Can a word in and of itself be funny? Johnny Carson, a long ago host of the Tonight Show way before Fallon, certainly thought so. He always felt a hard 'C' consonant within a word sounded funniest. So for example he would choose 'guacamole' over 'spinach' dip in a joke.

A new study shows maybe he was on to something. This article talks about research that claims to have found the funniest words in the English language. Published in Behavior Research Methods by University of Warwick it describes a study involving over 800 participants and nearly 5,000 common words. Each participant had to rate 211 words on a 1 to 5 scale, 5 being the funniest. If you really want to delve into the nuts and bolts of the actual study, you can devour it here.

So what were the top dozen funniest words in the English language?

1. Booty
2. Tit
3. Booby
4. Hooter
5. Nitwit
6. Twit
7. Waddle
8. Tinkle
9. Bebop
10. Egghead
11. Ass
12. Twerp

There ya go twerp, booty is so funny it might make you tinkle like a nitwit.

I don't know that I agree with this list. I'm probably getting hung up on what the funniest words are specifically here in Jersey. I can think of a few words that make me laugh out loud.

Governor

Tax fairness

Tenure

Property tax

School funding

Tolls

Justice

Come to think of it, I'm only laughing on the outside but crying on the inside.

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