Anyone who has spent a lot of time with a small person below the age of, oh, five years old or so, knows that their sense of humor is just beginning to emerge. This emergence is cute and adorable, but can be alarming to someone who is not used to it.  At this point in their joke-telling development, the small child is capable only of repeating any nonsensical, potty-related gibberish that, if it were being told by an adult, would make the person sound mentally deranged:

Child: “Want to hear a joke?”

Unsuspecting Adult: “Uh… sure.”

Child: “Why did the chicken cross the road?”

Adult: “I don’t know.  Why?”

Child: “Because it was making a POOP on the BUNNY!”  (Hysterical laughter from all 5 year olds in the area)

This is all well and good, but at a certain point, the small person becomes aware of “knock, knock” jokes, a lethal form of humor that is not only easy for them to memorize so it can be told over and over and over and over until you just want to jam a lobster fork in your ear, but has also been used in times of warfare to completely disarm the opposition by boring them to death.  One particularly deadly “knock, knock” joke that kids love goes something like this:

Child: Knock, knock.

Adult: Who’s there?

Child: Banana.

Adult: Banana who?

Child: Knock, knock.

Adult: Who’s there?

Child: Banana.

Adult: Banana who?

Child: Knock, knock.

Adult: Who’s there?

Child: Banana.

Adult: Banana who?  Is there an end to this joke?

Child: Yes.  Knock, knock.

Adult (wearily): Oh my God.  WHO’S THERE???

Child: Orange.

Adult: Orange who?

Child: Orange you glad the chicken didn’t POOP on the BUNNY??? (Hysterical laughter from all 5 year olds in the area)

Just kidding.  I think we all know the real punch line to that classic.  I would have written it out here, but apparently it’s still classified and being used as a torture device at Gitmo.

Which is frankly why I’m so deeply worried about Steve Byrne.  Steve is the head of a company that does corporate branding, wherein company logos are seared into the posteriors of corporate lackeys so that they are easily identifiable during the long and arduous cattle drive across the Plains.  I’m sorry, my mistake;  I’ve been out of the corporate world for a while, and apparently things have changed.  Steve helps companies make their products more readily identifiable to consumers.

Anyway, Steve has come up with what he believes is a Big Idea, and he posted it on a business website.   Basically, his Idea was to launch a new social networking site based around…. you guessed it, the “knock knock” joke.   He believes that a social networking site based on knock knock jokes would break down the walls of prejudice and foster meaningful dialogue between people from different cultures.  Ha ha!  What a card Steve is!   I’m pretty sure he’s never spent any meaningful amounts of time around small children.

As you can imagine, this Idea was not met with the normal amount of appreciation that your typical Big Idea usually receives.  Other business executives, who have obviously been through this stage of development with their own children, politely suggested that he increase the dosage of whatever medication he was taking.  And shortly thereafter, poor Steve was seen being shoved into the back of a black sedan and whisked off to be interrogated by the Committee to Advertise that Cheney acted Accordingly (CACA).