Balderdash Makes Kathy Martin a Winner!

Last week I hosted a Balderdash contest where people had to give a synopsis of the movie title "Wide Open Faces." The funniest one gets a surprise package of indie craft goodness from....me! This week the winner is from Kathy Martin Studios. Here's her entry: 

"Wide Open Faces is a rags to riches tale. The casting director of an online reality show is challenged to get the least likely contestant ever to go on "Last Chef Stirring". The direct must chose a bum off of the streets and turn him into a gourmet pro fast! The challenge that decides it all: The Open Faced Turkey Sandwich Face Off! ....now if they can only get the guy to wash his hands after he visits to bathroom we'll be in business!"

Ha! Nice work. Very nice work. 

I'm going to take a week off from contests and devise something really, really clever. Or just enjoy the nice sunshine.

I'm off to the studio later this afternoon for my latest bARTer Sauce trade. EeeeeeeeeeEEE! I'm so excited! 

Balderdash Winner & New Contest

Last week I ran a contest for the funniest definition for the word Zazzera. Kayla from The Eclectic Element  made me laugh very hard with her answer: 

Zazzera: Noun,

1. A popular new wave of dance moves where you thrust your butt into the air and sidestep like the north american crab.

Warning: Best not used under the influence.

Ex. I walked into the club and when the music came on, I made like a crab and did the Zazzera.

Congratulations Kayla! You'll be getting a cool surprise package from me in the mail.

Now for a new contest. This is from the last game I played with a group of friends. I'll give you all of our answers for inspiration. Then, you leave your own answer as a comment to this post. The funniest one gets a surprise package of indie craft goodness from me.

This one is a movie called Wide Open Faces. I googled for images with the phrase "Wide Open Faces" and got the one above. Enjoy.: 

1. A big, mouthed soda jerk takes on gangsters at a vacation resort.

2. An unintentional comedy, Wide Open Faces, consists mainly of people yelling, "Spaces or Faces?" "Places or Faces?" and "What?". It went straight to dvd. 

3. A circus movie about deformed performers who travel the world. 

4. A documentary about the world of competitive eating.

5. The horror of dental malpractice is exposed.

6. A quack surgeon attempts to make a face wide enough to be carried on the wind.

Now it's your turn. Leave your comment on this post with the synopsis for the movie, "Wide Open Faces" and the funniest one will hear from me next Friday.

Now, remember to check out Shower Art - waterproof art you can hang in your shower with a suction cup - and bARTer Sauce - and experiment in trading for art and odd objects. You'll probably be glad you did. And if you're not .... well ... um ... who cares.

Happy Friday.

More Balderdash...now with more dash

What the honk? 

I concur. 

This is the image I found when I searched Google Images for "Zazzera"  - which is - coincidently - the word for my new Balderdash contest.

Here's how it works. I post the definitions of the word Zazzera that my friends and I came up with when we played Balderdash and then you add your own as a comment. 

The funniest one gets a surprise package from me. It's mostly a surprise, but it's sure to include my favorite soap: Estrella Soap. 

It's seriously the best. 

And you might get some gocco-ed postcards handmade especially for you by me. 

And you might get some Shower Art. 

Anything is possible. 

Here's what we came up with for Zazzera: 

1. Available for children's birthday parties, weddings and barmitzphas. 

2. Phrase heard often in the jungles of Africa which means, "You missed a spot." 

3. A word invented in 1789 by Daniel Webster when he realized the section for the letter z of his dictionary was a little thin.

4. A priceless gift to give at a wedding to the bride and grooms parents in Egypt. 

5. The little sister of Zena the Warrior Princess who wasn't nearly as popular.

6.  A zebra who has lost track of it's herd. 

Okay - now your turn.

Balderdash Contest Winner

Holy Bazongas. 

I'm happy to report that we have a winner for the Balderdash contest. You were supposed to write the movie synopsis for the film "Ladies Who Do" and the funniest response was promised a mystery fun prize from yours truly.

Well, we DO have a winner. Oh my gosh do we have a winner. Heather's got it. She made me laugh out loud more than once which means she is hilarious because I'm a jaded stand up comic who rarely finds humor in anything.

You win Heather. You win. Congratulations!

Here's Heather's Synopsis: 

Ladies Who Do Fight Zombies. Suburbs, early Saturday morning, wake to find the world has turned upside-down by crazed undead who crave human brains. (Why is it always brains, not Big Macs or ice cream?) 

Following the plot of nearly every zombie movie, the women seek refuge in the local mall. (Could we find someplace with MORE doors and windows than a mall?) While the women are there they do the usual mall shopping scene. 

Next, they convert the mall shuttle bus into a pink zombie-proof transportation device. Armed with straws from the food court, they ward of the zombies by shooting eyeliner and lipliner pencils (sharpened to deadly points using the electric pencil sharpener in the mall business supply store.)

There are some close calls. One of the ladies accidentally inhales on the straw and hurts the back of her throat making her gag really bad. Some of the straws have small cracks in them ruining the perfect shot. And a batch of ammo eyeliners are actually eyeSHADOW sticks and won't fit into the straws.

Despite the odds, they make it to an unpopulated island where they are safe and have lots of great shoes.

Balderdash Makes Me Happy

Ah, Balderdash. My love. My Balderdash.

I really LOVE playing Balderdash. So much that I whenever I play a game, I bring home all the little slips of paper and blog our answers. And you get to play too. Just leave your answer as a comment on this blog and I'll pick the funniest one. Whoever is funniest gets a fun surprise in the mail from me. 

First things first -- the winner from my last Balderdash blog entry, Betsy -  who killed me with her synopsis of the movie, "Hello Down There":

The Story of forbidden love between a fuzzy Norwegian hat and the woman who wears it. Spoiler Alert: The hat dies in the end.

I don't know what it means -- but I know it's funny. And that's all that matters. So Betsy will be getting some cool farting tater tot greeting cards in the mail post haste. 

And now this week's contest: 

It's a MOVIE and the title is "Ladies Who Do." Our answers: 

1. A small town gets turned upside down when the local hair salon wins a hair styling contest.

2. Ladies clean up the entire world using only garbage bags and gum.

3. A documentary about women entering the work force during World War II.

4. A group of women start a do wop group in the 1920's and make it to #1 on the charts. 

5. A bunch of office cleaning women get rich when they find some hot stock tips in a garbage can.

6. The much more popular sequel to the first film, "Ladies who don't."

7. A small group of women in rural Georgia form an association to rebel against society's "A lady doesn't..." attitude in the 1950's. 

8. The sequel to "Ladies who don't" followed by the third installment "Ladies who don't do diddly squat."

Now it's your turn. Write a brief but hilarious movie synopsis of "Ladies Who Do" and leave it as a comment on this blog. I'll get in touch if you're the winner!

And if you don't want to play, just enjoy this new Shower Art: My Other Car is a Unicorn on Roller Skates. 

Baldy Balderdash

My favorite game of all time is Balderdash. The gist, if you don't already know, is that someone reads off a word, or a movie title, or a name, or date -- and you have to write a definition or a movie synopsis, or say why that person or date is famous. The challenge is that you want the other people at the table to think your answer is the correct one. My favorite way to play is with stand up comedians who don't care about anyone picking their answer as the correct one -- but instead just care how big of a laugh their answer gets. Doug and I went to The Hounshell's recently -- the home of Meghan Hounshell's parents (one of whom found us our very lovely condo that I am trapped in while recovering from foot surgery). Meghan used to live here and do stand up but she moved to LA to do some kind of tech support (lame) so now we only see her on her rare but normally Balderdash-filled visits. Here's Meghan up close: And here's Meghan on stage. I like to take home all the scraps of paper that we write our answers on and use them for blog contests. Here's how it works. I'll list out all the answers that we came up with for a certain item -- just to inspire you. Then, you write your own answer. The one I think is funniest gets a set of TaterBot Greeting Cards. Ready? OK! This one's a movie. You write the synopsis. Our answers: #1 An employee orientation film created by God, intended to replace the Bible. Unfortunately, it was only released on Betamax so only 19 people have seen it. #2 The story of a man who tragically fell down a well and was taunted by a pack of small children. #3 A giant says hello to everyone in town until he loses his voice. #4 Story of a family living in an underwater house for a month. #5 A single woman is terrorized by the resident who lives in the apartment above her. #6 A documentary about a man who was born with an inverted penis. Your turn. Leave your movie synopsis for "Hello Down There" as a comment and I'll contact you if I think you're hilarious enough to get some TaterBot cards.

Balderdash is Back

I Heart Balderdash so much. So much in fact, that I save the answers from every game we play so that you can read the funny things my friends come up with. And you can play along! What do I do? First, read our funny answers...one is the real one. If you want, you can try and guess which one is real. But you don't get anything for that. And I'll probably never tell you whether or not you were right, so it probably won't be very fulfilling for you. Second, make up a funny answer of your own and post it here as a comment. I'll assign numbers to each comment and pull one out of a hat (or other container to be determined by me). If I pull out the number I assigned to your comment, you get this tater tot themed greeting card: Yes, it does have the word anus in it. Honestly, it might not be for everyone. Let's begin. The word: Piloerection (we pronounced it - Pile o' erection -- I bet you can see where we're gonna go with the definitions) Our Answers: 1. When a hang glider's wing turn upright for landing. 2. The process for installing pilings under a bridge. 3. The official term for when dough rises. 4. Hair standing on end caused by fright. 5. The name of a phenomenon where atoms spontaneously combine into complex molecules. 6. A large mound of stimulated male sex organs (you knew it would happen, right? I'm just surprised there was only one like this) Now it's your turn. And if you're lucky you just might win the only tater tot themed greeting card with the word "anus" in it. CONGRATULATIONS! And when you're done, check out some Shower Art (waterproof art you can hang in your shower with a suction cup) and bARTer Sauce (my trading experiement for art and odd objects. Trade me something!)

Balderdash -- Round Two

I was sitting here for about ten minutes trying to think of what to blog about. And then I remembered that I had insisted on bringing home all of our Balderdash answers after we played a couple of weeks ago for that very reason -- so I didn't have to think of something to blog about! And then I forgot. Par for the course in my little brain sack. So, it's a word. The word is: Extispicy

Following are our answers from a hot, sexy evening of playing Balderdash:

Answer 1: Fortune telling by examining animal organs hit by lightning. Asnwer 2: Ron Jame's golf bag (which is a total inside joke and I shouldn't have even included it here, but ....I did...so deal Answer 3: Being and Nothingness. Five stars. Answer 4: No longer spicy Answer 5: A mexican jaw breaker made with tamarind Answer 6: How E.T, the extra terrestrial orders his Thai food, "Exti-spicy, please.....owwwwwwch." What should you do now? Come up with your own answer and post it as a comment here, or here, or here, or here. I'll pick the funniest one and you get a MYSTERY prize! It's a mystery because I can't think of what I want to part with and this gives me the opportunity to decide that you get an old promotional postcard or something lame like that. BUT, don't let that keep you from entering! And, in closing, here's some new Shower Arts:

Balderdash - Win a Card with a Tater Tot Farting on it

Okay, so maybe this makes me a nerd, but for some reason, I have the best time "playing" Balderdash. Maybe it's because I play with stand up comics. Maybe it's because no one is really trying to win, but instead just trying to write the funniest answer. Maybe it's because I'm completely insane and Balderdash calms the little voices inside. Who knows? So here, today, I share with you... Balderdash from last night.... Starring: Meghan Sara Evie Doug Rosalie & Meghan's Mom, Sue Pay close attention. There's a content. You could win this awesome greeting card with a tater tot farting on the front. The category chosen is: Person The Person is: Bob Boyer Answer #1: First man to use an alias Answer #2: Invented the soup which grew into a chain and became known as "Chef Boy-ar-dee" Answer #3: Inventor of Bob's butter which builds, bigger, better bodies Answer #4: An ancestor to pop singer/actress Lindsey Lohan, who also invented popsicle sticks Answer #5: While Bobs are notorious for not being exciting or doing anything worthy of comment, this Bob was the first. Answer #6: Chemist who came up with a way of turning soybeans into certain things, such as door knobs and gear shift handles. Okay, now for the contest rules. You can either: 1. Make your own answer to the Bob Boyer question and who ever has the funniest one wins. Or... 2. You can try to guess which answer was mine and I'll draw the names of everyone who had correct answers out of a hat. Whoever wins, gets a greeting card with a tater tot farting on it. Ready? Go.