Week 663: Worth at Least a Dozen Words


It's the same question we ask Style Invitational cartoonist Bob Staake
every week: "What is THIS supposed to be?" This time, though, we actually
asked him to make his pictures as ambiguous as possible. Interpret any of
them as you see fit in a caption. Winner receives the Inker, the official
Style Invitational trophy. First runner-up gets a sort of Inker-to-Be,
given to the Empress long ago by intrepid Loser Michelle Stupak: a
fake-marble statuette, below, of a chimpanzee sitting atop a pile of
books, one of them labeled "Darwin." The chimp is scratching its head and
pondering a human skull.

Other runners-up win a coveted Style Invitational Loser T-shirt.
Honorable Mentions (or whatever they're called this week) get one of the
lusted-after Style Invitational Magnets. One prize per entrant per week.
Send your entries by e-mail tolosers@washpost.comor by fax to
202-334-4312. Deadline is Tuesday, May 30. Put "Week 663" 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 June 18. 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 Chris Doyle of Forsyth,
Mo. The Honorable Mentions name is by Deborah Guy of Columbus, Ohio.

Report From Week 659, in which we asked for Fibs, six-line poems whose number of syllables per
line echoes the mathematical Fibonacci sequence: 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8. In
addition, we required that any two successive lines had to rhyme, and
that the subject matter be in the news.

4

Where's
That
Receipt,
Claude Allen?
We clerks get nervous
When you're near Customer Service.

(Jay Shuck, Minneapolis)

3

Duke
Lax
Scandal
Has the whole
Campus in a fix,
Because boys can't control their sticks.

(Andrew Hoenig, Rockville)

2 the winner of the Divorce Dark beer and Gap martini shaker:

White
House
Shows us:
Tony's in,
John may take a hike:
Proves no two Snow flacks are alike.

(Ira Allen, Bethesda)And the Winner of the Inker

When
The
Chinese
PM comes,
You meekly kowtow.
'Cause Dubya, Hu's your daddy now.

(Brendan Beary, Great Mills)

Not Quite So Well Versed

To Joe Lieberman:

It
Ain't
Brave, your
Behavior.
Please kiss a tiny
Bit less presidential hiney. (David Smith, Santa Cruz, Calif.)

Whenn
That
Aprill
Wyth showres
Hath made hys drizzle,
Thenn wander pilgryms, fo' shizzle.

-- K. Viswanathan, Cambridge, Mass. (Mark Eckenwiler, Washington)

I'll
Sign
The next
Immigrant
Bill that is offered:
Gotta clear brush down in Crawford. (Kevin Dopart, Washington)

It's
At
Three bucks
A gallon
And rising so fast,
The public's not pumped, but a-gassed. (Chris Doyle, Forsyth, Mo.)

Oh
Keith,
Now please:
Climbing trees?
Why don't you grow up?
You aren't 55 anymore. (Eric Murphy, Ann Arbor, Mich.)

Yes,
Bonds
Will be
Inducted.
But still, by and by,
I bet they'll change that "u" to "i." (Roy Ashley, Washington)

With
Tom
DeLay
Gone away,
House Speaker Hastert
Can't say he misses the bastert. (Brendan Beary)

We
Sent
Home Scott
McClellan.
Our ship ran aground!
We'd better move deck chairs around. (Jay Shuck)

Bush
Moves
To change
Palace guards.
The fault, dear Brutus,
Lies in ourselves, not in the Cards. (Phil Frankenfeld, Washington)

Oh
My
Papa,
To me he
Was so wonderful.
But to others, so blunderful.

-- Chelsea Clinton (Russell Beland, Springfield)

Down
With
All these
Big boxes!
Mom-and-pops for all!
(But dirt cheap, please, and in a mall.) (Elden Carnahan, Laurel)

Drats!
Stats
Told Karl
His BS
Just wasn't sellin' --
So he dumped poor Scott McClellan. (Nick Curtis, Gaithersburg)

When
Dick
Cheney
Shot Harry
While hunting for quail,
He hid and kept dragging his tale. (Chris Doyle)

O
My
People!
Paisanos!
Please go north in flocks.
-- Love, your leader, Vicente Fox. (Troy Siemers, Staunton, Va.)

Why
Lie,
Tehran,
About your
Big nuclear toil?
You need fuel? With all of your oil? (Mark Organek, Tempe, Ariz.)

Poor
Tom
DeLay
Once held sway,
The fearsome Hammer.
Will his next House be the slammer? (Mark Eckenwiler)

Let's
Leave
Iran
And not fight.
And when they nuke us
We can say, "Guess what? We were right!" (Jeff Brechlin, Eagan, Minn.)

Filled
With
Despair,
Tony Blair
Has cause to feel blue:
Approval ratings down the loo. (Brendan Beary)

Tom
And
Katie
Had Suri.
Timed the birth, you see,
To get big press for "M:i:III." (Phyllis Reinhard, East Fallowfield, Pa.)

Off
Drives
Britney
With her kid.
Folks want to shoot her:
She has a laptop commuter. (Jay Shuck)

Bless
Those
Downloads!
Even when
Her body's wiltin',
We'll always have Paris Hilton. (Roy Ashley)

Buy.
Sell.
Flip it.
Gentrify.
Oops, I'm in trouble.
The market just popped my bubble. (Bruce Alter, Fairfax Station)

East
Coast,
West Coast,
A story
You'll read every year:
"Drugs' Impact on Barry's Career" (Kevin Dopart)

Oh,
Dear!
LaVar
Arrington,
The noncompliant,
Will now haunt us as a Giant. (Walt Johnston, Woodstock, Md.)

To
Save
On gas
I must take
A Yugo in trade
For my Cadillac Escalade. (Elden Carnahan)

I
Called
My place
"Signatures":
I wish I knew then
I'd soon be heading to the pen.

-- J. Abramoff, Washington (Mark Eckenwiler)

Why
John
Can't add
Or subtract:
Is it because we
Gave him a TI-83? (Janet O'Donnell Lacey, Arlington)

"Lord,
In
'08
If it's "Frist"
Or "Hillary" to check,
I'll vote for Sharpton from Quebec. (Elden Carnahan)

Ten
Long
Decades
Since the Quake
Struck without warning.
FEMA just arrived this morning. (Jay Shuck)

Don't
You
Mess with
Our anthem:
"Jose can you see"
Includes enough Spanish for me. (Kevin Dopart)

Dude.
Whoa,
Let's go.
Pot's legal
Down in Mexico.
(Dude, I totally lost this line.) (Seth Brown, North Adams, Mass.)

Not really "in the news," but so what:

Oh
Good
Golly
Miss Molly,
You sure like to ball.
And when you're rocking and rolling . . .

-- L. Richard, West Hollywood, Calif. (Russell Beland)

And Last:

My
Drug
Of choice
Is really
Recreational:
The Style Invitational. (Russell Beland)

And very last:

No
Ink.
I stink.
Humor gone
Since last election:
It's your fault, Mr. President. (Michelle Stupak, Ellicott City)

Next Week: Foaling Down, or Rerun for the Roses