Britt's Blog

At long last, we have finally taken up residence in a new house. Behind every house purchase lies a tale of agony that leaves the new owners bloody, battered, and exhausted, and they are all horrific in unique and peculiar ways, but they’re all about equally boring, so let’s just skip that part and enjoy the final results.

Here’s the front of the house:

And the back, with some of the yard:

It’s very shady. I’ve had to revise my garden plans from “vegetable” to “shade-tolerant perennial.” However, it should be lovely for entertaining on summer afternoons, and despite the warm weather it has stayed nice and cool inside, even without the air conditioner. (Today it’s getting up into the nineties, though, so I broke down and turned it on.)

Walking distance to work for both of us, plenty of room, hardwood floors, wood-burning fireplace, gas range. It was worth all the trouble.

When it comes to tickling my funnybone, the ultimate comedic triad is:

1. The inside joke.
2. The running gag.
3. The flying tackle.

So, obviously, if you want to thoroughly crack me up, make a sly reference to a movie only the two of us have seen which contains several flying tackles.

I don’t know, maybe that’s actually a diad, because really a running gag is really just an inside joke, one that only the members of the audience who have seen the previous instance(s), will be in on.

I think inside jokes are definitely a geek thing, based on the number of conversations I’ve had that consist exclusively of isolated setups or punchlines from movies, tv shows, or old RPG campaigns.

I’ve also found myself unconsciously using inside jokes as a way to build group identity. I sent an email to the “new faculty” mailing list referencing a joke from the workshop that five of us recently attended, and another email about our Writer’s Group meeting next week that makes a joke about a conversation that happened this week. Looking back on these, I have a strong sense that my motivation was to remind the “insiders” of our common experience and nurture that bond, as well as to pique the curiosity of the non-insiders, and get them to ask what the heck the Research Yacht is, or why we don’t mention the T-word at Writer’s Group.

A real geek, after all, would ask, because there’s nothing better than getting in on a new inside joke.

I leave you with these thoughts:

“There is no frog, no frog of judgment, there is no frog at all,” “I am Albert Potato,” and “Looks like I picked the wrong week to stop sniffing glue.”