By an amazing coincidence, three flies simultaneously plunge into each of their drinks.
The Englishman, disgusted, throws his drink away.
The Scotsman reaches into his drink, fishes out the fly, and throws it away before continuing to drink.
The Irishman reaches into his drink, fishes out the fly, and holds it over his glass, squeezing it and yelling, "SPIT IT OUT, YE WEE BASTARD!"
Joke Poo: The IT Department
Three IT guys – a Java developer, a Python scripter, and a legacy COBOL programmer – are troubleshooting a critical system outage at 3 AM.
Coincidentally, the server room’s AC unit fails at the same time, and sweat starts pouring down each of their faces.
The Java developer, overwhelmed, declares the whole system needs a complete rewrite and walks out, citing design flaws.
The Python scripter calmly pulls out a cooling pack from his bag, applies it to his forehead, and continues debugging, muttering about quick fixes.
The COBOL programmer grabs the Python scripter, holds him upside down, and shakes him, shouting, “WHERE’S THE COLD AIR, YOU BIT-FLIPPING IMBECILE! SPIT IT OUT!”
Alright, let’s break down this classic ethnic joke and then sprinkle in some comedic enhancement!
Joke Dissection:
- Setup: The setup is a well-worn trope: Three men from different national backgrounds (English, Scottish, Irish) are in a familiar situation (drinking in a bar). This immediately sets up expectations of contrasting reactions based on stereotypes.
- Trigger: The trigger is the shared, disgusting event: Each man has a fly fall into their drink. This forces each man to react and show their supposed national character.
- Punchline: The punchline lies in the contrast between the Englishman’s disgusted reaction (throwing away the drink), the Scotsman’s frugal reaction (fishing out the fly and continuing to drink), and the Irishman’s aggressive, humorous reaction (squeezing the fly and demanding it spit out the drink).
- Underlying Stereotypes:
- Englishman: Prissy, refined, and easily disgusted.
- Scotsman: Frugal, practical, and unwilling to waste anything, even if slightly contaminated.
- Irishman: Hot-tempered, argumentative, and comically irrational.
Comedic Enrichment – The “Did You Know?” Approach:
Okay, let’s leverage a “Did You Know?” fact related to insects and combine it with the original joke’s setup:
Did you know? A fly’s lifespan is, on average, only about 28 days. That’s just enough time to accidentally fall into three different national drinks.
- An Englishman, horrified, throws away his drink. “Simply unacceptable!” he exclaims.
- A Scotsman carefully removes the fly. “Waste not, want not,” he mutters, and resumes drinking.
- The Irishman, face red, pulls the fly up. “Spit it out, ye wee bastard,” he shouts, “…or I swear, I’ll introduce you to the other 27 days you missed!”
Explanation of the Enrichment:
By stating the fly’s 28-day lifespan, it gives the audience something a touch more relevant. It could be construed that, with the fly nearing its potential expiry, the Irishman’s anger is now less about the stolen alcohol, and more about stealing the fly’s few remaining moments.
I could also add…
Alternative – A New, Related Observation:
Why did the insect therapist open a practice near the pub? Because he heard the Englishman, Irishman and Scotsman were going to be there, and the Scotsman’s thrift would be his most lucrative client. After all, he was going to have issues, when all the flies that got fished out of his drinks demanded compensation.