DISQUS

jennifer k · 1 year ago

Omg, great article. I love that site, but think that the appeal is equal parts humor and tragedy.

DJ · 1 year ago

You know one good way to rid some of the sadness in the world? Making others laugh with you rather than cry. Thanks LOLann.

Sonny Gill · 1 year ago

I can haz hooman inturakchun wif ann...

kthxbai.

MLDina · 1 year ago

I don't think I've ever looked at the LOLCats from that perspective before. I try to just have a good laugh at the funny photos that go so well with the captions, but I can see (in some of the pictures) where you're coming from. Is there a spinoff LOLDogs site?

Gary Cohen · 1 year ago

Testimony to man's creativity and imagination. It is a hilarious site and I love that the content is reader created. The beauty is that different images really appeal to different people. "The Dog looks pissed" is IMHO, priceless.

Lucretia Pruitt · 1 year ago

I hate lolcats. I loathe them. I detest the dumbed down language that accompanies them.
But I LOVE this post.

It's the first time I've ever seen anything of value in lolcats.
Thanks for posting it.

Deb · 1 year ago

on the floor, seriously. I needed this post, at exactly this time.

thanks,
Deb

Ann Handley · 1 year ago

@mldina Are you kidding? Of course there's a LOLdogs...
http://ihasahotdog.com/

I kind of like LOLprez (or whatever they call it), too:

http://punditkitchen.com/

Thanks for the feedback, all.

dizzymum · 1 year ago

I love Lolcats for exactly the same reasons. Animals are sooo expressive, funny, sad all at once!

Chance · 1 year ago

True Genius post -- I detest LOLcats and yet, here you are, showing me the thing of value in them. Thank you, and thank you again.

Julie Roads · 1 year ago

Okay - I admit that I had seen random shots from this site and never took the time to explore or break it down...still not sold on the site...but, as always, sold on your writing and insights...

Paul Chaney · 1 year ago

Ann, u r friggin' amazing. (Sorry, my best attempt at ICAN talk.) To see past the seeming silliness to the real emotion being expressed, then to articulate it so eloquently. Nice.

But, now that I've read this post, I'm all in a funk too. I was really trying to hold it in, all this holiday melancholy, but your post pushed the wrong button and now it's all gushing out.

Ever since my divorce in 2004, I've hated the holidays because all they do is serve as a ragged edge sharp reminder that my two sons have no place to call home. Oh, there's mom's place and dad's place, but no longer "our" place. And the brief visit I get with them for a few hours on Thanksgiving or Christmas can in no way salve the harsh truth that things are not like they were supposed to be.

I'm sad. I miss my sons. I can't fix what's broken. I hope January will soon arrive.

Mukund Mohan · 1 year ago

You know the thing is more than ever, now people crave for humor, comfort and a sense of belonging. I categorize icanhascheeseburger in the comfort website bucket. I dont go there often, but when I do its to replace my mac and cheese.

Leigh Duncan-Durst · 1 year ago

Annie,

Girl, you are far too down in the dumps if you are laughing at cats. It's a dog's world woman! SNAP out of it!

Don't you realize how wrong this is? The thing about cats is they will NEVER love you back. It is all about them... they're just manipulating you... step away from the LOLcats. ;-)

I did laugh. Dangit. I confess. I did. Actually, I'm beginning to wonder about the superiority of dogs to cats. Maggie (our lab) swiped our Turkey Carcass from a not-so-strategic place Thursday night. (Read: Hubby left it out).

She managed to sneak it into the back yard for intermittent snacking. She didn't get legs or carcass bones, SOMEHOW...but we have been watching her aggressively to make sure she's okay.

We have seen her through one bout of montezuma's revenge (which commenced ACROSS the floor of MY OFFICE!) and four days of THE most foul, horrid, death plague, rotten egg smelling, turkey tainte, leave the room gagging farts on the planet.

Sadly, my former scared-of-her-own-farts chief morale officer has been summarily BANNED from my home office. Chem Dry is coming to the rescue for the floor. A cat is looking mighty good right now but I should feel differently in the morning.

LOVE YOU, you amazing writer!

Just remember, you have friends. LOTS of them. And widon tawk like dis or caz athsma.

Loved your description of Ross - and the post...

Shelley · 1 year ago

I have never seen LOLcats before, Annster. Most of that site looks like stupid crap, but you have shown us some of the FUNNIEST specimens. I'm dyin' here.

I try not to let the holidays bum me out, so instead I concentrate on keeping some magic in it for 10-year-old Kinsey. That helps balance out the uneasy discomfort of having to spend time with relatives who actually care very little about each other. (If they ask me one more time, "What exactly is it you do again, Shelley?" I swear I'll tell them I'm a prostitute.)

Ann Handley · 1 year ago

As always, the comments here are richer than the post itself. At least for me. Thanks, everyone.

I think the holiday thing is just a little overblown. Or possibly I've watched too many Hollywood movies and have unrealistic expectations. That might be it, too. ; ) Thanks for snapping me out of THAT, Leigh...

Hugs to you, Paul. Thank you for your honesty. Is it January yet? kthxbai

And Shelley: I always get requests to fix hardware, because "I work in computers." riiiiiighhttt.....

Sonia Simone | Remarkable Comm · 1 year ago

I love LOLs. I don't know why. Maybe it's like getting stung by bees, get stung often enough and you start to have an unreasonable reaction.

Gavin Heaton · 1 year ago

You are such a great storyteller, Ann! But that is exactly what draws us to lolcats ... it is the space between what we see before our eyes and the short word stories that let us enter a different world.

That's what it is like here ... Ann's world. And when you share this with everyone, it reminds us of our own lives, our own tragedies and triumphs. And in that gift, the space between us all shrinks just a little bit more ;)

Christian Gulliksen · 1 year ago

At first I thought you were making this up. Swear to god.

These lolcat people kind of scare me.

Becky Mochaface · 1 year ago

I love that site! While I do like the cheezburger pics, I agree it is the ones that have more feeling and depth to it that I'm most drawn to.

Claudia · 1 year ago

Ann,
Once again, you use humour as a direct connector between you and us, at least me, to deeper emotions. It acts like a "magic opener". You give to see beauty, in you (so much!) and us. Did you ever think about becoming a dentist?? !

Blaire · 1 year ago

As a recovering social worker, I can tell you that the holidays were our biggest nightmare. Suicide, child abuse, domestic violence, all of it skyrocketed starting in late November. And you want to know why? Because people watch Miracle on 34th Street like its a documentary. They stare longinly at the pictures on Christmas cards and believe that those families are real. (You know the ones with the glistening perfectly browned turkeys and smiling grandmas and adoring siblings.) Now I realize that I should be using this space to tell Ann that her post was brilliant (and it was) but instead I am going to give in to my social worker compulsion to save everyone from holiday hell.
Please, I beg all of you who get depressed this time of year to listen to me carefully.
1. I promise you, cross my heart, that not one of those families are real. Not the ones on cards, not the ones in movies and not the ones in Touched by an Angel. They are fake. They are airbrushed just like the models with no cellulite. To compare your life to theirs and come up wanting is like measuring your swimming skills against a mermaid. Say it with me "THEY ARE NOT REAL." These are manufactured images designed to make me go buy more stuff to try to reach a nirvana that does not exist. I promise.

2. Tell everyone and I mean everyone in your life that in an effort to reduce your carbon footprint or to do your part against the recession, you are ONLY accepting donations of catfood/dogfood to the local animal shelter as gifts this year. NO exceptions. Do you know how good it feels to have the shelter send you a thank you card for fifty pounds of dry catfood sent in your name? You'll be wishing Christmas was every month.

3. You must rage against the dying light. Hold a
hawaiian luau party. Throw a Mexican fiesta. Have a party where everyone has to wear a bridesmaid dress so that they can get a second use out of that peach cobbler fluff pair of shoes. Call it the "Anti Christmas Christmas Party" and you will be shocked at the number of people who show up at your house and wont leave. They hate Christas too.

4.Do NOT let hallmark or any other corporate entity manipulate your emotions. Every time you see one of those commercials, cards, pictures, etc.. just repeat the words of Emerson outloud "That is TOTAL bullshit, most people live lives of quiet desperation." (loose quote)

4. Winter is sad, summer is not. Go right now to the tanning bed and throw caution to the wind. Get some wrinkles. Trust me, it's just not possible to be depressed with a tan.

I could go on but I accept that this is a comment section and I have overstepped my boundaries.
Anne, you made us laugh and that is the ultimate weapon against the holidays. Good job.

David Niall Wilson · 1 year ago

I believe that Lolcats are probably the single most ingenious development on the Internet. Think about it. When web pages (personal pages) first proliferated, the biggest complaint was that everyone put up their "My Cat Fluffy" pages and clogged the bandwidth and search engines.

Now, decades later, not only are they still hogging bandwidth, but they have their own site, an international following, and are almost the only consistently funny "watering hole" on the net. I have literally fallen out of my chair laughing at some of them and...I have contributed. I have made (to date) over 80 lolcats, and will continue to make them because they make others smile, and I like that:



You can view my lolcats at:

DIS PLACE

Kirk Petersen · 1 year ago

I'm astonished by how many commenters say they have never seen LOLcats before.

My favorite was "Her eyes not down here."

Michelle / chelpixie · 1 year ago

Giggling and awwwwing.

Indeed this day on particular, it's good to laugh and good to remember, but especially good to realize that being vulnerable to sadness and hurt makes us human. There's love that goes along with being human that we're lucky to experience.

Leah · 1 year ago

I think I might be the lone voice of dissention, but I do enjoy the holidays. Winter's my favorite season (strange and unnatural, yes, I know, I've heard) because I love staying in with a cuppa cocoa and a movie or hitting the ski slopes or snowmobile trails equally.

Until this year, my Christmases were simple (because I was living happily at home and still in school). Then my boyfriend's parents got divorced, and mine just did this past June. Last Christmas morning, my mom welled up and said that it was the last Christmas we'd all have together because I was planning to move out in the summer/fall. Now I know it's the last we had as a single family unit in the house I've lived in since 7th grade.

So as much as I've loved the holidays in the past, it's going to be difficult this year. Given all that, though, I'm doing my best to remain cheerful and hopeful that the Christmas season is more than just family drama, but a time to celebrate what we have and be glad. I dare you to listen to the music from The Nutcracker ballet and try not to dance. It's much harder than it seems!

And on a happier note, there's nothing better on a Monday morning than an RSS reader full of LOLcats, LOLdogs, Pundit Kitchen (that's the government one, with a happily liberal slant), and ROFLrazzi (the celebrity site, generally formatted like the motivational posters found in offices everywhere). The Cheezburger family of sites makes me smile like an idiot, and that's just what I need sometimes.

Nedra · 1 year ago

Though I never much got into the LOLcats thing, my guilty pleasure is its sister site the Fail Blog (failblog.org), which points out the absurdities of life (and often of marketers). Guaranteed to make you laugh if you get tired of cats.

BTW, that last pic was apparently miscategorized and clearly should have been in the lolsealz site. :-)

Shelley · 1 year ago

Note to self: Don't send Blaire to Ann's blog again... ;]

Larissa Gaston · 1 year ago

I think feeling melancholy during the holidays is normal. It's okay to miss people we love - we love them after all.:)

I've personally never gotten into LOLcats, but "He said he would meet me."...that one hurt (sniff).

Joel Libava · 1 year ago

Ann,
I am a Dog dude. Had a cat. I don't like their tude. Of course, they are easier to have as pets, cuz they do their own thang.

If their was a site like the Cheezburger one for dogs, I would probably frequent it as a respite for the everyday ups and down of life.

Anyway, great writing. {as usual}

Now, back to MY funky mood.

RUFF.

Joel Libava

Shelley Greenberg · 1 year ago

Hi Ann. :)

Thanks for this - you really got me thinking now about the philosophy behind Lolcats. And here I was thinking they were just for fun!

It's true though - the reason we like them so much is not so much because they're cats, but because we've personified them with human qualities - and it's those simple human blunders and hopes that really make for the success of Lolcats. I'd even offer that the same would hold true if it had been Loldogs (well, that actually exists now) or Lolpandas or some other animal (though I must admit that cats can be the silliest and most expressive of the animals but then again, I'm a cat person).

Lori · 1 year ago

With each of your posts I read, I get a little more scared - we think way too much alike! LOL

I love that site. It just sets any day right. :))

Joanie · 1 year ago

Blair, Blair, Blair. You scare me at times. Please enjoy your retirement.

1. Just because I watched Michael Phelps on TV doesn't mean that I expect to swim 5000 meters. Or 2, for that matter. Way too literal. I was inspired, however to train for my first triathlon at the age of 49.

2. I am down with that.

3. "Anti-Christmas"? Yes, let's boycott the birth of the Savior because you hate a season of love, joy and celebration. A 'raging' luau's going to fix THAT!

4. Yes, overcommercialization is ubiquitous . So to your point, we should all hate Mother's Day?!

5. I'll give you that one too. Sunlight boosts spirits. Just go outside if you can, not to a booth.

And LOLcats, is funny, you haters! Ann is right. Relating to the human condition is humorous, poignant and ridiculous...enjoy it.

Joanie

B.L Ochman · 1 year ago

What great writing ann!
I often wonder what's so funny on LOLcats when the captions make the cats look stupid. BUt "the dog looks pissed" is hilarious and cheered me right up for some bizarre reason.

the "he said he would meet me" is a heart breaker, and so is your description of missing someone we loved. we all have that....

thanks for a wonderful read, as always.

can't wait for your book.

Sean Carmody · 1 year ago

It took me a while to stop laughing and compose myself sufficiently to write a comment. That lolrus caught me entirely by surprised...the funniest thing I've seen in ages. And it works on so many levels!

Megan Cordero · 1 year ago

The cat looking in the oven ... LOL funny!

Danna · 1 year ago

I've looked at their loldogs site too, and although they're funny and I love dogs, the lolcat site always makes me laugh more. I wonder why...perhaps because cats take themselves so seriously? I don't know.

Iyabo Asani · 1 year ago

Hello there, this is my first time to your site. I found it by the referral from Shannon Paul's site.

You know this year, I had a very different Thanksgiving and the holidays are taking on new meaning for me. I was honest with my family this year about who I am, not who I think they want me to be and I really did not care about their reaction.

My family is a very educated uptight bunch of folks and it would not be P.C. to fall out laughing over sites like Icanhazcheeseburger.com.

To fix the holiday blues, I recommend everyone focus on being more authentic. You may not be able to be fully authentic, but just be a little bit more authentic. See how that works with you.

Use laughter and creativity to be that more authentic part of yourself.

Happy holidays.

Blaire · 1 year ago

Joanie
Speaking of way too literal....I think you misunderstood. I love Christmas. I love it because I dont let myself get manipulated by unrealistic expectations. Anti Christmas simply meant refusing to buy into the "perfect Christmas" fantasies that simply cause disapointment. I dont hate the season of "love, joy and celebration." I was offering lighthearted coping tips. Reality: Many people see this as a season of commercial bloat, lonliness and depression. And uh...Joanie...Christmas celebration began over four thousand years ago, centuries before the birth of Christ.

Marnie · 1 year ago

Annie...Hope that your spirits have lifted by now...sorry that your not a cat person... those four "love sponges" need some diversity...how about adding a cat to your menagerie...not just any cat but a "Siamese" cat...love my two...Sammie knows the sound of my car and greets me at the door raising up and pawing my leg...and folks say cats are too independent??...not my experience....I'd be suspicious of "Sonny" boy and his "inturakchun"...beware... ;-) ...loved Iyabo Asani's remark..."Use laughter and creativity to be that more authentic part of yourself."...Cheers to all who read this...Marnie

Laura Chamberlain · 11 months ago

The cat under the streetlamp broke my heart, punched it, smacked it, hit it with a baseball bat, cut with a chainsaw, and even nibbled at it a little.

Then it squeezed out all the blood in my heart, hissed at me, and walked away.

In short, if I had a working heart left, it would be totally upset by that picture. :(

But I also looked at the walrus picture and giggled like crazy.