Week 192: Hill's Bills
The Pease-DeGette-Goode-Price Farm Subsidy Act
The Goode-Cooke Proclamation Honoring Julia Child
The Kind-Pappas Absentee Father Retraining Bill
The Goode-Pitts Bill Requiring Proper Underarm Maintenance with Sleeveless Dresses
This Week's Contest is the second biennial post-election name-a-bill contest. At the bottom of the page is a listing of the 85 new members of the House and Senate. Your goal is to come up with bills any of these freshmen might jointly sponsor, as in the examples above. This is one of our favorite contests, with a storied history (Who can ever forget the "Traficant-DeLay-Akaka Roadside Port-a-Potty Bill"?). First-prize winner gets a taxidermized piranha, a value of $ 20.
Runners-up, as always, receive the coveted Style Invitational Loser's T-shirt. Honorable Mentions get the mildly sought-after Style Invitational bumper sticker. Winners will be selected on the basis of humor and originality. Mail your entries to The Style Invitational, Week 192, c/o The Washington Post, 1150 15th St. NW, Washington, D.C. 20071, fax them to 202-334-4312 or submit them via Internet to this address: losersaccess.digex.net. Internet users: Please indicate the week number in the "subject" field. Entries must be received on or before Monday, Nov. 25. Please include your address and phone number. Winners will be announced in three weeks. Editors reserve the right to alter entries for taste, humor or appropriateness. No purchase necessary. The Faerie of the Fine Print & the Ear No One Reads wishes to thank Jonathan Paul of Garrett Park for today's Ear No One Reads. Also, at the suggestion of Jennifer Hart of Arlington, we are soliciting headlines for Art Buchwald's Thanksgiving column, that hilariously, chortlingly funny offering we run year after year after year after year after year after year after year after year, in one of those precious traditions that will survive even a worldwide nuclear holocaust. "Hey, Skrackle," one radioactive cockroach will call out to his friend. "It's that Buchwald column again! I love the way he makes fun of the French!" Best headline gets printed on the column. Send entries to Buchwald's Turkey, c/o this contest. Employees of The Washington Post and their immediate families are not eligible for prizes.
Report from Week 189, in which we asked you to come up with pranks, based on one of several partial scenarios we provided.
But first, the results of our fine-print contest to write a chant for the Fighting Quakers, the high-school football team of Salem, Ohio.
* Second Runner-Up:
Two Four Six Eight
On vict'ry let's meditate!
Let's go Quakers, let's go Friends,
May the Holy Spirit
Smite their Ends
In a Peaceful and Illuminating Fashion.
(Jonathan Paul, Garrett Park)
* First Runner-Up:
Dost thou think we won't get sore?
That we'll never go to war?
We're not ones to try your tricks on
Just remember Richard Nixon!
(David Smith, Greenbelt)
* And the winner of the drinking duck:
Fight on, Fighting Quakers,
Thou art a team no one can score on,
Fight on, Fighting Quakers,
Thou art a perfect oxymoron.
(Gary Lefkowitz, Springfield)
Back to pranks:
* Second Runner-Up: One day, next to a particularly large pothole in Washington, some cruel practical joker puts up a sign that says "Men Working." It remains there forever, next to the pothole. (Jonathan Paul, Garrett Park )
* First Runner-Up: At night, a team of pranksters sneaks into the airport and creates trompe l'oeil paintings of deep craters in the runways. (Stephen Dudzik, Silver Spring)
* And the Winner of the Uncle Sam birdhouse: One day, an unusual ad appears in The Post, offering a 120-acre poultry farm for Sale for, like, $ 99. First come first served. At 6 a.m., you call the phone number that was listed in the ad and say, "Hello? Hello? I'd like to buy the farm!" It turns out to be Jack Kevorkian's house! Hahahaha. I got a million of these. I'm going to go get a beer now.
(Paul Kondis, Alexandria)
*Honorable Mentions:
At night, a team of pranksters sneaks into the airport and places signs at the airport bars that say, "Pilots Happy Hour: M-F 4:30-7:00 p.m." (David Genser, Vienna)
One day, the phone rings at Dr. Kevorkian's house. Someone does a flawless imitation of the president of the United States, claiming he has a terminal illness and wants to die with dignity. He instructs the doctor to tell the security guards at the White House that the purpose of his visit is to help the president die. (Tom Witte, Gaithersburg)
One day, next to a particularly large pothole in Washington, traffic slows to a crawl to view a mock missile lodged in the crater's center. Half the body is visible along with the tail fins and USAF decals. Men in HazMat suits are scurrying around. A sign warns that use of cell phones may detonate the warhead. (Stephen Dudzik, Silver Spring)
One day, an unusual ad appears in The Washington Post: "Darling: I think your wife suspects. Wear your blue suit today if you think she is on to us, and your gray suit if you think she isn't. See you in the car pool. Your honeybun." (David Genser, Vienna)
A diner opens the menu at a fancy Washington restaurant to find a handwritten note asking maintenance to correct the focus of the hidden camera in the ladies room. (Stephen Dudzik, Silver Spring)
Next Week: Office You Can't Refuse
Aderholt, Allard, Allen, Baird, Berry, Blagojevich, Blunt, Boyd, Boswell, Brownback, Cannon, Capps, Carson, Cleland, Collins, Cook, Cooksey, Davis, Davis, DeGette, Delahunt, Durbin, Emerson, Enzi, Etheridge, Ford, Gibbons, Goode, Granger, Hagel, Hill, Hinojosa, Hulshof, Hutchinson, Hutchinson, Jenkins, John, Johnson, Johnson, Kilpatrick, Kind, Kucinich, Landrieu, Maloney, McCarthy, McGovern, McIntyre, Moran, Northup, Pappas, Pascrell, Paul, Pease, Peterson, Pickering, Pitts, Price, Quigley, Reed, Reyes, Riley, Roberts, Rogan, Rothman, Ryun, Sandlin, Schaffer, Sessions, Sherman, Shimkus, Smith, Smith, Snowbarger, Snyder, Stabenow, Strickland, Sununu, Tauscher, Thune, Tierney, Torricelli, Turner, Watkins, Wexler, Weygand.