You resent the understated attempt at humour, or perhaps the deliberate Strunk and White non-compliance?

I have read several of Vs books, each of them sublime, along with Stephen Kings 'On Writing'.. and I think my comments were on topic.

ok, I'll pay 17c via paypal to the first two persons who upvote this post, thus obliterating the downmod.

http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

that's the general rule, but i'm going to play along this time, because -1 does seem a bit harsh for what you wrote.

humor is risky. it's not that news.yc readers don't like it, it's just that our standards are very high. the ^H^H joke is a threadbare cliche at this point and should be avoided.

sometimes you get downmodded for no real reason by a karma troll. if that happens, you really shouldn't complain about it, because within an hour or two somebody will vote you back up in sympathy.