Root Cause Analysis is a term coined by unfunny, businesslike people that like to use vague, professional sounding words like methodology, implementation, and kittenfarming. And as entirely lacking of humor as it sounds, it's at the heart of being a good writer, humorist, or 5-year old child.

Basically, it goes something like this: Q. Why is the sky blue? A. It's the atmosphere. Q. Why? A. It's sunlight scattering through the air. Q. Why?! A. It's because the wavelength removes the other colors at certain times!! Q. Why? A. Shut up, you snotty nosed brat, or I'll put a whoopin' on ya! Q. Why?

And so on, until the question is answered or the child is removed from custody. As a writer, the only way to be funny is to know much, much, much more about something than your audience does. This does not mean that Stephen Hawking is the funniest person on Earth. And E=McDaddy isn't as funny as I think it is. Any time you attempt to employ humor, make sure you drill down into the subject you're talking about until you find WHAT can make it funny.

This is where Irony comes in. Now, as you probably know, Irony is one of those literature words that English professors use. Dare I say something that falls outside of the written code of the Great Bard, Socrates, and Mr. Bean.

Here's how you can snub Shakespeare and abuse irony in your story! I'm not going to talk about the different types of irony (yawn), or link to examples that are written better than my stuff. Save that for your musty old tomes and 3-hour lectures.

The trick with irony is it's a combination of the unexpected (a great humor device, of course), but generally it includes an intrinsic oxymoron (Like my Uncle Pete!). So, say, a one-legged man who became the World Champion Three-Legged Racer is irony. (Although not necessarily a good hero).

Dramatic Irony can setup humor, but is used more often in horror - where the audience knows more than the character. For example, I make a cheddar cheese and triscut sandwich, set it on the bar, and go outside to bother the ice cream man. While I'm outside, the audience sees my wife, Paisley, make a tomato and mayonnaise sandwich right next to mine. She steps away to wave to her flock of fans gathering in the streets down below, and I come back in. The audience knows that the sandwich I grab is tomato and mayonnaise, not cheese and triscut, but I don't - and when I bite into it, my face turns into a sourpus unseen by generations. Something's wrong with my triscuts!!!

Well, I hate to truncate - as you all well know - but there's more to talk about and this post is turning into a Stephen King novel (because of the content, not the length!) So let's move on to Exaggeration briefly.

What's there to say about exaggeration that isn't already been said by every person that's ever written a single letter to their mom or dad, or lied to their spouse? Not much! But people still don't listen. I still read stories filled with pathetic attempts at exaggeration, lackluster details, and Nascar heroes. Ugh.

So, since even highly intelligent authors (and perhaps, mostly you guys) have trouble with this concept, let's spend a couple paragraphs to talk about it...

Exaggeration is taking what you mean to say, and making it more robust. It's very common with numbers - like, "I must have drank a million Tangs on my way to the moon!," Alice said. But it can also be used in different circumstances... You may describe a character as a caricature - "Bob had a huge forehead that would make a Neanderthal look like Sissy Spasek, and big wide eyes like some fish that's been extinct since the pre-cambian!"

The most important thing is to not underwhelm your attempts at exaggeration. Nothing says unfunny like "I've been writing this novel for a hundred hours!" ... So? That's not a big deal, most people who don't live in palatial mansions like mine work that many hours in a two week period. Go one way or another - "I've been working on this novel longer than the Colorado river's been working on the grand canyon!"

So - a good exercise for exaggeration is to come up with something you think is a good exaggeration, funny, blah blah blah... And then spend a little time trying to make it better. If you have friends, then it may be good to send them three different versions of the exaggeration and ask them which is funniest. If they write back "They're all funny!" Then you sent it to your mom, and - as a writer - you should NEVER trust your mother. If you have no friends, you can send them to me.

When I first started working on this project - the funny vs. unfunny theme for the week, that is, I had planned a whole list of items that will help aspiring writers add some humor to their stories. As I'm posting this exactly an hour before my time here ends (an exciting story I'll be sure to share with you at some point), I'll finish these articles up at my new blog - huntcole.blogspot.com.

Next time for the humor tricks:

• Self deprecation and extreme arrogance.
• Wit and Wry.
• Out of Place, Out of Character
• The Truly Offensive.

-Hunter