PETER SAGAL, HOST:
Now it's time to move on to our final game, "Lightning Fill-In-The-Blank. Each of our players now has 60 seconds in which to answer as many fill-in-the-blank questions as he or she can. Each correct answer is now worth two points. Bill, could you give us the scores.
BILL KURTIS, BYLINE: Tom has two, Shelby three and Charlie has four.
SAGAL: So that means that Tom, you are up first. The clock will start when I begin your first question. Fill in the blank. Senator John McCain broke with his party this week when he defended the released Senate's blank report.
TOM BODETT: The torture...
SAGAL: Right.
BODETT: ...Report.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Following Prime Minister Netanyahu's call for early elections, lawmakers in blank voted to dissolve their parliament.
BODETT: Israel.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: After a giant storm resulted in power outages throughout the city, San Francisco was briefly forced to shut down their famous blank system.
BODETT: Trolley car system.
SAGAL: Right, the cable car.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: On Tuesday, economist Jonathan Gruber apologized for saying that the Democrats relied on quote "the stupidity of the American voter" to pass blank.
BODETT: Obamacare or ACA.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: A Wisconsin man who failed a breathalyzer test told the police that while he had not been drinking, he had just blanked.
BODETT: He had just injected heroin.
SAGAL: No, he had some beer-battered fish.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: On Wisconsin. With representation with seven categories, "Birdman" led the nominations for the 72nd Annual blank Awards.
BODETT: Golden Globes.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: This week, NASA's Curiosity rover uncovered evidence that showed blank may have once been home to a giant lake.
BODETT: Mars.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: A Canadian man said that he is quote "ashamed of the person he is when he is drinking" after he blanked in the middle of the night.
BODETT: Called his ex-wife and apologized.
SAGAL: No. After he entered the wrong apartment while wearing a full-body zebra costume and attempted to bite the person he found there.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Marshall Mann had just left a costume party.
BODETT: Why couldn't I have just guessed that?
SAGAL: I don't know.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Always a good idea on this show to go for the drunk zebra. Marshall Mann had just left a costume party where he had been dressed as the world's drunkest zebra when he stumbled onto what he thought was a friend's place and woke up the guy who lived there, became obstreperous started kicking, biting. Bad news, the guy's roommate was a hungry lion.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Bill, how did Tom do on our quiz?
KURTIS: He did very well. Six right, 12 more points, 14 and the lead.
SAGAL: Well done, all right.
(APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: Shelby, you are up next. Please fill in the blank. District attorneys in California announced plans on Tuesday to sue popular ridesharing service blank for misleading customers.
SHELBY FERO: Uber.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: A woman in Chile was arrested after the police discovered that her fully-decorated Christmas tree was blank.
FERO: A dead person?
SAGAL: No, actually a giant marijuana plant.
FERO: Oh okay.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: This week, Malala traveled to Oslo to accept her blank.
FERO: Oh, her and the other girl just got the Nobel Prizes.
SAGAL: Nobel Peace Prize, right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Ken Weatherwax, most famous for playing Pugsley on the TV show blank, passed away at age 59.
FERO: Sure, I would know that.
(LAUGHTER)
FERO: Can you say it again?
SAGAL: You're probably not going to know.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: "The Addams Family."
FERO: Oh.
SAGAL: When asked by a police officer how much she'd had to drink, an Ohio driver responded blank.
FERO: Too much.
SAGAL: No, she said gobble, gobble, turkey.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: So Jessica Sorensen was driving down the street in Ohio. She didn't notice that her front tire had come off the rim. And police pulled her over and she said how much have you had to drink? She said gobble, gobble, turkey. And they said OK, no problem then. Go on your way. No, they arrested her. Bill, how did - how did Shelby do...
FERO: I don't want to know.
SAGAL: ...On our quiz?
KURTIS: Shelby got two right.
SAGAL: Yeah.
(LAUGHTER)
FERO: But can I say - for the record...
SAGAL: Yeah.
FERO: I did know all of Tom's. I knew - I knew the fish.
SAGAL: All right then.
KURTIS: Four more points and seven points total. But Tom still has the lead.
SAGAL: How is that possible?
FERO: What, really?
SAGAL: And how many does Charlie need to win?
KURTIS: He needs five to tie, six to win.
SAGAL: Here we go, Charlie. This week, the United States officially ended its combat mission in blank after 13 years.
CHARLIE PIERCE: Afghanistan.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Despite the fact that he was already consulting with debate experts in preparation for 2016, Texas governor blank said running for the presidency is not an IQ test.
PIERCE: Rick Perry.
SAGAL: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Veterans gathered in Hawaii on Sunday to commemorate the 73rd anniversary of attack on blank.
PIERCE: Pearl Harbor.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: On Tuesday, the Energy Department lowered the projected average price of a gallon of gas blank by .35 cents.
PIERCE: Gasoline.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: According to the BBC, it takes longer to watch the "Hobbit" movies than to blank.
PIERCE: Read the books.
SAGAL: Right...
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: ...Read the book. There's only one. The column for the Spectator magazine, former Rear of the Year winner and royal sister-in-law Pippa Middleton said her famous rear does not compare to blank.
PIERCE: Her sister's.
SAGAL: No, to Kim Kardashian's.
SAGAL: Bystanders were amazed when a Brooklyn TGI Friday's unveiled its adorable mistletoe holiday drone, and it immediately blanked.
PIERCE: Crashed.
SAGAL: Into a woman's face.
PIERCE: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: So the newest holiday tradition at the Brooklyn TGI Fridays is the mistletoe drone. It's one of those four-propeller drones with a mistletoe hanging from it. When it flies over your head, either you kiss your partner or it crashes its blades into your face and takes a chunk out of your nose. That's what happened, but only because according to the drone operator, the woman in question quote "flinched."
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: TGI Fridays has blamed the mistake on faulty intelligence that said the woman was an enemy combatant from the Applebee's across the street.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Bill, did Charlie do well enough to win?
KURTIS: He did well. Six right, 12 more points. And with 16, he's the champ.
SAGAL: Yes. Well done, Charlie.
(APPLAUSE) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.