PERMANENT INKSTAIN FOR PHILIP DELDUKE

This is what you've done, each Week. I arrange the rows in reverse chronological order, because there are some Losers, and they know who they are, who check up on my points-awarding every Week.

But I would just like to reiterate that such checking up is not a problem for me. I have said many times that each Loser's enlightened self-interest is my best QA.

If you wish to see what your ink was, refer to the Master Contest List or search All Invitational Text. Remember that Types I, P, some H, and sometimes A are seen "above the Report" -- that is, if they are listed here for Week 7777, for example, they will be found in text files or images of Week 7777. Everything else will be found in a "Report" section of a file two, three, or four weeks later; 7781 in this Example.

If you see any error, please let me know, elden.carnahan@gmail.com.

Key to Ink Types:

WKTITLESYNOPSISINK TYPES
288 PICTURE THIS What is happening in these pictures? H H
284 ASK BACKWARDS MCLXVII You are on "Jeopardy!" These are the answers. What are the questions? H
283 UH-OH Come up with "uh-oh" lines, statements that occur in the middle of a seemingly benign speech or conversation, suddenly alerting the listener that he is about to hear some bad news. H
278 THE STALE INVITATIONAL Begin with a word. Add, subtract or change a single letter only, and then provide a new definition. H
239 NAME THAT TOON Send us the captions for cartoons not provided. H
225 WE RESPECTfully decline to publish any dumb entries by YOU. Come up with signs for a T-shirt or a bumper sticker that hide the real message in tiny type. H
222 TRIP DEUCES Take the two subject listings at the top of any page of the Yellow Pages and create a dictionary definition for the compound word they form. 5
219 VERBOSITY Come up with new, obnoxious, self-conscious faux verbs and use them in sentences. H
211 GIVE US THE BACKS OFF YOUR SHIRTS Design the back of the fourth Style Invitational T-shirt, with anything that captures the transcendent indignity of this contest. H
209 WE NEED SOME SEASONING Come up with the first signs of spring in Washington. H H
208 SEND IN THE CLONES Suggest questions a commission to investigate the moral, legal and practical question raised by cloning might consider. H
174 THE EDGE OF MIGHT Complete any of the four provided "you might" phrases. H
170 THE ELEMENTS OF SMILE Why are these people smiling? H
164 MEAN MEANINGS Translate things politicians say into what they really mean. H H
150 TRIAL BALLOONS What are the people saying? H
123 WHY IS POOP FUNNY? Come up with creative answers to any of the five questions above that might be asked by a 5-year-old. H
98 YOUR CHEATIN' ART Come up with titles for country music songs featuring any one or more of the following themes: cheatin', thievin', drinkin', truckin', lovin' or dogs. H
91 ASK BACKWARD IV You are on "Jeopardy!" These are the answers. What are the questions? H
88 GIVE US SOME GOOD NEWS Come up with ways things are going to be different now that Republicans have ascended to power. 2 H
80 NICK KNACKS Come up with a great nickname for any contemporary celebrity. 3
22 STUMP US Come up with slogans for the 1996 presidential campaign. H
14 COLLECTIVE INSANITY Modernize collective nouns (as in a "pride" of lions or an "exaltation" of larks), inventing snide new names for groups of things. H

MOST OF YOUR INK

Here is, I hope, most of your ink to be found in the All Invitational Text list. I have to find these with what are called regular expressions, which is a method used in a lot of programming languages to find and modify certain text strings in larger corpora. Basically I look for something like this:

"Report From Week 758"

or

"And from The Style Invitational four weeks ago . . ."

and then some text, your name, and your town, arranged in this familiar way:

"GlaxoSmithKline: I have six kids named Chesterfield, Winston, Lark, BensonHedges, Doral and Kool. If I name my new baby Nicorette, can I get a free coupon for your products? (Jennifer Hart, Arlington)"

I don't catch everything, but I believe I find 90%.

Unlike in the table to the left, I've arranged these in chronological order, so you can see how your humor matured, like a forgotten cheese deep in the walls of an old house. You started out, perhaps in Year 1, sending in riddles you sort of remembered from grade school, and now look at ya, ain't you Dorothy Parker.





[still working on this ...]