September 26, 2022

Here are 10 TikToks to amuse you for a few precious moments. Some people love them.

1. Painting invisibility.

2. What the hell is the internet?

3. One by one, he's eliminating the least popular state and merging it with a neighboring state.

4. One by one, they're replacing family photos with photos of Danny DeVito until Mom notices.

5. The man deserves a medal for all the years he's patiently listened to his wife tell stories like this.

6. Chef Reactions judges the French grandfather's making of lunch.

7. "Have you ever wondered what items in your place just give men 'ick'?"

8. "We're going to go look at wedding dresses."

9. My favorite music-and-the-child video of all time.

10. Finally, the dolls.

27 comments:

Assistant Village Idiot said...

#5 - This is not uncommon. It is more common among women than men, but both can display a need to upload the events of their day sequentially, as if the mere fact of their having happened to them makes them important to share with those who love them. For those who are more abstract, and choose their stories on the basis of entertainment and/or imparting needed information, this can be quite frustrating.

Ann Althouse said...

"This is not uncommon. It is more common among women than men...."

I haven't seen studies, but there seems to be a belief that women indulge in this form of sequential — you are there — storytelling. I've known men who do this too. Some people can make it entertaining, such as professional comedians and novel writers, but I've known people who want to hold center stage or just think the subject is their own existence, so the more the better. I don't like to have to be jerk but I can find myself saying "Is this story going somewhere?" or "Does this have a point?" Some people say "Cut to the chase."

One thing the story-form narrator is likely to be bothered by is if you barge in with a guess about what happened... especially if you thereby get the laugh they were building toward.

Ann Althouse said...

From the Wikipedia article "Shaggy dog story":

"In its original sense, a shaggy dog story or yarn is an extremely long-winded anecdote characterized by extensive narration of typically irrelevant incidents and terminated by an anticlimax. Shaggy dog stories play upon the audience's preconceptions of joke-telling. The audience listens to the story with certain expectations, which are either simply not met or met in some entirely unexpected manner. A lengthy shaggy dog story derives its humour from the fact that the joke-teller held the attention of the listeners for a long time (such jokes can take five minutes or more to tell) for no reason at all, as the long-awaited resolution is essentially meaningless, with the joke as a whole playing upon humans' search for meaning. The nature of their delivery is reflected in the English idiom spin a yarn, by way of analogy with the production of yarn."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shaggy_dog_story

Malcolm Phoenix said...

For #9, what is that music he's playing? It's beautiful!

Robert Marshall said...

Painting invisibility was impressive, as an art "trick." Very nicely done.

Dave Begley said...

Is #9 in Russia?

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

6

walter said...

Some people love feeding the CCP

Rory said...

New Jersey, California, Ohio, Arkansas were the first four.

Barbara said...

I loved painting invisibility and I watched the toddler entranced by the violinist three times. And then weirdly enough for me, those dolls singing opera had a certain something. Nice job animator. The chef’s sweetness toward the French grandpa is always a bright spot.

Lucien said...

The idea that Texas was one job the four least popular, or worst, states, is revealing.
When you look at where people are actually moving Texas ain’t doing so bad.

Wilbur said...

After about two or three sentences from that wife I'm inexorably going to bust in with "So, what happened?"

Then a sentence later, a more impatient "Tell me what happened".

michaele said...

I'm a sucker for opportunities to laugh unexpectedly...that's why I almost always check out your TicTok selections. #4 got a half laugh (such a cute idea) and #7 a full one. The addition of the goofy uninhibited dancing of the girl in front of her collection of horses is what made 7 funny to me.

Kai Akker said...

So "patient husband" in #5 recorded 30 seconds of his wife's roundabout prologue to a story. He put a label on it about having endured this for 14 years or so.

Why does anyone want to watch this? Even for 30 seconds? He looks down at his camera a couple times to show how long-suffering he is. But the video also credits Erica Priscilla for "sound."

Huh? Is he trying to be a cyber comedian? It's not funny, so I hope not. Is he trying for clicks for some other reason? Using his wife? Yecch. Is it a straight portrayal or did they script this?

If straight portrayal, how has she handled 14 years of his passive-aggressive maneuvers?

If scripted, it is unimpressive.

Why would anyone watch this?

tim maguire said...

My wife tells stories similar to #5.

I spend a lot of time wanting to scream, "Get to the point! What am I listening for? When do you tell me why you're even telling me this?!," but the worst part is the long pauses as she decides what word to use or which irrelevant detail to dwell on next. There's always a part of me hoping she's done, or at least will advance the story when she starts talking again. But that's not usually how it works out and I just sit there quietly waiting for her to wind it up.

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

Number five
Shaggy Dog
My old boss
Long-winded Rob

Nope not even close to being a woman thing.

Left Bank of the Charles said...

#5. This isn’t so much a shaggy-dog story, engaging but with an anticlimactic ending. It’s a stream-of-consciousness story, hard to follow sequentially, but the husband listens intently as he knows he will be expected to connect the dots at the end.

Ann Althouse said...

@Kai Akker

It seems clear to me that the husband and wife are playing a scene, showing something about their life together, and they both have some depth of understanding and humor about it. She's able to laugh at herself and sympathize with him and he loves her but wants other people to affirm that he is doing something supportive in being patient and hearing her out as she does it her way.

As to why anyone would listen to this: It's a very relatable situation! It might make you laugh, identify, or even feel like you actually would love to have a partner to talk with, even if they had an quirky/annoying way of expressing themself.

I gave 10 videos, and this is the one that people are talking about, so your question is a good one: Why do people want to watch this? That's why I tried to answer.

RoseAnne said...

Liked the Chef best. While he can be foul mouthed, he also is blunt about both the good and bad. If he was only blunt about the bad, he would be boring, but he does give credit to some unlikely (on the surface) sources.

Liked #1 (technical expertise) and #10 (just because it made me laugh).

The guy with the states: Noticed my Ohio was gone immediately so I didn't care about the rest.

Rusty said...

That little kid looked like she didn't know whether to stand there or runback to mom. The body language said run but the look said stick around. She will remember that moment for the rest of her life and that is beautiful.
Thank you Ann.

RoseAnne said...

Forgot to mention the husband and the wife:

I admit I am like the wife sometimes so I can't be too judgmental.

When in the role of listener, I find myself mentally trying to diagram the discussion with all its side trails off the main point - which I also watch to see if they ever got to the main point.

lonejustice said...

Not sure if this is a Shaggy Dog story, but it's still one of my favorites from Norm MacDonald.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJN9mBRX3uo

EAB said...

I wish we’d done the Danny DeVito thing to my mom. She had collages of each of us - three daughter - in the hallway, then a bedroom. Would have been fun to mess with her.

FleetUSA said...

No contest...the French grandfather. He knows his stuff for sure and the chef confirms it. Coq au vin done to perfection. Yummy

Sean said...

My wife tells stories like this #5. It is one of the ways she deals with stress. I have learned that you don't even have to listen (I think about other things) but the story must be told and any interruption will result in a non satisfactory result.

Everyone has their oddities. Hopefully both parties in the video see that and are comfortable making fun of the situation.

Ann Althouse said...

Please note that these posts listing videos are only for discussion of these video. I delete comments about TikTok generally. Take that to the nearest open thread.

Krumhorn said...

Loved the chef commentary about the 87 yr old French grandfather making lunch.

- Krumhorn