Humorists

"You learn very very quickly that it is mostly about swearing, actually. That's all you're doing, swearing, in a box with wheels."

"You had an empire once, Britain. Had a great empire! Impressively commandeered and sequestered from the rest of the world, with great style. You just marched in and said 'You, you and you—fuck off, we're having tiffin.'."

"America is like the really bad flatmate of the world: 'Oh sorry, did I break all your shit? I d'n't know it was yours. Yeah, I'll replace it sometime... with my stuff.'."

"They have sheets of ham so large that if you bite out the middle, you've saved yourself the price of a poncho."

"Then you get these articles about how unhealthy life is in the city. You know; mobile phone tumours - far more likely in the city; Well you know what, so is everything else! Including sex, coffee and conversation."

"NEVER try the local thing. You know why it's local? Because it's shit, that's why it's local. You eat it, you'll become one of them, you'll turn red and start spouting bigotry and eating tweed with lamb fat dribbling down your chin, don't go near any of that stuff."

"You're supposed to eat the cows. They're great big lumbering stupid things - they'd be everywhere if we didn't eat them."

"You’re never going to go. Why would you go? It’s a disgusting place. It’s always wet even when it’s dry. There’s nothing there. Farmers aren’t really people, you know this. They’re just necessary, we need somebody to kill cows."

"This stage, if it hasn't already, probably will see a production of the Vagina Monologues. Which I cannot wait to see, because it sounds so fabulously fucking stupid. Everybody knows that if female genitalia could speak, it would sound exactly like Enya."

"Bagpipes covered in hair"

"You're looking for a lump in a bag of lumps, that can take some time"

"And they say that after people make love there's a kind of melancholia that descends; la petite mort, you know, the little death. Well, I'm here to tell you, after a romantic night in with yourself, there's a very acute sensation of failed suicide. And I think a lot of that, if you're men is because of the quality of the gear you've got to work with. I mean it's horrible looking. Like a deep sea fish that ate its own arse after about an hour. What's going on down there?! Do something nice, like a kittens head... or something and you could just tickle its chin until it got sick... it would be alright..."

"And then I did a very male sort of reckoning, I did the calculation, I thought, ‘right. there’s three of you and there’s one of me’—I’m rubbish at maths, by the way—but, in record time, I worked out that it would take, at least, three of me to defend myself against a third of one of them even if he only attacked me with his ass. I’m not a fighter, you know, I’m a bleeder. The best I can hope for would be to drown somebody else with my own blood... if I don’t drown myself before."

"Death before dishonour." I always used to wonder, Hey, exactly how much dishonour are we talking about here? 'Cause I could handle quite a lot. I would, for instance, fellate a Smurf before I picked death. I'd cook him a little Smurf omelette as I was doing it, you know, I'd be perfectly happy doing that. Seasoning it with thyme, you know, listening to his happy satisfied Smurf lip smacks. But every man thinks about Smurfs. They don't say it, but they do. That's why I'm here—to be honest. Just once, you know, what would it be like? Nobody needs to know, you go away for the weekend. Just once, to have the blue salty bulb lolling on your tongue... if I don't say it, nobody else will."

"That's why the have the programmes presented by 45 guys; "Hi I'm Ted, I'm Bob, I'm Ralph, I'm Dick, I'm Dale, I'm Nick, I'm Will", and they keep changing all the angles of the camera. "I'm over here, I'm at this desk, I'm standing here" and Wendy comes up from under the desk with the financial weather."

"There's a guy, John Humphries, who does a lot of the interviews, and he sounds like he's been up since about midnight jogging on the spot to accuse people you've never heard of of lying. It's very aggressive right from the off. You turn it on and he goes: "DON'T LIE TO ME!! DON'T LIE TO ME! I'VE BEEN DOING THIS FOR 45 YEARS, WHAT DO YOU THINK I AM, A FUCKIN TURNIP?!" [...] "WHERE ARE THE BOMBS? WHERE ARE THEY?!?!....Get up so I can kick you again, you lying fuck!""

"People who get implants, it's so depressing, you know… People— I don't know. The route of that, you know, maybe they want more love or attention, or what it is, but they always go for the most obvious place, you know? Here... Well if you really want more attention, why not get them in your eyes? And then move you eyes down to where you nipples used to be, put you breasts up on your head, EVERYBODY will pay attention!"

"Well, you know what they say about John, anyway?"

"Chocolate bread! That's how they start the day. It's only going to escalate from there. By lunchtime you're fucking everybody you know. I was in Paris recently—they are very good at pleasure. I was walking by a bakery—a boulangerie, which is fun to go into and to say, even—and I went in, a childish desire to get a cake—"Give me one of those chocolate guys," I said—and I was talking to someone on the street, took a bite... I had to tell them to go away! This thing! I wanted to book a room with it! "Where are you from, what kind of music are you into? Come on!" Proper, serious pleasure. Because they know they're gonna die. Nobody goes to church. You think, we're gonna die, make a fucking nice cake."

"The weak, sensual, pleasure-loving French. You know, not going to war because they’re all still in bed at two in the afternoon, with the sheets coiled about their knees, lying, there scratching themselves, smoking a Gauloise inside a Gitane, sweating Nice sancerre. Before one of them sloughs off the sheets to pad around the kitchen naked. No, not naked, naked from the waist down. To emphasise their nakedity. Picking up yesterday's croissant crumbs with their sweaty feet. Slashing yesterday's paintings."

"What dya mean theres no fackin chips, I come ere on a plane, you cunt! I've got children ere, what am I spose to do with this fackin tomato fiasco."

"I'm kinda looking forward to being old, you know really really old, so that I can lean over in a restaurant with my son or daughter and say: "You know what I just did? I just pissed myself, you deal with it, then carry on telling me about you job or divorce or whatever the fuck it is, I’m not really listening to you to be honest, which one are you Siobhan or Simon? I can never tell.""

"Or when people break up, they always use a bunch of lines on each other, you know, terrible rubbish lies, like "It’s not you, it’s me, it’s me." It’s NEVER you, it’s always them! You should level with these people! Tell them! "You know that strange sound you used to hear when you were going to sleep? That was me CHEWING the bed, out of sheer boredom! OOOOHH, How I HATE you, I hate you so much it gives me energy! I have to get up early in the morning to hate you because there isn’t time enough in the day. Please, GO AWAY!" Or that other BULLSHIT: "I need more space!" People never quantify exactly how much space they really need.. do they? But strangely enough, it always seems to be the exact same height, depth and breadth as you."

"You cannot over estimate how infantile men are about sex! Men are people that have sex BECAUSE they have a headache... or are on fire, or have been shot in the head, or whatever it is!"

"Partir, c'est mourir un peu... mais mourir, c'est partir beaucoup."

"Première communion de jeunes filles chlorotiques par un temps de neige."

"Marche Funèbre composée pour les Funérailles d'un grand homme sourd."

"Life with a Jolly Parent is a bit like life in a holiday camp. The beds are too small and there's an outbreak of Salmonella every five minutes."

"Flash Teacher: How to spot: He'll be the only member of staff who drives a customized Lada."

"There are two distinct types of bike: The one you save up for and buy yourself, otherwise known as the 'Dream Machine' , and the one your parents buy for you, otherwise known as the 'Complete waste of space'."

"For a start, let's look at the Grotto itself. By and large these are extremely aptly named, 'Grot' meaning rubbish and 'Oh' being exclamation of disappointed surprise."

"It's easy to forget you are in debt to the tune of £10, and to a woman who never forgets anything. Crikey, she can even tell you which Coronation Street character was the first one to have their brain removed (Footnote: And not have it replaced by acting talent unfortunately.)"

"Fishing is a jerk at one end of a line waiting for a jerk at the other end of a line."

"Good luck distinguishing which sign is the REAL sign when my entire front lawn is covered with thousands of little green signs - each with a different number! Ahahahah! I'll be EVERY address in the whole freakin' township! And what are you gonna do about it? Hopefully, NOTHING!"

"They are "sexcellent". That is a pun for you, you will find lots of puns on the internet! Also: blonde jokes."

"I speculate that the genesis of the chicken-joke lies in some situation such as the one illustrated above, but over time the original context of the joke was lost, which left the chicken sadly decontextualized."

"If you find you are not understanding my explanation for a joke, hit "F5" on your browser and the page will refresh and I will explain it again."

"I collect power supplies like other men collect meaningful relationships! THAT IS TO SAY, AT THE RATE OF ABOUT ONE A YEAR"

"Man, staying at home is for chumps! You could shake the man's hand! YOU COULD TOTALLY SMOOCH HIM MAYBE. maybe not but still!"

"Failure is just success rounded down."

"Strange things in the neighbourhood (partial list):"

"We're all already aware of boobies; it is the general state of most people in North America! THANKS, MEDIA AND THE MALE GAZE"

"You're supposed to whore yourself out! Nobody will judge you! ACTUALLY EVERYONE WILL JUDGE YOU THAT'S HOW THE SYSTEM WORKS"

"I'm suddenly worried people will think that I believe their religion can be summed up on four sex-obsessed sentences."

"I'm totally applying assumed Creative Commons rights."

"I saw The Mountain Ghost last night and they were really good but also scary! Actually they are called the Mountain GOATS and do not feature scary g-g-g-ghosts. Luckily."

"Of course it's easy to get on public transit! It's public transit."

"Don't worry, it's very clear that the painting was done by a human, most likely a human with one eye removed and a feverent if incorrect understanding of design and anatomy."

"The subject of men and women is absolutely fraught with sex, which is as it should be."

"When I finally gathered, invented, stole, simplified, borrowed, and found a publisher for a clutch of reasonably foolproof recipes, I learned I had friends I hadn't known about—more proof that a mutual dislike can be quite as sound a basis for friendship as a mutual devotion."