Style Invitational Week 1146: Stick it to us with an idea for a new
Loser magnet
And the winning tweets from @JFKanye West and other hybrid names
from Week 1142
Honorable-mention magnets from 2014-15 and 2011-12. It’s time to do a
set for 2016. (The magnets can also be horizontal.) (Designed by Bob
Staake for The Washington Post; slogans by Barbara Turner (left) and Tom
Witte.)
By Pat Myers October 22
feedback for 'Style Invitational Week 1146: Stick it to us with an idea
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(Click here to skip down <#report> to the results of our “hybrid tweet”
contest)
Ever since 2004, when we stopped sending out bumper stickers, the
Empress has been awarding each Style Invitational honorable-mention
winner a Lusted-After Loser Magnet, created by the unmentionable Bob
Staake and featuring a contest-winning slogan. Every year or so, we
print two new designs, 500 copies each — so they really are
limited-edition artworks.
And now that we’re low on the 2015 models — “Hardly Har-Har”
and “The Wit Hit the Fan”
— tell us what to put on our next pair of magnets. This is the first
time we’ve asked you since 2012; we’ve been using runner-up entries
since then. Over the years, the slogans have taken several tacks: (a)
the idea of being not quite good enough to win (“Middle-Wit Champion”
;
“Honor Among Dweebs”
); (b) the idea
of being bad (“Discredit Card”
;
“Po’ Wit Laureate”
) (c) a fairly
positive sentiment (“Puns of Steel”
); and (4) a
joke about the Invite in general (“Sunday Drivel”
).
Surely you don’t want to attend Thanksgiving dinner without proper
headwear: Style and Metro art director Susana Sanchez-Young poses gamely
in this week’s second prize. (Pat Myers/The Washington Post)
*This week: Suggest a new Style Invitational honorable-mention magnet*
to be drawn by Bob. You can include just the text and Bob will
illustrate, or suggest a visual idea as well — in fact, Bob exhorted me
to remind you: “Think visually!” But remember: *The magnet is only the
size of a business card* (2 by 3.5 inches), and it needs to say “The
Style Invitational,” “The Washington Post,” “Honorable Mention” and
“2016” — so you can’t also show a complicated cartoon and/or a long
sentence. See this week’s Style Conversational (bit.ly/conv1146
) for all the slogans so far. You may resubmit
your own idea from any of our previous prize-slogan contests.
Winner gets — along with the magnet with the winning slogan — the Inkin’
Memorial
,
the Lincoln statue bobblehead that is the official Style Invitational
trophy. Second place gets the other magnet we’ll be using, plus — just
in time for Thanksgiving dinner — this fabulous pumpkin pie hat, modeled
here by Style graphic designer Susana Sanchez-Young (Empress: “Would you
like to have your picture in the paper with a pie slice on your head?”
Susie: “Do I have time to put on some lipstick?”).
*Other runners-up* win their choice of a yearned-for Loser Mug
or the ardently
desired “Whole Fools” Grossery Bag.
Honorable
mentions get, yes, a magnet, probably the last of the current
batch.
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 night, Nov. 3; results published
Nov. 15 (online Nov. 12). You may submit up to 25 entries per contest.
Include “Week 1146” 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
. The headline for this week’s results is by
Kevin Dopart; the honorable-mentions subhead was submitted by both Jeff
Shirley and Danielle Nowlin. Join the lively Style Invitational Devotees
group on Facebook at /on.fb.me/invdev ./ “Like”
the Style Invitational Ink of the Day on Facebook at /bit.ly/inkofday. /
*The Style Conversational: *The Empress’s weekly online column discusses
each new contest and set of results. Especially if you plan to enter,
check it out at wapo.st/styleconv
.
And the results of the Style Invitational contest announced four weeks
ago . . .
*Social neTWOrking: Report from Week 1142*:
In Week 1142, inspired by the tweets of KimKierkegaardashian
, we asked you to combine two names
into a Twitter handle, and write a tweet or “bio” by the hybrid person:
4th place
*@Lao-Tzuperman:* A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single
bound. (Chris Doyle, Ponder, Tex.)
3rd place
*@JFKanye:* Ask not what your country can do for you — ask what /you/
can do for you. (Or for me.)” (Lela Martin, Midlothian, Va.)
2nd place and the “I’m an california gril” T-shirt:
*@Trumpelstiltskin:* Of course the bimbo knew my name — everybody knows
my name! And I never wanted her firstborn. Ugliest kid I ever saw. (John
Glenn, Tyler, Tex.)
And the winner of the Inkin’ Memorial
*@OrangeJulius:* Could be well mov’d: My friends in the House are
sticking knives into me. #IdesOfSeptember (Gary Crockett, Chevy Chase, Md.)
Tweetin’ Low: honorable mentions
*@BieberOfSeville:* Look at Me. . .
Look at Me. . .
LookatMeLookatMeLookatMeLookatMe . . . LOOK AT ME! (Todd DeLap, Fairfax,
Va.)
*@RonaldonaldReagantrump:* Mr. Obama, put up that wall! (Warren Tanabe,
Annapolis, Md.)
*@Trumpelstiltskin:*I can spin this straw poll into gold. (Jesse
Frankovich, Lansing, Mich.)
*@Santorumplestiltskin:* Do you even know what my name means? No, wait .
. . . Don’t Google it! (Jamie Martindale, McLean, Va.)
*@BelaLuGehrig:* Today I consider myself the suckiest man on the face of
this earth. (Gary Crockett)
*@GenPaulMacArthurny: *I shall go back! Go back! Go back to where I once
belonged! (Doug Frank, Crosby, Tex.)
*@RalphWaldoLauren:* Nature always wears the colors of the spirit.
Thinking of new tanning product line, silver/turquoise packaging.
Classic. (Pat Tompkins, San Mateo, Calif., a First Offender)
@*JohnLewistler’sMother: *Fought all my life for civil rights, but in
that painting I’m a prime example of profiling. #grayandblacklivesmatter
(Mae Scanlan, Washington)
*@MrBillcelMarceau:* : o
(Jeff Shirley, Richmond)
*@KeanuReevevere:* The British are coming! Whoa. (David Friedman,
Arlington, Va.)
*@JayLenOmar Khayyam:* The moving finger writes, and having writ, moves
on. Well, it writ me smack out of late night, and I haven’t moved on
yet. (Mae Scanlan)
*@FScottFitzGeraldFord:* So we beat on, boats against the current, borne
back ceaselessly into the — oops! Man overboard! (Mark Raffman, Reston)
*@HennyJungman:* Take my wife . . . as an example of an overdeveloped
superego! (Doug Frank)
*@YogiBerraGrylls:* When you come to a fork in the road, pick it up,
sharpen the tines, lash it to a stick, and use it to hunt small reptiles
for food. (Ben Aronin, Washington)
*@SwedishChefferson:* Yers der tree øf libjörtie müst be refrüshed vrom
time der time vit de blüd øf patriørts und tyrants. Børk! Børk! Børk!
(Davd Friedman)
*@StevieWonderWoman:* It’s true — I have an invisible airplane.
Invisible to me anyway. (Dave Ferry, Purvis, Miss.)
*@SecretariatHRClinton: *So I’m supposed to just keep running to the
left? (Mark Spencer, Waldorf, Md., a First Offender)
*@RobertTheBruceLee:* Kicking the English out of Scotland. Literally.
(Lawrence McGuire, Waldorf, Md.)
*@RobertFrostyTheSnowman:* Some say the world will end in fire, some say
in ice. All I know is that if this hat goes, I’m a puddle. (Rob Huffman,
Fredericksburg, Va.)
*@RaspuTaylorSwiftin:* Stabbers gonna stab stab stab stab stab. But I
shake it off, I shake it off. (Sandy Moran, Santa Rosa, Calif.)
*@OliviaNewtonJean-LucPicard:* I hate Q, I honestly hate Q. Yar, the one
that I want. (Barbara Turner, Takoma Park, Md.)
*@JimmyJacobBuffett:* I dreamed a ladder was set upon the beach,
reaching up to paradise and at the top, behold: a cheeseburger. Wow.
Blew out my flip-flop. (George-Ann Rosenberg, Washington)
*@JackLordByron: *She walks in beauty like the night. Book ‘er, Danno.
Solicitation. (Gary Crockett)
*@Hillary Clinton Portis:* Don’t worry, fans — I’m still running and
running and running for Washington! (Jamie Martindale)
*@HerodTheGreatPumpkin:* This Halloween, I shall rise from the most
sincere patch, seek the world’s good children, and slaughter them. (Jeff
Contompasis, Ashburn, Va.)
*@GeorgeR.R.MartinLutherKing:* I have a dream today, and I will tell you
the next part of it in five or six years. (Duncan Stevens, Vienna, Va.)
*@DonMcLenaDunham:* And I knew if I had my chance / That I could go take
off my pants / And maybe HBO’d be happy for a while (Rivka
Riss-Levinson, Washington, a First Offender)
*@DeepakGrouchopra:* I find meditation diverting — whenever someone
starts to meditate, I go in the other room and smoke a cigar. (Frank
Osen, Pasadena, Calif.)
*@CharlesDa’IrwinCrocHunter: *Crikey! This magnificent creature appears
to be the predecessor of several other species! Cranky little bugger,
though. (David Friedman)
*@CarlyFioSimon:* I’m so vain, I probably think I saved HP. (Robert
Schechter, Dix Hills, N.Y.)
*@CaptKirkCousins:* If Scotty would beam me up about a foot, those
@#$%&* linebackers couldn’t tip my passes. (Dick Barnes, Washington)
*@BryceHarperLee:* Shoot all the Blue Jays you want, if you can hit ’em,
but remember it’s a sin to choke a National. (Tom Witte, Montgomery
Village, Md.)
*BritneyShakeSpears (@Oops):* At which hour lest I not be with thee I
lose mine mind. Giveth unto me a sign. Hit mine own self baby again but
once. (Kevin Dopart)
*@AnneFrankGehry:* In spite of everything, I still believe that people
would rather live in functionless forms that don’t belong in their
surroundings. (Roy Ashley, Washington)
*@EmmaLazarump: *Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses
yearning to breathe free — I’ll make them pay for the wall I’ll build to
keep them out. (Gary Crockett)
*@EmmaLazaRushLimbaugh:* We don’t want your tired, your poor, your
huddled masses yearning for free stuff. (Chris Doyle)
*@TrumptyDumpty:* Trust me, I know about walls.
#LetsPutAmericaTogetherAgain (Jesse Frankovich)
*Still running — deadline Monday night: Our annual Tour de Fours
neologism contest. See bit.ly/invite1145 . *