| The basic problem with most light bulb jokes is the
emphasis on quantity
over quality. So many people these days write light bulb jokes
and
break them down into categories (e.g. religions, animals, fields of
science,
etc.) and then break the categories down into sub-categories (religious
denominations, breeds of animals, branches of that particular field of
science, people who enjoy different styles and forms of horseback
riding,
etc.). They also have a tendency to include multiple answers,
which
detracts from the impact of the joke, and merely makes for a longer
list.
Furthermore, most of the extremely specific-category jokes are extremely esoteric. I can understand a joke about a mathematician, but if there is a separate punch line for a statistician as opposed to a chaotician, probably very few people besides other mathematicians will get the jokes. Example: "How many statisticians does it take to change a light bulb?" Answer: "1-3, alpha .05." I'm sure that that joke would be very funny if I understood it, but I don't. This also applies to jokes referring to British soldiers involved in the Falkland Islands War. I'm sure that Dennis Miller would find such a reference hilarious, but few others would. Finally, many of the jokes themselves are not funny. Most of them are based on a simple formula using randomly selected stereotypes, which have nothing at all to do with changing a light bulb (and typically involve the words "sit around"). Example: "How many Australians does it take to change a light bulb?" Answer: "Six, one to change the bulb and five to sit around saying 'G'Day, mate." Even worse are the jokes where the punch line involves various committees having lengthy planning sessions. There are a lot of specific categories of people to whom the classic red-tape-themed joke would apply. The problem, however, is that the reader / listener gets the joke after the first few words, but the punch line tends to drag on for two or three pages. My advice is that if you can't think of a good punch line, don't do the joke. An unfunny joke is much more conspicuous in a joke list than the void of having left out a certain member of the category. (In other words, if your theme is students of different colleges, and you can't think of a good punch line for Pepperdine, just skip it.) The point of any joke is to draw a laugh, not to be some monument to completion of a well-organized and highly thorough categorical list. That's VH-1's job. Now that my little rant is out of the way, here is my low-quantity high-quality list of light bulb jokes. Enjoy. |