The last one refilling detergent is a parody of The Milkmaid by Johannes Vermeer; everyone has seen it on textbooks and it has become a meme template on Japanese Twitter in recent years.
Thank you, I was confused by what simply appeared to be a picture of someone doing laundry.
blobbers 9 hours ago [-]
I mean, that's a tough idea. That's literally just a picture of someone pouring detergent, not an actual costume. Would have to say this one is pretty lame...
Just have to ask, how do you know this???
numpad0 3 hours ago [-]
It's in Japanese school textbooks. I don't remember if it was in art or world history class, but a lot of people have seen it and/or had to be able to fill it in the blanks from multiple choices. It's also a memorable work of art, so it's famous to those Japanese and terminally online. I agree that this can be a bit more obvious, though.
2muchcoffeeman 3 hours ago [-]
This will be one of those things where if you are very familiar with Vemeer, you’ll understand the reference.
I was watching the new Street Fighter movie and I was wondering who is Joe? But actually a funny reference.
happytoexplain 13 hours ago [-]
Some of these are very humorous because of the cultural disconnect (as an American, I have never experienced somebody asking to put their seat back).
"An expert on a very niche subject" made me laugh out loud the hardest, because it's the one that's most "just a guy", and yet it's also exactly how it's described.
drunkboxer 2 hours ago [-]
I similarly enjoyed "an expert on a very niche subject" because it was so ridiculous. Seeing your comment explaining it is even funnier still.
jrecyclebin 6 hours ago [-]
More about the expression, but the glasses are pulling their weight here too. Modern masterpiece.
Fricken 4 hours ago [-]
The airplane seat was the only one that needed no explanation for me. I could tell he was about to ask specifically to put his seat back.
Jedd 3 hours ago [-]
I am reasonably confident that's a train seat, not an airplane - though obviously the wonderful cultural norm of politely enquiring / advising the person behind you work in both realms, it's a very common action on the trains.
Waterluvian 12 hours ago [-]
These are masterpieces in my opinion. It’s difficult to get the vibe exactly right when you’re working with so little.
Yes, a thousand times yes you can put your seat back you gentle soul.
jen729w 8 hours ago [-]
> Yes, a thousand times yes you can put your seat back you gentle soul.
Overjoyed that I understand this, allow me to explain it to those who don't.
Seats on the Shinkansen [0] are bolt-upright by default. You basically have to recline them a little bit to be even vaguely comfortable.
Every person, every time, asks the person in the seat behind them whether it's okay to recline their seat by 5°.
The seat pitch on the Shinkansen is approximately 1 metre. There's a lot of room.
[0]: My line, anyway – the E5 series cars that run the Hayabausa service.
happytoexplain 11 hours ago [-]
The Japanese seem particularly adept at the concept of "vibe".
riazrizvi 4 hours ago [-]
Love these. Visual comedy. I could say "Person trying to persuade bus driver to let them on at a traffic stop" but without the specific instance that captures it for ppl, there's no joke being communicated.
henearkr 12 hours ago [-]
They are more like "situational haikus", or the transposition to practical humor of the concept of haiku.
hackernud3s 7 hours ago [-]
This year I went as "person who forgot it was halloween".
imp0cat 2 hours ago [-]
I think it's just a sign that you're getting older.
> Many yearly traditions gradually get stale. You’ve done them many times. You’re not sure if you should put in the effort this year. Your jack-o-lanterns become fewer, and then vanish.
qsfp28 7 hours ago [-]
[dead]
PCI-eX16 13 hours ago [-]
Maybe this is a different type of mundane costume, but I like costumes that just look like guys. When the anime initial D was popular, I would wear a white T, blue jeans, part my hair down the middle and say I'm cosplaying as Takumi Fujiwara...
syshyk 11 hours ago [-]
What you're doing wrong is not ordering a premade suit from amazon, then chucking it in the bin or a charity shop at the end of the day. /s
literallyanythi 7 hours ago [-]
well of course, because what you're actually supposed to do is return it for free and cut into the trillion dollar corpo's profit margins
no, i'm not responsible for global warming. please don't even try to shift the blame from corporations to me for doing this.
low 6 hours ago [-]
Glad to see that the world has finally discovered Daily Portal Z.
jen729w 8 hours ago [-]
Mine would be "dude who vibed a to-do app with Claude and thought he'd be rich then realised 20,000 other dudes had done exactly the same thing".
Source: these dudes email me at a rate of about 5/week asking me to spruik their app to my audience.
corndoge 5 hours ago [-]
As someone who gets these also - it's not the author emailing you.
jen729w 2 hours ago [-]
So who is it? Claude? Or someone they've farmed out their marketing to?
Either way they're pretty transparently mass generated. "Hi Johnny, we've been watching your {{latest YouTube video}} with interest and are impressed by how you {{summary of your latest blog post}}."
skyberrys 13 hours ago [-]
Love how long each consume caption is. It could just be called Halloween costumes that take many words to explain.
_vertigo 13 hours ago [-]
These are great. First 3 are brilliant. The second one is golden, I wish I had thought of that.
michaelbuckbee 12 hours ago [-]
I saw video of a costume contest this year where one participant was wearing an Amazon delivery driver vest, flung a cardboard box across the stage and then took a picture of it (all to wild applause).
WorseIsBetter 1 hours ago [-]
[flagged]
ndndndndjd 10 hours ago [-]
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swingandamiss 13 hours ago [-]
[flagged]
timacles 11 hours ago [-]
Japanese culture has been fascinating to westerners since I dunno … the discovery of Japan
OJFord 11 hours ago [-]
It's San Francisco, there's a lot of immigration, cultural influence, etc. whereas say Australia has outsize Vietnamese, Indonesian influence; or India in the UK.
happytoexplain 13 hours ago [-]
If I may gingerly throw a stone within my glass house, your username checks out.
Klonoar 12 hours ago [-]
Yup.
You don’t see this kind of post rise for any other culture.
Rendered at 09:53:43 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time) with Vercel.
1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Milkmaid_(Vermeer)
Just have to ask, how do you know this???
I was watching the new Street Fighter movie and I was wondering who is Joe? But actually a funny reference.
"An expert on a very niche subject" made me laugh out loud the hardest, because it's the one that's most "just a guy", and yet it's also exactly how it's described.
Yes, a thousand times yes you can put your seat back you gentle soul.
Overjoyed that I understand this, allow me to explain it to those who don't.
Seats on the Shinkansen [0] are bolt-upright by default. You basically have to recline them a little bit to be even vaguely comfortable.
Every person, every time, asks the person in the seat behind them whether it's okay to recline their seat by 5°.
The seat pitch on the Shinkansen is approximately 1 metre. There's a lot of room.
[0]: My line, anyway – the E5 series cars that run the Hayabausa service.
https://moultano.wordpress.com/2025/12/30/children-and-helic...
> Many yearly traditions gradually get stale. You’ve done them many times. You’re not sure if you should put in the effort this year. Your jack-o-lanterns become fewer, and then vanish.
no, i'm not responsible for global warming. please don't even try to shift the blame from corporations to me for doing this.
Source: these dudes email me at a rate of about 5/week asking me to spruik their app to my audience.
Either way they're pretty transparently mass generated. "Hi Johnny, we've been watching your {{latest YouTube video}} with interest and are impressed by how you {{summary of your latest blog post}}."
You don’t see this kind of post rise for any other culture.