Showing titles in Comedy & Humor

It’s amazing what the lack of immediate threat to one’s life and wellbeing can do for a person’s disposition. High risk, high reward endeavors suddenly seem far less appealing, month-long delays are no longer a cause for concern, and sleeping in every single day of the week becomes an extremely attractive proposition. Indeed, without a pressing need to aggressively expand its power, Boxxy T. Morningwood is finally able to simply sit back, enjoy life, and watch the world both turn and burn.

Millions of people visit xkcd.com each week to read Randall Munroe's iconic webcomic. His stick-figure drawings about science, technology, language, and love have a large and passionate following. Fans of xkcd ask Munroe a lot of strange questions. What if you tried to hit a baseball pitched at 90 percent of the speed of light? How fast can you hit a speed bump while driving and live? If there were a robot apocalypse, how long would humanity last?

Xavier “Priest” Priestly is a snarky former seminarian turned private investigator. Dusty Queen is a hard-as-nails professional stuntwoman and freelance bodyguard. When Dusty’s girlfriend suddenly disappears, a woman in a strange blue wig tries to assassinate Priest, and a twelve-year-old boy shows up claiming to be his son, the two friends are thrown into a maelstrom of intrigue and high-stakes violence that’s as convoluted and dangerous as it is hilarious. Thankfully, Priest and Dusty don’t have to navigate these tangled mysteries alone.

Bill Bryson once again proves himself to be an incomparable companion as he guides us through the human body - how it functions, its remarkable ability to heal itself, and (unfortunately) the ways it can fail. Full of extraordinary facts (your body made a million red blood cells since you started reading this) and irresistible Bryson-esque anecdotes, The Body will lead you to a deeper understanding of the miracle that is life in general and you in particular. As Bill Bryson writes, "We pass our existence within this wobble of flesh and yet take it almost entirely for granted."

Sink or swim. Or at least that's what Annette Feldman tells herself when she books a cruise for her entire family. It's been over a decade since the Feldman clan has spent more than twenty-four hours under the same roof, but Annette is determined to celebrate her 70th birthday the right way. Just this once, they are going to behave like an actual family. Too bad her kids didn't get the memo.

Please note: This podcast is intended for adults only.

In this entry from Anthony Award winner Charlaine Harris' New York Times best-selling series, the gorgeous and feisty telepath hits the road to find her missing boyfriend, who may have run off with his former lover - a notorious vamp.

Wyatt Wallace is a practical, super organized director of TV commercials. Biz Petterelli is a child-actor-turned-magazine-writer who thrives on spontaneity. Though polar opposites, they are fully committed to their relationship and their life in Brooklyn with their dog, Matilda. They’re also about to have a baby together. And they’re freaking out. They’ve both dreamed of becoming parents, but now that it’s happening, they’re doubting everything. Their baby is due in a few weeks and instead of flying to California just before the birth as planned, Biz has a better idea.

Well, this year, after the Spring Planting season, I’m really gonna relax and put down roots. It’s the slow life for me. Sure, the talking animals and cultivators coming to live with me are a bit weird, but this year everything is gonna be basically normal. There definitely won’t be any Heavenly Tribulations, ancient formations, or cultivator issues to deal with . . .

Having arrived at a certain age (her prime), Ann Leary casts a wry backward glance at a life spent trying—and often failing—to be nice. With wit and surprising candor, Leary recounts the bedlam of home bat invasions, an obsession with online personality tests, and the mortification of taking ballroom dance lessons with her actor husband. She describes hilarious red-carpet fiascos and other observations from the sidelines of fame, while also touching upon her more poignant struggles with alcoholism, her love for her family, her dogs, and so much more.

Hilarious, fascinating, and a roller coaster of dizzying, historical what-ifs, Napoleon's Hemorrhoids is a potpourri for serious historians and casual history buffs. In one of Phil Mason's many revelations, you'll learn that Communist jets were two minutes away from opening fire on American planes during the Cuban missile crisis, when they had to turn back as they were running out of fuel. You'll discover that before the Battle of Waterloo, Napoleon's painful hemorrhoids prevented him from mounting his horse to survey the battlefield.

Tina Fontana is the hapless but brazen 30-year-old executive assistant to Robert Barlow, the all-powerful and commanding CEO of Titan Corp., a multinational media conglomerate. She's excellent at her job and beloved by her famous boss - but after six years of making his reservations for restaurants she'd never get into on her own and pouring his drinks from bottles that cost more than her rent, she's bored, broke, and just a bit over it all.

In Made in America, Bryson de-mythologizes his native land, explaining how a dusty hamlet with neither woods nor holly became Hollywood, how the Wild West wasn't won, why Americans say 'lootenant' and 'Toosday', how Americans were eating junk food long before the word itself was cooked up, as well as exposing the true origins of the G-string, the original $64,000 question, and Dr Kellogg of cornflakes fame.

If I had to pick a bride of convenience, my first choice would not be Peach Maloney. My 50th choice would not be Peach. Top spot on my list of occupational hazards? Yes. Royal pain in the crumpets? Yes. A bride of convenience? No. But I've unexpectedly gone from royal bodyguard to monarch, having inherited a crown that was stolen from my family long before my birth. The kicker? In order to take the throne, I must find a wife. Have I mentioned Peach would not have been my 100th choice? But I've no other options, and she needs a favor that my new position can fulfill quite nicely.

Two comedians take an unmerciful and hilarious look at athletes who have lost big games...with the law! Crime in Sports does the research, and finds the funny in the world of sports true crime. New episode every week!

Before Liz Lemon, before Weekend Update, before Sarah Palin, Tina Fey was just a young girl with a dream: A recurring stress dream that she was being chased through a local airport by her middle-school gym teacher. She also had a dream that one day she would be a comedian on TV. She has seen both these dreams come true. At last, Tina Fey's story can be told. From her youthful days as a vicious nerd to her tour of duty on Saturday Night Live. Tina Fey reveals all, and proves what we've always suspected: You're no one until someone calls you bossy.

Emmy-award winning gadfly Mike Rowe presents a ridiculously entertaining, seriously fascinating collection of his favorite episodes from America’s number-one short-form podcast, The Way I Heard It, along with a host of memories, ruminations, and insights. It’s a delightful collection of mysteries. A mosaic. A memoir. A charming, surprising must-have. Mike Rowe’s The Way I Heard It collects 35 fascinating stories “for the curious mind with a short attention span”.

Think your job is purgatory? Try working for the afterlife. For former man of science and very unhappy medium, Dr. Newton Barlow, the frontline between good and evil is starting to get old. With Purgatory a mess of hopeless bureaucracy, banal amateurism and unreliable excitement, he's beginning to crave a challenge. Something big.

Gorm Ingerson knows the king is a fink. With the land’s insidious ruler hell-bent on his destruction, the axe-wielding Dwarf berserker is desperate to beat him to the punch. But when he discovers the rotten regent’s claim of a town razed by the world’s richest dragon is false, the gruff adventurer fears there’s more than a personal grudge at stake.

When Norm Macdonald, one of the greatest stand-up comics of all time, was approached to write a celebrity memoir, he flatly refused, calling the genre “one step below instruction manuals.” Norm then promptly took a two-year hiatus from stand-up comedy to live on a farm in northern Canada. When he emerged he had under his arm a manuscript, a genre-smashing book about comedy, tragedy, love, loss, war, and redemption. When asked if this was the celebrity memoir, Norm replied, “Call it anything you damn like.”