Granted, our quarantine hasn’t been a lot of fun. But my fallback solution for serious matters remains unchanged: Humor. Seek it out, and use it as a welcome tonic. Humor got me through some serious hospital business five years ago by keeping my medical pros laughing and firmly on my side. Humor, dark and otherwise is...infectious. And medical and newspaper types have always appreciated—and needed—gallows humor. There is some here, albeit in small doses:
—The New Yorker’s Andy Borowitz, arguably the top humorist today, came up with these recent headlines:
“Trump Optimistic about Winning Nobel Prize in Medicine.”
“Fauci Warns Trump that if Virus Dies Out, it Will Kill his TV Ratings.”
“No One Could Have Seen Pandemic Coming Except People Capable of Reading.”
“Fauci Begs Pharma Companies to Speed Development of Anti-Narcissism Drug.”
—A great money-making idea I’ve decided against: Selling T-shirts reading “I’m Asymptomatic!”
—Great line from Baltimore Ravens QB Robert Griffin III: “Whoever said one person can’t change the world never ate an undercooked bat.”
—The Seattle Times asked staffers to compile a playlist of appropriate social-distancing songs. Some of them:
“U Can’t Touch This.” (MC Hammer)
“Don’t Stand So Close to Me” (The Police)
“I Can’t Get Next to You” (The Temptations)
“All By Myself” (Eric Carmen)
“One Is The Loneliest Number” (Three Dog Night)
—Political bumper sticker I want to get: “ByeDon2020”
—Loafers welcome: My son in Vancouver has had one of the most respected and acclaimed home bread-baking websites for 20 years. He reports traffic to his TheFreshLoaf.com is up 500% in recent weeks. People are home, and people are baking. Proof? Just try to find yeast in a local store.
—Speaking of stores, heroes to thank who bring cheer to us: Local grocery store employees. Plus first responders and doctors and nurses, of course. OK, back to the funny business...
—Another hot item while we’re sheltering in place is jigsaw puzzles. One funny story is about a guy who tells his friend it took “only” four years to work one. “What’s so fast about that,” asked his friend? The puzzler replied, “The box read 5-7 Years.” Rim shot!
—Terse tweet from the reliably funny Al Franken: “Science Good. — Einstein, Frankenstein.”
—Lots of lists are appearing in media outlets about suggested movies to watch during the isolation. Many are sketchy at best. Here are two you can’t go wrong with: “The Freshman” and “My Favorite Year.” Plus any of the Python movies.
—Comic Mike Dugan: “I’ve had too much free time. I’ve named all of my paper clips.” Response to this on Facebook: “...“I’ve alphabetized all of mine.”
—Mordant, sick comic Larry “Bubbles” Brown on Facebook (you might want to ‘friend’ this guy): “I’ve had so much free time I’ve detailed my car. And solved the Zodiac case.”
To which one fellow comic replied, “You found your old datebook?”
On another matter, Brown again: “Gas is getting so cheap people are ripping the batteries out of their Priuses.” I’m a Prius hugger, but hey, let’s not get carried away here, Bubbs.
—Art notes: A funny neighbor here in PT says our getting new yard-waste containers has a down side. He’s posted photos of some old local ones that look as bad as my poorly spray-painted receptacle did, with this note: “Well helvetica it ain’t ...but I’m really gonna miss driving around appreciating redneck calligraphy.”
“Today was the end of an era for participatory folk art in Port Townsend,” he adds. “I’d love to see an exhibit of these retired receptacles at the historical society.” That would be funny.
—San Francisco comic/friend Fred Reiss, complains, “I didn’t think living in a police state would be this boring.”
—The preternaturally funny Brown again: “Some day we’ll look back on all this and laugh our lung out.”
—Finally, this from a Canadian friend: “We thought we’d have flying cars by 2020. But no, here we are teaching people how to wash their hands.”
(PT humorist Bill Mann is trying even harder to find laughs lately.)
