> I agree with you wholeheartedly. I was a little
> ticked when I originally posted, and am not
> usually that sensitive. I can take a joke pretty
> well, but what really gets my goat is when
> those telling the jokes can't take one about
> themselves. I'm tired of double standards
> about everything.

Well, I remember I once saw a "counterattack" piece floating around through e-mail entitled "You Know You're a Yankee If..." I, being a Yankee among Yankees (raised in New England, living indoors all my life, and the voice of the "liberal media" among my friends), should be very offended by such things, but I in fact laughed out loud at the concept and couldn't help but write a few of my own. If all y'all Southerners who suffered patiently through Jeff Foxworthy's reign of terror think you'd enjoy putting the shoe of shame on the other foot (the one that's currently in the shiny leather wingtip and Argyle sock) for a change, then I'd be only too happy to take a few lumps of cynical stereotyping! And I'll even administer the dose myself, with my gold-plated, filigreed, miniature ball-peen hammer that I bought at the Gap (it's the one I usually use to punish political incorrectness). Lemme see if I can remember a few...

- You know what the word appliqué means, and use it in conversation.

- You think the word "barbecue" just means a cookout.

- Your idea of "going casual" is a polo shirt and dress slacks.

- When asked where milk comes from, your immediate response is, "The supermarket".

- The largest vehicle you have ever owned is a four-door sedan.

- You're having your midlife crisis, so you sell your car and buy a moped.

- You know the names of five hundred clothing designers, but the only two breeds of dog you can name are "big" and "small".

- Your idea of a home-cooked meal is a microwaved TV dinner.

- To you, the worst way to insult an elected official is to call her "relatively conservative"; to call someone "right-wing" verges on profanity.

- You don't understand the difference between music and Muzak.

- The Gap has named one of their stores after you.

- You had your wedding at window 7 of City Hall.

- You were in a polo shirt and dress slacks at the time.

- You decide to become a vegetarian, so you vow that from now on you'll only eat the chicken sandwiches at fast-food restaurants.

- When someone tells you s/he was a Girl/Boy Scout as a child, you get excited and try to get someone to take your picture with this "rugged survivalist".

- Your idea of a simple meal is veal without parmesan.

- Your idea of roughing it is a house without air-conditioning.

- When you picture starving people in Ethiopia, the first thing that strikes you about them is, "Oh, gosh! They can only afford to buy basic cable!"

And here's some Rinkworks-specific ones:

- You don't understand what Equiworks is supposed to be about, but you think it has something to do with math.

- You're not sure if How To Be Romantic is supposed to be in the humor section.

- You consistently score 0's on the Horse and Cow Trivia in Trivia Stampede and rarely score more than 1 or 2 on Auto Racing Trivia, but you always beat everybody's butt at Academy Award Trivia. You wonder when Sam is going to put up Fashion Trivia, Soap Opera Trivia, or Middle Management Trivia. (Please, get that last one up soon!)

- You actually use the phrase "beat everybody's butt", and you weren't aware that it was supposed to be a euphemism.

- You're not sure what a "euphemism" is, but you think it means the same thing as "sodomy".

- You actually use such phrases as African-American, Southern-American, Asian-American, etc. consistently, to the point where, when someone asks, "What's Tiger Woods?" you quickly reply "an Asian-African-Caucasian American" rather than the more obvious "a golfer".

- When your daughter goes out on her first date, you warn the boy that if anything inappropriate happens, you can and will take legal action.

- Something inappropriate happens, you take legal action, and end up settling out of court.

- The "something inappropriate" you meant was making her pay for their hotel room.

- It really was a hotel room, not a motel room.

- You refuse to allow your children to watch Nick at Nite because you fear the shows promote sexist attitudes; instead, you encourage them to watch HBO's "Sex in the City" and "The Sopranos", so they can be exposed to real art.

- You actually paid attention when someone published a paper saying the Babar books promote social inequality.

- On the other hand, you didn't know anything about the Jerry Falwell/Teletubbies issue.

- You don't even know who Jerry Falwell is.

- The most stress you had in high school was trying to decide whether to go to Harvard or Yale.

- You picked Harvard because Yale seemed too much like a "party school".

- When asked, you find you can't give the names of any non-Ivy League colleges.

- You think a "blue-collar job" is a job that offers casual days.

...And that's all I've got for now. I love role reversals! (Okay, so these technically aren't that funny, but not all of us are Jeff Foxworthy, especially if we're Yankees.) I hope you had fun wasting your time reading this! :)

(If anyone's interested, I've got a few brunette jokes, too.)

(Boy, this was a frivolous post. Ah well, it's an entertainment site.)