I think of myself as a funny person.
I’m mostly successful being quick-witted and making mundane situations more interesting. I failed during an audition for an improv group in college and gave up my comedy career shortly after. However, now that I am retired and full of hope, I decided to follow Jerry Seinfeld and start a joke-writing streak.
Seinfeld says that he has a calendar that he marks off with an X when he does his writing for the day. It was one of the reasons I started my streaks and I decided that I would write at least 10 jokes every day. They didn’t have to be fully thought out or amazing, but 10 first drafts. It doesn’t sound like a lot, but over the course of a year, that is 3650 jokes.
Now of course not all jokes are going to be funny. But I’ve found just getting the jokes out there can lead to better jokes later. Also after doing some reading about joke writing, I realized that not every line of writing is designed to make someone shit their pants. You need setups and chuckles as well before the headliner. Meaning maybe only 2 or 3 a day are actually “jokes” I would consider as passable, but that still leaves me with around 1000 for the year.
How I Do It
I decided on picking a random topic every day. This was done by randomly picking an apples-to-apples red card each day. Ok, I didn’t actually pick the cards I used the list of 1713 phrases and created a script to randomly generate one (which I now need to update because of the number of duplicates I get).
In Google Keep I create a note for the day with the phrase and the date. Then I make a list of 10 “jokes.” Now some of these things I actually have to research (sorry Madame Curie) to make intelligent comments about. Some I get excited about (Pokemon) and some I dread (Adolf Hitler), but all get done.
Unfortunately, I can’t claim a perfect streak for 2020.
Here’s the story…
I thought I did my writing one day… only to find out the next day… that I didn’t…
I did write 20 jokes the next day, so I am still on pace for 3660 jokes written in 2020.
And Then?
As I’m reaching the end of 2020, I never thought about what I would actually do with these jokes. I figure I keep writing these drafts and then when I die my children find some really random things in my Google account?
I would like to go back and create updated versions of these jokes. That word “version” is what triggers me though. Unfortunately, I also want to see and show others how my joke writing progressed. I would love to actually have a git-like history of these jokes and also be able to categorize.
It would be really cool to have an age rating system so I can flag which ones my kids can see or which are safe for work. As well as provide alternate cleaner versions. I generally agree that adding curse words doesn’t improve comedy, but it can elevate the situation quickly.
I guess just a Google Doc would work as it shows history, but I also want the individual jokes categorized and if I ever actually did a standup set show the versions I went with and what comments I might or add fan reactions on certain dates…
Can We See Them?
You can see some of the bad ones I’ve written…
If the IRS sold children. I wouldn’t buy them.
– The IRS 10/15/2020
Kirstie Alley only did comedies because no one likes dark alleys.
– Dark Alleys 10/11/2020
Why don’t they sell spit containers?
– Spit 9/21/2020
Knock-Knock.
– Knock Knock Jokes 9/5/2020
Who’s There?
Mew.
Mew Who?
Mew Two never knew his parents.
Anne Frank? More like Anne Verbose.
– Anne Frank 9/4/2020
We didn’t have a funeral for my dog but we all sat with him as we euthanized him. I played taps on his belly.
– Funerals 6/27/2020
