After getting sorted, processed, and settled, it’s lights out and he gets ready to sleep.
After a few minutes he hears someone yell out “Forty Six!” and the whole cell block erupts in laughter.
A few more moments pass and someone else calls out “Sixteen!” and again, the whole cell block starts laughing.
This goes on for some time, people calling out numbers and everyone laughing at it.
Eventually, he leans to the side and asks his cellmate, “What’s with the numbers?”
“Well, we’ve all been here so long that we’ve told each other all of our jokes. After awhile, we just numbered them, and now you yell out the number and everyone knows what it is and laughs.”
“That’s pretty smart,” the man replies, “Can I give it a try?”
“Sure,” says his cellmate, “just yell out any number between 1 and 100.”
The man yells out, “Sixty Eight!”
Nothing.
“Eleven!”
Silence.
“Forty?”
You can hear crickets chirping.
He turns to his cellmate and cries out, “What gives!? Are these jokes not funny?”