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Discover weekly, the best short stories

Looking for a steady supply of funny short stories? Every week thousands of writers submit stories to our writing contest.

Funny Short Stories to read

Submitted by writers on Reedsy Prompts to our weekly writing contest. The world can get dreary and overwhelming, so when you’re looking to have a good laugh, take a scroll through our free collection of funny short stories.

Funny Short Stories – Page 4

The Anniversary Date

Bettina Karpathian

Weekly Contest #362

Marjorie hurried into the living room waving a large heavy envelope.“Look!”Robert, who was sprawled on the couch drowsily watching a basketball game on television, started upright.“What? Where’s the fire? What’s going on?”“Read that,” Marjorie said, shoving the envelope into his hands and silencing the TV.“Hey! I was watching that …okay, okay, I’m reading.”He extracted a sheet of heavy vellum paper and smoothed it open.“Dinner reservation for two on Friday, 14th at 8pm at La Casa Blanca. Who sent this and what’s the occasion?”Marjorie put he...

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Biographical Buffet

Weekly Contest #362

My mother never taught me to cook. She was born in 1906 and learned to cook in traditional ways, and without spicy curries and the like. I have never found any pastry that was as good as hers. But I was destined to be a provider, not a housewife and mother, so there was no point in passing those skills on to me. Also, my mother could not eat cheese, and she passed that sensitivity down to me and my sister (but, oddly, not to my brothers). Meat tended to be boiled in the 1950s in England, and I hated it. Fish was not very fresh, so I hated th...

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It'd Be Rude Not To

Greg Lang

Weekly Contest #362

Everyone is perfect in this town, at least outwardly so. It can be occasionally liberating but more often tends to be unsettling in a way that is difficult to vocalize. Like a chill up the spine or an unyielding stare from a neighborhood alley cat. Still, I do my best to fit in, donning the suburban camouflage that identifies me as a member of the pack when out on the town or, in this case, walking to the neighbors’ house.Khakis, polo shirt, and stylish but sensible loafers.The loafers are torture on my large feet, and I find the ornamentati...

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Crumbling

Weekly Contest #362

“I’d really like some pie,” Kelly said to an empty room. It didn’t matter that it was 2:00a.m., or that there was nothing open. It didn’t even matter that she had never made pie before. Kelly was a self-starter, and she was going to do it herself. This was not some hormonal hallucination. It was not an avoidant coping mechanism, given the state of things. No, she simply wanted pie in the middle of the night. Who would blame a girl—or, more accurately, a grown woman? She started with the crust. The image was clear in her mind: flawless, chise...

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Fog Lake Ferox Feast Time

Jo Freitag

Weekly Contest #362

“That wind is really getting up! I think we could make it home, if we leave now.”“It is not called the Fog Lake Ferox for no reason! I had a Road Weather Alert on my phone. I think you should stay here overnight. There are a few spare rooms and I am just about to make dinner.”“Well, if you are sure…”“I would love you to stay.”Arthur and Regina Penman, President and Secretary respectively of the ARC Arthurian Readers Club had spent the afternoon with Little Plump Jo, who was the current Artisan in Residence in Malory Tennyson’s Cloudbank Cabi...

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Grounded

Teresa De Roulet

Weekly Contest #362

How arduous it is to be a fallen angel in 2026. These Americans are so empowered, so demanding. Where do they learn to be so assertive? If it weren’t for the tremendous opportunities for sin here, I’d go somewhere else. There’s so much pressure with today’s marketing presentation. Plus, my supervisor’s coming by later. I’ve decided to wear my lucky stilettos today. It’s bad enough that I’m tasked with increasing the base sin rate by 10,000 a year, but I’m being punished to do it as a—yech—human. See, I made a little, teensy mistake. I didn’t...

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The Cookbook

Weekly Contest #362

The leather bound, deep red cookbook followed me from house to house. From the moment I left my childhood behind into the scary unknowns. When I was 17, I moved into an old house with my brother and a friend I had known since pre school. The book found its first home tucked to the side of the kitchen bench or open next to the cooktop. The noise of the main road penetrating even back to the kitchen. Months later it had found its way close to the beach. Salt precipitating on its cover. It stood upright on the low bookshelf. This house w...

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Mushroom on the Ceiling

Alev Gefen

Weekly Contest #362

Brian had taken notes. He'd made a shopping list organized by grocery store aisle. He'd even practiced his British accent in the mirror while saying "puff pastry" because Gordon Ramsay made it sound so elegant, and he wanted to impress Adra when he served it."It's just beef wrapped in stuff," he told himself, standing in his kitchen at 2 PM, five hours before Adra would arrive for their two-year anniversary dinner. "How hard could it be?"These would later be recognized as the most dangerous words ever spoken in his apartment, narrowly beatin...

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A DENNIR PARTY

J R Duncan

Weekly Contest #362

The microwave beeped six times, sounding like a tiny, domestic life-support machine. I chose to ignore it, staring instead into the glassy murk of the oven as if looking for signs of life, or perhaps a miracle."Why didn’t we just get a takeaway from the night market, Stella?" I whispered, clutching a tea towel to my chest like a shield. "Thai requires no carving. Nobody has ever managed to throw a spring roll with lethal force. But lamb? Have you read Roald Dahl? Giving either of those two a sharp instrument right now is simply tempting fate...

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Crack Up

Nancy Carpenter

Weekly Contest #362

Nina fractures an egg against the bowl’s edge and, as if her hands belong to someone else, maneuvers the yolk between the cleaved halves. “When making a chocolate soufflé, there’s no question which comes first. No room for chickens here. The eggs.” She smiles despite the heat of the studio lights. “Always the eggs. Always room temperature. At this point you might be tempted to take their temperature.” For the benefit of the camera, she holds up an oversized thermometer to which she delivers a quizzical look. “Point is, at room temp the white...

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The Magical Land of Noodleville An Adventure About Friendship, Kindness, and Love

Weekly Contest #362

Have you ever wondered what happens in a kitchen after everyone goes to sleep?When the moon rises over the Happy Kitchen, something magical happens.The spaghetti twirls like dancers.The carrots race through the garden on tiny scooters.The apples play catch.The marshmallows bounce so high they almost touch the clouds.Even the spoons, whisks, and rolling pins come to life!Welcome to Noodleville, where every day is an adventure, every meal is a celebration, and everyone knows that the best ingredient in any recipe is love.Among all the happy fo...

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Public Pizza Vs. Private Sushi

James Duncan

Weekly Contest #362

Frank and Kelly sit silently at their family dinner table, staring at their phones, trying to avoid eye contact. Frank is drinking a Miller Lite while Kelly sips a finely aged white wine. For most married couples, drinking in silence is a great American pastime, like fireworks on the Fourth of July or bitching about taxes. But for Frank and Kelly, the silence is deafening. As a couple, they excel at communication. This is the main reason that after fifteen years of marriage and three kids later, they are still in a loving, committed relation...

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Home Is Where the Heart Is

Andrew Wood

Weekly Contest #362

Dr. Roland Bennings examined four distinct basketball-sized lumps of masticated food on his steel lab worktable. There was a fibrous greyish-brown lump, a stringy green lump, a bumpy dark white lump, and a smooth pale-yellow lump. “Hmm,” Dr. Bennings said as he retrieved the pen tucked behind his ear and poked at the nearest lump. “Skirt steak, string beans, white bread, and corn.” Dr. Bennings cut off a generous slice of each lump and took his meal into the ship’s kitchenette. He sat at the square table in the corner, t...

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A Woman's Understanding of Fictional Voids and Sleepless Nights

Brig A

Weekly Contest #362

Sitting at my writing desk at 5:39 am with a glass of ice water and zero hours of sleep in my system. Ready to start my literary day. Firstly, I check my email; no new messages. I double check that I absolutely sent that email to an agent; I had. At 5:42, I refill my water. Later I will have to pee.My current work is sitting abandoned in a google docs folder as I wait for agents to look it over; so I google writing prompts. I can’t find any good ones, but I am amused by the memes I find. The clock hands tick by as I continue to scroll. Then ...

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Morris Minor, Crisis Major

Rebekah K

Weekly Contest #362

MacConnels was not the right choice.My body screams noooo as I reluctantly bite into what is supposedly a burger, swallowing quickly in the faint hope my taste buds can still be saved. Yuck.I try to eat as slowly as possible so that we'll run out of time before I'm forced to finish it. Oh, what a shame. Such a tragedy. Picking up a couple of chips, I squeeze them without thinking. Oil oozes down my fingers. “Eugh.”I stand up just as James gets back, plastering on a smile."Thanks, Amira, you left some for me!" he grins."All yours," I say, def...

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