Style Conversational Week 1265: Obits and pieces More about the late Godzilla actor, two courageous soldiers, and an entitled cat By Pat Myers close Image without a caption Pat Myers Editor and judge of The Style Invitational since December 2003 Email Email Bio Bio Follow Follow Feb. 1, 2018 at 2:39 p.m. EST The Style Invitational's contest to write humorous poems about people (and the occasional animal) who died in the previous year — variously titled Dead Letters, The Post's Mortems, A Lit Obit of Fun, and A RIP-Roaring Year — has celebrated the Formerly Functioning annually since 2004. And as always, this year's results mix the big headliners with those who were household names in only certain households. Here's some more about four of the subjects of this year's inking Dead-Poems. *HARUO NAKAJIMA (1929-2017)* /The actor who portrayed Godzilla Hence shall act as coffin filla. (Jesse Frankovich)/ Haruo Nakajima, the "suit actor" lumbering within the Godzilla costume in a dozen Japanese films beginning in 1954, first made his mark as a serious actor earlier that year in Kurosawa's "Seven Samurai," as a bandit. Released just nine years after Hiroshima and Nagasaki, "Godzilla" is the heartwarming tale of an irradiated mutant that springs from the ocean in the wake of a hydrogen bomb test and rampages through Tokyo. And inside Big G was Haruo Nakajima. “He hasn’t voted for anything I wouldn’t have voted for,” said one resident of Talkeetna, Alaska, about her town’s honorary executive. “He hasn’t voted for anything I wouldn’t have voted for,” said one resident of Talkeetna, Alaska, about her town’s honorary executive. "Big" is an understatement. As Nakajima remembers in a Great Big Story mini-doc, rubber was hard to come by in postwar Japan, and so "instead, they used ready-mixed concrete, so it weighed about 100 kilograms" — more than 200 pounds. "It was so heavy and hot, and with the lighting, it was even hot just to touch it." He said that the end of a day's shooting, which consisted of him knocking over meticulously constructed scale models with just the right amount of energy, he could fill half a bucket by wringing the sweat out of his undershirt. But Nakajima continued to suit up (presumably with increasing comfort) 11 more times through 1972. He also took a turn as King Kong in 1967. *STANISLAV PETROV (1939-2017)* /In '83, with Cold War tensions high, A Russian, at his button, didn't use it. Though sirens screamed to let the missiles fly, The truly big know when they shouldn't lose it. There wouldn't be a smithereen still left of Our world today, if not for Comrade Petrov. (Frank Osen)/ AD From a Washington Post article by Kristine Phillips: "Just past midnight on Sept. 26, 1983, Stanislav Petrov was on overnight duty inside Serpukhov-15, a secret bunker southwest of Moscow where the Soviet Union monitored its early-warning satellites positioned over the United States. The 44-year-old lieutenant colonel in the Soviet Union's Air Defense Forces was sitting on the commander's chair when sirens began blaring. A red button on the panel in front of him flashed the word "Start." On a computer screen was the word "Launch," in red, bold letters. The message appeared clear: The United States had just launched a nuclear missile attack against the Soviet Union. And Petrov, the officer in charge of Serpukhov-15, had to immediately warn his commanders so that the Soviet government could plan a counterattack. A second missile was launched. Then another, and another, and another. Petrov and his staff were in shock, but they had only minutes, if not seconds, to act. . . . Petrov had two choices: He could follow military protocol and tell his commanders that computer readouts were saying that five intercontinental ballistic missiles had been launched by the United States. Or he could go with his gut. Less than five minutes after the alarms began blaring, Petrov, working the intercom with one hand with lights flashing around him, picked up the phone with his other hand. He told his commanders that the computer warnings were false. If he was wrong, his mistake would be catastrophic and irreversible. The government's military would have no time to respond, leaving his country vulnerable in the face of a nuclear attack. … But if Petrov was right, a nuclear holocaust in the middle of the Cold War would be averted. And he was." Petrov wasn't just using his gut; he also used his head: "First, why just five missiles? A country seeking to start a nuclear war would've fired more, he told The Post. Second, the ground-based radar installations, which detected missiles, showed no evidence of an attack." The article goes on to say that while Petrov went on to be hailed as a hero in the West — there's a 2014 documentary titled "The Man Who Saved the World" — the Soviet government didn't even laud him at home, let alone remind the world how frighteningly it had screwed up. The story finally emerged in the late 1990s; Petrov lived his final years on a small pension in a town outside Moscow. *PVT. EMMANUEL MENSAH (died Dec. 28, age 28) * /Emmanuel Mensah never knew His native land was dung. We need more "wretched refuse" just like him And less from Donald's tongue. (Beryl Benderly) / From the New York Times, Dec. 29 : "Emmanuel Mensah was a handsome, strongly built young man in his late 20s who immigrated to the Bronx from Ghana five years ago. He joined the Army National Guard but returned to his apartment on Prospect Avenue in December, after graduating from boot camp with the rank of private first class. And on Thursday night, he lost his life trying to save people from his furiously burning apartment building, one of 12 people to die in the blaze. "He brought four people out," said his uncle, Twum Bredu, who lives next door. "When he went to bring a fifth person out, the fire caught up with him." ... Private Mensah, a decorated soldier who had been awarded a medal for marksmanship and was planning to join the military police, got that family to safety, then pulled out four more people, his uncle said, before returning to the building. He never emerged; the authorities said he died of smoke inhalation." The Army later said that Mensah had rushed back into the burning building at least three times to rescue fellow residents. It awarded him the Medal of Valor and a Soldier's Medal. As The Washington Post summed up aJan. 12 editorial in the wake of the president's comments on which countries' immigrants are more desirable: "Most Americans understand how fortunate we are to attract such heroes to our shores." *STUBBS THE CAT (1997-2017)* /For years, Alaskan tourists made a mandatory beeline To meet Talkeetna's mayor: such a well-connected feline. "Alas!" Alaskans mourn, "he could have gotten votes aplenty If he were in the running for VP in 2020." (Beverley Sharp)/ From a2013 Wall Street Journal article by Jim Carlton TALKEETNA, Alaska—The mayor of this tiny village has been shot, fallen into a restaurant fryer, jumped off a moving truck and been mauled by a dog. Now the burning question around these parts is: Has Mayor Stubbs used up his nine lives? Stubbs is a cat—but that didn't stop residents of this unincorporated burg of 876 from naming him their mayor 16 years ago. "It's an honorary position we gave him, and it just stuck," says Lauri Stec, general manager of Nagley's General Store, where Stubbs was adopted by the management as a stray kitten. "We don't own him, he owns us," she added, scratching His Honor under the chin. But townsfolk are being forced to contemplate regime change, after the golden-furred Manx mix was attacked by a dog in late August and left with 12 stitches, a punctured lung and fractured sternum. Stubbs spent nine days in a veterinary hospital before being released to his home in an upstairs room of the general store, where he is said to be recuperating slowly. … There are no formal surveys, but the mayor's approval ratings seem high. "He hasn't voted for anything I wouldn't have voted for," says Peg Vos, 61, a retired schoolteacher. "Anything's better than a human," adds Gil Gunther, 46, owner of the Antler Outpost. Stubbs's run of bad luck began about five years ago when some teenagers opened fire with a BB gun, leaving a pellet lodged in his hindquarters. Not long after, Stubbs hitched a ride on a garbage truck, prompting an all-points-bulletin on the local radio station. He managed to jump off on the outskirts of town and make his way home. Last year, he fell into the fryer of a restaurant—fortunately when the oil was cold—requiring an all-night cleansing with dish soap, Ms. Stec says. Most recently, on the night of Aug. 31, the mayor was out making his rounds when he was attacked by a mixed-breed dog. Ms. Stec says she . .  . .found him bleeding on the ground, she wrapped him up and took him to a local vet. Stubbs survived, and upon his return to Nagley's, was greeted like royalty. Fans from around the world, who knew of the cat mayor from previous news coverage, sent get-well cards and left messages of support on a Facebook page. Like an even more well-known former mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, Sarah Palin, Stubbs's star power has helped put Talkeetna on the map. But with Stubbs' recovery going slowly, talk inevitably has turned to succession plans. Exactly how—or whether—to replace Stubbs hasn't been determined. Says Sassan Mossaner, owner of the Denali Brewing Co., "Those are difficult paws to fill." --- Duncan Stevens's take on the somewhat better known Hugh Hefner — envisioning his afterlife "dressed as a bunny" — earns Duncan his fourth Style Invitational win and his 211th (and 212th) blot of Invite ink. On the other hand, Beryl Benderly's verse about Pvt. Mensah (and Prsdt. Non-Mensa) brings her just Ink No. 14 — but her third trip to the Losers' Circle — though she's been entering the Invite, very sporadically but successfully, since Week 94. And our other two "above the fold" Loserbards, Melissa Balmain and Beverley Sharp, seem to be up there more often than not whenever I post results of a poetry contest (or any other kind). *What Doug Dug:* The faves of Ace Copy Editor Doug Norwood this week were Melissa's runner-up about the inventor of Caller ID — "So why, when Death called, did you ever pick up?"; Jesse Frankovich's terse verse about Roger Ailes — "Now the CEO of Fox/ Does his lying in a box"; and Duncan's thoughts on Zbigniew Brzezinski: "When you're waiting in line at those ol' Pearly Gates/ To enter the kingdom of light,/ And they look up your name in the Book of the Fates, Here's hoping they've got it spelled right." *This just in: * Biggest Loser Ever Chris Doyle notes in the Style Invitational Devotees Facebook group, just as I'm writing this column: This week's poetry ink for Duncan, Mark Raffman and Chris Doyle pushes them all over the 100-ink mark for this Loser Year (Feb-Feb) alone, to join Jawdropper Jesse Frankovich, who got there months ago and is pushing 150. It's very rare for anyone to get 100 inks in one year; in the two previous years, only Chris met that mark, and no one did the year before. There was one other time when we had four 100-ink Losers, according to Elden Carnahan's Ridiculously Comprehensive Loser Stats : In 2005, Chris, Russell Beland, Kevin Dopart and Brendan Beary swabbed up that much ink — but that was when you could send in an unlimited number of entries rather than the current 25, and some of these people would send upward of 100 in a single week. The three new inductees to the Century Club, Chris adds, brings the membership only to nine; the other two to score 100 in a year were Jennifer Hart and Craig Dykstra. But while I'm eager to see the work of all of them in this week's song parody contest, Week 1265, I also hope that the rest of Loserdom isn't deterred: This past year, well over /three hundred/ different (oh, boy, are they different) Losers have gotten ink in The Style Invitational, and we have a month to go. I'm always delighted to see the work of the seldom-entering, not to mention brand-new Losers. Note that we have a First Offender this week, by the way: Mary Erickson's poem about mystery novelist Sue Grafton was my favorite among at least half a dozen candidates about the alphabetical-titler. *IT'S PARODY TIME! * Due to the length of this column, and just to not reinvent the wheel: If you're thinking of writing a song parody for our new contest, Week 1265, please look at my Style Conversational advice for our previous contest, Week 1235 — which in turn links to even more Wise Words, from Week 1202 . Note once again that you have a full extra week for the parodies; the deadline is Feb. 19. And always check out any discussion on the Devotees' thread about this week's contest (it's pinned to the top of the page; just click on "comments" and you can add your own — and always feel free to email me at pat.myers@washpost.com). *WHO'S HEADING NORTH TO THE LOSER BRUNCH FEB. 18? * The Loser Community, a.k.a. the Not Ready for the Algonquin Round (Table) Society, likes to schedule its monthly Sunday brunches all over the D.C.-Baltimore area, to give everyone a chance not to drive /that / far at least once in a while. This month, as in previous Februaries, we'll be gathering at noon at the Victoria Gastro Pub, just off I-95 in a shopping center in Columbia, Md., midway between Washington and Baltimore. RSVP to Elden at NRARS.org ("Our Social Engorgements") so we'll get a head count for the reservation. And as someone who lives on the opposite side of the metro area, I'll be happy to join a carpool.