Lighten up, Hong Kong
A bunch of camp characters appeared between the police and protesters on Sunday. They were members of the Wanchai Hash House Harriers on their annual Red Dress Run. Blokes were wearing bras, over-done make-up and short frilly red dresses. In front of police in riot gear and masked demonstrators they primped, posed, minced, blew kisses, wiggled their asses and flashed non-existent breasts. People on both sides laughed. The tension was blown away for a few minutes. These were straight guys camping it up for fun in aid of charity.
Hong Kong needs more of this. Let’s lighten up. Perhaps more people who want to calm things down will take to the streets between the police and protesters dressed as clowns, for example, and see if more people can be brought together through shared laughter.
In that spirit, here are some of the funniest things we have spotted recently:
Hugh Laurie on treatment for Donald Trump
Talk show host Stephen Colbert is interviewing actor Hugh Laurie on late-night television. Laurie tells Colbert he has been studying psychology for a role he will soon play. Colbert asked what Laurie has learned and whether he has found a psychiatric solution to the manic antics of Donald Trump. Laurie says, “Breast-feeding.”
All those crazy-arsed professors you see running around all over the place: What happened to them?
We all know them. Mad professors. Hair like the Muppets’ Animal or the Stooges’ Moe, wild or vacant expressions, sometimes thousand-yard stares, other times obsessive manic behaviour. What happened to these professors? Where did it all go wrong?
The answer is to be found in David Christian’s “Origin Story: A Big History of Everything”: There is a type of sea slug that early in its life has a brain. At first it uses the brain to search for a suitable permanent home. When the slug has found this comfortable place it no longer needs a brain. So it eats it.
Just like a tenured academic.
How Queen’s College coped with a coming calamity, admission of female undergraduates for the first time after 532 years of single-sex status
Stephen Fry tells the story in “The Fry Chronicles”:
I can picture the scenes at the meeting of the Queen’s College governing Fellows. The President coughs for attention.
“Gentlemen! As you know, this body voted two years ago for women to be..”
“I didn’t.”
“Nor I!”
“Er, yes, thank you Doctor Bantrey, Professor Threlfall. A majority of Fellows voted for the admission of women. Next term, as you know, we will see our first intake…”
“Will they eat with us?”
“Well, of course they will eat with us, Dr Kemp, why on earth shouldn’t they?”
“Well, I thought they ate. . . differently.”
“Differently?”
“They pick up their food with their mouths, don’t they? Or am I thinking of cats?”
“Dr Kemp, have you ever actually met a woman?”
“Er. . . well, not that you’d . . . my mother was a woman. Was introduced when I was seven. Used to see her at mealtimes occasionally. Does that count?”
“And did she eat normally?”
“Let me think. . . now you come to mention it, yes, she did, yes. Quite normally.”
“Well, there you are then. There is, however, the issue of cloacal arrangements. Women do of course have hygienic requirements that are . . . somewhat sui generis.”
“Oh, yes. In what way?”
“Ah . . . well, to be honest I am not exactly sure on this one myself. But I believe every now and again they are required to shout and slap a man and then burst into tears and then. . . they blow their nose or something. And do their hair. This happens regularly once a month I am told. So we will need specially designed rooms set aside for this purpose.”
“I knew no good would come of this.”
“Hear fucking hear.”
“Gentlemen, please! If we can just. . .”
“And where are they going to hang their breasts at night? Answer me that?”
“Excuse me?”
“Women have extra mounds of flesh that they attach with wire suspenders and silk peggings to the front of their chests. I know that much at least. The question is, where are they going to hang them at night? Hm? You see? You just haven’t thought this thing through, have you?”
And so on . . . until the meeting broke up in disarray.
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