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In between bites of banana, Mr. Remora would tell stories, and the children would write the stories down in notebooks, and every so often there would be a test. The stories were very short, and there were a whole lot of them on every conceivable subject. "One day I went to the store to purchase a carton of milk," Mr. Remora would say, chewing on a banana. "When I got home, I poured the milk into a glass and drank it. Then I watched television. The end." Or: "One afternoon a man named Edward got into a green truck and drove to a farm. The farm had geese and cows. The end." Mr. Ramora would tell story after story, and eat banana after banana, and it would get more and more difficult for Violet to pay attention.
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Lemony Snicket (The Austere Academy (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #5))
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FUNNY QUOTE : 50% of marriages end in divorce and the other 50% are miserable (he he so funny)
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Casper Van Dien: Roger Niles, Hawaii 5-0 TV Series Season 8 Episode 2.
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New Rule: Americans must realize what makes NFL football so great: socialism. That's right, the NFL takes money from the rich teams and gives it to the poorer one...just like President Obama wants to do with his secret army of ACORN volunteers. Green Bay, Wisconsin, has a population of one hundred thousand. Yet this sleepy little town on the banks of the Fuck-if-I-know River has just as much of a chance of making it to the Super Bowl as the New York Jets--who next year need to just shut the hell up and play.
Now, me personally, I haven't watched a Super Bowl since 2004, when Janet Jackson's nipple popped out during halftime. and that split-second glimpse of an unrestrained black titty burned by eyes and offended me as a Christian. But I get it--who doesn't love the spectacle of juiced-up millionaires giving one another brain damage on a giant flatscreen TV with a picture so real it feels like Ben Roethlisberger is in your living room, grabbing your sister?
It's no surprise that some one hundred million Americans will watch the Super Bowl--that's forty million more than go to church on Christmas--suck on that, Jesus! It's also eighty-five million more than watched the last game of the World Series, and in that is an economic lesson for America. Because football is built on an economic model of fairness and opportunity, and baseball is built on a model where the rich almost always win and the poor usually have no chance. The World Series is like The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. You have to be a rich bitch just to play. The Super Bowl is like Tila Tequila. Anyone can get in.
Or to put it another way, football is more like the Democratic philosophy. Democrats don't want to eliminate capitalism or competition, but they'd like it if some kids didn't have to go to a crummy school in a rotten neighborhood while others get to go to a great school and their dad gets them into Harvard. Because when that happens, "achieving the American dream" is easy for some and just a fantasy for others.
That's why the NFL literally shares the wealth--TV is their biggest source of revenue, and they put all of it in a big commie pot and split it thirty-two ways. Because they don't want anyone to fall too far behind. That's why the team that wins the Super Bowl picks last in the next draft. Or what the Republicans would call "punishing success."
Baseball, on the other hand, is exactly like the Republicans, and I don't just mean it's incredibly boring. I mean their economic theory is every man for himself. The small-market Pittsburgh Steelers go to the Super Bowl more than anybody--but the Pittsburgh Pirates? Levi Johnston has sperm that will not grow and live long enough to see the Pirates in a World Series. Their payroll is $40 million; the Yankees' is $206 million. The Pirates have about as much chance as getting in the playoffs as a poor black teenager from Newark has of becoming the CEO of Halliburton.
So you kind of have to laugh--the same angry white males who hate Obama because he's "redistributing wealth" just love football, a sport that succeeds economically because it does just that. To them, the NFL is as American as hot dogs, Chevrolet, apple pie, and a second, giant helping of apple pie.
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Bill Maher (The New New Rules: A Funny Look At How Everybody But Me Has Their Head Up Their Ass)
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Escape from Mr. Lemoncelloβs Library The Island of Dr. Libris Welcome to Wonderland: Home Sweet Motel Welcome to Wonderland: Beach Party Surf Monkey The Haunted Mystery series COAUTHORED WITH JAMES PATTERSON Daniel X: Armageddon Daniel X: Lights Out House of Robots House of Robots: Robots Go Wild! I Funny I Even Funnier I Totally Funniest I Funny TV Jacky Ha-Ha Treasure Hunters Treasure Hunters: Danger Down the Nile Treasure Hunters: Secret of the Forbidden City Treasure Hunters: Peril at the Top of the World Word of Mouse
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Chris Grabenstein (Mr. Lemoncello's Library Olympics (Mr. Lemoncello's Library, #2))
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He has tattoos, nose rings, and those little metal studs that look like steel zits. Recently, he had a metal spike pierced through his ear. Made his lobes look like barbecued shrimp on a skewer.
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James Patterson (I Funny TV: A Middle School Story (I Funny Series Book 4))
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Now I have a ghost and a grim reaper in my lounge room!" said Lance Infuriated.
"A Grim Reaper where?" asked the ghost in horror.
"Me, the grand reaper,", said. Blake more engrossed in the television than the ghost who he saw as no problem.
"Grand reaper what's that?" the ghost asked.
"Another name for a couch potato!" Lance hissed,
"King of the Grim reapers he's meant to get rid of you!
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Rachel Lawson (The Magicians: Lend me your ears: first book of the series)
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The applause light comes on. The audience claps like crazy. Theme music swells out of the speaker.
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James Patterson (I Funny TV: A Middle School Story (I Funny Series Book 4))
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Sheβd always suspected that she was the sort of girl who wouldnβt go home to see a sick father if she had a shot at a television series, but sheβd rather hoped that the news would be revealed slowly, and not for a while yet.
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Nick Hornby (Funny Girl)
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Judging by how fast she talks and how
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James Patterson (I Funny TV: A Middle School Story (I Funny Series Book 4))
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When a TV show starts out, it is incredibly competitive: maybe one in a hundred TV ideas goes on to get made into pilot (tester) episodes. Maybe one in twenty of those pilots will go on to have a first series commissioned. And maybe one in ten of those will be asked back for a second season.
It takes a sprinkling of fairy dust and a lot of goodwill.
But do two seasons and you will quite probably go on to do five--or more.
So we got lucky. No doubt. And I never even asked for it. Let alone expected it.
I was simply, and blissfully, unaware.
But on this journey, Man vs. Wild has had to endure a lot of flak from critics and the press. Anything successful inevitably does. (Funny how the praise tends just to bounce off, but small amounts of criticism sting so much. Self-doubt can be a brute, I guess.)
The program has been accused of being set up, staged, faked, and manipulated. One critic even suggested it was all shot in a studio with CGI. If only.
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Bear Grylls (Mud, Sweat and Tears)
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You, Jamie Grimm, are the new Gru!β βFrom
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James Patterson (I Funny TV: A Middle School Story (I Funny Series Book 4))
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Walking the Dog
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James Patterson (I Funny TV: A Middle School Story (I Funny Series Book 4))
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My own list includes Allen Drury, Advise and Consent; Robert Penn Warren, All the Kingβs Men; Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird; George Orwell, 1984; Gore Vidal, Washington, D.C.; Sinclair Lewis, It Canβt Happen Here. I am also a big fan of the books and short stories of Ward Just. My son came of age watching The West Wing, and I loved both the riotously funny if cynical book and British TV series Yes, Minister. And, even if it is not a substitute for reading The Federalist Papers, you would be hard pressed to spend a more enjoyable evening than watching the musical Hamilton.
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Richard N. Haass (The Bill of Obligations: The Ten Habits of Good Citizens)
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For instance, atoms. Seriously. When was the last time you heard a guy on TV joking about protons, neutrons, and electrons?
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James Patterson (I Funny: School of Laughs (I Funny Series Book 5))
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You used to be Jamie Grimm.
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James Patterson (I Funny TV: A Middle School Story (I Funny Series Book 4))
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Why couldnβt the Easter egg family watch TV? Because their cable was scrambled.
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Smiley Beagle (You Laugh You Lose Challenge - Easter Edition: 300 Jokes for Kids that are Funny, Silly, and Interactive Fun the Whole Family Will Love - With Illustrations ... (You Laugh You Lose Holiday Series Book 1))
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out that shoes are required to eat in the cafeteria. But socks can eat anywhere they like!
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James Patterson (I Funny TV: A Middle School Story (I Funny Series Book 4))
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The Smileys, of course, are still the Smileys. They just have more room to frown in.
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James Patterson (I Funny TV: A Middle School Story (I Funny Series Book 4))
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roll out of the faculty lounge wondering if turkey is the language they speak in Turkey. Or if talking turkey is just something you should only do around Thanksgiving.
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James Patterson (I Funny TV: A Middle School Story (I Funny Series Book 4))
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But other people have universes with super-important dealios in them, too.
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James Patterson (I Funny TV: A Middle School Story (I Funny Series Book 4))
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And instead of getting all gushy and apologizing for being politically incorrect, Jacky Hart just laughs.
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James Patterson (I Funny TV: A Middle School Story (I Funny Series Book 4))
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of a dolt, eh, what?β βDoes βdoltβ mean heβs an idiot?
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James Patterson (I Funny TV: A Middle School Story (I Funny Series Book 4))
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TOOTSIE (by Larry Gelbart and Murray Schisgal, story by Don McGuire and Larry Gelbart, 1982) β’ Premise When an actor canβt get work, he disguises himself as a woman and gets a role in a TV series, only to fall in love with one of the female members of the cast. β’ Possibilities You could take a funny look at the modern dating dance, but also dissect the deep immorality that underlies how men and women act toward each other in the most intimate part of their lives. β’ Story Challenges How do you show the effect of menβs immoral actions against women without seeming to attack one entire gender while making the other gender look innocent? β’ Problems How do you make a man believable as a woman, weave several man-woman plots together and make them one, end each plotline successfully, and make an emotionally satisfying love story while using a number of farce techniques that place the audience in a superior position? β’ Designing Principle Force a male chauvinist to live as a woman. Place the story in the entertainment world to make the disguise more believable. β’ Best Character Michaelβs split between dressing as both a man and a woman can be a physical and comical expression of the extreme contradiction within his own character. β’ Conflict Michael fights Julie, Ron, Les, and Sandy about love and honesty. β’ Basic Action Male hero impersonates a woman. β’ Character Change WβMichael is arrogant, a liar, and a womanizer. CβBy pretending to be a woman, Michael learns to become a better man and capable of real love. β’ Moral Choice Michael sacrifices his lucrative acting job and apologizes to Julie for lying to her.
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John Truby (The Anatomy of Story: 22 Steps to Becoming a Master Storyteller)