The Week in Review, Plus Things

Awards now, and later, some babbling. What could be better?

Last Week's Swinging Dicks

In a tie for Third Place, co-winners of the anchors I forgot to use when installing a towel-rod in my bathroom: Steve U and Bronze Hammer, with 6 Favorites in the past five days.

This is my favorite Steve U joke from last week. As a commenter pointed out on Thursday, it's all about the juxtaposition.

Here's my favorite BronzeHammer joke from last week. So full of charm and personality.

In Second Place, winner of two small piles of drywall dust that accumulated while drilling what ought to have been anchored holes for a towel-rod in my bathroom: Raysism, with 7 Favorites in the past five days.

And here's my favorite Raysism joke from last week. Who doesn't love a good caption joke? Nobody, that's who.

And in First Place, exclusive winner of the actual towel-rod that easily tore away from the wall the first time someone yanked a towel from it: SavetoFavorites, with 8 Favorites in the past five days. Take a bow!

Here's my favorite SavetoFavorites joke from last week. This is one of several moonshot homeruns from SavetoFavorites this week. It's an incredible joke, and it just nosed out the absurd sequence from Friday in the Misfit Knicks post.

Don't Forget These!

The Monday Comment of the Day, from SavetoFavorites.

The Tuesday Comment of the Day, from Steve U. 

The Wednesday Comment of the Day, from RMJ=H.

The Thursday Comment of the Day, from Lionel Osbourne.

The Friday Comment of the Day, from Malik Sealy Dirt Mattress.

Congratulations, funny, funny people.

The Unwelcome Lesson of the Week

This man is a schmuck.

His name is Robert Parker Jr. and he is the principle reason why all wine sold in America tastes the same.

Mr. Parker likes soft, palatable red wine that tastes like oak. I also like soft, palatable red wine that tastes like oak, and first among many differences between the two of us is that I am a wine noob. It's safe for me to assume that any red wine Mr. Parker likes I will also like, because though he is a professional wine drinker guy and I am just some guy who likes to drink the occasional glass of wine, we like the same red wine. The problem, of course, is that he's a professional wine drinker guy. A prominent one. The prominent one. Mr. Parker has been applying his simple 100 point system to wine rating for so long it has become the measurement of wine quality. When Mr. Parker says a wine is good, it becomes dogma. This is a problem because many grapes are not supposed to taste long and mellow and oaky. And many winemakers are forced to decide between making a wine with the genuine characteristics of their land and their grape and their methods and the expression of their winemaker, or with the best chance of scoring a 93 on Mr. Parker's 100 point scale. You'd hate to be the guy who made the truest [navigates to Wikipedia] Nebbiolo ever, expressing his terroir (I'm pretty sure that's a small, yappy dog), and with 5% [back to Wikipedia] Cabernet Franc for his own personal touch, and get zapped with an 81 by Mr. Parker. That's a wine that won't sell for shit.

I'm not sure how much of this is Mr. Parker's fault. At some point he thought, "Hey, I like writing about stuff and I like wine, and I'm going to do both." Years later, we've got homogenized reds with no end in sight. I hope somewhere along the way, though, Mr. Parker had at least one cold-sweat sleepless night, one of those My God what have I done? crises that ought to afflict anyone who exerts influence over the creative efforts of dedicated artisans. Because he doesn't air out his I'm-not-worthiness, there are people like me who will call him a schmuck. What's he supposed to do, hang himself? He likes wine, he likes writing about it, people like reading him, people trust his system. Is he a schmuck, after all?

Probably.

At any rate, look: I'm just a guy. I like jokes, I like thinking about them, I like writing about them, some of you like reading about yourselves them, some of you need immediate psychiatric assistance trust my taste in jokes. That's all fine and good. On the other hand, I sincerely hope I'm not discouraging any of you from stepping way out with your own brand of humor. I sincerely hope you're not shelving a tricky pun in favor of a goofball dialogue joke. I sincerely hope you're not favoring silly over clever (or doing the opposite) because I of all people am influencing your process. I'm just some guy. That would be a fucking crime.

As with all performance art, joke-makers play to their audience. Deadspin works that way, of course, but I don't want to be fucking Genghis Khan sitting on a throne in the back of the auditorium, exerting undue influence over your choices. I'm just one guy in the audience. And so I hereby invite you to strenuously disagree with my Favorites and Duds. If you don't want to publicly dismiss another commenter's work, by all means email me the very moment you think I've included a cheap or easy joke, or if you think I've too heavily favored a particular joke type over others, or if there are any other ways you think I or other commenters suck. I will make a sincere effort to work all such feedback into future posts. This would be best done anonymously, but not in the form of Anonymous or Guy Who comments down below. I will protect your anonymity if you email me directly at madbastardsall@gmail.com. And I will try to find a way to address your concerns in full view of whoever reads this blasted thing to begin with.

Have a great weekend, everyone. We're back in action come Monday.