PETER SAGAL, HOST:
Coming up, it's Lightning Fill In The Blank. But first, it's the game where you have to listen for the rhyme. If you'd like to play on air, call or leave a message at 1-888-WAIT-WAIT. That's 1-888-924-8924. Or click the Contact Us link on our website, waitwait.npr.org. There, you can find out about attending our weekly live shows right here at the Chase Bank Auditorium in Chicago and our upcoming shows - June 27 at the Mann Center in Philadelphia and July 18 at the Blossom Music Center just outside of Cleveland in beautiful Cuyahoga National Park. And don't forget to show off your smarts with a Wait Wait Quiz, our smart speaker game. Just ask your Alexa or Google Home to open the Wait Wait Quiz and feel that sense of accomplishment you so desperately need.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Hi, you're on WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME.
JONATHAN DURANT: Hey, this is Jonathan from Raleigh, N.C.
SAGAL: Hey, how are things in Raleigh?
HELEN HONG: Oh, they're fantastic. Love things here in the City of Oaks.
SAGAL: You do? What do you do there?
DURANT: Well, I am a sports information assistant and a professional sports play-by-play announcer...
SAGAL: Are you...
DURANT: ...Or I can tell people a professional alphabet arranger.
SAGAL: You're - that's - you're a professional play-by-play announcer? Well, do you have a - do one sport or all the sports?
DURANT: I do football, men's and women's basketball and baseball.
SAGAL: Wow. Is there a secret to being a great play-by-play person?
DURANT: Being able to talk and being able to arrange words in ways that people usually don't, like talking about a pitcher being like a downhill soapbox derby racer.
SAGAL: That's a weird metaphor.
(LAUGHTER)
DURANT: He was on a roll.
SAGAL: All right. Well...
(LAUGHTER)
JORDAN CARLOS: Oh, I like this guy.
SAGAL: Oh, yeah. You have a future, my friend.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Welcome to the show, Jonathan. Bill Kurtis is going to read for you three news-related limericks with the last word or phrase missing from each. If you can fill in that last word or phrase, correctly, in two of the limericks, you'll be a winner. You ready to play?
DURANT: I am.
SAGAL: Here is your first limerick.
BILL KURTIS: All those sprinkles and cakes are exhausting. It's not money but health that they're costing. Our kids won't eat dressing, but we're not stressing. We'll cover our salad with...
DURANT: Frosting.
KURTIS: Yes.
SAGAL: Frosting, yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
KURTIS: Frosting.
SAGAL: In an effort to get kids to eat more vegetables, Kraft is rebranding ranch salad dressing as, quote, "salad frosting"...
(LAUGHTER)
HONG: Wow.
SAGAL: ...And selling it in a little frosting tube. Kraft somehow didn't realize that, in the phrase salad dressing, the problem was not the dressing part.
(LAUGHTER)
HONG: I'm not going to lie. I kind of like the frosting idea. Like, if they did sell frosting in, like, individual tubes, I would be tempted to eat it.
SAGAL: Do you know, Helen...
HONG: Yes?
SAGAL: ...They do.
(LAUGHTER)
HONG: Wait, what?
SAGAL: Yeah.
CARLOS: I was like, what is...
SAGAL: The whole notion of salad frosting is...
HONG: Wait, doesn't frosting come in those cans?
SAGAL: There's cans, and there's tubes...
CARLOS: There's cans, and there's tubes...
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Yeah. You know how, sometimes, there are, like, letters or...
HONG: Yeah.
SAGAL: ...People write names in frosting? That's often done with little tubes of frosting you buy.
HONG: But those - that's done by professionals.
SAGAL: No, Helen.
CARLOS: Helen, are you, like, a UFO wearing a skinsuit? Like, what's happening?
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: You can go out and just buy tubes of frosting and stick them in your mouth and squeeze them and never leave the house again.
HONG: You know, you Americans are so weird.
(LAUGHTER)
HONG: My mother would never allow such a thing.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Here is your next limerick.
KURTIS: My laundry routine has been squashed 'cause couture is now low and deposhed (ph). I'll wear them for weeks. Who cares if it reeks? My clothes are made not to be...
DURANT: Oh, boy. Washed?
SAGAL: Yes, washed.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
KURTIS: Yes.
SAGAL: Companies are now developing and selling clothing pieces meant to be worn for weeks at a time without ever being washed. They're geared toward travelers, environmentalists and that guy who has a pair of sweatpants he considers the dressy ones.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: The idea is that the clothing has this special hygienic wool blend. It doesn't smell even after multiple wearings.
HONG: Wait. Does this new brand come with a bottle of deodorant?
SAGAL: Well, no. But the idea is it doesn't absorb your - for - somehow, through some amazing chemical, high-tech process, it does not absorb your sweat and smell. So it does not smell.
CARLOS: Doesn't smell.
SAGAL: That's the...
HONG: What? Well, why didn't they start with this from the first place?
SAGAL: Because it's hard to do. This is 21st-century technology.
ROY BLOUNT JR: So do you smell inside your clothes?
(LAUGHTER)
BLOUNT JR: Once you take them off, whoa.
SAGAL: Yeah, I know.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: It had no place to go, you know?
CARLOS: It just traps smells.
SAGAL: Back up, honey. I'm taking off my pants.
(LAUGHTER)
BLOUNT JR: Whoa.
CARLOS: Wow.
(APPLAUSE)
CARLOS: Happy Father's Day.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: All right. Here is your last limerick.
KURTIS: Those blood splatters leave me undaunted. Satanic goats? Just what I wanted. We are making the sale of a former witch jail. I am buying a house that is...
DURANT: Haunted.
SAGAL: Yes.
KURTIS: Haunted, it is.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Haunted. A charming two-bedroom cottage in Essex, Britain, can be yours for only $300,000 as long as you don't mind it's a former haunted witch prison. The cheerful, yellow cottage - formerly called The Cage - was built in 1582. It has sunny garden views, all new appliances and room enough for 14 women accused of witchcraft.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: The cottage is in great shape. It hasn't been occupied since 2008 when the current owner moved out after - and this is true - being, quote, "physically attacked" by the, quote, "Satanic-looking ghost of a goat."
(LAUGHTER)
HONG: Wow.
CARLOS: Wow.
SAGAL: Yeah.
CARLOS: And a witch prison. That's, I mean, interesting. I thought they just burned them at the stake. But some of them - were they only...
SAGAL: No, they had to be kept for trial before they were executed, yeah.
CARLOS: Oh, sure. I'm sorry.
HONG: Yeah.
(LAUGHTER)
HONG: You can't just burn them right away.
SAGAL: I mean, they're not savages.
CARLOS: You're right.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Due process?
BLOUNT JR: This is America.
SAGAL: It's Essex, England.
CARLOS: It's not - (laughter). But there is due process.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Bill, how did Jonathan do?
KURTIS: Perfect, 3-0. Good going, Jonathan.
SAGAL: Congratulations. Well done, Jonathan.
(APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: Thank you. Bye.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "THE HOUSE OF THE RISING SUN")
FIVE FINGER DEATH PUNCH: (Whistling). Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
