I am 50% Left Brain and 50% Right Brain. Interesting...

You Are 50% Left Brained, 50% Right Brained
The left side of your brain controls verbal ability, attention to detail, and reasoning.
Left brained people are good at communication and persuading others.
If you're left brained, you are likely good at math and logic.
Your left brain prefers dogs, reading, and quiet.

The right side of your brain is all about creativity and flexibility.
Daring and intuitive, right brained people see the world in their unique way.
If you're right brained, you likely have a talent for creative writing and art.
Your right brain prefers day dreaming, philosophy, and sports.

Friday, December 03, 2004

With a little help from my friends

As most people know I'm an avid lover of the corny joke. I prefer to leave the sophisticated anecdote to the intellectuals. Give me something simple like:
What did one sick casket say to the other sick casket?
-Is that you, coffin?
and I'll laugh for hours. As a matter of fact I'm chuckling right now. However sometimes it takes me a little longer to get jokes than it does other people. A friend of mine once said I'm on a 5 second joke delay. A joke is told and everyone laughs, about 5 seconds later I get it and start laughing. One time it took me 6 months and randomly in the middle of work I started laughing at a joke. I know I need help.

Well anyhoo, the other day I was working at the Mathnasium and I was helping a girl do her homework. In the process of completing the homework we would use the correct answers to eliminate letters at the bottom of the page. The remaining letters would be used to form the punchline of a joke. It went like this...What is the difference between a cheap hamburger and a pulled tooth? After repeated checkings to make sure we had eliminate the correct letters the ones we ended up with in this order were: oneistoo. Now it seems to me that that looks like: One is too. But if that's the case then I don't get it. What does it mean? I asked my fellow mathnasium coworkers and we were all stumped. If there is anyone out there who can help me , please help. I stayed awake late last night thinking about this question to no avail. So if someone could explain:

Joke recap:
What is the difference between a cheap hamburger and a pulled tooth?
One is too.

As always have a good day and enjoy. (Still not laughing yet)

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

I don't get it either. I'll ask around and let you know if I figure it out. Gee, thanks, now this is gonna bug me.

ps - thanks for adding anonymous commenting :)

LP

Anonymous said...

searched over the internet (I have a very distinctive, patent pending research technique that often yields results when others are unable to obtain them) and found nothing. Let's consider some posibilities

1. There was a production error, and there really is a joke involving ch and pt, but the answer isn't "oneistoo"

2. The instructions are incorrect and "oneistoo" needs to be further deciphered.

3. There was a production error, and the joke doesn't really involve ch or pt, or neither of them.

4. The handout is actually correct, and the joke is just not funny, doesn't make sense (but the author intended it to be a joke)

5. The author was lazy and didn't write a real joke, but just substituted some random answer, either from another joke, or just a strange assortment of letters.

My analysis follows. The fact that even though the letters in the answer are incorrectly spaced, they combine to form comprehensible words militates against a finding of utter randomness. Further, the answer has a tpe of literary device common to corny jokes "one is too" is phonomically indistinguishable from "one is two". That suggests to me that the answer is related to some corny joke somewhere. Further, I was struck by the similarity between "too" in the answer and "too-th" in the stem.

There could be a possible relation, though I admit this is a bit stretched. Another possible association is that there are two items in the stem (ch and pt) and both of which are two words (cheap + hamburger and pulled + tooth). Persons missing the front teeth would have problems pronouncing the "th" sound (dental fricative? linguistics lovers please correct). Thus someone who had had their front tooth pulled would pronounce "tooth" as "too".

I can't think of a relationship between a cheap hamburger and "one". Except that one dollar might be pretty cheap for a hamburger, but we can all agree that that is weak.

So my working theory is that the answer is somehow correct, but a mistake was made and we can't know the real answer. I think you should write to the publisher and find out. It is important. And it would solve this great mystery and put all of our minds to ease.

Salamanders are cool.

Anonymous said...

you know come to think of it from the last posted comment...this is a joke possibly developed by a Mathematician..so it is quiet possible that this is corny...random absurd joke that nobody but a mathematician would get! So the rest of are clueless 'cause we're not mathematicians??

Tanika said...

I appreciate all the time and thought that all of you have put into this joke. I really appreciate the analysis of the missing letters such as pt and th. I have decided to write the publisher and find out exactly what was meant by this seemingly simple joke. I will publish my findings on this blog.

Michael Durand said...

i also was unable to google up even a single clue as to the actual answer... the search continues...

Anonymous said...

Thanks for writing the publisher. I think we will all sleep easier at night knowing the definitive answer. We could even turn this into a fun story and submit it to a newspaper or something. And hopefully, the dreams of slightly raw hamburger with a bloody pulled tooth in it will stop.

Salamanders in captivity like to eat beef heart. Then someone suggested that this might not be healthy for them because of the cholesterol. I was like, "Duh, do you see salamanders predating cows in the wild?"

Tanika said...

Hmmm...well if you put it that way and the hamburger is slightly raw and it's a bloody pulled tooth. Well hmmm maybe one is too makes more sense. Just kidding.

Daniel said...

The publisher is trying to play games with your mind.

But it is kinda funny after you think about it for a while.

Maybe you just need to think about it in twelve dimensions, and then it will make sense.

Anonymous said...

my son was given this riddle in math class and no one could figure it out either. His teacher DID FIND THE ANSWER SOMEHOW.....

What is the difference between a cheap hamburger and a pulled tooth?

one is too thin and the other is tooth out.

mystery solved.

DBZ

Tanika said...

Thankyou very much DBZ. i really appreciate that.

Jason said...

My 7th graders are using these work sheets as reinforcement for mean median and mode introduction. To answer your question; you only hold page one of a four page assignment, thus you have only one of four pieces of this riddles answer. To obtain a complete answer and the punch line you need to acquire the 3 missing worksheets.
P.S. The punch line is hilarious…

Good Luck!

Jason MI