Laughter in Public

I was walking around in the zoo when I noticed this family was off to the side eating some food. I thought to myself, "Well, this might be the video for my final project." As I was walking closer, they began laughing. I quickly pulled out my phone and started recording, or so I thought. I ended up leaving the zoo thinking I had a video, but instead ended up with this candid photo of the family laughing. What had happened was that the child on the right was trying to say "backpack." Instead he was saying "packpack". The rest of the family erupted at laughter while the kid was unsure of what was so funny in the way he was saying "backpack". The little girl on the left ended up laughing after this photo was taken. Laughter is in fact contagious. The laughter of the male in the center and the two females on both sides of him caused the little girl to begin laughing even though the little girl did not know what was going on. The lady on the far left sort of chuckled at the situation. I guess children do laugh more easily than adults.

One Tequila, Two Tequila, Three Tequila, Floor

The Thanksgiving had finally arrived. Man, college is a doozy. I was so relieved that it was Thanksgiving. This Thanksgiving break was going to be my “catch-up on sleep” days. To make things even better, it was the weekend of the Baylor game. I was so ready to skin some bears at Amon G. Carter. On top of that, both Robbie and I had friends coming over for the weekend. This was going to be one epic weekend. Now one of Robbie’s friends that was coming over this weekend I had met during the fall break. I was pretty excited to see him again and for him to meet my friends.

            I went home first for the Thanksgiving and headed back to TCU with my friends after that so that we could make it to the game. During the car ride, my friends and I used this time to catch up on our lives. We all went to different universities, so it was good to catch up. As the time passed, we arrived at TCU. We were running a little bit late due to the traffic. We quickly went to Academy to get them some purple clothing in order to fit in at the game with all the other students. As soon as we got what we wanted, we went back to my room to meet up with everyone and so that I could also introduce them to everyone else in the room. As we arrived to my room, numerous people are in there “pre-gaming” the football game. I saw Robbie’s friend that I knew and talked with him for a while.

At that time, he was training at an Air Force base nearby. Coming to TCU was a sort of break from the Air Force for him. On top of that, he hit the famous 21 a couple weeks ago. Now the guy waited till he was twenty-one to drink, and he really wanted to try tequila because all of his squadron told him it was their favorite liquor to drink. Robbie and I looked at each other and agreed that we needed to get him some tequila shots. Soon after that, a close friend of mine here at TCU texted me that she wanted to come to my room with her mother to “pre-game” the football game as well. Now Robbie’s friend at this point was starting to really feel the effects of the tequila and one that I did not expect to ever see in my lifetime. My close friend here at TCU arrived with her mother. As soon as her mother walked in, Robbie’s friend was somehow weirdly attracted to her. Out of a huge group of girls in the room, he looked at this girl’s mother and asked her to take a shot. He did whatever he could to talk to this girl’s mother. Robbie and I both knew at this point we needed to cut him off. The guy was literally hitting on this mother the whole time and completely ignoring every other girl that was trying to get his attention. My friend’s mother was completely unaware at the moment until her daughter pulled her to the side and told her. Her mother was so shocked that this guy was hitting on her, but she was also somewhat amused. She felt somewhat young again.

Robbie’s friend obviously struck out and ended up dead asleep on the floor later that day. He woke up later that night completely unaware of had happened earlier that day. For him it was literally "one tequila, two tequila, three tequila, floor." That day will forever be remembered for Robbie’s friend’s valiant effort at hitting on a mother before a football game as well as the day that TCU defeated a Baylor team that was looking at possibly winning the Big 12. I’m looking forward to Robbie’s friend coming over again. I wonder what this guy has planned next for us.

Giselle

            Recess was my absolute favorite time of the day when I was in second grade. It was the time out of the day that I could get away from that nasty Mrs. Sutter. She always had something to scold me with. “No, Donny, do not cut that girl’s hair!” “Did you just call her a dirt devil? What does that even mean? That’s it you’re going to the principal’s office!” “No throwing rocks at the building, Donny!” What did she expect? I was a kid. Alright maybe I wasn’t the most well-behaved kid out there, but I honestly tried to behave myself.

            Anyways, there was this girl named Giselle. For some odd reason she had a crush on me at the time. Me being the boy I was at that time would claim that she had “cooties”. At one point of time there was actually a game called “The Cooties Game,’’ very original name. Now before you go off and think that I was the devil as a child, this game was actually played by the whole class. The girls actually wanted to play this game to. The game was essentially a never-ending game of freeze tag except with “cooties.” Now back to this Giselle girl (no not Tom Brady’s wife). She was the only girl that was not a huge fan of it, especially whenever I said that she had “cooties.” Now I had a legitimate reason for saying this. The girl would follow me everywhere. One time she even followed me to the bathroom! I just wanted to pee in peace! That’s when I told her that she couldn’t come into the bathroom with me because she has “cooties.” For some odd reason, this statement somehow caused her to stop following me into the bathroom and sometimes around school. I had tried the traditional “can you please stop following me” or even told the teacher about it, but none of that worked.

            On this particular day during recess, Giselle was following me again. That day I was quite impatient since I forgot to do my homework that was due that day and knew I wasn’t going to hear the end of it from my mother later that night. We were playing kickball since it was kickball Thursdays. I really had to use the bathroom so I had to leave the game for a couple of minutes. As I was walking to the bathroom, I noticed that Giselle was following me yet again. I was so annoyed that this time I yelled at her. “Giselle, leave me alone! You have cooties! Get away from me!” The poor soul just looked down and started crying. I knew I messed up at that time. Yes, it was excessive that this girl was obsessively following me; however that did not justify my reaction. I was later told to go to principal’s office. Let’s just say that part wasn’t fun at all. On top of forgetting to do my homework, I also had this waiting for me when I got home. I learned that day to be more considerate of people’s feelings despite the situation. The sight of this poor girl being absolutely crushed by a couple of sentences that I had yelled still haunts me today.

The Beautiful Brazil

Some time had passed. Anderson and I finally found a time to meet up again and hangout. He had a huge test earlier that week and finally had a brief break from school. Fortunately, I had a brief break as well. We planned a date to meet up again. I reminded him that he promised me that he would tell me of places to go if I ever visited Brazil. He was already one step ahead of me. Whenever we met, he had a sketch of Brazil drawn with the names of some of the states on the drawing.

He told me of numerous states. The first state he talked to me about was the state of Sau Paulo. Now Sau Paulo is a large city with quite a bit of things to do. First of all, Sau Paulo is home to Anderson’s favorite soccer team, Sau Paulo F.C. He has been a die-hard fan ever since he could remember. I, myself, am a huge soccer, or futbol, fan. My team is in fact Juventes F.C. From there we progressed into discussion of our futbol teams and ours was better. I later mentioned that I used to play when I was in high school. He was intrigued by this and asked me questions such as which position I played. After that, Anderson mentioned that Ibirapuera Park was a must see if I go to Sau Paulo. He told me that when you walk into this park, you feel as if you are truly in the forest. He later progressed to the state of Santa Catarina. Now this state was one of his personal favorites. The first thing he told me about this state was that if I want to find some of the most beautiful women in the world, then I need to head on down to this state. I asked him how the whole “dating” scene worked over in Brazil. He told me that you typically ask a girl out on a date. Dates in Brazil are similar to that of the U.S. You go out to eat, watch a movie, or even go to the dance club. However, there is one difference. After the date, if the girl is still interested in dating, she will allow you to kiss her. Now it’s not a make-out session, but it is a kiss. This is so the guy knows whether or not to continue putting effort into the relationship. If she does not allow you to kiss her, then she is not interested. This somewhat clears up any confusion about the relationship that we sometimes see prevalent here in the U.S. This caught me completely off-guard. Here in the U.S. people always tell you to never kiss on the first date because that’s just bad luck. In Brazil, it is a whole different ball game.

He later discussed some of the other states briefly, but the two that he discussed more in depth were the states that I should visit. His wife soon called him asking if he was ready to go since she was outside waiting for him. Unfortunately, we had to end our conversation. We talked about possibly meeting again, but with exams and big exams happening before finals, we were not sure if we would be able to find another time to meet up again. We agreed to communicate over text to see if we could possibly meet up another time. We said goodbye and soon went our separate ways. I never thought to learn so much from Brazil like I have through Anderson. One always thinks that you can learn everything you need to through a book. However, a lot of times it seems that experiences are often times more helpful and valuable then merely a book.

Spider Dog

I’m startled by the sound of the alarm on my phone intended to wake me up from my nap. The time is 3:22. I’m definitely not making it to class on time. I slap on some clothes making me appear as if I literally just rolled out of bed (which I did). As I run to class, people turn the heads quietly judging me with their stares. “Look at this kid running to class. What a freaking dweeb,” is what they were probably thinking. I finally arrive to class and try entering in a stealthy manner until I trip as I walk in. I’m glad I could get everyone’s attention.

            Today in class Dr. Williams had a nice treat for us. It was the day of the spider dog. These videos were simply composed of a small, friendly dog wearing a spider costume. The real kicker was that this dog would chase random people during the late hours when no one was around. These videos were hilarious! The dog would literally scare the pants off of the people! My favorite part was whenever the spider dog chased an older man in the subway into a “spider web”. The man was stuck for a while frantically trying to get out of the clutches of the spider dog.

            Later on in class, Dr. Williams answered my prayers and searched for the videos with the cats versus the cucumbers. Who knew cats would be so scared of cucumbers. The little fur balls literally flew when they realized the cucumber was right next to them. It was as if this little green object was a threat to these poor, domestic cat’s lives.

            Watching these videos made class one to remember. However, they were more than just hysterical videos. These videos highlighted several themes that we have gone over in class. For instance, the video with the spider dog, elements for both superiority and relief theory were present. Watching the people pee themselves with fear was hysterical. Being that I knew before hand that this spider dog was in fact harmless, I am automatically superior to the person being scared off by this animal. Their misfortune in this case was fuel to my enjoyment. Relief theory was also present in this scenario. Seeing the random people’s misfortune of a lack of information of the situation makes one pity them a bit but in a laughing manner. This is somewhat due to the fact that nothing harmful was inflicted upon the person that was chased by this spider dog. The videos with the cats versus the cucumbers embodied more of the incongruity theory than anything. Everyone watching the video was completely caught off-guard by the reactions of the cats when they came into contact with the cucumbers. From literally running to class to experiencing the first known evidence of cats flying in households, this day was definitely one for the books. It’s crazy how laughter, which was once seen as a phenomenon to me, can somewhat be explained through different types of theories. One concern of mine was that this course would ruin the art of laughter for me through its dissection. However that proved that in fact my laughter is still in tact.

"Bueller. Bueller. Bueller. Bueller. Bueller."

Arriving to class right at 3:30 is a forte of mine. However, it comes with a cost. As I was walking into class right at 3:30, I see my normal seat being taken by Mark Alar. I was thinking to myself that this guy is now at the top of my hit list. I was forced to drag a chair and sit on the side portion of the table.

This day in class we went over our reading of “Vacation ’58” by John Hughes. I never really knew who John Hughes was until I was told about some of his work in the past. One of his more famous works was “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” which is one of my favorite movies of all time. As class progressed, we were given a worksheet over the reading. This reading was one of my favorites so far, so I was prepared to kick the class’ butt on the questions. We were given some specific questions; however we were pretty much able to answer all of the questions.

After going over the questions, we then proceeded to discussing John Hughes and some of his works. We first saw clips from the original “National Lampoon’s Vacation.” The clips were pretty funny overall. After watching these clips, we proceeded to analyze some of his other works and even a couple of videos honoring him after his death. As I mentioned before, “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” is one of my favorite movies of all time, so when we discussed this movie, I was ready. The whole scene where the principal tries to call Bueller’s bluff about being sick, but ends up being proven wrong is hilarious. The situational humor created in this scene literally had me on the floor laughing when I first saw it. Soon after this scene, there is a part where Bueller pretends to be the father of his girlfriend in order to get her out of school. In this scene, he picks her up and right before they leave, he asks for a kiss from his girlfriend with the principal still nearby the see. Of course the principal sees this and is still confused embarrassed about the earlier situation that he just doesn’t even know what to think about this scenario.

These scenes ran through my mind throughout class as we watched videos about John Hughes and discussed some of his works and the elements that they possess. For instance, some of the scenes that are absolutely hilarious are situational humor that causes one to feel somewhat superior to the person that is experiencing an unfortunate situation. I find a lot of John Hughes humor to satisfy the conditions of superiority theory more than anything. These elements can be seen in “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off”, the “Home Alone” movies, and even “National Lampoon’s Vacation.”

A lot of these movies that John Hughes has written have been all time favorites of mine. I never really thought about the writer or director when it came to the quality of the movie. Now I need to pay more attention to that. I might be able to find more movies now to watch on Netflix or even on HBO Go.