So long, George

I was really shocked this morning when I heard this morning that George Carlin had died. I mean, yeah, he was 71, but he just seemed like one of those people who would always be around, someone bigger than life. Someone this world needed. Maybe it's because I became a fan at an early age, when we got HBO when I was around 9 and he was already a huge name. I quickly got hooked on all the comedy specials and would stay up late on weekends and during the summers to watch them again and again and again and again.

It wasn't just the "dirty" stuff that appealed to me. Most especially with Carlin, it was how he was able to pick out the absurdities of life, our language and our world. And no one group was off-limits to him. He made me think. I didn't always agree with what he said, and didn't always like what he said, but I was always amazed that he just came out and said it. And I always laughed.

So have a few laughs, courtesy of the late, great genius:

Honesty may be the best policy, but it's important to remember that apparently, by elimination, dishonesty is the second-best policy.

The very existence of flamethrowers proves that some time, somewhere, someone said to themselves, "You know, I want to set those people over there on fire, but I'm just not close enough to get the job done."

Well, if crime fighters fight crime and fire fighters fight fire, what do freedom fighters fight? They never mention that part to us, do they?

When someone asks you, A penny for your thoughts, and you put your two cents in, what happens to the other penny?

I thought about how mothers feed their babies with tiny little spoons and forks so I wondered, what do Chinese mothers use? Toothpicks?

"I am" is reportedly the shortest sentence in the English language. Could it be that "I do" is the longest sentence?

And there's some excellent clips of his routines here. "Feminist Blowjob" is one of the best.