Many have tried to analyze comedy, but to date, I don’t think anyone’s ever described just what humor is. It shows up in the oddest places, as it did for me recently.

A TV program I was watching two nights ago brought up the subject of cereal box toys. As I kid I vividly remember digging to the bottom of each new cereal box (or even dumping the whole box into a huge bowl) to find out what toy awaited me.

One toy I remember was a spoked plastic wheel with suction cups at the end of each spoke. It was supposed to stick to any smooth surface you threw it at, but as with most cereal box toys, the TV demonstration far outshone the actual user experience. I remember that it was called a “thwock.” The name probably stuck with me because it’s so nicely onomatopoeic.

Grabbing my laptop, I did a Google search for “thwock” and was immediately rewarded with a link to the Urban Dictionary. This definition greeted me:

thwock

The sound that accompanies the act of kicking an individual schquarely in the Jimmy. The act of kicking one in the Jimmy itself is commonly referred to as the administration of “THWOCKAGE.”

I have no idea how I avoided waking the entire house. For some reason, that definition tickled me so irresistibly that I laughed for a solid minute. Laughter aftershocks continued for the next hour.