Style Conversational: You’ll have to wait 5 weeks for one of these guys.
But you can help plan the Week 1139 Style Invitational contest.
If you’ve won an Inkin’ Memorial but never an Inker, you might want one
of these regifted guys if you win again. (I’ll send a new headbag for
you to glue together.) (Pat Myers/The Washington Post)
By Pat Myers
Pat Myers
Editor and judge of The Style Invitational since December 2003
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August 6, 2015
Because I’m going to be in Italy from Aug. 30 to Sept. 8, I need to have
the Sept. 6 (online Sept. 3, I hope) Style Invitational done in advance,
so that someone just has to click on “Publish.” (The last two times I
was on vacation the day the Invite was supposed to post — in California
in June 2013 and in England in April 2014 — this did not exactly work.
But this time, copy chief/Invite fan Courtney Rukan is going to have my
back.)
Anyway, this means I have to have a new contest totally prepared before
I leave (preferably a week before that), and because there won’t be a
full set of results that week (since there’s no new contest this week
),
I’ll have room to put up a contest that takes some space to describe.
And ta-da! Loser Bruce Carlson wrote to me just the other day to suggest
that we rerun one of the Invite’s most unusual contests, dating back to
2000, in honor of the upcoming 64th birthday of the Czar. It was called
When We’re LXIV, because there were 64 possible challenges you could
take up. This is what the original (Week 348, aka Week XV) put forth:
/*Formats:*
1. Write a short poem about . . .
2. Write an analogy or metaphor related to . . .
3. Design a slogan or aphorism involving . . .
4. Write a funny sentence beginning with “Did you ever wonder why . . .”
with respect to . . ./
/*Subjects:*
A. An undergarment
B. NAFTA and its relationship to pending minimum-wage legislation
C. A household appliance
D. A 19th-century event/
/*Limitations:*
(i) that is written in the style of a famous author.
(ii) that contains an unfortunate factual error.
(iii) that would absolutely enrage Marisleysis Gonzalez.
(iv) that employs a clever double-entendre./
/This Week’s Contest was suggested by Russ Beland of Springfield. It is
really 64 contests in one, because there are 64 ways to win. You have to
fashion an entry by selecting one from each menu group above. For
example, the following takes the path 1-C-(iv): Toast should be made
like lovin’/ Not half-baked, but aroused, I find/ So I use no toaster
oven/ I prefer the pop-up kind. Make sure you indicate the path you took./
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I think it’s a great idea to do this contest again, but of course we
would want all new subjects, some new limitations, and perhaps a new
format or two. So how about if I choose among Losers’ suggestions? You
won’t know until the contest is published which ones I choose, so you
can’t get a head start before Sept. 3. I’ve already postedthis
invitation
in the Facebook group Style Invitational Devotees
, and you could also suggest elements right here
in the comments thread of the Conversational — after all, that was what
the Conversational was created for; what happened was that back then in
2009, The Post’s technology and formats were terrible, and we finally
resorted to the Facebook group for interacting (Facebook is still better
, but not by as wide a margin). Or you could e-mail me your suggestions
at pat.myers@washpost.com. I’ll credit you in some way, but probably not
connecting you to your specific suggestion. (Unless a bunch of people
suggested the same thing you did.)
AdChoices
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Footnote: The Czar’s 64th birthday, for all those interested in paying
homage (I know there always are because people keep asking me), occurs
around the time the results of this contest would run.
Even more of a footnote: Marisleysis Gonzalez is Elian’s cousin who
served as his mother figure
during
his stay in Miami.
The top winners (there weren’t many overall) of the first contest:
*Second Runner-Up:* /(A short poem about an undergarment, in the style
of a famous author, Allen Ginsberg)/
I saw the best buns of my generation clad in bikini-cut briefs.
High-hanging models gaunt-cheeked staring from bulimiaed pages of
Victoria’s Secret,
whose readers intoned impossible pantyhosannas.
Who flipped through hip images juxtaposed in slick IPO capitalist layouts,
flipping through a dark satin underworld S/M/L/XL,
flipping backward and forward
mumbling incantations of papercut delirium, a doomed hollow-eyed joyride
endlessly seeking out London and France. (Jonathan Paul, Garrett Park, Md.)
*First Runner-Up/: / * /(An analogy related to a household appliance
that contains an unfortunate factual error)/
The vacuum cleaner is the FBI agent of appliances. Its job is to track
down, suck up and bag the dirt of society. Then, just like its inventor,
J. Edgar Hoover, it spends its off-duty time in the closet. (Susan
Reese, Arlington, Va.)
*And the winner of the buck grunt call:// * /(A short poem about NAFTA
and its relationship to pending minimum- wage legislation in the style
of Dr. Seuss, that also contains an analogy, an aphorism and a sentence
beginning with “Did you ever wonder why,” as well as references to an
undergarment, a household appliance and a 19th-century event, while
committing an unfortunate factual error, executing a clever
double-entendre and including a statement that would absolutely enrage
Marisleysis Gonzalez)/
Did you ever wonder why
The lowest wage is not so high?
It’s the fault of Uncle Sam.
Am I angry, Sam? I am!
It started very long ago
With a man named James Monroe
Who made us one with other lands
--With peons and their outstretched hands.
James began the paycheck-steal.
An act of Congress nailed the deal.
And sired the monster that is NAFTA.
(Can’t you hear the Mexicans’ lafta?)
And now that the populace panics and panics
We bring in bureaucrat budget mechanics!
The boys in the press give this barely a mention
As one Cuban brat distracts their attention.
And now our poor wages NAFTA will gnaw,
Which just goes to prove that clever old saw:
“Government’s like a bad laundry machine:
It goes round and round, yet our undies ain’t clean.” (Mike Elliott,
Oberlin, Ohio)
Mike Elliott, alas, was last heard from in Week 594, barely into the
Empress’s reign, escaping with a mere 13 blots of ink — but two were
first prizes and one was a second.
Armed Farces*: The results of Week 1132
/*A non-inking entry by Stephen Dudzik and I think several others. /
I’ve pretty much learned not to panic while judging, and indeed I think
this week’s results turned out fine. But
Lordy, there was so much lousy stuff (I know not by whom, since I
name-check only the good stuff): really lame wordplay, sexist and
xenophobic “humor,” and a number of old-saw jokes that people must have
remembered from their Army days.
But we did end up, as virtually always, with a muster-passing parade of
inking entries. It might not be fun to judge a contest in which 95
percent of the entries rot, but as long as the remaining 5 percent can
fill the page, the stinkitude of the 95 is entirely irrelevant. In fact,
I’m game for a few more fictoid categories, if anyone wants to work up
some examples.
Meanwhile, today’s victory parade is headed up by someone with a
distinct military connection: The helpmeet of Yet Again a Winner
Danielle Nowlin is the genialLt. Ryan Nowlin
,
assistant director of the U.S. Marine Band. I don’t think, though, that
had too much to do with her Inkin’ Memorial- (or Inker?-) winning entry,
a zingy dig at Congress. Danielle’s entry was so well done that my Copy
Editor Reflex didn’t even kick in to note that “Congressional Medal of
Honor” isn’t the official name; it’s just “Medal of Honor.” But even I
am not so pedantic that I’d knock it off the pedestal for that.
Runners-up Nan Reiner and Chris Doyle have hung out in the Losers’
Circle too many times to mention, but wow, what a week for Larry
McClemons of suburban Virginia, who really took to this contest: Besides
his runner-up entry, he also blotted up three honorable mentions — more
than doubling his previous ink total. However, it’s already the second
“above the fold” ink for Larry since he started Inviting this year: His
first was his debut ink, a runner-up in another fictoid contest. It was
this edgy one for fake sports trivia: “After their tragic experience
with Lou Gehrig, the New York Yankees passed on a chance to sign Brian
Alzheimer.”
Another cool McClemons factoid: Larry’s new total of seven inks still
places him three shy of his son Steve’s. Nothing like a burning familial
rivalry.
*Laugh Out of Courtney: * Copy chief Courtney Rukan, a Northern Virginia
resident, was partial to Nan Reiner’s first runner-up about Gen.
McClellan’s ill-advised plan to get out of D.C. in that direction
on
a Friday evening. Also, as Courtney points out, “McClellan surely would
have selected the wrong time and the wrong route:”
Speaking of military history: Let’s go to Gettysburg on Aug. 16
It looks as if the Royal Consort and I can join the Losers’ annual trip
to Gettysburg, Pa., about an hour and a half north of Washington. We’ve
gone at least twice before, but this time, Loser/Tour Guide Roger
Dalrymple is adding some stops in the town itself along with some
battlefield edification — and of course a hearty lunch, this time
atO’Rorke’s Eatery , where the field trip
starts at noon. It would be great to be able to carpool; contact Elden
Carnahan on the Losers’ “Our Social Engorgements” page
to RSVP and to say whether you
need or can offer a ride. Dress is ultra-casual; T-shirts bearing
Confederate flags are not advised.