Thesis:

Life is too crazy and too shitty to not laugh.

Humor is a cornerstone of who I am. I love the funny. I love making the funny. Without the funny, we’re just a ceaseless army of surly automatons. Faceless and grim.

I’m not saying the world doesn’t have room for seriousness. If all we seek is entertainment, what’s the point?

(He says as he balances on a unicycle, juggling chainsaws and writing advice, wearing a t-shirt with your favorite dick joke emblazoned upon it.)

Anyway, from time to time, it seems like a good idea to pop on in here and tip you off to the things that are Making The Funny with me. Both now and in the past.

Today’s Specimen of Hilarity:

Bruce McCulloch.

Yes, he of Kids In The Hall fame.

You might want to get familiar. Check out:

Happiness Pie, or Cancer Boy, or an Open Letter To The Guy Who Stole His Bike Wheel.

Thing is, McCulloch is also writer and director. His actual post-KITH work hasn’t been stellar, but commendable. You want to get a good vibe for his talents, it’s worth looking at some of the more bizarre sketches from Kids in the Hall, like the Eraserhead homage (“Sausages“) or McColloch’s weird paranoid fantasies (“My Pen!”).

Still, you want Maximum Bruce –

You gotta listen to his music. Or poetry. Or whatever the hell it is.

My iPhone — acting sometimes as the Magical Reminder Machine — forced me to remember both of McCulloch’s two albums, Shame-Baced Man and Drunk Baby Project. Both hysterical and disturbing. Broken fathers, alcoholism, damaged relationships, self-esteem issues — all smeared with a Vaseline haze of absurdity.

For your pleasure, I’ve gone and put some of these tracks for you to listen to below, via Grooveshark. Listen not only to his poetic language, to the absurdity and darkness, but to the man’s gift of storytelling (particularly in Clinique Ladies and 40 Housewives).

Check it, peeps. Be back later with more laughness.