Are you adjusting to our new stay-at-home lifestyle? Need a few laughs? As an erstwhile professional humorist, I feel constrained to give it a shot. Short items from a shortchanged mind:
—Funny headline from the Co-op’s well-done monthly magazine, for a class called Composting 101: “Because a rind is a terrible thing to waste.”
—Speaking of nutrition, an upcoming sequel with original cast members will reportedly be called: “Star Trek VIII: The Search For Oat Bran.”
—I didn’t mention this in my downbeat last column about being a crippled kid who now hobbles around on spindly legs. When I’m about to enter the pool here, a sick fellow swimmer friend of mine will yell out, “Marco!” To which I reply, “Polio!”
—I’m not a big podcast user since I don’t commute (unless you count going from the bedroom to the kitchen), but one podcast I do enjoy is on the BBC, and it takes its name from one of Tony Soprano’s favorite lines: You’re Dead to Me.” It’s a lighthearted look at famous decedents like Joan of Arc, Blackbeard and Napoleon. Check it out.
—Good news: Steven Colbert has resumed his CBS show this week, sans studio audience. For the past few weeks, he’s been doing short show openers from his second home down in his native Charleston, SC. Now we get Seth Meyers back on NBC. Meyers has better writers than Colbert. Seth’s recent Netflix special, “Lobby Baby,” might the best comedy special I’ve ever seen about marriage and parenting. The title comes from his wife’s having to give birth prematurely in his apartment building’s lobby-a true story. Check it out.
—Speaking of TV personalities, we’re currently getting a rare glimpse of TV people doing their shows from home. MSNBC’s talented Nicolle Wallace has been joking online about how different she looks when doing her own hair. If you’ve ever worked in TV (I have), you know you can’t overstate the importance of hair, lighting and makeup on TV. Ask this next guy...
—Speaking of hair, there’s no way The Food Network’s upbeat and ubiquitous Guy Fieri—who I knew in Sonoma County before he became famous—would have ever become such a big star without that white, spiky hair. It’s the kind of hair that could cause severe tire damage.
—About five years ago, I had the misfortune of contracting a rare autoimmune disease called Weggener’s (don’t leave...there’s a joke coming, I promise). Except this type of vasculitis isn’t called Weggener’s any more. Why not? Because German scientist Dr. Weggener happened to be friends with a guy named... Hitler. The moral: If you want a disease named after you, better choose your friends more carefully. The new name of Weggener’s, btw, is about 20 syllables long.
—Having been forced to read this stultifying author in my French class, I appreciate the headline about the ongoing quarantine atop Suzanne Moore’s recent column in The Guardian: “They can lock me down, but they can’t force me to read Proust.” D’accord!
—Finally, good pandemic line from comic Larry “Bubbles” Brown: “I sure picked a bad time to open a kissing booth.”
(Homebound PT resident Bill Mann has written humor columns for CBS MarketWatch and USA Today. Reach him at newsmann9@gmail.com.)
