2021—what a fun, funny year. Oh, wait, I was thinking of 1021, when Senekerim-Hovhannes Artsruni, the king of Vaspurakan (Greater Armenia), just straight up handed over his kingdom to the Byzantine Empire and became the governor of Cappadocia! That was a good time. The past twelve months, not so much so. But, thankfully, the Daily Shouts and Shouts & Murmurs stores are impervious to supply-chain woes and never ran bare.
New Yorker writers reflect on the year’s highs and lows.
Sure, it’s no Cappadocia, but we enjoyed jokes about the British royals, moms, cats, dating, Bill and Melinda, dating Bill and Melinda, and, of course, cast-iron pans. There were, in fact, so many excellent 2021 Shouts that, when it came time to anoint my favorites, I threw up my hands and crowdsourced the task. Here are your most-read humor pieces of the year—or maybe these writers just clicked on their own pieces a lot. (We’re all looking at you, John Kenney.)
Rubik’s Cube (Hasbro)
You finish it. Now what?
Congratulations, you have a slightly more attractive cube.
After the events of Sunday evening, I would like to address certain topics that arose in the interview conducted by the American journalist Harpo Winfrey. I take my job as sovereign seriously. But I am also a mother and a grandmother. And so it would be impossible for me not to express my deep concern for those chickens. Chickens are people, too, though not in any biological sense.
There are creaking sounds. These are perfectly normal—it’s just the sound of the building trying to stay up. We’d be much more worried if the building didn’t make any effortful noises!
Whether the trio and the crew end up being friends or frenemies, fans can no doubt look forward to classic brunch scenes, featuring Carrie, Miranda, Charlotte, and three to five people awkwardly standing in a semicircle around them holding sound equipment, all chatting it up about their sexual misadventures.
Canada has been pretty strict about who can enter the country since the pandemic began, and rightfully so. They even evicted the Toronto Raptors and made them play home games in America, like a troubled teen they shipped off to boarding school. But, once this is all over, in six years, there will be free poutine fountains at the border. Prime Minister Drake will make sure of that.
At the end of the day, there are not many people out there who can appreciate my funny jokes (like, how iPhones are better Androids) or my tattoos. I have a couple of tats that are Pablo Neruda quotes about love. My favorite one says “In one kiss, you’ll know what I said.” But it’s been a while since anyone has seen my ass and been able to appreciate it.
