Sometime in February of 2013, my German wife and I spent a weekend with her parents in their charming little house. My wife’s father — who shall henceforth be known as ‘Papa Thunderchops,’ due to his epic silver sideburns — was sitting at the kitchen table peeling carrots. Except for when he is outside tending to his garden, Papa Thunderchops is always in the kitchen peeling something: apples, carrots, potatoes… the man just loves to peel shit. So I sat down next to him and started helping, and that’s when my wife came into the room to find the two of us hunched over a rapidly filling bowl of carrot skins.
THE WIFE: “Want to hear a joke my family likes to tell each other?”
ME: “Absolutely.”
THE WIFE: “Carrots are good for your eyes. Do you know why?”
ME: “Why?”
THE WIFE: “Have you ever seen a rabbit wearing glasses?”
*The joke was so bad I actually started laughing. Hard. I was left to wonder, however, if it might be a common joke here in Germany. My wife insists only her family tells it, but that can’t be true. Have you ever heard it before?
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