PETER SAGAL, HOST:
Now on to our final game, Lightning Fill The Blank. Each of our players will have 60 seconds in which to answer as many fill-in-the-blank questions as he or she can. Each correct answer now worth two points. Bill, can you give us the scores?
BILL KURTIS, BYLINE: Luke and Tom each have two, Roxanne has three.
SAGAL: All right. We have flipped a coin. Luke has elected to go second, so, Tom, that means you're up first. The clock will start when I begin your first question. Fill in the blank. This week, the leaders of countries along the western Balkans agreed on a 17-point plan to deal with the recent influx of blank?
TOM BODETT: Immigrants.
SAGAL: Right. On Thursday, the EU adopted a nonbinding resolution, calling for the protection of NSA whistleblower blank.
BODETT: Oh, Edward Snowden.
SAGAL: Right. On Wednesday, the Fed voted to keep blanks unchanged.
BODETT: Interest rates.
SAGAL: Right. A man in Missouri was arrested this week for starting a huge brawl at the blank.
BODETT: Oh, yes, the haunted strip club.
SAGAL: No, at the...
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: ...Annual Ozark Mountains Monopoly tournament. On Monday, Wal-Mart asked federal regulators for permission to test their new delivery blanks.
BODETT: Drones.
SAGAL: Right. On Thursday, Apple announced that they had sold $1.7 billion worth of blanks since introducing them last September.
BODETT: The iPhone 6.
SAGAL: No, Apple Watches. The week, officials warned that any athlete caught doping during the blanks would be immediately disqualified.
BODETT: During the blanks.
SAGAL: During the blanks.
BODETT: I have to fill in that blank.
SAGAL: You have to fill in that blank.
BODETT: During the Kentucky Derby.
SAGAL: No, during the World Puddle Jumping Championships.
BODETT: Good enough guess, right? Wait a minute - the Kentucky Derby in the rain...
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Give it up now, Tom. It's never going to work.
BODETT: All right, sorry.
SAGAL: The officials at the World Puddle Jumping Championships specifically banned competitors who range in age from 7 to 9 from drinking fizzy soda or energy drinks, saying the added sugar gives athletes an unfair advantage. If you're curious, competitors at the World Puddle Jumping Championships win prizes for the height of their jump, the size of the splash and for being the one person who showed up to the World Puddle Jumping Championships. Bill, how did Tom do on our quiz?
KURTIS: He got four right for eight more points and a total of 10 and, you know, Tom, you're in the lead.
BODETT: There you are.
(APPLAUSE)
BODETT: I got a hunch.
SAGAL: All right. Luke, you're up next. Fill in the blank. On Wednesday, the House passed a two-year blank deal.
LUKE BURBANK: Spending package - budget bill.
SAGAL: Yeah. After a video of him violently arresting a student went viral this week, a school police officer in blank was fired.
BURBANK: South Carolina.
SAGAL: Right. Residents of Islamabad are still recovering from a 7.5 magnitude blank...
BURBANK: Earthquake.
SAGAL: ...That hit Afghanistan - yes. On Thursday, Nepal elected that country's first ever blank president.
BURBANK: Female.
SAGAL: Right. During his speech on Wednesday, Bernie Sanders said he would remove blank from the federal drug list.
BURBANK: Marijuana.
SAGAL: Yes. On Tuesday, the first game of the 2015 World Series lasted for a record-tying blanket innings.
BURBANK: Fourteen.
SAGAL: Yes, and audience members attending a musical at the Nottingham Royal Concert Hall called police when a woman in the audience blanked.
BURBANK: Rushed the stage and tried to do the performance herself.
SAGAL: You're so close. They called the police 'cause the woman near the front of the stage would not stop singing really badly along with the musical. It's a musical based on the film "The Bodyguard."
(LAUGHTER)
BURBANK: Strike one.
SAGAL: Strike one - and about a third of the way through, audience members starting yelling at this woman to shut up and she wouldn't. And they eventually called the police. The woman was saved when a member of the cast heard her singing, pulled her from the audience onto the stage and gave her a starring role. Just kidding - she was arrested. Please don't sing along at concerts or musicals. I didn't pay $78 to hear you sing "Copacabana." Bill, how did Luke do?
KURTIS: Luke didn't do bad. He got six right, that's 12 more points. So with 14 he's in the lead, Roxanne, something to shoot for.
SAGAL: All right.
(APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: How many then is Roxanne about to get right so she ends up winning again?
ROXANNE ROBERTS: It doesn't always happen.
BURBANK: It always happens.
ROBERTS: No, it doesn't.
(LAUGHTER)
KURTIS: She needs six to win.
SAGAL: She needs six to win, all right. Here we go. Fill in the blank. This week, Defense Secretary Ashton Carter announced that when necessary, the U.S. would fight blank using ground troops.
ROBERTS: ISIS.
SAGAL: Right. On Tuesday, former House Speaker blank plead guilty to charges of intentionally hiding the recipient of money transfers.
ROBERTS: Dennis Hastert.
SAGAL: Right. The U.S. joined a dozen other world powers in Vienna on Thursday to discuss the continuing civil war in blank.
ROBERTS: Syria.
SAGAL: Yes. One day after making its landfall near Puerto Vallarta, Hurricane blank was downgraded to a tropical storm.
ROBERTS: Patricia.
SAGAL: Yes. This week in Salem, Mass., a blank sued a blank for harassment.
ROBERTS: A witch sued a warlock.
SAGAL: She's good. A new study found that the most effective way to stop a baby from crying is blank.
ROBERTS: Pick the baby up and comfort the baby.
SAGAL: Play music. This week, astronaut Scott Kelly set the U.S. record for blanking.
ROBERTS: For the longest amount of time in the International Space Station.
SAGAL: You're right. Authorities are concerned that underage kids are getting drunk by going to CVS and buying blank.
ROBERTS: Cough syrup.
SAGAL: No, 40-proof homeopathic laxative. Used to be back in my day...
ROBERTS: Wait, no, no drunk is worth that.
BODETT: Now wait a minute.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: It used to be that underage kids hoping to get drunk would have to steal from their parents' liquor cabinet or wait for a booze-filled comet to crash into the Earth, but all they have to do is go to CVS, buy as much homeopathic laxative as they want and drink it up. Be warned, though, overdosing on a 40-proof laxative is the only way to hit rock-bottom and have your bottom hit back.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Bill, I'm pretty sure Roxanne did well enough to win, did she not?
KURTIS: Well, she got six right, 12 more points and by one point she won.
SAGAL: There you are.
(APPLAUSE)
KURTIS: Fifteen.
SAGAL: Thank you, Roxanne, for not humiliating - we're all grateful.
(LAUGHTER) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
