WhatsofunnyI MAY HAVE AN UNBELIEVABLE FACE BUT I HAVE RATIONALIZE.
What’s so funny about this? This joke is a little deeper than it seems at first reading. This is due, in part, to the double meaning of “unbelievable”. Literally, it means that the person is a liar, or at least their face makes them appear that way. I’m sure you know people like this, no matter what they say, you don’t trust them to be honest and truthful, whether you know them or not. Of course, the same thing can be true of a believable or honest looking face. Whatever comes out of their mouths sounds like the “gospel truth”. BTW that expression means that it’s so true, it could be in the bible. Needless to say, people with believable faces make the best con men and women. But “unbelievable” also has an idiomatic meaning, and that is “extremely good looking”. The sense is that it’s not possible that a face could look that good, hence, it’s unbelievable.
The second part of the joke looks a bit ungrammatical if you’re reading it. If you only hear it, then it sounds fine and correct. This is because of the homophonic qualities of the word “rationalize”. Before I forget, I need to apologize to the original joke because this word was spelled with an “s” at the end instead of “z”. I changed it to American English spelling. The entire word is spelled r-a-t-i-o-n-a-l-i-z-e. The trouble is, it sounds exactly as if it were talking about eyes, e-y-e-s that are rational, that it, rational eyes. “Rational” means normal, reasonable, believable. The only way this sentence can be grammatically acceptable is for it to limit the meaning to the eyes. Otherwise, we would be faced with the ungrammatical construction, “I have rationalize”, which is the verb form of rational. To be grammatical, it would have to say, “I have rationalized”, with the –ed ending of the past participle. But just what the hell are rational eyes, eyes which are reasonable? When you rationalize something, it means you are trying to explain or justify it. You could even say that I’m rationalizing, or explaining this joke. But can eyes alone do this? Well if you can’ believe the face, maybe you can believe the eyes. Of course eyes never lie, do they? As the singing group the Eagles once said, “Honey, you just can’t hide your lyin’ eyes”.
And THAT’s what’s so funny!
play0:00 / 9:05Hosted by Brian Beatty, produced by mnartists.org. This month's featured writer is comedienne and self-described "cat lady," Colleen Kruse.
