The Invitational Week 55: Tour de Fours — Be STUD-ly

Give us a new word or phrase containing 'DUST' in any order of letters. Plus we bring out our dead of 2023 in verse.

These lookalikes died in 2023, but one of them did not bomb Cambodia. See Dave Zarrow’s tribute to his dad below, among this week’s obit poems.

Hello. Today we will deliver a new contest and publish the rotting corpse of an old one — it’s about obituaries — but first, this Gene Pool Gene Poll:

This week’s Invitational: The Great DUST-up

It happened so fast that we didn’t notice, but in last Week’s Invitational, Loser Duncan Stevens gobbled up his 1,000th (and 1,001st) blot of Invite ink. Duncan, who’s a lawyer for the FDIC, came to The Invitational in 2012 after people liked the song parodies he wrote for retirements and such at the office; he dipped his feet into the Invite pool for a few inks a year, then suddenly zoomed to the top reaches of the Loser standings, spattering up the Invite with more than a hundred blots every year — a figure he’s easily passed for seven years straight — and winning the whole contest twenty-six times, most notably with his song parodies, but also every other challenge we’ve tossed in front of the Loser Community. (Here’s a link to “The Style Invitational Runs on Dunc’n,” a collection of his first 500.)

The “reward” we give to 1,000-ink Losers is an offer to both choose the next contest and to guest-judge the results. Some among the previous seven have agreed to do the Czar’s and Empress’s work for them; others have sanely declined. Duncan, you might be stunned to hear, also has a non-Invite life; there are the two kids who’ve grown from toddlerhood to adolescence with a Loser Daddy, and the distance running and bicyling, and the Ultimate tournaments, and LearnedLeague, and the church choir, and even some stuff he does for the government. So Duncan opted sensibly for just Part 1: to select the contest. It’s a perennial — our twentieth running, each with a different letter block.

For Invitational Week 55: Come up with a new term or multi-word phrase that includes the letter block DUST — for DUncan STevens, see — in any order but with no other letters between them (spaces between words are okay). Like these examples. The first two are by Duncan himself, the third is by The Czar:

GO DUTSH: Show up to the date so drunk that you can’t manage to pay the bill.

EXODUST: “Yo, Pharaoh, this place is filthy! We’re outta here.”

ST. DUFUS: He was martyred by kissing a wall socket.

Click here for this week’s entry form, or go to bit.ly/inv-form-55. As usual, you may submit up to 25 entries for this week’s contest, preferably all on the same form.

Deadline is Saturday, Jan. 27, at 9 p.m. ET. Results will run here in The Gene Pool on Thursday, Feb. 1. Please see the entry form for formatting directions.

The winner gets the ever-useful Dial-an-Excuse wheel, which offers five different “reasons” for each of dozens of wrongs. Turn to “Forgot Birthday,” say, and choose from Classic, “Later surprise planned”; Mundane, “Preoccupied at work”; Extenuating, “Mercury in retrograde”; Farfetched, “Gift stolen at gunpoint”; and Sob Story, “Childhood birthday trauma.” Donated by the inexcusable Steve Smith.

We’ll use this when we forget to mail it out to you: This week’s prize.

Hey, we’d like your questions and observations, many of which we will respond to today in real time. Send them to this grotesque orange button:

Reader’s Die-Jest: Celebrating the ex-folks of 2023

In Week 53 we asked you to commemorate in verse someone who died in 2023. As our obit poems do every year, they salute both the big names on the In Memoriam reel and those who didn’t get their moment of fame till their remarkable demise.

Third runner-up: Confectioner Bob Born (1924–2023)
Bob Born would talk about the tricks
He learned producing candy chicks.
But now in his eternal sleep,
He isn’t gonna make a Peep.
(Jesse Frankovich, Laingsburg, Mich.)

Second runner-up: Actress Gina Lollobrigida (1927-2023)
Gina Lollobrigida
Made erections rigida. (Chris Doyle, Denton, Tex.)

First runner-up: Henry Kissinger (1923-2023) and Ray Zarrow (1920-2023)
Henry Kissinger and my Dad both died in ’23;
Each of them managed to hang around for at least a century.
In public Dad was sometimes asked if he was Henry the K,
(Or Howard Cosell, but that’s a story for a different day,)
Ol’ Dad was super friendly, he would always say hello ta ya,
And never in his hundred-plus would he have bombed Cambodia.
(Dave Zarrow, Skokie, Ill.)

And the winner of the pooping-dog toothpaste dispenser:
Among the dozens of trailblazers within their race, gender, ethnic group, sexual orientation, or religion who died last year:
Hooray for their firsts in pro bowling, car racing,
And tap dancing, sailing, and MBA-chasing,
In riding on horseback and superintending,
In modeling, judging, and perp-apprehending,
In violin playing and movie directing,
In signs-of-volcanic-eruption detecting,
Plus many more fields! And let’s hope till we’re bursting
That folks of all kinds soon will need no more firsting. 
(Melissa Balmain, Rochester, N.Y.)

Urnable Mentions

Daredevil Robbie Knievel (1962-2023)
Off-road riding, damned near flying,
Up till lately, death-defying:
Robbie Knievel, Evel’s son
Has passed away—his life is done.
Over chasms deep and wide
And rows of vehicles he’d ride.
His closing exploit, final stop:
A three-foot gap, a six-foot drop.
(David Franks, Washington County, Ark.)

Stockton Rush (1962-2023), CEO of the OceanGate adventure-touring company
Taking tourists to view the Titanic,
Stockton Rush, like his name, sounded manic,
He said, “Safety’s a waste!” and dispatched them posthaste,
In small pieces, throughout the Atlantic.   
(Frank Osen, Pasadena, Calif.)

Al Jaffee (1921-2023)
For fifty-five years, the cartoonist Al Jaffee
Drew every Mad magazine back-cover Fold-In.
Determined as always to have the last laugh, he
Now lies in a grave he can LOL and be cold in.
(Chris Doyle)

II. “This casket is too small, and soon the service will begin:
I’m sorry, Mr. Jaffee, but I’ll have to fold you in.” (Rob Cohen, Potomac, Md.)

III. The mourners file past with tear in eye,
And one asks, “Al, friend, why’d you have to die?”
Faintly, a voice—the merest of suggestions:
“To get away from all your stupid questions.”
(Duncan Stevens, Vienna, Va.)

Confectioner Bob Born (1924–2023)

In tribute to Bob Born, let’s bury a Peep,
Then dig it up after a twenty-year sleep.
The miracle chick will defy natural laws
And be just as edible as it never was.
(Pam Shermeyer, Lathrup Village, Mich.)

Doyle Brunson (1933-2023), Hall of Fame poker player
A heart the size of Texas, that is what this legend had;
A club is where he played the game that made him oh so glad.
A spade was used for digging in his cemetery plot—
A diamond is forever, but Doyle, he was not. (Jesse Frankovich)

Emil C. Gotschlich (1935-2023), vaccine creator
Though shots of his vaccines may not delight us,
They beat meningococcal meningitis. (Melissa Balmain)

Miljenko “Mike” Grgich (1923-2023), winemaker
In sleepy Napa Valley, U.S.A.,
Mike Grgich made a tasty Chardonnay.
The vintage opened many people’s eyes,
When —sacre bleu! — in France, it won first prize.
And just like that, to Napa vintners raced,
With local farms and businesses displaced.
Today, on cars and tourists Napa chokes,
With no place left to live for just plain folks.
While over in Sonoma, locals share
Relief that Grgich didn’t settle there.
(Mark Raffman, Reston, Va.)

Dick Butkus (1942-2023), Hall of Fame linebacker
Dick Butkus earned a lot of fame
For playing hard and taking aim
At anyone who ever came
Upon him in a football game.  
And never felt a bit of shame
For having such a funny name.  (Jesse Frankovich)

Theodore Kaczynski (1942–2023), the “Unabomber” 
Kaczynski's gone, perhaps to meet his Maker,
Alone—as he preferred. The undertaker
(Perhaps to not invoke his Luddite ire)
Cremated Ted with good old-fashioned fire,
Then packed his dust and fragments up to go,
And sent him off to Texas, and below.
And—not to add a spoiler to this ode—
The box they sent him in did not explode.  (David Franks)

Harry Lorayne (1926-2023), magician and memory whiz
His amazing feats of memory would instruct and entertain;
It sure would be ironic to forget Harry Lorayne.
(Elliott Shevin, Efrat, West Bank)

Businessman Charlie Munger (1924-2023):
He spent his life investing
And made a bunch of cash.
He and Buffett crushed the game,
Developed quite a stash. 
But those heady days are over,
He has nothing left to learn.
And for once in Charlie’s lifetime
He won’t get a return.
(Leif Picoult, Rockville, Md.)

W. Jason Morgan, plate tectonics geophysicist (1935–2023)
Dr. Morgan, an underground great,
Closely studied each underground plate
Until meeting his underground fate. (Jesse Frankovich)

Fred la Marmotte (died Feb. 2, 2023), the Punxsutawney Phil of Quebec
Ironic that on Groundhog Day, 
Fred la Marmotte drew his last breath
And the only shadow that he saw
Was that of the Angel of Death. (Elliott Shevin)

Alice K. Ladas (1921–2023), co-author of “The G Spot”
Higgledy piggledy,
Alice K. Ladas was
Known for her book that was
Centered around

Touting a spot that is
Nonascertainable.
(Now that she's gone, she’s as
Hard to be found.) (Jesse Frankovich)

Douglas Lenat (1950-2023), artificial-intelligence pioneer
He made AI more commonsense,
Then Doug Lenat departed hence
To death’s bourn, where, it’s said, he lingers
With six or seven extra fingers. (Frank Osen)

Art McNally (1925-2023), NFL Hall of Fame referee
The doctor stood beside the bed:
“There is no pulse. McNally’s dead.”
”Replay the tape,” the nurse replied,
“To verify he really died.”
She played the tape back in slo-mo
To watch the patient’s fading glow,
Then faced the doc with upheld hands:
“The ruling on the gurney stands.”  (Rob Cohen)

Yevgeny Prigozhin (1961-2023), mercenary leader who led a rebellion against Russia’s president
The death of Prigozhin was shocking and sad;
His days were cut short when he turned against Vlad.
When tangling with tyrants (I firmly opine):
Be careful!  You're Putin your life on the line. 
(Beverley Sharp, Montgomery, Ala.)  

Mary Quant (1930-2023), mother of the miniskirt 
Mary Quant
Knew what we want:
Skirts so far from maxi,
They make it impossible to gracefully get out of a taxi.  (Melissa Balmain)

Pat Robertson (1930-2023)
A leading televangelist and avid Bible thumper.
Just scratch one of his followers — you’re sure to find a Trumper.
At bashing foes and gaining wealth he clearly was adept.
So what was the reaction up in heaven? Jesus wept. 
(Jonathan Jensen, Baltimore)

Joseph Smith of Sumner County, Kan.  (died Jan. 21, 2023, age 30 or 32 depending on the source)
Joe and dog Lucille went to hunt in his friend’s truck,
He put his dog in the back seat with his friend’s gun like a schmuck.
  The dog stepped on the trigger and shot his owner dead.
  The man today would be alive if he’d just used his head.
What’s the moral to be learned from this? Well, let me be quite blunt:
If your dog likes “riding shotgun,” better let her sit up front. 
(Jon Gearhart, Des Moines)

Unnamed Woman in New Zealand (died May 12, 2023)
The patient was homebound and just out the door
When dropped from a stretcher, face down on the floor.
She fell from a ledge (which was quite a surprise!); 
Then hit by the stretcher, which caused her demise.
So always take care when you're out on the town:
An accident might turn your life upside down. (Beverley Sharp)

Embryologist Ian Wilmut (1944-2023)
Sir Ian Wilmut cloned Dolly the sheep
A feat that was truly a dilly.
He's gone now forever, he sleeps the Big Sleep
We will not see his like again ... will we?  (Gary Crockett, Chevy Chase, Md.)

Jim Brown (1936–2023), running back;
Fred White (1955–2023), drummer;
Shecky Greene (1926–2023), comedian;
Vida Blue (1949–2023), pitcher
Jim Brown, Fred White, and Shecky Greene, and also Vida Blue?
I do not think that we could bear to lose another hue!  (Jesse Frankovich)

The headline “Reader’s Die-Jest” is by Jesse Frankovich; Jon Gearhart wrote the honorable-mentions subhead.

Still running — deadline 9 p.m. ET Saturday, Jan. 20: Our Week 54 contest for edgy alphabet-book couplets. Click on the link below.

The Invitational Week 54: S Is for Smartass

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Here comes the real-time segment. If you are reading this in real time, please keep refreshing your screen so you can see your observations and Gene’s responses. Some of the observations today are about our call, in the Weekend Gene Pool, for moments in your life that made you feel old and out of it. Others are about sexually self-pleasuring. These are not necessarily related.

Q: From the start, the SI under the Czar's watch tried to challenge the editors/censors/wet blankets on some edgy topics. [I love that you persisted for 13 years - Allah be praised.] What were some of your faves that you got by them, maybe in the small print? We read the little things just to seek your wins.  – Lynne Larkin 

A: This was asked during the last Gene Pool and I promised to answer it today, after rumination.  

During the Ancien Regime, there was a rule that mid-level editors followed to keep their jobs.  It will be familiar out there to many journos at big-name publications:  “No surprises.”   What that means is, hey, you are in control of your section, and we trust your judgment, but don’t do anything without prior approval that is going to cause a microphone to be shoved in my face on the 11 o’clock news.  It’s not a bad policy.   If I were the executive editor, I would enforce it. It’s why it took me 13 years to get the pubic-hair poll out there.  (Imagine if Leonard Downie Jr. or Ben Bradlee had gotten an eleventh-hour  mike in his face to defend that.)   Therefore, many of the “little things” we “got away with” were things we might have gotten away with had we not followed the no surprises rule, at the cost of our jobs. 

There are a few examples, some of which I have referred to in the past.   Once, the Style Invitational was running a contest about frivolous political-correctness lawsuits that oversensitive  people might file.   I had a few examples I wanted to run that were not particularly politically correct, and went to run them by Mr. Downie.  He vetoed most of them, but said he had no problem with “The Gay and Lesbian Alliance sues The Green Bay Packers to demand they change the name of the football team.”  Len said he had no problem with that.   Excited, I thanked him and turned to leave, and then had a furious internal battle with my conscience and the No Surprises Rule.   I turned back and asked him if he understood the joke, and he said “I guess not,” so I had to explain anal sex jargon to the great and exalted executive editor of the Washington Post, who was appropriately horrified.  It did not run.   

A second instance occurred for a contest where we asked for limericks that included certain very difficult terms, in terms of meter, one of which was “Kevorkian,” the surname of the doctor who specialized in euthanasia.  I wanted to run this one: 

A comely young lass from Nantucket

Wanted help in kicking the bucket. 

“No problem, my child, 

Doc Kevorkian smiled, 

“Wrap your lips round my tailpipe and suck it.” 

Yes, it was No-Surprised out of existence. 

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Also we had a contest once to come up with captions for cartoons drawn by our great ‘toonist, Bob Staake.   This one was a photo of a woman bringing in a letter from the mailbox.  It was, for some reason, dripping a liquid.  The woman had an empty dialogue balloon.  

The proposed caption, by a reader, was “Honey, the mail came!”

As I recall, I didn’t even try to get that past the No Surprises guy.  

My point is, Pat and I have not changed much.  Back then, we simply had adults backing us up. 

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All of those, I think, would appear today. There Are No Rules Except Funny.

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The thing I once “got by them,” was a tiny bit of type at the top of the Sunday Style Section, which I edited. It was a wasted space that usually had the line reading something like “Features / People / Gardens.” Or something. I began secretly replacing it with jokes. One week the line read: “Brought to you by a large, uncaring conglomerate.” This wound up earning me a Sunday morning panicked phone call from Bob Woodward, which remains one of my favorite moments of my life. He worried that we were the victim of sabotage. When I explained, he laughed. I like Bob.

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TIMELY TIP: If you’re reading this right now, on an email: Click here to get to my webpage, then click on the top headline (In this case, “The Invitational… ”) for the full column, and comments, and real-time questions and answers. And you can refresh and see new questions and answers that appear as I regularly update the post.

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Q: I realized I was living in a different world than the young people following an interaction I had with my daughter a few years back.  She was 9 or 10 at the time and we were cleaning out my grandmother's basement storage.  I came across a classic rotary style phone and thought she might be amused at how we old farts used to have to 'dial' someone's number.  Her response was to grab the phone and ask, "People used to carry these around with them?!?"

A:  I LOVE this. 

Q: Snowfall of the past couple of days in Northern Virginia has left vehicles with a 6-inch topping of snow.  It's decent snow, not heavy or slushy, so it's relatively quick and easy to clean it off your car.

The law is that a driver must sufficiently clean their vehicle to minimize the risk of snow or ice flying off the vehicle at speed and hitting vehicles that are behind.

Last night we got home from the office and I noticed one car, a nearly brand new Honda Accord, parked in the lot near us.  The owner had neatly cleaned the windshield, the hood, the rear window and trunk, but left all the snow untouched on the car's roof. 

If the vehicle was a tall SUV with a roof rack, I'd cut the owner a break.  I know that it can be difficult to reach the roof and clean off the snow.  But on an Accord? 

Earlier in the day I had cleaned off our sedan so we could drive it to work.  It took me less than 10 minutes to clean off the car....including the roof.  If I had not cleaned snow off the roof, I would have saved 3 minutes at most.

I suppose the owner of the Accord is so important and his time so valuable that he couldn't clean off the roof.  I decided to be a good neighbor and do it for him.

But all that snow from the roof covered the windshield and the rear window.  I would have cleaned the snow off of them, but hey, my time is valuable too, right?

A: I agree with you except for your wimpiness about the tall SUV.  If you buy a huge boat-car you are exempted from others having to deal with the problem your piggishness foists on them?   

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Q:  Majorly interesting aptonym”

“Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich”

A:  Indeed. Smot, Yiddish accent.   Smart, rich.  Jewish. 

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Q: Speaking of forced self-gratification. The one time premature ejaculation is desirable--- after all, there are other guys waiting to get into the closet-like enclosure --- is  having your baby batter tested at a fertility clinic. Quite the surreal experience.  Handed a specimen cup, a moist towelette, a well-thumbed copy of Playboy and told to be quick about it. Thing is, if you've already spent uh...your ...uh...ardor...on that "Miss April," as it turned out (did I say it was a very old Playboy, as befits a medical or dental office), you can't easily ask for a newer "Miss April." And relying solely on imagination does tend to slow things down, to say nothing of using a plastic receptacle. They could have used a little more imagination there too. Anyway, it's a wonder the little guys felt like wiggling at all --- considering. 

A: Thank you.  Made me laff.  This is the greatest story ever written on the subject.  I was 33 when I edited it.  Joel was 23 when he wrote it.  Yours is good, too, but PLEASE.  

Q: Gene, are you sure that your knees are titanium?  When I got a knee replacement several years ago, I asked the surgeon if the knee would be titanium.  He replied that titanium is not strong enough to handle the force of walking [Why that is, I don't know].  He told me that I would getting a chrome-cobalt knee.  If your knees are titanium they will not set off metal detectors.  Chrome-cobalt joints will set off metal detectors.  One other thing:  it may be that what causes the pain and swelling in your knee is the kneecap.  At least that's the cause of the pain in my metal knee.

A: Whoa!  I will check this out.  My knees DO set off metal detectors.  But according to Dr. Google: “Titanium is a commonly used material for knee replacement implants. It has several advantages, such as being strong, durable, lightweight, and resistant to corrosion.”

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Q: A number of years ago my wife happened to notice an envelope I had been scribbling Muldoons on. One concerned a young woman from Fort Hunt. She said you are NOT sending that in. But fatter heads prevailed.

A: Noted.

Q: David Koronet's story of being one of only six Koronets in the US reminds me of this factoid.  As far as I can tell from an exhaustive online search (15 seconds of Googling) there are three living people in the world with my name:  Warren Hoy.  Besides myself, a retired Army officer living in California, there is a DJ in Swindon, England, and someone who runs an eco-resort in New Zealand.  Okay, big deal.  But consider this:  for my entire Army career, I requested to be stationed at McMurdo Station in Antarctica, for no better reason than that the ribbon you get for having served there looks really cool, and hardly anybody has it.  Let's face it, Army officers don't get sent to Antarctica.  More people have walked on the moon than wear that ribbon.  Then when I Googled myself, I discovered that for a while the morale support officer (a basically unskilled job that consists mostly of handing out volleyballs and leading games of Trivial Pursuit) was a Warren Hoy.  I think it was the one who's in New Zealand now.  Talk about the Mother of All Coincidences.  I mean, the odds have to infinitesimal.  But now I can tell people I served in Antarctica, and when they call BS on me, I can tell them to Google me and see for themselves.

A: Didn’t find this very interesting enough until the end.   I once was able to say I was the mayor of a small town, and milk that for all it was worth:  A man of the people, a beloved local, an Alabaman with a liberal bent…

Q:  I am a heterosexual male.  I am married.  I am physically attracted to women.  I will greedily look at a photo of a naked woman, and use such a picture to arouse myself. But I cannot stomach pornographic videos. I am repelled by them.  Never watch them.  I am not a prude.  What is wrong with me? 

A: They are geared to creeps and morons.  They have misspellings and pseudo English.  The women vamp and often behave in a blowsy, kittenish, faux-sexy way.  They are not like women you know or would want, whatever age or dimensions they are.   Er, that’s a guess. 

Q: Re the Beatles. I’m a big Lennon fan and in my late fifties I had Lennon’s minimalist self-portrait tattooed on my back - about the size of a softball. I thought it would be immediately recognizable as Lennon, sharp nose, oval glasses. Sometimes in the gym hot tub, I talk to other people with tattoos. I ask them if they can guess who the tattoo was of. Most of these people were forty or under. No one can. One guy said: I know it’s a woman. Another time a young kid at the pool said he liked my Harry Potter tattoo. 

A: Ow!  Though I think John would be charmed. 

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Q: Your story about Tom Scocca and his allegation that you had sort of plagiarized the tone of a story written by a friend of his: Interesting.  Had you in fact read her story first?

A:  Yep.  It was a good story, but not my story, which went on to basically expose the whole terrible thing as a fraud.  Here is Ellen’s story.   And here is mine.  You can judge for yourself!  

Q: Gene, do you have any male acquaintances not named Tom? Tom Scocca, Tom Shales, Tom the Butcher?  Oh yeah, there's Dave Barry.

A: He is Thomas David Barry, Jr.   (Kidding.)

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Q: I first realized I was drifting out of it once the women I dated started wearing tattoos.  I'm just old enough to associate tattoos with guys who got them in World War Two.  You know, the kind that were old, mostly dark green, and rendered somewhat unrecognizable by age.  They were the only people I knew as a kid who had them.

While I'll fight for anyone's right to get one or five or twenty, people with tattoos just have different standards of taste than I.

A:  Yep, I don’;t get it.  I see it as the equivalent of wearing the same outfit every day, like Donald Duck, or Mort from the (speaking of …old ) old Bazooka Joe comics, with the turtleneck over his mouth. 

Q: Market for nostalgia: Had some old Zippo lighters my father used to give to customers.  Was going to toss them.  Someone said eBay them.  Ok, maybe $5 each.  Sold for $200 each !!!!   I don't get it.

(No name please, don't want IRS calling)

A: I know a little about this.  Collecting Zippos is like collecting coins.  On the bottom of the Zip is a year of its production, in two numbers.   “08” means 1998.   I have one from 91, which was the year I was diagnosed with a fatal disease.  I vowed, to myself, that I would outlive it.  We are still battling, the Zippo and I.  

When I answered your poll about how out-of-touch I gauge myself to be, I picked "Mostly" as the best of the available options, but I was thinking that was an overstatement. I mean, just because I don't know anything about what's cool in modern music, or TikTok, or YouTube, or Instagram, or slang...

Never mind. "Mostly" is accurate.

Q: Regarding being able to resist self-pleasuring urges... sure, we can, but why?  In line at the supermarket?  Great time to resist that urge.  By all means, resist away.  In fact, I’ve never witnessed anybody who succumbed in that situation.  Ever.  Off by yourself with nobody else to inconvenience, and feeling particularly inclined?  What purpose is served?  I suspect I’m preaching to a choir.

A: You are. 

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Q: I do not consider myself afraid of death itself, per se. I am, however, terrified of dying alone. I'm an only child, perpetually single, no children; my worst nightmare is becoming ill and having nobody to care for me, with my second-worst nightmare dying and causing a horrible mess because nobody finds my body until it starts to stink after several weeks. (My third-worst nightmare is never getting Ink again.) - Seth Christenfeld

A: I am very sorry to be laughing at this, but I do believe that was your intent. So I am absolved, and good for you.

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Q:  Reddit doesn't allow view of facepalm signage without an account. Will you screen grab and post the sign you linked to last week, please? 

A:  I am reliably informed that Reddit is available to anyone.  But here it is on a different url.   

Q: Though in many ways I am hopelessly out of touch with contemporary culture (just started Medicare—your tax dollars at work!), I can intermittently pass for being au courant because I work in a high school. I can often adopt just enough “teen culture” to be cringey without getting yeeted. No cap.

A: You are a fraud.   And the kids know it.  That’s the thing about kids.  They KNOW it. 

Q: I was talking to a manager about her employee who had written that she thought a policy was “cray-cray.” I thought the employee must be a slow learner or demented. I had to have the modern usage explained to me.

A: I am old enough to remember being puzzled the first time I encountered the word “dissed,” which I researched and discovered it was an abbreviation for “disrespected,” which you, now, in your disgusting youth, might not even know.  

Q: Here’s where I first felt “out of it.” It was 1983, and I was 25 years old. I was in charge of a church 6-7th grade youth group party, and I had requested that participants bring music. No one did. I had a mixed tape (remember them?) of 60s rock—Beatles, Beach Boys, Simon & Garfunkel—which I put on. One little kid, about 4 feet tall, came up to me and said, “Where did you get that elevator music?” And suddenly I felt VERY old.

A: Nice diss.

Q: Good pastrami in D.C? It seems to me that they should offer two types - fat or no fat - and let the customer decide. Or even three types with middle fat in the middle. I presume that one can cut to include or exclude fat to a useful degree.

A: It makes sense, but that has not been my experience.  The waiter will proudly tell you that all their pastrami is lean, better for your heart, and screw your tastebuds.   Also, fat is not bad for you. 

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Q:  Re basketball:  Of course there are clear differences in the distribution of physical abilities between the sexes. That's why there are separate sports leagues; otherwise only a handful, at most, of women would be able to compete professionally. I am glad for the growth in women's sports; everyone should have an opportunity to compete, and although women do not generally have the same size, strength, and other dimensions of physical ability, they do have the same distribution of skill and strategy. I enjoy watching women's professional soccer as I do men's; they can dribble creatively and work together for a great drive down the field just as well as men, even if they cannot kick the ball quite as hard or run quite as fast. I have just one question: By the same logic, shouldn't there be a professional basketball league open only to men under 6 feet?  

A: Good question.   Problem: No one would watch the games, for the simple reason that there ARE guys under six feet playing in the NBA, so these guys would be seen as castoffs.

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This is Gene. I copy us down, using NASA moon landing terminology, which, it reminds me: You should upgrade your subscription not for my benefit, but in memory of Neil Armstrong and John Glenn. You do it here. I will donate all new subscription money to Neil and John and me, in some division I have not yet determined.

Also, please keep sending in questions. I need them, and so do Neil and John. Their children, and their children’s children, beg you.