Week 837: Strip Search


It's not a good time to get into the comic strip business: Despite the ever-growing need for humor in our lives, newspapers have been cutting way back on the number and size of the funnies they run. Here's a way to free up some space, suggested some time ago by Stephen Dudzik of Olney and just the other day by Michael Kilby of Wildau, Germany: Combine two comic strips that appear in The Washington Post or at washingtonpost.com/comics and describe the result, as in the example above. You don't have to have a "mash title," as this one does; you can instead explain what happens when one or more characters of one strip join those in the other.

Winner gets the Inker, the official Style Invitational trophy. Second place gets a cool old-fashioned flip book showing, when you flip from the front and from the back, Mickey Mantle batting left and batting right. Donated by Andrew Hoenig.

Other runners-up win their choice of a coveted Style Invitational Loser T-shirt or yearned-for Loser Mug. 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, Oct. 12. Put "Week 837" 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 Oct. 31. 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 results is by Tom Witte; this week's honorable-mentions name is by Beverley Sharp.

Report From Week 833, our perennial contest in which we asked you to take a real word, name or multi-word term -- this time beginning with M, N, O or P -- and add or subtract one letter, substitute one letter or transpose two adjacent letters, and describe the result.

Once again, lots of wickedly clever neologisms among the 2,500 entries -- but no one played on "neologism."

Incredible Milestone Alert: With last week's results, Kevin Dopart of Washington bounded across the 500-ink line as the seventh and by far the speediest member of the Style Invitational Hall of Fame: Kevin began entering the Invite only four years ago. His E-Z key to success? Just enter every single contest for 200-plus weeks, with a ton of entries every week -- including 163 (!) for the contest below -- most of them strikingly clever and funny.

The Winner of the Inker

Mulatte: Rejected name for Starbucks' new half-coffee/half-milk drink. (Pam Sweeney, St. Paul, Minn.)

2. the winner of the cans of genuine imported haggis and corn smut: Sparadigm: A model panhandler. (Kevin Dopart, Washington)

3. Cold Faithful: Spouse who won't sleep with you anymore, but at least isn't sleeping with anyone else, either. (Christopher Lamora, Arlington)

4. Parismonious: Describing the portions of food served at a French restaurant. (Judy Blanchard, Novi, Mich.)

A Change for the Worse: Honorable Mentions

Pathletic: Hopelessly uncoordinated. (Tom Witte, Montgomery Village)

Bordures : A store that specializes in bathroom reading material. (Paul Kocak, Syracuse, N.Y.)

Nowscaster: A Twitterer. (Craig Dykstra, Centreville)

Morning gory: The half-chewed mouse the cat thoughtfully leaves on your side of the bed. (Lawrence McGuire, Waldorf)

Phonym: e.g., "Tom" from the Bangalore help desk. (Kevin Dopart)

Pollbearer: The guy who carries the Cook County cemetery ballots. (Peter Metrinko, Gainesville)

Methuselay: Romance at the old folks' home. (Mae Scanlan, Washington)

Pal de mer: A barf bag. (Les Greenblatt, Ann Arbor, Mich.)

Adagascar: New name for the Hummer. (Russ Taylor, Vienna)

Oediplus: Theban king who inadvertently slept with his mother and his sister. (Brendan Beary, Great Miills)

Costentatious: "Forgetting" to remove the price tag from an expensive objet d'art. (Anne Paris, Arlington)

Moonucleosis: The butt-kissing disease. (Chris Doyle, Ponder, Tex.)

Pilatitude: Annoying encouragement from the fitness instructor: "Feel the power!" "You know you can do it!" (Pam Sweeney)

Public hair: The result of a Speedo malfunction. (Dean Evangelista, Rockville)

Masochistick: A golf club. (Larry Yungk, Arlington)

M?bius Strep: A virus that keeps going around. (Elise Jacobs, Silver Spring)

Postnaval drip: A retired admiral who bores you with war stories. (Chris Doyle)

Porximity: The personal space of the fat guy in the adjacent seat. (Craig Dykstra)

Liver Twist: What they call rotgut in London. You probably won't ask for more. (Barbara Turner, Takoma Park)

Zornography: Game film of the Redskins getting it every which way. (Scott Campisi, Wake Village, Tex.)

Okrap: What most people say when first biting into okra. (Tom Witte)

Mistoke: Lighting up a fat one at a stoplight next to an unmarked police car. (Kat Nove, Kerrville, Tex., a First Offender)

Pimplex: A high school campus. (Kevin Dopart)

NIMBY-pamby: Not In My Back Yard (if that's okay with you). (Lawrence McGuire)

Peripathetic: Going nowhere. (Tom Witte)

X-menarche: The initial blossoming of a superhero's powers. (Judy Blanchard)

Muscle cart: A six-horsepower Amish dragster. (Chris Doyle)

Purgeatory: The bathroom at the modeling agency. (Peter Metrinko)

Pillowcasas: The houses you used to make from the sofa cushions. (Craig Dykstra)

Magnum pus: A big zit. (Les Greenblatt)

Trize: The "participant" trophy given to Little League bench-sitters. (Brian Cort?s, Hockessin, Del., a First Offender)

Nincompop: The father of any teen. (Bird Waring, Larchmont, N.Y.)

Majoritsy: A 51 percent "mandate." (Jeff Contompasis, Ashburn)

Midlift crisis: The sudden realization during your cosmetic surgery that even with all this, you'll never look 25 again. (Beverley Sharp, Washington)

Oopspore: The egg that was fertilized when the condom broke. (Brendan Beary)

Unclear fusion: The Democratic Party. (Barry Koch, Catlett, Va.)

Octopush: To labor under a mass conception. (Beverley Sharp)

Smoron: A graham cracker cooked between two marshmallows. (Kevin Dopart)

Momniscience: The ability to know just who broke that vase. (Kallen Dun, Hockessin, Del., a First Offender)

Pubic defender: Chastity belt. (Dave Komornik, Danville, Va.)

Psychiatryst: The shrink with the stained couch. (Chris Rollins, Cumberland, Md.)

Piroulette: How ballerinas decide who gets the pas de deux with the one straight guy. (Erik Wennstrom, Bloomington, Ind.)

Mobstetrician: Deliverer of the Gambino bambinos. (Anne Paris)

Menses: What do you mean it's not a valid entry? I switched the first S with the second S!!!!!! (Roy Ashley, Washington)

Next Week: Fractured Compounds, or Post Hitching