Style Invitational Week 1458: Do adjust your set
Use the letters of a TV show to make a new one. Plus punku — haiku with puns.

(Bob Staake for The Washington Post)
By Pat Myers
October 14, 2021 at 10:02 a.m. EDT



Use all the letters in “The Odd Couple” to create “Poled Tech Duo”: Felix and Oscar open a strip club with free WiFi.

“Jeopardy!” > “Ye Pea Pod Jar”: A cooking show about old-fashioned pea-pickling.

“The Chase” > “The Aches”: The cast of “Friends,” now in their 50s, reunite to sit around and talk about how everything seems to hurt all the time.

“CSI New York” > “Kooky Wonky Rices”: How to prepare the world’s most common grain in the weirdest ways.

This week: Use all the letters of any TV show (including streamed ones), past or present, to create a new show; or it can be a new episode of the original, as in the first example, out of the mind — the out-of-his-mind mind — of Bob Staake. The other examples, of new shows, are by 58-time Loser Sarah Walsh, who suggested this contest and just might have been thinking about her own appearances on both “Jeopardy!” (2017) and “The Chase” (2021). Your entry can be an anagram — the letters simply rearranged — like the first and third examples, or you may repeat any letters as often as you like, like the other two. But if the original has, say, two O’s, you don’t have to use them both. You can’t omit any of the letters from the original, though.

Carving is NOT recommended: Inflatable Turkey, this week's second prize.
Carving is NOT recommended: Inflatable Turkey, this week's second prize.

Submit up to 25 entries at wapo.st/enter-invite-1458 (no capitals in the Web address). Please type each entry without a line break, as above, so the Empress can sort the entries and not go any more bonkers than she already is. Deadline is Monday, Oct. 25; results appear Nov. 14 in print, Nov. 11 online.

Winner gets the Clowning Achievement, our Style Invitational trophy. Second place receives an inflatable roast turkey made of beach ball-type plastic (“Ingredients: Expandable poultry”), a nice 16 inches long and perfect for Thanksgiving dinner, as long as eating is not part of your dinner plans. Donated by Dave Prevar.

Other runners-up win their choice of our “For Best Results, Pour Into Top End” Loser Mug or our “Whole Fools” Grossery Bag. Honorable mentions get one of our lusted-after Loser magnets, “A Small Jester of Appreciation” or “Close, but Ceci N’est Pas un Cigare.” First Offenders receive only a smelly tree-shaped air “freshener” (FirStink for their first ink). See general contest rules and guidelines at wapo.st/InvRules. The headline “Hai Tops” was submitted by both Tom Witte and Kevin Dopart; Tom also wrote the honorable-mentions subhead. 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; and follow @StyleInvite on Twitter.


The Style Conversational: The Empress’s weekly online column will return next week.

And from The Style Invitational four weeks ago . . .

Hai tops: Inking punku from Week 1454
Week 1454 was our third contest for punku — haiku that includes a pun or other wordplay. (For our sophomoric purposes, a haiku was any three lines whose syllables divided into 5-7-5.) The Empress tried to screen out old jokes, but if one got through, okay, it’s 17 syllables. Calm yourself.

4th place:
Vaccines ought to be
Essential for employment —
Jab security.
(Dave Silberstein, College Park, Md.)

3rd place:
Bezos, Branson, Musk:
I’m glad they’ve all avoided
Orbituaries.
(Steve Baldwin, Bethesda, Md.)

2nd place
and the Thumb Sumo kit:
In Senate showdowns,
Why is it Mitch won’t buckle?
He figures Chuck’ll.
(Chris Doyle, Denton, Tex.)

And the winner of the Clowning Achievement:
We are not close to
Solving climate change, but we
Are getting warmer.
(Laura Clairmont, Venice, Fla.)

'Ku cuts: Honorable mentions
The center folded
Once Trump made politics a
Dirty MAGA-scene.
(Kevin Dopart, Washington)


Chemistry! Who knew
That the smallest of bases
Could make a Big Lye!
(Kathy Hardis Fraeman, Olney, Md.)

When you bet on the Nats
And they don’t win, it’s a shame:
You lost your shirt, sir.
(Keith Ord, Potomac, Md.)

Athenians hate
The morning sunlight because
Dawn is tough on Greece.
(Luke Baker, Columbia, Md.)

My dating life is
Like a credit card offer:
One year, no interest
(Erika Ettin, Washington)

Biden’s plan to spend
Trillions on infrastructure:
Colossus of roads.
(John O’Byrne, Dublin, Ireland)

How rich do you need
To be for a trip to space?
Astronomically!
(Jesse Frankovich, Lansing, Mich.)

Since Alex passed on,
“Jeopardy’s” been trying to
Make the host of it.
(Jesse Frankovich)

A foreign substance
On my cap? No way! I’m the
Pitcher of virtue!
(Ann Martin, Brentwood, Md)

Steakhouse waiter: “What
Cut of meat would you like, Mitch?”
“A filet, buster.”
(Duncan Stevens, Vienna, Va.)


Nicki Minaj’s
Story of her cousin’s friend
Was totally nuts.
(Frank Osen, Pasadena, Calif.)

Pence may be spineless,
But when he well could have caved,
I’m just glad he Quayled.
(Frank Osen)

I overindulged
At the Middle East Cafe:
Now I falafel.
(Craig Dykstra, Centreville, Va.)

“Fast and Furious
100” title should be
“Pop Goes Vin Diesel”
(Marni Penning Coleman, Falls Church, Va.)

Indian food jokes
Even at one’s own expense
Don’t curry favor. — G. Weingarten, Washington
(Mark Richardson, Takoma Park, Md.)

Uncle Bob’s slide shows
Chronicle all his wild travels
From hither to yawn.
(Mark Richardson)

Under DeSantis,
Florida has turned into
The Shun-Science State. (Chris Doyle)

What keeps us Texans
Glued to the news in Austin?
The farce of Abbott. (Chris Doyle)

If Lake Mead’s water
Level drops any farther,
It’ll be Lake Mud. (Chris Doyle)


Oh, Magic 8-Ball:
Should I get my vaccine? “All
Science points to yes . . .”
(Jon Gearhart, Des Moines)

Underpants that lift
And separate should be called
A caboostier. (Jon Gearhart)

Nothing’s better than
World peace, but a warm beer is
Better than nothing
(Ward Foeller, Charlottesville, Va.)

What is that high coo?
Pigeons targeting my hair,
Laughing from the sky
(Dottie Gray, Alexandria, Va.)

Poor Desdemona
Died, followed by Othello.
Co-Moor-bidity!
(Tom Witte, Montgomery Village, Md.)

Boromir’s smashed nose
Makes it clear that he should not
Walk into more doors.
(Todd DeLap, Fairfax, Va.)

Calculus exam
Flunked after a night of fun:
Don’t drink and derive. (Luke Baker)

The Artifice Deal:
Trump’s new memoir should have six
Chapter 11s.
(Roy Ashley, Washington)

Hookers who service
Overweight men learn how to
Roll with the paunches.
(Lawrence McGuire, Waldorf, Md.)


Fire reported
At the optician’s office:
It went up in frames. (Erika Ettin)

Daniel Craig looks great:
Although his hair’s turning gray,
It’s no time to dye. (John O’Byrne)

I followed the signs
Straight to hell — I should have known:
The font? Sans-seraph.
(Liav Lewitt, Silver Spring, Md., a First Offender)

Why did the wine cork
Stay in place? The sommelier
Lacked any screw-pulls.
(Mark Raffman, Reston, Va.)

He endures spring for
One day. Then blossoms open;
He falls to his sneeze.
(Coleman Glenn, Huntingdon Valley, Pa.)

How often do Smurfs
Stick their butts out the window?
Once in a blue moon.
(Beverley Sharp, Montgomery, Ala.)

The artist would paint
While high on weed. He called it
“All-in-a-daze work.” (Beverley Sharp)

Still running — deadline Monday night, Oct. 18: our Ask Backwards contest. See wapo.st/invite1457.

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