proudly resents ...

 

The Week in Loserdom:

All the Losers were far too busy naming horses to have any real lives this week. Losernet traffic slowed as everyone thought up mates for BLOW THE WORLD. TWW editorial junta is not in the habit of reading other e-journalism products, but an April 10th feature by Jack Shafer, printed in SLATE, happened to fall into the TWW news grotto. The title was "The Post's 'Weird and Appalling' Ombudsman." While the story does not mention the Invitational, it does take Michael Getler to task for having "too-tight thong undershorts." Unfortunately, there was no mention of Bob Levey or his undergarments.

Results of Week LX (A Verse to Poetry)^*

Summary:
Putting a Post story to rhyme seemed like a tough contest from the start. So it was no surprise when the results, while not bad, were not really fall-down funny either. In general, we conclude the Losers and the AuxCzar, did their best with what they had.

F2.1 (The AC's Comments):
I had a great time compiling The Style Invitational Treasury of Snide, Tasteless and Just Plain Silly Verse. As usual of late, there were many more worthy entries--highbrow, lowbrow and nobrow--than the 20 I could fit. Special credit goes to Chris Doyle for writing one of the most challenging forms ever: the double dactyl--subject of its own devilish Invitational some years back. The winners all scanned pretty well and, as required, rhymed. Some also-rans, alas, didn't. Or they used the Snoop Dogg Standard of Rhyme, as in: Greenspan/Mulligan; Weingarten/hardenin'; and, my favorite, Carpe diem/Should I try 'em. Best title on a poem that didn't run: The Ballad of Red Ink Gaol (William J. Byrd, Upper Marlboro) for Kornheiser's column on the crashing market. There were many more entries than usual from the District this week. Make what you want of that.

In an shameless act of inisde baseball, we almost decided to change this week's Invitational to Week LXV -- and skip LXIV. The reason would be for symmetry: Back in 1994--before we started counting over again with Roman numerals--we inadvertently omitted a "Week 64," scampering merrily along to Week 65. Some weeks later, we even did a semi-contest on "What Happened to Week 64"?

As for those horse names. Entrants sneaking in 19 or more letters will be gelded.

The Siberian Express:

Dealin' card games with the old men in the club car is our very own Dave Zarrow. Stockings in your Kohl's was the cleverest thing on the page this week.

Score Losers:

Not a lot of action on the leader board today as poetry took up too much room for anyone to have a really big week. Hart (at 24) picks up another point on Beland to cut his lead to two. Doyle's three points make him the third Loser to reach triple digits for the restoration. He also moves into third for the year (at 19). Three points also push rookie Ewing into double digits (at 11). Arnold and Midgley-Biggs continue to get ink at an accelerated rate in 2001. He's tied for 17th (with 7 points). She's tied for 19th (with 6).

Week LXIV (Omit letters from an actual sign to make a new funny sign):

The Weak Week Prediction:

TWW needs to be straight-forward here. We don't much like this contest. First the requirement that it be an actual sign is, well, a bad idea. Is the Post going to send someone to Camperdown, Australia to check? On the other hand, how many actual signs can there really be in Camperdown, or Lenoir for that matter? Second, the entire contest is a near repeat of Week 329 (OS) in which we had to find hidden messages in names, and it is taken from National Lampoon, which did the blacked out letters thing regularly. Third, and always a really bad sign, the examples were not particularly funny. Finally, this another contest that involves actual effort and the Losers are likely to be pooped out after horsing around for the last week. We'll bet the results are disappointing.

The Weak Week Word to the Wise (WWWW) :

Don't spend your time driving around looking at signs. Virtually any business in the Yellow Pages has a sign, and, as we suggested above, what are they going to do, check?

Russ to Judgment: On a one-seventeen scale, sixteen being best, Week LXIV gets a:

We are sure someone will come up with some good entries, but it won't be many, and it won't be us.

How Cool the Drool: On a one-five scale (where five is a stuffed mongoose) this week's week's Royal Cutout Book gets a:

It sounds like it has a certain charm, but charm is no substitute for shockingly tacky and vulgar.

The Week Link: Week 64 Where Are You?

As the AuxCzar noted above (stealing our thunder as she typed) the original Week 64 didn't exist. We were really hoping that LXIV would get skipped too. It is, after all, a tradition, but it seems the AuxCzar wasn't feeling playful.

The last time ever we list this contest: Stop Me Before I Blurb Again
The next-to-last time we list this contest: Hell's Smells
One contest we're going to list for a while yet: Filly Filly Bad Name

Read more Weak Weeks

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