What's funny?

This is the net, so I guess I have to mention Monty Python, if only because of spam! Now, keep in mind that there's spam and there's spam! Okay?!

One of the best shows on TV is "Good News Week". Great fun. On one of the shows during the Comedy Festival, one of the panelists was Rich Hall. Here's a few of the things he had to say:
"I can't believe I'm sitting here as an American and nobody's picking on me!"
"Can I say, as an American, I'm sorry for everything. There. I think that clears it up."
"If boxing doesn't cause brain damage, how come they call it a ring when it's clearly a square?"
"Arkansas is Darwin's rewind button."
"When I heard that schoolmates were shootin' other school mates in Arkansas, I thought 'I didn't know they had schools in Arkansas!'"

Comedy and science fiction make good partners. Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, Red Dwarf and so on. There is an excellent book of short stories called "Alien Sex" that includes Larry Niven's account of what it would be like if Superman and Lois Lane were really in the sack together, called "Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex".

And, while Niven's commentary is humourous, some of the other stories were much better. The end of Harlan Ellison's "How's the Night Life on Cissalda?" goes this way ... "It had just occurred to him that his only consolation in bearing the knowledge that he had destroyed the human race, was that for a little while, in the eyes of the best fuck in the the universe, he had been the best fuck in the universe. There wasn't a cockroach in the world who could claim the same."

The only comedians that I enjoy that I know have a web page are the Scared Weird Little Guys. They even have sound on their web page, so for more variety than I can give you here, check it out. I guess some other comedians probably have web pages too, but I haven't gone looking.

Speaking of good comedy two of the best films in existence are Bedazzled, with Peter Cook, and The Party, with Peter Sellers.

Sometimes humour is in the oddest places, such as in aus.sf.babylon5. Check out the reasons why Babylon 5 is Better than Sex for example.