Looking for Laughs: The Sniglet

Rich Hall is still around, but during the 80's he really was a driving performer in my interest in humor derived from the English Language.  Of course, George Carlin was the master in the comical exploration of wordsmithing, but Hall was no slouch. 

He started his career in stand up comedy before making a successful foray into television.  He was a writer and performer for Late Night with David Letterman (which I will eventually go into with some depth at a point in the future), before becoming a regular on HBO's Not Necessarily the News.  He was a player on my biggest ingress of Saturday Night Live, the 1984 season, and is the only performer to be on that show as well as ABC's short lived Fridays. (along with Michael Richards.  Before Seinfeld, he paid his dues.  Anyone see Transylvania 6-5000?)

While on NNTN, he unleashed the sniglet upon the world.  He of course expanded it's sphere by appearing on Late Night as a guest to sell the idea, and multiple volumes of books full of them were published. One copy I had (Unexplained Sniglets of the Universe) even invited you to send in your own creation to be published in a future book.  It even brandished an entry form at the back. 

What is a sniglet?  It's a made up word that serves to describe something that may not otherwise have a single word description.  For example, from the premiere Sniglets edition, you have:  

EXPRESSHOLES:  n.  People who try to sneak more than the "eight items or less" into the express checkout line. 

Of course being around 12 or 13, I found these things fucking hilarious, sought out and bought the one book I did end up having, and shared them with friends who always found them annoying and far less funny than I did.  I bought the slim tome in Waco, Texas, (at the Richland Mall, of course), and it went over just as poorly in Waco as it did in Wisconsin after I moved back home. 

One of those things that I should have just shared with myself I guess. 

I did make up my own sniglet, and planned to send it in to that address at the back of the book which was P.O. Box 2350 in Hollywood.  

This is it's world premiere.  DRUM ROLL, PLEASE.

PILLOTISSERIE:  The act of turning your pillow over in the middle of the night to lay your face on the cooler side.

I never did send it in.  Maybe with some encouragement, I would have done so, but being surrounded by people with no sense of humor at the time, or at least not sharing mine, I felt it futile at best. 

Anyway, long live Rich Hall and his sniglet.