Very, very few things make me literally laugh out loud while reading them -- the medium of writing is just a bit too removed to be uproariously funny on a general basis. However, an exception to this rule is Lemony Snicket's introduction to the new book, "Noisy Outlaws, Unfriendly Blobs, and Some Other Things That Aren't as Scary, Maybe, Depending on How You Feel About Lost Lands, Stray Cellphones, Creatures from the Sky, Parents Who Disappear in Peru, a Man Named Lars Farf, and One Other Story We Couldn't Quite Finish, So Maybe You Could Help Us Out," which I will give you the first two paragraphs of before sending you to a link that has the funny parts:
An introduction to a book of stories is like a warning printed on a bottle in a medicine cabinet, because few people bother to read such things, and by the time they learn that there's something dangerous inside they may already be dead. There are plenty of very dangerous things in this book, which is bad news for the characters in the stories but good news for the reader. Without dangerous things, a story tends to be tedious, a word which here means "something you may have to read in school," and although there are many kinds of stories in this book, some you might like and some you might not, none of them are tedious.
It may be, however, that you are the sort of person who likes tedious stories. Perhaps you lead a life of danger, and like to unwind at the end of the day with a tedious story, the way some people like a glass of warm milk before bedtime, or perhaps you once fell in love with a tedious man or woman and you like to read tedious stories to remind you of your romantic past. If this is the case, you will not enjoy the stories in this book, but you might enjoy the remainder of this introduction. As a courtesy, I have printed a few excerpts from tedious stories, so that the tedious reader does not feel left out. If you enjoy tedious stories, you may read the following paragraphs for your tedious enjoyment, and if you don't, don't.
i sincerely do not know what you are doing here. are you lost? were you
looking for your delicate calico cat, and did you follow her up two flights of stairs
to this room? she is not here. she was here, yes. we gave her a warm bowl of milk, we talked with her about campaign finance reform for a time, and then she bid us good day. i believe she was
going to the post office two blocks down, but i don't quite recall.
for surely you did
not find your way from prinsiana, the least traveled site on
the internet. if you did, though, perhaps you are looking for humor. perhaps you are looking for profundity. perhaps you are looking for answers.
i'm sorry, but you shall go naught-for-three.
