Dear Readers,

I regret to inform you all of a most terrible discovery. Due to a scheduling mix-up I was called in to write a humor article this week. No sweat, I thought, easy peasy. I’ll just go grab some jokes from the back. But there were no jokes in the back. We are all out.

Allow me to explain. Over the years we here at the humor section have curated an extensive stockpile of jokes, japes, gaffs and whatnot, a veritable feast designed to last us through the coldest of comedic winters. Whenever we ran out of ideas we would simply retrieve a joke from the stockpile. But, tragically, we just ran out. We didn’t know how good we had it.

Do you know what that last joke was?

Knock knock.

Who’s there?

Interrupting duck.

Interrupting duck wh- QUACK!

Terrible. I’m going to get fired for this.

I have resorted to monkey-on-a-typewriter tactics, mashing random word combinations together in hopes of stumbling upon some undiscovered jest, but it is useless. There is only one thing to do: I must go out into the world and find more jokes. If I am successful then perhaps the humor section will survive. And if I fail? Well, then I suppose they’ll have to find something to fill the back page. Perhaps an extra large Criss-Cross, or another op-ed or my thrice-rejected comic strip idea about a duck who goes to law school.

Whatever happens, we thank you all for your support over the years. Without our loyal readers we would truly be nothing. It’s you who inspire us, week after week, to search deep inside ourselves to find the witty, the chuckle-worthy and the insightful. Or, failing that, a dick joke.

With fond regards (but not too fond, I don’t know some of you all that well),

Conor