Week 571: A Tour de Fours


TESH: kiteshoe: The sneaker that puts Air Jordans to shame.

STHE: malisthenics: Ten more push-ups, just for spite.

HETS: apathets: "whatever," "so," etc.

In his first Style Invitational contest suggestion ever, Obsessive Invitationalist Chris Doyle of Forsyth, Mo., proposes a twist on a contest that ran occasionally in the erstwhile New York Magazine Competition, of which this column is a direct rip-off. Editor Mary Ann Madden offered up a game called Superghost, in which a "root" of four letters was supplied, and contestants had to create and define a word that included it. Chris suggests that we invite more variety by letting you arrange the four letters -- we'll be using T, H, E and S -- in any order before you make up the neologism (the letters must appear consecutively, however).

First-prize winner receives the Inker, the official Style Invitational Trophy. First runner-up wins a Defense Intelligence Agency coffee mug plus a bandanna with a picture of a stealth bomber on it. Drinking from the mug or wearing the bandanna makes you invisible. Other runners-up win the coveted Style Invitational Loser T-shirt. Honorable mentions get one of the lusted-after Style Invitational Magnets. One prize per entrant per week. Send your entries by e-mail to losers@washpost.com or by fax to 202-334-4312. Deadline is Monday, Aug. 23. Put the week number in the subject line of your e-mail, or it risks being ignored as spam. Include your name, postal address and phone number with your entry. Contests are judged on the basis of humor and originality. All entries become the property of The Washington Post. Entries may be edited for taste or content. Results will be published Sept. 12. No purchase required for entry. Employees of The Washington Post, and their immediate relatives, are not eligible for prizes. Pseudonymous entries will be disqualified. The revised title for next week's contest is by Brendan Beary of Great Mills.

Report from Week 567, when we asked you to tell what these cartoons had to do with the presidential campaign.

Many people described Cartoon C as a diagram of the spider holes hiding WMDs and/or Osama bin Laden under the Crawford ranch.

Fourth runner-up: Cartoon A: Kerry will claim that the grass clippings spraying onto his legs merit another Purple Heart. (Jerry Pannullo, Kensington)

Third runner-up: Cartoon D: In a bold attempt to steal the thunder from Barack Obama's convention speech, Jack Ryan makes off with the party mascot. (Janice Eisen, Brookfield, Wis.)

Second runner-up: Cartoon B: Despite his being shot, drugged, given electric shocks, and left in the bathtub for dead, the Republicans can't stop Vice President Rasputin from hitting the campaign trail. (Jon Reiser, Hilton, N.Y.)

First runner-up, the winner of the "Impala Skin Bushpen": Cartoon A: Vying for the suburban vote, Bush and Kerry hold a "mow-off." After the initial photo op, however, Kerry's manservant Jacques is easily defeated by Bush's head gardener, Vicente. (Jeff Brechlin, Potomac Falls)

And the winner of the Inker: Cartoon D: As the entire GOP convention floor went silent, Karl Rove began to regret hiring MTV to produce the "Let's Whip the Dems" video. (Josh Tucker, Kensington)

Honorable Mentions:

Cartoon A:

Bush goes right, Kerry goes left, they both make a lot of noise, and neither one scratches the surface. (Ned Bent, Oak Hill)

The candidates diverge at the grass routes level. (Brendan Beary, Great Mills)

Surprise winner Nader took the high road and found positions for both Kerry and Bush on the White House staff. (Elden Carnahan, Laurel)

Each man tries to prove that he's the "lawn order" candidate. (Joseph Romm, Washington)

Both candidates were poorly advised for their campaign stop in Motown. (Rick Powell, Springfield)

Cartoon B:

After a long day on the trail, Karl Rove unwinds in a soothing bath of hydrochloric acid. (Roger and Pam Dalrymple, Gettysburg, Pa.)

Okay, who let the president play with the rubber pretzel bath toy? (John Ost, Alexandria)

Cheney swims a dozen laps to prove to the press corps that he is fit to serve another term. (Jeff Brechlin)

Cartoon C:

Hoping to appeal to rural voters, Bush boasted of the time he spent on the farm as a kid. (Art Grinath, Takoma Park)

Just because Bush didn't go to Vietnam doesn't mean he didn't have to battle the Viet Cong. Here, from the family archives, is a cross-section of ranch in Crawford circa 1969. (Carl Gerber, Annandale)

This is clearly a hoax. The intent may be to let us know where the veep's "undisclosed location" really is, but this can't be the United States because everyone knows there are no more family farms in the United States. (Bill Spencer, Exeter, N.H.)

The Anagrammarian Party buys ads to point out that "ant farm" = "Mr. NAFTA," but fail to explain how that's in any way relevant. (Brendan Beary, Great Mills)

While they can find nothing on Kerry himself, or even his immediate family, Republicans discover there is dirt dug up on his ant. (Russell Beland, Springfield)

In an ant farm, the ants work very hard and remain in the dark. This is a good metaphor for the current administration, except for the "work very hard." (Elden Carnahan, Laurel)

Cartoon D:

Wesley Clark could never understand why his training as a cavalry officer got people so upset. (Elden Carnahan)

If Cheney withdraws, many Republicans think former House whip Tom Delay would make an ideal dark-horse candidate, assuming there's nothing embarrassing in his closet. (Chris Doyle, Forsyth, Mo.)

Cartoon E:

This is your brain listening to campaign ads. Any questions? What? Um, well, those are your Achilles tendons listening to campaign ads. Any questions? (Ned Bent)

Kerry, out to show he's not a snooty elitist, goes to breakfast at Denny's, where he promptly orders un oeuf avec deux tranches fines des lardons fumés. (Chris Doyle)

The legend under this campaign button reads: "He lied. People fried." (Phil Frankenfeld, Washington)

Where's the beef? (Hamdi Akar, Broad Run)

The fundraising breakfast for the American Jewish Committee went terribly wrong. (Thad Humphries, Warrenton)

As we learned from 2000, it's not ovum till it's ovum. (Tom Witte, Montgomery Village)