Week 716: The Hard Spell

(Bob Staake for The Washington Post)

Lovers of language go totally nuts
Over one of life's stranger enigmas:
How does a noun meaning "rumbling guts"
Sound rumbly itself? Borborygmus!

This past week 286 boys and girls gathered in Washington for the annual National Spelling Bee, in which the talent, tenacity and mental toughness of some of our nation's brightest youngsters are channeled for years toward the goal of memorizing thousands of letter combinations, many of which they will never encounter again outside the spelling bee world. (There is absolutely no relevance to the fact that at least two current Style Invitational Losers have been top winners in the National Bee.)

So give this year's participants a chance to read their winning or losing words in a different context (if not actually a sensible one): Write a humorous poem featuring one of the 75 words we've selected from this year's National Spelling Bee (see the list here). It doesn't necessarily have to define the word, as does the example above (from last year's words) by Washington Post Funny Poem Writer Gene Weingarten. It can't have been already published in print or online.

Winner gets the Inker, the official Style Invitational trophy. First runner-up receives a bar of "Touch Me Please Virginity Soap," made in Thailand (presumably for people who can't make up their minds) but sent from the country of Oman. And that's not all: In case Touch Me Please is working a little too well, we include a trial-size envelope of "Garlic Shampoo" ("Formula for Hair Loss & Hair Grow" -- also for the conflicted, we guess).

Note: The person we referred to last week as Robert Kirkpatrick has informed us that he would prefer to be called Robert Kurlantzick, inasmuch as that is his name. We will graciously accede to this but only because it is a way cooler name.

Other runners-up win a coveted Style Invitational Loser T-shirt or yearned-for Loser Mug. Honorable Mentions (or whatever they're called that week) get one of the lusted-after Style Invitational Magnets. One prize per entrant per week. Send your entries by e-mail to losers@washpost.com or by fax to 202-334-4312. Deadline is Monday, June 11. Put "Week 716" in the subject line of your e-mail, or it risks being ignored as spam. Include your name, postal address and phone number with your entry. Contests are judged on the basis of humor and originality. All entries become the property of The Washington Post. Entries may be edited for taste or content. Results will be published July 1. No purchase required for entry. Employees of The Washington Post, and their immediate relatives, are not eligible for prizes. Pseudonymous entries will be disqualified. This week's contest was suggested by Andrew Hoenig, who also wrote today's Honorable Mentions name. The revised title for next week's contest is by Tom Witte of Montgomery Village.

Report From Week 712

---

In which we asked you to take the winning horse names from Week 708 and "breed" them to produce grand-foals: Once again, the entries stampeded in by the thousands. Some Losers proved astonishingly adept at incorporating the various elements of the sire's and dam's names into that of the foal: For example, Brad Alexander of Wanneroo, Australia, bred Coito Ergo Sum with Nein to Fife to produce Lay Off Macduff, a play on the line "Lay on, Macduff" from "Macbeth." See, "coito" means "I lay" (in the bedroom sense) in Latin; while "nein" is German for "no," hence "lay off"; and to top it off, Macduff's title is Thane of Fife. Whew. Wonderfully clever . . . but funny? Eh.

4. Duck! + Doctor Do Little = Quack! (Chris Doyle, Ponder, Tex.; Nancy Israel, Bethesda)

3. Popular Mechanics + Calleth Us Dudes = ClickethNClacketh (Dave Prevar, Annapolis)

2. the winner of the skull models (yes, we found two): Halitosis + Chicks in the Mail = Malodor Bride (Jay Shuck, Minneapolis; Russell Beland, Springfield)

And the Winner of the Inker

---

Months Ending in R + Nats Blow Another = Days Ending in Y (Pam Sweeney, Germantown)

Belmont Steaks

---

Angina Monologues + Kermit Loves Bert = Heart Felt (Andrew Hoenig, Rockville)