What’s Made You Laugh Lately?

I’m an American living in Europe and I just discovered that I spent the last 19 months “washing” my clothes with fabric softener instead of detergent. (A pox upon the intricacies of the Dutch language!) Surprisingly, my clothes have not been super soft either.

I laughed so hard I cried when my 2yo saw a dog wearing a cone and said “LOOK a moon rocket dog!!”

I’m SO LATE to the party (thanks stupid work schedule) but this swimsuit video never fails to make me laugh-cry. And as swimsuit season neareth, I’ll rewatch again to remind myself that this mom bod was made for WORK and FUN and not fitting into some stringy teeny thang. https://youtu.be/MyNfyiVrImo

I teach preschool so there’s usually lots to laugh about. Yesterday, one of my little guys had just finished packing up his back pack and put it on his back. He looked at me with this serene, glowy smile and said, “I just love doing that.” He just loves putting his backpack on!

So, I saw the photo at the very top and was waiting for a shout out to the show PEN15!! I just started watching it and it is so funny and spot on about the awkwardness of adolescence. I think Andy Samberg is one of the producers.

I was taking my four year old to ballet class and there’s a sign on the door of dog with a line through it. And it says “no pets.” She can’t read yet so she just assumed they don’t like dogs. She shouts “This place hates dogs!” And then inside there was a statue of chicken and she sarcastically mumbles to herself “But I guess they think chickens are okay.” I’m watching her shake her head in indignation and absolutely cracking up inside.

My daughter is almost 5 and has a gymnastics move she calls the “Kneel Armstrong”. It was hard to hold back the giggle when that was boldly announced.

When my three and a half years old arrived from school and before even saying hello asked: “Mommy do you have a meeting now?” – I give my kids screen time to keep them entertained when my nanny is away and I need to take a work meeting. So basically she was asking me to watch TV. It made me laugh so much.

When my 5-year-old sat down for dinner last night, he pointed at the carrots and yelled, “What is this dirt and leaves?!” My husband and I burst out laughing. Apparently I went a little overboard with the pepper and thyme.

Anything Conan O’Brien expresses or verbalizes is bound to be comedy gold. His remotes are a classic and his podcast got me rolling.

I have a funky neighbor who has all kinds of weird stuff in his yard. Not just garden gnomes but flamingos, plastic dinosaurs, you name it, all artfully arranged into little scenes. Walking my dogs the other day, I noticed he’d hung a sign on a tree that says, “Private Sign. Do Not Read.” Total dad joke but we need people like him who clearly don’t take life too seriously.

Not really a laugh, but this made my heart melt a little bit. My daughter is in grade 6 (final year of primary school). As a grade 6, she has a Prep ‘buddy’ (a little kid in their first year of school who she looks out for). One day she mentioned a name that I didn’t recognise (let’s just say Jane). I said who’s Jane? My daughter said she’s my buddy’s mum. It turns out that my daughter has this whole relationship with her buddy’s mum based around her being there for school drop off and pick up. Then my daughter said to me ‘Jane’s going to come and watch me speak at assembly next week’. It seems like this new prep mum just loves my daughter. I’m so proud of her because I really think that her care and attention to her buddy has probably made her transition to school so positive, and clearly this other mum is so happy to know that a kind grade 6 girl is really looking out for her daughter. Also, I’ve finally returned to proper full time work this year, and can no longer attend things like assembly, so it makes me happy to know that there will be a parent there quietly rooting for her Sorry, this ended up being really long!

This clip still makes me giggle after watching it about a hundred times: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DGh3eqDuoyW/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

My 6 year old nephew is autistic and communicates mostly nonverbally but has been speaking more and more since starting kindergarten this year- his mom took him for his passport photos this week and since he has sat through two school picture days he thinks he must always say “cheese” when getting his photo snapped. His mom was trying ways to get him to keep his mouth closed for the photos and asked him to repeat “apple” instead and this kid proudly exclaimed appleCheese! He’s so smart and funny and I love him so much!

Ok one more although this is from a while ago. My daughter had seen a neighbor’s sphynx cat (the hairless breed) in their window. She was trying very hard to reference it later but didn’t know the name so she called it “the meat cat” since it looked like meat. LOL!!! (we don’t even eat meat!!)

My 12yo looking through a grocery store ad that came in the mail and reading it quietly aloud to herself “wild caught tuna.. wild caught halibut… (absolute deadpad) wild caught satsuma oranges…” she’s getting nuance now and is hilarious!

My two dogs make me laugh every single day! We rescued them both around Thanksgiving and it was SO HARD at first (I even posted in the comments here about it and got some much-needed encouragement from COJ readers!). But they are so funny; my husband, daughter, and I already have a million inside jokes, nicknames, and backstories for them; and, even though they didn’t know each other before we rescued them, they are now BFFs who wrestle/play all day and who have even been caught cuddling on a few occasions! Dogs (especially puppies/young dogs) can be so much work but the rewards are unquantifiable!

There’s a parent at my daughter’s elementary school with the license plate WELATE and I’ve never related to a personalized plate more in my life!

I can’t remember where (probably on COJ) that I saw this, but the show Jersey Shore airs in Japan under the name ‘Macaroni Rascals’. Still makes me laugh.

My 5 year old regularly holds my 2 year old’s face with both of her little hands, rests her forehead against her sister’s, and says “You are so so so beautiful. You look just like me.” – cracks me up every time while my heart bursts into a million pieces. Side note: may we all have the confidence of my 5 year old.

I still think about when my Daughter was little and she was trying to convince me to go to Iceland, it wasn’t going well and I said ‘Well what would we eat there?’ and she said ‘all good! we eat demented shark!’ I said loudly ‘DEMENTED SHARK?’ and she goes, ‘oh, wait, sorry, it’s fermented’ I said that doesn’t even sound much better and she said ‘maybe we just bring lunchables’.

I run by this car pretty much every day, that is just like some random SUV that is at least 14 yrs old and has seen better days but the plate just says OH WELL and that makes me crack up so much. I want to meet the person who drives it, because, me too!!

Someone posted this on slack and it is so true and so funny that I saved a screenshot to have it available when I need to laugh: Why can’t baby teeth fall out when you’re, I don’t know, 20? I was too stupid to understand what it really meant to have only one set of teeth. I used to get paid a dollar per tooth from the tooth fairy, but now I pay the tooth mafia $140 per filling.

Oh my great-uncle passed away last weekend. He was one of the funniest people I have ever known, as a child I remember my siblings and I laughing with anticipation for the jokes we would be told on Christmas Day at his home. His life was a comedy act. I laughed and laughed when I heard the eulogy my grandmother gave at his funeral this week.

My very loving two year old, staring intently at my face: “mama, I like your lips.” Me: “thank you monkey, I like your lips.” Monkey, inches from my face: “and mama, I like your these [eyelashes]” Me: “thank you, baby. I like your lashes! And your nose. And your cheekies.” Baby, thoughtfully and staring me dead in the eyes: “mama, I like all your parts.” The deadpan earnestness of toddlers is never not hilarious (and sooo cute!)

My 2.5 year old daughter has been taking ballet lessons at daycare and she *thinks* she can do a leap and she always wants to show us, her parents and her 3 month-old sister. “Mama, Dada, Baby Kit watch this” and then she makes a very abrupt, somehow elegant, jerking motion upwards but doesn’t leave the ground with her arms to the sky like Mary Katherine Gallagher, VERY proud. It. Is. Perfect.

As I was walking with one of my preschool students a few months ago she suddenly sneezed and she looked down into her hand and then gaped up at me and said “Miss Becca, a jewel just came out of my nose.” Sure enough there was a bead sized purple jewel covered in snot sitting in her palm. Makes you wonder how long it was in there, why it was in there, and what else has been in there. Kids. The most ridiculous and the best.

Making family’s inside jokes into epic songs on Suno AI app – I’m so so sorry to ruin your day (please make sure to use v4 for maximum wonder)

At the playground today, a 4 year old comes up to me and says “look at this little duck I found. My dad says I can keep it but we have to wash it when we get home.” This duck is smaller than a dime. Me: “That sounds like a good idea to get rid of germs.” 4 year old: “yeah, once it’s clean, I can put it in my mouth!”

So my 5 year-old and I were riding in the car the other morning and I wanted to distract her from our current topic of conversation, so I pointed out the fire truck that was at the intersection that we were approaching. me: Oh wow, do you see the fire truck? her: No, where? me (pointing): Right there. It’s behind the white car. her: I don’t see it. me: We’re just passing it now. Do you see it? her: No, I can’t see it. me: Huh, I’m surprised you missed it. It was pretty close to our car. Oh, well. We’re past it now. (We talk about other things for a solid five minutes, then there’s a little silence, and eventually I hear her voice from the back again…) her: Mama, did you say fire truck or pirate truck? me: I said fire truck. her: Oh, I saw that. Sweet kiddo was looking for a pirate truck!!! Love her.

Thank you to the COJ commenter who wrote “Trump is a monster with pudding for brains” earlier this week! Funny and somehow really encouraging Comment of the week, month, year for me. I’m telling everybody I love.

My 9 and 10 year old and I were playing “guess my favorite thing” in the car on the way home from school. The 9 year old chose “favorite bird” as her introductory category. My 10 year old and I ramble off birds, each quess met with an emphatic “No!”. We then beg for a clue, and the 9 year old offers the initials B.D.E.. I could not for the life of me come up with a bird that had three names! She finally relented and shared the name of her favorite bird: “Ball De Eagle” The ten year old and I completely lost it!

This morning, in the kitchen, as he handed me my first coffee, my husband and I laughed together at the memory of returning home from France, when I dropped our kindergartener off at school and said hello to another mom, and my three~year~old whipped around in his stroller seat and said, “We’re not doing our bonjouring still?”

I told my coworker I grew up cult adjacent, and always feel like I am cult susceptible. She laughed and told me her friends always vote her most likely to lead a cult. I said “oh, am I actually in a cult right now?” She said, “Surprise!” That was last week and I haven’t stopped laughing. (I hope it was a joke)

The podcast Good Hang with Amy Poehler. Love her with Tina Fey!

The meme / video of Hugh Grant listing the things he hates. I laugh just thinking about it.

This makes me smile. After the shameful meeting between, Trump, JD Vance and President Zelenskyy, JD Vance was met with protests and protestors in Vermont. Watching the news coverage,I noticed one of the protestors had a sign that said “JD Vance puts his cast iron skillet in the dishwasher!” Very silly but made me laugh!

I watched Deli Boy’s on the weekend- cracked me up!!!

My 17 month old niece, Everly, who now answers questions with “No way!” instead of “No.” It’s the most emphatic answer to the breeziest of questions. “Evie, do you want more cheese?” “No way!” said ever so gleefully. Never not funny to us!

My five year old made a play dough cupcake with play dough candles for my husband’s birthday a few days ago. The candles were hot pink with tiny blue stripes and looked exactly like tiny Barbie sized penises. “Make a wish on these special candles, Dada!!” Then she tried doing the splits and yelped out, in front of our extended, prim and proper family,”Well, that hurts my VAGINA!” And then she wrote a note for her little cousin which said,”I hope you lake to CUM to my howse.” And yes, it was all caps and center page. My husband and I laughed the entire night.

I have my first ever embryo transfer tomorrow, and some studies were done about humor and implantation rates. The study I saw had clowns present after a transfer! Regardless, I’m going to read through these comments for a little mood boost after my procedure tomorrow.

My favorite story from my bestie: she was at a party and went to the bathroom to change her tampon and her flow was heavy, thus the tampon came swinging out and splashed blood all over the white cotton shower curtain. This will always be the funniest thing ever to me.

This quote I just happened upon: “Whatever you do today, do it with the confidence of a four year old wearing a Batman shirt.” I think everyone can relate to this but it’s particularly meaningful to me because — you guessed it — my youngest grandchild is a four year old who LITERALLY wears nothing but Batman shirts. So it’s funny but also a bit creepy cause now I think someone has a camera running in my house all day…..

After seeing it here, I showed my daughters the make your own connections site. They make 4 or more a day and absolutely roast me and their dad. I have never laughed so hard. Categories include: “brands mom doesn’t ‘trust’” ”Ice cream flavors dad says he doesn’t like, but eats anyway” There’s nothing sweeter than being reminded that no one knows you better than your children.

All the funny things they say in Younger on Netflix. Such a crack up.

The last few days have been tense here at home: my man hit a deer so we’re one vehicle down, the kids have colds that will not go away, and I’m waiting for some scan results. For some reason, we decided that Mom should play video games with the kids. I can’t articulate enough how terrible I am at vids. We howled for two hours through Super Mario Wonder until my youngest begged to stop because he thought he might throw up. My man has made a few of my squeals into his new ringtone. I highly recommend!!

The Smartless podcast, always and forever.

The “your outie…” cat videos on IG. I told my husband about them and we spent a car journey making “your outie” statements at each other. There were points where we couldn’t even get the statements out because we were too busy snorting with laughter.

Omg our two year old, by far! He is just so sweet, and so, so funny (sometimes intentionally but most often by accident!), and he is obsessed with his six month old sister (especially making her laugh and giving her hugs and snacks) and watching them interact is a balm. He’s also obsessed with listening to music, and his requests are giving me life – Tracey Chapman, The Band, Otis Redding, Nina Simone, Fleetwood Mac, Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Louis Armstrong, Leonard Cohen, etc. From the time I found out I was pregnant with him we tried to brainwash him to love the music we love, and it seems to be working better than we ever could have imagined, haha. For something everyone else can also delight in: The Lonely Island and Seth Meyers Podcast. I’m definitely the cliche of people who think that SNL was at its best when they were in their teens and early 20s, but it’s absolutely true for me (2004-2014). Every episode of the pod is a delight of SNL nostalgia and of best friends who love on and roast each other in equal measure. I get so much behind the scenes on things I love, it reminds me of things I’d forgotten about, it introduces me to things I missed, and it has sent me down a delightful rabbit hole of old SNL because I watch the corresponding digital short when I listen to each new episode and now YouTube is exclusively recommending SNL clips to me 😂 My husband is also listening to it, and we’ve started using so many digital short lines in our every day life – our six month old accidentally tosses toast off her high chair? She threw it on the ground! Trying to get past? Excuse I! These four goofballs and their reminiscing is like a warm hug, and I hope they never stop never stopping. https://open.spotify.com/show/2jKBZHnSn6wLezZjggpKHy?si=Oy6g6RByRy-TvwVIC1u0Zg

Another ‘White Lotus’ moment from Sunday’s episode that I howl-laughed at “You’re moving to Taiwan?!”

My four month old is learning to laugh and surprised himself with some hearty belly laughs the other day while we were all in the kitchen making dinner. So then it was one of those cascading laugh things where we laughed and then he looked around and saw us laughing and kept call-and-response laughing, the whole time looking pleasantly surprised about all of it, like delighted to find that being human is exceedingly expectations. It reminded me of my favorite Eugene Merman sketch where he plays a medieval knight who’s time traveled to the present. He’s clearly crashing with some stoner 20-something who drives an ancient Honda Civic but the knight is totally blown away by it because the whole concept of a car is new to him, so he keeps muttering “Honda Civic!” and shaking his head in amazement with a half smile. That’s my baby!!

This post from my city’s subreddit about someone trying to buy a pizza, but the worker farted on the pizza. I laughed about this for several days. https://www.reddit.com/r/springfieldMO/comments/1jb7ssk/little_caesers_employee_farted_on_my_pizza/

Tina Fey talking about how having a teenager is like having an office crush. So funny and if you know or love a teen, you can totally relate! https://www.popsugar.com/family/tina-fey-compares-having-teenage-daughter-to-office-crush-48337557

Las Culturistas forever

I’ve recently returned to work after my second child, and I’m once again reminded how nice it is to have diversity of friendships – namely the three men I work with. Being outside the parent bubble they make me scream with laughter sometimes. Only yesterday I couldn’t help laughing when one sidled up to me and said ‘Sooo children always get head lice, is that kind of their thing?’ (After I groaned opening an email from daycare) Also watching, Deli Boys, Amandaland

I moved into my house in September ’24, and because of where I live all the trees were bare at that time. It’s now spring and I’m realizing my entire street is entirely lined with huge cherry blossoms that I get to look directly out my office window at!

My husband and I are listening to Unruly: The Ridiculous History of England’s Kings and Queens by comedian David Mitchell. It’s so brilliant and funny and makes me laugh so hard I cry.

My four-and-a-half year old pronounced Saint Patrick’s Day as Same Practice Day! She laughed at how hard it was and decided to wish people a “happy Green Day!”

My almost-3-year-old nervously (but bravely!) speaking up for his principles this morning as he and his little pointer finger explained to the hairstylist: “we don’t cut hair, only paper.”

Our puppy! She’s a delight and a ray of sunshine. Seeing her shake so hard with excitement to see my daughter that she vibrating body couldn’t stand up! And when she jumps she does this little twist that just looks fun and we all just watch her with pure joy and laugh real laughs. Also UK Ghosts and Modern Family. So so funny! And kind – great combo funny/kind x

Our toddler has been responding to requests or questions recently with “maybe yes…maybe no…”, but last night, it turned into “maybe no…maybe not…” 🤪

My girls (age 5 and 7) full heartedly believe I can’t open the garage without their “sister power” and I don’t want to ever tell them. When coming into our alley I wait until they scream in unison “open sesame!” and only then do I secretly hit the opener in my pocket. It only backfired once when we didn’t have the opener and they tried and tried to no avail. I tried to lesson the blow by wondering if it was broken but they were convinced it didn’t work because I doubted their sister magic. I won’t make that mistake again! I couldn’t love these two little loves more. ❤️

I didn’t laugh but it my heart smile. My friend’s 6 months tried food for the first time. She looked so confident and happy. It was so cute, I nearly cried.

My kids were telling me that their friends say “bad” words, like “stupid” and “dumb”. My husband asked if there are any other bad words they know, and my 6 year old responded “Trump!”. I almost spit out my drink!

I have just binge-watched The White Lotus Season 1 and 2 and I’m still crying tears over F. Murray Abraham‘s „It‘s a penis, not a sunset.“

We moved a precariously placed bag away from the counter edge saying ‘this is a recipe for disaster’. Our youngest asked what that meant and we explained it. Their immediate response was “oh like if there were evil robots and a million flies and only one fly swatter?” which prompted us to invent the game “recipe for disaster” where each person names 3 things and the most disastrous trio ‘wins’ (or no one wins if your kids are still at a burst into tears age, haha). A recent winner: 100 Minions and Thor in a fridge WHAT a disaster

This old couple makes me laugh every. single. time. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QogORWRe37M

I started watching my favorite awesomely dumb show (Too Hot To Handle) IN spanish with english subtitles. Such a sweet spot of improving myself (hardly, but still) and dissociating with smut (fully, thank god!). Don’t underestimate the joy of hearing phrases like “sit on my face” in another language.

I’m a children’s librarian and at storytime yesterday, one of our songs encouraged children to look for a certain color within the storytime room. On one iteration, we asked them to find the color pink. A little girl immediately ran up to me, sticking out her tongue and pointing at it. I laughed so hard, yes, your tongue IS pink!!

Overhearing my adorable baby brother (who is not a baby) inheriting a rally car from a friend and telling him feverishly on the phone, “The sport mode on this thing ain’t right, man. This is against Jesus.”