Текст книги "Brain Droppings"

Автор книги: Джордж Карлин

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brain droppings do. Humans must easily be the meanest species on Earth. 6 Probably the only reason there are any tigers left is because they don’t taste good. I respect animals. I have more sympathy for an injured or dead animal than I have for an injured or dead human ^ being, because human beings participate and cooperate in their own undoing. Animals are completely innocent. There i are no innocent human beings.

Here is an anecdote from the writer Patricia Highsmith: “Not so long ago I said to a friend of mine: ‘If I saw a kitten and a little human baby sitting on the curb starving, I would feed the kitten first if nobody was looking.’ My friend said: ‘I would feed the kitten first if somebody was looking.’” I would

Some people seem shocked and say, “You care more about animals than you do about humans!” Fuckin’-A well told!

I do not torture animals, and I do not support the torture of animals, such as that which goes on at rodeos: cowardly ^ men in big hats abusing simple beasts in a fruitless search for manhood. In fact, I regularly pray for serious, life-threatening rodeo injuries. I wish for a cowboy to walk crooked, and with great pain, for the rest of his life. I cheer when a bull at Pamplona sinks one of his horns deep into the lower intestines of some drunken European macho swine. And my cheers grow louder when the victim is a young American macho-jock tourist asshole. Especially ; if the bull is able to swing that second horn around and ‘; catch the guy right in the nuts.

GEORGE CARLIN

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But although I don’t go out of my way to bother Irvine– O things, I am not without personal standards. A mosquito on my arm, an ant or a cockroach in my kitchen, a moth approaching my lapel; these animals will die. Other insects in my home, however, the ones who merely wish to rest awhile, will be left alone. Or, if noisy and rowdy, lifted gently and returned to the great outdoors.

I am also perfectly willing to share the room with a fly, as long as he is patrolling that portion of the room that I don’t occupy. But if he starts that smart-ass fly shit, buzzing my head and repeatedly landing on my arm, he is engaging in high-risk behavior. That’s when I roll up the sports section and become Bwana, the great white fly hunter!

Sometimes there’s an older fly in the room, one who flies slowly and can’t travel too far in one hop-or it might be a female, heavy with eggs. In this case, even if the fly is bothering me, I don’t kill it; instead, I adopt it as a short-term pet. I might even give it a name. Probably something based on mythology.

Generally, I like flies, but they’d be far more welcome if they would make a choice—and stick to it—between my bean burrito and that nice, hot, steaming dog turd out in the front yard.

Also, in keeping with my insect death policy based on the intentions of the insect, any bacterium or virus entering my body that does not wish me well will be slain. Normally, my immune system would accomplish this without notifying me, but if the old T-cells aren’t up to the task, I am prepared to ingest huge amounts of antibiotics, even if they are bad for me. 238

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And yet, in spite of all these examples of creature mayhem, I will not strike a dog, I will not chase and taunt a bull around a ring, and I will not squeeze an animal’s testicles just to give the yokels a better show.

I’m also uneasy about the sheer number of scientific experiments performed on animals. First of all, animals are not always good models for medical experimentation: penicillin kills guinea pigs; an owl is not bothered by cyanide; monkeys can survive strychnine, etc., etc. Couldn’t these scientific tests just as easily be performed on humans? Condemned prisoners, old people, the feeble, the terminally ill? I’m sure there are plenty of ignorant, desperate Americans who would be willing to volunteer in exchange for some small electrical appliance.

What makes me happy in the midst of all this is that ultimately animals get even. The major killers of humanity throughout recent history—smallpox, influenza, tuberculosis, malaria, bubonic plague, measles, cholera, and AIDS—are all infectious diseases that arose from diseases of animals. I pray that mad cow disease will come to this country and completely wipe out the hamburger criminals. Eating meat is one thing, but this whole beef-rancher-manure-cattle-hamburger side show is a different skillet of shit altogether.

Each year, Americans eat 38 billion hamburgers. It takes 2,500 gallons of water to produce one pound of red meat. Cattle consume one half of all the fresh water consumed on earth. The sixty million people who will starve this year could be adequately fed if Americans reduced their meat intake by just 10 percent. But if I were one of those sixty

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million people, I wouldn’t be reachin’ for the salt and pepper too quickly. It ain’t gonna happen.

Ranchers raise pathetic, worthless cattle and sheep, animals who cannot live off the land without human supervision, and the same ranchers kill wolves, magnificent, individualistic animals fully capable of caring for themselves without assistance. Individualism gives way to sheep behavior. Sound familiar?

I root for a wolf to someday grab a rancher’s kid. Yes I do. And you know something? The wolf would probably take the kid home and raise him, in the manner of Romulus and Remus; and probably do a better job than the rancher. Remember, wolves mate for life, and they care for their sick and infirm; they don’t run them off, or kill them, or abandon them. Give me a wolf over some fuckin’ jerkoff rancher any day of the week.

One last item to demonstrate the depth of human perversity: Some zoos now sell surplus animals to private hunting ranches where rich white men hunt them down and kill them for amusement. No wonder they call it the descent of man.

When your dogs lick a visitor and they say, “Oh, he’s very affectionate,” ask them, “Did you notice what he was doing prior to coming over and licking your face?” “No. Well, yes! I think he was cleaning himself. He’s a very clean dog.” “Well, his balls and asshole are very clean. In fact, he has a perfectly clean five-inch circle around his balls and asshole. His tongue, lips, and nose, however, are filthy with old dog shit and fermented ball sweat. Why do you think we taught him to shake hands?”

I don’t like moths, because I can’t predict their flight patterns. They don’t seem to know where they’re going. I don’t like that.

And they’re always hanging around light bulbs. Somehow they’re even able to get inside the sealed light fixture between the bulb and the outer glass. How do they do that? One day you can clean out a hundred old, dead moths and then put the clean globe back on, and a month later there’ll be another twenty or thirty full-grown dead moths inside the globe. How do they get in there?

And what is that attraction to light all about, anyway? You know what I think they’re doing? Trying to read the writing on the light bulb. It’s hard to read, isn’t it? The writing on a light bulb is placed right where you can’t read it when the light is on, because the light is too bright. And then, when the light is off, you can’t read it, because there’s not enough light. No wonder moths are so fucked up.

2*0,

GEORGE CARLIN

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1HEGE0RGE iot Books OutttoAsf OITer #3: OEHE RAL INTEREST TITIE5 ft Twelve Things Nobody Cares About ft The Picture Book of Permanent Stains ft Firecracker in a Cat’s Asshole: A Novel i ft The Complete List of Everyone Who Enjoys Coffee ft The Official British Empire Registry of Blokes ft Ten Places No One Can Find ft Tits on the Moon (science fiction) ft Why Norway and Hawaii Are Not Near Each Other ft The History of Envy ft The Pus Almanac ft One Hundred People Who Are Only Fooling Themselves ft Diary of a Real Evil Prick ft Carousel Maintenance ft Why It Doesn’t Snow Anymore ft The Dingleberry Papers

ft A Treasury of Poorly Understood Ideas ft Why Jews Point ft The Golden Age of Tongue Kissing ft Famous Bullshit Stories of the Aztecs ft The Meaning of Corn ft Feel This: A Braille Sex Manual ft A Complete List of Everything That Is Still Pending ft Really Loud Singalongs for the Hard of Hearing OETAIIFE

One morning I get up, get out of bed, get showered, get some breakfast, and get to thinkin’, “I’m not gettin’ any.” I get the urge to get some nookie, and get an idea. So I get dressed, get in my car, and get on the freeway.

When I get downtown, I get a few beers, get a buzz, and get lucky. I get a glimpse of a fine-looking woman. I get her a drink, get her talking, and we get acquainted. So I get up my courage and get her to agree to go get a room. We get outta there, get some booze, get in a taxi, and get a hotel.

We get in the room, and get comfortable, and I’m gettin’ excited ’cause I’m gonna get in her pants. So we get undressed, get in bed, and get started. And I’m gettin’ hot ’cause she’s gettin’ horny. She

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wants to get down, and I wanna get my rocks off. I wanna get it up, get in, get it on, get off, and get out.

And it starts gettin’ real good. But then I get thinking, “Suppose I get the clap? If I get the clap, I’ll have to get shots. Might get worse. Could get AIDS. Shoulda got rubbers.” Now I get paranoid. Get a bit crazy. Get a bit scared. Gotta get a grip.

Then it gets worse. Suppose she gets pregnant? Will she get an abortion? She might wanna get married. I can’t get involved. If I gotta get married, I gotta get her a ring. How do I get it? I’d have to get credit. Or get hold of some money!

That means gettin’ a job. Or gettin’ a gun. And a getaway car. But suppose I get caught? Get busted by cops. Get thrown in the jail! Gotta get help. Get a good lawyer. Get out on bail.

No. I gotta get serious. Get it together. Get with the program. Get me a break, get me a job. Get a promotion, get a nice raise, get a new house, and get some respect. But if I get all of that, I can’t get real cocky. Might get someone mad who’d get on my case, get me in trouble, and then I’d get fired.

Then I’d get mad, maybe get violent, get kicked outta work. Then get discouraged, start to get desperate, get hold of some drugs, get loaded, get hooked, and get sick. Get behind in my rent, get evicted, get thrown on the street.

Maybe get mugged, get beaten, get injured, get hospitalized, get operated on, get a blood clot, get a heart attack, get the last rites, get a stroke, get a flat line, get a trip to the graveyard, and get buried in a field.

So get this. You gotta get smart, and you gotta get real. Get serious. Get home, get undressed, get in bed, get some sleep. Or you might just get fucked. Get me?

. In spite of all the wonderfully entertaining sex crimes we enjoy in this country, Americans are still a prudish lot. So now we’ve decided to use the word gender when referring to a person’s sex. Gender has been borrowed from linguistics, and will soon include other meanings: “I think he’s pervert-ed, Stan. He told me he had gender with a woodchuck.” “He’s as ugly as shit, Gloria, but the gender is strangely dark and b quite intense.” “Pull up your pants, Russell. I told you, anal gender is high-risk fun!” And, of course, that once-exciting 1960s tripod of sex, drugs, and rock ‘n’ roll has been completely euphemized. Now it’s, “gender, controlled substances, and alternative rock.” 6 If a movie is “R-rated,” it means that if you’re under sev– enteen, you have to see it with an adult: “What’s he doing, Dad?” “He’s fucking her, son.” SEX QUIZ FOR MEN: ** I. Have you ever been walking on the street toward three great-looking women who all have fabulous tits, and you don’t know which set of tits to stare at? And you only have a few seconds to decide? Thank God you can at least K study their asses while they’re walking away.

U. Did you ever see a really attractive mannequin in a department store, and you think maybe you’d like to fuck her? But you know you can’t, so you try to sneak a quick look at

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E 0 R C E C A R L I N her crotch? And you don’t worry about anyone seeing you, 6 because they would never believe what you’re thinking? Remember, ladies, the thought most often coursing through a man’s mind is, “Boy, I’d sure like to fuck that.” 3. Have you ever been talking to a married couple you * just met, and the woman has really great tits? And you’re dying to get a really long look at them, but you can’t even 5 take a quick glance, because her husband is staring right at you? Then, when he finally looks away for an instant, do you immediately look straight at her tits, regardless of whether or not it makes her uncomfortable?

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News note: On TV recently, a guy was complaining that « he was sexually “abused” by a female teacher when he was a boy. He said she touched him and made him touch her in their private parts. Yeah? So? Where’s the abuse? Maybe I’m twisted or something, but as a child, I would’ve been willing to kill for this kind of special attention. I’d have had my hand in the air all day long, “Teacher! I need some more of that special help!” It would have really lent a stimulating new perspective to the idea of staying after school.

I’m glad I don’t have any weird sexual fetishes. It’s hard enough just getting laid, can you imagine cruising the bars searching for a submissive, albino rubber freak who wants you to throw canteloupes at his ass and shit on his chest?

I will, however, admit to being fascinated by a strange new perversion I’ve heard of. It’s called S Et W. Apparently just as you’re about to come, your partner vomits root beer on you.

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Actually, truth be known, my sexual fantasies are fairly prosaic: a woman takes off her dress, I fuck her, I drive home. Simple, neat, very little down side. nARRY AH QRTHAn

Men, take my advice, marry an orphan. It’s great. First of all, there are never any in-law problems. Second, there are no annoying Thanksgiving and Christmas visits sitting around pretending to enjoy the company of a couple of fifth-generation nitwits. In fact, when it comes to visiting her folks, the worst thing that might happen to you would be an occasional trip to the cemetery to leave some cheap flowers. And you might even get out of that by claiming a morbid fear of headstones.

But most important, as the relationship is just beginning, you won’t have to worry about making a good impression on the girl’s parents, nor will you have to get her father’s approval. Believe me when I tell you, when you say, “I hope your father will approve of me,” there is no greater thrill than having your beloved turn to you brightly and say, “My father’s dead.” HAPPY HEW YEAR

How late in the new year can you say “Happy New Year” and not be considered weird? Actually, the whole thing starts on December 26. If on that day you think you’re not going to see someone again until after New Year’s, you wish them, “Happy New Year.” And it’s generally all right to say “Happy New Year” right on up through New Year’s day. But after that, it begins to change a little. On January third or fourth, for instance, it still may be acceptable, but only if you haven’t

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;een the person since the First. And then even as late as the sixth or >eventh of January, you can still get away with it if you haven’t seen :he person for a really long time, say since Christmas. But once it starts *ettin’ into early April, if you’re still running around telling people, ‘Happy New Year,” you are simply begging to be fitted for one of those garments where the sleeves tie in the back. You are gonna wind up saying “Happy New Year” through that little food slot in the door. And no one, including you, will care what day it is. Or year, for that matter. RHTtltS YOU JUST DOm HEAR E aster/kiester humor/tumor Tonto/Toronto surgery/perjury manhandle/panhandle nudist/Buddhist postcard/Coast Guard creditor/predator pickup/hiccup mobster/lobster doormat/floormat Eugene’s/blue jeans decaffeinated/decapitated

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There are entirely too many love songs. I know. Society probably demands a certain number of them, but, goddamn, is this the only thing people can sing about? As far as I’m concerned, the love song category is filled. Let’s move on. There must be some other topics. Everything’s a broken heart. “Broken heart. Broken heart.” What about a broken rib cage? Hah? How would you like that? Or a ruptured spleen? You never hear a song about that. Wouldn’t you like to see some nice tall woman with long hair and big tits up there beltin’ out a song about a ruptured spleen? Or how about a nice song about a fire in a hotel? Or a guy who gets his legs caught in a threshing machine? How about someone who goes up into a hayloft and finds sixty dead Shriners? It seems to me we’re passing up a lot of subjects that would make really good songs.

WHO’STEAHWHOIl

What exactly is a “student teacher”? As I understand it, a student teacher is a person of student age who is far enough along in his education to be doing some teaching. But a “student teacher” could also be someone who simply teaches students, a student teacher. Which is what all teachers are.

Or a student teacher might be a student studying to become a teacher. Not yet a teacher, still a “student teacher.” Such a student, studying to be a teacher, could also be called a “teaching student,” which is, after all, what our original “student teacher” was: a teaching student.

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GEORGE CARL IN

Sometimes teachers, later in their careers, go back to school for further education, and once again they become students, while still remaining teachers. Well, if a younger student who is doing some teaching is a “student teacher,” then wouldn’t an older teacher who goes back to school logically be a “teacher student”? Or I guess you could call her a “student teacher,” couldn’t you? So far, that’s three different kinds of student teachers.

Now, these teachers who go back to school obviously have to be taught by “teacher teachers.” And if one of these teacher teachers were also taking a few courses on the side, that would make her a “student teacher teacher.” And if she were just beginning that process, just learning to be a “student teacher teacher” wouldn’t that make her a “student teacher teacher student”? I think it would. CHAn6inO THE SUBJECTS

Talk about wrong priorities. We live in a country that has a National Spelling Bee. We actually give prizes for spelling! But when’s the last time you heard about a thinking bee? Or a reasoning bee? Maybe an ethics bee? Never. Did you know the only people in our culture who are taught ethics are a handful of college students? Then they graduate and go to work for large corporations. So much for ethics training. Ethics and values should be taught early in grade school, not in college when the child has already been spiritually warped and perverted by his parents, friends, religion, and television set.

And while we’re at it, why don’t we teach courses in how to be responsible, or how to be married, or how to be a good parent, or, at the very least, how to be a reasonably honorable human being? Unfortunately, such courses will never be taught, because the information gleaned would have no application in real life.

brain droppings “KIDS TODAY!”

I know this sounds like old-fart talk, but I think today’s kids are too soft. They have to wear plastic helmets for every outdoor activity but jacking off. Toy safety, car seats, fire-resistant pajamas. Shit! Soft, baby boomer parents, with their cult of the child, are raising a crop of soft, fruity kids.

Here’s another example of how adults are training children to be weak. Did you ever notice that every time some guy with an AK-47 shows up in a schoolyard and kills three or four students and a couple of teachers, the next day the school is overrun with psychologists, psychiatrists, grief counselors, and trauma therapists trying to help the children cope? Shit! When I was a kid, if somebody came to our school and killed three or four of us, we went right on with our work. We finished the arithmetic. “Thirty-five classmates, minus four equals thirty-one!” We were tough! I say if a kid can handle the violence in his home, he oughta be able to handle the violence in school.

What bothers me is all this mindless, middlebrow bullshit about children being “our future.” So, what’s new? Children have always, technically, represented our future. But what does that mean? What is so important about knowing that children are our future? Life as it is right now—today’s reality in this country—the people lying on the streets and park benches, living in the dysfunctional homes, the prisons, and the mental institutions, the addicts and drunks and neurotic shoppers, these people were all once children described as “our future.” So, this is it, folks. This is what the system produces. The adults you see today are what kids become. Is anything really going to make it any different? To me, they’re just another crop of kids

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waiting to become wage slaves and good little consumers. You know what I see when I look at today’s kids? Tomorrow’s fucked-up adults.

honor student.” Or, let’s get real: “Our son was a teen suicide because of unrealistic expectations by his father.” I think it’s time we abandon sentimental, emotional kitsch as a prime means of public expression.

What is all this nonsense about parental guidance, parental control, and parental advisories? The whole reason people in this country are as fucked up as they are and make such ignorant decisions on public policy; is that they listened too closely to their parents in the first place. This is an authoritarian country with too many laws, rules, controls, and restrictions. “Do this! Don’t do that! Shut up! Sit still! No talking! Stand up straight!” No wonder kids are so fucked up; traditional authoritarian values. It starts in kindergarten: They give you a coloring book and some crayons, and tell you, “Be creative … but don’t go outside the lines.” Fuck parents!

One of the more embarrassing strains of American thought is the liberal-humanist, touchy-feely, warm and fuzzy, New Age, environmental-friendly pseudo-wisdom that appears on bumper stickers: “Have you hugged your kid today?” “Think Globally, Act Locally,” and most embarrassing, “Practice Random Kindness and Senseless Acts of Beauty.” Isn’t that precious? You know, if kindness and beauty require public reminders, maybe it’s time we just throw in the jock. Here’s another middlebrow abomination: “Our son is an honor student at Franklin School.” I’m waiting for a bumper sticker that says, “We have a son in public school who hasn’t been shot yet. And he sells drugs to your fuckin’

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I can identify my periods of heavy cocaine use by the years in which I have no idea who was in the World Series or the Superbowl. Bliss.

I remember one Saturday morning when I know I must have been high, because I found myself profoundly moved by Elmer Fudd and Petunia Pig who were appearing in something I took to be a drama.

There was another time when my right nostril was all plugged up, so I spent a whole night snorting in just my left nostril. The weird part is that only my left eye was dilated.

Late one evening, after scraping all the white powder and dust off my dresser top and making two lines out of it, I realized I was actually snorting some Desenex and my own dandruff.

Sometimes I’d get so wired I would do anything to come down a little. You ever chugalug a magnum of children’s Tylenol?

Eventually, alas, I realized the main purpose of buying cocaine is to run out of it.

But long after I gave it up I was still self-conscious when I blew my nose in front of other people. And if I had to leave a group of people to go to the bathroom more than once, I was sure everyone thought I was going to do some blow. I used to say, “No, really! I have diarrhea! C’mon! I’ll show you.”

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I’ve always believed people get the diseases they ask for and deserve. The same is true of countries.

America. Chronic fatigue and anorexia. This is what we’ve become. “I’m tired!” and, “I don’t wanna eat!” How plain. How pathetic. Years ago, a nice, horrifying, fatal consumptive dis– ease would come along and completely eat your fuckin’ organs away. Now it’s, “I’m tired” and “I don’t wanna eat.” Christ! b Here’s another one: “I’m depressed.” Well, shit, look around! Of course you’re depressed; you live in a neon sewer. You’ve earned it. There are supposed to be eleven million clinically depressed Americans. And those are just the ones they know about. I’m sure there are millions more nodding off in closets and attics all across the country. You wanna know why? Because it’s one big fuckin’ garbage can. At least those people with agoraphobia have found a good solution: “I’m not going out. I don’t like it outside.”

You say there’s rampant cancer? How appropriate. We worship growth; everyone wants growth. Well, we got it. A Exuberant cell growth. Lots of big cancers, lots of different kinds and plenty of ‘em to go around. All part of who we are. Breast cancer? Who has a more distorted titty hang-up? Epidemic prostate cancer in a nation brimming with assholes? How unusual. Skin cancer? Vanity, thy name is tan. uf And how ’bout them lungs? The ones that suck up all that fine stuff we belch into the air. We got a cancer for everything. So don’t worry, folks, if it’s growin’ on you, it’s a part of the American dream.

brain droppings Then we have the eating disorders. Is it really a surprise h that with all our pathological feeding habits Americans have eating disorders? Who makes worse dietary decisions? Who ?:;– wastes more food? And not just the ordinary waste of uncaring gluttons; that’s easy. I’m talking about those grotesque, M all-American food stunts the television news shows find so amusing: hands-behind-the-back pie-eating contests, the k largest pizza in the world, the block-long omelet, the biggest banana split ever, the who-can-eat-the-most-hot-peppers-in-fvfteen-minutes competition, and the swimming pool full of cherry Jell-0 all schlocked up with bad fruit cocktail. And don’t forget the wiener-eating contests, where the wieners are actually dipped in water so they’ll slide down whole, 4 eliminating all that bothersome chewing. Such healthy attitudes toward food!

And all of this conspicuous, deliberate waste takes place in the midst of global malnutrition and starvation. No wonder fucked-up teenage girls don’t want to eat. . Here’s another wonderful irony: with all our supposed superiority in food production, we provide our people with far higher rates of stroke, heart attack, colon cancer, and other diet diseases than most “inferior” Third-World food economies do. But don’t you worry, those folks are catching ^ up; social pathologies are our biggest export. And so, in a curious way, cancer turns out to be catching, after all.

Please note my restraint in ignoring “shopping disorders.”

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I’m always relieved when I see a magazine article I don’t have to read, like “How to Turn Prison Rape into a Spiritual Quest.” Or “Quesadillas for Quadraplegics.” I’m practically giddy when I see an article about a disease I know I’ll never get. I laugh heartily as I race past page after page of “Five Hundred Early Warning Signs of Cancer of the Labia.” It’s such a time-saver.

And I notice as I get older, the magazine articles that catch my eye have begun to change. For instance, in my early twenties, “Ten Career Choices that Lead to Suicide” was a must read. And “Achieving a Six-Hour Orgasm Without a Date” was duly clipped and laminated. But these days I find my interest caught by such titles as “Test Yourself for Alzheimer’s,” “Ten Tips on Surviving a Nursing Home Fire,” and “How to Rid Yourself of Old-Person Smell.” I guess the article I really need is “How to Extend Your Magazine Subscriptions Posthumously.”

There was a young man from St. Maarten Who saved all his odors from faartin. If it passed through his crack It went straight in a sack And mistakes were all kept in a caarton. A Jewess who lived in St. Croix Fell in love with a handsome young goix. Her parents forbade She should marry the lad So instead she eloped with the boix.

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A flatulent actor named Barton Had a lifestyle exceedingly spartan. Till a playwright one day Wrote a well-received play With a part in which Barton could fart in.

CEORCE CARLIN

It goes without saying I’m not the only person who has noticed this, but I never got to spell it out my way before.

Comedy’s nature has two sides. Everybody wants a good time and a couple of laughs, and of course, the comic wants to be known as a real funny guy. But the language of comedy is fairly grim and violent. It’s filled with punchlines, gags, and slapstick. After all, what does a comic worry most about? Dying! He doesn’t want to die.

“Jeez, I was dyin’. It was like death out there. Like a morgue. I really bombed.”

Comics don’t want to die, and they don’t want to bomb. They want to go over with a bang. And be a real smash. And if everything works out, if they’re successful and they make you laugh, they can say, “I killed ‘em. I slaughtered those people, I knocked them dead.”

And what phrases do we use when we talk about the comic? “He’s a riot.” “A real scream.” “A rib-splitting knee-slapper.” “My sides hurt.” “My cheeks ache.” “He broke me up, cracked me up, slayed me, fractured me, and had me in stitches.” “I busted a gut.” “I get a real kick out of that guy.” .;.’??.,… : ., ? > “Laugh? I thought I’d die.” 258