Posts from — August 2007

Hilliard Davidson High School senior Kyle Garchar says he and two friends spent three days plotting the trick, which was captured on video and posted on YouTube:

Garchar says he was inspired by a similar prank pulled by Yale students in 2004, when Harvard fans were duped into holding up cards with the same message.

The 17-year-old placed about 800 black and white cards in seats at Crew Stadium before an August 24th game with Hilliard Darby High School.

Directions instructed fans to check that the number listed on their card matched their seat number.

Darby supporters were told the sign read “GO DARBY.”

So…should Kyle have been suspended? Please add your thoughts in Comments below…

SOURCE:

• WTOL-TV

A recent medical study at the University of Maryland School of Medicine indicates that laughter appears to cause the tissue that forms the inner lining of blood vessels, the endothelium, to dilate or expand in order to increase blood flow. This is good news for most people, unless of course you have just suffered a nasty cut whereupon you could bleed out while you guffaw at a particularly hilarious pratfall or gag. And to date, there is apparently no form of joke, boner, slapstick or rib-tickler that can restrict blood flow, so if you’re a funny person already, then it’s probably prudent to be a bit glum and unfunny around hemophiliacs or the accident prone.

Writing comedy isn’t easy.

If it was, everybody would be doing it and nothing of a serious nature would get done around here. Thank goodness there are plenty of plain, dull and boring people to handle that stuff. And analyzing humor, it is said, is like dissecting a frog: Few people are interested and the frog dies as a result. So at the risk of boring the reader, or offending biology students, we can begin.

If you are like the majority of schlubs walking the street that have no comedy chops to save your life, then a few tips are in order. The first rule of comedy writing is:

1. There are no rules – Sure there are subjects that could never be funny, like, say f’rinstance a rash that won’t go away or a vicious dog bite. At least, they aren’t funny when they happen to you. Anybody else is fair game.
2. Keep it simple, Simon – It doesn’t matter who Simon is, as long as you don’t complicate your story, joke, sight gag with too much build-up or collaterol information. And don’t try to remember ridiculous acronyms like KISS, since Kissing really has nothing to do with comedy, unless you’re very bad at it, or you decide to kiss an animal like a monkey.
3. Humorous Subjects – Monkeys…they might be poor defenseless primates, but historically, they make people laugh. Should we ship them all back to the jungle just because they can’t seem to get regular jobs or hold political office? Two words: George Bush. Other subjects that lend themselves to natural silliness are, in no order of importance, breast implants, drunks, strange accents of speech and hats. A monkey that looks like a drunken French politician with large breasts and a fedora can’t miss.

THE BASIC JOKE

There are million jokes in the big city, and a few of them will kill every time. There are long drawn-out gags and there are one-liners, but The Zinger is my favorite, and sex is a popular topic:

A man goes to the doctor, “Doc, my wife complains about, you know…my sexual performance…” then he adds quickly, “But hey, it’s not been so good for me, either. For the last six months, I’ve been faking an erection.”

Good jokes come in lots of styles, but most of the best of them consist of three parts. The set-up, the act and the punchline.

The proto-typical ‘man walks into a bar’ joke is a good example:

The Set-up:

‘A man walks into a bar and sits down next to a lady and a dog. The man asks, “Does your dog bite?”. The lady answers, “Never!”

The Act:

The man reaches out to pet the dog and the dog bites him. The man says, “I thought you said your dog doesn’t bite!”

The Punchline:

The woman replies, “He doesn’t. This isn’t my dog.”

While this old gag might be funny to some, it’s a lot better when you change a few items around:

A man walks into a bar and says, “Give me a beer before problems start!” Again, the man orders a beer again saying, “Give me a beer before problems start!” The bartender looks confused. This goes on for a while, and after the fifth beer the bartender is totally confused and asks the man, “When are you going to pay for these beers?” The man answers, “Ah, now the problems start!”

For the English majors in your audience, there is this variation;

Shakespeare walks into a bar and asks the bartender for a beer. “I can’t serve you.” says the bartender. “You’re Bard!”

And as an example of how weirdness can be funny:

A grasshopper hops into a bar. The bartender says, “You’re quite a celebrity around here. We’ve even got a drink named after you.” The grasshopper says, “You’ve got a drink named Steve?”

Another great way to break the ice in a pre-comedic setting is the story-joke. But it’s important to try to keep the joke fresh. And jokes are like recipes; stale ones seldom go over well. So if the joke is old, instead of just reheating it, try to update it or change some of the ingredients.

A cop parked behind a billboard sees a car full of nuns was driving really slowly. He whips out and pulls them over and asks why they were going so slow. The head nun replies “Well, the sign over there says 23, so… I was going 23 miles per hour.” The officer chuckles a little and says “No, M’aam, thats the Route number not the speed limit, you can go 55 miles per hour.”

The nun then says “Well that explains why the nuns were yelling at me earlier today…we just got off Route 125.”

OFFENSIVE, RACIST AND DIRTY JOKES

Some comedians build their careers on blue comedy, pseudo-racist jokes or just plain offensive material.

But the payoff is difficult to justify.

Michael Richards’ recent fall from grace is evidence of this, and while someone like Chris Rock can get away with all manner of ‘white cracker/honky’ jokes and making fun of African-Americans, the laughter is generated mostly out of discomfort with the subject matter.

Still, many people regard Lenny Bruce as a comedy great and Bruce considered no subject untouchable.

Offensive jokes are more generalized and often offend across races or gender equally.

Examples are below, if you dare to try them, but for my money, there are plenty of funny things to joke about without crossing these lines.

The Dirty Joke:

Little red riding hood runs into a wolf in the forest.
She asks, ‘Mr. Wolf, why are your eyes so big?
The Wolf glares and says, “Get out of here kid, I’m trying to take a sh*t.”

The Racist Joke:

Why dont they have the Olympics in Mexico?

Because anyone who can run jump or swim is already accross the border.

The Offensive Joke:

What do you call a rape victim that doesn’t contact the police?

A good sport.

Simple jokes aside, you can write comedy for films, TV, print or for a stand-up act.

Writing a good, funny movie script requires much study and perseverance. But the rewards can be huge. The Coen Brothers stand out as exemplars in this.

TV comedy needs to be quick and to the point since TV audiences, equipped with remotes, generally have the shortest attention spans.

My experience is mostly in print, and it seems easier to stretch your legs in a written piece. It’s nice to be able to write a humorous short story because you can take your time and really tweak it for best effect. But for a quick fix, there’s not much that beats a comedian who is really on his or her game.

I once saw a clever, Seattle comedian named Matt Reidy do a thing called an ‘attitude switch’ which brought down the house:

A woman was sitting so close to the stage that one of her feet was resting on the raised platform. Matt stopped in the middle of a bit, focused on the woman and said sweetly, “Are you into comedy?…Studying to be a comedian?” The woman giggled and shook her head, no, whereupon Matt shot back, ‘THEN GET YOUR GAWDAMN FEET OFF THE STAGE!”

The element of shock worked so well that the audience howled for nearly five minutes.

(S.A.’Scott’ Robinson is an author, writer and columnist who occasionally has something to say that could be construed as humorous, which can often be found at http://eunoterpsia56.blogspot.com).

That’s not that unusual, but what is is that the accident caused his seatbelt to do a Heimlich-like maneuver on him, thus saving his life.

Steven Earp, 48, was eating a fast-food sandwich while driving Wednesday morning, said police Sgt. Doug Mozan.

Earp choked and blacked out.

His 1997 Honda sedan hit a parked car.

After the wreck, Earp came to.

Mozan attributed his revival to a “seatbelt-induced Heimlich maneuver.”

Witnesses told police Earp got out of his car, and they asked if he was okay.

“No, I’m not,” he said, and collapsed again.

Paramedics revived him and took him to the hospital, where doctors determined he hadn’t been injured.

“We urge people to take the extra time to pull over to the side of the road to enjoy your breakfast sandwiches,” said Mozan. “The fact that it was a nonfatal accident was extremely lucky. He didn’t choke to death or take anyone else with him.”

JOKESTARTERS:

• This isn’t the first time Earp has been saved by his car. Previously, he had severe blockage of his bowels, until a wild swerve caused him to end up sitting on the gearshift, which cleared the blockage.
• Earp’s 1997 Honda is being touted as a hero now, and is touring the country on behalf of the Heimliching Vehicles Foundation, a new non-profit made up of sentient motor vehicles that can save lives.

SOURCE:

• First Coast News

But this use of duct tape takes the cake:

A man in disguise tried to rob a liquor store in Ashland recently, wearing duct tape wrapped tightly around his face, with his t-shirt pulled up over his head, ala “Cornholio” from “Beavis and Butthead.”

Store manager Bill Steele had some duct tape of his own, but his was wrapped around a wooden club that sent the robber fleeing, according to a report by WSAZ-TV in Huntington, W. Virginia. The robber ended up dropping the rolls of change that he got in the robbery.

Store employee Craig Miller said he chased the man to the parking lot, tackled him and held him in a choke position until police arrived, the station reported. An unidentified customer also helped, police said.

Kasey G. Kazee, 24, was charged with first-degree robbery. Kazee, in an interview with the TV station, denied he was the bandit who robbed the store of two rolls of change.

Kazee pleaded not guilty Monday in Boyd County District Court and was ordered held under a $250,000 cash bond.

JOKESTARTERS:

• This isn’t the first time the suspect has tried to rob a store using a tape-based disguised. Previously, he failed to hold up an espresso stand while wearing a mask made of Scotch Tape. He was immediately identified by the barista victim.
• Police knew they had the right guy when they checked his ID and saw the name “Kasey Kazee.”

SOURCE:

• WRAL

MANCHESTER, CT – First, he was seen in a grilled cheese sandwich.

Then in a tree.

More recently, as a grease stain on the floor of a garage that sold on eBay for over $1,500.

And now, a Connecticut couple, Malynda and Eric Smith, say that one of the kitchen cabinet doors has an image of Jesus Christ in it.

The couple says they have lived in the house for about a year and never noticed anything different about the cabinet.

And they say it may be hard to believe, but everyone who looks at it sees the image.

“My daughter came and and said, ‘Mom look it’s God,’” recalled Malynda.

“And I looked and there it was a picture of Jesus Christ. Then my son noticed it and my husband came in and noticed it. I just can’t believe we hadn’t noticed it before.”

The family says, unlike others who have items bearing the likeness of Jesus, they are not going to sell the cabinet door.

They say that would be bad luck.

JOKESTARTERS:

• Actually, it makes perfect sense that Jesus would choose to put his image in a cabinet. After all, he was a carpenter, right?

SOURCE:

• First Coast News