A Newsletter of Humorous Writing

For February 22-28, 2023

Hello and welcome to A Newsletter of Humorous Writing, a roundup of the week's finest short humor pieces and funny articles, and a celebration of the fantastic writers who wrote them. Just a reminder: If you have a piece that you want to see in the newsletter, you can always write up a short paragraph about it and submit it for the Old Favorites section, and we may run it in a future edition! Don't be shy--if you're a regular reader of the newsletter, we're sure you'll have plenty of interesting things to say about your pick and we love to be made aware of pieces we might have missed!

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What We Enjoyed This Week

Gonna Pop These Overripe Bananas in the Freezer Until I’m Ready to Take Them Out and Throw Them in the Garbage by Alexis Pooley (McSweeney's) This piece features some really great sentence-level joke writing. Consider, for example, the wonderful and surprising way this passage reveals that the narrator actually has no idea how to make banana muffins and that, even if they did know, they have no real intention of making them anyway: "Those little babies would be so soft and fluffy with whatever ingredients make them that way, including these rock-hard, freezer-burned bananas that I will never touch again." The contrast between the "soft and fluffy" muffins and the "rock-hard, freezer-burned bananas" is also quite satisfying.

Welcome to the Comfort Zone! by by Evan Waite and River Clegg (The New Yorker) An excellent execution of a really original premise ("What if a 'comfort zone' was an actual physical location?") with a wonderful tone and expert use of CAPITALIZATION to build the narrator's voice and make jokes LAND EVEN HARDER.

I'll Carry All My Groceries Inside in One Trip, Even If It Kills Me by Rachel Reyes (Points in Case) Rachel finds a nice variety of ways to explore this premise, including the history of carrying groceries in one trip ("Did our ancient ancestors spear the mighty mammoth and bring the spoils to their caves in multiple trips because it was too heavy? Of course not! Well, I’m pretty sure. Don’t quote me on that."), and the great reveal that the narrator has a specific insult they call people who can't bring in all the groceries at once. ("My parents didn’t raise me to be a Two-Trip Tommy.")
 

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-- AD --

Emmy-award winning comedian and writer Taylor Kay Phillips has written her debut humor book, A Guide to Midwestern Conversation, based on her McSweeney's article series of the same name. This funny, loving, and beautifully illustrated guide to the language of the landlocked is available for purchase on April 11 and for pre-order RIGHT NOW from wherever you buy your books! How bout that! A Short Humorous Writing that turned into a Long Humorous Writing. (Hi, this is Taylor. It's been me the whole time! Please pre-order my book, I really think you'll like it. Okay, love you! Don't be a stranger.)

(Do you have an ad you'd like to place in the Newsletter? Fill out this form!)

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An Old Favorite

A Celebrity Profile of My Cat by Lars Kenseth (The New Yorker) A very funny parody that nails the tone and turns of phrase specific to celebrity profiles. It also gets at the way that cats do sometimes feel like celebrities: Aloof, too cool, and convinced they're doing us a favor when they deign to grace us with their presence and attention.

Do you have an Old Favorite of your own? Let us know by filling out this form and we may run your pick in a future edition of the newsletter.

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Updates From Your Hosts and Friends of the Newsletter

Nothing from us this week! Too busy refreshing our Old Favorites Mail Bag to get ready for all the great writeups we're sure you'll be submitting!
 

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Other Humorous Writing News

Alexandra Petri, Washington Post humor columnist and one of our favorite funny writers, is doing a show at The Bell House on April 11th. The show is based on her new book, U.S. History: Important American Documents (I Made Up), and will feature Friend of the Newsletter Karen Chee, among other guests
 

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See you next week!

@lukevburns & @jamesfolta

We started this newsletter with our dear friend Brian Agler, and we want it to always honor his memory and his love of all things humorous. You can find our newsletter tribute to Brian here.

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