We use a lot of old sayings without irony or humor - they have morphed in the vernacular as descriptive phrases instead of their original side-splitting, milk-snorting* hilariousness:
“Life’s a bitch, and then you die”
“Dumber than a sack of hammers”
“It’s not brain surgery”
These were awesomely funny when first used, but now we just use them.
*another one.
All of them, really.
They can be refreshed somewhat in delivery.
"Pardon me, sir. Could you set down the phone and find your ass with both hands? Don’t call me back until you have progress to report. "
Referring to an ugly person as a double-bagger made me laugh uncontrollably the first time it was said and explained to me.
The step beyond that is coyote ugly.
I’ve never gone to bed with an ugly woman.
I sure have woken up with some though.
-Willy Nelson
“Turtle’s Peaking” to announce the need to defecate in the very near future.
“This is the first day of the rest of your life.”
The first time you hear it, hey, that’s kinda cool.
After that, maybe not so much.
“All your base are belong to us.”
I feel that for anyone who spends more than a small amount of time on Internet discussion boards: pretty well any and every would-be witty / pithy saying, has a considerable likelihood of becoming common and jaded. With so many millions of people throughout the English-speaking world intensively “discussing and discoursing” with each other electronically, this is inevitable. Lots of people enjoy exercising wit and humour; but, let’s face it, few of us are talented and original wordsmiths – most rely on witticisms already come-up-with by someone else.
The idea comes to mind that a possible treatment for cliche-fatigue, might involve taking the occasional complete break from the Net…
Alas, so true.
“Hi, Opal” was absolutely brilliant, the first time it was used. But after the five-hundredth repetition…
When I first heard Felix Unger explain how if you assume you make an ass out of u and me, it was hilarious. It got less funny every time it was repeated.
Same thing when Col Flagg said he could tell Henry Blake a secret but then he’d have to kill him.
I’m fairly new to the Dope; and have never “got” the business with “Hi, Opal”. Am aware that the board had a quirky and prolific poster – now sadly deceased – who used the name Opal Cat, and seemingly had a bit of a tendency to “overshare”. Was the “Hi…” stuff, one of those things which are funny because they are completely pointless and meaningless and, well, not funny?
The “Hi, Opal” thing wasn’t really about her oversharing. She was a stickler for a certain rule about lists. The rule being that if a list doesn’t have at least 3 items in it, it can’t legitimately be put into list form. She evidently insisted upon this so often that people started creating two-item lists and using the phrase “Hi, Opal” as the third item.
It became more of a joke when some people would put “Hi, Opal” as the third item of any list that they posted.
“It is what it is.”
I used to like that quote- just a simple, down to earth way of saying, “Deal with reality.”
But it got really old a long time ago.
I would argue that the absurd variation “it’s not rocket surgery” has, with all due respect to the poster of that name (who I haven’t seen post in ages, by the way) gone the way of its original inspiration in terms of being rather lame these days.
Thanks ! I’d never twigged about the “lists” bit.
Lighten up, Francis
Suck it up, Buttercup
Life sux, get a helmet
“Wherever you go, there you are.”
Pretty cool the first time I heard it, but that was when I was too young to drive so I was pretty naive and impressionable. Now? Nah, not so much.
As the OP I was aiming for the ones that were of laugh out loud quality. And not so much the ones that brought a chuckle or wry smile.
Peaking or peeking?
I prefer “touching cloth” or “prairie-doggin’,” myself.