Comic Relief in Life and Writing

I cringed happily received an email forward from a friend the other day that made me laugh. It wasn't an astoundingly funny joke or link to a youtube video, but it was funny. The idea behind the email was simply to ponder why some things are the way they are. And it made me do just that.

Hope it does the same for you. Here goes:

My favorite comic relief on Body of Proof:
Dr. Curtis Brumfield, played by Windell Middlebrooks

How important does a person have to be before they are considered assassinated instead of just murdered?

How is it that we put a man on the moon before we figured out that it is a good idea to put wheels on luggage? [Seriously!]

Why is is that people say they "slept like a baby" when babies wake up like every two hours?

Why are you IN a movie, but ON television?

Why do toasters always have a setting that will burn the toast to a horrible crisp that no decent human would ever eat?

Why does Goofy stand erect and Pluto remain on all fours?

Do the Alphabet song and Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star have the same tune?

Why did you just try singing the two songs above? [GOTCHA!! I totally did too...and laughed at myself!]

Why do we press harder on a remote control when we know the batteries are going dead?

Why do banks charge a fee on "insufficient funds" when they know there is not enough money?

Why doesn't Tarzan have a beard?

Why is it that no matter what color bubble bath you use, the bubbles are always white?

Why do people constantly return to the refrigerator in the hopes that something new to eat will have materialized?

Why do people run over a piece of thread a dozen times with a vacuum cleaner, reach down, pick it up, examine it, and then put it back down to give the vacuum cleaner one more chance?


If no one else has done that last one, then I guess I need to sign up for therapy myself, because I certainly have. WHY do I do that? Makes no sense.

Characters should have moments like these, too, and that could bring some comic relief to the reader, perhaps at a much needed time. Have a character sit back and examine something they've done or thought time and time again. Chances are, it's something the reader has done or thought too, and the character's internal dialogue might just make your reader laugh out loud.

When things resonate, as hopefully some of the above did with you in this post, it just makes it funnier to realize that other people have wondered the exact same things. 

Let's Analyze: What was the last funny thing that you read in a novel that made you laugh out loud? Was that because you related to the event?