Week 233: SEEKING PARODY


From the Washington Post:

The federal government has agreed to pay hospitals around the country hundreds of millions of dollars not to train doctors in a highly unorthodox initiative aimed at alleviating a growing glut of physicians.

As rewritten by Doctor Seuss:

"I need a doctor," said old mister Gipp,
"For the aches and the pains in my hip and my lip."
So he went to the hospital quick as a wink.
It had nifty contraptions that beep, whoosh and blink.
Big ones and small ones, short ones and tall,
But no doctors in sight, no doctors at all!
"We don't feature doctors," sniffed the hospital staff,
"We've cured us of doctors," they said with a laugh.
"But we've got machines to attend to your health,
Because, without doctors, we're rolling in wealth.
The government pays us to stay doctor-free,
So we spend all the money on wheedle-dee-dee
Like snazzy new carpets and fancy TVs,
Nurses up the gazoo to ignore your disease."
Gipp said his gazoo was feeling just swell.
"It's the rest of my body that's going to hell."
With a moan, he declared: "I don't need me no nurse!"
And soon he was right. He needed a hearse.

This Week's Contest: Take any paragraph appearing on page A1 of today's Washington Post, and rewrite it in the style of any famous writer. The example above is from last Sunday's Post. First-prize winner gets a handsome wall clock made from a genuine piece of cow poop, a value of $ 50.

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 233, 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, Sept. 8. Please include your address and phone number. Winners will be announced three weeks from today. Editors reserve the right to alter entries for taste, humor or appropriateness. No purchase necessary. (David Genser, Arlington) Next week: Shakespearean ear credit. Employees of The Washington Post, and members of their immediate families, are not eligible for prizes.

Report from Week 230, in which you were asked to take any noun and create for it an ironic cryptogram.

The Czar was confident the results of this contest would be spectacular, but his boss, the Baron von Ferkelpinkeln, cautioned him otherwise. "They will be clever but not funny," he predicted. "You will have to contrive an elaborate, overlong, self-indulgent introduction to disguise the fact that you have insufficient good entries to fill the space." Nonsense, replied the Czar, indignantly drawing himself up to his full height, which is 5 feet 10 inches, give or take a few millimeters. At this, the Czar permitted himself a brief chuckle, recalling a line from his favorite poem, "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock," by the eminent British poet and critic Thomas Stearns Eliot (1888-1965), who refers to "a tedious argument of insidious intent." Not that the Czar compares himself to Eliot. Eliot was taller.

* Third Runner-Up -- X-Files: Y-Watch? (Dave Zarrow, Herndon)

* Second Runner-Up -- Hong Kong: Weds Reds (Jennifer Hart, Arlington)

* First Runner-Up -- Dan Quayle: Boy Wnoder (Jose Cortina, Centreville)

* And the winner of the Bag o' Dwarfs:

Rush Limbaugh: Paid Blowhard (Don Juran, Rockville)

* Honorable Mentions:

Watergate: Dicktrick (Don Juran, Rockville)

Paula Jones: Romeo Stink (Jennifer Hart, Arlington)

Mike Tyson: Chew Rival (Barney Kaufman, Manassas; Mike Hammer, Washington)

Pol Pot: Mad Man (Annie Wauters, Washington; Tom Witte, Gaithersburg)

ABBA: Poop (Roy Ashley, Washington; Tom Witte, Gaithersburg)

Dick Morris: Slut Nibble (Jonathan Paul, Garrett Park)

Elvis: Porky (Dian Sams, Springfield)

Network News: Tabloid Talk (Kathy Fraeman, Olney)

Zima: Spit (Anthony Sebro, Columbia)

Bill Gates: Wuss Chief (Dave Zarrow, Herndon)

Dan Quayle: Top Skolar (Charlie Steinhice, Chattanooga)

IBM PC: Hal Jr. (Stephen Dudzik, Silver Spring)

Ivana Trump: Lusts Money (Kevin and Joan Maloy, McLean)

Prozac: Zombie (Kevin and Joan Maloy, McLean)

Howard Stern: Waxing Horny (Kevin and Joan Maloy, McLean)

Mike Tyson: Ouch! Bites! (Jonathan Paul, Garrett Park)

Elvis: Goner (Tom Witte, Gaithersburg)

Barney: Opiate (Bruce Shepard, Manassas)

VISA: DEBT (Neil Molenda, Arlington)

Packwood: Meshugga (Sandra Hull, Arlington)

Al Gore: Is Next (Steve Hoglund, Washington)

Jack Germond: Gust Machine (Sue Lin Chong, Washington)

Dick Nixon: Nose Polyp (Ronald Reagan didn't fit, okay? This was hard.) (Paul Kondis, Alexandria)

Next Week: Giving Quarter