What's so funny?

[Taylor]

In the dance episode, when Rickie and Angela burst into laughter, what's so funny?They are laughing at Jordan or is that their thing?

[MyLifeIsBrians]

I think it was just an inside joke.

[Jody Barsch*]

I've always looked at it as they are laughing at the situation they find themselves in. In this episode, Rickie and Angela both stress out a bit about who they are going with to the dance. They also talk about liking people who they feel they have no chance with.

At the dance, Angela is dealing with the fact that Jordan wouldn't take her, and then when she sees him, he does not approach her, or even really acknowledge her, as she hoped, and probably expected, he would.
Rickie experiences similar feelings of disapointment and rejection when Corey walks away from him once he knows that Rayanne is not coming. As they stand together outside, they are both feeling alone, rejected, and maybe a little foolish.

I belong nowhere, with no one ... that I don’t fit

At that moment Jordan enters the scene and just stops and waits for her to come to him. They laugh because it is absurd that this is how her evening ends up. It's absurd that Jordan can’t approach her, he doesn’t even look at her, he just strands and waits. It’s a little funny that this is like a big thing for them to see -- at this point for them, this small act, which gives all the control to Jordan, represents a huge invitiaon of opportunity. Rickie and Angela recognize the absurdity in the moment -- that relationships are so strange, as are the power stuggles involved in them, and the things we do when we want somebody. It isn't that there is an actual joke at play here, it is that momentarily the two of them are able to look at themselves from a detached vantage point. (This moment of self-reflection -- the liberating ability to laugh at themselves and their percieved drama, fades for Angela as she aproaches Jordan and the emotional stakes rise again, but I think it does linger with Rickie, allowing him to let go of all the insecurites and reservations (demonstrated in his dance with Delia), which is signifcant as I see "Life of Brian" as the starting point of Rickie's journey)