ready for the next?"

And the one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword said, "Yes, my lord, I am ready!"

The king smiled.


"Very well. This may sound strange, but trust me--it is important. A boat on Dantar waters carries a bottle with them. This bottle is made of jade, and bears the letter "T" on its stem. You must get the bottle from the Dantar boat and bring it back to me."

The one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword nodded, and grinned his one-toothed grin, and set off.

It took the one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword many days to reach the Dantar boat, for it was swift, and he was but a lone seaman. But his efforts were not in vain--finally, under dead of night, he came to the side of the ship.

The one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword placed a gnarled hand on the side of the boat, and thought long and hard about what he was going to do. There would be many enemy seamen, and he would have to fight many before he could escape with the strange jade bottle. But then, he thought of the princess, and he boarded the ship.


He flung himself aboard, sword at the ready, hacking through dozens like a madman. They came in waves, but the one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword was a skilled soldier indeed, and they were no match for him. Finally, he managed to break through the mob, kick down a door, spot the bottle with his sharp eye, grab it, and fling himself overboard. It took him many days to get to shore, but finally, he arrived--bottle clutched in his weathered hand.

And so, the one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword returned to the king, and said, "Behold! For I have taken the jade bottle marked with a "T" from the Dantar boat!"

And the king laughed, as kings do, and took the bottle. "Excellent work, good solider! Excellent indeed! There is but one more task. It seems minor, of course, given what you have been through, but it is a task nonetheless."

And the one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword smiled his one-toothed smile, and said, "My lord, I am ready!"

And the king took a breath.


"Good one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword, this task is simple. There is a blue sapphire at the bottom of a nearby cave, the Cave of Ant'erior. Retrieve it--but beware, for there are wolves below."

And the one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword raised his rusty sword, and cried, "It shall be done!"

The one-eyed-one-toothed soldier with a rusty metal sword set off, traveling many miles to the cave of Ant'erior. Finally, he came to the cave mouth.

At first, he was frightened, for there were wolves below that could tear the flesh from an ordinary man. But then, he thought of the princess, and he grew determined. He set off into the cave.


He was devoured by wolves.

[Elemental]

I was really expecting a certain someone who I'm stealing this from to swoop in and deliver it, but as this has not occurred, I warn you. You will remember this. Please forgive me.

It is best read aloud, and best to another person.

*Removed for reasons of length*

You sir, have made my week!

[danzibr]

How dirty of jokes can we tell here? I don't want to offend, but all my funny jokes are dirty.

[Anarion]

Bookmarking this thread for future use.

And here's my own contribution.


A guy comes home and finds that his dog isn't responding to him. Thinking the dog is sick, he takes the dog to the vet right away. The vet brings in the dog, takes a look at it, pokes a bit, then goes into his office. He comes back out with a cat, which he allows to walk around the dog for a bit then takes it away.

Finally, the vet turns to the man and says, "sir, I can confirm that your dog is dead. That will be $1010 dollars."
"$1010 dollars!, says the man. What for, you barely did anything?!"
"Ah," replied the vet, "it's $10 for the visit, and $1000 for the cat scan."

[Protoneiko]

Time For some Terrible ones.

How do your make an Octopus laugh?

With Ten Tickles

did you hear about the Scarecrow, he won an award?

He was Outstanding is his field

Whats blue and sitting on a toilet?

A police man doing his duty

(this one is terrible) what kind of bee's make milk?

boobies

I told you terrible....

[MikelaC1]

My best anti-Maple Leafs joke.

The pope happens to be visiting Florida, and as he is walking on the beach, he sees two men in boat, wearing Senators jerseys, struggling to help a man dressed in Leafs jersey into their boat as he is being attacked by a shark.
When the two men manage to get the third into the boat, the pope waves them to come over, and says to them, "on my visit to North America I have learned that there is great animosity between Senator fans and Leaf fans, but you two have proved that in spite of this, you all still filled with compassion for your fellow man. Go in peace, my sons".
After the pope leaves, the first Sens fan turns to the other and says "who was that?"
The second fan says, "that was the pope, he knows everything about religion."
The first fan replies "well, he may know everything about religion, but he doesnt know a thing about shark fishing. Hows the bait holding up?"

[Anarion]

(Bad) Musician joke time

When setting up your band, how do you tell if the stage is level?
The percussionist drools out of both sides of his mouth

What do a percussionist and a philosopher have in common?
Both see time as an abstract concept

What's the definition of a trombone?
Wind-driven, manually operated pitch approximator

How do you turn a trombone into a French Horn?
stick your hand in the bell and miss a lot of notes

What's the difference between a lawnmower and a saxophone?
If you lend your neighbor the mower, you'll want it back.

What do you have when there are 50 violists buried up to their necks in sand?
Not enough sand

Okay I'll stop now.

[KoboldRevenge]

I think this was in a Pearls Before Swine strip once.

Yep that's where I got it.

Here be another: One day there was an old man sitting on his back porch. There was a creek that passed by his fence that there was a younger man fishing in.

Suddenly the young man had a bite and pulled out a big salmon, but It flew over his head and into the old man's lawn.

The man came over and said "Hey can you give me my fish?"

The old man said "Oh no, thats my fish now. It landed in my yard. It's my property"

The man yelled "What, you can't do that! Give me my fish!"

The old man said "Alright, listen I'll compromise with you. How about you and I punch each other in the face as hard as we can, until one of us gives up?"
The man thinking he could outlast the old man agrees.

"Okay me first." Says the Old man. He winds up and punches the Young man as hard as he can in the face.

The young man after he recovers "Okay *pant* my turn right?"

The Old man says "Oh no, you can have the fish."

[AsteriskAmp]

Orchestra jokes:
What do you do with a violinist unable to produce melodies?
You take the violin away, put a box under them, and start calling them director.

What do you do with a director unable to keep tempo?
You give him another stick and send him to the drums

What do you do with a percussionist unable to keep his hands from shaking?
You take away his sticks, send him to the piano and call what he plays stride.

[Kindablue]

Orchestra jokes:
What do you do with a violinist unable to produce melodies?
You take the violin away, put a box under them, and start calling them director.

What do you do with a director unable to keep tempo?
You give him another stick and send him to the drums

What do you do with a percussionist unable to keep his hands from shaking?
You take away his sticks, send him to the piano and call what he plays stride.


Why do violists hate the Kama Sutra?
Too many positions.
What's the difference between a viola and a coffin?
The coffin has the dead person on the inside.

[The Underlord]

Ooh! Viola jokes. My turn!
Whats the difference between a violin and a viola
violas burn longer
Whats a violist's favorite explosive?
C-4
What's the definition of a perfect throw?
getting the viola in the dump without hitting the rim at 100 paces

[Science Officer]

My best anti-Maple Leafs joke.

Great!

And mine:

Two guys from Toronto have ended up in hell, and there's fire and brimstone all around, but they don't seem to mind it. In fact, they're quite enjoying themselves. The devil comes around and asks them what they're so happy about and they explain that, well, they're from Canada so it's nice to have a little warm weather.
The devil is much upset by this, and causes the flames to burn even hotter. But it is to no avail. So he tries a different approach. He brings the temperature down as far as it will go, freezing, stinging, bitterly cold. Everything is instantly covered in frost.
But the two guys start jumping up and down and cheering. Outraged, the devil asks how they can be so happy in this horrible freezing cold. And they reply, "Hell's frozen over, the Leaf's must have won the Stanley Cup!"

[Kindablue]

Ooh! Viola jokes. My turn!
Whats the difference between a violin and a viola
violas burn longer
Whats a violist's favorite explosive?
C-4
What's the definition of a perfect throw?
getting the viola in the dump without hitting the rim at 100 paces

What's the difference between a chainsaw and a viola?
If necessary, you could use a chainsaw to make music.
What's the difference between a trampoline and a viola?
You take your boots off before jumping on a trampoline.

Those are all of the jokes that I know.

[Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll]

My best anti-Maple Leafs joke.



Great!

And mine:



I thought the best anti-Maple Leafs joke was The Maple Leaves themselves? :smalltongue:

[Das Platyvark]

Die ist ein Kinnerhunder und zwei Mackel uber und der bitte schon ist den Wunderhaus sprechensie. 'Nein' sprecht der Herren 'Ist aufern borger mit zveitingen'.

[GolemsVoice]

So, a woman died and is taken to the graveyard. At a nearby river, a fisherman sits and fishes. As the procession walks past, the man respectfully takes of his hat. After the ceremony, the priest comes to the man and says: "You've shown respect for the dead, that doesn't happen often these times"
"Well" answers the man "it's not everyday that they bury your wife"

[Mauve Shirt]

A rabbi, a priest and a buddhist monk walk into a bar.
http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs71/i/2010/097/3/7/April_2010_IA__Bar_Joke_by_EvilELQ.png


Also a great joke. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xlIrI80og8c)

[Soylent Dave]

Die ist ein Kinnerhunder und zwei Mackel uber und der bitte schon ist den Wunderhaus sprechensie. 'Nein' sprecht der Herren 'Ist aufern borger mit zveitingen'.

Wenn ist das Nunstuck git und Slotermeyer? Ja! Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput!?

(or is that a breach of the Geneva Conventions?)

[No brains]

Die ist ein Kinnerhunder und zwei Mackel uber und der bitte schon ist den Wunderhaus sprechensie. 'Nein' sprecht der Herren 'Ist aufern borger mit zveitingen'.


Wenn ist das Nunstuck git und Slotermeyer? Ja! Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput!?

(or is that a breach of the Geneva Conventions?)

This thread suddenly becomes German? I did Nazi that coming... :smalltongue:

"The, Bart. The."

[danzibr]

This thread suddenly becomes German? I did Nazi that coming... :smalltongue:
I lol'd.

Okay, extremely dirty joke. Read at your own discretion.
Three nuns are at the pearly gates. Saint Peter says that as holy women who are supposed to be celibate, any part of their body which touched *that part* of a man must be purified in a nearby bowl of holy water. The first nun walks up, dips the tip of her index finger in the bowl and is allowed into heaven.

The third nun becomes very anxious and raises her hand and jumps up and down. Saint Peter says, "Sister Mary, why do you want to go before Sister Ruth? You're supposed to be patient and wait your turn."

Sister Ruth responds, "I want to wash my mouth out before Sister Mary washes her bum out."
Btw, German speaker, I just checked the forum rules. Not supposed to do that.

[Miklus]

A little euro-humor...

Heaven: German car, english chauffeur, french cook, italian wife.

Hell: French car, italian chauffeur, english cook, german wife.

[Goosefeather]

A little euro-humor...

Heaven: German car, english chauffeur, french cook, italian wife.

Hell: French car, italian chauffeur, english cook, german wife.

Or as I heard it somewhere else,

Heaven is where the police are British,
the chefs Italian,
the mechanics German,
the lovers French,
and it's all organized by the Swiss.

Hell is where the police are German,
the chefs are British,
the mechanics French,
the lovers Swiss,
and it is all organized by the Italians.

[AshesOfOld]

{scrubbed}

[GolemsVoice]

Did you hear about the Russian elections? The other candidates were Putin their place.

DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

[Soylent Dave]

Btw, German speaker, I just checked the forum rules. Not supposed to do that.

We're not supposed to quote Monty Python?

[truemane]

Two of my all-time favourites. Both short, punchy, and both benefit from being told with a little attitude.

JOKE 1;
There's a kid sitting on a park bench with a big bag of chocolate and he's ramming them into his mouth one after the other. A guy walking past sees him, stops, and says: "Kid, you shouldn't be eating all that chocolate. It's not good for you>"

The kid looks up and says, "I don't know about that. My uncle lived to be 120 years old."

The man says, "I don't think your uncle lived that long by eating chocolate."

The kid says, "No no. He lived that long by minding his own goddam* business!"

JOKE 2:
Guy is sitting on his sofa, watching tv. He hears a car roar into his driveway, squeal to a stop, and his wife comes running in all out of breath. "Honey!" she says, "Pack your bags! I just won the lottery!"

The man goes, "That's great! Should I pack for the beach or the mountains?"

Wife: "I don't care, just get the hell* out."

*Replace with four-letter equivalents for additional, non-forum-friendly hilarity.

[Cobra_Ikari]

We're not supposed to quote Monty Python?

Post entirely in non-English, IIRC.

[Pyromancer999]

Some jokes I've really liked:

1. A man walks into a psychiatrist's office wearing shorts made of saran wrap. The psychiatrist takes a look at him and says, "Well, I can clearly see you're nuts."

2. Osama Bin Laden ends up in heaven. All of a sudden, all of the original members of the Continental Congress show up and start beating the living tar out of him.

"But, wait!" Osama protests, "Where are my 70 virgins?"

George Washington replies, "It's 70 Virginians, you a**hole!"

3. So, a man sits at a bar when he sees this incredibly inebriated man attempt to jump off the bar's balcony, which is 18 stories above the ground. The man hurriedly rushes and tries to get him down. The man shrugs him off, and says, "No worries! You see, the wind at this particular spot allows you to jump to the ground nice and safe, with no injury. Just watch me!". With that said, the inebriated fellow jumps off.

So, the first man sits at the bar feeling horrible that he couldn't stop the drunk man when he hears the ding of the elevator, shortly followed by the drunk man coming out. Astonished, he decides to try out the balcony trick himself. He jumps out the window, and goes ker-splat on the ground.

The bartender slowly looks down from the balcony, then turns to the drunk man and says, "You're really a jerk when you're drunk, Superman."

[dehro]

somewhat political...

A guy walks in and asks the bartender, "Isn't that Bush and Powell sitting over there?"
The bartender says, "Yep, that's them." So the guy walks over and says, "Wow, this is a real honor. What are you guys doing in here?"
Bush says, "We're planning WWIII."
And the guy says, "Really? What's going to happen?"
Bush says, "Well, we're going to kill 140 million Iraqis this time and one blonde with big cans."
The guy exclaimed, "A blonde with big cans? Why kill a blonde with big tits?"
Bush turns to Powell, punches him on the shoulder and says, "See, smartass! I told you no one would worry about the 140 million Iraqis!"

[Goosefeather]

Some jokes I've really liked:


Surely that should be:

1. A naked man walks into a psychiatrist's office. The psychiatrist takes a look at him and says, "Well, I can clearly see you're nuts."

[late for dinner]

That one really long joke about the Snake is 22 pages long in microsoft word at size 10 font....anyways...

So, this Panda walks into a diner. He orders a cheeseburger. He takes his time enjoying it, finishes the fries, and drinks a delicious strawberry milkshake. As he finishes up, he pulls a pistol out, blows the head off of the person at the table next to him and walks out.

No one really says much, which bothers a patron at the diner. So, he walks up to the Chef and says, "Did you just see what happened?!!? Who does that panda think he is?!" The Chef replies, "Look it up in the dictionary pal." The man went home and pulled out his Websters and opened it to the "P" Section. He read: "Panda: Eats Shoots and Leaves"

[Douglas]

"Panda: Eats Shoots and Leaves"
You're missing an important comma between 'Eats' and 'Shoots', there.

[late for dinner]

If I added that Comma, wouldn't it have turned "Shoots" into a verb instead of a Noun? In the dictionary it is a Noun, but in the pun, it's used as a verb.

[Douglas]

That's exactly the point. The joke is about an error in punctuation that greatly changes the meaning of something, and that error (the specified comma) needs to be present for it to work.

[late for dinner]

...WELL...ok everyone...when you read my joke, put a comma between Eats and Shoots....

Here is another good one: In order for this really to work well, you need to say a buch of cheesy laffy taffy riddles before...(what did the fish say when it ran into a brick wall? Dam/ What do you call a person that crosses the street, rolls in the mud, and crosses the same street again? A dirt double crosser/ and so on)...say about 4 or 5 of them....

Then you say, "Why did the chicken cross the road?" "To get to your house."

Then you say, "Knock Knock" "Who's there?" "The Chicken" :smallbiggrin:


This Joke is all about timing. But, when you pull it off just right, it is gonna be the best joke of the night.

[Cobra_Ikari]

...WELL...ok everyone...when you read my joke, put a comma between Eats and Shoots....

Here is another good one: In order for this really to work well, you need to say a buch of cheesy laffy taffy riddles before...(what did the fish say when it ran into a brick wall? Dam/ What do you call a person that crosses the street, rolls in the mud, and crosses the same street again? A dirt double crosser/ and so on)...say about 4 or 5 of them....

Then you say, "Why did the chicken cross the road?" "To get to your house."

Then you say, "Knock Knock" "Who's there?" "The Chicken" :smallbiggrin:


This Joke is all about timing. But, when you pull it off just right, it is gonna be the best joke of the night.

...you're fine, I've never seen that joke presented with the comma intact. It's not a joke about a dictionary misprint, after all. =P

[Delusion]

The barman says: "Get out, we follow the laws of Causality here."
Tachyon enters the bar.

[Ulysses WkAmil]

I have two short jokes and one long one.
JOKE JOKE JOOOOOOOKE :smallcool:

[Greensleeves]

So, warning, these jokes are probably really rather offensive. Just so you know.

[Elm11]

I'm a bit concerned that some of these are becoming just a little too borderline, and I don't think disclaimers make that any more valid.

On a lighter note:

"Light travels faster than sound, which is why some people appear smart until they open their mouths".

[thubby]

"taxes are awesome, i like taxes"
(other person asks why)
"because before taxes, the only certainty was death"

[AshesOfOld]

I'm a bit concerned that some of these are becoming just a little too borderline, and I don't think disclaimers make that any more valid.

On a lighter note:

"Light travels faster than sound, which is why some people appear smart until they open their mouths".

I think you're right, I don't want the thread closed, because people get offended.
I'll edit a rule into the first post. Hope people take heed.

And a joke:
Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson go on a camping trip. After a good dinner and a bottle of wine, they retire for the night, and go to sleep.

Some hours later, Holmes wakes up and nudges his faithful friend. “Watson, look up at the sky and tell me what you see.”

“I see millions and millions of stars, Holmes” replies Watson.

“And what do you deduce from that?”

Watson ponders for a minute. “Well,
Astronomically, it tells me that there are millions of galaxies and potentially billions of planets.

Astrologically, I observe that Saturn is in Leo.

Horologically, I deduce that the time is approximately a quarter past three.

Meteorologically, I suspect that we will have a beautiful day tomorrow.

Theologically, I can see that God is all powerful, and that we are a small and insignificant part of the universe.

But what does it tell you, Holmes?”

Holmes is silent for a moment.

“Watson, you idiot!” he says. “Someone has stolen our tent!”

[Fri]

Post entirely in non-English, IIRC.

It's from the monty python sketch 'funniest joke in the world.' Anyone who listen to the joke dies laughing. So at the end they tell you the joke in german, which you can't understand, so you don't die because of it.

But
it's not actually german. It's just gibberish.

[Knaight]

Two old philosophers are sitting next to each other in a nudist camp. One turns to the other and says "Say, have you read Marx?" The other responds "Yes, it must be these wicker chairs."

[Kalmageddon]

german wife.

As long as you're not the husband, however, they're pretty good! :smallbiggrin:

[Elemental]

Hmm... It is time I contributed once again.
*thinks*
No, references Nazis...
That one is inappropriate...
That one perpetuated a negative stereotype...
No one would get it...
I don't even find that one funny...
Far too long...
That one's best slipped casually into conversation...

I've got nothing - oh! Wait! - No. False alarm.
Finally got one!

The devil challenged heaven to a cricket match, to which the saints agreed wholeheartedly. However, in the interests of fair play, they reminded the devil that most of the good cricket players resided in heaven, and would thus be on their team.
The devil remained unfazed.
"Nothing to worry about," said Lucifer, "All the umpires are down here."

[H Birchgrove]

From DDR:

Erich Honecker, General Secretary of the Socialist Unity Party and Head of State of the German Democratic Republic, woke up at sunrise.

"Good morning, comrade Sun", he greeted the rising sun.

"Good morning to you too", my dear comrade Honecker.

Honecker started to work right away after breakfast and the morning shower. At luncheon, he greeted the sun again.

"Good day, comrade Sun. It's a really nice day."

"Good day to you too, comrade General Secretary. It really is."

Honecker continued to work, until it was evening. He had dinner, and after it he took a look at the sunset.

"Good evening, Comrade Sun. What a lovely evening this is"

"Bugger off, you tool, I'm in the West now!"

Paraphrased from Jan Guillou, Swedish writer of thrillers, historical novels, non-fiction, etc:

In order to have a perfect army, you need:

Germans as officers.

Britons as privates.

Americans in charge of supplies and logistics.

Frenchmen as chefs.

Finally, Italians as the enemy.


There's nothing wrong with a few bad chemistry jokes.

Drat... Now I have to come up with something funny.
Here goes:
A plane carrying a businessman, a politician, a hiker and a doctor were flying over the Swiss alps, when the pilot came out of the cockpit and informed them that they were soon going to crash, and that they only had four parachutes.
Apologising for being a coward, he put on one parachute, and threw the other three into the cabin.
The doctor at once claimed that he had many patients who required his aid, so grabbed the first parachute, put it on, and jumped out.
The politician claimed that he was the most important leader of the day, so grabbed the second parachute and jumped out.
The businessman and the hiker looked at each other, and the businessman said:
"I guess it's either you or me, and I have no children and my wife died several years ago, so I guess you can have it."
To which the hiker responded:
"Don't be silly. There's one for each of us. The most important leader in history grabbed my backpack."

I love that one, it's so heart-warming. :smallwink:

[Copper]

I am fond of the surrealist anti-joke. For example:

How do you confuse a blonde?
Paint yourself green and throw forks at her!

Why did the plane crash?
Because the pilot was a loaf of bread.

And how many pancakes does it take to build a doghouse?
None, silly, alligators don't fly!

[Comrade]

How do you make a plumber cry?

Kill his entire family in front of him.

Knock knock
Who's there?
The IRS.

So a duck walks into a bar.
Animal Control is promptly called and the duck is safely retrieved and released into a nearby park.

A priest, a rabbi, and an imam walk into a bar.
They could not agree on the fundamental nature of god and so they cordially agreed to disagree.

Love anti-jokes.

[dehro]

not exactly a joke per sé, but this has got to be one of the funniest "rabbi and a priest in a bar" sketches out there (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwAr2LbPphc)

[Elemental]

I love that one, it's so heart-warming. :smallwink:

I'm glad you like it.

[Pyromancer999]

Surely that should be:

1. A naked man walks into a psychiatrist's office. The psychiatrist takes a look at him and says, "Well, I can clearly see you're nuts."

I actually meant wearing saran wrap shorts, but thanks for noticing the mistake.

[H Birchgrove]

Crap, I had created my own anti-joke, but I forgot what it was about. :smallfrown:

[noparlpf]

Knock knock.
Who's there?
I don't actually know any knock-knock jokes.

...Amazingly, that's gotten laughs before.

[Dogmantra]

Knock knock.
Who's there?
I don't actually know any knock-knock jokes.

...Amazingly, that's gotten laughs before.

Me: Want to hear a knock knock joke?
Them: Okay!
Me: Alright, you start
Them: Knock Knock
Me: Who's there?
Them: <confused look>

[noparlpf]

Me: Want to hear a knock knock joke?
Them: Okay!
Me: Alright, you start
Them: Knock Knock
Me: Who's there?
Them: <confused look>

Haha, that's a good one.

[Roland St. Jude]

Sheriff of Moddingham: Yet another joke thread must be locked for political, religious, and sexual content. Seems inevitable, I suppose. Please, people, keep the Forum Rules in mind, regardless of where on the Forum or what you are posting.