This guy walks into a bar for the first time, and he’s sitting around drinking. Some of the old timers are telling jokes. One of them says ‘Seventeen’ and the other old timers all roar with laughter.

A little later, another of them says ‘Thirty-Two’ and again, they all laugh and holler.

Well, the new guy can’t figure out what’s going on, so he asks one of the locals next to him, “What’re these old-timers doing?”

The local says “Well, they’ve been hanging around together so long they all know all the same jokes, so to save extra talking they’ve given them all numbers.”

The new fellow says, “That’s mighty clever! I think I’ll try that.”

So he stands up and says in a loud voice “Nineteen!”

Silence; everybody just looks at him, but nobody laughs.

Embarrassed, he sits down again, and asks the local fellow “What happened? Why didn’t anyone laugh?”

The local says, “Well, son, you just didn’t tell it right.” — Hi Lama