Events of the Year in Limericks

You’re listening to A Way with Words. I’m Martha Barnette.

And I’m Grant Barrett. And we’re joined now by our quiz guy, John Chanesky. Hello, John.

Hi, Grant. Hi, Martha. How are you?

What are you up to?

Oh, you know, 6’5″. Just about that. Yeah.

Really? 6’5″? A big man, are we?

You’re taller than Lincoln.

I am taller than Lincoln. It was 6’4″. That’s correct. Yeah.

Take off those heels.

What do you have in your puzzle bag?

Well, you know, I just want to tell you guys, you might find this interesting.

Instead of watching CNN, I prefer LNN.

LNN.

That’s the Limerick News Network.

Oh, okay.

Yeah.

Gotcha.

All right.

Yeah, sure.

Their slogan is, if the news is bad, it could be verse.

Oh, man.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Sorry about that.

You know, I’ll give you a limerick about some event that occurred in 2009, and I’ll leave off the last word or two.

You’ve got to come up with the correct rhyme.

How’s that?

Okay.

Okay.

Okay.

Okay.

Let’s try it.

Let’s see how it goes.

Okay, let’s see how it goes.

All right.

Here’s the first.

Now Obama’s in office and leads, though he’s still hard at work on his deeds.

He’s improved relations with several nations.

Heck, he got a big prize from the…

Swedes.

Swedes is right.

Because he won the Nobel Prize, right?

He did win the Nobel Prize, won the Swedes, yes.

So that’s our first.

What did you think?

Yeah, great.

I like it.

So far so good.

Better to write it with Swedes than Thorberg, thinkerwonkin, or whatever his name is.

Right?

Exactly.

Okay, here’s the next.

NASA really put on a great show.

A new lunar crater did blow.

To the glee of mankind, the rocket did find that the moon contains much water below.

H2O.

H2O, much better.

I’ll take them both water below, sure.

It was near the poles, I think, that they did find the water.

But H2O is correct, Martha.

One for you.

All right, let’s do another.

Singers, some scandal did spawn, they could stand to be much more withdrawn.

Say, did you happen to see the awards on TV when Taylor was dissed by rude?

Kanye.

Kanye.

That’s right.

And if I never hear somebody say, I’m going to let you finish, but I just wanted to say one more time.

If I never hear that again, I’ll be happy.

I know, I know.

I will recommend, though, I’ve been using it as a knock-knock joke.

Knock-knock.

Who’s there?

Kanye West.

Kanye West, too.

Now, just a second here.

I’m going to let you finish.

I just want to say one thing.

That’s like the interrupting cow.

Exactly.

Exactly.

Okay, move on to the next limerick.

Now, you guys know in the NPL, we actually have puzzles we call WNFR puzzles.

WNFR, we never finish reading.

They’re puzzles that, from the very first line, you can pretty much tell what the answer is going to be.

And I have a feeling this limerick might be one of them.

Here we go.

All right.

Though lots of New Yorkers were laid off.

Coming to you live from the WNFR.

The WNFR.

Go ahead and finish.

There we go.

Though lots of New Yorkers were laid off, it really was more of a tradeoff.

If you haven’t got squat, then you surely have not lost your savings to Bernie Madoff.

Bernie L. Madoff.

That’s right.

Very good.

This next one is on a little more positive note.

I think you’ll like it.

While 143 quiver, neither pilot nor co-pilot shiver.

Sully did shine.

Flight 1549 landed safe on the cold Hudson River.

Hudson River.

Very good.

Very nice.

Here’s the next.

From Canada to Argentina, the talk of the tennis arena was a heated death threat against a ref.

Now I’ll bet that you know that the answer is…

Serena.

Serena’s right.

Very nice.

Thank you.

Very nice.

Hardly serene to be Serena sometimes, I’m sure.

She wasn’t at that point, no.

No, no.

But that was a good get.

Good get.

Okay.

Here’s the last one.

The limericks almost are done.

The year was sure wacky and fun.

Well, maybe not.

It seems that I’ve caught a touch of the…

H1N1.

H1N1, that’s right.

Also known as the hiney flu.

The hiney flu.

That I haven’t heard.

But that’s good.

You guys did fantastic on the Limericks.

I’ll tell you what network you can find the Limerick News Network on.

I’m sure you’re going to want to get on there right away.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Do these run across the bottom of the screen?

Yes, they do.

That would be nice, you know.

Five lines at a time.

That’s good.

Yeah, they were good.

Great stuff, John.

Good Limericks as always.

Thank you very much.

It was a lot of fun.

Thanks a lot, John.

Bye.

Well, if you have a question about wordplay or language or grammar or slang or regional dialects or Limericks, call us, 1-877-929-9673.

That’s 1-877-Wayword, or send an email to words@waywordradio.org.