"so Doctor what's the prognosis?"
"Do, you want the good, or bad news?"
"Bad"
"You have only six months to live"
"What's the good!!?"
"You've got A job for life."
Joke Poo: The Accountant’s Audit
An accountant goes to the IRS after a routine audit…
"So, agent, what’s the verdict?"
"Do you want the good news or the bad news?"
"Bad news first, always gets it out of the way."
"We’ve flagged every return you’ve ever filed for gross negligence and possible fraud. The penalties will be astronomical."
"Okay… and the good news?"
"You’ve created enough accounting errors to single-handedly ensure full employment for IRS auditors for the next decade."
Okay, let’s break down this joke:
Joke Dissection:
- Setup: A postman visits his doctor. This establishes the characters and a familiar, relatable scenario.
- Central Conflict/Premise: The doctor delivers both good and bad news. This creates anticipation and sets up the punchline.
- Punchline: The postman has only six months to live, but the good news is he has a job for life. The humor lies in the absurd juxtaposition of a terminal diagnosis with job security, playing on the perception of postal work as being a stable but potentially undesirable career.
Key Elements:
- Postman: Represents stability, routine, and the "job for life" stereotype.
- Doctor: Represents authority, health, and mortality.
- Terminal Illness: Represents the opposite of stability and routine – a sudden and drastic change.
- Irony/Juxtaposition: The core comedic element, highlighting the absurd contrast between the severity of the health news and the mundane job security.
Comedic Enrichment – Witty Observation/New Joke:
Let’s lean into the "job for life" aspect of being a postman, and the historical changes affecting the postal service.
Witty Observation:
"You know, that postman thought he had a job for life before email was invented. Now, ‘job for six months’ is actually an improvement on the average postal worker’s outlook."
Amusing "Did You Know?"
"Did you know that in the early days of the U.S. Postal Service, mail was often delivered on horseback, with riders sometimes switching horses every 10-15 miles? So, technically, that postman did have a job for life… it just might have been a very, very short life due to the dangers of 18th-century equine travel. A doctor offering him six months would have been considered good news then."