Just how funny is my new book?
Pittsburgh publisher and Steeler insider Jim Wexell loves my book!
So how funny is my new book on how to deal with stuff that sucks? Jim Wexell in an interview he did for my podcast declares in 1:40 the humor is “brilliant.”
Here it takes him 48 minutes to say much the same thing but, as the subject of the praise, I find it more satisfying. Jim combines intelligence and articulation to give what I think is a fun and compelling chat. For the record, it was his idea to host my podcast to interview me and say the things I wouldn’t be comfortable saying myself. So, you see, he also has a generous heart. His online HQ is 24/7 Steeler Insider.
I had what I thought were two outstanding posts this week. The first one begins with a beautiful sentiment: what if they change the rules in heaven and the first ones in are the ones who’ve shed the most mortal tears. Beautiful, yes? But I couldn’t let it stand without a crack up. A crack up to me is the line no one sees coming. So I took a blast at the hapless Pirates.
“What if they change the rules and people got into Heaven based purely on the number of tears they shed during their mortality? Would you make the cut? Did you suffer grievous losses? Were you empathetic when you witnessed injustice or cruelty? Did your heart break easily? Me? It’s a cinch I’d get in. I’ve been a Pirate fan my whole life.”
I like this one, too. This is what I call thinking with the brain of a free-range chicken. When people say I think funny, I think what they really mean is I think.
“Being a student of word origins, I’ve spent the past week frustrated by Easter. What’s an Easter? Today it’s accepted as referring to the risen Christ. But there was no precedent for that. I think I’ve figured it out. There was a common ingredient known for making things miraculously rise. It makes flat bread buxom. Therefore, I say we’ve fallen victim to a careless typo. It’s never really been Easter. Brother & sisters, let me be the very first to wish you a Happy … Yeaster! All rise!”
Space seems to be in the news alot lately. So today’s them is …. Space!
•How come almost every depiction of alien life forms, the aliens have not one single hair? You’d think beings that can master intergalactic space travel would have by now thwarted male pattern baldness. And what about the kids who nurture humble aspirations of opening barber shops or hair salons? They must be heartbroken. Maybe they don’t have hearts.
• The literalist in me becomes furious whenever he visits the National Museum of Air & Space and sees a building with walls and ceilings.
• I wonder how often Hubble-telescope monitoring astronomers catch themselves humming, "I can see for miles and miles and miles …" #TheWho
• NASA deserves ridicule for saying there are 8.8 billion Earth-like planets. Wrong! None of them have Trump!
• Someone will one day identify an exclusively male condition in which men convince themselves they alone possess the virility and sex appeal to, if needed, re-populate the entire planet. These men are “egoTESTicle.”
• I wonder how long it'll be before the whole world is on fire and if there's some extra-terrestrial volunteer fire department that is right now racing across the universe to save Planet Earth. And I wonder how much they're going to charge and if they take Discover.
• It would take a solar powered golf cart traveling 36,400 mph about 9.5 years to reach Pluto -- 9.7 years if you stopped for pee breaks.
RANDOMS …
• I’m unfamiliar with the procedure, whether it involves either a seamstress or an exorcist, but I have to imagine when one "darns" a sock one is condemning the sock's soul to heck.
• Anytime I hear someone in charge say it's time to "re-think" a misguided decision, I automatically assume zero actual thought went into the original decision.
• Being a scholarly rabbit must be one of nature's most frustrating circumstances. Even your very best ideas are dismissed as hare-brained.
• Nutritionists ought to have a term for the unnecessary fats we foolishly add to our diets when we kill off the last slice of pizza so we can’t eat it later and the term ought to be “kamikaze calories.”
• Peter Dinklage is a terrific actor and I've heard him speak movingly about the challenges prejudices adults of his stature must endure. It is wrong for me to say I empathize yet still wonder if he gets upset when a prominent director calls and says he's on their short list.
• The time management experts may argue the point, but killing two birds with one stone must be considered an act of fowl play.
My Go Fund Me account is just $2,204 shy of its stated $7,500 goal. At this point every dollar you donate is going straight to the book account. I went through 50 brand new ones in 12 days and the demand is high. It is earning praise loft enough to have me at least considering entering it in the 2025 TINARA Awards for Outstanding Non-Fiction, but I must continue to stoke the fires. Please consider your donation. GoFundMe-Rodell