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. You can click the Contact Us link on our website, waitwait.npr.org. There, you can find out about attending our weekly live shows, usually here at the Chase Bank Auditorium in Chicago and our upcoming show in San Antonio, Texas, on April 11. And if you like our show but wish it was four minutes long and you were the only guest, check out our interactive game on your smart speaker. Just ask your Alexa or Google device to open the Wait Wait Quiz and be a star. You might even win a prize.
All right. You are on WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME.
REBECCA WEINTRAUB: Hi, Peter. This is Rebecca from New York City.
SAGAL: Hey, Rebecca. How are things in New York?
WEINTRAUB: Well, it was snowing a couple days ago, and tomorrow, it's going to be 56 degrees, so it can't really make up its mind.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: I know. What do you do there?
WEINTRAUB: I'm an archivist.
SAGAL: An archivist - what kind of archives do you work in?
WEINTRAUB: I work at a Jewish nonprofit.
SAGAL: Oh, yes. OK. And so you're archiving all their archives.
(LAUGHTER)
WEINTRAUB: Pretty much.
SAGAL: Well, welcome to the show, Rebecca. Bill Kurtis is going to read 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 on two of the limericks, you will be a winner. You ready to play?
WEINTRAUB: I guess so. Yeah.
SAGAL: All right.
WEINTRAUB: Let's go.
SAGAL: Here is your first limerick.
BILL KURTIS: Kim Kardashian seems filled with bile. Her skin's pleasantness she won't defile. When lips and eyes twinkle, that placidness crinkles, so to fight it, she simply won't...
WEINTRAUB: Smile.
SAGAL: Yes.
KURTIS: Smile.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Exactly right.
KURTIS: Right.
(APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: This week, Kim Kardashian revealed her secret for preventing wrinkles - quote, "never smile." That's what she said. You'd say, how is that possible? How can you go through life never smiling? Well, step one, marry a crazy person.
(LAUGHTER)
LUKE BURBANK: Did you see what said person did for Valentine's Day?
SAGAL: Yes. It was remarkable. It was on Twitter. She put it on Twitter. Tell us about it, Luke.
BURBANK: Apparently, Kanye West, to celebrate Valentine's Day with his wife - he hired Kenny G and then surrounded Kenny G in a room of roses - single roses in, like, little, single vases. The whole room is just roses, vases and Kenny G playing whatever that instrument is that he plays.
SAGAL: Yeah.
(LAUGHTER)
ALONZO BODDEN: Can you imagine doing that for your wife, and she doesn't smile?
SAGAL: Yeah.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: All right, Rebecca. Here is your next limerick.
KURTIS: Since corruption is hard to proscribe, a harsh uniform change we'll contribe (ph). Now Kenya's police have no palms left to grease. Without pockets, they can't take a...
WEINTRAUB: Bribe.
SAGAL: Indeed.
KURTIS: Yeah.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Yes. There's a problem, apparently...
(APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: ...In Kenya with police accepting bribes. But several sources are reporting they have a fix. They're just going to remove the pockets from police uniforms. The perfect deterrent - with nowhere to put their illicit wads of cash, the problem is solved.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Officer Smith, welcome back from patrol. And why are you clenching that way?
(LAUGHTER)
BODDEN: Now there's a reason to give up cash.
SAGAL: Indeed.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Here is your last limerick.
KURTIS: As snowstorms are starting to wail, in Portland, the grocery stores failed. The shelves are wiped clean of dark, leafy greens. The Northwest has run out of...
WEINTRAUB: Kale.
SAGAL: Yes, indeed.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Kale - very good.
(APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: A huge snowstorm hit the Pacific Northwest, and Portland residents, faced with the possibility of losing power for days, if not weeks, thought, man, I should really find a way to make this situation even more unbearable.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: And they went out and they bought all the kale they could. As we all know, human beings can survive 48 hours without water and forever without kale.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: So we saw pictures of organic grocery stores in Portland that had been ransacked by people preparing for this storm, and all the kale and avocados were gone.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Left untouched - bread and milk - or, as they call them in Portland, gluten bricks and eww, gross - milk.
(LAUGHTER)
BURBANK: There was also just a - kind of a table full of smallpox vaccines...
(LAUGHTER)
BURBANK: ...Perfectly intact.
SAGAL: Bill, how did Rebecca do on our quiz?
KURTIS: One, one, one - Rebecca, you did very well - 3 and 0.
SAGAL: Congratulations, Rebecca.
WEINTRAUB: Thank you.
SAGAL: Take care. Thanks for playing.
WEINTRAUB: Bye-bye.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "LET US LOVE")
BILL WITHERS: (Singing) Let us love one another. Let us love on just a day. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.