The greatest Mitch Hedberg joke (according to Mike Birbiglia)
"It's a joke about essentially nothing but simultaneously everything."
Birbiglia’s fave joke is this one from Mitch Hedberg:
I wrote a letter to my dad. I wrote, "I really enjoyed being here," but I accidentally wrote rarely instead of really. But I still wanted to use it, so I crossed it out and wrote, "I rarely drive steamboats, Dad. There's a lot of shit you don't know about me. Quit trying to act like I'm a steamboat operator." This letter took a really harsh turn right away.
Birbigs explains why he loves this joke to Esquire:
It starts with a semantic misunderstanding and then it broadens out to the idea of being misunderstood by your father and then it broadens out to being misunderstood in life. When my wife and I have a misunderstanding we'll say to each other, 'Quit trying to act like I'm a steamboat operator.' That's my favorite kind of joke because it's a joke about essentially nothing but simultaneously everything. All of Mitch's jokes are like these little poems.
More of Esquire’s greatest jokes ever told.
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Also: Watch my new “Substance” special.
What happens when a control freak decides to lose control? That’s the question at the heart of Substance. In it, I perform four standup sets, each one filmed a week apart, in a different state of mind: high, drunk, tripping on shrooms, and sober. And I took the mission seriously – and got seriously f*%$ up. The resulting sets were unlike any comedy special you’ve ever seen before. Think Jackass meets Michael Pollan meets George Carlin.