WEEK | TITLE | SYNOPSIS | INK Types |
---|---|---|---|
1614 | The Tile Invitational XI | Make up new words with the letters we give you | H H H |
1613 | What's the Worst That Could Happen? | After the election, we mean. And be funny about it. | H 2 |
1612 | Asterisky Business | Put words in Horace's mouth: Tell us a joke that not everyone will get. | H H H H |
1611 | Ask Backwards XLIII | We give you the 'answers'; you tell us the questions. | H H H 4 |
1610 | Wryku | Write a haiku about something in the news. | H |
1609 | Saved! | Tell us funny ways to be thrifty in these parlous times | H H H |
1608 | Stick It | An election bumper sticker contest | L H H H |
1607 | Funny, Init? | Compare two people who have the same initials. | H H |
1606 | The Cold New Trend | What would be an even sillier new fad than decorator refrigerator shelves? | W H 3 |
1605 | Get Thee to a Punnery | Change a quote slightly and credit it to someone else. | H H H H H |
1604 | Call Your Dog | Give us creative names for various pets | M H H |
1602 | We Got Game | Tell us some funny ways to 'improve' a sport. | H 4 2 |
1600 | Taylorgaters | Take a line from a 'Tortured Poets' lyric and rhyme it with one of your own. | H H 4 |
1599 | Picture This | It's our caption contest. | W H H H H |
1598 | Same Difference | We give you a random list of things, and you tell us how any two are alike or different. | H |
1597 | The Farce of July | Give us new ways to celebrate Independence Day. | H H H |
1596 | History for the tl;dr Crowd | Sum up an event for the 21st-century reader in a rhyming couplet. | H H |
1595 | Ebenezer Screwed | Write us a funny comic strip on a certain sensitive subject | 4 |
1593 | Qwerty Lashes | Write us something funny from just a few letters of the keyboard. | H 3 |
1592 | It's Parody Time | Write a funny song about ... anything you like! | W H H |
1590 | All You Need Is Ink | Take a line from a Beatles song and rhyme it with your own. | I H H H H H H H H |
1589 | Wait Wait Right Here! | Write some 'Not My Job' questions a la the NPR quiz show. | H |
1588 | Colt Fusion | Because of our munificense and guilt, you get a full hundred foal names to 'breed' for 'grandfoals' | H |
1587 | The Trite Stuff | Replace some well-worn phrases with better ones. | W H H H |
1586 | Pun for the Roses | Our annual crazy-popular horse 'breeding' wordplay contest. | H |
1585 | Bring Up the Rear | Move the last letter of a word to the front. | H H H H |
1584 | Seeds of Change | Make an anagram of a name-brand product. | H H 2 |
1583 | A Thousand Words | Write a funny poem about the artwork of your choice. | H H H |
1582 | You're Workin' on a Chain, Gang | A classic connection game. | H H |
1581 | SOTU-Speak | Use words from Biden's State of the Union speech to write some lines for another oration. | W H H H H H H |
1580 | Hi, Anxiety! | Tell us some funny ways to stress yourself out. | H H |
1579 | Captions Courageous | Write a description for any of six photos | H |
1578 | The Pepys Show | Give us a diary entry from anyone in history. | H H H H H H 3 |
1577 | Why the #$%#$% Not? | The Washington Post is looking for some bold ideas -- Let's show it some! | H H H H |
1576 | Praise the Lurid! | Give us clickbait headlines for mundane stories. | H H |
1575 | The Ughscars and the Phewlitzers | Give us an idea for a bad book or movie. | H H H H 2 |
1573 | The Invitational Week 55: Tour de Fours — Be STUD-ly | Give us a new word or phrase containing 'DUST' in any order of letters. | I H H H H |
1572 | S Is for Smartass | Presenting the Devil's Alphabet Soup | H H |
1571 | Dead Letters, our annual obit contest | Write a funny verse about someone who died in 2023. | H |
1570 | The Invitational, Week 52: Replaying Around -- The 2023 retrospective, Part II | Enter or reenter our Week 26-50. | H H H H H H H |
1569 | Look Back in Inker -- Our 2023 retrospective, Part 1 | Enter or reenter our Week 1-25 contests. | H H |
1568 | Nextra! Nextra! | Tell us the funny news events from 2024 | H H H |
1567 | Picture This | A caption contest | W H H H |
1566 | Well, the Good News Is ... | Put a positive spin on a bad-news headline | H H |
1565 | Oh, For Namesakes! | Compare two people who share part of a name. | H 4 |
1563 | The Perfect(ly Ridiculous) Gift | Offer up some products for people-who-have-everything catalogs. | H H H |
1562 | Rhyme and Rhyme Again | Write a funny "monorhyme", a poem whose lines all rhyme on the same sound. | H H H |
1560 | The 'Hole Story | Write us a funny 'Am I The Asshole' question | L |
1559 | As the Word Turns | 'Discover' new words by snaking through this random grid | H H H |
1558 | It's Parody Time | Send up the news with those songs and videos you do so well | H H 2 |
1557 | Tailgating On the Highway | Pair a Dylan line with your own rhyming one | H H H H H H 3 |
1555 | Do You Have to Spell It Out for Us? | Give us "backronyms" | H H |
1554 | U (Heart) TFG's BFFs | Reach out to beleaguered Trump supporters and bathe them in the warmth of your love, to help bind the nation’s wounds | H H H H 4 |
1553 | Doody and Muldoon | Write a Muldoon, a four-line poem that features at least two body parts and a place name, and at least one rhyme. | H |
1552 | A Mirthday Party | Link two people who share a birthday | H H |
1551 | Ask Backwards XLII | We give the answers. You give the questions. | W H H H H |
1550 | Holy Moly, It's Limerixicon XX | Write a limerick featuring a word beginning "ho-". | H H |
1549 | The Tile Invitational X | It's our 10th running of this coin-a-word game. | H |
1548 | Poll-ish Jokes | Come up with a ridiculous reader poll. | H H H |
1547 | Alphabettering | Write a funny sentence containing all 26 letters. | L H H H |
1546 | Put It in Bee-verse | Write a funny poem using a spelling bee word | H H H H |
1544 | Same Difference | Tell us humorously how items on the list are alike, different, or otherwise linked. | H H H |
1543 | F Things Up | Neologisms by adding Fs or changing letters to F | H 3 |
1542 | Your (B)ad Here | Tweak an ad slogan to use it for another product | H H |
1540 | Picture This | It's caption contest time, with eight motley pictures to choose from. | H H |
1539 | Get Real, Reel | Name a scene in a movie, a TV show, or literature, and tell us how it might be revised (perhaps less satisfyingly but far more realistically) | H H H H 4 |
1538 | Rhymes Against Humanity | Write a four-line poem about people in the news, using either of two poetic forms | H 3 |
1537 | A Crooning Achievement | Write a lyric for a politician to sing. | H H 2 |
1536 | Colt Following | Now that we have the winner and punners-up of our venerable foal-name contest, it's time for 'grandfoals'. | H H |
1535 | The Poops Diorama | Make some funny art with toilet paper and send us a photo. | H |
1534 | Pun for the Roses | Our renowned horse name 'breeding' contest returns! | H H H H |
1533 | The Very Last 'Snappy Answers to Stupid Questions' | Tell us a stupid question followed by a funny retort. | W H |
1532 | We Bee Back With Neologisms | Make up words using letter sets from the NYT Spelling Bee game | L H 3 |
1531 | The Worst New Contest Ever | Describe something that would be worse than a second Trump presidency | H H H |
1530 | Mess With Our Heads | Reinterpret any headline by adding a 'bank head'. | H |
1529 | Hello, Dall-E! | Our new contest partners you and a machine. | H H |
1528 | It's Our Birthday. Party Like It's 1993. | As the Invite turns 30, enter your choice of contests from our year of infancy | H H H |
1527 | Film Flim-Flam | Use all the letters in a movie title to make a new movie | I H H H H H H H |
1526 | Poke Us Till We Giggle | Write a "poke", or a joke recast as a rhyming poem | M H H H H H 2 |
1525 | Arty Har-har | Give us an idea for a humorously audacious modern art work | H H |
1524 | Picture This | A caption contest | W H |
1523 | Where in Hell ...? | Name a "circle" for some "evil", plus a suitable punishment | W H H H |
1522 | Questionable Journalism | Find a sentence published in the next week and tell us what question it could answer | H H |
1521 | Send Us the Bill | Our "Joint Legislation" contest | L |
1520 | Nextra! Nextra! | Read All About it. Predict the big news events of 2023 | W H H H H H H H |
1519 | Dead Letters | The post-Post humor contest barely skips a beat as the Czar and Empress begin with the annual obit poems. | H H H H |
1518 | The final Post edition | Some all-time favorite entries | H |
1513 | You're such a card | Come up with a greeting card rhyme for an un-greeting-card occasion. | I |
1512 | Alphabetter | Write a 26-word sentence or other passage whose words each start with a different letter — except that the X in the X-word may appear elsewhere in the word, as long as the word has an “ex” syllable. | H H |
1511 | The inside word--our 'air quote' contest | Highlight part of a word, name or short phrase in “air quotes” to give the word a new meaning or description. | H H |
1510 | Only U (or A, E, I or O) | Write a humorous univocalic poem — one that uses only one of the vowels A, E, I, O or U | H H |
1509 | MASH MASH: combine 2 one-word movies | Combine two single-word movie titles to make a new movie and describe it. | H H H |
1508 | Tour de Fours XIX —Laughtime Achievement | Coin a word or phrase containing the letters E-L-D-N — consecutively but in any order — and describe it. | H H H |
1506 | Let's go magnet-fishing with new words | From the provided list, write a humorous poem of eight lines or fewer. | 3 |
1505 | Munici-pals | Choose any two or more real U.S. or Canadian towns — they need to show up on a Google search — and come up with a joint endeavor they would undertake. | H H H H |
1504 | All set — anagram all 100 Scrabble tiles | Write a Scrabblegram — an anagram of all 100 tiles in an English-language Scrabble set (your choice for the two blanks). Any punctuation is fine. | H H |
1503 | Sing of your supper--parodies about food | Write a humorous song on the subject of food. | W P |
1502 | It's Hi-time for Limerixicon XIX | Supply a humorous, previously unpublished limerick significantly featuring any word, name or term beginning with “hi-. | H |
1501 | Try a little 'kindness' | Tell about an “act of kindness” that you or someone else does that, well, won’t be appreciated. | T M H |
1500 | These go to 15 | Make up a word or phrase whose Scrabble letter values add up to exactly 15 (no blanks!) and define it. | I H H H H H |
1499 | Picture This, a cartoon caption contest | Write a caption, either descriptive or in dialogue, for any of the provided cartoons. | H H |
1498 | V for Verses -- misuse a word in a poem | Write a short (eight lines or fewer), humorous poem that uses one or more words in other than their actual meanings. | H H |
1497 | The if-word | Give us a "what if" scenario and its humorous result | H H H H H 4 |
1494 | Put it in bee-verse | Write a humorous poem of eight lines or fewer that includes at least one of the words used in Round 4 or later of this year's bee; OR: write a joke in Q&A form that uses at least one of the words. | H H H H |
1493 | Frankly speaking with feghoots | Tell a feghoot -- a mini-story (a ridiculous one is fine) that ends in a groaner pun on a familiar expression, title, line from a song, etc. | H |
1492 | Set us right -- conservative humor | Send us conservative-leaning humor in a Q&A joke format or a knock-knock joke. | H H H |
1491 | The add biz | Choose any word, name or phrase beginning with A throough E, then add any single letter of the alphabet to it -- one or more times -- and define the result or show how it would be used. | H H H |
1490 | It's parody time -- sing the news | Write a satiric song about anything in the news these days. | H 2 |
1489 | Let's movie things around | Rearrange the words of a movie title to create a new movie, then describe it | H |
1488 | Let's recycle! | Come up with humorous uses for ANY product or combination of products listed at RepurposeMaterials.com, including but no restricted to the provided list. | H H H |
1487 | Colt following -- now it's the grandfoals | Breed" any of the "foal" names provided in today's results (including the intro) and give the "grandfoal" a name that reflects both names. | H |
1486 | No can do: Signs of incompetence | Give us a clue that someone was incompetent in a given field. | H H |
1485 | Switchcraft -- transpose two letters in a word | Switch the positions of two letters within a word, name, title or phrase, then describe the result. | H H H 4 |
1484 | Two ways about it | What's something (printable) you could say in two -- or more -- of the provided situations. | H H |
1483 | Pun for the Roses -- our famous foal-'breeding' contest | Breed" any two of the provided names and name the "foal". As in actual thoroughbred racing, a name may not exceed 18 characters including spaces. | H |
1482 | The Tile Invitational IX | Rearrange the letters of any of the letter sets provided to create a new term, then define or describe; you may use all seven letters, but also just six or five. | H H 2 |
1481 | Mess with our heads | Reinterpret some actual headline (or a major part of it), from any publication, print or online. | H H |
1480 | Oh, you don't really mean that | Define" inaccurately and humorously any of the provided words. | H H |
1479 | It's a WordleVite! Write a prhase of 5-letter words | Write a phrase or sentence consisting of two to six five-letter words or names, then define it or say something funny about it. AND the Wordle part: once a letter is in the right, "green" place -- the same place as it is in the final word (like the P in "pouty" in the example provided) -- your subsequent words must keep those letters in their right places. | H 3 |
1478 | It's a small, small world | Write a humorous poem, eight lines max, using only words from the provided list of 1,000 most common English words. | H 4 3 |
1477 | Thinking outside the big box | Send us a humorous "review" for any of the provided items listed on walmart.com<\em>. | H 2 |
1476 | Matchless humor -- show us some Googlenopes | Find us a Googlenope -- a phrase in quotation marks that generates the message "It looks like there aren't many matches for your search" -- or a Googleyup, a phrase that surprisingly does have hits. | H 4 |
1475 | Hail to the Commanders! | Write a song (set to any familiar tune) or shouted cheer for the Washington Commanders. OR: Write for any other D.C. institution, e.g., the Metro, the Senate, the National Zoo, The Washington Post. | H H 3 |
1474 | Hyphen the Terrible | Combine one side of a hyphenated word or phrase with one side of another such term -- either side can be the end or the beginning -- to create a new term. AND! Both halves of the term must come from the same issue of a newspaper (The Post or another one) or published the same day on its website, Feb. 3 through 14. | H |
1472 | Phony money -- tell us fake financial trivia | Tell us some fake trivia about money or the financial system. | I H H H H |
1471 | Tour de Fours XVIII: B-I-D-E with us | Coin a word or phrase containing the letters B-I-D-E -- consecutively but in any order, and describe it. | H H H |
1470 | Your add here -- a prefix feast | Add a "prefix" -- by which we mean at least one syllable of any kind (but not multiple words) -- to the beginning of any word in well-known phrase, name, book title, etc., and describe the result. | H 4 |
1469 | Post Mortems 2021, our obit poems | Write a poem of no longer than eight lines (plus an optional title) about someone who died in 2021. | H H H H |
1468 | The Year in Redo, Part 2 | Enter (or reenter) any Style Invitational contest from Week 1440 through 1464. | W H H |
1467 | The Year in Redo, Part 1 | Enter (or reenter) any Style Invitational contest from Week 1413 through 1439, except for Weeks 1414-1416. | H H |
1466 | Be invitationally correct | Give us a funny "correction" that a newspaper or magazine might offer. | H H H H |
1465 | Put your '22 cents in for our annual pre-timeline | Name some humorous news event to happen in 2022. | H H H H |
1463 | Fork over some (new) Spoonerisms | Write and original Q-A joke featuring a spoonerism. | H H |
1462 | Time for a new career? | Tell what would happen if any two people switched professions or other roles. | H H |
1461 | It's the eponymy, stupid | Create an eponym -- a word based on the name of a well-known person -- define it, and perhaps use it in a humorous sentence. | I H H H |
1460 | These new words are on fleek | From the provided list, write a humorous poem of eight lines or fewer. | H H |
1459 | And we quote: 'It's Parody Time' | Write humorous first-person lyrics for a song "by" some particular person. | W I H H H |
1458 | Do adjust your set: TV anagrams+ | Use all the letters of any TV show (including streamed ones), past or present, to create new show; or it can be an episode of the original. | H |
1457 | What is Ask Backwards XL? | You are on "Jeopardy!"; various answers are provided. You provide the questions. | H H H |
1456 | The hunting of the snark | Ask an insulting rhetorical question in the form (or a variation) of "Is that your _______ or _______? | H H |
1455 | Good idea! Or not. | Cite a "good idea' and, with a small change of wording, a "bad idea". | H H |
1454 | Punku 3 -- haiku with a pun | Create a haiku containing a pun or similar wordplay. | H |
1452 | As the Word Turns | Discover" a word or multiword term that consists of adjacent letters -- in any direction or several directions, up, down, back, forth, diagonally -- in the provided grid, and provide a humorous definition. | H |
1451 | Could have said it worse ourselves | Give us a humorously bad "first draft" of a famous line from history, literature or entertainment. | H H |
1450 | Putting the 'anoid' in humanoid | Humorously describe some aspect of our current society as a space alien and/or future anthropologist might interpret it. | I H H H H |
1449 | Let's have a get-together | Begin with a real name; append to it a word, name or expression so that they overlap; and finally define or "quote" the resulting phrase or name. | H H |
1448 | Hear, hear -- it's Limerixicon XVIII | Supply a humerous, previously unpublished limerick significantly featuring any word, name or term beginning with "he-". | H |
1447 | Give it to us straight | Take any sentence from an article or ad in any publication (print or online) dated July 29 through Aug. 9, 2021, and intepret it in “plain English". | H |
1446 | Clue us in -- and we spill the beans | Write novel clues for as many as 25 answers in the provided grid, across or down, first substituting your own letters for any covered ones. | H H |
1445 | Put it in bee-verse -- poems with spelling words | Write a humorous poem of eight lines or fewer that includes at least one of the words used in Round 8 or later of this year's bee; OR: write a joke in Q&A form that uses at least one of the words. | H 4 |
1444 | It's a whole new all-game | Slightly change the name of a sport, sports event or similar pastime to create a new one, and briefly describe it. | H H |
1443 | The letters of the laws | Propose some law -- it doesn't have to be a serious issue -- and give it a name and an acronym, | M H 2 |
1442 | Same difference, or missing links | Choose any two (or more) items from the utterly random list above and say how they're different, alike or otherwise linked. | H |
1441 | \'Rick rolling: songs as limericks | Sum up or otherwise reflect a well-known song as a limerick. | H H |
1440 | It's parody time! | Write a satiric song about anything in the news these days. | H H |
1439 | Vowel Movement: The Musical | Choose a song title; remove all the vowels; then add back as many vowels as you like to create a new title, and describe the song. You might also provide a line or two of lyrics. | H |
1438 | Nothing but the untruth: Fake trivia about the law | Give us some bogus trivia about the law -- lawyers, courts, judges, police, odd laws, terminology, what have you. | H H |
1437 | One-offs: A 'typo' neologism contest | You're a fat-fingered typist: Change a word, name or phrase by either adding or substituting one letter that's adjacent (in any direction) to the original one on a regular QWERTY keyboard, or by doubling the correct letter. | H H H H |
1436 | Haven't seen it: Fun with movie titles | Misinterpret a movie title in a supposed plot description. | H H H H |
1435 | Who needs Peeps when we have CICADAS? | Create a witty visual artwork that includes at least one real cicada or cicada casing (the body-shaped shell from which the insect emerges) and send us a photo of it. | H |
1434 | Go ahead, mate my bay: Grandfoals | Breed" any two of this week's inking foal names and name the "grandfoal. | T H H H |
1433 | Questionable Journalism | Choose any sentence (not a headline!) in an article or ad in The Washington Post or another publication dated April 22 through May 3, and write a question it might humorously answer. | H H H |
1432 | Turn tale and run with it | Offer a new angle on a folk tale, nursery rhyme, children's song, etc., with a short poem, mini-story (under 100 words) or song parody. | H H |
1431 | The On-Our-Way-Back Machine | Tell us how (in some funny way) things will be different as we emerge from the pandemic. | H |
1430 | Back to racing speed with the 'foals' | Breed" any two of the provided names of the 100 horses nominated for the 2021 Triple Crown races and name the "foal" to humorously play off both parents' names. | H H H |
1429 | Forsoothsayers | Quote a line or so from any Shakespeare work, and exemplify it with a contemporary quote, real or imagined. | W I H H H H |
1428 | The Tile Invitational VIII | Create a five-, six-, or seven-letter word (or phrase) by scrambling the letters of any of the provided sets and define it. | H |
1427 | Rocky of ages, or Badenov for you? | State any historical event -- right up to 2021 -- in the provided "A, or B" format. | H H H |
1426 | Mess with our (or others') heads | Reinterpret an actual headline (or a major part of it) by adding a bank head, or subtitle. | H H H |
1425 | Picture this -- a caption contest | Write a caption, either descriptive or in dialogue, for any of the provided cartoons. | H H H |
1423 | Muddled heads: Headline anagrams | Choose a headline (or part of a headline) in any print or online publication dated Feb. 11-22 and rearrange all its letters into an anagram. | H H H H |
1422 | The Collaboratory | Think of a book, movie or song title. Then pair its creator, star, singer, etc., with an unrelated "collaborator" to produce a wordplay on the title. | H H H |
1421 | Alternaugural Address '21 | Write a humorous passage -- a "quote", an observation, a joke, a dialogue, a poem, anything -- using only words that appear in Biden's inaugural address. | H H H |
1420 | Singing on the job -- a parody contest | Write a humorous "work song" for any job or profession. Set it to any well-known tune. | I H H |
1419 | Send us the bill -- 'joint legislation' | Combine two or more names from the provided list of the new members of Congress to “co-sponsor” a bill based on their combined last names, and state its purpose. | H H |
1418 | Tour de Fours XVII: Just Undo It | Coin a word or multi-word term containing the letters U-N-D-O -- consecutive but in any order -- and describe it. | H H |
1417 | Dead Letters, our obit poem contest | Write a poem of no longer than eight lines (plus an optional title) about someone who died in 2020. | H H |
1415 | The Year in Redo, Part 1 | Enter (or reenter) any Style Invitational contest from Week 1360 through 1387, except for Weeks 1361-1363. | W H H H H H |
1414 | Divining comedy: 2021 predictions | Name some humorous news event to happen in 2021. | H H H H H |
1413 | We're finna give you some new words | Write a poem of eight lines or fewer featuring one or more of the provided terms. The terms must be used as they're defined in the new m-w.com listing. | H |
1412 | Jumble bells -- anagram a song line | Rearrange all the letters in a song title, or a line (or more if you dare!) from a song. Optional: Offer a parody of the original tune (or a few lines of it) that refers to the new title. | H |
1411 | Back end of a Bulwer | Write a humorously awful final sentence or two to an imaginary novel. | H |
1410 | Legends of the fall -- more fictoids | Tell us some bogus trivia about autumn, or things that happen (or have happened) in autumn. | H H |
1409 | Skip a groove: Drop a letter or more from a song title | Drop one or more letters from somewhere in the middle of a song title and describe the new song, and/or quote some lyrics from it. | I H H H H H H |
1408 | Re-Organization | Slightly change the name of a nonprofit organization and describe it. | H |
1407 | Your ad space (or space ad) here | Come up with an idea for promoting some commercial product or service (a) in space, (b) in a prison, (c) at a kindergarten, (d) by a football team or (e) in the White House. | H |
1405 | Okay, once more around the track | Breed" any two of the provided foal names that got ink in Week 1400 and name the offspring to reflect both parents' names. | H H |
1404 | Ask Backwards XXXIX | The answers are provided. You supply the questions. | H H |
1403 | Who was that masked man? | Current a short listing for a current or past TV show that has a coronavirus story line, or one reflecting some other issue in the news right now. | H H H |
1402 | The fourteeners--a neologism contest | Make up a word whose Scrabble letter values add up to exactly 14 (no blanks!), and define it. | I H H H H H |
1401 | How hai? A joke-haiku contest | Write a joke (roughly) in the "It's so xxx" genre as a haiku. | H 3 |
1400 | Back on track with our classic 'foal' contest | Breed" any two of the provided names of the 100 horses nominated for the 2020 Triple Crown races and name the "foal" to humorously reflect the parents' names. | H H 3 |
1399 | The lie-zy days of summer | Tell us some bogus trivia about the summer or things that happen or have happened in the summer. | H H |
1398 | This is the year that is | Describe the year 2020 in a novel, colorful metaphor or simile. You may also offer an original graphic. | I H H H H H H 4 |
1397 | Trope springs eternal | Use any of the four provided standard settings -- (a) desert island, (b) bartender at a bar, (c) desert, (d) psychiatrist next to a couch -- and describe a cartoon that includes your choice of characters, along with a caption. | H H H H H |
1396 | Hail Limerixicon XVII: Write a limerick featuring a 'ha-' word | Supply a humorous, previously unpublished limerick significantly featuring any English word, name or term beginning with "ha-". | H H 3 |
1394 | Two movies, one line | Cite a real or coined line, or give a description, that could work for two different movies, plays or TV shows. | W H |
1393 | Second chance (acned conches?) for anagrams | Describe any of the provided anagram businesses, or offer its slogan. | H H |
1391 | No-covid zone -- a neologism contest | Coin a new word or phrase that lacks C, O, V, I and D and describe it. | I H H H H 2 |
1390 | 'Same difference' for a new time | Explain how any two of the items in the provided list are similar, different or otherwise linked. | H H H |
1389 | TankaWanka 4: Haiku plus tu | Write a TankaWanka about something that's been in the news lately. | H H |
1388 | Turning around a business | Create a business, product, organization or similar entity that contains a word, name or phrase and its anagram, and describe it. | H |
1387 | Movie clips -- drop letters from the middle of a title | Delete one or more letters (they must be consecutive) from the middle of a movie title, and describe the resulting new movie. | I H H H |
1386 | Colt following: It's the grandfoals! | Breed" any two of the 70 foal names that got ink this week and name the offspring to reflect both parents' names. | H H |
1385 | Don't you want to see new places? | Change any place name slightly and describe the new place. | H H |
1384 | Of course there are stupid questions! | Give us stupid questions, especially ones reflecting Our Current Situation. | H H |
1383 | Questionable Journalism | Choose any sentence (not a headline) in an article or ad in The Washington Post or another publication dated May 7 through May 18, and write a question it might humorously answer. | H H H |
1382 | For us, it's still Post Time | Breed" any two names from the provided list of 100 of the 145 previous Kentucky Derby winners, from 1875 to 2019, and name the foal to humorously reflect the parents' names. | H H H |
1380 | Both sides now | Delete one or more letters (in a row) from a word or brief phrase to find another word, and define it. | H H H |
1379 | Your wish: A pun -- a star | Tell a joke, in your choice of form, whose punchline is a pun on a song title or lyric. | I H H H |
1378 | It's (emergency) Parody Time | Write a song about life in the Age of Corona, set to a familiar tune (or even one of your own, if you perform it on video). | H H |
1377 | Make your own March Madness | Think of some sport, game, art project or other activity that you can conjure up using various items that you might find around the house. | H |
1376 | Get thee to a funnery | Add a character (or more) to a Shakespeare play and supply some resulting dialogue. | H H H H H H |
1375 | Mess With Our Heads | Reinterpret an actual headline (or a major part of it) by adding a bank head, or subtitle. | H H |
1374 | Versus' verses in a rap battle | Write a mini-"rap" between any two characters, real or fictional, as in the provided ERB example. | H H 4 |
1372 | Trash talking, 1880-style | Write a quatrain or -- heck -- two of Balliol rhyme about some person. | I H H H |
1371 | The Tile Invitational VII | Create a five-, six-, or seven-letter word (or phrase) by scrambling the letters of any of the provided sets and define it. | W H H H H |
1370 | What's in a name? | Write something about a well-known person, real or fictional, using only the letters in that person's name. | H H H |
1368 | Picture This -- cartoon captions | Supply a caption for one or more of the provided cartoons. | H |
1367 | Pick me up at work, okay? | Give a pickup line from someone in a particular profession, or from a particular person or fictional character. | M I H H H H H H |
1366 | Tour de Fours XVI -- It's the LIAR club | Coin a word or multi-word term that contains the letter block L-I-A-R and describe it. | H H |
1365 | Dead Letters, our obit poem contest | Write a poem of eight lines or fewer (plus an optional title) about someone who died in 2019. | M H H H H |
1363 | The Year in Redo, Part 2 | Enter (or reenter) any Style Invitational contest from Week 1334 through Week 1359. | W H |
1362 | The Year in Redo, Part 1 | Enter (or reenter) any Style Invitational contest from Week 1307 through 1333, except for Weeks 1309-1311. | H H H H H H H |
1361 | 2020 vision -- the year in preview | Name some humorous news event to happen in 2020. | W H H |
1360 | The lyin' in winter: Seasonal fictoids | Give us some untrue trivia about winter or things that occur in winter. | H |
1359 | Back up in the air (quotes) | Write a sentence or two and highlight an "air quote" that spans two or more words (and two sentences if you like). | H |
1358 | What to your wondering eyes will appear? | Write a humorous passage -- a "quote", an observation, a joke, a dialogue, a poem, anything -- using only words that appear in "A Visit From St. Nicholas" (a.k.a "The Night Before Christmas"). | W H H |
1357 | It's parody time! | Write a satirical song about anything in the news right now, set to a familiar tune. | 2 |
1356 | Ask Backwards 38 | Sixteen "answers" are provided. Tell us the questions. | H H H |
1355 | The inside word | Highlight part of a word, name or short phrase in "air quotes" to give the word a new meaning or description. | H 2 |
1354 | As the Word turns 5: Taking our vowels | Discover" a word or multiword term that consists of adjacent letters -- in any direction or several directions -- in the provided grid, and provide a humorous definition. | M H |
1353 | What's playing at the retroplex | Change a movie title to its "opposite" by reversing one or more words; then describe the new movie. | I H H H H H |
1352 | Hee-rotica -- Steamy prose for unsteamy life | Write a short steamy scene (100 words would be considered long) about a non-steamy event. | H H H |
1351 | What concept will you be for Halloween? | Give us a creative, clever idea for a timely Halloween costume (for one or more people) or an idea for a party or other activity. You may even send us a photo of an actual new costume you've created this year. | I H H H H |
1350 | Here's inspo for new-word poems | Write a poem of eight lines or fewer featuring one or more of these recent additions to m-w.com. | H H 4 |
1349 | Revise and extend these remarks | Go to congress.gov/congressional-record and click on the PDF for any day's Congressional Record. Choose any sentence (or substantial part of one) and write a question that it could answer. | H |
1348 | Same difference | Explain humorously how any two or more of the provided items are alike, different or otherwise connected. | H H H H H |
1347 | Reologisms | Write a clever, funny definition for any of the provided Loser-concocted words and phrases, and/or show they'd be used. | H |
1346 | AZ if -- balancing acts | Think of a new word or two-word phrase that begins and ends -- either way -- with one of the provided "alphabetically balanced" pairs. | H H H |
1345 | The confaketionary -- food fictoids | Tell us some comically false "fact" about food, drink or dining. | P M H H |
1344 | Well, that's just great -- It’s Limerixicon XVI | Supply a humorous, previously unpublished limerick significantly featuring any English word, name or term beginning with "gr-". | L H |
1342 | MRGRS: Mash 2 abbrevs. | Combine two acronyms or other abbreviations, whether of entities or expressions, into one big one, and describe it, offer a slogan for the new organization, etc. | H |
1341 | Portmanteautapping from E to R | Coin a portmanteau word beginning with E through R, in which the words overlap by at least two letters, and describe it. | H |
1339 | Songs for a modern error | Write humorous lyrics about some modern woe, set to a familiar tune. | W L H H |
1338 | Picture This -- cartoon captions | Supply a caption for one or more of the provided cartoons. | H H H 2 |
1336 | Two ways about it | What's something (printable) you could say in two -- or more -- of the provided situations. | H H H |
1335 | Put it in bee-verse! Or . . . | Write a humorous poem of eight lines or fewer that includes at least one of the provided words, used in Round 9 or later of this year's Scripps National Spelling Bee; OR: write a joke in Q&A form that uses at least one of the words. | T H H H 3 |
1334 | Mull 'er over: A search for collision | Combine any two words, names, abbreviations, etc., from anywhere in the redacted Mueller report, in a two-word or hyphenated phrase and define it. | H H H H H |
1333 | Check your (homo)phones | Invent a homophone--a word that sounds the same as an existing word but is spelled differently--and define it. | H H H H |
1332 | We'll call them Spellimericks | Write a humorous limerick that's an acrostic: a pertinent five-letter word or name spelled out by the first letter of each line. | H H 4 3 |
1331 | Paste Imperfect | Choose a headline or sentence from The Post or another publication, print or online, dated May 9-20, 2019. Then change that headline or other text by: A. Deleting up to 40 consecutive characters from it (put brackets around the deleted text); B. Adding up to 40 consecutive characters from the same article or ad (write the additions in capital letters); or C. Both A and B, as long as the added text goes at the end of your headline or sentence. |
W H H |
1330 | Spinoff x Time Is Now = Grandfoals Week! | Breed" any two of the 65 foal names that got ink this week, and name the offspring to reflect both parents' names. | H H H |
1329 | Shakespeare + Thee: Tailgaters | Select any line from a work by Shakespeare (poetry or prose) and pair it with your own line to create a humorous rhyming couplet. | I H H H H |
1328 | Hooked on 'classic': a do-over | Summarize a book or play by any author, or retell a scene (or even a moment) from one, in the style of some other person. | H 2 |
1327 | Mess with our (or anyone's) heads | Reinterpret (or comment wryly on) a headline (or a big part of a headline) by writing a bank head, or subtitle. | W |
1326 | Foaling around | Breed" any two names from the provided list of 100 horses and name the foal to reflect both names. | H |
1325 | Stand up and jeer | Give us some original standup jokes that would have been good at this year's White House Correspondents' Dinner. | H H |
1324 | Chapter and worse | Tell or describe a Bible story, or another classical or folk tale, very briefly (75 words would be lengthy) in the voice of a particular author or other person. | H |
1323 | Selected shortened subjects | Delete one or more letters from the beginning or end (or both) of a movie title and describe the resulting movie. | I H H H H |
1322 | Back to the drawing board | Come up with an idea for an invention that still needs a bug ironed out. | M H H |
1321 | Pumping Prime: Amazon reviews | Send us a humorous "review" (like the provided samples from our earlier contests) for any of the provided items. | H |
1320 | Questionable journalism | Find any sentence (or a substantive part of a sentence) that appears in the Post or another publication, in print or online, dated Feb. 21-March 4, and pair it with a question it might answer. | H H H H H 3 |
1319 | The Tile Invitational VI | Create a five-, six-, or seven-letter word (or phrase) by scrambling the letters of any of the provided sets and define it. | H |
1318 | Love the tiny tail stain! | Create an anagram -- a phrase or sentence with the letters rearranged -- of any text (except merely someone's name), of any length. | H H |
1317 | Punku 2: Haiku with puns | Create a haiku containing a pun or similar wordplay. | I H H H H 2 |
1316 | Lies, damn lies, with statistics | Tell us some bogus trivia using "statistics" or some bogus quantitative meaure. | H H 2 |
1315 | Clue us in -- our reverse crossword | Supply clever, funny clues for as many as 25 of the 74 words and multi-word terms in the provided grid. | H H H |
1314 | Bill Us Now -- 'joint legislation' | Combine two or more names from the provided list of the new members of Congress to “co-sponsor” a bill based on their combined last names, and state its purpose | 3 |
1313 | Dead Letters -- our obit poem contest | Write a poem of no longer than eight lines about someone who died in 2018. | H H H H 2 |
1312 | Neologisms in TOUR de Fours XV | Coin a word or multi-word term that contains the letter block T-O-U-R and describe it. The letters may be in any order. | H H 2 |
1311 | Nextra! Nextra! The year in preview | Name some humorous event to happen in 2019. | H H H H |
1310 | The Year in Redo, Part 2 | Enter (or reenter) any Style Invitational contest from Week 1282 through Week 1306. | H H H 2 |
1309 | The Year in Redo, Part 1 | Enter (or reenter) any Style Invitational contest from Week 1255 through Week 1281. | H H H |
1308 | Picture this -- or these | This week you have two choices: (1) Write a caption for one or more of these pictures, or (2) explain what is wrong with the picture. You might also combine two pictures into one -- or all four into one. | H H |
1307 | One-for-one for all | Replace one letter in an existing word, name or multi-word phrase with one different letter (in the same place in the word) and define or describe the result. | H H H |
1306 | PolitiCaroling: A song parody contest | Write a song about something in the news lately -- political or otherwise -- using a Christmas, Hanukkah or New Year's tune. | W H |
1305 | Hits and Googles | Find us either a Googlenope -- a phrase in quotation marks that generates no previous hits -- or a Googleyup, a phrase that surprisingly does have hits. | H H |
1304 | All the muse that's fit to print | Present a "what if" scenario and explain its effect. | T H H H |
1303 | Neologisms to di- for | Replace a digraph in an existing word or phrase with another digraph to make a new term. | H |
1302 | Ask Backwards 37 | Fifteen "answers" are provided. Tell us the questions. Do one or more, up to a total of 25 A&Q's. | H H |
1301 | Tell us a Fib(onacci) | Write a humorous poem of 20 syllables divided among six lines like this: 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8. And a least two -- any two -- of the lines must rhyme. | W H H H |
1300 | Botch office sensations | Add "13" to an existing movie title, and some humorous trouble to the plot. | I H H H H H H |
1297 | A different type o' headline contest | Change a letter in an article or ad in the Post or another publication dated Sept. 13-24 by adding or subtracting one letter; substituting a letter; transposing two letters; or changing spacing or punctuation; and then add a "bank head. | H H |
1296 | A, we're Adorbs: New-word poems | Use one or more of these words new to M-W.com in a humorous poem of eight lines max. | H H 4 |
1295 | Really, now? A matter of degree. | Tell us an indication to some problem, followed by an even more dire sign. | H H |
1293 | Constitutional unconvention | Humorously translate or explain some part of the U.S. Constitution. | H H 4 |
1292 | Golly gosh, it's Limerixicon XV | Supply a humorous, previously unpublished limerick significantly featuring any English word, name or term, beginning with "gl-" through "go-". | H |
1291 | Film flam -- movie anagrams | Rearrange the letters of a title of a movie or play to make a new title, then describe the new work. | I H H H H H |
1290 | Bobbing for Witte words | Come up with both an object/situation and a neologism for it. | H H |
1289 | Fake gnus: bogus animal trivia | Tell us a fictoid -- a humorously false "fact" -- about the nonhuman animal kingdom. | H H H |
1288 | Your results may vary | Write a funny disclaimer or warning for some product or service. | H H H H |
1287 | It's parody time: Oldies for newsies | Write some song lyrics about something in the news these days, set to a familiar tune. | H H 3 |
1286 | Mind your P's and B's (and more) | Replace one or more P's in a word, name, or multi-word term with a B or with another letter and define or describe the results. | H H |
1285 | That is so wrong! | Supply a trivia question along with both the correct answer and a cleverly "wrong" guess. | I H H H |
1284 | Same difference | Explain how any two of the items in the provided list are similar, different or otherwise linked. | H H H |
1283 | Put it in Bee-verse | Write a humorous poem of eight lines or fewer that includes one of the provided words, all from the 2018 National Spelling Bee. | L H H H H |
1281 | We only have (googly) eyes for you | Send us a photo of something that you have made funny by pasting googly eyes on it; funny titles and captions are optional. | H |
1279 | Just do it -- the 'real' way | List some "accurate" directions for using some product or completing some task. | 4 |
1278 | Colt following: The 'grandfoals' | Breed" any two of the 68 foal names that got ink this week, and name the offspring to reflect both parents' names, in the style of today's inking entries. | H H H |
1277 | Come into Beeing with neologisms | From any of the 15 provided Spelling Bee letter sets, coin a new term of one or two words and define it humorously. You may also supply an especially clever or funny definition of a real term. | H H H 2 |
1276 | What 4? A limerick contest | Use a limerick using one of the provided lines as Line 5. | H H |
1275 | That is the question | Choose a line from Shakespeare (or a significant part of a line) and pair it with a question that the line could humorously answer. | I H H H H H |
1273 | Restocking the Cabinet | Explain why a particular person -- or thing -- ought to fill a Cabinet post or other U.S. government position. | W H H 4 |
1272 | The hex files: creative curses | Come up with a creative curse. | H |
1271 | Yodel Doyle's praises with a D-O-Y-L-E neologism | Coin a new word or phrase that contains the letters D, O, Y, L and E. | H H H H |
1270 | The Style Invitational turns 5 x 5 | Write a witty poem, on any subject, in any of these forms: A. Five lines of five syllables each B. Five lines of five words each C. Five lines of iambic pentameter |
H H |
1269 | Mess with our (or other) heads | Reinterpret (or comment wryly on) a headline appearing in The Post (print or online) or another publication and dated March 1-12 by writing a bank head. | H |
1268 | Playing pinocchio | Tell us some humorously bogus trivia about the news media or the publishing or broadcasting industries. | H H 3 |
1267 | Jingle bungle | Suggest an ill-advised spokesman (dead or alive, or fictional), along with a humorously noooo slogan or jingle. | M H H H |
1266 | The Tile Invitational V | Create a five-, six-, or seven-letter word (or phrase) by scrambling the letters of any of the provided sets and define it. | H |
1265 | Parody for the course | Write a song relating to a class or course of instruction, or to school in general. | H H |
1264 | A cry for Yelp: 'Review' any place | Write a humorous review, positive or negative, of anyplace (real of fictional) one might visit. | H H H H |
1263 | Playing the short game | Using the three-letter Olympic national abbreviations and/or the abbreviation for any college, tell what would happen if one abbreviated team played another. | H H H H H |
1262 | Clue us in -- a backward crossword | Supply one or more creative clues for the provided filled-in crossword grid -- as many as 25 clues in all. | H |
1261 | Post mortems -- our annual obit poem contest | Write a humorous poem of no longer than eight lines about someone who died in 2017. | W H |
1260 | What lies (are) ahead for 2018 | Jokingly predict some news event to happen in 2018. | H H H |
1259 | Beat the banned with euphemisms | Come up with creative euphemisms for the provided words, or for other words that might offend someone or other. | H |
1258 | The year in redo, Part 2 | Enter (or reenter) any Style Invitational contest from Week 1230 through Week 1254. | H |
1257 | The year in redo, Part 1 | Enter (or re-enter) any Style Invitational contest from Week 1203 through Week 1229, except for Weeks 1205 and 1206. | P |
1256 | Picture this -- a caption contest | Provide a funny caption for any of the provided cartoons. | H H H |
1255 | Tour de Fours XIV: SANT is coming | Coin a word or multi-word term that contains the letter-block S-A-N-T; the letters may be in any order, but there may be no other letters between them. | H H H 3 |
1254 | Inkorporation--a change-one-letter contest | Change the name of a present or past business, store or agency (not just a product) by adding one letter, deleting one letter, transposing two letters or substituting one letter for another. | H H |
1252 | It's a med, med, med, med world | Invent a clever name for a new medical product, and specify the condition it would treat. | H |
1251 | Thanking outside the box | Tell us something to be thankful for. | H H |
1248 | C'mon, fess up! | Send us a brief "confession" -- there will be categories for true and just-kidding. | H H H H |
1247 | Script tease | Offer a quote from a script whose title you've given a different plot. | I H H H H H H |
1246 | Questionable journalism | Find any sentence (or a substantive part of a sentence) that appears in The Post or another publication, in print or online, dated Sept. 21-Oct. 2, and pair it with a question it might answer. | H H H H |
1244 | Primed for product reviews | Send us a creative "review" for any of the provided items that are listed on Amazon. | H H |
1243 | We bid you: No T-R-U-M-P | Coin a new term, or choose an existing one, whose letters do not include a T, R, U, M, or P, and write a humorous definition. | H |
1242 | Generation Yux | Give us a "then/now" joke. | H H H H |
1241 | Less taste, more fill-in | Give us a novel clue for any word or phrase in which the remaining letters in the provided crossword puzzle fit, across or down. | T H H 4 |
1240 | We GIVE you Limerixicon XIV | Supply a humorous, previously unpublished limerick significantly featuring any English word, name or term beginning with "gh-" or "gi-". | H |
1239 | MASH 3 | Combine two movie titles and describe the result. | I H H H |
1238 | D-E-F Comedy Jam (or E-D-F, etc.) | Coin a threeword phrase (you may add an insignificant word or two) whose words begin with D, E and F — in any order — and describe it. | H H |
1237 | Our alliteracy campaign | Rewrite an existing headline from any publication, print or online — about something in the news from July 20 to 31, by using alliteration. | H |
1236 | Portmanteaux faux | Explain--inaccurately but amusingly--how a real word is a combination of two or more words, with an illustrative sentence, as in the provided examples, or some other funny way. | H H H H |
1235 | The Sound of Science | Write humorous lyrics on the subject of science or technology, set to a well-known tune. | H 4 |
1234 | It's incontestable | Four weeks from now, the Empress will have just placed her dainty imperial toe back on our glittering shores. Which means that for the first time since January 2002, almost 800 contests ago—back during the late reign of her predecessor, theCzar—the Invitational will skip two contests in a row. | H |
1233 | Not | The Loser Community gets a week off (actually two) from writing contest entries and will have to find something else to do during staff meetings, sermons, romantic breakups, etc. | H H |
1231 | TankaWanka 3: Haiku Plus Tu | Write a TankaWanka about something that's been in the news lately. The poem must consist of five lines of 5, 7, 5, 7 and 7 syllables in that order. And at least two of the lines must rhyme. | H H H 2 |
1230 | What in creation . . . ? | Supply a brief monologue or dialogue about a Creator's specifications or planning for some living being. | H H H |
1229 | Gorey bits from A to Z | Send us one of more edgy rhyming alphabet-primer couplets. | H H |
1228 | That movie is SO about you | Name someone who was the "secret inspiration" for a certain movie. | H H H H H |
1227 | Celebrate ortho-diversity! | Name and describe a new life form -- and no letter in the term may be used twice. | H H H |
1226 | Colt following: The 'grandfoals' | Breed" any two of the 61 foal names that got ink this week, and name the offspring to reflect both parents names. | H |
1225 | The Ideas of March | Suggest a march for some group or field, along with one or more slogans. (You might also, or instead, comment on the march with some pertinent wordplay.) | H |
1224 | We beg you to differ | Explain how any two (or more) items in the provided list are the same or different, or otherwise connected. | H |
1223 | Post again out to mislead public! | Write a humorously sensationalistic, misleading headline on an otherwise mundane article or ad published in The Post or elsewhere from April 13 to April 24. | L H 3 |
1222 | Foaling around | Breed" any two of the provided racehorses nominated for this year's Kentucky Derby, Preakness and Belmont; and name the foal to reflect both of them. | H |
1221 | Who's kidding whom? | Take two people from history, past or present, and tell what their child would be like | H H 2 |
1220 | O pedantry, O pedantry | Give us some humorous pedantry. | H |
1219 | Cast your Bred upon us | Write a Lik the Bred verse about someone in the news lately. | L |
1217 | Mergers you wrote: Combine two businesses with puns | Give a clever name for a combination of two or more businesses. | H H |
1215 | A so-so contest (How so-so is it?) | Write a humorous exaggeration in the form "x is so y that . . . | P H 4 |
1214 | The alternaugural address | Write a humorous passage — a “quote,” an observation, a joke, a dialogue, a poem, anything — using only words that appear in Trump’s inaugural address. | M H |
1213 | Punku | Write a haiku that incorporates a pun. | H H |
1212 | The Tile Invitational IV | Give us a five-, six- or seven-letter word (or two words) by scrambling the letters of any of the provided sets and define it. | H |
1211 | The best tweets in history | Write a stupidly disparaging tweet (140 characters or fewer, including spaces) about some laudable figure of past or present, true or fictional. | H H 4 |
1210 | Send us the bill: Our 'joint legislation' game | Combine two or more names from the provided list of members of Congress to “co-sponsor” a bill based on their combined last names, and state its purpose. | H |
1208 | A RIP-roaring year: Obit poems | Write a humorous poem of no longer than eight lines about someone who died in 2016. | H |
1207 | Clue us in -- a reverse crossword | Supply clever, funny clues to up to 25 of the 72 words and multi-word terms in the provided grid. | H H H |
1206 | Do-over the do-over -- enter any of the year's contests | Enter (or re-enter) any Style Invitational contest from Week 1149 to 1202, except for Week 1152, last year's do-over. | H H |
1205 | Could we just have a do-over? Yes, we could. | Enter (or re-enter) any Style Invitational contest from Week 1149 to 1201, except for Week 1152, last year's do-over. | H |
1204 | Well, at least . . . | Note some good news for the coming year to comfort -- or "comfort" -- those who are depressed about the change of presidential administration. | H |
1203 | You've got the powers | Tell us what you would do if you had one or more of the six magical powers provided. | H |
1202 | Don't be afraid of the dark | Write lyrics to a song that, in some way, express hope. | H |
1201 | Tour de Fours XIII: What's there to NOVE? | Coin a word or multi-word term that contains the letter block N-O-V-E. | W |
1200 | The definitive dozen | Supply a word, name or multi-word term along with a wry definition or description; together, the term and description must total exactly 12 words. | H H H |
1199 | We want some bad choices | Offer one or more funny Questions for Terrible People, as shown. | H H 3 |
1196 | Hyphen the Terrible | Combine either half of a hyphenated word or compound term with either half of another such term to create a new hyphenated term, and describe the result humorously. | L H H 2 |
1195 | Don't change a letter! | Alter a movie title only by changing word spacing, changing capitalization, and adding or deleting punctuation marks, accents, etc., then describe the result. | H |
1194 | Nyetymologies: fake word origins | Provide a humorously untrue explanation for the derivation of a word. | H |
1193 | Poedtry | Write a Poed, which consists of four lines: The first line contains six one-syllable words. The second line contains three two-syllable words. The third line contains two three-syllable words. The fourth line contains one six-syllable word (or a name totaling six syllables. And at least two of the lines must rhyme. | H |
1192 | Ask Backwards | The 15 provided phrases above are the answers. You provide the questions to as many as you’d like (up to 25 entries total). | H |
1191 | Mess with our heads | Reinterpret (or comment wryly on) a headline appearing in The Post (print or online) and dated Sept. 1-12 by writing a bank head, or subtitle | H |
1190 | You're workin' on a chain, gang | Create a chain of no more than 15 proper nouns — names of people (real or fictional), products, places, etc. — including one title of a work — in which each name relates somehow to the previous one. | H |
1189 | Gee, it's Limerixicon XIII! | Supply a humorous, previously unpublished limerick significantly featuring any English word, name or term beginning with "ge". | H |
1188 | Just short words, one more time | Explain some concept or philosophy entirely in words of one syllable. | H H |
1186 | We're always happy to verse you | Write a humorous poem, of any form, about or “by” the anagram of anyone’s name. | H H |
1183 | C'mon, be honest with us | Write something in roughly the form "If X were more honest, (then) Y. | H H 2 |
1180 | Strip search! | Find a line of text from any comic strip or panel that appears on the Post's comics pages or on washingtonpost.com/comics, dated anywhere between June 16 and June 27, and either (a) supply a question that the original line could answer, or (b) follow it with your own line of dialogue or reply. | H H H 3 |
1179 | Blasted alphabetical contests . . . | Coin a three-word phrase whose words begin with A, B and C -- in any order -- and describe it. | L H H |
1178 | A ______ of collective nouns | Propose one or more funny new names for groups of things. | I H |
1177 | The ballad box | Write a song related to this year's elections, set to a familiar tune. | H |
1176 | Let 'er RIP: Write an obit line | Write a humorous line or two for someone's obituary -- either for a particular person (dead or not) or for a fictional or generic one. | L H H 2 |
1175 | Good luck with 13 | Make up a word whose Scrabble letter values add up to exactly 13, and define it. | W H H |
1173 | Tinker with the recipe | Slightly change the name of a food or brand of food (or something else in the food industry) and describe it, or write a slogan, jingle, etc. | H |
1171 | What's my (next) line? | Take a line from any song and pair it with your own second line to make a humorous rhyming couplet; the second line should match the rhythm of the first, rather than the second line of the song itself. | I H H H |
1169 | Be caustic by acrostic | Review or otherwise describe a movie, book, play or TV show (or Internet equivalent) with words whose first letters spell out the name of the work. | I H |
1168 | Asterisky business | Tell us an original joke whose punchline can't be understood without knowledge -- not necessarily scientific -- that most of us don't have (which you'll supply with a concise explanation). | W H |
1167 | So what's to liken? | Take any two items from the provided list and explain how they're similar or different, or connect them some other way. | H |
1166 | Questionable journalism | Take a sentence (or most of a sentence) that appears in text (not a headline) in The Washington Post or on washingtonpost.com dated March 10-21 and make up a question that the sentence could answer | H H H 2 |
1164 | 'Wait Wait' for us | Compose a multiple-choice question about a Ridiculous but True fact a la the NPR show 'Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me.' | H H H 2 |
1163 | Put it in reverse | Spell a word, name or phrase backward and define the result in a way that relates to the original. | H H |
1158 | What have we here? | Tell us what one or more of these objects really are. | H |
1157 | Clue us in -- a backward crossword | Supply clever, funny clues to up to 25 of the words and multi-word terms in the provided grid. | H 2 |
1155 | Vowel movement | Choose a title of a book, movie, play or TV show; drop all the vowels (including Y when it's used as a vowel); then add your choice of vowels -- as many as you like -- to create a new work; and describe it. | H |
1154 | Tabby Road -- songs for cats | Write a song for -- or about -- cats or other animals, set to a familiar tune. | H 3 |
1153 | Be three-paired | Choose two or more entities represented by a single three-letter combination from IAA through LZZ, found at the provided link, and say how they are alike or different or have some connection. | H |
1152 | Oops? You do it again. | Enter any Style Invitational contest from Week 1098 through Week 1148, except for Week 1101, last year's do-over. | H |
1151 | To [a glass], snarkly | Write a short, snarky (but witty) note to one of the provided glassbowls. | H 4 |
1150 | A deviant character | Change the name of person or animal -- real or fictional -- by adding or subtracting one letter; substituting one letter for another; or switching the positions of two nearby letters, and describing the results. | H H |
1149 | Gestures of depreciation | Suggest ways to celebrate National Love Your Lawyer Day -- or a made-up "holiday" celebrating some other profession. | H |
1145 | A DICEy situation | Coin a word or multi-word term that contains the letter block D-I-C-E. | H H H |
1144 | Someone else's business | Name a real brand, along with something else it would be a better name for. | H |
1143 | Ask Backwards | Provided are 15 answers, separated by asterisks. You supply the questions. | H H |
1142 | Two-faced tweets | Combine two well-known names into a Twitter handle, and write a tweet (no more than 140 characters and spaces) that that portmanteau person might write. | H |
1141 | Mess with our heads | Reinterpret (or comment wryly on) a headline appearing in the Post (print or online) Sept. 17-28 by writing a bankhead, or subtitle. | H 3 |
1138 | Show us your touché | Offer an elegantly snide (and original) insult of anyone living or dead. | H |
1137 | Be a published author! | Give us a spicy title for a boring book, real or imagined. | H |
1084 | Limerixicon XI: Fi-, fo-, go! | Supply a humorous, previously unpublished limerick significantly featuring any English word, name or term beginning with "Fl-" through "fo-". | H |
1081 | It's the stupidity, stupid | Write us stupid questions that will make us laugh. | H |
1080 | McGonagall with the windiness | Memorialize a modern "tragedy" in a poem burdened with hilariously overwrought verse; lame, forced rhymes; and painfully uneven meter. Get the badness across in one verse of no more than eight lines. | H |
1045 | Songs for the asking | Take a sentence, phrase or title from a song and provide a funny question it might answer. | H |
1029 | Ditty Harry | Write a descriptive theme song for a well-known movie, set to a well-known tune. | H |
974 | Eat our dust! | Write a limerick humorously describing a book, play, movie, or TV show. | H |
970 | Couple it | Take a line from any well-known poem and pair it with your own second line to make a humorous couplet. | H |