Drew Panckeri<\/a>, who helped us pick the winning entry and five runners-up. His drawing is set in an office, where a man in a cubicle is addressing a female co-worker. Behind them is a hellish landscape. There are flames everywhere, and in the distance we can see the ramparts of a castle and what appears to be a dormant volcano. The castle and volcano confused some people, including me. Drew explained that he was trying to depict Hell the way Hieronymus Bosch would have, and when I looked at Bosch paintings like \u201cThe Last Judgment\u201d I think Drew achieved his goal.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nDrew\u2019s original caption was long but did a nice job of reconciling the disparate elements: <\/span>\u201cSure, the workflow is never-ending, but at least we have all of eternity to meet our deadlines.\u201d<\/span><\/i><\/p>\nSome of you focused on the volcano and submitted Pompeii jokes, while others focused on the cat calendar and submitted \u201chang in there\u201d jokes, but none of those was particularly well-constructed. There were, however, several good computer-related captions:\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/p>\n\n- \u201cHave you tried unplugging it and plugging it back in?\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n
- \u201cHow do I change my background for video calls?\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n
- \u201cOh, nothing, just doom-scrolling again.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n
- \u201cI shouldn\u2019t have clicked on that link.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n
- \u201cI put in a request to the Help Desk.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n
- \u201cCtrl+s is SAVE ALL, right?\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n
- \u201cHow do I unsend an email?\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n
- \u201cDid I reply all?\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n
- \u201cOur firewall might be outdated.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
That last entry may also be the month\u2019s best pun, but it has competition: <\/span>\u201cIt\u2019s all overtime.\u201d<\/i><\/b> That\u2019s really good, but it would be even better if there were a space between the words \u201cover\u201d and \u201ctime,\u201d which would emphasize, but not in a heavy-handed way, that the man is acknowledging that it\u2019s all over.<\/span><\/p>\nHere\u2019s another decent pun: <\/span>\u201cAnd what fresh hell is this?\u201d<\/i><\/b> The only problem is that it doesn\u2019t address the office setting.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nThat\u2019s not the issue with this entry: <\/span>\u201cAnd you wonder why I prefer to work remote.\u201d<\/i><\/b> The problem, instead, is the last word, which I think should be the adverb \u201cremotely.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\nI love this entry: <\/span>\u201cBoss wants is done by the end of days.\u201d<\/i><\/b> Some of my fellow-judges, however, argued that it doesn\u2019t really make sense because, if the employees are in Hell, the end-times have already happened. I disagree. Though I\u2019m no expert on Catholic theology, my understanding is that many people wind up in Hell before the prophesied end of the world. That\u2019s the whole premise of \u201cDante\u2019s Inferno.\u201d I just finished that book, by the way, and Dante was one sick bastard. Honestly, I felt like I was reading the novelization of all ten \u201cSaw\u201d movies.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nHere\u2019s another end-times caption: <\/span>\u201cHow do you spell \u2018Armageddon?\u2019\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/p>\nBecause of all the fire, there were several temperature-related captions, and these were the two best:<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/p>\n\n- \u201cMaintenance says their system shows it is 72 in here.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n
- \u201cIt\u2019s not the heat. It\u2019s the flames.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Like that last entry, the following caption does a beautiful job of creating a fitting caption by changing just one word in an ordinary statement: <\/span>\u201cSmells like someone\u2019s been cooking flesh in the microwave again.\u201d<\/i><\/b> It doesn\u2019t need the last word, though. \u201cMicrowave\u201d is a much better punch line than \u201cagain.\u201d<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nThese entries transform an ordinary statement into a fitting caption without changing a word:<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/p>\n\n- \u201cThere\u2019s always a sense of urgency.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n
- \u201cThis is no time to panic.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n
- \u201cThat\u2019s not my department.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
The next three captions all allude to the fact that, for some people, work is hell:<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/p>\n\n- \u201cIt took me ten years to realize I\u2019d died and gone to hell.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n
- \u201cHonestly, this is just how I pictured it.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n
- \u201cThis is my own personal hell.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
The following entry suggests that the boss is responsible for creating such an unpleasant work environment: <\/span>\u201cHe says that if I apply myself, I can get a little desk fan.\u201d<\/i><\/b> And this caption suggests the boss is a horse\u2019s ass: <\/span>\u201cMy manager encouraged me to view this inferno and an infer-yes.\u201d<\/i><\/b> Even though that\u2019s a fine example of a caption so bad it\u2019s good, I have to admit it made me laugh out loud, perhaps because I\u2019ve known managers who would makes similar comments in a misguided attempt to sound clever or inspiring.<\/span><\/p>\nBob Mankoff liked this caption because it captured a certain aspect of his marriage: <\/span>\u201cI can\u2019t believe you would follow me all the way to HELL just to complain about putting the bread away without a twisty tie!\u201d<\/i><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nThis caption explains why the office worker who\u2019s speaking ended up in Hell:<\/span> \u201cI stole a pen once. You?\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/p>\nThe next two entries make the man who\u2019s speaking unusually and inappropriately calm:<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/p>\n\n- \u201cOf course I know. It\u2019s killing my plant.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n
- \u201cThat\u2019s nothing. My stapler is missing.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Finally, here are two captions that make the speaker oblivious:<\/p>\n
\n- \u201cWhat\u2019s the commotion? Did someone bring doughnuts?\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/li>\n
- \u201cI want to quit, but I\u2019m waiting for a sign.\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Congratulations to ANDREW WELHOUSE, who submitted the winning entry: <\/span>\u201cHonestly, this is just how I pictured it.\u201d<\/i><\/b> He\u2019s having a good week, as he also just won <\/span>The New Yorker<\/span><\/i> Cartoon Caption Contest featuring E.S. Glenn\u2019s drawing of a witch using her camera phone to take a picture of a boiling cauldron. His winning entry was,<\/span>\u201cNow for the most toxic ingredient of all\u2014social media.\u201d<\/span><\/i><\/p>\nThe runners-up for our CartoonStock contest are:<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/p>\n\n- \u201cSmells like someone\u2019s been cooking flesh in the microwave again.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n
- \u201cHow do I change my background for video calls?\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n
- \u201cI want to quit, but I\u2019m waiting for a sign.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n
- \u201cBoss wants it done by the end of days.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n
- \u201cIt\u2019s not the heat, it\u2019s the flames.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Watch the Judging Process<\/h3>\n
If you who want to see how we made our selections, we recorded the process with Drew and you can see it<\/p>\n
![\"CartoonStock](\"https:\/\/www.cartoonstock.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/smaller2538-cubicle-hell-300x257.jpg\")
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