Click opera in retro mode

[imomus]

What's going on? Click Opera is in retro-minimalist mode while Momus writes a book.

What book? A full-length fictional confection called The Book of Jokes. If you have any good jokes -- or know a good literary agent -- leave details in the comments section or mail Momus.

When does normal service resume? September 1st.

What's happening in the meantime? This page will be changing every day, with news and announcements and links to old content from the last three years of Click Opera.

What's today's old content?



June 12th 2004: Each of us kills our own inner George W. Bush in our own way. To amuse himself, Momus imagines Morrisseyesque ways in which 'George W. Bush' might die.

June 12th 2005: A Chromatic Economist, a Chromatic Geographer, a Symbolic Interactionist and other fictional and real characters discuss colour in Japanese street fashion.

June 12th 2006: Caveat Renter: flathunting with Momus in Berlin Friedrichshain.

Where is Momus today? In Berlin, sleeping off jetlag and writing a funny book.

Next Momus appearance: With Laila France and Kumi Okamoto at the Fleche D'Or in Paris on June 29th.

Momus photos: Flickr.

Comments

[ksta.livejournal.com]

a brilliant joke I heard the other day -

What's the difference between an outlaw and an in-law?
An outlaw is wanted.

[alibee.livejournal.com]

Kick ass! I can't wait to read it.
:)

The only literary agent I know is my friend's, and she writes romance novels. I am not sure that would be helpful (although she has published 6 mass market paperbacks, so at least it's all real).

[jaimi.livejournal.com]

I am hotly anticipating this book.

[lord-whimsy.livejournal.com]

You know where to find me, boyo. No promises, of course, but I can arrange a meeting when you come to NYC.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Thanks Your 'Ship!

[gillen.livejournal.com]

You've gone into hiatus. No new episodes till next season. Battlestar Galactica, thou!

[atthesametime.livejournal.com]

I love the idea of a book of jokes. I’m fascinated by jokes that function as a way of reinforcing community (and especially communities of resistance).

Here are two I’ve heard that are set within the Irish Nationalist movement, but could be translated to a political movement anywhere:

Irishman gets invited on Who Wants to be a Millionaire in England. He brings along a number of his mates to sit in the audience. The host asks him the first question, “When was the Irish famine?” He answers, “I don’t know”. The host says “OK, here’s the second question, who was the first female prime minister of Ireland?” “I don’t know” he responds. The host is getting nervous now, and so is the audience.

A third question, “What is the name of the leader of Sinn Fein?” I don’t know” he answers, and his mates cry out “That’s right Paddy, tell ‘em nothing!”

Another one (which I have heard staged in Ireland, the American South during the civil rights era, and Chiapas during the current Zapatista uprising)…

Kid gets arrested for his suspected involvement with the IRA/Zapatistas/SNCC. While he is in prison, his old father writes him saying “Oh, Rory, now that you’re locked up, I don’t know how I will ever get the fields tilled, I am too old to do it myself!” The son writes back, “Dad! Don’t till the eastern field, that’s where I buried the guns!”

The next day, soldiers come and tear up the eastern field. They find no weapons. The father writes to the son, “Rory why did you say there were guns buried here? Soldiers came and they didn’t find any.” The son write back, ‘Yeah, but you got the field tilled, didn’t ya?”

And here’s the third, not of the same milieu, but good all the same…

What do you call someone who speaks two languages? Bilingual. What do you call someone who speaks three languages? Trilingual. What do you call someone who speaks one language? American.

Good luck with the book.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Ha, good jokes, thanks!

[rhodri.livejournal.com]

I can never remember jokes. The only one I can ever recall - that made me cry and beat the floor when I heard it - was this (and I haven't done it justice, but you get the idea):

A man is doing door-to-door canvassing for a local election. He knocks at the door of a nondescript semi-detached house, and it's opened by a 6-year old boy. The boy is dressed in a dinner suit with satin lapels, he has a large glass of cognac in one hand, and an enormous cuban cigar in the other. "Hello, son," says the man. "Are your parents in?", and the boy replies: "Does it look like my fucking parents are in?"

[lord-whimsy.livejournal.com]

That was good, actually.

[lord-whimsy.livejournal.com]

Would have been better if the lapels had grosgrain piping, but that's a trifle.

[rhodri.livejournal.com]

I laughed when I typed it out, and I just laughed again, so that must give it a certain quality.

[lord-whimsy.livejournal.com]

Well it certainly brought back some old childhood memories.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

I'm sure you drank cognac, smoked cigars, and wore satin jackets with grosgrain-piped lapels even when your parents were in, Whimsy!

[lord-whimsy.livejournal.com]

No--When they were home, I would stay in my robe and slippers with my nose planted in a book on heraldry, or some such thing. Not good form to show up one's guardians, you know.

[dermfitz.livejournal.com]

There was a good documentary on BBC4 on Saturday called "Laughing with Hitler" that could be worth a look. Nice re-enactments of the jokes too.

Reply to Atthesametime and best wishes to Momus

[(Anonymous)]

I heard the first one of your Paddywhack jokes a few years ago, rather a chuckle to hear it again.
Mt favourite homeland joke is really only funny if you are a native Irish Gaelic speaker and had the sorry misfortune to learn the language through the grim, mandatory, cliche strewn medium of our schools system so - excuse the obscurism but - perhaps some of you of that experience may get a chuckle out of this:

A French prostitute moved from Nice to Galway and began working the streets.
Having some very definite ideas about the business she refused to do any work before six o'clock in the evening.
Because of this peculiar work ethic she became known by the locals as 'La hoor tar eis a se'.

Good luck with the book Nick, your updated blog will be missed but revisiting those past posts will be entertaining, if I hear any good jokes I will pass them on, the above is a linguistically and culturally a little recondite but it has the seeds of two good meta-narratives.
Regards - Thomas S.

some doosies.....

[(Anonymous)]

Q-what did the coffee say to the man?
A-hey man, I'm yer coffee man, what!
Q-how many midgets does it take to change a lite bulb?
A-just one, they might need a step ladder or something but midgets are perfectly capable of changing a lite bulb
Q-how many jews can fit in a phone booth?
A-like 3 or 4, I don't know....ok ok, I don't really know any good jokes sorry

[(Anonymous)]

[it helps if you do good, somewhat humourous, crying]

A man out on a coastal walk comes across a young boy standing beside a cliff and is crying. "Boo hoo hoo hoo..." The man asks the young boy what is the matter. The boy continues to cry "Boo hoo hoo hoo..." and points over the edge of the cliff. The man peeks over the edge to see two mangled bodies at the bottom and asks, with a shocked expression, "Are those your parents?!" The boy continues to cry "Boo hoo hoo hoo..." and nods his head, to which the man says, as he undoes his flies, "It's really not your lucky day."

------------

Q. What do you do once you have had a baby?
A. Put the nappy back on.

------------

A guy walks into a pub, goes to the bar and is surprised to see a horse sitting there. The barman asks him what he wants. He orders his drinks and has to ask "What is a horse doing here?" The barman explains that there is a competition: the first person to make the horse laugh gets free drinks all night. The man thinks for a short while and says "Ah! I know." He goes upto the horse and whispers in his ear. The horse suddenly splits his sides with laughter, one hoof banging on the bar. The man has a fantastic evening.
A few weeks later the same man goes into the same pub and is surprised to see the horse still there, quietly chuckling to himself. He asks the barman "What is the horse still doing here?!" The barman explains that they just could not get rid of him, and that there is a new competition: the first person to make the horse cry gets free drinks all night. Again the man thinks for a short while. His face lights up, gives the barman a nod and goes over to the horse. They get into a huddle and after a moment or two the horse is on the floor sobbing his eyes out, his hooves banging on the floor. The man goes to the bar to get his drinks and the barman says "That is just amazing, I mean, how did you do it?" The man says "Well, the first time I told the horse I have a bigger penis then he does, the second time I showed him."

------------
Hope they were not too offensive
Go well,
~Rob
www.engtect.net

[cityramica.livejournal.com]

i don't have any good jokes at the moment but i recently heard a funny "pick-up" line...would you be interested in that?

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Go on, then!

[cityramica.livejournal.com]

me: "i'm wearing an x-ray watch and i can see you're not wearing any knickers"

you: "oh, but i am wearing knickers!"

me: "you are? oh it must be an hour fast."

HAR HAR!! so silly i know.
i probably think it's more funny because it worked on Virgil. :)

[psychronic.livejournal.com]

[loveishappiness.livejournal.com]

but this wasn't his promiced book of jokes was it? The closest he got was the script he wrote for the Jokes short film.

[(Anonymous)]

Great. Now that this page will be more or less inactive, I'll have 5 extra minutes every morning. What will I do with myself?

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Write a book!

[mandyrose.livejournal.com]

I know this is a bit late and off today's topic, but I'd certainly never turn Donald Richie down if he was buyin' what I'm sellin'. I fucking love that guy. I just watched his little video interview about "Au Hasard Balthazar", where he says it "defies all of his critical acumen". Hot-blooded.

Glad to hear about the book... are you angling for a possible Johnny Depp involvement, teehee? I'll be so glad when Click Opera is reinstated September 1st... I'll sit my monolingual American self down next to a big steaming heap of real locally grown Ohio corn (non-Monsanto if you please), spread that liberally with mustard, and have a look.

In the meantime, it looks like you've culled a few pearls from the past. Happy trails!

[mandyrose.livejournal.com]

By the way, this dropoff in new Click Opera content coincides rather sadly with my new addiction to computer mah-jong. Sigh.

No "Secret Lives of the Composers?"

[stjamesdawson.livejournal.com]

Does this mean there won't be a "Secret Lives of the Composers?" (I think that was the title of the book you said you were writing a while back, but I'm too lazy to go back and check...) I really liked the sample bit you posted here from that one. Dang!

Re: No "Secret Lives of the Composers?"

[imomus.livejournal.com]

I sort of got bored with the idea, but it could always be revisited.

[misstasty.livejournal.com]

A bear walks into a bar in Billings, Montana and sits down. He bangs

on the bar with his paw and demands a beer.


The bartender approaches and says, "We don't serve beer to bears in

bars in Billings."

The bear, becoming angry, demands again that he be served a beer.


The bartender tells him again, more forcefully, "We don't serve beer

to belligerent bears in bars in Billings."


The bear, very angry now, says, "If you don't serve me a beer, I'm

going to eat that lady sitting at the end of the bar."


The bartender says, "Sorry, we don't serve beer to belligerent,

bully bears in bars in Billings"


The bear goes to the end of the bar, and, as promised, eats the

woman. He comes back to his seat and again demands a beer.


The bartender states, "Sorry, we don't serve beer to belligerent,

bully bears in bars in Billings who are on drugs."


The bear says, "I'm NOT on drugs."


The bartender says, "You are now. That was a

barbitchyouate.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Stephen Fry investigates the peculiar English predilection for puns (http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/aod/mainframe.shtml?http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/aod/radio4_aod.shtml?radio4/currentpuns).

[junkerr.livejournal.com]

Q] What is Rudy Giuliani's favourite american football team?
A] The New York Jets.

...too soon?

[cap-scaleman.livejournal.com]

A Priest, a Rabbi and a Leprechaun walk into a bar. The Leprechaun looks around and says, "Saints preserve us! I'm in the wrong joke!"

[(Anonymous)]

Oh yeah it's all the rage this joke book by collective submission malarky is like what Lenny Henry is doing on BBC TV right now.

Soy Borealis.

[peripherus-max.livejournal.com]

Today, whilst I communed with ducks, terrorists set off a gay bomb (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/4174519.stm) in my fair city. It caught me from behind.

[thetemplekeeper.livejournal.com]

Good luck with the book! In the meantime, here (http://scienceblogs.com/strangerfruit/2007/06/from_sea_to_shining_sea.php)'s a rather lovely representation of flight paths over the USA to remind you of your recent travels. All the best.

[projectmustache.livejournal.com]

Did you hear about the artist whose new work wasn't depressing anymore? Apparently he found a happy medium.

[zzberlin.livejournal.com]

I'll miss the fresh thoughts and content of a new, daily Click Opera, but I'm sure I'll be busy reading the entries from previous years, since I've only been here about a year

I probably won't ever see the book. I just don't want to consume paper. Though it will be interesting to see how you organize the material, and I imagine you'll add liberal commentary, so I might just break my no-paper rule

The jokes posted on this page are funny! I can never remember jokes, except this one, which somehow I think may not be quite right for the book, but anyway:

At a party celebrating his 50th wedding anniversary, the husband is asked "To what do you attribute your success in marriage?" Husband says, "Early on we agreed that she would make all the little decisions, and I would make all the big decisions." He is then asked about some of the big decisions he has made over the 50 years. After a moment's reflection, the husband says, "Well, I haven't had to make one yet!"

Hee hee, I love that joke. Except it's never been true for me and my relationships. I seem to get boyfriends who insist on being involved in all the decisions, oof!

Good luck with the writing, Momus, and I look forward to reading your columns from the past few years

[(Anonymous)]

Anyone know when the Irish learned to walk on their hind legs?

[(Anonymous)]

or when racists learned to read and write?

[cosmodromo.livejournal.com]

i use to be bad with remembering jokes people tell me, but there this one i know well and want to tell. i'll try to write it in a funny way:

there was a man who had this turtle. the turtle had a dream: to go out and watch a porn movie. one day, the man takes the turtle, puts the turtle inside his pants, and off they go to the movies. arriving to the theater, he unzips his pants, the turtle sticks out the neck, and so they watch the movie. the turtle was loving it!!
sitting next to them, there was a couple. the girl whispers to her boyfriend "uhh, honey? the guy sitting next to us put his penis out...", to what the boyfriend says "oh, but my penis is out too". "yes, but...his is eating my popcorns".



i believe this joke is old enough to rule out the possibility of renting the porn movie instead of having to go out to the theater.

good work on the book, and best wishes