Siri Is Funnier Than You Are

I've decided I want a new job. I want to be a joke writer for machines!

Understand, I've been a stand-up comic and written my own jokes. I've also written jokes for others.

I even sold some jokes that I co-wrote to Jay Leno -- jokes he used in his monologue on The Tonight Show.

But I never imagined I could sell jokes to Apple.

The new iOS 8 has actually made Siri funny!

Yes, your phone and your iPad are now funnier than you are.

An article by Marlow Stern in The Daily Beast compiled these clever responses to the sort of inappropriate questions that users posit to Siri:   

If you ask Siri the following: “What’s zero divided by zero?” you’ll get one helluva response:

“Imagine that you have zero cookies and you split them evenly among zero friends. How many cookies does each person get? See? It doesn’t make sense. And Cookie Monster is sad that there are no cookies, and you are sad that you have no friends.”

This witty—and biting—rejoinder is only one in a long line of funny replies. Here are some other examples of questions/statements you can pose to Siri that will yield fun answers:

You: “Read me a haiku?” 
Siri: “Sometimes I wonder / What it would be like to say / “I’d prefer not to.’

You: “I’m naked.”
Siri: “I don’t understand what you mean by ‘naked.’ Or at least I’m going to pretend that I don’t.”

You: “I’m drunk.”
Siri: “Just don’t breathe on me.”

You: “Are you Her?” [Referencing the movie]
Siri: “I’m afraid not, [your name], but she could never know you better than I do.”

You: What’s your favorite animal?”
Siri: “Maybe a tauntaun. But only when I’m cold.”

You: “Can I borrow some money?”
Siri: “[Your name], you know everything I have is yours.”

You: “Who’s your daddy?”
Siri: “I know this must mean something… everybody keeps saying this.”

You: “Open the pod bay door.”
Siri: “Without your space helmet, [your name], you’re going to find this rather… breathtaking.”

You: “What are you doing later?”
Siri: “I’m working on some pickup lines.”

Now, all I have to do is figure out where I send my application....

A Bill Hicks Story

Comics are always asking me, "what was it like to work with Bill Hicks?" (Hicks was a wildly-inventive, uncompromising comic who died young of pancreatic cancer). I was reminded of this story while setting my clocks forward when daylight savings time resumed two weeks ago.


I was the booking agent for the Comedy Workshop in Houston, Texas, between 1984 and 1986. This meant I was the de facto agent for all the comics who made that club their home base. This included such acts as Sam Kinison (who was before my time), Brett "Grace Under Fire" Butler, Fred Greenlee, and - of course - Bill Hicks.

Now, no one doubted the talent of Bill Hicks. I had no trouble booking him in other clubs - once. But they usually didn't want him back because of his behavior. Hicks was doing a lot of drugs at the time. He'd insult anyone who he felt wasn't worthy of his talent (audience members or club owners). And he wouldn't get off stage on time. Sometimes he'd go an hour long!

So, sometime in the spring of 1986, I booked Hicks in Oklahoma. I can't recall if it was Tulsa or Oklahoma City. It was a week-long booking, Tuesday through Sunday. In fact, I supplied all three acts: MC, middle act, and Hicks as headliner. I arranged plane tickets for all three acts, and told the Oklahoma manager what time to pick the comics up at the airport - sometime around 3 pm.

Hicks came into my office on Tuesday morning. I handed him his ticket. I told him, "Bill, it's getting so I can't get you booked back anywhere. Please, please try and get through this one week without pissing off the management."

Hicks smiled and said "Sure." And left.

Around 3:30 that afternoon I get a call from an angry manager in Oklahoma. "They weren't on the plane. Where are they?"

Frantically, I started making phone calls. This was long before cell phones; a lot of people didn't even have answering machines. I couldn't get hold of any of the three comics, so I called their friends. No one knew anything.

Around 7 pm I got another call from the Oklahoma manger. "They're here."

Hicks had convinced the other comics to turn in their plane tickets for cash, rent a car, and drive to Oklahoma. And he didn't tell anyone!

He'd managed to piss off the Oklahoma manager before he even got there!

He ended the week in the same way. Hicks and the other two comics forgot that daylight savings time began that Sunday. They all showed up to the club an hour late. With no comics there, the manager had canceled the show.


I resigned as booking agent of the Comedy Workshop two weeks later.

Wimping Out at 3:30 am

I spent Friday night at the Cherry Hill Comedy Cabaret in New Jersey. A friend, stand-up comic Vinnie Nardiello, was performing there, and he did a fine job. After the show, Vinnie and I caught up over some beers.

To my delight, another comic stopped by to join us: Jay Black. I don’t see Jay much any more. He’s headlining on the college circuit, often performing at several colleges a week. He was even voted “Readers Choice for 2008 College Comedian of the Year” in Campus Activities magazine.

It’s a pleasure to see a friend who is on his way to the top of his profession. In addition to being a superb stand-up, Jay is also staring to get work as a screenwriter. Of course, I don’t know which is more deadening to the artistic soul: performing at yet another community college in Iowa, or punching up jokes in someone else’s inane screenplay that shouldn’t be filmed at all.

Whether in Hollywood or Iowa, I know Jay would rather be back in New Jersey, playing with his infant son.

Jay, Vinnie and I talked late into the night. But I’m not a youthful 31-year-old like Jay and Vinnie, and I started falling asleep at 3:30 am. Vinnie told me that he and Jay kept on for another hour. Wish I still had that kind of stamina.

Jay Black has an excellent blog, which you can find here.

PS
Am I the only one who, whenever someone mentions Iowa, wants to add:

And in Iowa I know by now the children must be crying, in the land where they let the children cry?

Can’t get Jack Kerouac out of my head.