I'll Go Home Then, It's Warm and Has Chairs. The Unpublished Emails. by David Thorne

by David Thorne

All new, never before published material from the author of The Internet is a Playground and 27bslash6.com - new emails, new articles, new exclusive content. Featuring more than 200 pages of brand-spanking-new material, I'll Go Home Then, It's Warm and Has Chairs is the second book by author David Thorne.

Genres: Humor, Nonfiction, Comedy, Essays, Short Stories, Memoir, Internet

Paperback

First published January 1, 2012

About the author

David Thorne is an Australian humourist, satirist, Internet personality and New York Times best-selling author. His work has been featured on the BBC, The Late Show with David Letterman, The Ellen DeGeneres Show, and Late Night with Conan O'Brien. Thorne gained public recognition in late 2008 for an email exchange in which he attempts to pay an overdue bill with a drawing of a seven-legged spider. The exchange spread virally via email and social networking sites, leading to a surge of visitors to his website 27b/6 (27bslash6). 27b/6 features a collection of humorous emails and articles from Thorne's life. These and additional essays appear in Thorne's book, The Internet is a Playground. Published by Penguin Group and released on 28 April 2011, the book debuted at number four on The New York Times Best Seller list.

Reviews

[jv poore · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book brings me joy.

Thorne is so funny that laughter bursts from my mouth a milisecond before I chide myself for laughing at something so wildly inappropriate.

[Luffy Sempai · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'll go home then is not an apt title by any means for any kind of book. Trust David Thorne to come up with it. It's not as good as Thorne's first book, The Internet's a playground. He knows this book is inferior, a fact that I grasped within the first few pages. Although the quite long foreword was good, it showed a different kind of humor, more slapstick.

The book's main jokes are double meaning. That's fine if the idea by itself is funny. Maybe this book is not for me but I did enjoy the Internet's a playground... what has changed? Well I think that David Thorne's simply happier and more mellow. He is relatively newly married and like the proverbial stand up comic, he is no longer bitter and his new-ish material lacks vim.

Did I go into this book with impossible to fulfil expectations? No. But I started reading with a wide grin that faded and would not reappear. Some of the entries are from his website. I didn't laugh then and I didn't laugh much thereafter at the old and new material. The fact that I couldn't understand the myriad references proves nothing as the few that I understood didn't improve the jokes and I also didn't feel rewarded a la Captain America in the Avengers.

[Tracey Allen at Carpe Librum · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm a huge fan of David Thorne's caustic humour and writing style and his work always (without fail) makes me laugh out loud. His first book The Internet is a Playground was a 5 star read for me in 2013, and this one, I'll Go Home Then, It's Warm and Has Chairs - The Unpublished Emails is just as funny.

There's plenty of email trails to delve into, photoshopped pictures to enjoy and a treasure trove of stories, anecdotes and letters to laugh about. Again, I couldn't help myself and had to read one of the stories out loud, and keep wanting to use some of his best one liners in conversation.

David Thorne's sense of humour is full of satire and wit, and he captures the office work environment so well it makes me chuckle just thinking about it. His comments about the team building weekend are still making me laugh and his diagrams really bring his scenarios to life in a way you can't possibly imagine until you see his work.

If you've never read any of his stuff before, you can read some it for free on his website, or grab any one of his books. You won't be sorry, instead you'll be laughing and looking for someone to share it with post-haste.

I've already been recommending this one to friends and family, and that says it all really.

[Peter Derk · Rating 4 out of 5]

Oh, David Thorne. You give trolls a good name.

For those who are unfamiliar, David Thorne is in the business of giving people the business. Someone emails him something, often an asinine request of him, and he takes them down a terrible, horrible rabbit hole.

What he does is what people would call trolling, although I'm not totally sure that's what's going on.

First off, let's get something straight. For some reason, people who engage in trolling online are called "trolls." Which is stupid. Trolling isn't what trolls, the mythical creatures, do all day. It's not like those creatures say, "Just livin' dat troll life, trollin' it up!"

Trolling is a term that comes from the boring, awful, stupid world of fishing. Which is probably why we've mis-associated it with Lord of the Rings shit. Fishing is boring and stupid.

What trolling is, in fishing, is casting your line out and letting it trail behind a boat. The bait slowly moves through the water, and you see if you can get something to bite. To connect it to the online internet, you're putting some bait out there, and sort of lazily waiting to see if something bites.

So, shouldn't someone who trolls on the internet be called a fisherman? Instead of saying "Don't feed the trolls" shouldn't we say, "Don't bite the bait?"

Anyway, David Thorne isn't really a traditional troll in that he doesn't put stuff out there with the intent of getting a bite (most of the time, anyway). He responds to crap he gets. Sort of like he's not even fishing, he's just walking around a lake when a particularly stupid fish jumps out of the water and bites down on his pant leg.

The book provides a great lesson for all of us in how to avoid being trolled. I'd like to summarize these lessons in a simple X Point Plan [I'm putting X because I'm making this up as I go, and I don't know how many points I'll have. Maybe I'll come back and fix this. But probably not].

1. Oh my god, just shut up!
When someone is trolling you, all you have to do is stop talking to them. A troller can't really troll unless you keep up the momentum. Because the troller only cares about your reaction, not the actual issue at hand, if you remove your reaction, there's nothing left. It's amazing to see how people always, ALWAYS want to have the last word with Thorne. And then they end up in his book. And their last word is usually a stupid one.

2. Having an argument is fruitless when the other person's goal is to piss you off and waste your time.
There's nothing to be learned. You won't walk away with a new understanding, and neither will the other person. In this book, the more someone argued with Thorne, the more passionate and wordy they were, the better it was for Thorne.

3. If you're thinking of starting a reply or comment with some form of "I don't know if you're a troll or what," then don't make that comment at all.
Seriously, that's all you need to know. If you think someone is a troll, they're almost definitely a troll. Or they're so profoundly stupid that their actual comments seem like trolling. Either way.

4. Don't troll the troller.
Sometimes people try to pull this off, but I don't think it works most times. It seems like it'd work, like reversing a practical joke so the bucket full of red hot screws falls on THEIR head (anyone? just me?), but when it comes to complete insincerity, butting up against more complete insincerity doesn't make for hilarious fodder. It's like watching a slam dunk contest where the contestants both give zero fucks about slam dunking. The idea is funny, but the enjoyment wears off quick.

5. Kill with kindness. And dumbness.
If you've got a troller that you have to address for whatever reason, there's no way around it, the answer is to be the sincerest, kindest idiot on the planet. If you're willing to resign yourself to looking stupid on the internet for a minute, then you can be this good-hearted idiot who not only doesn't know they're being trolled, but genuinely things the troller is trying to ask a question or express something. The thing is, a lot of the most successful trolling comes about because the person taking the bait is unwilling to look stupid, unwilling to have anonymous strangers think they have been bested. Even when they realize they're being trolled, they cannot let go. And these are the absolute best people to target, by far the most fun. You know who's not fun to target? Someone who only seems to be nicer, kinder, and stupider the harder you go at them. Just be a nice dum-dum. Some people will see what you're doing, some won't get it, and most will not care at all. Meanwhile, the troller will be completely exhausted.

6. Just accept that this is part of the world.
Getting your goat, taking the piss out of you, there are all these terms that mean the same thing as trolling, and there are all these terms because people have been doing it forever. And we all do it. Some jerkoff pulls up on your bumper, and you just slowly let off the gas. You go to a party and see how many beers you can open, take a single drink of, and then leave sitting around (this happens with such alarming frequency, even with adults, that I have to assume it's intentional). You heat up a whole pack of screws until they're red hot, put them in a bucket, balance the bucket between the cracked door and the frame, and then call someone into the room. Seriously, am I the only one who knows about this hilarious prank?

The alternative is to try and correct the trolls, which is exactly what they love.

Face it, they've got us by the short hairs.

[Ammara · Rating 4 out of 5]

This guy is funny.

[Angela · Rating 5 out of 5]

I quickly realized I was not going to be able to read this anywhere in public due to the uncontrollable bouts of laughter it caused. Not a bad problem to have.

[Leslie Langtry · Rating 5 out of 5]

From my review at bookendbabes.com:

http://www.bookendbabes.com/2012/07/0...

Every time I review a funny book here at BEB, I worry that I’ve gone too far. “That’s it Leslie. You’ve read all the really funny books out there, and nothing will make you laugh out loud at the orthodontist again.” Sigh. It’s sad because I believe it to be true. And yet, I’m still here, reviewing funny books. But this time, I think I’ve truly hit the wall…jumped the shark with Fonzie…whatever. Until I found this – David Thorne’s I’ll Go Home Then; It’s Warm and Has Chairs, the Unpublished Emails.

I read this over lunch in my office at the day job, door closed, practically suffocating myself so no one else would hear me snorting with laughter and become alarmed. I read this in the car to my husband as we drove to a mall – where we both arrived with puffy, red crybaby faces – hiccupping like deranged leprechauns. I don’t know why I don’t learn from these things, really. You’d think I would, right?

This book is…I laughed so much…there’s this thing with cats…oh forget it and bring me another vodka tonic.

See? I can’t even come up with a coherent sentence. Unless it’s about vodka – then I can.

You may be aware of Mr. Thorne – he’s behind some serious meme damage, including Missing Missy and trying to pay his chiropractor with a picture he drew of a seven-legged spider. But I’m a bit slow at these things so I’m just learning about him now. And thank god, because I was pretty sure I’d have to review Jonathan Franzen next. (Insert shudder here).

Anyway, Thorne is the guy who does and says the things you wish you could do or say, but don’t (largely because you have to go out in public at some point – and bodyguards are pricey).
He takes on the obnoxious, ego-maniacal coworker, the very silly-headed secretary, the police, McDonalds, etc. He even takes on Human Resources when the obnoxious, ego-maniacal coworker and silly-headed secretary file complaints. You want to do things like this, but you can’t. Or maybe you just won’t. Or you have some semblance of common sense.

Thorne does these things for you. That’s right – like a modern-day, smart-alecky (I promised Dani no swearing) cousin of Jesus – he sacrifices himself so that you don’t have to. Isn’t that thoughtful?

This is one of those books you should probably read in paperback – as opposed to e-format. I read it on my kindle just fine, but this is a book you’ll want to open and read often. And then buy his first book, The Internet is a Playground: Irreverent Correspondences of an Evil Online Genius. Read them someplace fairly private (I recommend being the only human on a space station) and enjoy.

[Eric Johnson · Rating 4 out of 5]

The only reason to buy this book is to thank Mr. Thorne for all his humor that is available on the internet. But that is a very good reason. Absolutlly amazing amusing stuff.

[Daniel C · Rating 4 out of 5]

David Thorne is a jerk.

Granted, there are a lot of jerks out there making money off of their jerkiness. There are the boys from Jackass. The main characters from It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia and Arrested Development and The League and Archer and Seinfeld and Curb Your Enthusiasm. Tosh.0. The abysmally popular Tucker Max novels. There's even Steve Martin's The Jerk, although he's less a jerk than an idiot. Not that the two aren't often synonymous.

That's the real trademark of a jerk worth paying attention to: intelligence. And if Thorne is a jerk, he's at least a smart jerk. His first book (mostly) contained email exchanges he'd had with co-workers, online roustabouts, and folks who were otherwise just trying to do their jobs (mostly bill collectors). He approached these communiques with the subtle and absurdist wit of Monty Python channeling John Swartzwelder. Or vice versa. They're a lot funnier if you believe that they're real, and after having read both of his books, I'm inclined to believe. If they're entirely fictional, then I'd be more impressed, although not nearly as amused.

Much of his first book relied on knowing things about David, such as his coworkers' names and various inside jokes he had with regards to most of them. Certain people -- Simon, Holly, Shannon, Lucius, Thomas -- figure prominently in Thorne's life, but it takes a few reads to figure out how or why, at which point the jokes start to make a lot more sense. Of course, some of his more famous exchanges don't need a whole lot of backstory to work ("Missing Missy" is perhaps his most famous, and for good reason).

The first book was also peppered with essays that weren't quite as funny as the emails. Written with a random, absurd, kitchen-sink approach, they're pretty much Thorne being as wacky as he can possibly be. At their best, they sound like some of Woody Allen's older stuff from The New Yorker. At their worst, they're repetitive jokes about how dumb he can make the narrator sound. Overall, Thorne's funnier when he's just being mean to what (I hope) are real people.

This book is, I think, much better. For one thing, the ridiculous essays are gone, replaced with true-life tales of both his home life and his experiences with nearly cheating death. They show how well he can find the humor in almost anything without having to resort to bizarre non-sequiturs or wacky nonsense. If you like the wacky nonsense, he's included several picture stories (most about his group of cat friends) that are punchy and hilarious (the best is when the cops pull them over). There are a few pictures of formal notices, letters, and forms that are difficult to read on the Kindle, but they aren't completely illegible. Overall, it's a much better read than the first book, even if it does make David look even more like a jerk than the first book. I mean, I'd hate to be in his life, but I enjoy reading about others who aren't as fortunate.

[Viktoria · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

Can't really see most people digging this, but I love it, and so.

As well, nearly all of the content in this book and his first are available at his excellent website, and better still, the images are in color. So, like, you can save some money and check it all out without opening your wallet.

Me, I buy his books because I find his stuff so gasp-inducingly funny that I want to support him. Laughed out loud long and wheezily at so much in this book (and on the site), that it is hard to single out favorite bits. Though I think my favorite is when Thorne records himself humming a score of songs and TV theme tunes, burns them on CD, then creates a package for it all and sends it to a bunch of friends as "David Thorne Hums the Theme to Space 1999 and Other Christmas Classics." We get the email responses from the unlucky recipients, and I think I've already read through them a half-dozen times, boring my business partner and Beth with my breathless read-alouds of the emails.

So much fun.

[Christa Van · Rating 4 out of 5]

David Thorne is back with another book of emails, childhood stories, and interactions with neighbors and businesses that are priceless. He still works with Simon, a guy who I assume is the "Dwight" of the office, David being the "Jim." David delights in pushing Simon who has now taken to filling our HR complaints about David. The forms are all included and they are priceless. In other news, David has moved to the states and gotten a dog. That doesn't sound like much but it is great in context.

Plus, how do you beat the cover? Only if the snowboarding, astronaut cat had a book maybe?

[John Patterson · Rating 4 out of 5]

More of David Thorne's irreverent and yet somehow insightful sense of humor. Since this book is full of articles and emails that did not make the web site (and a few that did) it is not quite as funny. Still a fun read for fans of his web site.

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

It is absolutely hilarious, if you are familiar with his writing or website.

[Moriah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nearly perfect. I only wish there was more new content in it. And cats.

At least I've got a copy with the cool penguin on the cover. B)

[Megan · Rating 5 out of 5]

LOL

No seriously, I would erupt in laughter frequently while reading causing my husband to run into the room, thinking that I was dying or having a fit or something.

[Eric · Rating 4 out of 5]

More funny, antagonizing silliness from Thorne. For some reason, these rants feel more angry and personal. Everyone laughs and wins!

[Heather · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was laughing out loud so much. Hilarity.

[Chaz Donaldson · Rating 4 out of 5]

I would have finished faster, but I only read it on the toilet.

[Tom M. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Much more consistent than his first book and, therefore, much funnier.

His continued harassment of his co-worker (especially the formal disciplinary write-up) just gets better and better -- I laughed uncontrollably at one point, which I haven't done with a book in years.

(Why he starts off with a piece from his first book escapes me as it wasn't necessary at all.)

[Barbara · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love David Thorne. Not enough to marry him, as then my ego would be involved to some degree and I would probably have to kill him. I found this book when I was culling and cleaning the wall-o-bookshelves in our bedroom and realized (with glee) that I hadn’t, actually, finished reading it! So, I did. I’m glad.

[Earlthomas29 · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read a lot

I have a good sense of humor, and most of the time when I hear or read something funny, I say or think "now THAT is damn funny".

When reading this book, I burst out laughing so many times that I had to keep handing the book to my wife so that she could read the chapter. Then I got to watch her laugh too.

If you like to see you wife laugh, then buy read this book.

[Simon Sweetman · Rating 2 out of 5]

Remember when we all thought this guy was hilarious? His time-wasting pranks? So clever. Getting one back for the little guy, etc...Nah, I read this and just thought he was a mean-spirited wind-up artist. Shit-stirrer toppling on over into being a fairly nasty, petty troll. It's funny what time does. If I'd read it at the time I might have thought it very funny indeed. (It's really not).

[Marshall Cobb · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thorne says upfront that this book is a lessor offering compromised largely of stuff that didn't make it into his first one--largely because it isn't as good. There are still treasures here but it does match his description.

[Matthew · Rating 5 out of 5]

Back and forth emails with Penguin about logo adjustments... memos from corporate about adding Justin Bieber's face to all the stock images in a coworker's folder... Emails from friends after receiving a 'christmas album' of humming...

This book is full of silly trolling and is very funny.

[D. Rambo · Rating 5 out of 5]

I unabashedly love David Thorne. I like to pretend I am in the advertising industry because of him. It's not true but it might make him feel better about himself.

If you don't like sarcastic, sometimes juvenile humor this book is not for you. Also you might be boring.

[K · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mais um pra coleção de lidos! E mais uma coleção de histórias fantásticas e divertidas.

[Julie Braunstein · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good Laugh

This guy is an arsehole in the best way. Sometimes, the e-mail chains drone on, but overall, hilarious and a quick read.

[Lorna · Rating 5 out of 5]

A hilarious collection of random articles that made me chuckle throughout. I would recommend this book to anyone that wants a laugh! The sections are short and sweet, making it an easy read!