A READER’S DIGEST BOOK
Copyright © 2011 The Reader’s Digest Association, Inc.
All rights reserved. Unauthorized reproduction, in any manner, is prohibited.
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FOR READER’S DIGEST
Copy Editor: Marilyn Knowlton
Project Designer: Elizabeth Tunnicliffe
Manager, English Book Editorial, Reader’s Digest Canada: Pamela Johnson
Senior Art Director: George McKeon
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Manufacturing Manager: Elizabeth Dinda
Associate Publisher, Trade Publishing: Rosanne McManus
President and Publisher, Trade Publishing: Harold Clarke
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Laughter really is the best medicine : Reader’s Digest’s funniest jokes, quotes, and cartoons from Reader’s Digest magazine.
p. cm.
ISBN 978-1-60652-204-2
1. American wit and humor. I. Reader’s Digest Association.
PN6165.L38 2011
818’.60208--dc22
2010031441
Cover art and spot illustrations: George McKeon
Cartoon Credits: John Caldwell: 6, 12, 15, 23, 54, 99, 162, 181, 196; Dave Carpenter: 18, 35, 45, 85, 91, 102, 141, 156, 167, 175, 178, 205; Roy Delgado: 11, 41, 53, 59, 72, 86, 101, 118, 129, 150, 188, 211;
Mike Lynch: 36, 48, 63, 64, 77, 110, 123, 193; Scott Arthur Masear: 26, 107, 136, 182, 185;
Dan Reynolds: 69, 80, 115, 149, 155, 170, 201, 208, 215; Harley Schwadron: 30, 94, 124, 132, 144, 159
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Editor’s Note
“Y
ou grow up the day you have the first real laugh—at yourself.”
Those words from Ethel Barrymore couldn’t be more true. Something we all have in common is the ability to laugh at ourselves and the comical situations life brings to us. The comedian Rodney Dangerfield may have joked about not getting any respect, but in reality his talent for tickling our funny bones earned him many guffaws and fans. Moments of laughter take us to another place—one filled with muchneeded comic relief.
Inside this collection of jokes, one-liners, cartoons, and quotable quotes from the popular Reader’s Digest column “Laughter, the Best Medicine ®,” you’ll find Dangerfield, Barrymore, and hundreds more celebrities, professional comedians, joke writers, as well as everyday folks, who poke fun at the facts and foibles of daily life. And you’ll find that no subject is sacred. From politics, religion, technology, doctors, and lawyers to sports, pets, children, and relationships—our day-to-day experiences provide all we need for this unbeatable collection.
So take a break and get ready to laugh. We think that these lighthearted glimpses of life are just what the doctor ordered!
In the Office
M
y friend had been pounding the pavement in search of a job with no luck. Frustrated, she asked her dad to look at her résumé. He didn’t get much further than the first line of her cover letter before spotting the problem.
“Is it too generic?” she asked.
“I doubt it,” said her father.
“Especially since it’s addressed ‘Dear Sir or Madman.’”
— GISELLE MELANSON
M
y friend’s hour-and-a-half commute to work got old quickly—the time spent stuck in traffic was sending him over the edge. So I was happy for him when he found a new job closer to home.
“That’s great,” I said. “What are you doing now?”
“I’m a bus driver.”
— ELYSA STANTON
M
y secretary liked to yammer on the phone with friends. One day I was about to interrupt her chat to tell her to get back to work, when she looked up at the clock and put an end to the conversation. “Sorry, I have to hang up now,” she said. “It’s time for my break.”
— JAMES R. MAXWELL
A
pplicants for jobs at the company where my friend Diana works are asked to fill out a questionnaire. Among the things candidates list is their high school and when they attended. One prospective employee dutifully wrote the name of his high school, followed by the dates attended: “Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.”
— JENNIFER CARUANA
M
y coworker Sarah was annoyed that our company’s automated telephone directory had mangled her last name. She called the person in charge and asked that he fix it.
“Sorry,” he said. “All requests must be made via e-mail.”
“Okay,” said Sarah, “just tell me how to e-mail the correct pronunciation for Zuckschwerdt.”
— REBECCA COLE
W
inding his way through the office cubicles, my son Mike spotted one of his employees playing a video game on the computer.
“Why aren’t you working?” Mike asked him.
The employee had an excellent excuse: “I didn’t see you coming.”
— ROSEMARY SIEVE
“G
ood morning,” I said to a coworker in the parking lot. She mumbled something back and continued to the front door, distracted. As we walked, I couldn’t help but notice that she was muttering to herself: “It pays the bills, it pays the bills, it pays the bills…”
— LINDA TILLMAN
O
ur office manager is a tyrant when it comes to keeping the printer area clean. Recently, a coworker printed something, but when he went to pick up the document, it was gone.
“You know I throw out everything that’s more than 24 hours old,” the manager told him.
“But I just printed it,” my friend insisted.
“Sorry,” she said. “But I’m not in tomorrow.”
— NOEL ROWLAND
A
s a business-writing instructor, I read lots of résumés. Inevitably, I run across some students with skills no employer could pass up, such as:
The young paramedic who “makes life-threatening decisions on a daily basis.”
A child-care worker who can “overlook up to 35 children at one time.”
An enterprising young woman who is “flexible enough to perform in all manner of positions if the situation gets desperate.”
— AUTUMN CAMPBELL
So how do you make a computer your best bud?
Buy it a nice bunch of software and get it loaded.
— DAVID E. BOELTER
B
efore leaving my assistant job for greener pastures, I was asked to reply to applicants hoping to replace me. “Very smart and intelligent,” my boss had written on one of the applications. “Too good for this job.”
— VI BRIERLEY
A
fter my wife landed a coveted job offer from DHL, we went out of town to celebrate. While on our trip, she was contacted by the company’s human resources depar
tment with an urgent request to complete and send back her tax forms.
“No problem,” she said. “I’ll FedEx them right over.”
— ROSS MCCOY
T
he average insurance agent’s workday can be pretty mundane—except when he gets to read claim forms like these from actual auto accidents.
The pedestrian had no idea which way to go, so I ran over him.
I had been driving my car for 40 years when I fell asleep at the wheel and had an accident.
I was on the way to the doctor’s with rear-end trouble when my universal joint gave way, causing me to have an accident.
An invisible car came out of nowhere, struck my vehicle and vanished.
W
hen I phoned my employee to find out why she hadn’t come to the office, I expected to hear a sob story about how sick she was, blah, blah, blah. Instead, her excuse was pretty plausible.
“When I was driving to work, I took a wrong turn,” she explained. “And then I just decided to keep going.”
— JUDIE SHEWELL
I
’ve heard every excuse from coworkers for missing a day of work. But this one actually sounded legit.
“What’s wrong?” I asked a woman who called in. “Are you sick?”
“No,” she said. “I can’t find a cute pair of shoes to wear.”
— JOSHUA DONALDSON
A
sked about the kind of job he wanted, an applicant at our tax management company stated, “I seek full authority but limited responsibility.”
— MIKE WILKERSON
“W
hat starting salary are you looking for?” the head of human resources asks the newly graduated engineer at the end of a job interview.
Going for it, the guy says, “Well, sir, I was thinking about $125,000, depending on the benefits package.”
“Okay,” the HR director says. “How about five weeks’ vacation, 14 paid holidays, full medical and dental, 100% company match for your 401(k) and a Porsche for your company car?”
The engineer gasps and says, “Wow! Are you kidding?”
“Yeah,” he replies. “But you started it.”
M
any senior executives find talking with management consultants invaluable. My friend, a no-nonsense businessman who works for a large firm, is not one of them. Halfway through their meeting, and noting my friend’s terse answers, the consultant asked, “How do you cope with managerial stress?”
“I don’t,” came the gruff reply. “I cause it.”
— CLIVE ATTWATERS
“That’s a great place to work!” shouted my 16-year-old brother after coming home from the first day at his first job. “I get two weeks’ paid vacation.”
“I’m so glad,” said my mother.
“Yeah,” added John.
“I can’t wait to find out where they send me.”
— STEPHANIE DIOCEDO
W
hen asked her opinion on punctuality, an applicant for an office job assured me she thought it was extremely important. “I use periods, commas, and question marks all the time,” she said.
— MEL ROBERTS
I
work for a chartered bank in Ottawa, but my support unit is in Toronto. A colleague from the support unit e-mailed me to say she was missing a report due from one of my clients. I e-mailed back that I had faxed it to her earlier that morning and to check another file because the two reports were faxed at the same time.
“Thanks,” she replied when she found it, “but please don’t staple files together when you are faxing them to us.”
— DENISE LOSIER
D
ave irritated everyone in our office. Whether it was the tone of his voice or his condescending attitude, we all steered clear. He must have suspected he was annoying because he asked a coworker, “Why does everybody take an instant dislike to me?”
Larry responded, “It saves time.”
— DAVID GOEHRING
“Why did you leave your last job?”
“It was something my boss said.”
“What did he say?”
“‘You’re fired!’”
— HEIDI GORDON
A
job interviewer asked me where I wanted to be in five years. I said, “Ideally, suspended with pay.”
— COMIC ANDREA HENRY
R
ob and Tom apply for the same job. They take a written test. “You both got the same number of questions wrong,” the HR person tells them, “but Rob gets the job.”
“If we both got the same number of questions wrong, how come he gets the job?” Tom asks indignantly.
“Well,” says the HR person, “one of his incorrect answers was better than yours.”
“Whoa, how can that be?”
“For problem No. 46, Rob wrote, ‘I don’t know.’ You wrote, ‘Me neither.’”
— SAQIB AHMAD
I
n the human resources department in the large corporation where I work, I receive absentee slips for all of the employees. Over the years I’ve heard every excuse, ranging from the reasonable (“I had no hot water”) to the questionable (“My dog might have rabies”). But the other day I found one in my voice mail that I’d never heard before.
“I won’t be in today,” said my absent coworker. “I’ll call back later with an excuse.”
— KATHY PRICE
A
junior manay tager, senior manager and their boss were on their wo a lunch meeting. In the cab they found a lamp. The boss rubbed it, and a genie appeared. “I’ll grant you one wish each,” the genie said.
Grabbing the lamp from his boss, the eager senior manager shouted, “I want to be on a fast boat in the Bahamas with no worries.” And poof , he was gone.
The junior manager couldn’t keep quiet. He shouted, “I want to be in Miami, with beautiful girls, food and cocktails.” And poof , he was gone.
Finally, it was the boss’s turn. “I want those idiots back in the office after lunch.”
— ASHFAQ AHMED
H
aving looked the other way for weeks, the boss finally called Smith into his office for a sit-down.
“You know, Smith,” he said, “I’ve noticed that every time you have to take your dear old aunt to her doctor’s appointments, there’s a home game over at the stadium.”
“Wow, sir. I guess you’re right,” Smith answered.
“I didn’t realize it. You don’t think she’s faking it, do you?”
— SHARON KANSAS
Pecrentage of the workweek that a typical worker spends in meetings: 25.
Odds that a person at a meeting doesn’t know why he’s there: 1 in 3.
— FROM FIRED! BY ANNABELLE GURWITCH (TOUCHSTONE)
W
hen a woman applies for a job at a citrus grove, the foreman asks, “Do you have any experience picking lemons?”
“Well,” she answers, “I’ve been divorced three times.”
— MARILYN ADKINS
A
friend had a waitressing position open at his diner and asked job seekers to fill out an application. Under “Salary Expected,” a woman wrote, “Friday.”
— MARSHA MARINO
D
uring a company-held workshop on emergencies, our instructor asked, “What would you do if you received a letter bomb?” One guy knew: “Write ‘Return to Sender.’”
— KERVYN DIMNEY
I
input a junior manager’s self-evaluation, which said in part, “I have been on the job for three months, and I finally feel as if I’ve accomplished something.” I made one mistake, however. I replaced the word job with John .
— JANE FOX
B
ecause finding the proper work-life balance is crucial, our company scheduled a meeting on the subject for all employees. To make sure no one fell behind on their work, the conference was held from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. on a Friday night.
— MAR
CO RONO
A
lthough desperate to find work, I passed on a job I found on an employment website. It was for a wastewater plant operator. Among the job requirements: “Must be able to swim.”
— MICHAEL LEAMONS
S
omeone advertising on Craigslist said she was well suited for child care. After all, she had plenty of experience in “CPR and Choking Children.”
— ANN BOBBE
T
he businessman was self-conscious because he had no ears. So when he hired a manager, he asked each candidate, “Notice anything unusual about me?”
The first replied, “You have no ears.” He was shown the door. When the second candidate’s response was the same, he was also tossed out. But the third guy had a different answer.
“You’re wearing contact lenses,” he said.
The businessman was flabbergasted. “How did you know?”
“Because people who don’t have ears have to wear contacts.”
W
ho says companies only care about the bottom line? Ours is socially conscious and offers employees fun outdoor activities throughout the complex.
Both of these admirable elements were driven home one day when a voice over the loudspeaker boomed, “Everyone who signed up to donate blood, please report to the rifle range!”
— LISA CARNES
I
once had a boss tell me, “Don’t dress for the job you have; dress for the job you want.” I showed up the next day in a Cubs uniform.
— ROB PARAVONIAN
A
fter giving birth, I quit my job. The exit questionnaire asked, “What steps would have prevented you from leaving?” My answer: “Birth control.”
Laughter Really Is the Best Medicine: America's Funniest Jokes, Stories, and Cartoons Page 1
