Status Epilepticus: 50+ funny status messages from web history

// March 31st, 2009 // Featured, Fun

In 2001-2003, when instant messaging was in its infancy and social networking was something we did in bars, I probably spent too much time trying to write funnier status messages for Yahoo! Messenger than the 500-odd other employees. Is it any wonder they were happy to see me go?

Interestingly, in my original collection I had saved, “Is there anyone out there?” — what seemed like a funny thing to say in 2001 seems just weird to ask these days. Can you even imagine what it was like when there were whole chunks of the day when nobody was there in your buddy list?

These days, everybody’s got at least one status message, mood or “What I’m doing now” attached to an online profile. I bet the Dalai Llama’s says, “Laughing, again” and Kim Jong-Il’s says something like, “I feel like launching missles today.” So here are some of the most interesting status messages I’ve collected over the last few years.

Where known, I’ve credited their author by their Yahoo! Messenger ID. Many of those people still go by the same IDs, so if you’re interested, try googling them (oops, I mean “yahooing” them.) The remainder are my own work, hope you like them.

Think I write well? I’m available for hire!

  • 10,000 Leagues Under The C++
  • Wireless and clueless
  • Disk space, the final frontier
  • Do, or Ctrl-Z, there is no ‘try’
  • Home is where the base href is
  • There’s no page like home
  • About to be replaced by a shell script
  • On the internet, noone knows I’m a parent
  • Living la vida Yoda
  • The less i know the more i appear to understand
  • Phasers set to stun
  • Savaging the soothed beast
  • Filmed in Cinemascope
  • Communication creates the illusion of progress
  • Not at your desk
  • But more, much more than this, you’ll do it my way!
  • I am a work of speculative fiction
  • Luck can’t last a lifetime unless you die young
  • Conan the Humanitarian (naikrovek, 2002)
  • Let the Wookie win (naikrovek, 2002)
  • Stigmata – high-five gone awry (karen jackson 2002)
  • Winona, if you don’t steal, i’ll go out with you (naikrovek, 2002)
  • Only the young die young
  • It hasn’t been your day, your week, your month, or even your year
  • My PDA says it’s your birthday, but it cares more than I do
  • Advertising is 85% confusion and 15% commision
  • Pull apart my buns and smear them with butter (Easter)
  • Capitalisation is in the eye of the shareholder
  • What if the Hokey-Pokey IS what it’s all about? (Stephanie Snyder, 2001)
  • Camel, eye of needle… grease…
  • 99% of the game is half mental
  • All I want is a warm bed and a kind word and unlimited power
  • Like a snowball gathering steam (the_bigtee 2003)
  • Busier than a leper in an all-hands meeting (goonker 2003)
  • I went to buy some camouflage pants, but I couldn’t find any (Travis Wright)