Tuesday, October 04, 2011

Left Overs....

I am going to leave out one fact in this story as I tell it. I think you will understand why once you hear it. However, at the end I will will tell you the missing ingredient and the story will take on a very different meaning.
My friend Harry says that political correctness is a modern obstacle to comedy. There are some jokes that involve an ethnic group that are not racist, just funny. In Texas you can hear an Aggie joke, go to Pensilvania and hear the same joke told as a Polock joke, and in Canada the same joke would be a Nuffee joke. Same joke, just as funny but requires the assignment of a localized group that everyone knows. Most of the time the ethnic group has nothing to do with the humor of the joke, but because of political awareness those jokes are avoided. But given that we live in a world when we need to laugh more than ever, we can not eliminate a joke just because it might contain an ethnic word. We need to find another way to tell them.
Harry suggests we *invent* a group to make fun of. A race that doesn't exist and won't be offended by being the butt of the joke. Then we will be able to tell all the jokes that are now off limits. The world needs a laugh. Harry said.... let's just call them Cleathens. There is no such thing as a Cheahen, so we can make them anything we want. So here is the joke he tells after that lengthy set up: These two Jewish Cleathens walk out of a Synagogue..... Okay that is not quite on point but, here is my story.
Tonight the producer of the show took me, John and some of the staff members of the theatre out for an evening dinner. It was an Indian Restaurant known for exotic dishes not normal to the Rochester bill of fare. It was "special Buffett" night and they featured dishes that are not normally on the menu. The food was very good.
One off the staff volunteers is a lady who takes her tiny dog with her everywhere. She has a purse that is big enough for the dog and she sneaks him into every place she goes. Most of the time the business don't know there is a dog in their store because the pooch stays hidden in the bag. There are ordinances against dogs in the restaurants of Rochester, but so far she seems to be able to circumvent the rules with the hidden dog. Predictably she brought the dog into the restaurant this evening, maybe she is a regular and they know and don't care. I don't know, but none of the waiters seemed to be concerned about the large purse that would occasionally wiggle in the chair next to her.
I forgot to mention that the restaurant is packed there are people waiting outside for any available table that becomes empty. I think in the food service business they would refer to that as being "slammed". The fact that a chair would go unoccupied by an actual eating customer was attention grabbing.
So we finish our meal and the dog lady decides she will take some of the food home with her. They provide a container and the ubiquitous white take out sack for her. She slings the dog purse over the same shoulder with the take out sack. And we exit.
The second we are out the door she opens the purse for the dog to stick its head out, finally. He is curious about the smells coming from the sack and sticks his head in to find out. There is a large group of people standing near the entrance waiting their turn to go in. The dog can't get to the food and gives up. Just then a member of a large party sees the head of a dog coming out of the white sack and says, "Look it's a doggie bag. She is taking the left overs home." They all laughed hysterically.
The part I left out is that the entire party laughing was Asian. I am unsure if they were laughing at the pun, or more about the idea of eating the dog later.
As you were,
Jay

1 comment:

Aaron M said...

A good way to start the day....thanks for the "early" post!