A few nights ago, I came upon the following tableau in my living room:
My roommate K was laughing hysterically while my other roommate T looked at her with an expression of uncomfortable puzzlement. While K wept with her uncontrollable laughter, T told me what had happened:
"I was making my lunch for tomorrow and all I had was a bowl of quinoa I had made earlier. So I asked her what I could add to it, how I could 'dress up my quinoa.' And she said, 'You could make them tiny tuxedos.'"
At this point, the narrative was accompanied by K's shrieks of "Tiny tuxedos. Tiny tuxedos!" She was very proud of herself.
Now, this was a funny joke. How to dress up quinoa? In tiny tuxedos!
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| Quinoa tailors have tiny, nimble fingers. |
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What was even funnier, though, was my roommate's reaction to her own joke. Others may have never experienced this particular kind of self-inflicted meltdown, but I have. I was at work, surrounded by my three office-mates when I tried to explain why the phrase "Swiss Chad" is the funniest joke in the history of the world. I got as far as saying, "Swiss Chad! Swiss Chad!" before I broke down into hysterics. With very little poise, I ran out of the office--tears streaming down my face--leaving my three co-workers bemused and slightly terrified, I think.
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| I give my office-mates plenty of reasons to ask each other, "What the hell is wrong with her?" |
What they failed to understand was that "Swiss Chad" is how someone with a Boston accent would say the name of the leafy green vegetable "Swiss chard."
I imagine a guy named Chad in the Swiss Alps, his arms full of chard. Some Boston tourists come across Chad with his chard and proclaim, "Swiss chard!" which sounds like "Swiss Chad!" Chad from Switzerland is very confused as to how these strangers know his name and his nationality.
See? Hilarious.
