Pulling Your Leg Joke

This is a true story, it really happened to me.  Okay umm this one time during spring break, I went out to dinner with my friends Mary and Lindsey to this Mexican restaurant in DC called La Mila Dos.  We were there eating tacos and nachos or whatever and I got up to go to the bathroom with my friend Mary.  And when we came out of the bathroom there was this guy standing right there and he’s like, “um listen, um” and also it was weird because I noticed he had been staring at um Mary for like the whole time and it was kind of sketchy he’s like, “listen, I don’t want to like weird you out but you look exactly like my umm recently passed daughter”  I was like well that’s awkward umm because he said this to Mary, I was like uhhh okay, and he was like, “yeah umm god I miss her so much,” and he just started talking about how much he missed her, it was really awkward and umm Mary has like a bleeding heart and she’s like “ohh I’m so sorry.”  She asked how she died, all that stuff so umm anyways then the guy was like, “Okay listen, god don’t think I’m a weirdo, but when I leave, can I say goodbye Silvia,” Silvia was his dead daughter’s name, “and will you say goodbye dad back to me?”  And I was like is that legal, that is like so weird like so sketchy, but Mary was like, “okay, whatever  you need.” Because he was like, “yeah, because I need some closure, like I never got to say goodbye to her, she died in a car crash.”

So, we go back to our table and we’re finishing up her tacos and umm the guy walks by and is like, “Goodbye Silvia,” and Mary was like, “Bye dad.”  Then he leaves, yeah it was really weird.  Um so then uh then we finish eating , the waiter comes and brings the uhh check and we notice there’s an extra meal on it and we’re like, “yeahh wait we didn’t get Tacos Rancheros.” And she’s like, “no no no no no um your father said to just put it on your tab that you said you know you said you were going to pay for it.”  I’m like, “uh no our father is not here.”  And she’s like “oh yeah the guy that just left, you said goodbye dad.”  And we’re like, “NO that is not our actual father that was like some guy that like well we can’t explain the story its weird, but that was not our father.”  So Mary’s getting freaked out, I’m like umm “I’m not paying for this fucking Tacos Rancheros, I’m not like I’m not paying for this he’s not my dad.”  So um so uh me and Lindsey, who’s a sprinter, takes off out the door cause the guy only left like five minutes ago, and starts running down the street, Mary’s like almost sobbing, cause this is just so scary, we also didn’t have the extra money for it.  Um, I ran after Lindsey to make sure um she doesn’t kill the guy umm who like did this, scammed us I guess. And umm Lindsey like hops over a bike rack like and this guy’s getting on the bus and we see him like up ahead like on Connecticut and Western and um and he’s getting on the bus.  So Lindsey kind of like does this like leap over the bike rack and like grabs on to the guys leg as he’s getting onto the bus.  And she’s pulling his leg, and pulling his leg….just like I’m pulling yours right now.

The informant likes to tell this joke after she gets back from long trips, where her friends haven’t seen her in awhile and claim that this really happened to her while away, in the end revealing that the story is completely made up.  She claims the story is just for fun and believable enough that she can actually string people along for awhile.

I think it’s interesting how the joke ends with a folk metaphor.  This punch line really makes the joke.  The story connects the psychical action of pulling on someone’s leg with the metaphorical meaning of “pulling someone’s leg” to mean tricking them, or deceiving them.  Someone who does not know this folk metaphor, would then not get the joke.