Laughing so hard it hurts
Jul. 12th, 2006 09:46 pmHow often have I been physically incapacitated by laughing? Not very often. A few occasions spring to mind.
A physics lesson trying to represent a circuit with students passing pingpong balls. Every single thing went wrong, everyone said 'balls' every few minutes, the teacher was desperately trying not to set a good example and had a fixed grin trying not to snigger every time, and I was sitting at the back of the class, trying to ask helpful leading questions about electricity, and ended up totally cracked up. For about five minutes I couldn't stop laughing, just being in that situation was so amusing in itself, and everyone trying to help me.
Reading Three Men in Boat. Other books have been funnny, some early PTerry kept me giggling all the way through, but this was the only one I remember that made me collapse to the floor snorting fruit out of my nose. For years my family have been able to crack each other up with judicious quotes whenever we need to win a conversation in a hurry. Does anyone else agree about this book?
My first ever mao game, at a BMO summer school. Some of you may know, or sympathise, that after primary school and before sixth form I didn't really have many friends, and no-one very much like myself, and this was being thrown into a crowd of 50 mathmos, so was quite jolly. And as you know, mao can be very much a collaberative comedy exercise, especially with "ungentlemanly behaviour" cards being given for laughing too hard, playing sevens on people losing, saying things in peeved tones of voice, etc. I actually had to try not to wet myself.
Pirates 2. Notable only because it was a recent example, but after a lot of buildup, a moment of slapstick finally had be go over the edge and start coughing, trying to dislodge being-unable-to-breathe-from-laughing from my windpipe :)
When Friend From Trinity was visiting me and other FFT earlier this week. We've been good friends for *looks at watch* five years now, and get on well, but in some ways are quite different. I'm a complete mathematician, when viewing any problem, I immediately abstract it to the hilt. About many things he has done more reading, and is much better at extemporous bullshitting. And our vocabularies are now different enough -- mine filled with geekspeak, his filled with management terms like netnet -- that we can get into a laughing state where any more word just makes it hurt more.
I'm trying to work out. Has laughter become more rare as I've got older, either because I've heard more already, or because I'm less spontaneous, or has it always been rare. It is great, is it worth seeking out or should I just hope I find it?
A physics lesson trying to represent a circuit with students passing pingpong balls. Every single thing went wrong, everyone said 'balls' every few minutes, the teacher was desperately trying not to set a good example and had a fixed grin trying not to snigger every time, and I was sitting at the back of the class, trying to ask helpful leading questions about electricity, and ended up totally cracked up. For about five minutes I couldn't stop laughing, just being in that situation was so amusing in itself, and everyone trying to help me.
Reading Three Men in Boat. Other books have been funnny, some early PTerry kept me giggling all the way through, but this was the only one I remember that made me collapse to the floor snorting fruit out of my nose. For years my family have been able to crack each other up with judicious quotes whenever we need to win a conversation in a hurry. Does anyone else agree about this book?
My first ever mao game, at a BMO summer school. Some of you may know, or sympathise, that after primary school and before sixth form I didn't really have many friends, and no-one very much like myself, and this was being thrown into a crowd of 50 mathmos, so was quite jolly. And as you know, mao can be very much a collaberative comedy exercise, especially with "ungentlemanly behaviour" cards being given for laughing too hard, playing sevens on people losing, saying things in peeved tones of voice, etc. I actually had to try not to wet myself.
Pirates 2. Notable only because it was a recent example, but after a lot of buildup, a moment of slapstick finally had be go over the edge and start coughing, trying to dislodge being-unable-to-breathe-from-laughing from my windpipe :)
When Friend From Trinity was visiting me and other FFT earlier this week. We've been good friends for *looks at watch* five years now, and get on well, but in some ways are quite different. I'm a complete mathematician, when viewing any problem, I immediately abstract it to the hilt. About many things he has done more reading, and is much better at extemporous bullshitting. And our vocabularies are now different enough -- mine filled with geekspeak, his filled with management terms like netnet -- that we can get into a laughing state where any more word just makes it hurt more.
I'm trying to work out. Has laughter become more rare as I've got older, either because I've heard more already, or because I'm less spontaneous, or has it always been rare. It is great, is it worth seeking out or should I just hope I find it?