Here is a thing I have learned about our society:

If you do something stupid and small, we don't like you. But if you do something equally stupid and GIANT, we worship you.

Eat one hot dog in one minute?

You're unhealthy and likely to get indigestion.

Eat fifty hot dogs in ten minutes?

You're heroic and likely to get an appearance on Letterman.

Make a ball out of rubber bands?

You're lazy and you should be working.

Make the BIGGEST rubber band ball ever?

You're awesome and you should get an appearance on Letterman.

Well I, for one, could use that Letterman appearance. So the next time I feel like writing a not-funny blog, I'm gonna write the BIGGEST not-funny blog EVER. Well, unless I just did. In which case....oh never mind.

“How can you continue pursuing comedy every day when you KNOW that the odds of being successful are so small?”

I get that a lot.

It’s a valid question.

Here’s how I always answer it in my head:

“When he was young, my father very much wanted to be a smokejumper.

If you don’t know, a smokejumper is a person who parachutes into the middle of nowhere to fight a forest-fire. Why anyone would want to jump from an airplane into a fire is beyond me, but that’s another story for another time.

What is important is that he wanted the job desperately. And the first couple of times my father applied to the smokejumpers, he was rejected. I always found this part incomprehensible. I imagined the smokejumpers’ motto would be something like, “Smokejumpers: If you’re stupid enough to want to jump out of an airplane into a forest fire, who are we to stop you?”

But it it’s not.

You see, my dad didn’t meet the height requirement. He was too short. And there isn’t much to be done about “too short.”

So that should have been the end of it.

But my dad's a little crazy. He went back the next year and applied again. And the next. And then the one after that. He was just certain that he was meant to be a smokejumper.

I think the really really TRUE definition of an optimist is this: An optimist is a 25 year old man who thinks he just might get taller.

So can you see why I think I might just survive in this crappy comedy world?

Because in my family we believe in the impossible. We believe that 25 year old men can grow an extra inch if they want it really bad and that sometimes-funny-and-mostly-nice girls can become comedy stars.

That's why."

Oh, by the way, the third time he applied, my dad got accepted into the smokejumpers. He didn’t get taller; mind you. They bent the rules.

Chalk one up for the optimists.

I should have said this earlier, but I forgot because my life is filled with billions of very exciting things that you cannot even imagine. But I shall take a break from my eventful and fascinating life to tell you this thing now:

Thank you to frequent commenter, Jason Linetsky, for coming to my comedy show last week.

That is what I wanted to say.

He was my first blog reader ever to come to a show, you see.

Yay.

It was a momentous occasion in that I felt like a celebrity because he knew who I was and I didn't know who he was and he didn't ask for an autograph, but I feel sure that he wanted to probably. Errr....didn't he?

I think he laughed too, but I could be mistaken as that I was the one onstage and one can get confused from such a vantage point.

But since he frequently comments, I bet he will tell you himself.

And now I shall return to my brilliantly-dramatic life.

The end.

Do "economy-sized" products get smaller during a recession?

THIS IS ME PRETENDING I'M A WRITER FOR "THE DAILY SHOW"

1) The top United States’ general defended Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, by saying, “He leads in a way that the good Lord tells him his best for our country.” He later added, “Also the good Lord doesn’t like innocent Iraqi civilians very much.”

2) Senators Chuck Hagel of Nebraska and John Warner of Virginia have joined the growing number of Republican Congressmen who are urging the President to find a new strategy in Iraq. “Ideally this new strategy will involve never having actually gone in there,” says Hagel. “Can we make that happen?”

3) After learning that Kim Jong-il had ordered and completed a test of North Korea’s nuclear weapons, Assistant Secretary of State, Christopher Hill was quoted as saying, “He’s really going to rue the day he made this decision.” After that, Hill was also quoted as saying, “Rats! Foiled again!” and “Jinkies!” It’s possible that our friends in the State Department watch a bit too much Rocky and Bullwinkle.

Errrr...anybody want to give me a writing job?

I thought not.

I'm not very good at video games, but I think I'd be great at video mind games.

If you really loved me, you would KNOW which castle the Princess was in.

Do these bouncing turtles and poisonous mushrooms make me look fat?

There is an entire untapped market out there.

Now that North Korea has a nuclear weapon, everybody’s freaking out. They're all like, “This could lead to war,” and “Nuclear war is terrible!”

Well, I think that all the Gloomy Gusses of the world should take a minute and look on the bright side of nuclear war.

1) Glow sticks eventually run out, but the glow from radioactivity lasts for centuries. After nuclear war, we could have the awesomest rave ever.

2) I've never really been able to speak with pride about the time I live in. But after nuclear war, we will be able to say nostalgic things like, “Remember the good old days of child molestation and school shootings?” It'll be just like "Happy Days."

3) People will be way more tolerant of people with disabilities once every baby has two heads or an extra arm. After nuclear war, every Olympics will be Special.

These are just a few of the many good things about nuclear war.

There. Don't we all feel a little better?

I thought so.

I like to think of Pop Rocks as a mini-terrorist-attack in my mouth.

Yum.

I wish I still had an imaginary friend.

Real friends are great and all, but frankly mine are getting a little boring with their jobs and boyfriends and lives and blah blah blah. They almost never want to talk to my stuffed animals or have tea parties.

But imaginary friends? They can always get time off from their imaginary jobs to hang out with me.

And unlike real friends, imaginary friends are pretty much always happy. They never call you at three o'clock in the morning because their imaginary boyfriend just dumped them for an imaginary nineteen year old with an imaginary nose ring.

Or at least, that rarely happens.

I mean, I’m sure there’re bad things in the imaginary world too. Like probably there’s still rape and murder and eating disorders. But think about it: Sure rape is bad. But imaginary rape? Probably not that terrible. And throwing up after you eat can’t be all that painful, if it’s imaginary vomit.

I can't imagine I would be all that upset if I heard on the news today that North Korea just tested an imaginary nuclear weapon.

'Course I bet that our imaginary friends are always blaming us for stuff in their world. "Hey Peaches,who broke the flower pot? It was Jill? Now Peaches, you and I both know that Jill is real so she couldn't have broken the flower pot."

I imagine that the vast majority of imaginary people are named Peaches.

If I had an imaginary friend right now, I would have her read this over and she would think it was brilliant. That's because imaginary friends are always kind and supportive of your comedy writing dream.

Also, they're not so bright.

'Night, Peaches.

As part of a $200 million a year advertising contract, the U.S. Army has a new slogan: “Army Strong.”

Just think, for only another $50 million, they probably could have afforded a verb.

The thing that bothers me about copycat killers is that they’re so unoriginal..

Sellouts.

They’re like cover bands for murder.

I walked by a church today that had its class schedule listed on the bulletin board outside.

One of the classes was entitled "How Not to Read the Bible."

Now that's a class I could really get behind. In fact, I think I could teach a class in Not-Reading the Bible.

I'm a natural.

I don't want to brag or anything, but I don't read the Bible almost every single day without even trying.

Some days I don't read it twice.

After teaching "How Not to Read the Bible," my future classes might include:

How Not to Clean Your Kitchen

How Not to Drink Champagne in Moderation

and possibly

How Not to Not Eat Sixteen Cookies in One Sitting

It's time that I begin to share my gifts with the world.

Aside from the kitchen and the bathroom, I have two rooms in my apartment.

I have a box of 64 Crayola Crayons in each room.

I think that says something about me as a human being.

Mostly it says this:

I, Jill Twiss, am a very busy person. So I don't have TIME to go all the way to the other room when it's Strawberry-Shortcake-Coloring-Book Time, damnit.