Is There a Canopy in Store for Me?

The past three months, I've shared quite few long subway rides with co-workers. I don't think they've ever gone too smoothly. The constant starting and stopping really messes with conversation. Pauses are more awkward than they have to be and well, the rides are just so darn long. Today, while talking with [edit: the resident biostat extraordinaire], the conversation came in fits and at one point, we got on the subject of nerdy jokes. I asked if there were any stats/epi (epidemiology) jokes. Apparently there are. Or maybe there aren't. As my co-worker started his joke, I grew increasingly concerned that it'd be so esoteric that I wouldn't get the punchline.

This is what he said:

A group of epidemiologists and biostatisticians get on a train. The epidemiologists all buy tickets, but the group of biostatisticians only buy one ticket. The epidemiologists are all amazed and say to each other, "wow, look at those guys, I wonder what they're up to." When the conductor comes buy and yells for tickets, the epidemiologists all present theirs, but the biostatisticians get up and all cram into the bathroom, so that when the conductor knocks on the door and yells for tickets, one hand sticks out and they only show one. The conductor buys it and moves on. The epidemiologists are amazed. On the return trip, the epidemiologists only buy one ticket for the group but the biostatisticians don't buy any. "I wonder what they're up to now," the epidemiologists say to one another. When the conductor goes around checking for tickets, all the epidemiologists go into the bathroom, they hear someone knock, so one epidemiologist sticks out his (or her) hand and gives the ticket- only to realize he (or she) has handed it to a biostatistician, who give it to the conductor. The moral of the story is that epidemiologists shouldn't just copy what biostatisticians do without figuring out why.

I'm not sure if I was supposed to laugh at the joke or with the joke. But I'm pretty sure that there's a more effective setup for this moral. Is this what lies ahead in adulthood and further schooling? Jokes like this? If that's so, then let me be a corporate shill. Let me be a Toys R Us kid.