Week 621: Questionable Journalism


A. In fact, I don't think it's actually as hard to do as you indicate.

Q: You think I'd bring myself to kiss you if you were the last person on Earth?

This week's contest is of a type the Empress loves: one in which contestants cannot steal their entries off the Internet, and one that requires readers to peruse The Washington Post, the fine publication that gives her real cash money as long as she does not use the word or or, of course, (except as an adjective): Take any sentence that appears in The Post or in an article on washingtonpost.com anytime through Aug. 8 and supply a question that it could answer. Please cite the date and page number of the article you're using (or if you're online, include that section of the article). The example above is from today's Ask Amy column.

Winner receives the Inker, the official Style Invitational trophy. First runner-up receives a real treasure: One-time (and we mean one-time, not onetime) Loser Helen Ward is a movie storyboard artist: She makes innumerable ink drawings detailing, shot by shot, five to a page, a planned film. She has sent us the original 26 storyboards for Scene 83, "Van Crash," for "Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2," which she calls "probably the worst movie I've worked on."

Other runners-up win a 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, if you really have to, by fax to 202- 334-4312. Deadline is Monday, Aug. 8. Put "Images/circlei3.gif" border=0>Washington Post. Entries may be edited for taste or content. Results will be published Aug. 28. No purchase required for entry. Employees of The Washington Post, and their immediate relatives, are not eligible for prizes. Pseudonymous entries will be disqualified. This contest was originally suggested in 1998 by Jacob Weinstein.

Report from Week 617, in which we asked you to write something about a well-known person, using only the letters in that person's name.

Many impressive entries this week, too many (given the length of some) to fit in this space -- so be sure to check out more of the same in a supplement on washingtonpost.com. Obviously, it was easier in this contest to use a very long name than a very short one: The person who sent in a single moderately amusing sentence constructed from letters appearing in "Charles Philip Arthur George

Mountbatten-Windsor, Prince of Wales" receives only the Empress's haughty derision.

{diam}Third Runner-up: Rick Santorum: It's a crisis! Am I crass? I'm not. Man 'n' man is

tantamount to man 'n' mutt. To man 'n' cat. To man 'n' rat. To man 'n' trout! TO MAN 'N' STORK!!! ICK! (Daniel Mauer, Silver Spring)

{diam}Second Runner-up: William Rehnquist: He's a tease, this Law Master. We learn he's ill. He weathers the treatment. Then he swears in the new ruler.

Alas, the Master seems a shell. All winter, he marshals his mettle. He startles us; he retains his health. The law still warms this esquire's heart. His qualities shine: wise, serene, quiet, a little ruthless, a little quaint as well (at merest whim, it seems, he wears the silliest hats). We are in his thrall. When will he quit?

The Hill waits. It seethes. The time is here -- ere an ass rules the realm, the Master must retire! The militants swarm, hassle him: "We want that seat!" Rather than wilt in the heat, the Master issues a statement: "Retire? Hah! Let the Law Mistress retire. I'll retain this seat whilst air remains in me. Am I timeless, eternal?" He smiles. "We'll see, eh?" (Patricia Casey, McLean)

{diam}First runner-up, winner of the seven-volume Style Invitational Toilet-Top

Reference Set: Kelly Ripa: Early, perky, really irky. (Brendan Beary, Great Mills)

{diam}And the winner of the Inker: Scarlett O'Hara: [A character's short tale.] A careless lass, a tease, has a secret hero. Alas, her heart aches: He shoos her. Cross, she chooses Charles, a loser (later, a carcass). The rascal Rhett chases her: He's crass, hot to trot. Chaos! Terror! Shells scorch the earth. Her clothes tatter. She eats a root, retches. She shoots a
looter. Later, Rhett catches her. She has a tot a horse tosses. (A carcass here, too.) The horror shatters Rhett (alcohol has a role), so he scoots. At last, she settles at Tara. [A close shot. Tears roll. The orchestra soars.] (Chris Doyle, Forsyth, Mo.)

{diam}Honorable Mentions:

Henry David Thoreau: Dear Dunderhead: Overdue rent? Don't threaten me. Your untrue ad read, "Dandy Retreat! Divine Hideout! Adventure Nirvana!" Hah. The truth: a dreary, unheated hut and no oven, no TV, no Internet. Not even a radio! I hate it in toto: the dirt, the odor, the radon. . . . The "river trout"? They're nutria! I haven't eaten other than dried horny toad. And outdoor urination? Not dandy. At nadir: I have heavy ennui, and no vino. I need to hit a tavern in a hurry, dude. -- Your Irate, Annoyed Tenant (Mark Eckenwiler, Washington)

Peter Angelos: Legal eagle, Napoleon-poser, poor sport: As pleasant as a serpent, as gallant as a rat. (Brendan Beary)

Julius Caesar: A crisis arises. Cassius carries a slicer. A classic ruse assures success. Cruel rascals lure, assail a careless ruler. Alas, Caesar is a carcass. (Chris Doyle)

Ann H. Coulter: Launch ultra-cruel nuclear terror. Cut a tree. Hunt a crane, turtle, tern or toucan. Accelerate a hot car at a nun on a crutch. Return to coal heat. Halt the taco run to the north; neuter the nacho race here. Honor Colonel North -- a true hero. Halt the nocturnal oral, rectal act. Torch central L.A.! Lunch not at Nora! Tell a tall tale, ulcerate a heart, call truth untrue, act out, rant. Touche! (Peter Metrinko, Chantilly)

Fidel Castro: (Classified ad, Ocala Star)

Elder dictator desires to sell, lease, or trade aircraft carrier for coastal Florida flat. (Chris Doyle)

Howard Dean: We ran hard. Wandered down a dead-end road. No wonder we were rear-ended. And where are we headed now? Down a new road! NH! And OH. And DE. And OR and WA. And NE! And ND! ONWARD! AAAAAAAAAH!! . . . Oh no. Darn. (Danny Bravman, St. Louis; Jeff Covel, Arlington)

Ron Ely: Only one role: Eyeyeyeyeyeyeyeyeyeyeeeeeeeeeeeeee- eeeeeeeeeeyeyeyeyeyeyeyeyeo! (Elwood Fitzner, Valley City, N.D.)

Paris Hilton: Spoilt trollop -- nasal, tartish trash. As an A- list harlot, I stroll on patios as snoops shoot porn photos. I thirst to sin. Ah, lotharios, sailors, pianists! I strip polo shirt, pantaloons; I sport Titian lips, nail polish, a pair o' ta-tas, a tan torso, Saran shorts on loins. (No halo!) Lanolin lotion, palpation, oral passion, positions -- lots! trillions! An irritation, I appall pastors, parsons, papal historians, trinitarians, philanthropists, hoi polloi. (Spoilsports!) Titillation? Nonstop! (Mark Eckenwiler)

Paris Hilton: "That's so hot," or "That's so not hot." This, alas, is all I no. (Brendan Beary)

Karl Rove: A looker? No. A lover? No. A leaker? A real leaker. -- Val (Fred S. Souk, Herndon; John O'Byrne, Dublin)

Michael Jackson: Monomaniacal chameleon's nose has a mechanical cheesiness; his skin is like melamine. His one ace-in-hole comes as a shock: innocence. (Brendan Beary)

Rush Limbaugh: I'm all bull. (Michelle Stupak, Ellicott City)

John Edwards: Who? (Frank Mullen III, Aledo, Ill.)

Ernest Hemingway: I swagger. I rage. I marinate in gin. I write. This way. (Brendan Beary)

Bill O'Reilly: Ol' yeller. (Mark Eckenwiler)

Donald Trump: A mutant pompadour on a mammon adulator. (Chris Doyle)

Marcel Proust: A proposal occurs to me: Emote a tome! A colossal, spectacular, sumptuous, atemporal tome! A preposterous, almost-complete-career tome! Crap to popular appeal -- let's compose as our soul pleases! Mortals are poor, Art's ample! So let's use lots o' paper, create a tale to torture amateurs, to oppress lecturers, to perpetuate classroom terror; a tome to tear apart secrets, to corrupt Scoutmasters, to relate our cares or scream our pleasure, to compass all Europe, all cultures, all space, all else. (Me? Presumptuous?) (Mike Keith, Richmond)

Saddam Hussein: Madman has Sunni enemies, sadism issues and damn sad undies. (Brendan Beary)

Liza Minnelli: I mine nellie men. (Michelle Stupak)

Katie Holmes: [She meets Tom.] Sheesh! He has me at "hello." Ooh, he's a total hottie! That smile. Those teeth. He's so smooooth. Hmmm. Almost too smooth. I see he likes to steal looks at males -- a lot. That makes me a little skittish. Is he a sham? Is this all a mammoth mistake? I'll talk to Mimi. She'll tell me. [Tom takes a hike.] (Chris Doyle)

And Last: Leopold Ritter von Sacher-Masoch: He craves the approval of the SI Empress. "Please, oh, please, print this," he pleads. Print this and he shall remain, as ever: slave. (Bruce W. Alter, Fairfax Station)


More Honorable Mentions from Week 617 of The Style Invitational, in which entrants had to write about a famous personage using only the letters in the person's name:

Neil Armstrong: Not long ago, I'm in a sim trainer going nine G's. Imagine it, nine G's! -- I'm a man's man! So, I tell 'em I'm raring to go, again. Not so smart, see. Later on, all alone, I lose it in a latrine! Still, I'm as eager as a sailor on a rising sea, so NASA treats me to a mission to man's largest satellite: Moon. I'm game. . . . It's nearing T-time, so I settle in, set toggles, test signals, ignite engines. In no time at all, I'm going, going, gone! I soar among a million stars. It's great! Time goes on. I see I'm almost in range, so I ease Eagle, in slo-mo, settling in a mare ("sea" in moon lingo). In a rare moment, it's all me, so I start orating, "One small . . . one giant . . ." Rats! I'm losing it -- senior moment. Google it. Gotta go, it's Geritol time. (Kyle Hendrickson, Frederick)

Paris Hilton has all that hair, is tall, thin, a porn star (sorta). Still, Paris isn't all that hot. (Russell Beland, Springfield)

James Dobson, the conservative minister: O God, omens bode bad mojo, so end dames' boob, abdomen and nose jobs, bobbed manes and jeans on demon bods. Ban moans on beds, Onan men and Sodom sods. And damn Bob Jones. Amen. (Peter Metrinko, Chantilly)

Alfred Kinsey: Kinky freaks, randy elders, desireless ladies, afraid fairies, self-diddlers -- I seen all kinds. (Brendan Beary, Great Mills)

Arnold Schwarzenegger: A rare ego, a shrewd career. A lecher, he ogles gals galore, and lewd hands anger gals (careless!). Gals endanger win; so he does Leno: Leno endorses, enhances news angle. Snares win: Arrogance rewarded. (Jane Auerbach, Los Angeles)

Testimo, zestimo
Alan M. Dershowitz,
Shrewd and remorseless, a
Wizard-at-law.

Sentimentalities
Aren't in his arsenal.
Hammers the witnesses,
Win, lose, or draw. (Chris Doyle, Forsyth, Mo.)

Gwyneth Paltrow: New year. Pregnant. What now, "Pear"? (Judith Cottrill, New York)

Terri Schiavo: The harsh rhetoric, the "Save Terri" services, the rosaries, the crosses, the "she sees"/"she hears" theories, the tests, the irate voices, the threats, the hoots, the cheers, the chaos, the sheer theatrics, the heartache, the horror. These are over. She's at rest. (Chris Doyle)

George Donner: Deer gone. Dog gone. Gorged on Roger. Doggone good! (Elwood Fitzner, Valley City, N.D.)

Alice Roosevelt Longworth: She's not the chilliest girl on the Hill. Oh no, she's a riot. All want to watch how she chitchats with the social elite: her strong insights, how she nails the overweening, how she groans at all Washington inanities. She wastes no chances to view all with her laser lorgnette (it's the one with the glitter case with the lace cover). (Bill Spencer, Exeter, N.H.)