Welcome to the October links roundup, a monthly feature for Humor Me which I round up funny stuff and other links of interest.
It has been a rough month for world events and I can’t pretend to have the right thing to say about the violence in the Middle East, but I’ve been trying to read and learn more. I have also appreciated what some in the comedy world have said, including Pete Davidson’s cold open for SNL.
And I took Bess Kalb’s advice to “watch something dumb” and started watching The Kardashians on Hulu. And it turns out, the first couple of episodes lead up to Kim Kardashian hosting SNL.
It was an interesting behind the scenes look at hosting and creating the monologue and at several times Kardashian is stressed out because she feels she isn’t funny. I think it’s a good reminder that even famous people get nervous and that a lot of work can go into humor (and it doesn’t hurt to have famous friends like Amy Schumer to help give you notes).
So this month just remember that even watching something mindless can count as learning more about comedy.
Funny stuff and other distractions:
I very much related to the above
cartoon.This Hard Times headline also made me laugh.
- was nice enough to pose my funny t-shirt question in her Evil Witches newsletter and there were so many good suggestions.
This month I have a special guest funny rec from
.If you are a person who uses the internet you have probably read one of his many excellent viral McSweeney’s pieces at some point in the past few years.
He has a new book of essays and humor pieces out called Spoilers that you should get for the person in your life who enjoys movies and laughing.
Carlos also has an excellent Substack called Shades of Greaves that covers things like writing topical Satire quickly and an honest look behind the scenes of publishing his book.
This month Carlos shared a funny TV rec:
“I just finished watching Reservation Dogs and absolutely loved it. The show is a sometimes surreal, always funny look at the lives of four Indigenous teenagers in rural Oklahoma. It's so self-assured in its voice and unabashed weirdness and there are so many lovable characters you begin to lose count. Go watch it!”
Thanks, Carlos!
Writing-related links
This recent Twitter thread has some good potential possibilities for personal essay outlets.
I also thought this thread on pitching more than one idea at once was helpful although spoiler alert, opinions vary on this. I think it does depend on what you are pitching. I usually tend to only pitch one idea at once but I think it’s not a bad idea to send a couple ideas or a couple different angles on the same idea (which I have also done).
I’ve decided to do what I’ve been pondering (threatening?) to do for a while and run a humor writing challenge in January. Read more about it here.
If you want to get emails for it, you’ll need to opt in by toggling on your subscription under “Notifications” for my newsletter. (And “toggle” is a good word that we should all add to our funny words lists.) I’m also lining up some humor writers to provide guest prompts for it. If this is something that might be of interest to you, feel free to get in touch.
News from me
I enjoyed answering the Introvert’s Outreach questionnaire for
’s Substack Home|bodyAn editor from The Strategist reached out to me to see if I’d be interested in pitching them (and when I did, this was an instance when I sent multiple ideas at once). As a result, I wrote a piece about these kid plates recently. Turns out young kid dinner is a lot like girl dinner (yes I tried to make a joke about this in the piece and yes it got cut in edits).
Closing cat
Hope you have a good rest of the month and that your Halloween will be warmer than the 40 degree high they are currently predicting for us here!
*This newsletter contains affiliate links for which I will receive a small commission when you make a purchase through links at no additional cost to you.
Thank you for the fun post!
Yay for the introvert's outreach, thanks for sharing. And here's another black cat right at ya: https://sleepyhollowink.substack.com/p/the-poe-poe - just in this morning, my black-cat fixated post!