Jumping to the wrong conclusion.

Jumping to the wrong conclusion.

I was so keen when I started school, that when the teacher would ask the class a question like; “What do we all come to school for”? I would shout out what I thought was a completely reasonable but totally wrong answer. Even now I do the same thing when I am a bit stressed or simply as a joke. Last Wednesday, I was lying on the operating table of the Manchester Royal Infirmary about to have an angiogram. This is where a tiny camera on the end of a wire is pushed up the artery of your arm and into your heart to have a look around. There are several monitors and an Xray camera hovering over my body.

The nurse who was preparing me said. “Alan do you know what you are in for today” and as a joke I said. “To see the dentist”? Although I could not see her face behind her mask, I could tell by her body language that she was not amused.

 I am always surprised at what some people find funny others don’t. It reminds me of a conversation I overheard in the care home that my wife Wendy was staying in. Three of the elderly lady residents were having a nice chat in the dining room, Lillian was saying how she liked to have things done and dusted, she said “If it needs doing you may as well do it straight away”, she then said. “After all, don’t they say that ‘Mastication is the thief of time'”? Judy, her friend, smiled and said.

“Lillian, I think you have got the wrong word. The expression is ‘Procrastination is the thief of time’, it’s an easy mistake to make, so many words sound just the same but mean different things”. They both laughed and Dolly, who is at least ninety, and not quite hearing what is being discussed, said.

“In that case, I reckon that it has stolen about six months of my time”. 

The three old ladies fell about laughing, tears rolling down their cheeks.

Now, I know I’m a bit slow, and it is mildly funny, but after all this time I still don’t think it’s very funny at all, or am I missing something?