Possibly, but I would venture that it's funny because cheese-graters and braille share similarities in that they are both surfaces covered in a pattern of small holes, and that if one were to confuse them and apply the same methods of interaction to a cheese-grater that they would to braille, the result would be a shredding of the fingers which could be interpreted, with the type of cognitive leap characteristic of jokes (which would hopefully also trigger the humour response), as being a violent experience allied to the act of reading.
I think the blindness of the protagonist is indirectly related to the humorous content of the joke. I think that, much like the parallel usage of Stevie Wonder, it's more of a storytelling convenience that provides an easily-understood setting under which braille and a cheese-grater may be confused. The kernel of the joke would remain intact if it was a braille-literate, sighted individual wearing sunglasses in a coal-cellar during a blackout at night, but the telling might then strangle the payoff. However, I feel I may have tragically rendered that irrelevant by now. |
