Mrs Goody Two Shoes XII

No comic relief

I don't know what's worse -- the laughter shows popping up on every channel or the comedians we meet every day

Life's one big laugh. A joke. I mean in a very literal sense. As I sit down to dinner with my husband, ready with my outpourings of how a debate at office went out of hand, how I lost my cool and then remembered I was supposed to be in the good books and stopped right there, a roar of made-to-order laughter would swoop in through the window and hit us pretty hard. The clockwork precision of the choric laughter, beginning and ending on cue, shattering the tired silence would be followed by a cackling voice, and then the laughter again, all in cyclical succession.
The sounds drift to us from the neighbour's television set and although we cannot make out the words, we know one or the other of those laughter shows with the sickeningly sick jokes are on. I would stare in dismay. This could mean only one thing -- the next day I would have to tolerate a chuckling Mrs Nair as she re-narrated those supposedly 'humorous' anecdotes. I would have to cringe and smile as she chortles and gurgles.
I have an uncanny knack of bumping into such people, whose idea of humour is just some corny and cheesy lines. Or maybe we all find them, lurking about everywhere, offices, supermarkets, parties, waiting to pounce on you with the kind of one-liner that you hear and then, after a five-second pause, realise it was meant to make you laugh.
When Mrs Nair accosts me on the stairs as I am dragging myself to my apartment, thinking of what to cook for dinner, she would be spilliing with energy. "What do you look so tired for? Listen to this, and you will forget all work... hee hee... This husband comes and says, wife, wife, come to bed please..." I manage a "Ha ha... hmmm, ahem... well..."
By the time she is on her fourth joke, I am lost. The nightmares of office come back to haunt me. "Hey," this very senior man (who thinks he is a cool dude) would start off. And you would know what's coming. His creepy sense of fun! "You don't have time for people like us nowadays. Me, myself and meri tanhai, heh heh heh heh!" or something like, "The pen is pain, ho ho ho..." Does he cackle loudly or what! It reverberates through you, making your teeth chatter into a laugh. He would stand there wheezing, while I furtively look for an escape route, only to bump into another self-proclaimed comedian. Life is, indeed, a big laugh.