That's so funny! ...isn't it?

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humour or US humor
Noun
1. the quality of being funny
2. the ability to appreciate or express things that are humorous: a sense of humour
3. situations, speech, or writings that are humorous
4. a state of mind; mood: in astoundingly good humour
5. Archaic any of various fluids in the body: aqueous humour

Nevermind no 5. But hey, I didn't know about that, you learn something new every day. It's come to my attention that it's sometimes hard for strangers to tell when I'm joking. It's called dry humor people! When a joke is told without the face or tone of voice giving away that it is in fact a joke.

An example from the beginning of the semester before last. Picture this, 10 students, drinking coffee at a table made out of stone talking about politics. It's agreed that the heart is to the left, meaning that nine of the people around the table has said their share about the topic and Vänsterpartiet (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left_Party_(Sweden) ) is the political party they all favor, then the 10th student says "But I find Fredrik Reinfeldt so charming and his politics are so right for Sweden in this time, so I voted for Moderaterna" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moderaterna) which is at the total opposite of the political spectra. Without giving anything away the 10th student takes a sip of coffee in silence and looks out the window feeling the sceptical eyes of the nine others when the air is still. Then the 10th student smirks and says "If you could see the looks on your faces, priceless!" Now all ten students are laughing in unity.

Unity must be the goal of humor and in the example the 10th student provided just that, the relief of laughter in a tense situation before everyone knows each other. Maybe I took it a step too far being coy and letting them hang for so long, but I can't resist. These people then got to know me and would see when I was joking if something didn't go with my persona.

I also have a sarcastic trait. I don't concider sarcasm mean at all, it's a language you have to be familiar with to understand however. I will push jokes hard and say semi-mean things with the excuse that it was "only" a joke but the truth is that our prejudices show in the jokes we tell. I don't mind making a mockery of myself for the sake of a laugh. I really don't take myself seriously enough to worry about that, the politics joke could have lasted for a week or two, I could have built on it by showing up in overly snobby clothes and started arguments and acted the part of a moderat. Actually, it's a bit suprising that I didn't.

That being said, I don't understand all kinds of humor. Well, saying that I don't understand might be too much, but I don't find all kinds of humor funny. I don't care for sitcoms at all, nor sexists jokes because I firmly believe that as long as the ideas behind those jokes exist, so will the jokes. Best get rid of them. Nor do I find the chicken fighting scene in Family guy funny, it's too lengthy. Jokes that take too long with no added substance is nothing but dull. There's an unwritten rule in stand up comedy that you must make your audience laugh within 20 seconds or you've lost them. I think being funny outside of a stage is a bit different though, your "audience" isn't always aware of that they are in fact that to you.

Humor is also about emotion, so I do understand that what's concidered funny sometimes goes hand in hand with what's taboo, but for the same reason I don't like sexist jokes I don't always find that funny either. What's funny to me is the slightly ironic and complicated, the things that take some thought, so I usually produce most of my jokes in the shape of riddles.

I find puns mildly amusing even though I'm close to unable to produce a successful pun myself. I like to see humor as a bit of connect the dots, you have to pay attention to catch what's funny. Close to everything can be turned into a joke if you look at it as a cliché, the bigbottomed ladies in hiphop videos can be hillarious to me, so can the fact that it always rains when the hero and heroine first kiss in sad movies. It's oh so sad/romantic/dramatic/scary, take your pick, and there I am giggling.

I also like goofy things, like speaking for my cats in strange voices, or a fish wearing a hat. In fact, I would find it more amusing than strange to walk down the street wearing a duck costume. I laugh at myself when I trip and fall, or when I make a mess of myself by spilling coffee and I'm still laughing when it ruins my notebook so that all the pages stick together. It's just so typical.

Does this mean I have no sense of humor? I doubt it. Does this mean I sometimes make fools of others for the sake of a laugh? It's been known to happen. But when I do so, it's usually because I find the person rather funny, under the same category as I do clichés. I take a piss at those who take themselves too seriously, or try to belittle me. My defense is always humor, and at times my object bites and I can push the joke even further. Does this mean I'm a bad person? No, it means I'm a good judge of character. Do I like to ask rhetorical questions? Oh, yes I do.

I also believe we have two ears and one mouth for a reason, we should always listen more than we talk. Who knows which funnies we're missing when we're yapping away...

What we'd rather be

Early this morning, somewhere in the hour of me falling asleep and the alarm going off I had my arms stretched up above my head and my knees bent to the same side, almost as if I was jumping in a pose similar to Stina Dabrowski at the end of each segment. It's what the air does to me! I sleep in a victory pose rather than with my head buried in the pillow.

A short moment of bliss of being a victor. Things will work out. They will. I promise. For all of you.

Against my better judgement I occationally catch episodes of How I met your mother and in one of them Ted talked about how he figured being old would be great. You'd have no worries as you've already accomplished everything and Robin disagrees and says that it's the journey that makes it worth while. Sitcom philosophy. Oh! Speaking of philiosphy, read this: http://david.brax.nu/ He almost looks like Alex Kapranos! (http://www.dn.se/insidan/njutning-viktigare-an-vi-tror-1.959670)

Anyway, where was I going with this? Oh yeah, philosophy light, the whole tension between the goal and the road. I'm sure that it is the journey that's the important bit, at least nowadays. We have so many options that we must keep moving so we don't drown. I'm at my happiest when I'm going somewhere and working towards something, once I get there I always feel empty. I'm not ready to stop moving and I'm surely not ready to give up my dreams. We'll all die eventually and that must be the ultimate goal, then you really have nothing to worry about.

For farmgirl Anna in 1745 it might have been different. To begin with, life was shorter, so in that aspect you'd have to run faster, Anna didn't have as much time to rechange her mind. Also from our perspective it doesn't look as if she had many options at all. She was expected to do certain things. Find a nice farmboy named Nils and have nice little farmkids and a productive chicken. Was she unable to feel the bliss of the the winds of change in her braided hair? I doubt that. I'm sure she could feel the same amount, if not more, of happiness than we can. It was just other things that brought that feeling to her, that feeling of that everything will work out. Also, she didn't have as much time to roll her thumbs and ponder as Molly does in 2009.

Maybe I would have enjoyed knowing exactly what was expected of me and working hard to get there rather than close to aimlessly run down paths I thought were the right ones until I stumble on a tuft and fall face down in the mud. Either way I might not have had so much time to get lost.

Up at atom.

(And if you didn't understand the title of the post, you should have clicked the links and read between the lines of what I wrote and found the answer to have been "On the move, pleased and happy)

The helicopter robbery

Ok, this is what happened, a helicopter was used in a robbery. Now I know that. When I read the headline I figured a helicopter had been robbed and I thought to myself "AWESOME! They must have been some real acrobats!"

Why is it so difficult to put a sufficient headline? Here http://www.expressen.se/, as a thank you for me stealing your crappy picture I will help you set a less crappy headline, how about The ultimate FLIGHT plan, The highest catch, or how about Robbers got away in a helictopter?

Anyway, this is all actiony and stuff as they blew up the police helicopter that was supposed to follow them. It's like Oceans 11! How many people fit in a helicopter anyway? 5 or 6? Still Oceans 6 is pretty catchy. Then it's the whole planning bit, did they rent the helicopter? Or buy it? Or steal it? How hard is it to get a hold of a helicopter in tiny Sweden? Maybe the flew in from another country! Incredible.

It wasn't particularily nice to do something illegal like blowing up the police (eek and yay I can't help but squeek) and stealing other peoples hard earned money (no trip to Thailand now huh, mr Svensson) but still, I do admire the creativity. Hell yeah!

I will provide you with a link in English http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/sep/23/swedish-cash-depot-helicopter-raid

And furthermore, I read the know-it-alls-talk-about-it-all articles today and they're completely bumming me out. COME ON Lasse Wierup why can't the Swedes be the bad guys for once? Why would the pilot have to be recruited from abroad? Are you a sneak racist? Do you dislike them there foreigners? (Reference http://www.dn.se/sthlm/ranet-kostade-pengar-att-genomfora-1.959151) And yeah, I kind of figured it took some money to do this. Who knows, maybe it's some bored rich foreigners that wanted to see if they could do it? You'd like that Lasse, wouldn't you? If you find them, would you please let them know that they can donate some dinero to my paypal account because I really want to splurge on ebay.

The concept of reality

At times it's a cat's bed briefly sniffed by a dog, disguarded in fear or by intrest. On other occations, in other places it's more like frost on lilacs on spring mornings where the impossible wish of bare legs gives you goose bumps from a poor decision. In either example can one pinpoint that exact moment where reality seized to make sense and gave way for thoughts of flutter where images flash by faster than you'd be able to catch the barren trees in the lightning.

It's a held tilted back on a swing shivering from laughter, it's the fence moving too fast towards you when you drive, it's the gravel under your shoes when you walk towards the church doors, it's the heat of the liquid when you drink, it's the plant drooping, it's your hunger, it's the song you put on repeat to stay in a moment, it's the way you chased your dreams away.

Chased your dreams away... No matter the dark demons of your nightmares where you're chased at speed to escape the buildings collapsing behind you or where the rainbow meets the fluffy bunnies at play you chased them off to keep reality close.

It's when you see the connection between a song called Bättre i Berlin and the acoustic version of a song by Franz Ferdinand you smirk at reality's lack of new inventions. Everything will at one point be something new that is borrowed that is old that is blue.

You're blue. You're red. You're black. You're the heat of the moment. You're the sin commited, you're the neverending grace. You're the spider without a web, gently dribbling down the side of a custom designed mountain. You catch a ride from a rodent running in a frenzy from the demons that chases it while the mousetraps clap behind it as it chases for the rainbowed land with fluffy bunnies at play.

Your game of reality is barren. Not in the shape of the naked tree lit by lightning for that is nothing but that moment when you're fully aware of that you're real. You're real even when your thoughts flutter behind your eyelids and you dream.

I know what you are, but what am I?

How to eat

Plain food is the best. Seperate the parts, put the pasta on one side and the sauce on the other, and so on and so forth. Always have the dressing on the side. Food is ment to be mixed in your stomach, not on your plate. Keep it tidy.


Before you start eating make sure that the food is placed symmetrically on the plate and that your drink is to the top line. Not the rim. Get glasses with lines. Do it now. Take one bite, chew properly. Drink. Take another bite, chew properly. Drink. Wait a minute to see if you're full. If not repeat. The more you drink, the less you'll have eaten.It's important to have more liquid than solid food.

Were you to run out of drink you must immediatly stop eating. There should be at least two swigs left so that you can wash down the food properly. You can, if you wish, get more to drink, but then you must finnish half the glass before you take another bite of food.

Always leave room for dessert. It makes the other food worth while, and remind you that eating should be a pleasure, not a chore.

The seven deadly sins

As I'm writing this I can't be dead yet, isn't that what it means, basically, if you commit one you die, just like that, poof, so maybe I should call them capital vices instead, but somehow that expression isn't quite as catchy. Remind me to google just how it is exactly that these sins kill. I do however pretty much plead guilty to all of them. May God have mercy on my soul. See this as my confession.

Lust
I really don't need to go into detail here do I?



Gluttony
I love icecream. I love cookies. I love candy. I love cucumber. I love kladdkaka. I love raspberry pie. If this isn't gluttony I don't know what is. Although, I'm not too keen on steak, sushi, white rice, pastrami, sauces, vinegar, potato chips nor salmon. I often leave food in my plate, there I got the wasteful part in. And I once fall down the stairs next to Santa Maria cathedral in Visby due to drinking too much. But maybe it was just the stairs. But there was a cathedral. Come on, it has to be a sin!



Greed
This is a bit tricker. Hm. I kind of want stuff, yeah I want stuff. I want to possess things that others don't have. I really want come skull candy headphones for instance! Aren't they delicious? All the pretty colours are hypnotizing! I also want a car that never breaks and an orchid that survives my care. Yeah, I'm pretty darn greedy.


Sloth
The act of apathy. I'm pretty much the poster child for apathy. I spend a lot of time doing nothing. If it rots my soul? Well. I tend to feel more of a rotten mood when I don't get a change to lounge and catch my thoughts. Ohohoh! I read about that mystical creature in Peru too. Turns out it's just a naked sloth. How disapointing. No new spieces there either. Maybe it's you that's lazy God. I mean seriously, when did you last create something? New babies of the same kind don't count, you already had the recepie for those.


Wrath
Anger. Hm, I get angry about a lot of things. Injustice mainly, and standing in line. And when poor baby animals are in pain. And stupidity. Yes, stupidity and ignorance infuriates me. And reruns of bad sit coms!


Envy
I'm trying to think about the last time I got jealous, or envious. Well it wasn't exactly fair when Sweden didn't win Eurovision song contest. But I don't really envy the norweigians. That'd just be silly. I do get jealous of those who don't get migranes though. Very much so!


Pride
I'm very proud. I'm proud over how wellbehaved my cats are, how fast I can catch on to stuff, the way I manage with little and I do have a love-hate relationship with my hair. Some days I'm very much proud of it, other days not so. If I see myself as better as some people, though? Well, honestly I think that sometimes on my better days I tend to control my temper (damn, this didn't go with the stuff about the wrath!) than some others. I also think it's important to feel proud of who you are, but not at the cost of your respect of others.


It's not possible to be forgiven for your capital vices, is it, not if you're Catholic. Wait a minute. I'm not Catholic! I'm an agnostic Lutheran. Oh man, did I write all this in vain? Hardly. No thoughtprocess is ever wasted.

Home Swe(dish)t home

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
The Stockholm Syndrome Pt. 1
http://www.thedailyshow.com/
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Healthcare Protests

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
The Stockholm Syndrome Pt. 2
http://www.thedailyshow.com/
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Healthcare Protests

Yes, I know...

I do change blogspaces often. No excuse really, other than the fact that I get as restless in my online life as I do in my offline one. The equivalent of pacing around the house is to change places. Maybe I just need a fresh start from time to time.