Congratulations to CJ for getting his OED In Limerick Form (OEDILF) site up and running! You can access it from our home page, and we are looking forward to a great collaboration between the two sites.

Best of luck, CJ!

CJ sent out a press release for his OEDILF (Omnificent English Dictionary in Limerick Form) project today, and we wish him and his staff the best of luck! We hope a few of his new people will find their way to wordcraft.

The site is up completely now, and if you have posted a limerick for the OEDILF project, you will be able to access it.

Let's give them limericks, and they have promised to bring us word posts.

And, the news keeps coming from OEDILF.com. Congratulations to CJ and his people for being the subject of the Washington Post's Style Invitational this week. Read more about it here. You will see that I am offering an extra prize if the winner is a wordcraft posting member. I haven't thought about what it will be yet, but I am anticipating that I will be awarding somebody a prize!

Today is the final day for submitting your limericks to the Washington Post's Style Invitational! Unfortunately, they don't give a time deadline (that I could find).

Come on, everyone, send in your original limericks, starting with letters ai through ar NOW. You have procrastinated long enough!

Remember, if the winner is a wordcrafter, we will award you a prize as well. So, get those limericks in! After all, it would be pretty embarrassing if I had to award the wordcraft prize to myself (and the one I submitted this morning rocks)!

The deadline is midnight EST, but the Empress will make an exception for people with really good excuses.

You might be interested in knowing that some of the Losers (i.e., Style Invitational regulars) are working hard to defend their turf and honor against the onslaught of OEDIFLers.

You might be interested in knowing that some of the Losers (i.e., Style Invitational regulars) are working hard to defend their turf and honor against the onslaught of OEDIFLers.

And, let's add wordcrafters to that.

The limerick I entered this morning will beat any of those done by the Style Invitational regulars!

where do we send our limericks for this contest? And can we use ones we have already written for the OEDILF?

The email address is losers@washpost.com.

Put "Week 572: The Limerixicon" in the subject line.

As I understand it, limericks that have been posted on oedilf.com are NOT eligible. Moreover, if you send a limerick to the Washington Post Style contest, you cannot post it on oedilf.com until September 19 (when the contest results are printed) or it will be disqualified. After September 19, all the Style limericks can safely be posted in the OEDILF, including those that get printed.

Chris J. Strolin gave instructions for all of this on oedilf.com, if you want to see more details.

Chris,
Do you know if the limericks that we sent can be posted on this site before September 19? Just wondering, though I am happy to wait if the answer isn't clear.

Heck, we could have our own little contest.

In Chris's absence I'll answer.
The rules for the WP competition are that no limericks can be published elsewhere before the 19th. That would invalidate your entry and after the build up you've given it we wouldn't want that to happen.
After the 19th though the limericks are ours again to do as we choose with.

Thanks, Bob.

After seeing Chris's post about the winning DDs in the Style Invitational (absolutely awful!), I wonder how the limerick judging will be!

Let me put your fears to rest, Kalleh. The Empress is a stickler for scansion and rhyme, unlike her predecessor, the Czar. Since she also works as the editor for the Post's entire Style section, you may find she has edited your poem -- if it's good enough to get printed in the first place.

I'm sure the results will be outstanding and fairly judged. Keep in mind that it's humor contest. Many excellent and clever limericks will not get ink because they're not funny enough. Fortunately, there's a home for them in the OEDILF.

Quote "...Keep in mind that it's humor contest..."

Whoops. That's put paid to most of mine, then! I composed them as defining Limericks (as needed for OEDILF). Mind you, my "Abnormal" Limerick manages both to define and to be funny so maybe some of my entries will meet both needs.

Um... Richard...

The contest is for limericks defining words beginning with ai - ar. One on "Abnormal" won't be eligible I'm afraid.

Plus...it can't be a published limerick, though perhaps you have written another.

However, I do love your abnormal limerick that is published on OEDILF, Richard.

That's put paid to most of mine, then!

Funny, we wouldn't say "put paid" here. Generally, we only use "paid" to mean to give money (or something) in exchange for goods, though we might also use it as in "paying a visit" to someone. There is a good discussion on the "word history" of "pay" in Dictionary.com. As they said, it doesn't make sense that it would come from the Latin "pax," meaning "peace," since it isn't all that peaceful to pay a debt! See how the word has evolved (again, about midway down the page, under "word history).

Quote "...The contest is for limericks defining words beginning with ai - ar. One on "Abnormal" won't be eligible I'm afraid..."

Actually I didn't submit it; I merely cited it as an example that managed both to define and be funny.

All the Limericks I have submitted for the contest have been new ones (though I have a nasty feeling thar I might have submitted a couple that were out of alphabetical range before I re-read the rules.

Here is the winning limerick in the Washington Post. Unfortunately it wasn't by a wordcrafter. [It is especially unfortunate that the winner wasn't mine!]

It's in vain that the teenagers try

All their algebra skills to apply.

Though they can, on occasions,

Solve x in equations,

They still haven't figured out y.

(Brendan Beary, Great Mills)

Here is the link to the winning limerick, the runners up and a few of the honorable mentions.

But there are several honourable mentions of wordcrafter's contributions including CJ, Bob Hale and myself.

I have to say that I felt that the entries were of very high standard and some of the wordplay exquisite. One thing I did notice, though, was that many of the Limericks did not define the word used, even implicitly, which is one thing I try very hard to do.

And my own hon. mention?

It was this:

Artificial: not natural or real,
Like a flower that’s made out of steel,
Or pink nylon slacks
Or that fruit made from wax
Or McDonald’s new hamburger meal.

I wrote that one very tongue in cheek believing that the threat of a libel lawyer's intervention might prevent its getting ink!

Edit. And I now remember I didn't submit it! The version I sent can been seen on OEDILF and made no mention of McDonalds or nylon. I spoke of "some restaurant chain" and Terylene.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Richard English,

Here are some more honorable mentions. Congratulations to all of you wordcrafters!

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Kalleh,

Now, this is interesting! I was a bit miffed to see some of the limericks that won compared to my beauty on "antediluvian," so I began to look a little deeper at the limericks. Why is it that the winners, by a huge margin, are men? I realize that more men than women probably entered the contest, but not that many more. I know, for example, from reading OEDILF.com that there are some women there who write good (and lots of) limericks.

So, what's up with that?

I feel a bit vindicated now. In my mind, I got an "honorable mention!"

Here are the figures:

In the original contest 21 men won, and 1 woman won. I didn't count a "Hamdi" as I don't know if that is a man or a woman.

In the second link for honorable mentions, 27 men won, and 3 women.

Give me a break! Could there be a little sexism in the judging?

BTW, the judges seemed to love this Brendan Beary...he won the contest, received an honorable mention, and received 6 honorable mentions in the online link. If he is not already a member of the OEDILF crew, he should be!

Well, if there is sexism in the judging at the Post, it is reverse sexism, since "The Empress", Ms Pat Myers, is in charge!

My guess is that the Style Invitational contest appeals more to the male mindset than that of women, meaning that more entries are received from men. Don't ask me why, though! It is not just this contest; in all the other contests the winning names mentioned are mainly male.

BTW, Chris Doyle, who of course posts here as well as at the OEDILF, has mentioned on the OEDILF board that Brendan Beary does plan to join the OEDILF.

I did know that Pat is a woman, and that was confusing to me. However, I hear that they received about a thousand entries, and I just can't imagine that over 900 of those were from men. I also can't imagine that Pat did all the judging by herself; perhaps her assistants are men?

I don't know. But the odds are not good that so many of the winners would be men.

I am frankly surprised that no one on OEDILF has mentioned that. They had a long thread talking about the contest. It is quite obvious when you read the limericks.

A few things...

1. - I hadn't noticed this thread before posting on this same subject in a limerick thread Hab opened up in the Wordplay section. Sorry.

2. - R.E., not to argue with you but your Honorable Mention made it into The Post with the name "McDonald's" intact. It's the last one on the list of "other HMs" and can be seen in Kalleh's link above.

3. - Sexism in the judging? Speaking very frankly, I had several questions regarding the judging of this contest (most of them unanswerable, I'm sure) but I hadn't noticed the gender lop-sidedness. I can inquire if you like.

4. - An odd sidenote: THREE (at least) Wordcrafters all chose to write on the word "Alpenhorn" and I sincerely believe that each of them was better than the least best (I'm trying to be diplomatic here) piece to get ink.

5. - The Alpenhorn pieces, along with all the rest of the entries regardless of whether or not they made the grade, are viewable on oedilf.com now. Virge is working on a system where all Post entries will be groupable together. If you see the notation "WPSI," that's what that is.

6. - There were somewhere in the neighborhood of 2,000 limericks submitted this time around, much more than they expected, so if your piece wasn't one of the very few chosen, you definitely were in very good company. The OEDILF database has risen by a few hundred limericks (to about 2,100 right now) in the past couple of days and we expect more. Overall this whole exercise has to be viewed as a success.

Thanks again to all who had a hand in it.

quote:

---

Originally posted by Kalleh:
Now, this is interesting! I was a bit miffed to see some of the limericks that won compared to my beauty on "antediluvian," so I began to look a little deeper at the limericks. Why is it that the winners, by a _huge_ margin, are men? I realize that more men than women probably entered the contest, but not that many more. I know, for example, from reading OEDILF.com that there are some women there who write good (and lots of) limericks.

---

I didn't tell anybody that "Virge" is short for "Virginia" and that "Virgil Keys" should really be written as "Virge L. Keys."

(I also failed to mention that I'm really a 20 year old supermodel and not a middle-aged geek. Isn't web-anonymity wonderful?)

Speaking very frankly, I had several questions regarding the judging of this contest (most of them unanswerable, I'm sure) but I hadn't noticed the gender lop-sidedness. I can inquire if you like.

Oh, no, I'd never want to ask her. It was so obvious if you read the winning limericks that I am surprised more people hadn't noticed.

I realize that there were so many limericks entered that the chances to be chosen are slim, but I guess I would have done it differently. If you have an honorable mention, that's great. But, 6 for one person? What's the point? I am sure there were borderline decisions with the honorable mentions, so give it to somebody else.

Sour grapes, that's all. I have always been a poor loser! Plus it didn't help to see all the honorable mentions by people I know from here...I wish I had gotten one too!

(I also failed to mention that I'm really a 20 year old supermodel and not a middle-aged geek. Isn't web-anonymity wonderful?)

Well, my darlin', believe me, I could tell that you're a man by your posts.

Now...I am off to look up "Alpenhorn!"

Quote: "Why is it that the winners, by a huge margin, are men? I realize that more men than women probably entered the contest, but not that many more."

Yes, maybe it is that many more. By my count about 69% of the limericks on OEDILF are by men, 18% by women (half of them by a single authoress), and 13% by authors whose gender I can't identify. That makes the male-female ratio roughly 4:1.

Now why should this be?

Okay, so let's say that 20% of the limericks were by women (comparable to the OEDILF site), and CJ says that there were 2,000 submissions. Somewhere in the neighborhood of 400 should have been from women. There were approximately 50 limericks cited as winners or honorable mentions. Around 10 should have been from women, though there were only 4. I suppose random error could make up the difference.

Still...

Quote "...2. - R.E., not to argue with you but your Honorable Mention made it into The Post with the name "McDonald's" intact. It's the last one on the list of "other HMs" and can be seen in Kalleh's link above..."

As I have said elsewhere, that is not what I wrote. The Limerick was edited to relace my "...some restaurant chain's hamburger meal..." to "...McDonald's new hamburger meal..."

I don't happen to think it's an improvement but then, as has been aired here, we all differ in our judgements.

I thought my "Ampersand was a stonker and I think the only one that managed to include the full term (and per se and) from which the word derives.
.

As I have said elsewhere, that is not what I wrote.

I find that very curious. After all, these were supposed to be original. It seems as though they "workshopped" yours. Strange.

Strange indeed. I can understand them editing out a reference to the notoriously litigious McDonald's, but not putting it in.

Mine also contained two changes from the limerick as submitted. It's too trivial to worry about but you can compare it to the original which I have now posted at OEDILF.

Well, that is strange. I would think the rules would prohibit that. It seems that each author's limerick should stand on its own. I also found Jo's observation of meter errors as interesting. Chris Doyle had pointed that out in an earlier double dactyl contest, but he thought that no longer happened with the new Empress. I will have to go back and read them all again.

Just my two cents on this thread.

Brendan Beary had six "inks" (as we Style Losers call them). When he posted his 40 or so poems on the Losernet forum the morning after the deadline, I responded:

"Brendan, this is the greatest collection of Tuesday-morning SI entries I have EVER seen. The Empress should simply cut and paste your stuff directly into the column and be done with it.

"You are the master of the 'definitive' limerick. I'm sure that if you had the time, you could write the whole OEDILF and it would sell like the proverbial hotcakes. Amazing!"

You will be able to judge for yourself because Brendan is in the process of submitting his stuff to oedfilf.com.

Male-female imbalance: It has been even greater in recent years since Hall of Famer Jennifer Hart and two near greats, Jean Sorensen, Meg Sullivan, and Sandra Hull apparently found more rewarding things to do with their time. Off the top of my head, I'd say women have had about 25% of inks over the years.

As for Empress's editing of entries, I figure it's her column to do with as she sees fit. My double dactyl comment was that she knows (and cares) much more about scansion and matters poetic than did her predecessor, the Czar. (He judged the dd contest.) BTW, though there may have been 2,000 limericks, the Empress was the sole judge. She read every one of them.

she knows (and cares) much more about scansion and matters poetic than did her predecessor

Okay, thanks for the info. In this contest 8% of the winning limericks were from women. I strongly disagree that she should edit any of them in any way. While we did sign them over to her, it is a contest. It leads one to question to whether she changed some where the meter was off, either because she liked the subject or for some other reason. For example, on OEDILF CJ posted a before and after change (scroll to CJ's Sept. 23 post) of one of his honorable mentions (apparently several of the winners were changed), and it definitely worked better after the change.

Oh, well, it's not a big deal. It's not like this is the Pulitzer Prize!

I am impressed that she was the sole judge of all those limericks. I would like to know if any of the 5 winning limericks were changed.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Kalleh,

When you quote someone, it must be verbatim. Anything else is a misquote. A limerick (or any other writing) entered in a contest should not be edited, but rather it should be printed exactly as it was written and judged on that wording.

Tinman

Well, thank you, Tinman! That is exactly how I feel, and I have been surprised that both here and on OEDILF I have been in the minority.

Yet, those who are supporting those alterations do tend to be winners of the contest.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Kalleh,

That's all right, Kalleh. They have a right to their misguided opinions. But we know who is right.

Tinman

quote:

---

Originally posted by Richard English:
I thought my "Ampersand was a stonker and I think the only one that managed to include the full term (and per se and) from which the word derives.

---

I had never heard of the word stonker before, Richard, though its meaning was obvious from the context. I l;ooked it up in OneLook and found these definitions:
infoplease

stonk•er

Pronunciation: (stong'kur),
—v.t. Australian1. to hit hard; knock unconscious.
2. to defeat decisively.
3. to baffle; confuse.

Encarta

stonk.er [ stóngkər ] (plural stonk.ers)

noun

U.K. excellent thing: an excellent example of something, often something impressively large or powerful ( slang )
played a stonker of a shot
[Early 20th century. Formed from stonk.]

Compact Oxford English Dictionary
noun Brit. informal something very large or impressive of its kind.

— DERIVATIVES stonking adjective.

— ORIGIN from military slang stonk a concentrated artillery bombardment.


worthless word for the day
stonker
[Austral] 1) to hit hard: knock unconcious
2) to baffle completely: outwit, foil
stonking
[Brit] 1) impressively large 2) an intensifier
a ~ good time

A Dictionary of Slang (UK)

stonker Noun. 1. An erect penis, usually implying great size.
2. Something huge or impressive.

Interesting word.

Tinman

This message has been edited. Last edited by: tinman,

Kalleh asks: I would like to know if any of the 5 winning limericks were changed.
_______________
I saw the winner and the 2nd runner-up the day after the deadline, when they were posted on the Losernet. They were printed verbatim.

Regardless, this sentence appears in the instructions for every Style contest: "Entries may be edited for taste or content."

I believe that settles this matter.

One other major fact that hasn't been touched on is this: The Empress isn't being paid to run a contest for The Washington Post. She is, in fact, being paid to provide a column which will serve to increase the circulation of that paper.

This means that the contest entries need to be entertaining which, in turn, means that they may occasionally need a little help. The contest entrants are not her primary focus - The Post readership is. I am in a similar situation with The OEDILF but as I said on our BB, we have all the time in the world to workshop our limericks and this is a luxury which is certainly not available to The Empress and her staff.

Which brings up another point - The question was raised as to whether it might be possible that male underlings are in some way responsible for the dearth of female entrants getting ink. Here's a news flash for you: The Empress's staff consists of (fanfare, please) The Empress. Yep, she does the whole column herself. In this case, it was she who read each and every one of the 2,000 or so limericks that were sent in.

The Empress advised me that it's true that her heaviest contributors (100+ entries week after week) tend to be male but she wonders if this might be because they have more obligations in their lives. There was a woman who fit this category not too long ago, plus she was a frequent winner, but she didn't have kids and later burnt out and went on to other things.

Another point, though: Contests involving poetry or other "booky" themes (my term, not hers) tend to bring in MORE female entries so it's entirely possible that the limerick contest, as testosterone heavy as the results seem to have been, reflected a higher than average female participation.


All things considered, I'd say The Empress is doing a fine job of what has to be a very difficult column to write week after week.

Regardless, this sentence appears in the instructions for every Style contest: "Entries may be edited for taste or content."
I believe that settles this matter.

Surely, as long as it isn't called a contest. Once it's called a contest I disagree with you. Why correct someone's spelling error or poor meter, when there are 1999 others to choose from? A limerick is short; 5 short lines. Changes therefore are significant. It isn't like changing 2 lines of a 300-page novel. I thought CJ's changes for technical reasons (the meter) and Richard's for content ("Americanized," I believe she called it) were fairly significant. A contest ("A competition, especially one in which entrants perform separately and are rated by judges.") should be only in the entrants' words...or, if not, the credit should say "Pat Myer and Richard English."

The Empress isn't being paid to run a contest for The Washington Post. She is, in fact, being paid to provide a column which will serve to increase the circulation of that paper.

Understood. Don't call it a contest then.

The Empress's staff consists of (fanfare, please) The Empress.

Yes, I did note that in an above comment, saying how impressive it is.

All things considered, I'd say The Empress is doing a fine job of what has to be a very difficult column to write week after week.

Nobody has ever questioned this (here at least). However, I continue to think that it is wrong to change contest entries. Call it something else then, but don't call it a contest.

As I said before, it is just my opinion, albeit (hmmm, I wonder if OEDILF has a limerick on that!) strong one. Thank goodness there are different opinions in this world or we'd live in a terribly boring place!

P.S. Tinman, I agree with you about the word "stonker!" I love it!

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Kalleh,

My comment about this is, why did she bother to amend any entries? Either they're winners or they're not. Why change them? It seems rather a time-consuming and pointless excercise that will surely upset some people.

I could maybe see the justification were there to be only a couple of dozen entries, all of which were poor - but with 2000, many of which were excellent, it just seems unnecessary.

I agree, Richard, though here is her explanation from OEDILF. Apparently on their forum you can't search for specific posts, only threads. So click on the 9th page and down near the bottom.

First it was the Washington Post; now it is NPR! Congratulations to CJ on his recent appearance on NPR. I hear that one of the 3 limericks he highlighted was written by our Richard English, and it has always been one of my favorites. Here it is:

Abnormal means deviant or strange
Or out of the usual range,
Such as leaves that are blue
Or a mauve Cockatoo
Or a cabbie who has the right change.

In fact, CJ led with Richard's limerick. Good going, CJ! I know that they will get a lot of registrants because of that interview, and maybe a few will stroll in our way!

You can listen to the NPR story here.

Try as I might, I can't get the stupid thing to play. Darn!

It works OK for me in Windows Media Player 9. Unfortunately they have copy-protected it so I can't send a file to those who can't read it for themselves.

So now I have been mentioned by name on US radio and in the Washington Post!

I must have accessed the wrong media player when it asked for it. Now, that media player automatically pops up, but nothing happens. Oh, well...I read the edited script of it.

So now I have been mentioned by name on US radio and in the Washington Post!

And don't forget you facilitated a very impressive national group of nurses. Every time I mention that focus group, someone says, "Ah, we did love that Richard English!"

I guess you might as well move here, Richard. You've become a celebrity!

Well, now the beer's so much better there's maybe some merit in the idea. But could I put up with the extremes of temperature? It's been around 30 degrees Fahrenheit here for the past week and we are all looking forward to its getting a bit warmer since that's really cold for us.

And the idea of summer temperatures of over 100 degrees! we all start to swelter when it gets to 75!

Mind you, I would like to visit more often; two visits this year have whetted my appetite again. I just need to get a few more contracts...

San Diego is paradise. It is usually around 72 degrees F all year, and not with the rains or humidity you see in some of the other milder cities. Besides, California, I believe, is the state with the highest number of bars with cask beer.

Now, we must attract Margaret...