“The pen is mightier than the sword, and considerably easier to write with.”
— Marty Feldman
Marty Feldman, comedian, writer, actor
Category Archives: humor
I’m a writer and I don’t get no respect
[Editor’s note: I believe it was the late Rodney Dangerfield who had a comedy routine based on “I don’t get no respect.” The lack of respect could come from anybody, anywhere, including his wife. Below is a playwright Rodney could empathize with. He writes to Dear Abby, and she responds. I have known one or two other writers in the same situation. Maybe you, do, too.]
Sometimes respect is hard to come by for a writer, or a comic. Just ask Rodney Dangerfield.
I have won this prize four times – more than any other writer in the history of the contest. But is my family impressed? Not at all! My wife told me she thinks I write everything the same way and have simply repeated myself four times.
I am up in years. It’s unlikely I will ever again win this prize. So how do I respond to such indifference? What do you do when you feel you have accomplished something important and the response is, “so what else is new?”
–Looking for Validation in Florida
DEAR LOOKING FOR VALIDATION: My hat’s off to you. That you have won this prize more than any other writer in the history of the contest is a notable achievement. Attend the production, take your well-earned bow in the spotlight, and accept that the less you look to your wife for validation, the happier your life will be.
Nothing and the Philosopher
Doing nothing should not be rushed.
Filed under Cartoon, humor, Philosopher
The heist of some lifetime
Dear Congress,
I want my hour back.
The one you stole from me
To take up all the slack
Of saving energy.
A supercilious stance
Of the previous administration
Is giving me morning headaches
And hours of constipation.
Spring has not yet sprung
But an “extra” hour blooms
We’re supposed to use less fossil fuels
But you were a fool to assume.
You now fight over light bulbs
Some invoking “my right to chose.”
Yet, when robbing me of one hour,
You said I had nothing to lose.
There is no proof this hour
Is saving the country power.
I get up in the night, turn on several lights
As I make my way to the shower.
I use more electricity
As I start each day of work
All because you fell asleep
And forgot to think. What jerks.
You pander to the lobbyist
And engage in high mediocrity.
All the time wasting hours
On political pomposity.
By making daylight longer.
As I’m driving more for less
On gas I’ve forced to squander
While you show little or no regrets.
I’m losing sleep because I cannot be
Awake while the sun still shines
But with a jerk, the hour to start work
Finds me ever more behind.
I want my hour back.
The one you stole from me
And do not counterattack
With your light bulb skullduggery.
Even though my eyes are bleary
And my outlook a bit less cheery
I can still see quite clearly
And let you know sincerely:
I want my hour back.
The one you stole from me
To take up all the slack
Of saving energy.
The heist of some lifetime
Filed under Cartoon, heist, humor, poem, poetry, political humor, politicians, satire, story poem, theater of the absurd
The Kibitzer and The Kidd, part 6
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It wasn’t fair. Not only did he have a nickname he didn’t like – Kibbey – but he was also sleeping in the stable with the horses. Horse and hay, flatulence and flies, though it seemed odd that there were so many flies at night. He wondered if a fly got zapped by lightning, would it be resurrected.
Even the popcorn they delivered to him was stale and a little soggy from the humidity it picked up from the air. He had a bag of his own, but it had started raining again, so he couldn’t pop it outside. He looked around to see if the blacksmith’s workshop was part of the stables or nearby.
There was not a blacksmith’s forge, so he was on his own to create a fire.
He understood that the Kidd was the hero, having shot the pistol out of the floor-faced man’s hand. He knew that kibitzers were not easily or fully accepted into society. They were witnesses and scribes, and they reported to an authority most didn’t know about or understand. He certainly wasn’t sure why he had been selected. His family were not kibitzers. Nor any of his friends. And when they came in the middle of the night and told him he was selected, they did not give him a chance to say goodbye to his wife and two sons. Only a short note, quickly scribbled. It read: I’ve been selected. Don’t wait up.
He wasn’t sure how long ago that was, what his wife was like now, if his sons even remembered him.
The Kibitzer piled some hay in one area of mostly dirt. It was turning cold. He’d need the fire for more than popcorn.
Popcorn was his only solace. Bags of it turned up at the oddest times in the oddest places. He took it as a sign he was doing a good job.
He kept a book of matches dry and buried deep in a saddle bag. They were hard to get and he usually sparked a fire with a piece of flint and a piece of steel he carried; but they were both wet from rain. He was also too tired to try.
He added a piece of dried horse manure to the hay pile.
He found the matches, walked back to the pile of straw and dried other things and selected one from the box.
It was then somebody, head draped in a hood, stepped into the stable and tossed a torch on a larger pile of hay nearby. As the man left, he said, “Don’t wait up.”
At least that’s what the Kibitzer thought he said. The words were muffled by the hood. The words stunned him. By the time the Kibitzer recovered, the fire had spread to other parts of the stable, and the culprit was gone, and the Kibitzer was trapped.
(To be continued.)
Filed under humor, kibitzer, kidd, science fiction, story, storytelling, western, word play, words, writing
Super Tuesday Wrap Up
The Summation of Super Tuesday
Filed under Cartoon, humor, political humor, satire, Super Tuesday
Weird in an endearing sort of way
I have a friend who is tentatively planning to get married in March or April of 2013. Her boyfriend is an outdoorsman sort of fellow. They are considering New Orleans as a possible honeymoon destination, and I suggested that she and her intended take a raft down the Tennessee River near where we live to the Ohio River, the Ohio to the Mississippi River at Cairo, IL, and the Mississippi River to New Orleans. I suggested she could even mount her telescope to the raft and chart the stars as they go floating down the rivers.
She said she was not going rafting, not now, not ever, and not for her tentative honeymoon.
I said I was only trying to help them save on gas or air fare to The Big Easy and give them a chance to bond as they lived off the fish they caught in the rivers or the animals he shot on the land.
She said I was weird, but in an endearing way.
What I haven’t figured out is a river plan to get them to their other choice for a honeymoon: The Big Apple. Seems appropriate to send a newlywed couple to a city nicknamed after the fruit that tripped up Adam and Eve.
Some ideas are simply ahead of their time.
The Good Doctor S.
Dr. Seuss, can you come and play?
Dr. Seuss, it’s your birthday.
Dr. Seuss, can you stay?
Dr. Seuss has gone away.
Oh, Dr. Seuss, you cause dismay
and all the children want to say,
“Slay the monster or feed it hay,
that mean ol’ one that took you away.
Leave it toys or snacks on a tray,
however odd, bizarre, outre.
Oh, Dr. Seuss, what a display
Of love we have for you this day.
The blathering idiot has more questions
Just the other day, the blathering idiot had some time to kill, though he wasn’t sure it was alive to begin with, and while pondering the philosophical depths of life, came across questions for which he could not find answers. Below are a few more of those questions.
How come you can beat the odds, but never the evens?
How come formatting something means to put it in some sort of structure, but to reformat something means to wipe away all the structure?
How come falling in love leads only to a broken heart?
How come you can take a turn, but never give one?
How come you can fancy something, but are always told to speak plainly?
How come you can give a damn, but never take one?
After you put on airs, how do you take them off?
How come you can go for broke, but have to stop on a dime?
This may be too hard to think about
Filed under blathering idiot, Cartoon, humor, question of the day, questions, word play
The Devil’s Dictionary: miscreant
Every now and then, it is good to revisit a classic, or even a curiosity from the past. The Devil’s Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce was originally published in newspaper installments from 1881 until 1906. You might be surprised how current many of the entries are.
For example, here is a definition for the word miscreant The Old definition is Bierce’s. The New definition or comment are mine. From time to time, just as it was originally published, we will come back to The Devil’s Dictionary, for a look at it then and how it applies today. Click on Devil’s Dictionary in the tags below to bring up the other entries.
Old definition
Miscreant, n. A person of the highest degree of unworth. Etymologically, the word means unbeliever, and its present significance may be regard as theology’s noblest contribution to the development of our language.
New definition
Miscreant, n. A person of the highest degree of unworth, such as a politician or political pundit who wraps herself in the flag like swaddling clothes; proclaims “family values” as if they were a manger under siege, yet does nothing for families in dealing with the ravages of capitalism as the top 1 percent of the wealthiest people in the country control more wealth than the bottom 40 percent, and “wants to take my country back” as if somehow retreating into the past will deal with the future.
Etymologically, the word means unbeliever, holding an unorthodox or false religious belief. Again, see politician political pundit as described above. There is nothing more heterodoxical than living in a past that never was.
May want to see previous Devil’s Dictionary entries on politicians, politics, and orthodoxy.
Filed under Ambrose Bierce, Devil's Dictionary, humor, miscreant, satire
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