My Year of Laffy Taffy: Days 50 – 56: The Finale

The End

Well I made it 50+ days in, not bad! 13.6% of the way to the end. Sadly, it looks like this will be the final YoLT post – now maybe more appropriately named Two Months of Laffy Taffy. It was fun, but the content just isn’t there. After this post I have like a week’s worth of usable wrappers left, and even if I went down to eating a piece of LT a day, splitting a joke wrapper across two days, I don’t think I could eke out more than another couple weeks.

Also, I’ve been devastatingly sick for the past two weeks and the thought of eating more Laffy Taffy during those days made me feel even worse. So I didn’t. And it made me feel slightly better. So, like all good things, I think it must end. Not a full year like I planned, but I’m at least glad to have enjoyed attempting something that I’ve thought about doing for many years. Thanks for going on the journey with me, and I hope you get some final entertainment out of the following final reports.

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Day 50

Today’s flavor is brought to you by cherry. Haven’t had it for a minute and I must have the Mandate of Heaven today, because the first one I picked wasn’t a duplicate wrapper.

I like how this one is just “butterfly.” Not “A butterfly” like usual. reminiscent of yesterday’s caveman joke – maybe he got hired by Wonka after his failed attempt to turn his car insurance rep career into a sitcom one, and is writing their joke wrappers. That would make a lot of sense, really. More than most of these jokes do, anyway.

Also a regular bow, if we’re talking knots, or a crossbow. Or an elbow. Or… rochambeau. No? Too many linguistic liberties with that one? Ah, well maybe you’re just a Philistine.

Day 51

It’s been a minute since I’ve gone back to the blue raspberry well. But ol’ reliable keeps serving me up the soft sweet stuff with a new joke to “enjoy.”

Not bad on the face of it, though “wrapped up” isn’t a phrase typically chosen for that action – I believe “tied up” is the more appropriate expression. That being said, a minor quibble as it still works, and “tied up” would be better used as a punchline if the gift was some bondage type gift – maybe a joke better saved for Laffy Taffy After Dark flavors, marketed towards the edgy 16+ audience.

What are the odds? I guess not bad considering the themes of every wrapper seem to revolve around fruit (especially bananas), computers, 19th century riddles, and rainbows.

I see where they were going with this one and I’ll accept that the premise makes sense, but it’s a strictly inferior rainbow joke to the one we read yesterday, so to the incinerator it goes.

Day 52

Tiring of duplicates, I went through my various bags to eliminate them once and for all. unfortunately, that meant I had to get rid of over 80% of my current stash. This is the point I realized that at this rate, I’d be out of content in two weeks. It’s not even something that can be solved by just buying more, as all currently produced taffy seems to have the same jokes on the wrappers. Ah well.

Today is banana, and this flavor and blue raspberry constitute the majority of non-duplicate jokes, so we’ll be seeing a lot more of these this and next week.

Would have used “insect” instead of “bug”, but it’s a charming little joke. I do like ladybugs.

Not as charming. Perhaps “bovine” instead of “bull” for this one. Lazy writing, lazy wrapper, lazy flavor. Not a lot of good content today. Exactly what I’ve come to expect from the most reprehensible of flavors.

Day 53

Blue raspberry. I think they’re calcifying or something, each one has been tougher to chew than the last. That or the sugar is rotting my teeth so fast that they’re now soft, like noodles.

This joke would have been way better if the question was something like: “What did the programmer name his band?” A gigabyte isn’t a type of data, it’s a capacity measurement, and the query just sounds weird that way. If you can make it into a real world situation, do so, it’s funnier that way. “Data” doesn’t have bands and even with the willing suspension of disbelief we have to do in jokeland, it’s still a bad example of one.

I wonder if the two jokes are intentionally made to have similar themes sometimes. Looks like it’s a computer-related wrapper duo today. This one at least makes sense, as it’s a common problem PCs have. Sadly, making sense will not save the writer from the gallows, since the joke is still bad.

Day 54

Banana banana, I won’t be sorry to see the last of you.

I won’t be caught twice, now at least the hash part makes sense. It’s funny, I’ve had hash browns my whole life but thinking of the word “hash” all by itself does not make me think of potatoes. Something more… narcotic-y.

Mm, you crack the peanut shell, not really the peanut itself. Maybe it should be walnuts as the nut of choice. Or maybe the writer should never have been born. One of those things for sure.

Day 55

Blue raspberry, the last bite I’ll have of it in the name of this jester’s campaign. They seem to be getting harder and harder, though still nothing like the feeling of biting the curb that cherry gives me.

The beach hasn’t greeted me in years. As a father to young children, I don’t dare take them on a long trip to somewhere that exotic. Sometimes I think I’ve forgotten what the open ocean looks like…

I kind of like this one, due to my fondness for the moon, though it makes an interesting departure from thousands of years of human tradition by implying the moon is a man. ” ‘e clips it” is “he clips it,” I assume? Doesn’t quite sit right with me, I dunno – call me old fashioned.

Day 56

Well this is it. Last one. Over so soon, it’s a bittersweet Sour Apple that I chew for my final bite.

Definitely not the only type, and just because the word “up” is in “upload” doesn’t mean it’s literally rising into the air, or even vertically.

Fitting the final joke is also a near duplicate of one we’ve seen before. It’s the same reason the cable got sad – apparently going wireless causes a lot of relationship problems. And really, that’s kind of an allegory for society… wait, have these jokes been deep, philosophical ones all along? Have I been the out-of-touch fool who doesn’t get earnest, salt-of-the-Earth humor?

Nah.

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This has been February 19 – 25 of my journey through the Taffyverse. You can catch the entirety of its 56 day run in a chronological list over at the index.