Style Conversational Week 1301: Fibs as footnotes
Looking back at the current-events poems of our 2006 contest
Harvard sophomore Kaavya Viswanathan had plenty to smile about in 2006:
She’d signed a two-book deal plus movie rights, and her first novel was
coming out. Her smile faded days later, after all the plagiarism was
revealed. (Chitose Suzuki/AP)
Harvard sophomore Kaavya Viswanathan had plenty to smile about in 2006:
She’d signed a two-book deal plus movie rights, and her first novel was
coming out. Her smile faded days later, after all the plagiarism was
revealed. (Chitose Suzuki/AP)
By
Pat Myers
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Pat Myers
Editor and judge of The Style Invitational since December 2003
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Oct. 11, 2018 at 3:52 p.m. EDT
This week’s Style Invitational contest —Week 1301,
for Fib poems — is one we’ve done only once
before, back in the spring of 2006. That year, all the poems were
supposed to be about current events, a requirement I’ve dropped this
time. And indeed, looking back at the results of Week 659 (here, without
the Post paywall
),
I needed to do a little research to jog my memory on some of the
references. Below are some explainers.
I don’t have any concern that an Invite entry will be so topical that
readers a dozen years from now won’t know what the heck it was about. I
like topical! The Fibs this week just have to still be understandable by
Nov. 11, 2018.
Since syllable counting is the whole point of the Fib — based on the
mathematical Fibonacci sequence — we obviously have to strictly observe
the 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8 rule. But what counts as a syllable does allow for
some flexibility; “aren’t,” for example, could be one syllable or two. A
dictionary listing will of course count as valid.
So here’s some annotated ink from May 2006.
*4th place:
Where’s
That
Receipt,
Claude Allen?
We clerks get nervous
When you’re near Customer Service. (*Jay Shuck, Minneapolis)
Claude Allen was a top adviser to President George W. Bush when he
suddenly resigned in early 2006 to, what else, spend more time with the
fam. It turned out that he was about to be arrested on charges of
fraudulently obtaining thousands of dollars’ worth of refunds and
credits from department stores: According to the police quoted in a Post
story, “Allen would purchase an item, take it to his car, return to the
store, select the same item, take it to the counter and get a refund
based on the receipt for the merchandise in his car.” He pleaded guilty
in county court and got probation, a fine and community service.
*3rd place:*
*Duke* *
LAX* *
Scandal* *
Has the whole* *
Campus in a fix,* *
Because boys can’t control their sticks. *(Andrew Hoenig, Rockville)
LAX is lacrosse, and this runner-up entry was written prematurely, as it
turned out.In a case
that no doubt fuels the anti-#MeToo forces to this day, several members
of the Duke University lacrosse team were charged with raping a stripper
who had been hired for a party in March 2006. In addition, the team’s
coach was forced to resign, and the school canceled the rest of the
team’s season. But in the ensuing months, the stripper’s very graphic
account fell apart and misconduct by the prosecution was alleged —
eventually leading to all charges being dropped against the players.
*2nd place: *
*White
House
Shows us:
Tony’s in,
John may take a hike:
Proves no two Snow flacks are alike. *
(Ira Allen, Bethesda)
Tony Snow, a well-known commentator on conservative media, had replaced
Scott McClellan as White House press secretary. Snow served only a year,
having developed colon cancer; he died cancer in 2008, at age 53.
Meanwhile, John W. Snow, the former CEO of CSX, had been George W.
Bush’s treasury secretary for three years when on May 30, 2006, he was
replaced with another Wall Street exec, Hank Paulson. Turns out that
Snow hadn’t paid income taxes on $24 million of loan forgiveness from
his CSX days. (Oops! Maybe TurboTax didn’t have that line.)
*And the Winner of the Inker:*
*When* *
The* *
Chinese* *
PM comes,* *
You meekly kowtow.* *
’Cause Dubya, Hu’s your daddy now.*
(Brendan Beary, Great Mills)
In April 2006 President Bush brought out the 21-gun salute for the visit
of by Presiden Hu Jintao (I’m not sure how we figured that “PM” was an
acceptable alternative title). And — tell me if you’ve heard this lately
— Hu “offered vague assurances that he will address U.S. economic
concerns while resisting tougher action on Iran and North Korea,” as a
Post story reported.
A carefully staged photo op that day was upstaged protesting China’s
persecution oppression of practitioners of the Falun Gong sect. Bush
apologized to Hu for the embarrassment, but don’t say he didn't stand up
for American principles: Instead of a black-tie state dinner, Bush
offered his counterpart merely a halibut luncheon.
Honorable Mentions:
*To Joe Lieberman:* *
It* *
Ain’t* *
Brave, your* *
Behavior.* *
Please kiss a tiny* *
Bit less presidential hiney.
*(David Smith, Santa Cruz, Calif.)
Among the most hawkish of Democrats, Sen. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut
was often criticized over his embrace of the Iraq War and support for
the president.
*Whenn* *
That* *
Aprill* *
Wyth showres* *
Hath made hys drizzle,* *
Thenn wander pilgryms, fo’ shizzle. * *
-- K. Viswanathan, Cambridge, Mass. *(Mark Eckenwiler, Washington)
In a fairy tale story, Harvard sophomore Kaavya Viswanathan, as part of
a rich two-book deal, released the young-adult novel “How Opal Mehta Got
Kissed, Got Wild and Got a Life.” It didn’t take long — less than two
weeks — for the Harvard Crimson to note a number of passages
in
the book that clearly had been lifted from two novels by Megan
McCafferty.as well as other sources. Viswanathan called the copying
unconscious, but the publisher recalled all copies of the book from stores.
She went on to get a law degree from Georgetown.
*Oh
Keith,
Now please:
Climbing trees?
Why don’t you grow up?
You aren’t 55 anymore.*
(Eric Murphy, Ann Arbor, Mich.)
Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards, then 62, “has been hospitalised
after falling out of a palm tree at an exclusive Fiji resort,” according
to an April 2006 article in The Guardian. It turned out that the
immortal had fractured his skull and suffered bleeding inside. He’s
still playing.
*Yes,
Bonds
Will be
Inducted.
But still, by and by,
I bet they’ll change that “u” to “i.”* (Roy Ashley, Washington)
Roy turned out to be right on one prediction, wrong (so far) on the
other. Baseball legend Barry Bonds, caught up in the BALCO steroid
scandal, would be indicted in 2007, and convicted in 2011, on charges of
lying and impeding the federal investigation into the case. But though
his conviction was overturned in 2015, Bonds is still not in the Hall of
Fame. He has four more years of eligibility.
*Poor* *
Tom* *
DeLay* *
Once held sway,* *
The fearsome Hammer.* *
Will his next House be the slammer? *(Mark Eckenwiler)
Caught up in the Jack Abramoff influence-peddling scandal, onetime House
majority leader Tom “The Hammer” DeLay had just announced that he would
be giving up his seat. And sure enough, DeLay was convicted of election
fraud in 2010 and sentenced to three years in prison — but he stayed out
on appeal, and was eventually acquitted.
He eventually became a lobbyist.
*Off* *
* *Drives* *
* *Britney* *
* *With her kid.* *
* *Folks want to shoot her:* *
* *She has a laptop commuter.*
(Jay
Shuck)
In addition to driving a car while her baby was on her lap, Britney
Spears wasn’t wearing a seat belt.
*Why
John
Can’t add
Or subtract:
Is it because we
Gave him a TI-83? *(Janet O’Donnell Lacey, Arlington)
This wasn’t exactly “current events” by 2006; the Texas Instruments
graphing calculator was introduced 10 years earlier — and is still sold
today. Also, of course, it wasn’t about adding and subtracting; the
humor would have worked better in the early 1970s.
*In
’08
If it’s “Frist”
Or “Hillary” to check,
I’ll vote for Sharpton from Quebec. *(Elden Carnahan)
Senate Majority Leader Frist announced in late 2006 that he would not
run for president in 2008.
I won’t ask Elden if he voted for Clinton.
*No
Ink.
I stink.
Humor gone
Since last election:
It’s your fault, Mr. President. *(Michelle Stupak, Ellicott City)
Ah, Michelle. Remember the good old days?
*FLIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES*: THE ‘TYPO’ HEADS OF WEEK 1297*
/*Non-inking headline by Chris Doyle/
Always so much fun, these bank-head contests: both the ones to
reinterpret a real headline or, as in Week 1297
, to change a character with a “typo” and
then describing the “news.” This week’sresults
— 38 entries, including a graphic, by 28 people — left plenty of
inkworthy entries robbed. (Word to the wise: Historically, headline
entries tend to get a lot of ink in our December retrospectives, in
which you can enter or reenter any of the past year’s contests.)
I just noticed that our Losers’ Circle this week — the winner and
runners-up — are entirely T-free; maybe nonpolitical entries felt
refreshing. In fact, there turned out to be quite a bit less political
zingery than in most Invites lately, though it pops up now and then.
Frank Osen wins the contest for the Oh Come On Now 19th time, while
second-placer John Hutchins scores his 100th (and 101st) Invite ink
blots. Jeff Contompasis gets his 42nd runner-up prize, but he’s already
told me that his imminent “You Gotta Play to Lose” mug will be only his
second in that style. And J. Larry Schott — along with Drew Bennett and
John’s wife, Connie, one of the three members of our West Plains, Mo.
(population 12,000), Loser Bureau — scores either a mug or a bag for his
10th ink “above the fold” and 72nd in all.
*What Doug Dug: *The faves (or, as we now also can say, favs
) of Ace Copy Editor Doug Norwood this week
were John Hutchins’s second-place ticking - tickling; Howard Walderman’s
“folding pattern” about D.C. sports teams (not the Capitals!), and Tom
Witte’s “What’s Old Is Ew.”
*The Scarlet Letter // *for most unprintable entry: “Friction at the C&O
Canal Anal Park: Vaseline shortage shuts down sex club.” By John
Hutchins, who might hope that his kids don’t read this far in The Style
Invitational.
*Paper, Plastic or Grossery? *
By popular demand (and because I love it), after we run out of “I Got a
B in Punmanship” Grossery Bags, I’m ordering another set of cloth “Whole
Fools” bags, with Bob Staake’s clever parody
.