Week 719: We Har the World


The Perth (Australia) Thnatchers

The Damme (Germany) Yankees

The Havana (Cuba) Nice Days

The Bonn (Germany) Losers

In 1994 -- back when people read The Washington Post on real paper (and
paid for it with real money), it was pretty hard to find The Post outside
Washington -- and practically impossible outside the United States,
unless you got your mail in a diplomatic pouch. The Style Invitational
ran a contest asking readers to create fictional school team names for
actual American towns (winner: The Assinippi (Mass.) Guard Dogs, by Karla
J. Dickinson of Springfield). Now, the Empress regularly receives entries
from Tasmania to Oman to Scotland to New Delhi to Manitoba and even West
Virginia, and so, at the suggestion of Awfully Enthusiastic Loser Randy
Lee of Burke, she agreed it was time to take this contest global: This
week: Come up with a creative name for a sports team for a town or city
anywhere outside the United States; please include the name of the
country. If the joke requires a long explanation of the pronunciation, it
won't be much of a joke.

Winner receives the Inker, the official Style Invitational trophy. First
runner-up gets "When You're Smiling," a 2004 CD of Regis Philbin singing
old-time pop standards (consensus: Bing Crosby's place in music history
is secure).

Other runners-up win their choice of a coveted Style Invitational Loser
T-shirt or yearned-for Loser Mug. Honorable Mentions (or whatever they're
called that week) 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, July
2. Put "Week 719" 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 July 22. No
purchase required for entry. Employees of The Washington Post, and their
immediate relatives, are not eligible for prizes. Pseudonymous entries
will be disqualified. Randy Lee supplied the final example for this
week's contest. The revised title for next week's contest is by Tom Witte.

Report From Week 715, in which we sought ideas for what to put on the new Loser Mug and on the
back of the new Loser T-shirt.

Lots of nice ideas for both prizes, either of which an Invitational runner-up (or even an Inker winner) may choose.
When they finally arrive at Invitational headquarters deep in the bowels
-- where else? -- of the Washington Post newsroom, there should be enough
for at least the next two years of runners-up. (The shirts will finally
come in both L and XL, rather than just the bedspread size.) And you just
may end up seeing some of the other slogans below on future T-shirts,
mugs and Honorable Mention magnets.

For the back of the new Loser T-Shirt, whose front is the brain design
shown on the mug, designed by cartoonist Bob Staake:

4. This Mind Intentionally Left Blank (Steven King, Alexandria)

3. Last Seen Wearing This Shirt (Horace LaBadie, Dunnellon, Fla.)

2. The Style Invitational: Because It Really Gives a Shirt (Eric Murphy,
Ann Arbor, Mich.)

And the Winning T-Shirt Slogan

Object in T-Shirt Is Brighter Than It Appears (Lawrence McGuire, Waldorf;
Russell Beland, Springfield)

For the formerly pristinely elegant white mug that we are about to deface:

4. I Won This on Company Time, So I Only Use It at the Office (Roy
Ashley, Private Sector, Washington)

3. This Is NOT a Urinal (Walterjervis Sheffield, Fredericksburg, Va.)

2. The Style Invitational: Good to the Last Dork (Kevin Dopart,
Washington)

And the Winning Mug Design

(Beverley Sharp, Washington; Chris Doyle, Ponder, Tex.)

Factory Seconds

For the back of the T-shirt:

The Empress's New Clothes (Tom Witte, Montgomery Village; John Kupiec,
Fairfax; Art Grinath, Takoma Park)

Shtick for Brains (Russell Beland)

Fashions come and go, but bad taste never goes out of Style. (Art Grinath)

Cogito ergo desum: I think, therefore I lose. (Ira Goldman, Washington)

If You Think This Shirt Is Dumb, You Should See What I Did to Get It
(Lawrence McGuire)

I Got Shirt On by the Empress (John Kupiec)

I May Be a Loser, but at Least I'm Ahead of You (Paul VerNooy, Hockessin,
Del.)

How's My Walking? Contact losers@washpost.com (Horace LaBadie)

Future Dust Rag (Larry Pryluck, Amissville, Va.)

Living Proof of Intelligenter Design (Bruce Carlson, Alexandria)

The Style Invitational: Regularly Updating Flatulence Jokes Since 1993
(Steve Liu, North Potomac)

I'm With Pompously Self-Absorbed (Roy Ashley)

Twice the Brainpower of a Chimpanzee With a Typewriter! (Creigh Richert,
Aldie)

The Style Invitational: Lacking Only Style. And Invitations. (Susan
Thompson, Cary, N.C.)

Mind Over Manners (Phil Frankenfeld, Washington)

Think I'm a Loser? Wait Till You See the Front. (Josh Tucker, Kensington)

I Gave the Empress a Piece of My Mind (Barry Koch, Catlett, Va.)

A Mind Is a Terrible Thing to Waste. But Go Ahead and Enter the Style
Invitational anyway. (Larry Yungk, Arlington)

For the mug:

Wake Up and Smell the Ink (Tom Witte)

For Best Results, Pour Into Top End (Drew Bennett, Alexandria)

Cafe Empresso (John O'Byrne, Dublin)

The words "World's Greatest Grandma" appear in a large "folksy" font,
adorned with flowers and songbirds. But the words are scribbled out in
red marker, and "Style Invitational Loser Prize" is scrawled crudely
below it. (Jay Shuck, Minneapolis)

My Other Mug Is a Porsche (Russ Taylor, Vienna)

Panhandler Starter Kit (Kevin Dopart)

This Was a Pristinely Elegant Piece of Stoneware Before It Was Defaced.
(Bill Coffin, Silver Spring)

Could have been for either:

Wry Not (Tom Witte)

Lose Only as Directed (Mark Eckenwiler, Washington)

No Childishness Left Behind (Tom Witte)

The Style Invitational: You Gotta Play to Lose (Roy Ashley)

Aging Quippie (Tom Witte)

Loser
*Loserer
Loserest

Runner-Up, The Style Invitational (Bob Dalton, Arlington)

The Style Invitational: It's a Dishonor Just Being Nominated (Bruce
Carlson)

Next Week: The Hard Spell, or The Bards and the Bee