Recently, as part of my mission to eat or drink, or at least taste, all 144 items on the menu at Pomona’s Mix Bowl Cafe, I ate joke.

Joke is a porridge. At Mix Bowl, it can be ordered with chicken, pork or shrimp. I got it with chicken. It actually wasn’t bad.

My only regret is that I didn’t spill any on myself. Because then I could have said, looking down at my sleeve in mock sorrow, “Looks like the joke’s on me.”