Last weekend I was introduced to comedian Tim Minchin by my friend Nicki. Thanks to her I’ve spent the last few days firmly entrenching myself in the Tim Minchin fanclub, watching damn near all his videos on Youtube, as well as his “Ready For This?” DVD last night.

Minchin’s act is a combination of comedic songs (he’s an impressive pianist), regular standup and poems. There are so many great bits that had me in tears, including “If I didn’t have you” (which was the video that first sold me on him) and “Fuck the poor“. But his beat poem “Storm” was particularly clever, and the animated short film that was created for it makes it even better.

My favourite part (emphasis mine):

“You’re so sure of your position
But you’re just closed-minded
I think you’ll find
Your faith in Science and Tests
Is just as blind
As the faith of any fundamentalist”

“Hm that’s a good point, let me think for a bit
Oh wait, my mistake, it’s absolute bullshit.
Science adjusts its beliefs based on what’s observed
Faith is the denial of observation so that Belief can be preserved.
If you show me
That, say, homeopathy works,
Then I will change my mind
I’ll spin on a fucking dime
I’ll be embarrassed as hell,
But I will run through the streets yelling
It’s a miracle! Take physics and bin it!
Water has memory!
And while it’s memory of a long lost drop of onion juice is Infinite
It somehow forgets all the poo it’s had in it!

You can check out Tim doing the bit live here. I’ve got two other Minchin items queued up for as soon as I find time to watch: 2007′s “So Live”, and also a documentary that was made about Tim called “Rock ‘n’ Roll Nerd”.

If you like comedy, particularly clever comedy, be sure to check him out. You can also check out my newly created list of atheist comedians for more godless jokers. I’m always on the hunt for others, so please share your favs in the comments.

Here’s a bit of an excerpt, but definitely go read the full article:

It happened almost by accident. An American working as an English teacher was walking around the streets of the city where he taught and noticed a deluge of American fast food franchises, but found nothing resembling the kind of soft-serve ice cream that his college roommate’s family had turned into a multimillion-dollar enterprise.

And that is how Mr. Softee went to China.

Now this staple of New York City life is being served 7,000 miles away, on the streets of Suzhou, an ancient city of more than six million people about 50 miles west of Shanghai. Mr. Softee or Mr. Soft Heart, the English translation of “ruan xin xian sheng” — there is no Mandarin word for Softee — has been a hit, with sales doubling every year since the first truck started rolling three years ago.

There are now five Mr. Soft Heart trucks in Suzhou, and one in a nearby city, Taicang.

“There is a franchising boom going on in China that is similar to what was happening in America in the 1950s and 1960s, so we really jumped in at the right time,” said Alex Conway, the president of Mr. Softee China, whose grandfather James Conway helped found the company in 1956.

Customers like Meng Xiangbo, 19, a college student, have proved Mr. Conway right. He is a regular customer of the Mr. Softee truck that peddles its treats in Suzhou’s university district.

One recent balmy afternoon, Mr. Meng ordered a kiwi sundae. “They have six flavors,” he said of the sundaes. “I eat a different one every day. On Sunday, I rest.”

It was Mr. Conway’s college roommate, Turner Sparks, who first broached the idea that China might be ready for Mr. Softee.

“The only soft ice cream available was in places like McDonald’s and Kentucky Fried Chicken,” Mr. Sparks said. “I called Alex, who majored in business, and we started kicking around the idea. Before you knew it, we were talking to government officials and putting this thing together.”

Putting it together, however, was not easy.

Because Mr. Softee, which is based in Runnemede, N.J., is a foreign company, there were “a lot of forms to fill out, a lot of red tape,” Mr. Sparks said. A hygiene license had to be obtained, and company officials met repeatedly with Suzhou’s traffic police to explain a concept they had little knowledge of: selling products out of a truck. Mr. Soft Heart trucks were assigned specific routes and parking spots, with no deviating allowed.

In a reversal of New York’s noise restrictions, the trucks were allowed to play the Mr. Softee jingle only when parked.

Anyone that’s been around Suzhou a while probably knows Turner either as “the ice cream guy” or drummer extraordinaire. He’s also a comedian. Turner can routinely be seen performing standup comedy at the Drunken Clam down on Shiquan Jie.

h/t to Chengdu Living on Hao Hao Report

“Older” sounds a little better than “old,” doesn’t it? Sounds like it might even last a little longer … I’m getting old. And it’s OK. Because thanks to our fear of death in this country I won’t have to die — I’ll ‘pass away.’ Or I’ll ‘expire,’ like a magazine subscription. If it happens in the hospital they’ll call it a ‘terminal episode.’ The insurance company will refer to it as ‘negative patient care outcome.’ And if it’s the result of malpractice they’ll say it was a ‘therapeutic misadventure.’

You were a comedic genius and legend. Whatever it’s called, You will be missed.

Some of the greats

Usage of the Word Fuck

Filthy Words (Seven Words You Can Never Say on Television)

this isn’t the original bit, but I don’t know if it was captured on video – YouTube doesn’t seem to think so.

Religion is Bullshit