[Seth Says] Comedy= Tragedy+Time
I'm a math head.
Still better than using Sethamphetamines, but I do tend to overdo it on math sometimes. What can I say, I derive pleasure from applying mathematical formulas and concepts to things, and find it integral to my plans. Probably my most frequent application thereof is a little something I like to call:
THE TRANSITIVE PROPERTY OF FOOD
For whatever reason, the transitive property is one of those things that just stuck in my head, and so I often end up putting together food combinations that other people would consider weird based on this property. The mathematical principle, of course, is that if A is related to B by some rule, and B is related to C by the same rule, then A is related to C by the same rule.
It's as easy as ABC.
Food, I believe, should work the same way. A sweet pie goes well with apples, apples go well with cheddar, therefore cheddar on apple pie is great -- and many people would agree. Mole sauce is good with chicken, chicken is good with pumpkin, why not pumpkin mole sauce? Debbie was skeptical, but it turned out quite well. (We didn't even have to skin the moles.)
Ice cream goes well with coconut, coconut goes well with pineapple, pineapple goes well with crab, and anyway I put this all together at an ice cream making party a decade ago, and although it was not a hit, I maintain that the theory is sound. ("Yeah, sounds disgusting." Don't knock it till you've tried it.) ("What flavor ice cream did you make?" "Intimidation Crab.") (Although actually I called it "Pineapple coconut surprise", because it had a certain tu ne sais quoi.) (If it had been fish instead of crab, it could have been a tuna sais quoi.) (I'd flounder about more, but I try not to make too many fish-related puns because Kip Adotta pretty much obviated that.)
PUMPING IRONY
Anyway, the only thing I find more irresistible than unsupported overbroad mathematical formula applications is crushing amounts of irony. And I certainly deliver that (literally-ish, since I'm sending out this email) with this week's column, which goes out to my friends who subscribe to this newsletter, and takes some time to talk about how I'm terrible at keeping up with my friends.
This is not news to anyone; I know it, and presumably you know it. (Unless you were under the mistaken impression of "Oh, Seth is terrible at staying in touch with me, but probably he has a group of closer friends that he stays in touch with all the time," which is false.)(Although I do a decent job of keeping in touch with the two friends I have that live on my street, and there are houses on the street for sale, so if you're looking to uproot your life and move here, I will look forward to seeing you more often, and I'll even fry you a burrito as a housewarming gift.)(Alright, you drive a hard bargain, two burritos.)
"But Seth," you say, "Isn't being bad at keeping up with friends sort of a downer topic for a humor column?" Don't worry, I also talk about global catastrophes and millions of deaths!
We're all Frogs in a Pot Getting Hotter by the Day
Fun, right?
THE GRAPES OF MATH
Don't be sour and wine about it. (Vine about it?) You might be forgiven for thinking that I do not understand what humor is. But the real problem is that I am once again misapplying mathematical formulae, and so I believe that if Comedy=Tragedy+Time, then I can ask for a few minutes of your Time to read my column, I'll write about some Tragedy, and the result should be Comedy — mathematically speaking.
And sure, the world of late has seemed like a ceaseless cavalcade of bad news, but the past week felt like some dried grass braided and twined together:
A HAY OF ROPE
While non-stop doomscrolling has been the mood for a while, the past week's fast-moving political news (in spite of not necessarily being ideal) has precipitated a bit of a vibe shift, and I even saw someone online refer to "hopescrolling". I believe it -- at this point I'm far too jaded (oddly, the opposite of being green) to idolize any celebrity, let alone any politician... but I still watched a Kamala Harris speech where she spoke out for freedom and rights and not being controlled by weird fascists who don't believe in freedom or progress or even avoiding half-century regress, and darned if I didn't feel just a tiny bit of hope, and then nurture it by scrolling through news of big zoom calls and record fundraising.
And look, I'm not saying it's all a bowl of cherries, she's not perfect, and certainly the hopefulness vibes have been a bit tainted by Trump and Heritage Foundation leaders announcing that they're not worried about voting because they plan to fix things in other ways. But just seeing her come out and make an energized positive stump speech about standing for something, and something that really resonates, makes me hopeful that maybe we'll actually have a great turnout of voters who believe in democracy, which non-coincidentally is just the thing that democracy needs.
What I need is to end this email, so I thank you for reading, and will be back in two weeks with another column -- and maybe some ice cream.
Wishes,
Seth
("Best" is often followed by "Regards", and you can end a letter with "Best Regards", or just "Best", or just "Regards". "Best" is also often followed by "Wishes", and you can end a letter with "Best Wishes", or just "Best", so by the transitive property of valediction...)