I couldn't help noticing that the article didn't say anything about the quality of a very happy person's sense of humor. It's been my conclusion that the very happy person is many wonderful things, but hilarious is not one of them.

My studies indicate that very happy people tend not to trend toward sarcasm or irony or comic-effect exaggera-tion or any of the other stocks-in-trade of humor. Very happy people are, I think, earnest and sincere. Sincerity is all well and good, but it'll never work at the Improv.

"The story goes on. 'They also were less neurotic and scored lower on several tests for emotional problems.'

"That's good, huh? Less neurotic? Fewer emotional problems?"

"Hmmm-hmmm," she responded, spritzing perfume.

"Then it says some stuff '… somewhat surprisingly, the very happy people did not consider themselves more attractive …' yada yada '… positive feelings most of the time … occasionally negative moods … .' Here's the best part:

"'This suggests that very happy people do have a functioning emotion system that can react appropriately to life events,' they wrote."

Jessica stopped in midprimp.

"What?" Jessica said, laughing. "A functioning emotion system. What did they think?" She touched up her lipstick. "What a weird subject for a study, don't you think?"

"Not really," I replied. "You see, most of us wonder about people like you. Very happy people are the personality equivalent of the outer reaches of space or the deepest depths of the ocean. Completely mysterious. What are very happy people really like, we wonder. What's really going on deep inside them?"

She rummaged through her closet, found a light jacket to wear over her blouse, put it on.