How To Be Funny (5th Anniversary Edition)

How To!

Slate Magazine

Business, Education, How To, Self-improvement

4.4 • 1.9K Ratings

🗓️ 30 July 2024

⏱️ 42 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

How do you learn to tell the perfect joke? In this special edition of How To!, founding host Charles Duhigg joins Courtney and Carvell to mark five years of life-changing advice with a look back at our very first episode. It features a pastor from Oklahoma who wants to spice up his sermons. We introduce him to Gary Gulman, a New York standup comedian who makes jokes about his clinical depression. They workshop the pastor’s new joke about the New Testament, and Gary reveals “what might be the most important rule of being funny.” Charles Duhigg's favorite episode: How To Stop Being Anxious Courtney Martin's favorite episode: How To Be Lonely Carvell Wallace's favorite episode: How To Grieve an Estranged Parent Do you have a problem that needs solving? Send us a note at [email protected] or leave us a voicemail at 646-495-4001 and we might have you on the show. Subscribe for free on Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen. How To’s executive producer is Derek John. Joel Meyer is our senior editor/producer. The show is produced by Rosemary Belson, with Kevin Bendis and Sara McCrae. Slate Plus members get bonus segments and ad-free podcast feeds. Sign up now at slate.com/howtoplus. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	If just thinking about your bills makes you feel confused and disorientated,
0:05.0	like your head is full of Raspberry,
0:08.0	then you need Monzo.
0:10.0	Download your new favorite bank and pay bills from custom pots.
0:15.0	Money never felt like Monzo.
0:18.0	UK residents, T's and C supply. Please apply. Welcome to how to how to. Hey listeners we have a very special treat for you today.
0:39.0	This is believe or not the five year anniversary of of how to on slate. Can you guys believe that?
0:45.6	Does that seem like a realistic? That's amazing. That's amazing. So because of that, we have a very
0:50.7	special treat. We have a collection of an assembly of how to
0:55.1	hosts that have never been in the room together. It is me, Carvel Wallace. It is
1:00.0	Courtney Martin, whom you know and it is our show's founder, founding father, Charles
1:04.3	Duhig, all together to talk about what the last five years has been like and maybe even think
1:09.6	a little bit about what the next five years might be.
1:12.1	So thanks for joining us and thanks guys for
1:14.6	coming together here. Yeah this is so much fun. This is exciting. So I guess the first
1:22.0	question that Courtney and I have because we came to the show when it was already going is Charles can you give us a little bit of the origin story for what?
1:29.0	Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I had just left the New York Times and I kind of and I was an investigative reporter at the times and I kind of had this question which is I love reading like Dear Abbey. I love reading all those advice columns and I was writing books that kind of gave people science-based advice.
1:46.0	And I just thought like what happens if you bring the the skills of investigative reporting
1:51.5	where we're actually talking to experts and we're asking them hard questions and we brought that to dear Abbey
1:57.6	We would probably get something that not only would give you insights into how to life should work and how we can best move through life, but also help you understand why those insights are true.
2:08.0	And I think that it's that understanding that's most powerful, usually when I learned something.
2:13.2	Which can I ask you guys a question?
	...

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