Week 883: Compare and contrast


Chicken lo mein
The New York Yankees
Water balloons
A dental appointment
Illinois
Montezuma's Revenge
Arlington National Cemetery
An Elizabethan sonnet
Gulf Coast beaches
Venn diagrams
A Real Housewife of D.C.
School lunches
The Nobel Prize
Your friend's nose

Here's a perennial Invitational contest that treads some of the same ground as this week's results, without all the circles and stuff: Choose any two items from the list above and explain why they are alike or are different from each other. Some of the categories were used in non-inking entries for the Venn diagram contest; maybe they'll feel more at home here.

Winner gets the Inker, the official Style Invitational trophy. Second place receives the fine reference book "Five People Who Died During Sex, and 100 Other Terribly Tasteless Lists."

Other runners-up win their choice of a coveted Style Invitational Loser T-shirt -- current or classic model -- or yearned-for Loser Mug. Honorable Mentions get one of the lusted-after Style Invitational Loser Magnets. First Offenders get a smelly, tree-shaped air "freshener" (Fir Stink for their First Ink). 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, Aug. 30. Put "Week 883" 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 to be published Sept. 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 results is by Chris Doyle; this week's honorable-mentions subhead is by Kevin Dopart. The diagrams were produced by Bob Staake and Valerie Holt; Craig Dykstra did his own.

Report from Week 879, in which we asked you to express some observation about similarities and dissimilarities as a Venn diagram (or, in some cases, a Euler diagram, which doesn't show every possible intersection).

The Inker-winner, the three runners-up and the honorable mentions -- "Below-grade intersections," as they're labeled in the print edition of this column -- appear in the slide show on the top right of this page. Except for one offbeat HM that didn't fit the frame's dimensions. That one, thought up by Barry Koch and drawn by Bob Staake, is here.

Winner: Russell Beland, Fairfax, Va.
RU 1: Craig Dykstra, Centreville
RU 2: Ring Alexander, New York
RU 3: Joshua Kaplowitz, Arlington

Below-grade intersections: Honorable mentions

Beverley Sharp, Washington
Russell Beland, Fairfax
Dion Black, Washington
Eric Murphy, Washington
Jeff Contompasis, Ashburn, Va.
Russell Beland, Fairfax
Bird Waring, Larchmont, N.Y.
Bruce Alter, Fairfax Station, Va.
Russell Beland, Fairfax, Va.
Beverley Sharp, Washington
Russell Beland, Fairfax, Va.
Jeff Contompasis, Ashburn, Va.
Kevin Dopart, Washington
Sheri Tardio, Prince Frederick, Md.
Kevin Dopart, Washington
Kevin Dopart, Washington
Kevin Dopart, Washington
Barry Koch

Next week: Our greatest hit, or Lex-change operations