Limericks

Transcript

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, which is waitwait.NPR.org. There you can find out about attending our weekly live shows right here at the Chase Bank Auditorium in Chicago or our upcoming show at the Mann Center in Philadelphia on July 9 or in Louisville, Ky., on September 3. We're coming to Louisville. Hi, you're on WAIT WAIT ...DON'T TELL ME.

BRIAN KELLY: Yes, hi, this is Brian Kelly from Minneapolis, Minn.

SAGAL: Whoa, what voice you have, Brian.

KELLY: Well, thank you very much.

SAGAL: Wow. I'm sorry, I'm feeling a little intimidated. I - I...

(LAUGHTER)

KELLY: I'm terribly sorry.

SAGAL: Why don't you be the host and I'll call in?

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Brian, welcome to the show. Bill Kurtis is going to perform 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 2 out of 3 times, you'll win our prize. Are you ready to do this?

KELLY: I am.

SAGAL: All right. Let us hear from Bill Kurtis. Here's your first limerick.

BILL KURTIS, BYLINE: On a neck that I wanted to throttle, my man had an old wrinkled wattle. But now that he's gone, I'd still like to hold on. I'm preserving his scent in a...

KELLY: Bottle.

SAGAL: Yes.

KURTIS: Bottle it is.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

KURTIS: Good for you, Brian.

(APPLAUSE)

SAGAL: You know, Bill, I just want you and Brian to have an in-tone off.

FAITH SALIE: I know, I just want to hear them talk. I feel like I might just ovulate. Go, you guys.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: By the third limerick, I might be ovulating.

CHARLIE PIERCE: Yeah.

SAGAL: This is something.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Anyway, the answer to the limerick was bottle. We all want mementos of our departed relatives. But until recently, people with a bottle of grandpa's scent on their nightstand were considered serial killers.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: But now, a perfumer in France will take an item of clothing from your dead relatives and synthesize the scent they get from it so you can wear it, and it will provide quote "olfactory comfort," right? So if you miss your grandpa, you simply dab the perfume at your pulse points and you'll be transported back to happier, simpler times, back before you killed him to make perfume.

LUKE BURBANK: Yeah. You should not be wearing the perfume, right, somebody else has to be wearing the scent 'cause it's not like I remember when I used to smell like grandpa. It's I remember when grandpa - you have to find an older gentleman...

SAGAL: Yes.

BURBANK: ...And say would you mind if I apply this to you? And then could you come to my Little League game?

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: All right, very good. Here is your next limerick.

KURTIS: No hazelnut spread for you, fella. That's scourge is far worse than rubella. It uses bad trees, brings the Earth to its knees. Do not smear your toast with...

KELLY: Nutella.

KURTIS: Nutella.

SAGAL: Nutella. Yes.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

KURTIS: He's so sharp.

(APPLAUSE)

SAGAL: France's ecology minister is urging people to stop eating Nutella, the hazelnut spread that makes up approximately 60 percent of your dad bod. Nutella, she says, is bad for the environment as it contains large amounts of palm oil, which can only be harvested by clear-cutting tropical forests. So sorry everybody, you'll just have to learn to live without tropical forests.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Here is your last limerick.

KURTIS: As manboobs begin to appear...

(LAUGHTER)

KURTIS: ...My manopause seems to draw near. I drink lots of hops, so my chest drops and flops. I'm blaming my moobs on this...

KELLY: Beer.

KURTIS: Beer...

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

KURTIS: ...3 and 0. Good for you.

(APPLAUSE)

SAGAL: Hops, we now know, contain the hormone phytoestrogen, which is responsible for a condition known - and I'm not kidding - as Brewer's Droop. That is if you drink enough of it, you will grow your own manboobs. So all you need is enough beer, and then you should get some other beer that'll grow you a beach, a volleyball net and a bikini top in your size, and you'll never need to leave the house.

(LAUGHTER)

PIERCE: Why are people fighting over estrogen?

SAGAL: What?

PIERCE: That stuff you said...

SAGAL: I said - no, I didn't call fighting estrogen - phytoestrogen.

PIERCE: Oh, ok. I missed - I miss...

SAGAL: (Imitating Irish accent) Why those are fightin' estrogen.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Bill, how did Brian do on our quiz?

KURTIS: Brian got three, so he's a winner. Congratulations.

SAGAL: Well done.

PIERCE: Well done, Brian.

(APPLAUSE)

SAGAL: Well, thanks a lot and thanks for playing.

KELLY: Oh, thank you.

SAGAL: Bye-bye.

KELLY: Bye-bye.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.