Get In Your Last Shot: Photo Contest's Final Days


No new contest this week. While the sun never seems to set on the Empress, even she ventures outside the Forbidden City once in a while. Meanwhile, there's still enough time to e-mail us -- the deadline is Monday night -- with entries for our Week 750 contest to illustrate, humorously with your own original photo, any of five captions we supplied:

· I should have just stayed in bed today.

· Washington, D.C.: Sister City of Xplf, Planet Zornog

· Seventy-eight percent of Americans consider their pet "an equal member of the family."

· Chris has never been quite like the other kids.

· This is why it is important to read the directions on the package.

The rules: Photos must be your own work and not previously published. E-mail them as attachments 1 megabyte or smaller. You may digitally alter photos as long as you don't insert copyrighted material. You must include your real name, the best e-mail address for contacting you, your postal address and the caption that goes with your photo. You may enter as many photos as you like, but please send each digital photo in a separate e-mail to losers@washpost.com, with "Week 750" in the subject line. Deadline for entries is Feb. 25; winning photos will be published sometime in March. The winner, as usual, receives the Inker, the official Style Invitational trophy. Second place gets a wristwatch purchased on Tiananmen Square by Longtime Loser Sarah W. Gaymon, depicting Chairman Mao waving his arm up and down.

Other runners-up win their choice of a coveted Style Invitational Loser T-shirt or yearned-for Loser Mug. Honorable Mentions get one of the lusted-after Style Invitational Magnets. Contests are judged on the basis of humor and originality. All entries become the property of The Washington Post. 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 contest is by Brendan Beary; this week's Honorable Mentions name is by Brad Alexander.

More Report From Week 749, the contest in which we asked you to supply new meanings for common English words beginning with A- through H-, so people like cartoonist Berkeley Breathed of "Opus" wouldn't have to steal the ones from a contest we did in 1998:

As we noted last week, entries to this contest arrived by the thousands (including 288 from Kevin Dopart of Washington, who is, believe it or not, employed full time in the private sector), and there were so many worthies that we're spreading them over two weeks, with two sets of prizes. As with last week's results, we've italicized entries in which the word has to be pronounced very differently, such as Catholic: The lady whose house smells like six litter boxes. (Yes, that one's by Kevin Dopart, too.)

4.Automated: Got lucky in the back seat. (Russell Beland, Springfield)

3. Coping saw: "Look on the sunny side of life." (Mel Loftus, Holmen, Wis.)

2. Gramophone: A landline that's, like, attached to a wall in an old person's house. (Anne Paris, Arlington)
And the Winner of the Inker

Hippocampus: A weight loss spa. (Pie Snelson, Silver Spring)
More Misconstruisms: Honorable Mentions

Acquit: What your central air does in late July. (Peter Metrinko, Chantilly)

Addiction: The incomprehensible speed-talking at the end of TV commercials explaining that that amazing discount doesn't actually apply to you. (Christopher Lamora, Arlington)

Adjunct: To purchase useless items at a garage sale. (Jon Reiser, Hilton, N.Y.)

Airstrip: Pretend to take off your clothes. (Tom Witte, Montgomery Village)

Ampere: A French father's birth announcement. (Chuck Smith, Woodbridge)

Analogy: What is to proctology as penology is to criminology. (Jack Held, Fairfax)

Aspic: Just don't confuse it with a tootpic. (Steve Offutt, Arlington)

Atomizer: In the Reader's Digest Condensed Old Testament, the account of the First Man's first glimpse of his mate. (Dave Komornik, Danville, Va.)

Attenuate: The explanation for your all-night heartburn. (Brad Alexander, Wanneroo, Australia)

Auburn: The downside to having the Midas touch. (Christopher Lamora)

Austere: What you say when the helmsman won't shut up. (Elden Carnahan, Laurel)

Bag ladies: What single gentlemen try to do. (Christopher Lamora)

Bambino: Anti-gas additive to baby food. (Chris Doyle, Ponder, Tex.)

Bondsman: A steroid dealer. (Duncan Seed, Robin Hood's Bay, North Yorkshire, England)

Borehole: A person who manages to be dull and offensive simultaneously. (David Kleinbard, Jersey City)

Bracket creep: That obnoxious guy in your March Madness office pool. (Ed Conti, Raleigh)

Bratwurst: The most offensive child in day care. (George Selby, Alexandria, a First Offender)

Buggery: The original name considered for the Smithsonian's Insect Zoo. (Tom Witte)

Bumbling: Butt cheek piercings. (Kevin Dopart)

Burnish: The too-late feeling one gets from forgetting to apply sunscreen. "I started to feel burnish half an hour into mowing the lawn." (Brendan Beary, Great Mills)

Cantata: Someone who fills out a dress everywhere. (Kevin Dopart)

Cellulose: Any phone we buy the kids. (Ellen Raphaeli, Falls Church)

Chattel: The company that makes Sweatshop Barbie. (Kevin Dopart)

Chickweed: Virginia Slims. (Ellen Raphaeli)

Circumference: A meeting of mohels. (Phyllis Reinhard, East Fallowfield, Pa.)

Conjugate: Wear falsies. (Jack Held)

Colorfast: To wear all black during Lent. (Mel Loftus)

Contemporary: A prison escape artist. (Kevin Dopart)

Contender: A goal of penal rehabilitation. (Brad Alexander)

Curtailment: The mutual sniffing routine that dogs do. (Jay Shuck, Minneapolis)

Decadent: That new wrinkle you get every 10 years. (Tom Witte)

Declasse: Expelled. (Brendan Beary)

Department: A funeral home. (Tom Witte)

Depress: Reporters for the New York Post. (Mel Loftus)

Deranged: Forcibly removed from the kitchen. "Jack was promptly deranged after setting down the milk jug on the still-warm stove burner." (Bill Spencer, Baltimore)

Dictators: Long, thin tubers found in Third World countries. (Jeff Brechlin, Eagan, Minn.)

Direction: What Prince Charles had at least twice. (Kevin Dopart)

Dreaming: The chewing-out your boss gives you when he finds you nodding off at your desk. (Brad Alexander)

Endow: To sit on a tack. (Kevin Dopart)

Example: A woman who's had breast reduction surgery. (Steve Offutt)

Fixer-upper: A temporary dental plate. (Chris Doyle)

Flagellation: Beating on your political opponent by questioning his patriotism. (Peter Metrinko)

Fling: A minor epithet. (Kevin Dopart)

Footstool: Dog do that's stuck on your shoe. (Ben Aronin, Washington)

Fulcrum: A supermodel's big meal. (Brendan Beary)

Gallows: PMS. (Chris Doyle)

Grapple: To try to figure out all the features on your iPhone. (Brad Alexander)

Harbinger: Someone who watches the whole 12-hour "Three Stooges" marathon. (Kevin Dopart)

Hebetude: Chutzpah. (Jay Shuck)

Herpetologist: What Paris calls her Chihuahua's vet. (Russ Taylor, Vienna)

Hexagon: One's shape after exorcise. (Larry Yungk, Arlington)

Homogenized: What the religious right fears our youth will become if public schools teach tolerance toward gay people. (Peter Metrinko)

Next Week: Strike Gold, or Chuck Your Local Listings