About this quote

Humor relies on breaking our expectations about how grammar and reality work. We often get stuck in rigid ways of thinking because we take every statement at face value. Misdirection is a useful tool when you need to break tension in a stiff meeting or a stressful family dinner. When you learn to spot these double meanings, you realize how much of our daily anxiety comes from taking life too literally. Try looking at your hardest problem today through a ridiculous lens and see if the pressure drops.

When to use it

• An English teacher uses this to explain misplaced modifiers to a room of bored high schoolers who are struggling to understand sentence structure.
• A copywriter points out a hilarious double meaning in a draft billboard slogan during a marketing meeting to save the brand from a public relations disaster.
• You quote this to your partner when a tense breakfast argument starts spinning out of control over a silly misunderstanding of who said what.