The Snark Handbook: Insult Edition (Snark Series)

by Lawrence Dorfman

  hasn’t pleased one yet.

  A couple drove down a country road for several miles, not saying a word. An earlier discussion had led to an argument, and neither of them wanted to concede their position. As they passed a barnyard of mules, goats, and pigs, the husband asked sarcastically, “Relatives of yours?” “Yep,” the wife replied, “in-laws.”

  Between men and women there is no friendship possible.

  There is passion, enmity, worship, love, but no friendship.

  —OSCAR WILDE

  BODY

  (OR LACK THEREOF)

  BODY

  OR LACK THEREOF

  Think you’re too fat? Too skinny? Too tall or too short? Too sweaty? Too wrinkled? Imagine what Spanx would do if we got all Zen on our looks. Don’t worry, I’m not going soft on you. It’s not going to happen unless we suddenly enjoy looking like we’re at Friendly’s on a Sunday afternoon. (Ever driven by one of those joints? It’s not pretty.) Sometimes you just want to vent. Or rant. Or lay it on the line. Sometimes you want to scream, “Hey, how about a salad?” or “Have you heard about this new thing called soap?” or “Say, can I buy you some gum or a package of breath mints?” or just plain “Get away from me. You smell.” There’s got to be a better way ...

  She lost 100

  pounds, but that’s

  because she was

  poached for ivory.

  Hey, you have

  something on your

  chin ... the third

  one down.

  Can fat

  people go

  skinny-dipping?

  Look at the bright

  side ... fat

  people are harder

  to kidnap.

  They said you were a great asset. I told them they were off by two letters.

  If you didn’t have feet, you wouldn’t wear

  shoes ... so why wear a bra?

  Dancing with her

  was like moving a

  piano.

  How would

  you like to feel

  the way you

  look?

  I may be fat,

  but you’re ugly,

  and I can lose

  weight.

  No, those pants

  don’t make you

  look fatter. I

  mean, how could

  they?

  You’re so fat,

  your car has

  stretch marks.

  His dog

  fantasizes about

  other legs when

  he humps his.

  Beer with no

  alcohol is like

  a nun with a

  D-cup.

  It ain’t the size,

  it’s ... no, it’s the size.

  If you’re

  worried about

  criticism,

  sometimes a diet

  is the

  best defense.83

  83 Arrested Development

  Life and Death

  Either he’s dead, or my watch has stopped.

  —GROUCHO MARX

  WHEN IT COMES TO these two things, life and death, no one’s got a clue. Oh, everyone has an opinion and usually feels little compunction about sharing that opinion with you, regardless of how loudly thou doth protest....

  What to do about all that whining 81 ... I say snark and snark hard. Stop ’em in their tracks. Put the kibosh on it. Pull the rug out from under ’em. ... slay ’em. (Not literally, mind you.) Irony on a base level but still good stuff.

  He is useless on top of the ground; he ought to be under it, inspiring the cabbages.

  —MARK TWAIN

  If you can’t be a good example, then you’ll just have to be a horrible warning.

  —CATHERINE AIRD

  He would make a lovely corpse.

  —CHARLES DICKENS

  He is an old bore. Even the grave yawns for him.

  —HERBERT BEERBOHM TREE

  A lifelong Republican was lying on his deathbed when he suddenly decided to join the Democrats. “But why?” asked his puzzled friend, “You’re Republican through and through ... Why change now?” The man leaned forward and explained, “Well, I’d rather it was one of them that died and not one of us.”

  The years between fifty and seventy are the hardest.

  You are always being asked to do things, and yet

  you are not decrepit enough to turn them down.

  —T. S. ELIOT

  My mother always said that every time you do a good

  deed here on Earth, you’re storing up a treasure in

  heaven. Which means Mother Teresa’s probably got some

  beachfront property up there and I’m up to a box of Milk

  Duds and a Pez dispenser.

  —ROBERT G. LEE

  A lot of people say they think that Los Angeles is a heartless place that breeds insincerity and mistrust. But you know, I found that when I first moved there, I didn’t like it, but after a while, something inside me died.

  —JAKE JOHANNSEN

  End of season sale at the cerebral department.

  —GARETH BLACKSTOCK

  His mind is open ... so open that ideas simply pass through it.

  —F. H. BRADLEY

  Woody Allen

  Life is divided into the horrible and the miserable.

  Life is full of misery, loneliness, and suffering—and it’s all over much too soon.

  My one regret in life is that I am not someone else.

  On the plus side, death is one of the few things that can be done just as easily lying down.

  Why are our days numbered and not, say, lettered?

  I don’t believe in an afterlife, although I am bringing a change of underwear.

  You can live to be a hundred if you give up all the things that make you want to live to be a hundred.

  She’s a waterbug on the surface of life.

  —GLORIA STEINEM

  Stay with me; I want to be alone.

  —JOEY ADAMS

  Match the Person to His Final Words82

  Louis B. Mayer

  Lady Nancy Astor

  Carl Panzram

  Humphrey Bogart

  James W. Rodgers

  Winston Churchill

  I should never have switched from Scotch to martinis.

  I’m bored with it all.

  Hurry it up you Hoosier bastard! I could hang a dozen men while you’re screwing around.

  Am I dying, or is this my birthday?

  It wasn’t worth it.

  A bulletproof vest. (Asked if he has any last requests before facing a firing squad.)

  Good news for senior citizens: Death is near!

  —GEORGE CARLIN

  I never wanted to see anybody die, but there are a few obituary notices I have read with pleasure.

  —CLARENCE DARROW

  A woman went into a hospital to have her wrinkles removed but woke up to find the surgeon gave her breast implants. “What have you done?” she screamed. “I came in here to have the lines taken out, but instead you’ve given me these huge breasts!” “Hey,” said the surgeon, “at least nobody’s looking at your wrinkles anymore.”

  They say such nice things about people at their funerals that it makes me sad that I’m going to miss mine by just a few days.

  —GARRISON KEILLOR

  Every creature stalks some other, and catches it, and is caught.

  —MIGNON McLAUGHLIN

  She never was really charming till she died.

  —TERENCE

  He would stab his best friend for the sake of writing an epigram on his tombstone.

  —OSCAR WILDE

  Things Not to Say at a Funeral

  I should have said something earlier ... but I really, really need his kidney.

  Whoa. I didn’t know we were supposed to dress up.

  You look like you’ve seen a ghost.

  Boy, you wouldn’t believe the day I’m having.

  Pull my fin
ger.

  See, kids? This is what God does to the bad ones.

  Who needs gum?

  Could I drop you off somewhere—say, the roof?

  Not all men are annoying. Some are dead.

  Death is hereditary.

  How do you save a man from drowning?

  Take your foot off his head.

  He is as good as his word—and his word is no good.

  —SEAMUS McMANUS

  I wish I’d known you when you were alive.

  —LEONARD LOUIS LEVINSON

  Larry King: “You don’t look ninety.”

  Milton Berle: “I don’t feel it.”

  King: “How old do you feel?”

  Berle: “I feel like a twenty-year-old—but there’s never one around.”

  I don’t mind dying, the trouble is you feel so bloody stiff the next day.

  —GEORGE AXELROD

  If no one knows when a person is going to die, how can we say he died prematurely?

  —GEORGE CARLIN

  A dead atheist is someone who is all dressed up with no place to go.

  —JAMES DUFFECY

  When her husband passed away, the wife put the usual death notice in the newspaper, but added that he had died of gonorrhea. Once the daily newspapers had been delivered, a good friend of the family phoned and complained bitterly, “You know very well that he died of diarrhea, not gonorrhea.”

  Replied the widow, “Yes, I know that he died of diarrhea, but I thought it would be better for posterity to remember him as a great lover rather than the big shit that he really was.”

  Afraid of death? Not at all. Be a great relief.

  Then I wouldn’t have to talk to you.

  —KATHARINE HEPBURN

  My uncle Sammy was an angry man. He had printed on his tombstone: What are you looking at?

  —MARGARET SMITH

  At my age I do what Mark Twain did. I get my daily paper, look at the obituaries page, and if I’m not there, I carry on as usual.

  —PATRICK MOORE

  You should never say bad things about the dead, you should only say good ... Joan Crawford is dead. Good.

  —BETTE DAVIS ABOUT JOAN CRAWFORD

  I hate funerals and would not attend my own if it could be avoided.

  —ROBERT T. MORRIS

  The world is rid of him, but the deadly slime of his touch remains.

  —JOHN CONSTABLE ON LORD BYRON

  I have lost friends, some by death—others by sheer inability to cross the street.

  —VIRGINIA WOOLF

  I am ready to meet my maker, but whether my maker is prepared for the great ordeal of meeting me is another matter.

  —WINSTON CHURCHILL

  He must have killed a lot of men to have made so much money.

  —MOLIÈRE

  Epitaphs

  Here lies my wife: here let her lie. Now she’s at rest and so am I.

  —JOHN DRYDEN

  Where his soul’s gone or how it fares; nobody knows, and nobody cares.

  —ANONYMOUS

  Hotten Rotten Forgotten.

  —ON JOHN HOTTEN

  In Conclusion

  SO I SAY UNTO thee, snark! And it will set you free!

  (Always wanted to do that ... you know ... in a big voice like those preachers that dress like pimps? Falwell and those guys...)

  Is there anything we’ve learned here? Yeah, there’s a lot of people with huge bugs up their asses, no? Including yours truly. ...

  The difference is in finding a way to channel that angst and anger at the time and come back quickly with just the perfect amount of snark in your voice and words. It will set you free. Or send you to prison.

  Say hey to Bubba for me.

  Acknowledgments

  I AM GRATEFUL FOR THE friendship and support of three brilliant people who have been through this before: My wife Rosalind, who has the patience of a saint and a snarky sense of humor all her own; my editor, Ann Treistman, who kept me on track, gave me lots of encouragement and kicked my ass when necessary; and Mark Mirando, a great friend with a wit to match.

  Throughout the writing of this book, a number of folks looked at what I was doing and helped me shape the content. They are: my mom Janet, James Naccarato, John and Jenny Morris, Mike Jones, David Gilson, Bill Rafaelle, Glen Greenberg and the amazingly snarky staff at the Owl Bar, the incomparable Omuni Barnes and everyone at GPP, Tony Lyons and the Skyhorse gang, Karen Patterson and Stephanie Beam, and a host of many others who were there when needed.

  Index

  ABBA

  Abbey, Edward

  Adams, Douglas

  Adams, Joey

  Adams, Scott

  Agnew, Spiro T.

  Aird, Catherine

  Ali, Muhammed

  Allen, Fred

  Allen, Woody

  Aristophanes

  Arlen, Michael

  Arrested Development

  Asquith, Cyril,

  Asquith, Margot

  Astor, Lady Nancy

  Attila the Hun

  Auden, W. H.

  Austen, Jane

  Axelrod, George

  Baer, Arthur

  Bankhead, Tallulah

  Barbie

  Barr, Roseanne

  Barrie, James Matthew

  Beatles, The

  Beaton, Cecil

  Beatty, Warren

  Beckett, Samuel

  Beerbohm, Max

  Beethoven, Ludwig Van

  Bellow, Saul

  Bennett, Alan

  Berle, Milton

  Best, George

  Best, Pete

  You were wise to remove the curtain rings. ◆ May your soul rest in eternal piss. ◆ You are a mere burp in the great buffet of life. ◆ You are the man of the moment. Oops, moment’s passed. ◆ You look like a million bucks! (All green andwrinkled.) ◆ I don’t want you to turn the other cheek; it’s just as ugly. ◆ I don’t know what makes you so stupid, but it really works. ◆ I’ve seen people like you, but I had to pay admission! ◆ Why are you so stupid today? Anyway, I think that’s very typical of you. ◆ If you took an IQ test, the results would be negative. ◆ It’s men like you that make women gay. ◆ Save the planet! Kill yourself! ◆ You’re the reason God created the middle finger. ◆ You are proof that God has a sense of humor. ◆ You can’t fix stupid. ◆ You must be from the shallow end of the gene pool. ◆ I’d explain it to you, but your brain would explode. ◆ You sound reasonable. It must be time to up my medication! ◆ In man’s struggle against the world, bet on the world. * He has an intellect rivaled only by garden tools.

  Bevan, Aneurin

  Bierce, Ambrose

  Big Sleep, The

  Black, Lewis

  Blackstock, Gareth

  BMW

  Bogart, Humphrey

  Boleyn, Anne

  Bolt, Tommy

  Bon Jovi

  Bono

  Boras, Scott

  Borge, Victor

  Braddock, Bessie

  Bradley, F. H.

  Bradshaw, Terry

  Brien, Alan

  Brilliant, Ashleigh

  Brooklyn Dodgers

  Broun, Heywood

  Brown, Jerry

  Brown, Rita Mae

  Brown, Scott

  Browning, Elizabeth Barrett

  Browning, Robert

  Bruckner, Anton

  Bryan, William Jennings

  Buchanan, Pat

  Buchwald, Art

  Buffet, Warren

  Bulwer-Lytton, Edward G.

  Burns, George

  Bush, George

  Butler, Samuel

  Byron, Lord

  Camus, Albert

  Cantor, Eddie

  Cantu, John

  Capote, Truman

  Carlin, George

  Carlyle, Thomas

  Carson, Johnny

  Casablanca

  Cézanne, Paul

  Chacon, Elio

  Chamberlain, Neville

  Ch
andler, Raymond

  Chase, Chevy

  Cheney, Dick

  Cher

  Chicago Blackhawks

  Cho, Margaret

  Christmas Vacation

  Churchill, Winston

  Cincinnati Reds

  Clay, Andrew Dice

  Clay, Henry

  Clinton, Bill

  CNN

  Cobb, Irvin S.

  Cocks, Sir Barnett

  Colbert, Stephen

  Coleridge, Samuel Taylor

  Collins, Churton

  Come Back, Little Sheba

  Compton-Burnett, Ivy