WWDTM: Kara Jackson
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I'm Bill Curtis, and here is your host at the Studebaker Theatre Fine Arts Building in Chicago, Illinois, Peter Segal. Thank you, Bill. Thanks, everybody. We have a great show lined up for you today. Our guest later on is going to be Kara Jackson. She was the Youth Poet Laureate of these United States. She is now an acclaimed singer and songwriter. And this is true. I coached her t-ball team when she was eight years old.

So we will talk to her about how my guidance back then led her as far as possible from a career in sports. But first, we want to check on your swing. Give us a call and play our games. The number is 1-888-WAIT-WAIT. That's 1-888-924-8924. Let's welcome our first listener contestant. Hi, you're on Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. Hi, this is Matthew Neal from Santee, California. Santee, California. What do you do there? I

am a licensed professional fiduciary, but nobody knows what that means. You're right. I sell dead people's homes.

Oh, that's much more pleasant. Yeah. Is that like a good line at parties? Yes. Especially if you're going for like a sixth sense vibe, you know. Yeah, I understand. I understand. Well, Matthew, welcome to the show. Let me introduce you to the panel. First, she's a writer, actress, and comedian who you can see in Vermont at the Burlington Comedy Club. For two shows this New Year's Eve, it's Joyelle Nicole Johnson. Hello. Hi, Joyelle. Hello. Hello.

Next, he's an Emmy and Peabody Award-winning journalist and comedian. It's Alzo Slade. What's up, Matthew? Hi, Alzo. And making her debut on our panel this week, she's a culture writer for Slate, host of the Scamfluencers podcast, and author of the forthcoming essay collection, Sucker Punch. Welcome, Saatchi Cole. Hi, buddy. Welcome, Saatchi. Good job. Thank you.

Done like a fiduciary, sir. All right, Matthew, you're going to play Who's Bill this time. Bill Curtis is going to read you three quotations from this week's news. If you can correctly identify or explain just two of them, you will win our prize. Any voice from our show you might choose for your voicemail. You ready to go? Peter, do children fight over their parents' inheritances?

And that was Locked and Loaded. Locked and Loaded. All right, Matthew, here's your first quote. It was from a pivotal moment at a big political event this week. Gentlemen, the audience can't hear you. Your mics are cut. That was moderator Margaret Brennan speaking to the participants at what big event this week? That would be the vice presidential debate. The vice presidential debate, yes. Yes.

Tim Walz and J.D. Vance met on the debate stage Tuesday night, and America, as always, is divided about it. Some say the debate was boring, while others insist it was completely irrelevant. J.D. Vance lived up to his reputation, appearing calm, sincere, and reasonable while lying all the time. Basically, evil Pete Buttigieg. Right? Right? You see it, don't you? Yeah. Yeah.

But Governor Wal seemed incredibly nervous, and he garbled a bunch of easy answers. It was a performance that made Democrats say, any chance we could replace this guy with Kamala Harris, too? I think that the moderator is right. They should have said, gentlemen, the audience can't hear you because...

We're all sleep. Yeah. Your mics are muted and we're going to leave them that way. Listen, I prefer it to be a little sleepy because the excitement is too much for me. Like I went to Canada. Satya's from Canada, y'all. I am, famously. And I don't know if y'all ever seen a debate in Parliament up there, but they'd be yelling at each other. They'd be like, shut up, stupid. You're dumb.

And while that was fun in Canada, I don't want that to happen here. Really? I mean, they actually shook hands and spoke to each other like human beings. Yeah, I was surprised. It was strange. It made me feel unsafe. Really? Well, it was, you know, it was a throwback to the old school. Not that because it was boring, it was just two white dudes. Exactly. Yeah.

That's true. You had no one throwing shade just with their facial expressions like Kamala can. It wasn't like J.D. Vance was like, Walsh, you're just now identifying as white. LAUGHTER

I got to say that Governor Walz's performance was criticized, but it did burnish his sort of regular guy, Midwest guy credentials. Only a real hunter could have perfected that deer in the headlights look. All right. Here is your next quote.

Avoid your pet's names and no flipping to a random word in the dictionary and using that. That was the Washington Post talking about new federal guidelines that will make complicated what's a thing of the past. Ooh, can I get a hint, Peter? Yeah, you can still use zeros for O's if you want to be fancy.

Guidelines for your password? Yes, passwords. No more complicated passwords. We're having to change them all the time. Or so says the National Institute of Standards and Technology, or NIST, which by strange coincidence is my password. That sounds like a good one.

a rule invented by someone trying to get into my email. I just got this email from somebody and they said the passwords can be simple. Yeah, so I should change everything to password. Well, this came from a study of internet security over many, many years. It turns out, for example, you've all been told you have to have passwords with lots of special characters and random letters and stuff like that. No, it turns out that makes your password impossible to remember, which means you'll write it down somewhere, making them vulnerable to the cat burglars who break in and read all your post-its.

Doesn't Google suggest a password all the time? It does, yeah. It's like Qbert. I'm aging myself, but it's like 20 different characters, uppercase, lowercase, and then I just say yes, but then when I go back to that page, it never pops up. Right.

And then you have to, like, you know, hit a cartoon character on the toe with a hammer and just type in what he said. It's so awful. No, also, you won't have to change your password all the time. I mean, remember, if you work for a company, they say, now you have to change your password. It's been two months. You don't have to do it. I think that's foolish, though, because I'm pretty sure the reason I've never been hacked is because I changed my password from Aragorn Rules to Aragorn Rules 1.0.

Do you all have the same password for most of your things? Why don't you just tell us what your passwords are for everything? I'm just going to write them down real quick, and then we'll confirm what they are. I'm listening. I won't tell you my password. I will tell you my mother's maiden name. Oh, perfect. As a matter of fact, the new guidelines might also do away with those security questions, like your first car or your childhood best friend, so no more forced nostalgic reveries every time you order from Grubhub.

I think my password is, who the hell is Aragon? Yeah. All right, Matthew, here's your last quote. I have a small piece of chicken I don't know what to do with. Those were the words of a fry cook speaking to the owner of a restaurant in Manchester, New Hampshire, 50 years ago this month, on the day what incredibly popular fast food menu item was born.

Fried chicken? Not fried chicken. Fried chicken goes back further than 50 years. Chicken nuggets? Yes! Specifically, the chicken tender. This year marks the 50th anniversary of the birth of the chicken tender. It's the quintessential American cuisine, deep-fried whatever we have lying around. Only 50 years? Only 50. I know, that's amazing, isn't it? I feel like that's something that...

Black folks did thousands of years ago, and then white folks 50 years ago, they just found it and like, we discovered this. Somebody, they're Christopher Columbus, the chicken tender. Yeah. The story goes, there was one part of a chicken, the tenderloin, that was completely useless. So this inventive chef breaded it and fried it, and the chicken tender was born, joining the Mount Rushmore of breaded chicken hand food restaurants.

alongside the chicken finger, the chicken nugget, and the whatever your toddler wants to call it. Please, Elliot, just eat it. We're late. I used to order chicken fingers all the time at restaurants, and my mother told me, you cannot do this on dates when you get older. And I did it on the first date with my boyfriend. We've been together five and a half years. Really? I knew it.

Is that the key? I guess so. He didn't want to pay for the lobster. I was about to say that. If I went on a first date with a woman and all she wanted was chicken tenders, I'd be like, she is the one. This is good intel. I'm like, would you like some ranch sauce, barbecue sauce?

This is true. At the original restaurant, even though they invented this thing, it took a while for the chicken tender to outsell what had been everybody's favorite dish, barbecued lamb. Right? So if the chicken tender had not been invented, today we'd be going to McDonald's and ordering our kids six-piece McMuttons. Bill, how did Matthew do in our quiz? Matthew came to play. He got three right. Good. Well done. Well done.

Thanks so much, Matthew. Take care. Thank you for having me. Bye-bye. Right now, panel, it is time for you to answer some questions about this week's news. Also, this week, the Washington Post tried to explain one of the most mysterious phenomena that we know of, why people fall asleep on the couch but then cannot seem to do what? Sleep in the bed. Exactly right. You knew exactly what I was talking about. Get up from the couch. Say, oh, man, I've got to go to sleep. Go to sleep. You can't fall asleep.

Because we've all found ourselves waking up from a fast sleep on the couch in front of the TV. And you've gotten into bed to go to sleep. And you lie awake for an hour. It makes no sense. No one is like, oh, man, I can't sleep if I'm not sitting upright with my head lolling onto my chest while Netflix just keeps playing episodes, right? The Post asked two sleep experts to explain the phenomenon. They offered a bunch of possible reasons. First, people who fall asleep in the couch tend to get up.

brush their teeth, take out their contacts, take off their makeup, use the bathroom. By the time they're done with all that, it's morning. But I feel like you get the best sleep in places where you're not supposed to sleep. School, church, work, all those places, the best sleep. But in your own bed, not so much. Yeah. My wife falls asleep on the couch.

and then I cannot get her to get up. I say, come on, let's go to bed. Because she knows once she gets into bed, she won't be able to go back to sleep. Because you're there or because of... Wait a minute. Coming up, something's afoot in Montana in our Bluff the Listener game. Call 1-888-WAIT-WAIT-TO-PLAY. We'll be back in a minute with more of Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me from NPR.

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This message comes from Travel Nevada. Need a little space? They know a place, the Big Heart of Nevada, where you can go off-road and off the map, on two legs or on horseback, dip into hot springs and dive into deserts, climb a mountain, or make your best effort. See thousands of stars in some of the darkest skies. Stake out haunted hotels. Can you make it to sunrise? There's a place for you.

There's always something new to see because Nevada has plenty of space to just be. Plan your trip at TravelNevada.com. From NPR and WBEZ Chicago, this is Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me, the NPR News Quiz. I'm Bill Curtis. We are playing this week with Joy L. Nicole Johnson, Sachi Cole, and Alzo Slade. And here again is your host...

at the Studebaker's Theater in Chicago, Illinois, Peter Sago. Thank you, Bill.

Thank you, everybody. Right now it's time for the Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me Bluff, the listener game. Call 1-888-WAIT-WAIT to play the game in the air or check out the pinned post on our Instagram at waitwaitnpr. Hi, you're on Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. Hi, Peter. This is Stacey Bendixon in Des Moines, Iowa. Hey, Stacey. What do you do there in Des Moines? I work at a corporate foundation and I do community theater for fun and I'm a childless cat lady. Are you really? Yeah, Carol. Come on. Yeah.

Me and Taylor Swift. Exactly. Stacey, it's nice to have you with us. You're going to play our game in which you must try to tell truth from fiction. Bill, what is Stacey's topic? What's up with Arthur Shoebarth?

81-year-old Montana rancher Arthur Schubarth made the news this week for a pretty surprising reason, and it's not because he became the first ever literal jolly rancher. Our panelists are going to tell you what he did to get in the newspapers this week. Pick the one who's telling the truth about Mr. Schubarth, and you will win the weight-waiter of your choice on your voicemail. Ready to go?

I'm ready. First, let's hear from Joelle Nicole Johnson. Get the heck off my lawn, yelled Arthur Schubarth for the 21st time as 14 other senior citizens tried to catch up with him at the first annual Running of the Whippersnappers. This event was inspired by his father, Arthur Schubarth Sr., who would actually yell at kids to get off his lawn while waving a shotgun.

Arthur Jr., a retired high school coach and lifelong teacher, realized that kids today were both too well-mannered and also too indolent to ever come over to annoy an old man like him. So he came up with a competition which combines, quote, shenanigans, tomfoolery, and devilment. He invited local high schoolers to raise money for the right to trespass on his lawn and gather hidden prizes like his prize petunia while he attempts to shoot them with super soakers.

60 kids instantly signed up. But more surprisingly, other senior citizens also wanted to sign up. So now the event has two competitions, best pimple-faced brat and most curmudgeonly old coot. I want this to be my legacy, said Arthur. When I'm gone, I want people to say, that mean old man was really great. Arthur Schubarth starts the first running of the Whippersnappers.

A competition involving shooing kids off his lawn. Your next report on this rancher comes from Sachi Cole. Arthur Shoebarth spent the better part of his life in service to the animals. Most of his career had been in husbandry, tending to the horses, the cows, and even the bees on his sprawling Wyoming ranch. But in retirement, he wanted to turn his approach to a different kind of husbandry, human husbandry.

Enter the Love Ranch, an intensive 12-week matchmaking retreat where Shoebarth pairs attendees off until they find the one. Part spa and part sleepaway camp, singles work on the ranch and are matched up according to attitude and skill by Shoebarth. It's like a singles cruise except it's landlocked and everything smells like poop.

There are, surprisingly, a few overlaps between animal and human husbandry. People participants are put into small enclosures to smell and perhaps headbutt each other. Potential matches are encouraged to dine from the same trough as if it's a bonding exercise. And of course, if the studs get too frisky, there's always the cattle prod.

Shoebarth says he got the idea for Love Ranch after falling asleep in front of the television and waking up to hour six of a 28-hour Love Island marathon. Arthur Shoebarth has opened the Love Ranch where he applies his techniques of animal husbandry to humans. Your last Mr. Shoebarth scoop comes from Alzo Slade. For many of us, creating the world's largest sheep is just a dream, a fantasy we all yearn for but we never attempt.

Until this year, when 81-year-old Montana rancher Arthur Shoebarth tried to play God. Well, Sheep God. The rancher cloned a bunch of different breeds to create his perfect mutant sheep. Unfortunately, you can't just buy specialized sheep semen at the grocery store. So Shoebarth and his co-conspirators smuggled sheep tissue and testicles from Kyrgyzstan. Now, if you think he was creating the perfect giant sheep for cuddling, that's because you're soft.

Giant sheep are created for hunting, of course. The woolly sheep that you would count to sleep were too soft and weak, with no horns. Plus, they shed when mounted on a trophy wall. So, Shubar sent out to Frankenstein a super sheep. The result was a 300-pound specimen that was sold to hunting facilities around the country. Now, for all of his efforts of international ball smuggling and laboratory sheep creation...

Shoebarth got six months in prison. When he told his cellmate what he was in for, the cellmate replied, damn, that was a bad idea. So, I can tell you this much. There really is an Arthur Shoebarth in Montana.

But was he in the news this week for, from Joyelle Nicole Johnson running the first ever running of the whippersnappers with kids invited to try to get on his lawn, from Saatchi Cole opening the Love Ranch where animal husbandry is used for people, or from Alzo Slade jailed for illegally creating a frankensheep?

which of these was what Arthur Schubarth really did? I am going to go with my instincts and say the super sheep. The super sheep, the Franken-sheep, the monstrous hybrid sheep that haunts all of our dreams. You're choosing Alzo's story. Well, to bring you the correct answer, we spoke to a reporter covering this important story. A Montana rancher got busted for creating giant hybrid sheep to sell to hunting centers for huge amounts of money.

That was Justine McDaniel, a reporter for the Washington Post, who reported on the real story of good old 81-year-old Arthur Shoebarth and his freaky hybrid monster sheep. So you won. You were correct. Alzo, in fact, had the real story. Congratulations. Alzo gets a point for telling the truth. And you have won our prize, the voice of anyone you might choose in your voicemail. Congratulations, Stacey. I'm so excited. Thank you. I'm a super fan. Oh, thank you. Thank you. Bye-bye.

And now the game we call Not My Job. Kara Jackson grew up not far from here in Oak Park, Illinois, where she started writing poetry in high school, something she became so good at, she was named first Chicago's and then America's Youth Poet Laureate. She then started putting her words to her own music and playing at festivals from Pitchfork to Glastonbury.

Kara Jackson, welcome to Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. Thanks for having me. Now, I have left off what I think of as one of the most important items on your resume, which is that you were one of the starting players on the Angels, an eight-year-old girl's t-ball team in Oak Park, which I coached. Yeah. So...

A little nervous about the answer. What do you remember about Coach Sagal on the Angels and being on the Angels? You know, not a lot. No? It's probably not good because I'm not that old. But...

You know, I still actually have my Angels shirt, like the uniform. I can't fit it anymore, but I still have it. So my memory of it was like you guys were so amazing at coming up with like great cheers for any given situation.

and you still didn't know which base to run to when you hit the ball. I feel like I did, though. I was one of the good... You were. I didn't want to cast shade on the other players. No shade. I guess we have all healed from that moment, I hope. But I was pretty good at t-ball. I've got to say, I was just really tall.

Also, like, I remember it was me and Emma Smith. Yes. And we were just the tallest people on the team. So it was like, obviously, I can hit the ball. Yeah. I feel like some people struggled. Like, there were some people where it was like they were shorter. So they had to, like, you know, lower the T. Yeah. But the taller kids, they would make it bigger. And everyone would be like, back up. Like...

There really is no better feeling, I imagine, than coming to bat with the tee and all the other players. I feel like I'm still chasing that high, honestly. Right? So you moved from tee ball to poetry and were named the Chicago Youth Poet Laureate

while you were still in high school. Do you remember any of those early poems? Well, unfortunately for me, a part of the Youth Poet Laureate program in the city, every poet laureate is responsible for writing a chapbook, so like a mini book of poems. So I have, you know, a living archive of all the poems I wrote at that time. Right. Do you ever go back and look at them, and how do you feel about them? Huh?

I think it's been a minute since I've looked back at them, but I think I have mixed emotions. Sometimes it's cringy just because I think that having a living record of things you thought as a teenager would just be cringy probably for everyone here. It gets people canceled. You know, it's also like a chance for me. I'm trying to do better the older I get to also...

treat my younger self with care and appreciate what I was doing at that age because I think you take for granted a lot.

Yeah, my advice would be go to that young girl you once were and give her a snack and a juice box because it always worked. After the game snacks. Oh, the best part of T-ball. I can see we're never going to get off that topic. You then became, and I remember hearing about this and being very impressed, the National Youth Poet Laureate. And what kind of, I mean, that sounds like a serious post, what kind of obligations, duties, ceremony, or otherwise come with it?

Yeah, so when I became the Youth Poet Laureate, the program was still relatively new. I was the third one. So I think the program was still kind of establishing itself in terms of what it entails as a role. I think it was still kind of, you know, becoming a real tangible thing. So you were the third one and there have been plenty since then. Yeah. So do you look at the...

The new ones, like, man, y'all got it good. You know, like how college athletes are getting paid a lot more money now. I don't know. I really think I only look at the new ones with admiration because they're younger than me. So I just look at people who are younger than me with admiration. But...

Either way, I think I would never trade places with someone who's like 19. No matter what I'm going through. And you're 25 right now. Yeah. Okay. Almost 25 in a couple weeks. You're not 25 yet? She's 24. You're at that age? She's like, yeah, back in the day when I was just 19. 24 and a half.

Let's talk about your music. So you have a song about the various losers you've dated. It's called Head Blues. It's pretty scathing. And I'm wondering, what has that done for your social life? I don't know. Because I think that I am really associated with like-minded people. So I think it maybe only enhanced it. I feel like...

For people who needed that song, they really leaned into it. It's been fun to travel and perform that one in front of many different audiences. I had to perform at the US Ambassador in London, and I did that song for the US Ambassador.

And she was really cool with it. I feel like she, you know, maybe related, possibly. And the response was positive? Yeah. Yeah, well, there you are. The ambassador was like, right on, right on. She said, yeah, girl. Get them, Glo. Yeah.

Well, Kara Jackson, it is great to talk to you, and we've invited you here to play a game we're calling... It's a, yes, fun party. So you wrote a song called No Fun Party. Yes. So based on that, we thought we'd ask you about some really fun parties. Answer two to three questions correctly, you'll win our prize. One of our listeners, the voice of anyone they might choose for their voicemail. Bill, who is Kara Jackson playing for? Maureen Tarr of Natick, Massachusetts. There you are.

All right, ready to play? Okay, yeah. Sorry in advance to whoever I'm playing for. No, I just want you to conjure up the confidence of being a T-ball player and watching the fielders in the team back up because they can see you.

Getting ready to swing. Here we go. First question. The former executive of a company called Tyco was sent to prison back in the day for stealing money from his company to fund his lavish lifestyle, including a 2002 birthday party for his wife, which included which of these? A, each guest getting a new Mercedes-Benz in a giant bag as they departed.

B, an ice sculpture of Michelangelo's David that dispensed vodka from his little David. Or C, a musical background of instrumental versions of U2 songs played during the cocktail hour by U2. Oh my gosh, I don't know. All of that sounds so outrageous. But I feel like maybe it's B? It is B.

So if you think about it, it's sort of like a spigot, right? The ice sculptor. Anyway. Here is your next question. A British woman named Ivy Smalls celebrated her 105th birthday back in 2016. She only had one request for the party. What was it? A. Life-size blown-up photos of all her enemies that she had outlived. That's what I was wondering. That's my kind. That's what I was wondering. That speaks to me.

B, hunky firefighters with tattoos or C, pot brownies? - Hmm, even though maybe the last one is the most practical, the first one speaks to me the most, so I'm gonna go with A.

Life-size photos of all the people she had outlived. No, it was actually hunky firefighters with tattoos. Really? Yeah, that's what she wanted. That's fair. I guess I couldn't really put myself into, like, her perspective. Yeah, and that's what she says. I would like hunky firefighters with tattoos, please. And so the local fire brigade was like, we'll help. They even raised their ladder so they entered the party by climbing up to the second floor window of her old folks' home. She was very happy. All right, here's your last question. Get this right, you win.

Colleges are known, of course, for huge parties. And in 2017, one house party at a college in Maryland became such a rager that what happened? A, NBA scouts showed up just to recruit from the beer pong games. B, when the cops came to bust up their party, their breathalyzers all went off just from the air inside the house. Or C, the party became so big it could be seen from space. Okay.

Yeah, I'm gonna go with B. Sorry in advance to this person. You're right again. You're right, you're right. The air was so thick with alcohol that the breathalyzers on their belts started beeping. Bill, how did Kara Jackson do in our quiz? Two out of three, Kara. You are the poet laureate who won the game. Congratulations.

Kara Jackson is an award-winning poet and the celebrated singer-songwriter behind Why Does the Earth Give Us People to Love? And speaking from personal experience, she's a contact hitter who can hit with power to all fields. Kara Jackson, thank you so much for joining us on Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. In just a minute, Frog finally learns where Toad ran off to in our Listener Limerick Challenge. Call 1-888-WAIT-WAIT to join us in the air. We'll be back in a minute with more of Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me from NPR.

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From NPR and WBEZ Chicago, this is Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me, the NPR News Quiz. I'm Bill Curtis. We are playing this week with Alzo Slade, Sachi Cole, and Joyelle Nicole Judson. And here again is your host at the Studebaker Theater in Chicago, Illinois, Peter Sagal. Thank you, Bill. In just a minute.

Bill wins a Guggenreim fellowship in our listener limerick challenge. If you'd like to play, give us a call at 1-888-WAIT-WAIT. That's 1-888-924-8924. Right now, panel, some more questions for you from the week's news. Sachi, a new psychology study finds that if you want to preserve your reputation as a decent person while still talking about people behind their back, you should make sure you sprinkle your gossip with what?

I've never gossiped in my life, so this one's really tough for me. I don't know. Backstage, you were saying something about Peter. That was between us? You have to sprinkle your gossip with compliments? You're close, but remember, the person is not there. So it's all about, you're speaking about them behind their back. It's all about presenting a certain thing, a certain attitude to the person you're gossiping with. So it's like...

OMG, did you hear what Jeff did? I hope he's okay. You're telling people about it. Oh, you have to sprinkle it with concern. Exactly. Concern. Oh, I've been doing it wrong. Exactly. Yeah, I'm going straight for the neck. Exactly. And then I'm out of there. Exactly. I've been doing that naturally. Really? So maybe instead of me explaining the study, you can just give us an example. Yeah, because you'll be like, yeah, because you know, she was out there and then that baby wasn't hers. But also, that girl's blood pressure is high.

You know, that's... And you're worried about it. You're worried about her blood pressure. I've really been doing this wrong. Let's talk about her more. So this is a real example from the study. Instead of saying, quote, Kate is a drunken moron, science, science, say, quote, Kate got really drunk over the weekend. I hope she's okay. Okay.

That's pretty smooth, though. Yeah, it's really elegant. Yeah, it's really important. Joyelle, in a video meant to appeal to female voters, a GOP candidate in Virginia, running for Congress, posed with a wife and three daughters. One problem, though. What? Oh, my gosh. Alzo, do you know the answer? I do know the answer. It's pretty good. Did he have a fake family?

family? Yes, they were not his wife and children. They were somebody else's! Unexplained. Whose wife and children? He doesn't have a wife or children, so he borrowed some. He's trying to, this man is named Derek Anderson, he's trying to appeal to voters as a family man, right? So his campaign video ends with a candidate standing with this lovely woman and three kids who are in fact the family of a close friend of his and they all have smiles that say, how wonderful

How long do we have to keep smiling? And what makes all this even weirder, he's not married, but he has a fiancée. And he didn't ask her to pose with him for his campaign ad. Well, that would have been weird to have two wives in the photo. Yeah, I guess so, yeah. Depending on the state. Well, not in some districts, but in Virginia I think it's illegal, yeah.

Joelle, the New York City Council approved a landmark bill this week, finally making birth control free for whom? Mayor Eric Adams. You should be so lucky. I would have been a buy-in. Please. Give me a hint. It's hard. I mean, the reason you're not thinking of this is because you normally don't think of this. There are no love scenes in Ratatouille, for example. Oh. Ew.

- Ooh, rats! - Rats! - Well, that's good. - Rats are getting birth control for free. New York City, in their effort to eliminate rats and draw attention away from whatever Eric Adams just did, will be seeding the streets and gutters with pellets of rat birth control coated in a sweet substance to make it more tempting for the rats to eat. So rat birth control, delicious candy. But for humans, it's like, here's an IUD, it's made of knives.

I think it's good that the rats have more access to birth control than I do. I think that makes sense. I feel good about that. The problem is it's not consensual. What do you mean? They don't know that they're taking birth control. So you're concerned about like what, HIPAA for rats? Yeah, man. This isn't fair? It's not fair for rats. What if there's a female rat that wants to have children and she thinks she's eating candy?

She's a childless rat lady? Exactly.

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. You can catch us most weeks here at the Studebaker Theatre in Chicago, and we'll be at the Fox Theatre in Detroit, Michigan on November 14th. And this week, on our sister podcast, How to Do Everything, Mike and Ian help me fulfill a lifelong dream, the one that requires me to dress up as a sausage.

Hi, you're on Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. Hi, this is Bron. I'm from Chicago. Hey! Hey, Chicago! Hey! What do you do here in the greatest city in the world? I'm a sign language interpreter. You are? That's great! That's awesome. And who do you do that work for? All over the city. I do, like, freelance. So, basically, I get emails and I show up to where they tell me to go. I understand. And what is the best kind of event to interpret in sign language?

Well, my first degree is in theater tech, so doing theater stuff is really where I had the most fun. But also just anything where the job goes smoothly and everybody leaves happy. There you are. Well, welcome to the show, Bron. Now, Bill Curtis 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, two of the limericks will be a winner. You ready to go? Sure. Here's your first limerick. Here's a camouflaged Ford zipping past. Watch.

I hope Bigfoot is sipping his last scotch. With that truck's overhaul, it's the cryptid's last call. It's a bronco designed to hunt.

Sasquatch? Sasquatch, yes. There is a special edition Ford Bronco designed especially for dedicated hunters of Bigfoot. It's called the Sasquatch Searcher. It comes with everything you might need for your next cryptid hunting expedition, including a camo exterior, roof-mounted lights, and, of course, a really crappy camera so you can show your friends a blurry picture and say, see, I told you. I don't like this. You don't? Why not? It's going to set a precedent.

Now we're going to have Elvis, Tupac searchers. All these car companies are going to come out with cars searching for dead people. You're going to have like cars for like, you know, alien invader believers with no roof so they can just be beamed straight up. Exactly. All right. Here is your next limerick. Since bubbles affect madame's brain, what we'll do to Grand Cru's a damned shame. It's still a high price, but without any vice.

We're removing the booze from... Champagne? Yes, champagne. There's a brand new $119 alcohol-free champagne on the market, which is great news for people who love spending money but hate having fun. The founders say they created French Bloom non-alcoholic champagne because there are no, quote, alcohol-free festive and sophisticated beverage options.

Okay, root beer literally exists? I don't drink, so I don't even know what makes champagne champagne. Is it just the grapes? The region. The region. Yeah, the region of Spain. Yeah, but I mean, it's, you know. And also that it's gross. Right? Is all champagne bubbly? Yes, champagne is bubbly. That's just soda. No, it's the gross part. It's wine soda. Yeah, champagne is bubbly. It's sparkling wine, as they say. It sounds raggedy to me. Okay. Okay.

Here is your last limerick. At the store, I'm about to explode because this salad is not up to code. The mixed greens awoke and let out a low croak. Yes, my salad included a... Toad? A toad, yes. A woman in England was surprised when she found a live toad in her prepackaged salad.

That's what happens when you don't read the label. It clearly said, allergen alert manufactured in a facility overrun with toads. Are toads tiny? Toads are not necessarily tiny, nor do we know how big this toad was.

I feel like it don't matter if it's live in my salad. It's a problem. That's just bonus. Imagine, Joelle, if someone screamed, oh my God, there's a toad in my salad. Your first question would not be, how big? How big was it? Bill, how did Bron do in our quiz? Bron is the complete limerick player. Boy, 3-0, quick to it.

Well done. Thank you. Thank you, Ron. Thanks for playing. Take care. This message comes from Easy Cater, a platform where organizations can order food for meetings and events from favorite restaurants nationwide with tools to help meet dietary needs, stay on budget, and manage food spend. Learn more at easycater.com.

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Now on to 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 scores? Troy, Ellen, Alzo each have three. Sachi has two. Okay. Sachi, that means you're up first. Fill in the Blank. As part of her upcoming book tour, CNN says that Blank asked to be paid $2.

Melania. Diddy. Bird flu?

When he merged? I don't know. When he dressed up his passenger seat in a plaid shirt and tried to pass it off as a person. I can't believe I didn't think of that. According to new estimates, Twitter was worth 80% less than it was worth when Blank purchased it. When Elon purchased it. Yes. For several hours on Monday, over 100,000 Blank customers lost cell service. AT&T? No, this time it was Verizon. This week, a court in Taiwan sided with a son who had sued his mom after she blanked.

After she died. No, after she threw his comic books away. The woman's 20-year-old son was still living at home and was outraged when he found out his mom had thrown out his entire collection of Attack on Titan comic books. The court ordered the mother to pay $160 to the son to replace the comic books, though they did throw out the additional charge of, and we're all out of Doritos. Oh, my goodness. And get your ass out the house. Basically. Basically.

Bill, how did Saatchi do in her first quiz? Saatchi did well. Four right. Eight more points. Total of ten. That's a lead right now. Thanks. All right. That's a lead. I'm going to pick Alzo to go next. Here we go, Alzo. Fill in the blank. After reaching a tentative wage agreement with employers on Thursday, U.S. blank workers agreed to suspend their strike. Longshoremen. Yeah, port workers. On Tuesday, former President Blank celebrated his 100th birthday. The second.

Habitat for Humanity's president. Headass. In honor of him, I'll give it to you. Jimmy Carter, according to Nielsen estimates, over 43 million people watched the blank on Tuesday. Oh, the debate. The vice president's debate. On Tuesday, Claudia Scheinbaum was sworn in as the first female president of blank. Mexico. Right. This week, a Florida woman was released from prison after a test confirmed that the meth residue police found in her car turned out to be blank. Uh...

Sugar. Dried SpaghettiOs. What? That's what it was. It was on a spoon. On Tuesday, the doctor charged in connection with Friends star Blank's death pled guilty to distributing ketamine. Matthew Perry? That's the guy. This week, the New York Times published an explosive report that found many zoo pandas were blank. Many zoo pandas...

were disguised as dogs. Right. Although it's the other way around. I'll give it to you. They were dogs disguised as pandas. Yeah.

The Times says more and more zoos and circuses around the world have been painting dogs and passing them off as pandas. Oh, the fluffy. Yeah, the fluffy dogs. Maybe this is on us. We probably should have known something was up when the pandas at the zoo got so excited to see us they wouldn't stop humping our legs. Bill, how did Alzo do in our quiz? Very well. Six right, 12 more points. 15 is the total that leaves.

So, Bill, how many does Joelle need to win? Six to tie and seven to win. Here we go, Joelle. You know how I do. I'm rooting for you. Here we go. This is for the game. On Wednesday, new documents related to Blank's January 6th case were unsealed. Oh, Trump's? Yes. On Monday, controversial baseball legend Blank passed away at the age of 83.

A controversial baseball player? Yes. I don't know. Not Dikembe Mutombo. Not? No? No. No, this was Pete Rose. Oh, I've heard of him. Yes. This week, millions were left without power after Hurricane Blank swept across the southeast. Helene. Yes. According to a new report, parents of over 125,000 kindergartners filed for blank exemptions last year. Tax? No, vaccine exemptions. What?

This week, a man in Oklahoma was charged with stealing a car so he could get to court in time for his trial for blanking. Oh, Jesus. Cooking meth on a spaghetti spoon. No, for stealing another car. Thanks to melting glaciers, it was announced that the Alpine border between Italy and blank would soon have to be redrawn.

Switzerland? Right. I know geography. On Thursday, NASA bumped two astronauts from the Falcon 9 rocket to make room for those still stuck on the blank. International Space Station! Oh, some of y'all be listening. This week, hundreds of tourists flocked to a small town in Colorado to witness the yearly blank. Running on the whippersnappers. No, the yearly tarantula mating season. Oh.

You didn't even give me an email. Tourists from across the country travel to La Junta, Colorado every year to witness the beauty of tarantula mating season. Why not? It combines everybody's two favorite things, sex and spiders the size of your hand. That would terrify. Bill, did Joyelle do well enough to win? She got four right, eight more points. Her 11 means she's number two, and the winner is Alzo Slade. Woo-hoo!

Just a minute, we're going to ask our panelists to predict after chicken tenders, what food innovation will we be celebrating the invention of 50 years from today?

But first, let me tell you that Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me is a production of NPR and WBEZ Chicago in association with Urgent Air Car Productions, Doug Berman, Benevolent Overlord, Philip Godeka, Wrightsire Limericks, our public address announcer is Paul Friedman, our tour manager is Shane O'Donnell. Thanks to the staff and crew at the Studebaker Theatre. BJ Lierman, composer, our theme, our program is produced by Jennifer Mills, Miles Drobos, and Lillian King. Special thanks to Monica Hickey and Blythe Robertson. Peter Gwynn is our Peter Laureate.

Our vibe curator is Emma Choi. Technical direction from Lorna White. Our CFO is Colin Miller. Our production manager is Robert Newhouse. Our senior producer is Ian Chilag. And the executive producer of Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me is Mike Danforth. Now, panel, what food innovation will we be celebrating 50 years from now? Saatchi cold. I think it's going to be those chips that are so spicy they're sending people to the hospital. And I think we'll do it as an in-memoriam for whoever didn't learn their lesson. Joyelle Nicole Johnson. Ozempic cut oats.

The more you eat, the less you want. Alzo Slade. To get another celebration, the chicken tender is just going to make us call itself the boneless chicken wing.

Well, if any of that happens, panel, we'll ask you about it on Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. Thank you, Bill Curtis. Thanks also to Alzo Slade, Joelle Nicole Johnson, and Sachi Cole. And thanks to all of you for listening. Thanks to our fabulous audience here at the beautiful Studebaker Theatre. And to you, wherever you may be, I'm Peter Sagal. We'll see you next week. This is NPR.

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