There are two kinds of people in the world.
The ones who eat pizza for breakfast.
(Hot or cold.)
And the ones who don’t.
If you are the latter, I promise not to judge your soulless bacon and eggs.
Or those annoyingly heart healthy smoothies and yogurt.
I am overjoyed to stay a member of the crowd that can never get enough pizza goodness.
No matter what the clock says.
Copyright© 2026 Anne Morse Hambrock All rights reserved.
For a while now I’ve been struggling with what I do here. I’ve mentioned before how often I feel frivolous and chirpy and full of what could be considered “toxic positivity” while all around us the world is burning down.
But a couple things happened recently that helped me get back on track.
First, I attended the 80th Reuben Award weekend and got to hang out with an incredible group of funny and creative people for five whole days. (Pics to follow in a later newsletter after I get my act together.)
There is a healing power not only in humor, and camaraderie, but in clocking out from the daily doom scrolling and sleeping in a luxurious hotel room in a bed you don’t have to make.
Second, I heard a really good interview with Ben Collins, the CEO of “The Onion”, on the importance of humor and satire as a form of catharsis. (If you are not familiar with this publication please click the link because you are missing out on something important.)
In general, I am not a fan of living with my head in the sand. I know it’s important to be aware of what’s going on in the world and play my part in solving the problems we all face.
But at the same time, it is truly deadening to shut out silliness and absurdity and poetry and music and art and all the things we humans create to navigate our era and our emotions.
Despite the fact that the world in general did not improve itself much while I was partying with cartoonists, I still left feeling better.
And more committed to the work all humorists do.
And to continuing to spend my Mondays doing what I can to provide some catharsis for all of you.
There are a lot of new readers these days so I’ve decided every once in a while to revisit an old post:
Old ketchup.
Stale barbecue sauce.
Desiccated sweet and sour. (I think. Hard to tell once it’s crystalized)
Little packages of misplaced optimism.
You think you will use them.
No, you are sure you will use them.
Instead, they lurk in glove boxes and purses and drawers.
Maybe, occasionally, in a burst of tidying, you gather the lot into one place for easier access.
And continue to ignore them.
Until the day you have not got the soy sauce or ketchup or mustard - or whatever it is that recipe calls for - and you dig out the stash and raid it hoping to come up with the required amount.
Only, chances are, the contents of all the packets have become unfit for human consumption.
Or worse, are now an unrecognizable solid substance of a color that defies description.
We seem to have this idea about condiments, attributing to them a limitless shelf life.
Especially if they are in the fridge.
Most particularly, the back of the fridge.
Who has not, in blissful ignorance, pulled that container of mustard out from behind the jar of pickles only to discover an expiration date from two presidents ago?
To you I say, set the stash free.
You’ll feel better.
Until you open your glove box.
And realize you’ve already started a new one.
Copyright© 2024 Anne Morse Hambrock All rights reserved.
If you like my work there are two book collections of the comics/poems for sale. They make great gifts!
If you are just joining us I’m so happy you are here!
You might want to click here to find out what to expect.
And consider poking around the archives - there’s some fun stuff.
Images that make me feel better.
Mystery Lily.
Surprise Lily.
Resurrection Lily.
Whatever name you know it by, it is one of my favorite flowers of August.
Because, after the leaves shoot up and die off in the Spring, I forget those bulbs are still down there.
Waiting to surprise me.
Every time :-)
Works by other creators that capture our current moment…
As I mentioned above, I recently heard a great interview with Ben Collins of “The Onion”. Click here to listen.
He not only talks about the importance of satire and humor as catharsis but speaks to KQED’s “Forum” about how and why “The Onion” took over “Infowars”.
If you are not familiar with the story, the bones of it are this: Conspiracy theorist Alex Jones of Infowars was ordered to pay over $1.4 billion in defamation judgments to families of the victims of the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting after he falsely claimed the massacre was a hoax and that children did not die.
Jones has been stalling the settlement and has not yet paid anything to the families. When he failed to protect the Infowars brand, the Onion bought it and has rebooted it as a satire. A portion of the proceeds generated by the new brand will go to the Sandy Hook victims.
Every connection between us makes the work feel worthwhile.
Please drop comments, message me, hit the “like” button, use the “restack” feature, or share any other way you can think of.
I hereby pledge that all my writing, and other creative endeavors, are free of the use of A.I.
With the exception of Spell Check. And whatever other old fashioned proofing tools can be found in my eight year old version of Microsoft word. (I’m a lousy speller with suspicious punctuation skills. I need the help.)
Comments
Nothing yet. Say the first thing.
Sign in to join the conversation.