Style Invitational Week 1493: Give us a 'hoot -- tell a mini-story ending in a groaner pun
They're called feghoots -- make us go 'owww.' Plus 'Bad News: The Bears' and other rearranged movie titles.
It’s “the 1995 Earl Change Special” — check out the setup for this pun by the late Doug Frank in this week’s Style Invitational. (Cartoon by by Bob Staake for The Washington Post)
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This week’s Style Invitational is dedicated to longtime Loser Doug Frank, who died unexpectedly last week at 62. It’s one of Doug’s favorite genres: the feghoot, shaggy-dog story, or whatever you’d like to call it. For Week 1493: Tell a feghoot — a mini-story (a ridiculous one is fine) that ends in a groaner pun on a familiar expression, title, line from a song, etc. Keep it under 75 words or so; much shorter is fine, too! Deadline is Monday, June 27.
And we have 36 hilarious winners in our contest to rearrange the words in a movie title, then describe the new movie. Among them:
Thou Art Where? O Brother! Once again, an Elizabethan cobbler has to bail out his ne’er-do-well sibling from the village stocks.
First, 50 Dates: The hot-dog-eating competition begins with the Dried-Fruit Preliminary Round.
We’ve done feghoot contests at least twice before, and in my supplementary column The Style Conversational, I share some of the winners from 2000 and 2014 and link to the rest; they’ll give you a good idea of what I’m looking for. (And put on your groan-guards!) And I also offer a sampling of some of Doug Frank’s prime Invite ink from over the years.
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LINKS TO …
This week's Invitational column, Week 1493, and results of Week 1489
The same column for non-subscribers (but do sign up — there are always great promotions going on!)
No-paywall entry form for Week 1493
This week’s Style Conversational column
Still running -- deadline Monday night, June 20: For Week 1492, send us conservative-leaning humor in a Q&A joke format or a knock-knock joke. It goes without saying that it doesn’t mean hateful or racist, but we’ll say it anyway. See the paywall-free entry form here.
More ways to enjoy The Style Invitational and be part of the Loser Community:
Join the Style Invitational Devotees group on Facebook and the Devs will anagram your name every which way.
Also on Facebook, the Style Invitational Ink of the Day page presents one classic entry as a colorful graphic that's easy to share. "Like" the page to get it regularly on your news feed, or to scroll through the archives. bit.ly/inkofday.
And we have two seasons’ worth of the You're Invited podcast, half-hour episodes with host Mike Gips and various Invite luminaries. Catch all 18 episodes at bit.ly/invite-podcast or wherever you get your podcasts.
— Pat Myers, Empress of The Style Invitational, pat.myers@washpost.com (or just reply to this email)
*That's Loser with a capital L; named for the runner-up prizes emblazoned "LOSER," the community of regular Style Invitational entrants now proudly calls itself the Losers. If you enter the Invite, you're a Genuine Loser. But not (necessarily) a loser.