Cracked.com super editor Jack O’Brien called for a staff meeting at the Cracked house. I hate staff meetings. Usually it’s “Stop stealing from the company” this and “Leave Hannah Montana alone” that. Christ. If I had a dime every time Jack called a meeting to tell me to keep my pants on at work or to stop reading his mail, well, then I wouldn’t have to steal from the company so much.
I’d have all those dimes.
Jack assured me, however, that this particular meeting had nothing to do with my various indiscretions.
“Not to say that I don’t disapprove of your indiscretions,” Jack added when he saw me start loosening my belt, “because I do. It’s just that we’re not going to talk about them at this particular meeting.”
Seeing as I’m not really accustomed to attending meetings that don’t directly address my frequent and shameless pantslessness, I had no idea what to expect. What could the meeting be about? Was Gladstone retiring? Is Swaim too racist? Is Bucholz not racist enough? What about Ross’s beard? Was this meeting going to be about Ross’s beard? I always felt that discourse regarding Ross’s beard was tragically absent on Cracked, and I was thrilled with the idea that we would finally address the issue. When I arrived at what I assumed would be the beard event of the season, Jack was ready to speak.
“Guys, thanks for coming. You’re all probably wondering why I called this meeting.” I wasn’t. It was Ross’s beard. I could just feel it. “I just figured I’d let you all to know that Cracked.com was named an Honoree for the 12th Annual Webby Awards in the category of Humor.” A couple of the interns clapped. Personally, I don’t exactly know what kind of nerd bullshit a “Webby” is, but I do know that awards, in general, are cool as corndogs, (which is to say, very). I could only hope that a Webby wasn’t one of those embarrassing awards. Would this be a prestigious award, like a Best Actor Oscar, or one of those lame, pointless dipshit awards, like a Best Actress Oscar? My immediate concern was whether or not I could use my new status as an award-winner to do some good in this world. As I’m sure you’re all aware, “doing good in this world” translates to “porking supermodels like crazy” in my book.
Because, folks, I made a promise (below). I got into the internet comedy business for one reason: Boning supermodels. That promise is as true today as it was when I made it, when I was twelve years old and I first discovered supermodels, boning and the internet. (It was a big year.)
Jack spoke up again.
“That’s basically all I had, but if anyone has any questions-” My hand shot up immediately. My middle finger, to be specific, but whatever.
“I’ve got a question. How many supermodels, on average, do you think I’ll be able to bone a month as a result of this award? A whole bunch, or just a lot?”
“No, you misunderstand,” Jack explained. “We didn’t win, anything.”
“Yet,” I corrected with a wink.
“At all,” Jack said.
“Yet.” Another correction, another wink.
“No, I mean we don’t have a chance of winning. We’re honorees.” I nodded, to present the image that I was listening instead of thinking about railing all those freakin supermodels. What I did gather from what Jack said was that the amount of supermodels I’d be plowing would rank somewhere in the high-to-superhigh buttloads, which would be just fine with me.
“Webbys are awards given out for websites and bloggers that are outstanding in terms of either content or design or both. For the Webby awards, you can either be an honoree or a nominee. Being an honoree, which is what we are, means absolutely nothing. It’s kind of meaningless, actually,” Jack explained. I still didn’t quite understand, but I find that happens often when I don’t pay attention.
“It means we weren’t funny enough to be nominated, but we’re, I guess, slightly funnier than other websites,” Bucholz clarified, because he’s the only Cracked Blogger who actually knows anything. “I mean, the Webby’s wanted us to know that they’re aware of our existence, but, and I can’t stress this enough, we’re not funny enough to be even considered for an award. We’re basically not funny enough to lose.” This must be a joke.
“Are you pulling my leg, Bucholz,” I screamed. “Don’t you lie to me. Don’t shit in my toaster and tell me it’s a pop tart.” Bucholz lowered his eyes, so to suggest that he wasn’t, in fact, shitting in my toaster.
“Jaxaphone, you chump, did you seriously call a meeting to tell us we don’t even stand a chance of winning some award? Some stupid nerd award for jerks?” He nodded. “God Dammit. I can’t believe I got up early to be at this meeting.”
“It’s four in the afternoon,” Gladstone pointed out.
“And you were three and a half hours late,” Swaim added.
But it was too late. I’d already left the house and started keying Jack’s stupid car.
Now, you’re all probably wondering “If the laughter-and-orgasm-inspiring comedy juggernaut that is Cracked.com didn’t get nominated in the humor category, who did?” Well, I’m glad you asked, weak literary device. The Webby nominations aren’t just for your run-of-the-mill comedy sites like Cracked, (which, I should mention is updated every single day with original content). No, it takes a special kind of comedic genius to be nominated for a Humor Webby. Someone funny, yet smart. Someone edgy, and fresh. Someone that manages to be consistently funny yet still culturally relevant. For example, I Can Haz Cheezburger, a site that was nominated for a Webby this year.
And with good reason, too. Allow me to dissect the delicate nuances of ICHC’s comedy. See, they take pictures of cats doing things, (or alternately, not doing things), and they put words on the pictures. Words that aren’t spelled the way they ought to be spelled, as evidenced in the very title of the site. (”Has” is spelled with an “s” in real life. Not a “z.” Laughing yet?)
Honestly, how can Cracked possibly compete with the comedic brilliance over at Cheezburger? We barely have any cats at all!
Wait, are you still reading this blog despite the fact that I just pointed out a humor website that is clearly superior to us? Maybe I wasn’t clear on the art of their comedy. Let’s start over. See, they take pictures, and then they put captions on them. There are a bunch of picture of cats with words on them, and this website is just loaded with them. There’s, like, a thousand fucking pages of these fucking cats, right? And they’ve all got captions, like “Im a cat doin sum stupid shit all the tyme.” It’s pretty high brow, so don’t beat yourself up if you don’t think it’s funny. You just have to trust me that it is funny. You might not think it’s funny, (specifically, because when you look at the pictures you don’t laugh), but you’d be wrong. It’s very funny. For a slightly more authoritative opinion, you can turn to Aristotle’s Four Elements of Comedy. This book, thought by many to be “the definitive dissertation on comedy,” (while considered by some skeptics to be “totally made up”), focuses two whole chapters on the brilliant and subtle humor of merging cats and illiteracy. Dude was way ahead of his time.
If you’re not rolling on the floor laughing right now due to the content over at Cheezburger, (why not? Lol!), there are other Webby nominees for your viewing pleasure. After all, posting pictures of cats isn’t the only way to get a Webby nomination, just ask fellow nominee Rathergood.com, a site that claims to be “Your One Stop Shop for Good and Evil Kittens.”
Wait, I typed that sentence before I actually read it. Is this another fucking site about fucking cats doing stupid shit? Hold on one second.
…
Holy crap, it is…Uh, no problem, no problem with that at all. Truth be told, pictures of cats are the only things on the planet that are actually funny. Everything else is chimp excrement, plain and simple.
Don’t get me wrong. I mean, I was aggravated when I heard that we didn’t get a nomination. I’ve spent a year with this site. We’ve had compelling social commentary, wildly popular videos, and articles that challenge the lies you were taught in high school. So yes, I was a little pissed when we didn’t get a nomination. But now that I’ve seen our competition, I don’t feel so bad. Clearly, we were beaten by the best. It’s like we entered a painting contest and we were beaten by DaVinci, or perhaps, by someone who’d taken one of DaVinci’s paintings and written a bunch of misspelled words on it.
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