Yeah, I’m kind of seeing it as three different options. The first is that whatever they were traveling on that crashed had these things, the other’s like you said - it was sent with arrive too late, or #3 they’re dumb and didn’t notice that all the boxes floating around were exactly what they need. Very unclear
The second one seems most likely as there are indications that the boxes are only just arriving. Also there is an old meme about sending away for items delivered from Acme, like the coyote in Road Runner cartoons.
I think the joke is that the guy is unbelievably cartoonishly lucky that all those things are floating too him on a deserted island all at once, put in juxtaposition with the one element of bad luck (that he's already long dead).
The joke, IMO, is that no matter how crazy a social norm is, violating it causes us to feel shame and embarrassment. Comedy = tragedy + time. By taking the absurdity of the social norm to an extreme, the shame is all that is left to relate to unless you also love porcupines like I do and regularly hang out with other porcupine enthusiasts.
There are layers of absurdity. It’s some kind of a porcupine appreciation club, and everyone has one. And then his deflated. Do porcupines deflate? Is that a thing that happens? They have little sharp pokey bits, maybe that’s something that happens. Is he embarrassed? Angry that someone might have deflated his porcupine?
Or was his a fake, inflatable porcupine? Was he pretending to have one, and why? Peer pressure? Are people with procupines so popular in this scenario that it would be worth pretending?
Or maybe he’s infiltrated the group. Perhaps his cover is now blown, like his fake porcupine. Maybe he’s giving everyone the side eye to see if they will attack?
Ultimately, I think the joke is us, sitting here, wondering about a deflated porcupine, trying to figure it out.
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