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This is Twittering: Meta-Commentary Digest, Episode 42

What’s this? This is Twittering.

STUPID:

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:

Please star this on Twitter. Because I’m a star.

WISDOM:

This is ironic because I don’t have an indomitable optimism about humanity. Or maybe I do. Either way, it’s tough.

REACTION:

This is dumb.

WISDOM:

This is mean. (But maybe true?)

STUPID:

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:

This is not a joke about suicide or religion. It’s a joke about platitudes.

STUPID:

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:

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:

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.

  1. This is disregarding the Mega Number, but the principle is the same. [↩]
  Posted 23 April 2012 in Internets  
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Ask Conlan: Boiling

A reader writes:

Dear Conlan,

How do I figure out what to do with my life? I need to find a new job and I just don’t know where to start.

Sincerely,
Meandering in Minnesota

Thanks for your question, Madarin. It’s not uncommon for people of a certain age to wonder what it all really means and where they’re all really going and why it’s all WTF, dude. In fact, this question reminds me of a story…

Not too long ago there was a dog named Stanley. He was exactly six feet long (from nose to tail). That’s why they called him “The Human Tape Measure”. One day Stanley wanted to eat some bagels or some other kind of boiled bread. So he went to New York City, birthplace of the Bronx Boilers. Then Stanley was run over by a subway train and died (this was before 9/11).

The moral of the story is: don’t go chasing bagelfalls. Please stick to being a dog that’s a human tape measure.

The other part of your question (i.e., needing to find a new job and just don’t knowing where to start) is trickier. The obvious answer is, start at the beginning. But the right answer isn’t usually the obvious answer, because that’s not how TV mystery shows work. The right answer is: the old lady from the beginning of the episode who lived across the hall from the dead guy. She killed him because he was mean to her cat! What a twist!

In conclusion, I hope my insight has helped put Me-and-Da-Ring (rap name) on the path to a happy and healthy 2009.

If you hate your life and have a question you’d like to Ask Conlan, please find me and ask it.

  Posted 20 April 2012 in Ask Conlan  

This is Twittering: Meta-Commentary Digest, Episode 41

Today is This is Twittering day!

WORDPLAY:

Sandwiches again.

WORDPLAY:

This was the quickest question I could think of.

REACTION:

This is slightly amusing if you watch Downton Abbey. But only slightly.

WORDPLAY:

I was excited when Google told me I was the first person in history to think of this.

WORDPLAY:

This isn’t very funny.

STUPID:

This would probably have been funnier if anyone was still talking about The Secret, but I like it because both references are outdated. By the way: spoiler alert.

REACTION:

This isn’t meant to be dirty. I just think it’s funny how pregnant women take naked pictures with their arms covering their breasts, because a pregnant tummy resembles a giant breast itself (or so I’ve heard).

REACTION:

I saw a commercial about a guy who didn’t want to be around his wife’s parents. I thought it was interesting that, as a society, we’re still making in-law jokes. I’m not married, so maybe I just can’t relate—maybe it’s really one of those universal truths that will always be funny. But it just seems like such a tired joke.

WORDPLAY:

Because it’s not determined by popular vote, see. Collegiarity is not a real word. I made it up.

WORDPLAY:

This was just a throwaway idea in one of my Midnight Dumps…

MIDNIGHT DUMP ASIDE. I haven’t yet explained the full idea behind my Twitter Midnight Dumps, so here it is: It often takes time for me to get my toots worded just the way I want them, so I keep drafts saved until I think they’re ready to be published. Sometimes the germ of a toot never grows into something I’m happy with, or I write a toot that I don’t think is really worth publishing. Rather than throw away these oddball, half-formed, and otherwise incomplete toots, I occasionally unload several of them in a row around 12 a.m. I call it the Midnight Dump. This “dumping” technique is calculated on my part to produce at least some entertainment value to my followers, even if every single toot doesn’t hit its mark. I include some (but not all) of these dumped toots in my This is Twittering recaps because some of them actually are worth revisiting, and sometimes I want to provide further explanation as to why they didn’t work quite the way I’d hoped. Now, let’s get back to the show.

…But it struck me that if you say “Alcoholics Anonymous” fast, it sounds like “Alcoholics Synonymous”. And then, of course, the question is, what’s a synonym for alcoholic?

REACTION:

I’m fascinated by TV commercials. I’ve tossed around the idea of creating a blog about them, but I figure with fewer and fewer people watching live TV, it would become less and less relevant. Regardless, it’s absurd how many different TV campaigns Geico runs simultaneously. There’s the gecko, the pig, the unsolved mysteries guy, and more. I think Progressive has a few different simultaneous campaigns, too. Presumably it works for them, because they keep running them.

STUPID:

The interesting thing about this is, looking at your own snot actually is a useful intellectual pursuit. As you may know, the color can be an indication of infection. How many future physicians were intrigued by their own blood, mucus, and pus? A lot, I bet. But the way I phrased the question was obviously intended to seem gross and stupid. I just like screwing with expectations.

That concludes this episode of This is Twittering: Meta-Commentary Digest… or does it?

  Posted 18 April 2012 in Internets  
Tagged: ,

This is Twittering: Meta-Commentary Digest, Episode 40

Today is This is Twittering day!

STUPID:

This makes no sense, but it was pretty popular with the retweet crowd. Probably because it resonates emotionally.

STUPID:

If you have to have a bloodbath, try to make it as relaxing as possible.

REACTION:

Any time I see this kind of manipulative guilt-tripping, I get mad. Email forwards like this evoke from me a gut-level rage that’s completely disproportionate to the actual offense. Live and learn, I guess.

STUPID:

AGB wanted “ahoy” to be the standard telephone greeting (vs. Edison’s “hello”). If “ahoy” had stuck, I predict Hitler never would have risen to power. Prove me wrong.

WISDOM:

The “ahoy” joke was a relatively minor instance of this. I routinely think up jokes that require prior knowledge of at least two (often obscure) premises. Sometimes people may appreciate it as absurdism, and sometimes people may understand part of the joke, but I suspect a pretty limited number of people appreciate the full scope of what I’m trying to say. And that’s OK. The comedy starts to fall apart when it requires so much effort. But I still write these obscure bits, and here’s why:

  1. I’m goofing around. I’m not attempting to create high art. I’m just a dude who’s interested in language (and makes my living with it), so I like to experiment and play and create awful puns with it. Basketball players often learn all kinds of “useless” tricks with a basketball—spinning it on a finger, rolling it up and down arms, improbable dribbling techniques. These aren’t skills that players use in games, but I’d argue that it does make them better players with better control of the ball in different situations. Likewise, I’m not trying to produce practicable works of genius here. I’m just stretching my muscles and seeing what happens. Also,
  2. I personally get a thrill when I recognize someone else’s obscure reference. It creates an immediate rapport, and I feel more connected to that person even if I’ve never met them. I like the idea that someone somewhere is making that same type of connection when they read something stupid that I write. It’s a good feeling.

So that’s why.

WORDPLAY:

I don’t eat pudding, so this was just one big lie. But I think some pudding does have raisins in it.

WORDPLAY:

The apparent joke here is that “hero” is a type of sandwich, but really I just think it’s funny because it’s dumb and sandwiches are funny. When I try to think of a funny object, sandwich is the first thing that comes to mind. Also, they’re delicious.

WORDPLAY:

This is a joke about a French phrase in English.

WISDOM:

This is funny because crippling regret probably is worse than whatever temporary physical illness someone has.

REACTION:

This is a joke about confusing a movie with a hotdog eating contest.

REACTION:

I saw Jack White on SNL or someplace and he reminded me of Edward Scissorhands. As far as I know there is no Edward Scissorhands remake and, if there was, it wouldn’t be a music video. That makes no sense.

WORDPLAY:

Spoiler alert: it’s not worth it.

STUPID:

This toot happened because I thought it would be funny if someone thought Chicken Parmesan was variety of Parmesan cheese.

That concludes this episode of This is Twittering: Meta-Commentary Digest.

  Posted 16 April 2012 in Internets  
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