For July 22-28, 2026

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. No time for bits! We’re too busy desperately refreshing our other tab trying to get Imax 70mm tickets for The Odyssey. (Really!)

What We Enjoyed This Week

FAQ: Potato Salad by Gary M. Almeter (McSweeney’s) Gary takes us on a wild ride with this one! The piece is QUITE heightened right off the bat, but Gary still manages to find ways to heighten beyond his starting point without the jokes feeling too random—a difficult balance to achieve in a piece like this that is really swinging for the fences.

Is It Time to Wash the Dishes? A Flow Chart by Katherine Bettis (McSweeney’s) We love Katherine’s use of the flow chart form. It’s no easy feat to squeeze so many jokes into such a small graphic and make sure it’s easy for the reader to follow, but that’s exactly what Katherine’s done here.

Family Vacation Training Plan by Gwynna Forgham-Thrift (McSweeney’s) There are some truly great family vacation details in this one. It would have been very easy for this piece to accidentally become merely a description of a family vacation gone wrong, but Gwynna never loses sight of the very funny, very unique training plan aspect of her premise.

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An Old Favorite

The Do’s and Don’ts of Falling in Love by Dustin Mark (McSweeney’s) The title may be playing it coy, but Dustin doesn’t waste any time revealing the big, weird, highly specific unusual thing he’s chosen to focus on in this piece. There are some really nice surprising heightening moves, and the piece also achieves a surprising level of poignancy without ever sacrificing laughs or getting too far away from its absurd core.

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.

Updates From Your Editors and Friends of the Newsletter

Have you ever wondered about the convoluted rewards programs at some stores? James wrote about that for McSweeney’s: “Your Local Wine Store’s Super Simple Rewards Card Program“