This week: Immortality Edited by: Robert Waltz  
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The key to immortality is first living a life worth remembering.
-Bruce Lee
You’re only an immortal until someone manages to kill you. After that, you were just long-lived.
-Simon Green
I don't want to achieve immortality through my work; I want to achieve immortality through not dying.
-Woody Allen |
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Thanks to science, we have discovered the world's oldest surviving joke.
It dates back to Sumeria, circa 1900 BCE, and here's the joke:
“Something which has never occurred since time immemorial; a young woman did not fart in her husband’s lap.”
Now, this is not what we, today, would call a joke. Time and translation renders it less than funny. It's probably only the presence of hyperbole ("time immemorial") and a fart ("fart") that makes it recognizable as a Sumerian attempt at humor. For all we know, it was a knee-slapper at the time; archaeological science isn't precise enough to determine if a kneecap has undergone percussive force from a palm.
There's no indication that we know who chiseled those words into stone or pressed them into clay or whatever it was the Sumerians did at the time, but that long-dead Mesopotamian jester lives on, nearly 4000 years after his (I think we can safely say "his" in this case) death.
And wouldn't we all want something we did last 4000 years? That's the next thing to immortality, isn't it? Fart jokes are forever.
Sure, you can create art, but it will fade. You can write a story, but the book will deteriorate. You can build a house, but it'll burn down eventually. But a joke? A joke endures as long as people are around to tell it.
Of course, there's no such thing as actual eternity. Eventually, the sun will expand and burn up the planet. The universe itself will grind to a halt, all thermodynamic activity ceasing. But just before that happens, you can bet on one thing: the last two sentient creatures will observe the impending end of everything. One will turn to the other, and tell a fart joke.
And the other will laugh. |
It's hard to compete with ancient Sumeria, I know, but here are some attempts:
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Last time, in "Comet Chameleon" , I talked about the comet that was swinging past Earth.
Lilli 🧿 ☕: Thank you for including my story, "The Deal" , in this issue of the newsletter! I really appreciate it.
Way to sneak it in here again!
So that's it for me for August - see you next month! Until then,
LAUGH ON!!!
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Comedy: August 19, 2020 Issue [#10325]
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