The Best Funny Birthday Phrases, Sayings & Quotes ... Plus the History of Greeting Cards

Birthdays are like boogers, the more you have the harder it is to breathe.
~ Funny Birthday Messages ~

We're not that different from wine and cheese. As you age and mature you get a choice: Like wine and cheese you can turn one sided, sour and smelly ... or .... multi faceted, sweet and aromatic. What determines the difference? Your emphasis on love, both for yourself and for others.
~ Soren Lauritzen ~ ,the Personal Development Guy

For my birthday I got a humidifier and a de-humidifier ... I put them in the same room and let them fight it out.
~ Stephen Wright ~

I never know what to get my father for his birthday. I gave him a hundred dollars and said, ‘Buy yourself something that will make your life easier.' So he went out and bought a present for my mother.
~ Rita Rudner ~

About the only thing that comes to us without effort is old age.
~ Funny Birthday Quote ~

If you live to the age of a hundred, you have it made because very few people die past the age of a hundred.
~ George Burns ~

Inside every older person is a younger person wondering what happened.
~ Jennifer Yane ~

More funny birthday sayings to come! But first, let's take quick a look at ...

The History of Greeting Cards and Birthday Cards

You can trace the history of greeting cards back to the ancient Chinese. During this time, the Chinese used them for sending messages of good will on New Years.

Many believe the early Egyptians, too, used to use papyrus scrolls for conveying greetings to friends and loved ones.

Life is a card game during the first half of which we get birthday cards, and during the second half get-well cards.
~ Evan Esar ~

Later in history, in the early 1400's the exchange of handmade paper greeting cards within Europe developed. Throughout this time, the Germans would use woodcuts in order to print their New Year's greetings.

After the introduction of the postage stamp in the 1850's and advancements in technology for printing, greeting cards became more affordable.

As for the US of A, greeting cards did not emerge into the industry until 1856. This marked the time when the German immigrant Louis Prang first started a small lithographic business near Boston. Throughout the early 1870's, Prang is credited for perfecting the printing process. Following this, he started publishing deluxe editions of Christmas cards. These greeting cards instantly gained popularity, even in England.

For the first time in the 1950's funny birthday sayings, along with funny birthday quotes and sayings started to see the pages of Birthday cards all over the United States. Since then, many of the funny birthday sayings and phrases have evolved along with the changing times.

Throughout the years, the number of birthday phrases has grown to become, well, many. Some of them reference people's silliness as...

Last week the candle factory burned down. Everyone just stood around and sang, ‘Happy Birthday.'
~ Steven Wright ~

While other funny birthday sayings refer to a person's belief on why more people are living longer. One such example is...

People are living longer than ever before, a phenomenon undoubtedly made necessary by the 30-year mortgage.
~ Funny Birthday Phrase ~

On the other hand, some of the funny birthday phrases reference women and their age. Actually, you can find a number such as these...

Few women admit their age. Few men act theirs.
~ Funny Birthday Saying ~

A diplomat is a man who always remembers a woman's birthday but never remembers her age.
~ Robert Frost ~

Marriage is the alliance of two people, one of whom never remembers birthdays and the other never forgets them.
~ Ogden Nash ~

No woman should ever be quite accurate about her age. It looks so calculating.
~ Oscar Wilde ~

Funny Old Birthday Quotes about Growing Old(er)

No matter what, nothing beats the good old funny birthday sayings about a person getting old ...

Old age isn't so bad when you consider the alternatives.
~ Maurice Chevalier ~

With mirth and laughter let old wrinkles come.
~ William Shakespeare ~

First you forget names, then you forget faces, then you forget to pull your zipper up, then you forget to pull your zipper down.
~ Leo Rosenberg ~

How old I am? In dog years, I'm dead.
~ Funny Birthday Saying ~

A man of ninety years old was asked to what he attributed his longevity. I reckon, he said, with a twinkle in his eye, it's because most nights I went to bed and slept when I should have stayed up and worried.
~ Dorthea Kent ~

I wake up every morning at nine and grab for the morning paper. Then I look at the obituary page. If my name is not on it, I get up.
~ Harry Hershfield ~

A stockbroker urged me to buy a stock that would triple its value every year. I told him, "At my age I don't even buy green bananas".
~ Claude D. Pepper ~

I guess I don't so much mind being old, as I mind being fat and old.
~ Peter Gabriel ~

Funny Birthday Phrases to Make You Think a Bit

Other funny birthday quotes just make you think ...

My mother groaned, my father wept, into the dangerous world I leapt; helpless, naked, piping loud, like a fiend hid in a cloud.
~ William Blake ~

Real Birthdays are not annual affairs. Real birthdays are the days when we have a new birth.
~ Ralph Parlette ~

A friend never defends a husband who gets his wife an electric skillet for her birthday.
~ Erma Bombeck ~

How many observe Christ's birthday! How few, his precepts! O! ‘tis easier to keep holidays than commandments.
~ Benjamin Franklin ~

Success is like reaching an important birthday and finding you're exactly the same.
~ Audrey Hepburn ~

Finally there are those funny birthday phrases and quotes where people talk about the things they would do for their youth back or the benefits found with growing old...

To get back my youth I would do anything in the world, except take exercise, get up early, or be respectable.
~ Oscar Wilde ~

If you carry your childhood with you, you never become older.
~ Abraham Sutzkever ~

You can only be young once. But you can always be immature.
~ Dave Barry ~

Okay, that's it, for now. Hope you enjoyed this collection of funny birthday phrases, quotes and sayings and the brief history of greeting cards. No, wait, here a final one for you:

Whatever with the past has gone, the best is always yet to come.
~ Lucy Lacrom ~