Joke That Goes Quotes & Sayings

We had all opted to take City's financial reporting course work, which, in theory, meant we wanted to write about stock prices and corporate takeovers. That, of course, was a joke. No one still in their twenties, and broke, goes into journalism to write about money - a subject in which they still have zero practical experience. — Chris Ayres

America has got to learn to take a joke. — Herman Cain

You know how the joke goes: On the way to the execution ground, a condemned criminal complained that it was going to rain, and the executioner said, 'What have you got to worry about? We're the ones who've got to go back through it! — Liu Cixin

Once you start thinking about it in a mercenary frame of mind, then you're finished. You're a joke, because there are too many mercenaries out there already. — Tommy Shaw

There's nothing the people love more than a Federal Reserve joke. — Adam McKay

I heard joke once: Man goes to doctor. Says he's depressed. Life seems harsh, and cruel. Says he feels all alone in threatening world. Doctor says: "Treatment is simple. The great clown - Pagliacci - is in town. Go see him. That should pick you up." Man bursts into tears. "But doctor ... " he says "I am Pagliacci." Good joke. Everybody laugh. Roll on snare drum. Curtains. — Alan Moore

Now you are laughing aren't you?? You just came from holiday (AS for me I don't really give a shit from holiday, from walk with friends or whatever..)
You are thinking about the one fat guy and you think that you are perfect.
- If you are perfect you won't be here transcend people don't have what to achieve they know and they will continue to know everything, it's useless!
You have health problems, am I right?
You have some buds on places which nobody wants to talk, you think that you are a bigger as a personality - but you smoke (Don't you?? You try to stop it, but again the cigarettes say "Smoke one you will be better, smoke another one you will go to heaven..." - this goes to endless does it??
You drink Alcohol - don't ya?
I don't have words take a look at yourself you drink for what??? For confidence... oh my god you are fuck fagot aren't you??
You smoke, but why I know that chimneys smoke, but you?? Are you chimney, it's a joke! :D :D — Deyth Banger

Sometimes, comics will make the observation that it's not jokes that are funny, it's characters that are funny. And isn't that true! That's why I always kill jokes. I'm terrible at them, because I get the joke right, but I can't get the character right, and it just goes down like a lead balloon. — David Mitchell

How about this John Kerry controversy? So he's out there in California, tells some kind of joke and it backfires. He's saying he botched the joke ... This guy can lose elections he's not even in. — David Letterman

There's a joke about the balloon boy who has a balloon mum and a balloon dad and he goes to a balloon school with balloon friends ad a balloon principal. And one day, the balloon boy decides to take a pin to his balloon school, which is, of course, a disaster. And he's called into the balloon principal's office, and the balloon principal tells him, 'You've let me down, you've let your school down, you've let your parents down, you've let your friends down. But most importantly you've let yourself down'. — Gabrielle Williams

I cannot tell a joke. But I can do a situation, that it becomes a joke. — Don Rickles

I had begun to grasp, in the past few weeks, one of the great and uncovenanted delights of Greece; a pre-coming of age present in my case: a direct and immediate link, friendly and equal on either side, between human beings, something which melts barriers of hierarchy and background and money and, except for a few tribal and historic feuds, politics and nationality as well... Existence, these glances say, is a torment, an enemy, an adventure and a joke which we are in league to undergo, outwit, exploit and enjoy on equal terms as accomplices, fellow-hedonists and fellow-victims. — Patrick Leigh Fermor

Mr. Bloemker moved closer. He smelled like a wet diaper. "What is it," he asked, looking over Lenore's shoulder.
"If it's what I think it is," said Lenore, "it's a sort of joke. A what do you call it. An antinomy."
"An antinomy?"
Lenore nodded. "Gramma really likes antinomies. I think this guy here," looking down at the drawing on the back of the label, "is the barber who shaves all and only those who do not shave themselves."
Mr. Bloemker looked at her. "A barber?"
"The big killer question," Lenore said to the sheet of paper, "is supposed to be whether the barber shaves himself. I think that's why his head's exploded, here."
"Beg pardon?"
"If he does, he doesn't, and if he doesn't, he does. — David Foster Wallace

His whole personality was like an elaborate joke that he never stopped telling. — Lev Grossman

Knock, knock!" he called in a high, singsong voice.
For a moment, silence. Then a thud and a crash, as if something heavy had been hurled at the door. "Go away!" snarled the voice from within.
"Ah, no. That's not how the joke goes," called Rob. "I say 'knock, knock', and you're supposed to answer with 'who's there?'"
"Fuck off!"
Nope, that's still wrong." Robbie seemed unperturbed. I, however, was horrified at Ethan's language, though I knew it wasn't him. "Here," continued Rob in an amiable voice, "I'll go through the whole thing, so you'll know how to answer next time." He cleared his throat and pounded at the door again. "Knock, knock!" he bellowed. "Who's there? Puck! Puck who? Puck, who will turn you into a squealing pig and stuff you in the oven if you don't get out of our way!" And with that, he banged the door open. — Julie Kagawa

Delivering a commencement address is a great responsibility, or so I thought until I cast my mind back to my own graduation. The commencement speaker that day was the distinguished British philosopher Baroness Mary Warnock. Reflecting on her speech has helped me enormously in writing this one, because it turns out that I can't remember a single word she said. This liberating discovery enables me to proceed without any fear that I might inadvertently influence you to abandon promising careers in business, the law, or politics for the giddy delights of becoming a gay wizard.
You see? If all you remember in years to come is the 'gay wizard' joke, I've come out ahead of Baroness Mary Warnock. Achievable goals: the first step to self-improvement. — J.K. Rowling

A person reveals his character by nothing so clearly as the joke he resents. — Georg Christoph Lichtenberg

The joke was that President Bush only declared war when Starbucks was hit. You can mess with the U.N. all you want, but when you start interfering with the right to get caffeinated, someone has to pay. — Chris Kyle

There can be a science to joke writing, there are certainly rules and patterns that can be followed, but I think most of the best comedy goes beyond the rules. — Robin Ince

Trust Emmett to find the joke in the destruction of my life. — Stephenie Meyer

So what have I learned that is helpful? Well, if you are white, like I am, you can't get rid of the privilege you have, but you can use it for good. Don't say I don't even notice race! like it's a positive thing. Instead, recognize that differences between people make it harder for some to cross a finish line, and create fair paths to success for everyone that accommodate those differences. Educate yourself. If you think someone's voice is being ignored, tell others to listen. If your friend makes a racist joke, call him out on it, instead of just going along with it. If the two former skinheads I met can have such a complete change of heart, I feel confident that ordinary people can, too. — Jodi Picoult

I feel like until you're with the person, the person you end up marrying, you don't ever really know what you're looking for. I'm just into a girl with a really good personality, something that goes beyond looks. I want to be able to joke around, be respectful of each other ... there are a lot of things that go into compatibility. — Ryan Guzman

dot-com flameouts that erroneously believed that they could lose money on each customer but, as the old joke goes, make it up in volume. — Eric Ries

That's what happens with most comedies. If you watch 10 minutes and there's no joke, then you're disappointed because you're expecting jokes. The same goes for emotional movies. You have to feel something. If you don't feel anything for 10 minutes, you get bored. — Quentin Dupieux

The Canadian-Australian mathematician Norman Wildberger has posted an essay arguing that real numbers are a joke. — Max Tegmark

I grew up, as I joke around, in the 'People's Republic of Charlestown' in the city of Boston. And I was blessed to be raised right there on Monument Square in Charlestown, and every morning I'd hop on the bus and go on a 45-minute ride out to the suburbs in Brooklyn for elementary school. And I got to have my seat, really, in both worlds. — Jonathan Tucker

No doubt he was smiling. He smiled a lot, as if the world were a secret joke that only he was clever enough to understand. — George R R Martin

I'm a bit of a worrier, to an extreme. I'll crack a joke, then worry if I've offended someone - even when they're laughing. I have a guilt complex, always worrying. — Sophia Bush

Luck was a joke. Even good luck was just bad luck with its hair combed. — Stephen King

When comedy is good, it's jazz. The beats of it, the looseness, the improvisational part, the music-the way you hit the inflection, the high notes of a joke. It's all melody to me. — Billy Crystal

My life, my life, now I speak of it as of something over, now as of a joke which still goes on, and it is neither, for at the same time it is over and it goes on, and is there any tense for that? Watch wound and buried by the watchmaker, before he died, whose ruined works will one day speak of God, to the worms. — Samuel Beckett

You know that old joke about the guy who lives to be 104? The punch line goes something like 'If I knew I was gonna get this old, I'd have taken much better care of myself.' Well, guess what? We actually are living longer, and the time to start taking care of ourselves is right this minute. — Oprah Winfrey

If the business world is divided between optimists and pessimists (Schumpeter, January 31st) then perhaps what is needed are more scientists. There is an old joke that goes: to an optimist the glass is half full; to a pessimist it is half empty. To an engineer the glass is twice as big as it needs to be. — Anonymous

The opening scene in A New Hope, when you see the huge ship, it goes on, and on, and on, and on, and on ... that is like a joke of awesomeness. — Cass Sunstein

IN AN OLD YUGOSLAV JOKE mocking police corruption, a policeman returns home unexpectedly and finds his wife naked in their marital bed, obviously hot and excited. Suspecting that he surprised her with a lover, he starts to look around the room for a hidden man. The wife goes pale when he leans down to look under the bed; but after some brief whispering, the husband rises with a satisfied, smug smile and says "Sorry, my love, false alarm. There is no one under the bed!," while his hand is holding tightly a couple of high denomination banknotes. — Slavoj Zizek

In true Ted form, he was not in on the joke, which is basically the foundation of our relationship. No matter how much time goes by, I am still able to make him believe stories that no one who has completed high school would believe. On separate occasions I've convinced him that I paid sixteen thousand dollars for a pair of sunglasses, that I donated ten thousand dollars to a charity that helps prevent pit bulls from being forced to wear rhinestone collars, and that a pair of my shoes came with two Swiss Army knives under the soles. — Chelsea Handler

Meanwhile, Milo had been in the Senate on that day until it was dismissed and then came home. He changed out of his formal clothes, waited for a little while his wife got herself ready
you all know how that goes
and set out at the hour when Clodius, if he had been planning on coming back to Rome that day, would have returned. — Marcus Tullius Cicero

It was great seeing Annie again. I realised what a terrific person she was and how fun it was just knowing her. And I thought of that old joke, you know. The guy goes to a psychiatrist and says, "Doc, my brother's crazy. He thinks he's a chicken." and the doctor says, "well, why don't you turn him in?" and the guy says, "I would, but o need the eggs."
Well, I guess that's pretty much now how I feel about relationships. You know, they're totally irrational and crazy and absurd and, but, err, I guess we keep going through it because most of us need the eggs. — Woody Allen

I hope I'm Jessica Tandy, you know. I hope I'm onstage, and I fall over at 85 or something with everyone applauding thinking that it was a joke, you know, 'There she goes again,' and I'm just gone. I've gone to Heaven. — Elizabeth Banks

I have got acquainted with Lofty John. Ilse is a great friend of his and often goes there to watch him working in his carpenter shop. He says he has made enough ladders to get to heaven without the priest but that is just his joke. — L.M. Montgomery

Knock, Knock!' [Puck] called in a high, singsong voice.
For a moment, silence. Then came a thud and a crash, as if something heavy had been hurled at the door. 'Go away!' snaled the voice from within.
'Ah, no. That's not how the joke goes,' called Puck.'I say 'knock, knock', and you're supposed to answer with 'who's there?'
'Fuck off!'
'Nope, that's still wrong — Julie Kagawa

There is an old joke that went around- it goes, in the beginning God made man in His own image, and since the fall, man has been seeking to return the compliment. — Alistair Begg

I fall upon the thorns of life, I bleed. And then? I fall upon the thorns of life, I bleed. And what next? I get laid, I take a short holiday, but very soon after I fall upon those same thorns with gratification in pain, or suffering in joy - who knows what the mixture is! What good, what lasting good is there in me? Is there nothing else between birth and death but what I can get out of this perversity - only a favorable balance of disorderly emotions? No freedom? Only impulses? And what about all the good I have in my heart - does it mean anything? Is it simply a joke? A false hope that makes a man feel the illusion of worth? And so he goes on with his struggles. But this good is no phony. I know it isn't. I swear it. — Saul Bellow

And it started out fun. We were chattering enthusiastically, flipping between CNN, MSNBC, and FOX News. But as the evening wore on, and the numbers rolled in, it got quieter, and I found myself becoming intensely depressed. Why was I putting myself through this? The issues I've devoted my life to have become so marginalized by the coverage that they have no possible relevance to me. I can't even blame the media - people simply don't care about alternate-party politics. And why should they? I'm so far in the minority that my activism is a joke, a punchline that stopped being funny years ago. It goes beyond rooting for the underdog. It's not rooting for the Giants: it's more like, say, rooting for the Twins. But during the Super Bowl. — Phillip Andrew Bennett Low

One starts gambling for a joke, out of curiosity, as a little challenge to fortune. One goes on, pricked to the quick by delusions, excited by vague desires that grow. Woe to you if you win anything - an AMBO, a small TERNO! It is all up with you, for your chance of winning seems certain ... It is the devil's money going back to hell. — Matilde Serao

Heard joke once: Man goes to doctor. Says he's depressed. Says life seems harsh and cruel. Says he feels all alone in a threatening world where what lies ahead is vague and uncertain. Doctor says, "Treatment is simple. Great clown Pagliacci is in town tonight. Go and see him. That should pick you up." Man bursts into tears. Says, "But doctor ... I am Pagliacci. — Alan Moore

I tend to have a lot of jokes about ex-girlfriends. They always ask me if they will be the subject of a joke, and I always tell them they won't. Unless they do something crazy. They all tend to, so you know where that goes. There are no closed doors. The 'art' will suffer. — Adam DeVine

Worship isn't destructive, Martin. I know that.
I don't. I only know it's the core of his life. What else has he got? He can hardly read. He knows no physics or engineering to make to world real for him. No paintings to show him how others have enjoyed it. No music except television jingles. No history except tales from a desperate mother. No friends. Not one kid to give him a joke, or make him know himself more moderately. He's a modern citizen for whom society doesn't exist. — Peter Shaffer

Jokes? There are no jokes. The truth is the funniest joke of all. — Muhammad Ali

Mothers, take time to be a real friend to your children. Listen to your children, really listen. Talk with them, laugh and joke with them, sing with them, cry with them, hug them, honestly praise them. Yes, regularly spend unused one-on-one time with each child. Be a real friend to your children. — Ezra Taft Benson

I don't see much point in doing things for a pure joke. Every now and then you need a joke, but not so much as the people who spend all their lives constructing joke palaces think you do. — A.S. Byatt

And I ask myself what it is about me that makes this wonderful, beautiful woman return. Is it because I'm pathetic, helpless in my current state, completely dependent on her? Or is it my sense of humour, my willingness to tease her, to joke my way into painful, secret places? Do I help her understand herself? Do I make her happy? Do I do something for her that her husband and son can't do? Has she fallen in love with me?
As the days pass and I continue to heal, my body knitting itself back together, I begin to allow myself to think that she has. — Mohsin Hamid

There are three things which are real: God, human folly, and laughter. Since the first two pass our comprehension, we must do what we can with the third. — Aubrey Menen

It was a bit of fun. But of course like anything that starts as a joke, people started to take it all seriously! — Steven Wilson

But the problem is that you don't dare to think about anything. You're afraid; you don't know where your thoughts might lead you. Everything inside you is confused. You keep your eyes closed and stay on the old path. They brought you here, I don't know why and it doesn't concern me, but you won't accept my explanations of human guilt. You think it's a joke. Maybe it is, but maybe one could develop quite a nice philosophical idea out of it — Mesa Selimovic

My way of joking is to tell the truth. It's the funniest joke in the world. — George Bernard Shaw

That's something - you laugh about Eminem ... It's funny, man, because I didn't like him when he first came out, ya know. It seemed like a big joke. But I think the guy's for real, and I like his lyrics! — Alan Vega

The surprising thing is that I was not funny in high school. I was always jealous of the funny kids because they always got the girls. I couldn't tell a joke to save my life. — Seann William Scott

Oh, man," Xavier groaned. "See what you've done
now I'm stressing."
"You can't! You're the stable one!"
Xavier laughed and I realized his distress had been feigned to illustrate a point. He wasn't worried in the slightest.
"Just relax. Go and run a bath or have a shot of brandy."
"Okay."
"That second bit was a joke. We both know you can't hold your liquor. — Alexandra Adornetto

If God gives you (or makes you) a joke, what are you meant to do in response? (Receive it. Laugh.)
If God gives you an obstacle, what are you meant to do in response? (Receive it. Climb it. Then laugh.)
If God gives you more profound hardship, what are you meant to do in response? (Receive it. Climb it. Then laugh. Exhibit A: His Son.) — N.D. Wilson

When you're an older woman [in a movie], you are the brunt of the joke. — Jane Fonda

He wonders if it's some sort of twisted joke the adults are having, shoving hormonal teens into tight quarters but making it impossible to do anything but breathe.
"I wouldn't mind suffocating if it was with you," the girl says, which is flattering, but makes him even less interested in her.
"There'll be a better time," he tells her, knowing that such a time will never come - at least not for her - but hope is a powerful motivator.
Eventually they settle into a sort of symbiotic breathing rhythm. He breathes in when she breathes out, so their chests don't fight for space.
After a while, there's a jarring motion. With his arm now around the girl, he holds her a little more tightly, knowing that easing her fear somehow eases his own. — Neal Shusterman

One good thing about New York is that most people function daily while in a low-grade depression. It's not like if you're in Los Angeles, where everyone's so actively working on cheerfulness and mental and physical health that if they sense you're down, they shun you. Also, all that sunshine is a cruel joke when you're depressed. In New York, even in your misery, you feel like you belong. — Mindy Kaling

Existentialists are monumentally and monotonously serious; they don't like to joke. — Wislawa Szymborska

So although there is no phoenix here, there is, nonetheless, a fierce, stubborn, wildly insightful, arrogantly honest, crazily committed, and caring human, who will take the heat, the brunt of whatever silver spoon joke you may have, so I can help you have everything you want in your life. And I mean everything. — Lauren Handel Zander

I'm looking for laughs, you know? If it take me to flip over a table, if I have to go physical comedy, I will do it. But whatever the joke needs at that particular time, is where I'm dedicated to. I'm not into beating somebody down and beating myself up. I don't do insults and things like that. I don't do it - I'm a storyteller. — Bernie Mac

When were you born?"
"Huh?" She scrunched up her nose at the sudden change in topic.
"Your sign?" He insisted.
She thought it must be a joke. Wasn't that a bad pickup line from the '70s? — Joannah Miley

Please ejaculate", I silently urged the man, "so I can go to sleep". (In this way I imagine I was like millions of women before me — Jon Ronson

The sun is a joke. Oranges can't titillate their jaded palates. Nothing can ever be violent enough to make taut their slack minds and bodies. — Nathanael West

I just heard the latest joke about my hair: 'Do you know what that is on her head? It's a steering wheel to drive the state.' — Yulia Tymoshenko

And she'd also found Logan again. Now he was her ... what? New-old boyfriend? Lover? Skype buddy? Pen pal with benefits? Whatever his title, his e-mails filled her inbox. Sometimes he sent five a day, short and quipping. Other times he sent longer, more serious ones. She kept her tone light when she replied. That'd always been her MO - a joke, a jab. A way to deflect from what she was really feeling. A way to keep the nonstop ache of missing him from becoming too painful to survive. And honestly, what was there to say that would come close to what she felt? The moments they'd spent together before he'd shipped out on his latest naval tour had been the most peaceful she could remember - even with her anxiety about her dad. It'd been the first time she'd felt complete in a long time. And then, just like that, he was gone again. — Rob Thomas

I want people to just be paying attention even if they're not necessarily laughing at something, or if it takes them a while to get something, I don't mind that. If half the crowd gets the joke and the other half is sitting there scratching their heads, that's just as good for me if I like the joke, because I feel like it just brings people in more. — Anthony Jeselnik

I realized that you didn't have to make self-deprecating remarks or turn yourself into the butt of some unspoken joke. I also discovered that being big didn't deter possible suitors. — Maeve Binchy

You don't see yourself at all, do you? It seems to me that you're good at everything you try," said Ethan sincerely.
"I had a dream I could breathe underwater," I said flippantly, "Maybe I'll go swim with the mermaids."
Ethan turned to look at me with shock in his eyes.
"Just kidding," I said, alarmed at his reaction — Derrolyn Anderson

A joke is not a thing but a process, a trick you play on the listener's mind. You start him off toward a plausible goal, and then by a sudden twist you land him nowhere at all or just where he didn't expect to go. — Max Eastman

I have some bad feet. But really, my main fault would probably be my personality. A lot of times, I am not serious enough. I joke around too much sometimes. — Tim Hudson

People who would never think of dealing in racial or sexual stereotypes will still throw in a fat joke because it's still OK. Really? — Al Roker

Because Buffy really has become the straight man, every once in a while it's nice to be the one that tells the joke and it's nice to be the one that is the joke and it's nice to do something that's a little bit different. — Sarah Michelle Gellar

U.S. soldiers, with whom I now have more than a passing acquaintance, joke that they track my movements in order to know where they will be deployed next. — Christiane Amanpour

Even when there's not a joke or a hook, the first line has to be good and snapem to attention. Songs ain't novels. You don't have 30 pages to slowly wrap somebody in. They're more like short stories or poems. If the first line hasn't grabbed them, you won't get to the second line. Once you've developed an audience, you may have some luxury and trust, so you don't have to knock 'em over the head with line one. — Dan Bern

The one thing I've found you really can't joke about - and people think it's death or something - is money. No one thinks it's funny, whether you have it or you don't. Money is just something no one seems to like joking about. — Anthony Jeselnik

What's cool about Twitter is that you can make a joke about something very of-the-moment or random that I wouldn't be able to joke about in stand-up. — Aziz Ansari

What do you suppose is the use of a child without any meaning? Even a joke should have some meaning
and a child's more imporant than a joke, I hope. You couldn't deny that, even if you tried with both hands. — Lewis Carroll

[There's] a joke that I've done forever: 'Nowadays they say that the largest majority of people will be Latino and you'll tell scary stories to your grandkids: "A long time ago when I was growing up, there used to be people who were white," and the kid says, "Really?" and you say, "Yeah, like the man who cuts our grass."' I've had that line forever and I love it. — George Lopez