Style Invitational Week 1060: Caption some Bob Staake cartoons; and
the winning new weather terms


By Pat Myers
,
Thursday, February 13, 2:37 PM

We’ve managed to lure Bob Staake away momentarily from his next volume
for children, the ambiguously named “My Pet Book”

(spoiler: it’s not a book about different pets), not to mention his next
23 projects, so that once again he can ask your help in figuring out
what’s going on in these pictures, because /he / sure has no idea. *This
week: Write a caption, or captions, for one or more of these cartoons.*
Please indicate which cartoon you’re captioning; you’d think I could
figure that out, but believe me, I’ve judged at least 24 Invite cartoon
contests, and your thought processes aren’t always much clearer than
Bob’s. (Yes, I’m talking to you personally.) For larger versions of the
four individual pictures above, click on No. 1
, No. 2
,
No. 3

and No. 4.


Winner gets the Inkin’ Memorial
,
the Lincoln statue bobblehead that is the official Style Invitational
trophy. Second place — in honor of Valentine’s Day — receives a little
gadget called the Karleks Band, brought back from romantic Sweden by
Loser Mike Gips. If you’re in a hotel room and feeling amorous, and the
room has two beds pushed together, you hold them together with this
thing so your romance doesn’t fall through the cracks, as it were. We
will even throw in, for our European travelers, a roll of toilet paper
imprinted with the design of euro bills. Donated by Inge Ashley and,
amazingly, declined by the recipient the last time we tried giving it away.

*Other runners-up *win their choice of a yearned-for Loser Mug
or the ardently
desired “Whole Fools” Grossery Bag.
Honorable
mentions get a lusted-after Loser magnet, either the Po’ Wit Laureate

or Puns of Steel.
First
Offenders receive a smelly tree-shaped air “freshener” (FirStink

for their first ink). E-mail entries to /losers@washpost.com
/ or, if you were born in the 19th century,
fax to 202-334-4312. Deadline is Monday, Feb. 24; results published
March 16 (online March 13). No more than 25 entries per entrant per
week. Include “Week 1060” in your e-mail subject line or it might be
ignored as spam. Include your real name, postal address and phone number
with your entry. See contest rules and guidelines at wapo.st/InvRules
. This week’s honorable-mentions subhead is by
William Kennard; the alternative headline in the “Next week’s results”
line is by Danielle Nowlin. Join the lively Style Invitational Devotees
group on Facebook at /on.fb.me/invdev ,/ and
click “like” on Style Invitational Ink of the Day at /bit.ly/inkofday.
/

*Report from Week 1056, in which we asked for some novel meterological terms:

*The winner of the Inkin’ Memorial:
*

*Geiclone:* Windstorm followed 15 minutes later by a deluge of insurance
claims. /(Megan Durham, Reston, Va.)/

*2. * *Winner of the cow-on-motorcycle “snow” globe:

*

*Tropical repression:* Stifling high-pressure system that has stalled
over Cuba for the past 55 years./(Mark Raffman, Reston, Va.) /

*3. * *Snowed in: *Stuck in Russia and unable to come in from the
cold./(Beverley Sharp, Montgomery, Ala.) /

*4. * *Wintry meeks:* People who refuse to leave home if there’s even a
chance of snow in the forecast./(Tom Witte, Montgomery Village, Md.)/

*Category 1’s: honorable mentions*

*Driptease:* Amount of rain that taunts you by being too much not to use
your windshield wipers, but too little to use them continuously.
/(Danielle Nowlin, Woodbridge, Va.) /

*Typhool:* A TV reporter standing in the middle of a hurricane to tell
us it’s windy out. /(Gary Crockett, Chevy Chase, Md.) /

*Chris-T-storm:* A wind so blustery that it renders bridge travel nearly
impossible. /(Dave Silberstein, College Park, Md.) /

*Winter feather advisory:* Time to pull out the down quilt./(Kathy
El-Assal, Middleton, Wis.) /

*Molar vortex:* Wind so cold it makes your fillings hurt. /(Doug
Montgomery, North Potomac, Md., a First Offender; Tom Witte) /

*Polar cortex:* The result of venturing out in subzero weather without a
hat. /(Laura Remaly, New Windsor, Md., a First Offender) /

*Metropical front:* A line of city building facades from which a
pedestrian in summer will be steadily rained on by air conditioner
drips. /(Ring Alexander, New York)/

*Mai tai phoon: *Get your umbrellas out for this one. /(Nan Reiner,
Alexandria, Va.; Dudley Thompson, Cary, N.C.) /

*Borometric pressure:* The force keeping you tuned to the Weather
Channel, even though you’ve heard the forecast for the entire world 12
times./(Ken Gallant, Conway, Ark.) /

*Monsooner: *A wind that comes sweepin’ down the plain. /(Jeff
Contompasis, Ashburn, Va.) /

*Blizzard of Oz:* Two inches of snow in Sydney./(Edmund Conti, Raleigh,
N.C.)/

*Flash food warning:* Probably it’s going to be nothing, but you should
run to the store before they’re out of bread, milk and toilet paper.
/(Heather Spence, New York) /

*Tornudo:* A sudden gust of wind that whips up a woman’s skirt. /(Warren
Tanabe, Annapolis, Md.) /

*Salt shaker:* A snowfall in which the amount of salt dropped on the
roads exceeds the amount of snow. /(Dale Newbury, Gaithersburg, Md., a
First Offender) /

*Foot of snow:* A never-seen part of a snowman’s anatomy, the mere
mention of which sends shivers down the spines of Washingtonians./(Jean
Smith, Clinton, Md., a First Offender) /

*Showdownpour:* Torrents of rain that drench the hero at the climax of
nearly every ’80s action movie./(Lawrence McGuire, Waldorf, Md.) /

*Terpulence:* Long-term trend of bad season after bad season. /(Ira
Allen, Bethesda, Md.)/

*Meatierologist: *Al Roker, before the gastric bypass. /(Chris Doyle,
The Villages, Fla.; Robert Schechter, Dix Hills, N.Y.) /

*Tush sheets to the wind:* The effect of a windstorm on unlatched
port-a-potties. /(Sylvia Betts, Vancouver, B.C.) /

*El Nino:

* Cause of a rightward shift in jurisprudential currents over the past
three decades. /(Mark Raffman) /

*Isobra:* Garment to protect against cold fronts. /(Gary Crockett) /

*Car barf:* The gushes of post-storm street sludge thrown up by passing
vehicles. /(Greg Arnold, Herndon, Va.) /

*Enlightning strike:* An atmospheric discharge that teaches you safety
is more important than sinking a putt. /(Jeff Contompasis) /

*Presip:* A bracing swig of liquor in anticipation of a day spent not
going out in that storm./(Ring Alexander)/

*Oratornado:* A blowhard, but a master at spin. /(Steve Shapiro,
Alexandria, Va.) /

*Honey-do point: *When you realize that the game is so boring that it’s
not worth arguing about repainting the shutters. /(Mike Gips, Bethesda,
Md.) /

*Charmin offensive: * The run on toilet paper in advance of a snow
flurry./(Ira Allen) /

*Relative tumidity:* An indication of comfort in the lower latitudes.
/(Kevin Dopart, Washington)/

*Deep frieze: * High relief from the heat./(Dudley Thompson) /

*Hermancane:* A tropical storm that spreads rapidly across the United
States, but quickly subsides after damaging only itself. /(Danielle
Nowlin) /

*Wheahter:* The worst spell of weather we’ve seen in a long time.
/(Barry Koch, Catlett, Va.) /

A number of entries coined names for a predicted storm that never
materializes. They include *Nonsoon* /(Frank Osen, Pasadena, Calif.);/
*Snor’easter// * /(Jeff Contompasis); / *Typhooey* /(Larry Gray, Union
Bridge, Md.);/ *Tornada* /(Nancy Schwalb, Washington); / *Ice charades *
/(Jeff Hazle, Woodbridge, Va.);/ *Fizzard * /(Dan Ramish, Washington);/
and, when CNN does it, *Wolf Blizzard// * /(Gary Crockett). /

*Still running — deadline Monday night: Our contest to add parentheses
to song titles. See bit.ly/invite1059 . *

/See the Empress’s online column The Style Conversational
(published late
Thursday), in which she discusses today’s new contest and results along
with news about the Loser Community — and you can vote for your favorite
among the inking entries, since you no doubt figured the Empress chose
the wrong winner. If you’d like an e-mail notification each week when
the Invitational and Conversational are posted online, sign up here
or write to the Empress at
losers@washpost.com (note that in the
subject line) and she’ll add you to the mailing list. And on Facebook,
join the far more lively group Style Invitational Devotees
and chime in there. /

*Next week’s results: The Sportin’ Lie * or *Fake One for the Team, * a
contest for bogus sports trivia. See bit.ly/invite1057.


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