| WEEK | TITLE | SYNOPSIS | INK Types |
|---|---|---|---|
| 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 | P |
| 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. | P |
| 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 |
| 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. | P |
| 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 |
| 1372 | Trash talking, 1880-style | Write a quatrain or -- heck -- two of Balliol rhyme about some person. | P |
| 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). | P |
| 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. | P |
| 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. | P |
| 1300 | Botch office sensations | Add "13" to an existing movie title, and some humorous trouble to the plot. | P |
| 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 |
| 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 |
| 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 |
| 1209 | Invented facts: A fictoid contest | Tell us a humorously untrue account of how a product or invention came to be, or got its name. | P |
| 1144 | Someone else's business | Name a real brand, along with something else it would be a better name for. | P |
| 1108 | Hearts of dorkness | Write a humorous Valentine's Day sentiment to someone (or to some organization), either real or fictional -- either from you or from someone else you name. Plus an all-new option: We'll also be willing to run at least one really funny, clever, well-executed graphic. | P |
| 1096 | Picture this | Write a humorous caption for any of the provided Bob Staake cartoons. | H |
| 1054 | Dead letters | Write a short, humorous poem commemorating someone (or maybe even something) who died in 2013. | P |
| 1048 | Ask Backwards | You supply the questions to as many of the provided answers as you like. | P |
| 1027 | Built for two | Give humorous related names for any pair of features in a given building, organization, etc. | H |
| 1020 | Colt following | Breed any two of this week's winning foals and name the grandfoal. | P |
| 1015 | Faux re mi | Give us some humorously false trivia about music or musicians. | P |
| 1005 | Send us the bill | Name a piece of legislation "cosponsored" by two or more of the 98 new House and Senate members provided. | H |
| 1001 | Make us ROFL | Give us a funny, original acronym. | P |
| 987 | Bank shots | Take any headline, verbatim, appearing anywhere in The Washington Post or on washingtonpost.com from Sept. 6 through Sept. 17 and reinterpret it by adding a "bank head," or subtitle. | P |
| 965 | Foaling around | Breed any two of the horses in this year's Triple Crown races and name their foal. | H |
| 915 | Picture this | Write a caption for any of the cartoons pictured here. | H |
| 893 | Give us a hint | Write a humorously witty story in 25 words or fewer. | H |
| 866 | Natalie Portmanteau | Begin with a real name; append to it a word, name or expression so that they overlap; and finally define (humorously, of course) the resulting phrase. | H |
| 830 | Mess With Our Heads | Take any headline, verbatim, appearing anywhere in The Post or on washingtonpost.com from Aug. 14 through Aug. 24 and reinterpret it by adding a "bank head," or subtitle. | H |
| 801 | Ask Backwards | You are on "Jeopardy!" Here are the answers. You supply one or more of the questions. | H |
| 760 | Whacksy Buildup | Describe any of these Googlewhacks in the form of a question, "Jeopardy"-style. | H H 2 |
| 748 | Dead Letters | Write a humorous poem about a well-known personage who died in 2007. | P |
| 742 | Clue Us In | Give us a whole new set of clues to a crossword puzzle penned by Ace Constructor Paula Gamache. | 3 |
| 700 | Stump Us | Come up with someone's slogan for the 2008 presidential campaign. | P |
| 696 | Send Us the Bill | Come up legislation the newly-elected members of Congress might sponsor together. | H |
| 645 | A Hearty Har Har | Write up a Valentine's sentiment to any personage, or to someone in some generic category. | H |
| 642 | It's Open Season | Come up with a brand-new word and its definition. The words must begin with O, P, Q, R or S. | P |
| 619 | WordCount Us In | Write a poem of no more than four lines containing four or more consecutive words on the WordCount list. They must occur in the sentence in the order they appear on the list. | H |
| 587 | The B-List | Come up with an In-Out list for 2005, or other pairings. | H |
| 586 | God's Will (and Won't) | Complete either of the following: "If God hadn't wanted us to ----, God wouldn’t have ----"; "If God had wanted us to ----, God would have ----. | H |
| 574 | Boor Us Silly | Come up with some unwise attempts at humor--one either likely to backfire or to create other unpleasant consequences. | H |
| 570 | Timeline Rhyme Lines | Produce colorful chronological couplets about some historical event. They must rhyme and be in good meter. | H |
| 547 | Give Us a Bad Name | Take an existing product or business name and pair it with an incompatible one. | H |
| 542 | Discombobulate Us | Come up with both an object/situation and a neologism for it, something that Bob Levey would never have stooped to print in his column. | L |
| 424 | Osama Chanted Evening | Write poems about Osama bin Laden. | H |
| 406 | Bum Steerage | Offer some spectacularly bad advice to any of the provided people. | H H |
| 397 | Sins of Omission | Omit a letter or letters from a real-life sign to create a name for a new business, comically different from the original. Describe the new business or include a slogan that explains it. | H |
| 378 | Bill Us Now | Come up with a bill sponsored by any of the newly elected U.S. senators and representatives, and explain the purpose of the bill. | 5 |