What’s this? This is Twittering.
STUPID:
That’s about as helpful as a fart in a wind tunnel.
— Conlan Spangler (@thisisconlan) March 30, 2012
I like this joke for three reasons: (1) a fart wouldn’t have much of an effect in a wind tunnel, so it makes sense as an idiom, (2) a fart probably wouldn’t ever help anything—wind tunnel or not—so it makes no sense at all, and (3) farts.
WISDOM:
I prefer a “thumbs up” icon, rather than a heart icon, for showing approval online because I’m afraid of commitment.
— Conlan Spangler (@thisisconlan) March 30, 2012
Please star this on Twitter. Because I’m a star.
WISDOM:
Sometimes it’s tough to maintain this indomitable optimism about humanity.
— Conlan Spangler (@thisisconlan) March 30, 2012
This is ironic because I don’t have an indomitable optimism about humanity. Or maybe I do. Either way, it’s tough.
REACTION:
Made a drinking game out of Ken Burns _Prohibition_ on PBS. Drink every time someone says “prohibition”, “alcohol”, or “viewers like you”.
— Conlan Spangler (@thisisconlan) March 30, 2012
This is dumb.
WISDOM:
Maybe I wouldn’t “make you feel stupid” so much if you stopped being so stupid.
— Conlan Spangler (@thisisconlan) March 30, 2012
This is mean. (But maybe true?)
STUPID:
Pat Sajak and Vanna White make me believe in true love.
— Conlan Spangler (@thisisconlan) March 30, 2012
You think I’m just making a dumb joke here, but what if I’m not? What if we’re all wrong about love? What if love isn’t about passion and fuzzy feelings of adoration? What’s if it’s really about shared commitment, dedication to a common goal, and occasional after-hours orgies on a big spinning wheel?
REACTION:
God doesn’t give people more adversity than they can handle. I wonder why God thinks suicide is such a great way to deal with adversity.
— Conlan Spangler (@thisisconlan) March 30, 2012
This is not a joke about suicide or religion. It’s a joke about platitudes.
STUPID:
I guess having no job and no self-respect does have its perks.
— Conlan Spangler (@thisisconlan) March 30, 2012
I forget why this sentence popped into my head, but I remember that it did, fully formed (and it refers to me). I just like the way it sounds.
REACTION:
Mega Millions has shown how little people understand about statistics. And that’s a sense of smug self-satisfaction that money can’t buy.
— Conlan Spangler (@thisisconlan) March 31, 2012
I’m not talking about the fact that the chances of winning are 1 in 175,000,000. What I was referencing here is the pseudo-statistical games I saw people playing. I saw someone online say that the chance of there being multiple winners remains the same no matter how many people buy tickets. This is of course not true: the more people who buy tickets, the higher the likelihood that (if the winning numbers are chosen) two or more people will split the jackpot. Others were claiming that your chances of winning are higher if you choose numbers numbers over 31 because so many people pick their numbers based on dates. This may increase the chances of not splitting a winning a jackpot, but it doesn’t change the chances of winning any single draw (which is always exactly the same). The odds of the winning numbers being 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 is exactly the same as them being 3, 14, 28, 35, 39, 42.[1] Sequential winning numbers just don’t happen often because there are so many other potential non-sequential possibilities.
I don’t play the lotto, but I have no problem with people who do. I just don’t want people operating under false premises. The More You Know.™
WISDOM:
My mom taught me if I don’t have anything nice to say, I shouldn’t say anything at all and also to eat my feelings.
— Conlan Spangler (@thisisconlan) April 1, 2012
This one didn’t really turn out how I’d hoped. The joke is that, just because your mom taught you something, that doesn’t mean it’s true or a good idea. But I don’t think I found the right punchline that was funny, universal, and true. Besides, my mom didn’t teach me to only say nice things.
That concludes this episode.
- This is disregarding the Mega Number, but the principle is the same. [↩]