Can anyone tell jokes successfully?

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Pat Paulsen was good at this.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x4kWLUnorTU[/youtube]

Telling jokes - I generally suck at it. I can be quite "punny" though.

Sometimes people laugh at me for something I said (usually something inappropriate I said quite by accident). I've learned that by smiling in those situations NT people think I was just making a joke or being sarcastic (I don't understand sarcasm) and as a result I think people think I'm a lot funnier than I really am.

What can I say - the outside world is strange.

I have learned to mimic people's ways of telling jokes and have gotten better over time, but I used to be known as the queen of joke killing. If it is longer than two sentences, I tend to space out and my "uh, um, where was I now?" tends to ruin it.

One thing I've done when telling a joke is to branch out into something completely different and forget completely what joke I was telling or even that I was telling a joke.

I can't tell jokes. I never get the tone of voice right and it sounds like I'm being serious.

But people say I'm funny when I'm telling stories about what happened in my day etc. Again I'll sometimes tell a tale and I thought it was wildly funny but no-one else gets it.

It doesn't help either that the people I get along best with tend to be very literally-minded and tend not to get jokes - that combined with my tone of voice issue would just end in an almighty confusing tangle best avoided!

I have made some people crease up with laughter with oddball comments that are timed well and sometimes people have to think a little. The laugh comes a few seconds later when they have figured it out.

But I can't tell a joke from a jokebook very well. Sometimes the things I said were too much and caused some problems or misunderstandings. Over the years I have gotten better at spotting potential misunderstandings before opening my mouth.

My timing has got better over the years too and that is crucial to making people laugh. SOmetimes you need to leave time for the image to build up in their mind, sometimes they know what is coming, but making them wait a few more seconds makes it funnier. Sometimes it is about using timing to cause surprise, let them keep thinking their way down one path, but then flip it to another direction, and the surprise of the flip is the laugh getter.

People tend to think I am funny. I have a rather dry sense of humor. My stories and offhand remarks often make people laugh, but I do not tell scripted jokes well. I tend to get tripped up or lose direction, and it doesn't go over well. Therefore, I just stopped telling jokes long ago.

I remember struggling with the telling of jokes as a kid and getting picked on because of it, but that was probably because the jokes I was making up were above my peers' heads (I had an insanely high vocabulary as a kid, and still do as an adult), and my verbal language skills were also very high (though I had a lot of trouble with reciprocal conversation about subjects outside of my interests).

I also have a very, very dry sense of humor, but I tend to make people laugh with stories and one-liners. I studied improvisational comedy pretty in depth at one point in my life and I use that as a strategy to deal with people at work and in my life using humor and creativity to relate to them.

I can't tell jokes because I get the story tangled up. My 'jokes' are dry and sarcastic comments.

Ever had the experiencewhere you try a line of humour but you find you have mildly offended the person or they think you are being aggressive? I find this a fair bit. The worst is when I realise what is happening and try resurrect the situation; generally I just make it worse. They generally remove themselves from discussons with me and then shut me out.

I never even try to dot he dry humor or the stuff where you really pick on someone unless it's sort of copied from someone else. In fact I can't tell the difference between some sarcasm and when a person is being serious, which causes problems at times.

However, I love bloopers, Abbott and Costello stuff, and puns, like "Did you know they've found that all Egyptian pharoahs farted the same?" "Yeah, they had a Tutenkammen."(too in common for those who are too literal to catch this) I also came up with one, "Did you hear about the piggie who was anxious to pay video games?" "He cried Wii, Wii, Wii all the way home?" When words sound the same, or could sound like others, I love it.

In fact, one of the main plots in my NaNoWriMo last year when i tried for the first time ("Vikings Sack San Marino - the Trouble With Typos") one of the main plots winds up being what happens when alexis gets mixed up with a Lexus and someone is ordered to arrest a car for bank robbery.

My problem has always been that I can't stop laughing - sometimes I burst out before I start the joke, though I've gotten better at that. it's like when I think about it, it's already playign in my head and making me laugh. I have to be careful i don't start giggling in an inappropriate place because I'm thinking of a joke.

However, I'm a lot better at avoiding that than i was. But, even when I wasn't, it would come at odd times; I could never tell when it was going to make me laugh and when not.

I also have the problem that sometimes when i think of a joke, it sticks in my head so much, I wonder if there's such a thing as echolalia of thuoght. I ahve never exhibited echolalia with my speech but can with thoughts it seems.

I'm a horrific joke teller, but apparently, I am very funny to a variety of people. I make puns, plays on words, and satirical remarks based on the moment. I cannot tell an actual joke at all well. I always mess something up because my memory gets the best of me. I think I started trying to be funny due to my AS. I made fun of myself before they could make fun of me--it seemed easier. That was when i was young.

In the scenario you describe, I'd most likely try to change the subject or leave if it's the kind of jokes I hate--mostly racist, raunchy or really violent kind.

Lately, I've been paying attention to people who are good audience members. They just have a fun time smiling and laughing at the entertainment provided by the gathering of friends and/or acquaintances. I've been working on it a bit, and it feels fun to just kick back when others are going off with their joke competition.

It's hard when I don't get a joke. II can't say when it might happen, but sometimes, i just can't figure out what everyone thinks is so funny. If I'm around people I trust, I ask.

So an Autistic walks in to a bar.....

This woman spent half her salary on some perfume and I said, I thought I smelled Rattex (rat poison). Nobody thought it was funny, only me. Queue awkward silence and me feeling like an idiot again.

Ouch... we all know how painful that could be...

define successfully.