The Stooges Gene

I went to Ikea with my sister and brother-in-law yesterday. That is apropos of nothing, except the fact that Ikea is in Round Rock, which is over an hour away. We took my nephew as well, who is a solid two-and-a-half years old and loving every moment of it. So in addition to the time we spent in Ikea, I had several hours of driving time to observe him and his reactions to things.
   I know I'm not treading new ground here, but little boys are very different from little girls.
   My nephew has The Stooges Gene, which is that genetic quirk in boys that lets them find the hilarity in noisy bodily functions. Boogers were a favorite while we were in Ikea, but on the trip back he encountered the adult male's ability to burp on command. Since he's two years old he wanted me and my brother-in-law to burp over and over and over again, which we did, and he squealed with delight each and every time.
   My sister endured silently, then called one of her friends to chat while we echoed the truck cab with belches.
   I have two nieces as well, both of them substantially older than my nephew, and both of them gifted with wickedly funny senses of humor. Neither of them, however, would have found fifteen minutes of burping nearly as funny as my nephew did, not even when they were that little. I can tell you that not once did either of them laugh uncontrollably at a burp, then demand that I burp over and over and over again. I would have if they wanted me to, but it just never came up. It's a guy thing, chicks just don't understand.
   Burps are funny. Intrinsically funny, axiomatically funny. If a dying man interrupted his last words for a burp, guys would laugh, that's just the way it is. Farts are funny too, even if you're the victim of a particularly rank one. People getting slapped in the face is funny, and getting knocked in the head with a big board is funny, and getting poked in the eyes is funny, or jabbed in the stomach or pinched in the nipples by lobster claws or having a sledge hammer dropped on your foot... the list goes on and on and on, anything The Three Stooges did is funny. Always. And getting hit in the nuts is always funny too, as long as it happens to someone else.
   The Stooges Gene. It's only a matter of time before modern science isolates it within the human genome. It's probably in the same region as the Playing With Fireworks gene and the Hey Watch This gene. Once the Stooges gene is isolated we can get you ladies gene therapy so you can share in the glory that is two grown men burping on command for a two-and-a-half year old.