Week 838: Picture This


Almost-Forever Style Invitational Cartoonist Bob Staake almost cannot stop making art. He does covers for the New Yorker. He is the author and/or illustrator of 47 books, including four children's picture books that have not yet been released. You can even see him making his art (via Photoshop) on YouTube. In fact, the only way we've been able to stop Bob from making art is to have him draw cartoons such as the ones here. This week: Provide a caption for any of these pictures.

Winner gets the Inker, the official Style Invitational trophy. Second place receives a bag of sproingy-curly black fake hair for use on dolls, discourtesy of Loser Pie Snelson. This hair looks eerily like the Empress's own hair (see slideshow, along with the cartoons) except that it is devoid of gray.

Other runners-up win their choice of a coveted Style Invitational Loser T-shirt -- now in the Loser colors of "maroon" and gold -- 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. 19. Put "Week 838" 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 Nov. 7. 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 Dave Zarrow; this week's honorable-mentions name is by Chris Doyle.

Report From Week 834, in which we asked you to combine any two words from a single Washington Post story into a hyphenated compound word, and define it (we also accepted entries in which one of the elements was already a compound).

Smart-alecky Over-Loser Russell Beland, realizing that the Empress had not specified which days' papers could be used, submitted entries from Posts of June 4, 1957 (his birthdate), and Oct. 10, 1972 (a big Watergate story).

The Winner of the Inker

Up-Jones: Outdo the neighbors. (Sylvia Betts, Vancouver, B.C.)

2. the winner of the Greek "Do Not Throw Paper in Toilet" sign:

Mantra-reform: Om improvement. (Chris Doyle, Ponder, Tex.)

3. Air-football: Redskins fans' futile gestures as they try to will the ball past the first-down marker. (Dave Prevar, Annapolis)

4. Congressional-affordable: Unaffordable. (Russell Beland, Fairfax)

Sub-Merges: Honorable Mentions

Knowledge-harbor: The brain. "There don't seem to be many boats docked in Sarah's knowledge-harbor." (Mae Scanlan, Washington)

Guantanamo-baptism: Cheney's euphemism for waterboarding. (Kevin Dopart, Washington)

Home-down: A foreclosure block party. (Judy Blanchard, Novi, Mich.)

A-holy: Despicably sanctimonious. (Chris Doyle)

Hormone-filled-hurricane: The guy dating your daughter. (Peter Metrinko,

Gainesville)

Bowels-amok: A newly discovered early film by John Waters. (Peter Metrinko)

Garage-bustle: Earlier, more polite form of "lard-butt." (Jeff Contompasis, Ashburn)

Nixon-ranks: Near the bottom portion of any distribution. "Among NFL quarterbacks, he's in the Nixon-ranks." (Russell Beland)

Guillotine-cure: To fire someone rather than train him properly. (Barbara Turner, Takoma Park)

Economy-briefed: Wearing irregular underpants. (Beverley Sharp, Washington)

More-dead: Condition of vampires who have stakes through their hearts. (Russell Beland)

Dumas-zero: Loser who can't even spell. (Jeff Contompasis)

Pop-age: The years preceding one's switch to the smooth-jazz station. (Tom Witte, Montgomery Village)

Out-white: What Jeff Foxworthy and Larry the Cable Guy are trying to do to each other. (Erik Wennstrom, Bloomington, Ind.)

Hand-burger: The result of an accident at the packing plant. (Tom Witte)

Imitation-sleazy: "I'm not a member of Congress, but I play one on TV." (Christopher Lamora, Arlington)

Plodding-package: Diagnosis requiring Viagra. (Christopher Lamora)

Squint-castration: A babe's withering look that tells a guy in a bar, "Don't even think about it." (Dave Prevar)

Yoga-bingo: Twister. (Larry Yungk, Arlington)

Anniversary-apology: The annual ritual marking a man's annual forgetting of the occasion that is supposed to reaffirm how important it is to him. (Elizabeth O'Neill and Ryan Van Alstyne, Manassas, First Offenders)

Has-bean: An ex-vegan. (Chris Doyle)

Evaporated-cow: Where evaporated milk comes from. (Mae Scanlan)

Bear-head: The woods. (Chris Doyle)

Sheet-blogging: The modern, real-time equivalent of kiss-and-tell memoirs. (Christopher Lamora)

Zeroes-faking: Pretending to be rich. (Kevin Dopart)

Matzoh-bowels: The Eleventh Plague. (Chris Doyle)

Yahoo-spout: "Ask a question" at a town hall meeting on health insurance. (G. Smith, New York)

Fishing-sober: Still able to sit upright. (Elwood Fitzner, Valley City, N.D.)

Wigs-disease: Hairpiece simplex. (Chris Doyle)

Knobby-appliances: Electronics from back in the 20th century. (Larry Yungk)

And Last: Loser-postal: Dangerously ink-deprived. (Beverley Sharp)

Next Week: Tour de Fours VI, or The Whole ERTH Catalog