Viking Standup
First published 5/11/2000

One thing everybody loves is observational humour! Whether you're young or old, fat or thin, or any one of a number of various opposites, chances are there's nothing you love more than watching a standup comedian's quirky take on modern life.

But what a lot of people don't realize is that observational humour wasn't invented in the 20th century. No sir, it has a long rich history, dating all the way back to 400 A.D. and a fierce band of warriors from Northern Europe known as the Vikings.

Sadly, many of these priceless Viking standup routines have been lost, but recent excavations in Sweden have uncovered these gems:

• Men and women are different. Guys, you know what I'm talking about. Ladies like to talk and cuddle, and men like to sail to England and kill everybody. It's true! Isn't it guys! Yeah!

• Why do we put these big wooden heads on the front of our boats anyway? Whose idea was that? Can you imagine the first two guys to invent a longboat, sitting around going, "Gee, Ogar... what it really needs is a big ugly head. A big damn ugly head right on the front!" And the other guy's going, "Yeah, let's take another couple of hours and sculpt that!" Huh? Can you imagine?!?

• How many guys here like to chop off heads? I know I like to chop of heads. Line the heads up, I chop 'em off! My wife's like, "Güt, come in and eat!" And I'm like, "Sorry, baby... I'm chopping off heads!"

• Hey you in the front row... nice shirt! What kind of ugly reindeer did your wife skin to get that?

• Don't you hate it when the wigwam you choose to set on fire won't burn? It doesn't matter which wigwam I pick, it always just smoulders. All the other ones, they're on fire but I always get some kind of special fire-retardant wigwam! Forget it, man... I'm going back to the boat!

• Do we have any people from Iceland here tonight? We do? Then I'll talk slower!

• Don't you hate it when the axe only goes halfway through the guy, and the guy's all like "Argh! Argh!" And you're like, "Oh man, I need a new axe!"

• Why do we all have those two little dots over the vowels in our names? Whether you're named Küg or Glök or Igär, you've always got those two little dots. Oh well, I guess it doesn't matter... after all, we're all illiterate!

• Hey hey hey, ladies, you want to get with me? They don't call me horny because of this hat!

• Don't you hate it when you get all the way to Newfoundland, start a settlement, and then get wiped out? I mean, hey, hello! We're trying to start a settlement over here!

• I don't know about you folks, but personally I hope that someday we become a country that just makes porn flicks and sensible build-it-yourself furniture.

• There are two kinds of people: broadsword people and axe people. Me, I'm an axe person. But some people, they like the broadsword. Ain't that the truth! Then there's the spear people... but let's not even talk about them!

• Hey, thanks a lot, you've been a great audience. Drive safely and remember to kill your waiter!

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