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On laughter — 23 Comments

  1. About headgear and Scottish dances: here’s a video of a champion Highland dancer performing the traditional Sword Dance– to the accompaniment of the bagpipes rather than Mendelssohn. Note that the dancer is bareheaded, so no Glengarry or Balmoral bonnet with or without a feather to provoke laughter-hysterics:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vP4N33dZLM0&ab_channel=GIBSON%27GIBBY%27ROSS

    Side note: There’s a closeup of the dancer’s feet around the 2:00 mark, so you can see the intricate lacing of the soft leather shoes.

    Another aside: I wonder how the SF Ballet copes with the decay of the surrounding city. I’d enjoy seeing the company perform in person, but not if it meant going to San Francisco.

  2. How wonderful! The world could use a lot more laughter, and people less shy about sharing it!

    My wife is a great laugher. She loves comedy and is a great audience for any comedian, in person or recorded. She also is great at making others laugh.

    My sister and I can’t attend a religious service together because of the experience you cite. As children we spent an accumulation of hundreds of hours trying (and often succeeding) to make each other life while in pews that her and I start laughing if we are anywhere near one another in a church.

  3. My hubby makes me laugh. But no one provokes me to hysterics like my sister and our two cousins. Our parents had to separate us at Mass. And we were sent outside often for being too loud and silly when we were together visiting.

    At one great uncle’s funeral we all ended up in the church hall because we couldn’t “behave”. We loved him dearly and there was no reason all all that we couldn’t be respectful because we were sad about his accident, but we just couldn’t. Same at our mother’s funerals, although we were somewhat subdued by the thought of being haunted forever by the oh so very disappointed ghosts of our dear mothers who never did understand what was so funny.

    One cousin’s son is my godson and we were all at his very formal Latin Mass wedding last year. We had to very, very, carefully and intentionally not look at each other even once during the ceremony lest one accidental lift of an eyebrow or something would set us all off. We’re in our 60’s so we should be past all that, but no.

    OTOH, the reception was great fun.

  4. Rufus T. Firefly:

    I guess more people than I realized have had that laughter-in-the-pews experience. When that pew starts shaking, all bets are off.

  5. I am sure we all remember the infamous Mary Tyler Moore episode where she couldn’t stop laughing at the funeral for the clown stepped on by an elephant. And when the priest finally told the assembled mourners that it was okay and they all should remember Chuckles that way, Mary burst into tears! Thanks for this shout-out, Neo, I am honored. Sometimes we have to dig deep to find some humor in these perilous and depressing times! Ammo Grrrll from Power Line (Friday guest only)

  6. I’m glad you read Ammo Grrrll, she’s a treasure, both as a comedian, and as a commentator.

  7. I don’t often go off in hysterical laughter, but it happens sometimes. It’s my mother’s fault. I can remember her laughing uncontrollably with her favorite sister-in-law about a secretary bird — can’t remember the joke, but only the laughter.

  8. Saturday Night Live used to do “Bad Ballet” segments, back in the years when people say the show was funny. They also did a take-off on Black Swan. They do take the joke too far sometimes and carry on too long, and that can be a cure for out-of-control laughter.

  9. Used to call it “Church giggles.” Once started, very hard to stop. The worst was not the laughter, per se, but after it was almost under control, the loud snort that precedes the next round.
    You sound like delightful company Neo.

  10. in 70-71, about 60 ninth graders from Ms Turner’s English classes went to the discount theater to see a morning double feature of two Neil Simon hit plays turned into movies:
    – Barefoot in the Park with Robert Redford and Jane Fonda, and
    – The Odd Couple with Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau

    Both movies are funny, even today. But we found them side-splitting hilarious. And kids tend to get each other going So we laughed hard and relentlessly for four hours.

    My jaw hurt. Really, really hurt. Because somewhere down front was a guy with a loud, boisterous laugh. Never saw him, but he sounded like he must have been enormous. And he was always a few seconds slow in getting the joke.

    For four hours we kids in the back laughed at every humorous bit in the two movies. And just as we settled down, the big guy would get the joke and let out a huge belly laugh that is hard to describe, but funny as could be to hear throughout the theater. It cracked us up, so all of us 13 and 14 year olds would laugh again at him.

    The human body cannot really handle laughing constantly from double the jokes in a double feature for four hours. But it sure was a great day at school.

  11. Dear Neo:

    I don’t think my post will be read in the way I intended, would you please pull off of your site. It was never my intent to harm any feelings or ridicule individuals. Please excuse. Thank you,

  12. Anne:

    I can’t imagine that anyone would take offense. But since you asked, I’ll remove it.

  13. Susan Vass,

    I too thought of the “Chuckles the Clown” episode. One of the very best episodes in any sit-com. So well written and Mary Tyler Moore played her role brilliantly.

    My sister (who I mentioned earlier for our shared ability to make either break up at a solemn religious service) and I have a pact. Whomever dies first the other will state this at some point while eulogizing the other, “A little song, a little dance, a little seltzer down your pants.”

  14. My wife used to do the potato chip bag or cheetos bag thing while we were watching a movie. With a good movie at night, there is a bit of an altered state of consciousness for me, and the crinkling bag sound would occur every 10 seconds for about an hour. Sometimes there would be an empty dinner plate sitting right next to her. OMG. Please put a helping of your snack on your plate!

    Both of us were really good about not nagging each other, but this one crossed the line.
    _______

    Generally, when dating or socializing, nothing is better than great humor or a sense of humor. But as people age, we carry around more and more baggage and it becomes harder to find that humor.
    _______

    Initially, I found it a little difficult to laugh at the gun play in the end of the Ammo Grrll piece. I had to double check the top and it’s disclaimer to make sure I understood it correctly.

    I hadn’t been out to the firing range in a couple years and I went for the first time about three months ago. I hadn’t been there for more than 3 minutes standing behind my stall watching the other two guys shooting next me to when I witnessed this:

    The guy in the next stall was very experienced, but the guy next to him was a yahoo firing a semi-auto pistol that wasn’t working very well. He’d fire 2 or 3 rounds and his gun would fail to feed and he’d start yanking on the slide before firing another 2 or 3 rounds. Eventually, he grew so frustrated that he pulled his pistol in close to his chest to yank on the slide, and pointed it right at the guy next to him.

    I was almost ready to grab my stuff and leave the range, when the experienced shooter, who at this point was lucky to be alive, calmly walked up to the gentleman and explained the error of his ways. The yahoo exclaimed, “Boy, that would have ruined my whole day.” Then I said, “No, that would have ruined two people’s day.”

  15. Just a little note to Mr. Hofler: I understand your concerns, believe me. I have had similar terrifying experiences at the range. Often from guys trying to “instruct” their inappropriately-garbed girlfriends (hot brass is no joke!), who wave the weapons around like squirtguns! Because I am a regular Friday guest columnist on PowerLine (for 10 years now), all the “regular” readers know that I am both an excellent shot and Safety-First person. Oh, and also, as you point out, I identified it as a “spoof, parody and satire.” I loved your response to the idiot. AG (Susan Vass)

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