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, waitwait.npr.org. There, you can find out about attending our weekly live shows here at the Chase Bank Auditorium in Chicago.
And if you want more WAIT WAIT in your week, check out the Wait Wait Quiz for your smart speaker. It's out every Wednesday with me and Bill asking you all-new questions. Just say, open the Wait Wait Quiz, and you might win a prize. Plus - it gives you the thing our panelists dream of - the ability to make me stop talking.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Hi. You're on WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME.
REBECCA BRAUNER: Hi. This is Rebecca Brauner from Louisville, Ky.
SAGAL: Oh, hey. How are things in Louisville?
BRAUNER: They're fantastic.
SAGAL: And what do you do there in Kentucky?
BRAUNER: I'm a pulmonary nurse practitioner.
SAGAL: Oh, you're - OK.
(APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: You're doing medical care. Do you enjoy that work?
BRAUNER: I do very much. I've been doing it for a long time now.
SAGAL: Well, that's great. Well, welcome to the show, Rebecca. You, of course, are going to play our Listener Limerick Challenge. 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'll be a winner. You ready to play?
BRAUNER: I'm ready.
SAGAL: Here is your first limerick.
BILL KURTIS: There's no gravity here on our base. And of hominess, there's not a trace. So we are all lovin' this new, high-tech oven. We're going to bake cookies in...
BRAUNER: In outer space.
KURTIS: Yes.
SAGAL: Space - that's right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Space is the answer.
(APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: This week, a zero G cookie oven was launched to the International Space Station. So astronauts can enjoy warm cookies and make mouthwatering ice cream sandwiches with all their dusty astronaut ice cream.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: The device, which is basically an Easy Bake Oven that went to Harvard...
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: ...Allows for zero gravity baking by pressing the raw cookie dough between two fixed sheets as opposed to the traditional method of pressing it directly into your mouth.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: This is, by the way, the first time the astronauts have been permitted to bake as crumbs present a hazard. They float around. They get lodged in the equipment. NASA solved that problem by ensuring that all of the space station's cookies are oatmeal raisin and therefore will never be eaten.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Here, Rebecca, is your next limerick.
KURTIS: While some pizza toppings don't trouble me, these flavor pearls cost me a doubled fee. This must be a joke-a - fresh, hot tapioca. This pizza's new topping is...
BRAUNER: Oh, gosh, I don't know.
ADAM FELBER: It's a hard one.
FAITH SALIE: It is.
SAGAL: It is very hard.
BRAUNER: That is really hard.
SAGAL: It's really hard. It's pizza with bubble tea on it.
SALIE: Yeah. Yeah.
BRAUNER: Bubble tea.
SAGAL: I know. Now, if you don't know - maybe you don't - bubble tea is the trendy drink that combines sweet milk tea with tiny balls of snot. And Domino's...
(LAUGHTER)
BRAUNER: Sounds delicious.
SAGAL: ...Is getting on board...
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: ...With their new bubble tea pizza. According to Domino's, the pie is cheese, honey and tapioca balls on a hand-tossed crust...
(GROANING)
SAGAL: ...Which is important because when you are handed a pizza covered in wet tapioca...
SALIE: Ugh.
SAGAL: Your first question is always, but is the crust hand-tossed?
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: All right. You can still win it all, Rebecca, if you just get this last limerick. Here we go.
KURTIS: This is national bear propaganda. My dog never made that demand-a. In his black and white dye, my chow hound will cry. They are making him look like a...
BRAUNER: Panda.
SAGAL: Yes...
KURTIS: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: ...A panda.
KURTIS: You've won.
(APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: A cafe in China will dye your dog to look like a panda for only 200 bucks. They dye 70 to 80 dogs a day, which is the easy part. The hard part is training them to eat bamboo instead of their own vomit.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Now, this service is provided at a Panda Cafe, which is really a dog painted like pandas cafe. But judging from the pictures, it's pretty convincing. The dogs really look like pandas.
JORDAN CARLOS: Yeah.
SAGAL: So the good news is we finally fixed the problem of endangered species. It's easy.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: You just dye all these dogs to look like whales.
CARLOS: Is that place called Panda Express?
(LAUGHTER)
FELBER: Oh, that's nice.
SAGAL: Bill, how did Rebecca do on our quiz?
KURTIS: Two out of 3 - she won.
(APPLAUSE)
BRAUNER: Yay.
SAGAL: Congratulations. Well done, Rebecca.
BRAUNER: Thank you so much.
SAGAL: Bye-bye.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.