This is a cool joke, because it has a paradox built in because it only works when written about in third person.
I mean maybe she actually said "on the way to work" but i think post people would say "on my way to work" which doesnt work.
this post was submitted on 14 Mar 2025
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Dad Jokes
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"I saw a fox on the way to work" works just fine
maybe its just my weird brain then
your weird brain works just fine
your weird brain on the way to works just fine
"My Weird Brain" sounds like an 80s sitcom about a brain in a jar that can still somehow talk to people. And the backstory would be something like "One night, a lonely teenager tried ending his life by driving off a cliff. His body was unsalvagable, but his brain is preserved! Now he lives in a jar in the kitchen of government scientists kept secret from the public."
"My Weird Brain is filmed by a live studio audiance"
Well mine saw it the same way.
I would totally say "I saw insert thing on the way to work today," and would have assumed that would be the natural way to say it, but now I'm questioning that
You can always subtly rephrase it to make the joke in person. The first sentence of the following can actually be pretty broad.
W: "I saw a fox on my way to work!"
H: "Sorry, I didn't quite catch that. You saw a fox on the way to work?"
W: "Yes!"
H: "How did you know it was on its way to work?"
That degrades the quality of the joke quite a bit imo
This is the dad jokes comm. We don't do no quality here.
I saw a fox on one's way to work.
Actually, scratch that
But why did the fox hang up on you?
I found the dad!
I thought the punchline was going to be something like "My wife said she saw a fox on the way to work. I had to to explain to her what a mirror was. Such a ditzy blonde!"
That's cute
Sorry to bring linguistics in to this, but this is why irratates me about the English language. This joke would not work in Chinese.
我在上班的路上看到一只狐狸。
Which is literally: I, on the way to work, saw a fox
You cannot rephrase it like the Dad Joke above:
我看到一只狐狸在上班的路上。
This would be: I saw a fox on the way to work
But it would not contain the double meaning of the "I" being the one going to work.
But, somehow, in English, you could just move the words around and make it very confusing.
Ugh 🤦♂️
(Sorry about the rant)
I love a linguistics lesson, but this sentence is not actually that ambiguous.
If the sentence was unclear, the speaker would likely clarify:
- I saw a fox on its way to work
- I saw a fox on my way to work
Oh well, I guess its not for that market. I got it and that is really all that matters to me. I've heard quite a few jokes that translate badly in to English I just can accept that sometimes a joke can't be readily translated without getting excited.
You couldn't construct a Chinese sentence with dual meanings? Maybe not this one, but any? I know literally no Chinese, so I can't cite an example; but I thought completely unambiguous communication was why constructed languages like lojban exist.
edit: In a question about grammar, I used redundant words, but I can't think of a better replacement for "construct" in either case. I tried, though.
I often see in manga Chinese/Korean/Japan jokes explained, because they don't work in english. Don't be butthurt.
Bravo!