PETER SAGAL, HOST:
Now onto our final game, Lightning Fill In The Blank. Each of our players will have 60 seconds in which to answer as many fill-in-the-blank questions as they can. Each correct answer now worth two points. Bill, can you give us the score?
BILL KURTIS: Helen has three. Faith has Four. And Tom has five.
TOM BODETT: Oh, my goodness.
(CHEERING)
HELEN HONG: Tom.
KURTIS: A gasp goes up.
SAGAL: All right. That means, Helen, you're in third place. You're up first. The clock will start when I begin your first question. Fill in the blank. On Sunday, Joe Biden's campaign asked TV networks to stop the booking Trump lawyer blank on their programs.
HONG: Rudy Giuliani.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: On Wednesday, the Trump Administration announced new blanks on European-made aircraft.
HONG: Tariffs.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Right. On Tuesday, Johnson and Johnson reached a $20 million settlement for their role in the blank epidemic.
HONG: Opioid.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Now, The Wall Street Journal reported this week that a growing source of clutter in our homes is blank.
HONG: Paper?
SAGAL: Well, I'm going to give it to you. The answer is books about decluttering.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: On Tuesday, a federal judge ruled that blank's admission practices do not discriminate against Asian American applicants.
HONG: Harvard.
SAGAL: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: On Thursday, Chicago's blank union announced plans to strike if a contract wasn't agreed upon in the coming weeks.
HONG: Teacher?
SAGAL: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: A woman in Israel had to be hospitalized...
(SOUNDBITE OF GONG)
SAGAL: ...After eating a giant scoop of blank that she mistook for guacamole.
HONG: Wasabi.
SAGAL: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
HONG: Oh, damn.
(APPLAUSE)
FAITH SALIE: Wow.
HONG: That's harsh.
BODETT: The old wasabi guacamole.
SAGAL: A woman who just wanted to get her guac on ended up having to get her jacket on to go to the hospital...
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: ...After ingesting a, quote, "dangerous level of wasabi that she mistook for avocado." It's an understandable mistake to make because who doesn't expect tableside guacamole at their sushi restaurant.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Bill, how did Helen do on our quiz?
KURTIS: Going to be a close race. She got seven right, 14 more points, total of 17.
(CHEERING, APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: Oh, my goodness, a high-scoring game.
(APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: Faith, you're up next. Fill in the blank. Following a heart procedure, presidential hopeful blank canceled his campaign events until further notice.
SALIE: Bernie Sanders.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: On Monday, one man was shot by police as pro-democracy protests continued in blank.
SALIE: Hong Kong.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: A report released this week showed U.S. manufacturing had slowed to a 10-year low thanks to the trade war with blank.
SALIE: China.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: On Tuesday, a federal appeals court upheld the FCC's repeal of blank rules.
SALIE: Net Neutrality.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: After their boat capsized in the Pacific, three drug smugglers were able to survive in shark infested waters by blanking.
SALIE: Clinging to bunches of cocaine.
SAGAL: Yes, to floating...
SALIE: Floating.
SAGAL: ...Bales of cocaine.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SALIE: Yes.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Amid harassment allegations, Opera star blank resigned as general director of the L.A. Opera.
SALIE: Placido Domingo.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Police in states throughout the U.S. said they'd be on hand to monitor screenings of the new blank movie.
SALIE: Oh, "Joker."
SAGAL: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: After a two-hour search, police in California...
(SOUNDBITE OF GONG)
SALIE: ...Were able to apprehend a stalking suspect who had hid in a blank.
SALIE: He had hid in a cave.
SAGAL: No. He had hid in a corn maze.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: The stalker attempted to become the stalk when he...
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: ...Fled police...
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: ...And ran into a local pumpkin patch's corn maze. Though it took three hours, six officers and a helicopter, police did eventually find him.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: But before they could bring him to justice, they needed six hours, 12 more officers and two helicopters to get them out of the maze.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Bill, how did Faith do?
KURTIS: Faith has seven right, 14 more points, 18 total. And that means Faith is in the lead.
(CHEERING, APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: How many, then, does Tom need to win?
KURTIS: Seven to win.
SAGAL: Here we go, Tom. This is for the game. Just hours after announcing it would restart negotiations with the U.S., blank launched a ballistic missile.
BODETT: North Korea.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: On Thursday, a man armed with a knife attacked a police station in blank.
BODETT: Oh, that happened in Paris.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: This week, the White House announced plans to start collecting DNA from detained blanks.
BODETT: Immigrants, refugees.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Nutritionists and educators say a new study claiming that eating blank is healthy is scientifically inaccurate.
BODETT: Red meat.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: A Utah man says he has a, quote, "weird feeling" bison don't like him after he was blanked.
BODETT: Buffaloed.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: No. He was gored by a bison. Then he returned to the scene months later with a date who was then gored by a bison.
(LAUGHTER)
BODETT: That's what buffaloed means.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: On Monday, some towns in Montana got a record 40 inches of blank.
BODETT: Snow.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: After taking the team to the first World Series win in over 100 years, the blanks parted ways with manager Joe Maddon this week.
BODETT: Oh.
(LAUGHTER)
BODETT: Not the Cubs.
SAGAL: Yes. The Cubs.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
KURTIS: Yes.
(CHEERING, APPLAUSE)
BODETT: Yeah. Sorry.
SAGAL: A 9-year-old Minnesota boy who got lost...
(SOUNDBITE OF GONG)
SAGAL: ...Running a 5K race accidentally blanked.
BODETT: Won.
SAGAL: I want to say that's close enough. I'm going to give it to you - who accidently won. But he won the 10K race. Kade Lovell took a wrong turn during the 5K race, when a spectator cheering him on said keep going, keep going. And he's a good kid. He respects grown ups, even when they should mind their own business. So he kept going. And he won the race much to the delight of his mother and to the disappointment of the 40-year-old man who took second place to a child who wasn't even trying.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Bill, did Tom do well enough to win?
KURTIS: He won - we're going to give it to him - and wins by one point.
(CHEERING, APPLAUSE) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.