Really Bad Analogies
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REALLY BAD ANALOGIES
...from The Washington Post's Style Invitational contest.
·
She had a deep,
throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up. (Susan Reese, Arlington)
·
From the attic came
an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when
you're on vacation in another city and "Jeopardy" comes on at 7 p.m.
instead of 7:30. (Roy
Ashley, Washington)
·
Bob was as perplexed
as a hacker who meant to access T:flw.quid55328.com\aaakk/ch@ung but got
T:\flw.quidaaakk/ch@ung by mistake (Ken
Krattenmaker, Landover Hills)
·
The little boat
gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn't. (Russell Beland, Springfield)
·
McBride fell 12
stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty Bag filled with vegetable soup. (Paul Sabourin, Silver Spring)
·
She caught your eye
like one of those pointy hook latches that used to dangle from screen doors and
would fly up whenever you banged the door open again. (Rich Murphy, Fairfax Station)
·
He spoke with the
wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he
looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and
now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of
looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it. (Joseph Romm, Washington)
·
Her hair glistened
in the rain like nose hair after a sneeze. (Chuck Smith, Woodbridge)
·
Her eyes were like
two brown circles with big black dots in the center. (Russell Beland, Springfield)
·
Her vocabulary was
as bad as, like, whatever. (Unknown)
·
He was as tall as a
six-foot-three-inch tree. (Jack
Bross, Chevy Chase)
·
The hailstones
leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease. (Gary F. Hevel, Silver Spring)
·
Her date was
pleasant enough, but she knew that if her life was a movie this guy would be
buried in the credits as something like "Second Tall Man." (Russell Beland, Springfield)
·
Long separated by
cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each
other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling
at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph. (Jennifer Hart, Arlington)
·
The politician was
gone but unnoticed, like the period after the Dr. on a Dr.Pepper can. (Wayne Goode, Madison, Ala.)
·
They lived in a
typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy
Kerrigan's teeth (Paul
Kocak, Syracuse, N.Y.)
·
John and Mary had
never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met. (Russell Beland, Springfield)
·
The thunder was
ominous-sounding, much like the sound of a thin sheet of metal being shaken
backstage during the storm scene in a play. (Barbara Fetherolf, Alexandria)
·
His thoughts tumbled
in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without
Cling Free (Chuck
Smith, Woodbridge)
·
The red brick wall
was the color of a brick-red Crayola crayon. (Helen Hopp, Yucaipa)
·
Oooo, he smells bad,
she thought, as bad as Calvin Klein's Obsession would smell if it were called
Enema and was made from spoiled Spamburgers instead of natural floral
fragrances. (Jennifer
Frank, Washington, and Jimmy Pontzer, Sterling)
·
The baseball player
stepped out of the box and spit like a fountain statue of a Greek god that
scratches itself a lot and spits brown, rusty tobacco water and refuses to sign
autographs for all the little Greek kids unless they pay him lots of drachmas. (Ken Krattenmaker, Landover Hills)
·
I felt a nameless
dread. Well, there probably is a long German name for it, like
Geschpooklichkeit or something, but I don't speak German. Anyway, it's a dread
that nobody knows the name for, like those little square plastic gizmos that
close your bread bags. I don't know the name for those either. (Jack Bross, Chevy Chase)
·
She was as unhappy
as when someone puts your cake out in the rain, and all the sweet green icing
flows down and then you lose the recipe, and on top of that you can't sing
worth a damn. (Joseph
Romm, Washington)
·
His fountain pen was
so expensive it looked as if someone had grabbed the pope, turned him upside
down and started writing with the tip of his big pointy hat. (Jeffrey Carl, Richmond)
·
She was sending me
more mixed signals than a dyslexic third-base coach. (Jack Bross, Chevy Chase)
·
Having O.J. try on
the bloody glove was a stroke of genius unseen since the debut of Goober on
"Mayberry R.F.D". (John
Kammer, Herndon))
·
Upon completing
kindergarten, Lance felt the same sense of accomplishment the Unabomber feels
every time he successfully blows up another college professor. (Anonymous, no city please)
·
After sending in my
entries for the Style Invitational, I feel relieved and apprehensive, like a
little boy who has just wet his bed. (Wayne Goode, Madison, Ala.)
·
You made my day,
even a day as gray as white cotton sheets washed for decades in cold water
without bleach like no self-respecting woman who came of age in the 1940s would
allow in her house, much less on one of her beds, but up with which she must
put whenever she visits one of her own daughters, just as if they had never
been brought up right. (DEV,
Madison, Wis)
·
He fell for her
like his heart was a mob informant and she was the
East River. (Brian Broadus, Charlottesville)
·
Even in his
last years, grandpappy had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been
left out so long, it had rusted shut. (Sandra Hull, Arlington)
·
The door had
been forced, as forced as the dialogue during the interview portion of
"Jeopardy!" (Jean Sorensen, Herndon)
·
Shots rang out,
as shots are wont to do. (Jerry Pannullo, Kensington)
·
He regarded
death with hesitant dread, as if he were a commedia dell'arte troupe and death
was an audience of pipe-fitters. (Brian Broadus, Charlottesville)
·
The plan was
simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might
work. (Malcolm Fleschner, Arlington)
·
The ballerina
rose gracefully en pointe and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog
at a fire hydrant. (Jennifer Hart, Arlington)
·
The revelation
that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife's
infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free
ATM. (Paul J. Kocak, Syracuse)
·
The
dandelion swayed in the gentle breeze like an oscillating electric fan set on
medium. (Ralph Scott, Washington)
·
It was an
American tradition, like fathers chasing kids around with power tools. (Brian Broadus, Charlottesville)
·
Her lips were
red and full, like tubes of blood drawn by an inattentive phlebotomist. (Greg Dobbins, Arlington)
·
He felt like he
was being hunted down like a dog, in a place that hunts dogs, I suppose. (Russ Beland, Springfield)
·
She was as easy
as the TV Guide crossword. (Tom Witte, Gaithersburg)
·
Her eyes were
like limpid pools, only they had forgotten to put in any pH cleanser. (Chuck Smith, Woodbridge)
·
She grew on him
like she was a colony of E. coli and he was room-temperature Canadian beef. (Brian Broadus, Charlottesville)
·
Her pants fit
her like a glove, well, maybe more like a mitten, actually. (Chuck Smith, Woodbridge)
·
She walked into
my office like a centipede with 98 missing legs. (Jonathan Paul,Garrett
Park)
·
Her voice had
that tense, grating quality, like a first-generation thermal paper fax machine
that needed a band tightened. (Sue Lin Chong,
Washington)
·
Outside the
little snow-covered cabin, a large pile of firewood was stacked like Pamela
Anderson. (Meg Sullivan, Potomac)
·
Her face was a
perfect oval, like a circle that had its two other sides gently compressed by a
ThighMaster. (Sue Lin Chong, Washington)
·
Fishing is like
waiting for something that does not happen very often. (Jim Seibert, Falls Church)
·
Her breasts
were like two mounds of flesh waiting to be compared to something. Something
round. Perhaps some kind of citrus fruit. (Jerry Pannullo,
Kensington)
·
Her
eyes were shining like two marbles that someone dropped in mucus and then held
up to catch the light. (Barbara Collier, Garrett Park)
·
The sunset
displayed rich, spectacular hues like a .jpeg file at 10 percent cyan, 10
percent magenta, 60 percent yellow and 10 percent black. (Jennifer Hart, Arlington)
·
The young
fighter had a lean and hungry look, the kind you get from not eating for a
while. (Malcolm Fleschner, Arlington)
·
"Oh,
Jason, take me!" she panted, her breasts heaving like a college freshman
on $1-a-beer night. (Bonnie Speary Devore, Gaithersburg)
·
He was as lame
as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was
actually lame. Maybe from stepping on a land mine or something. (John Kammer, Herndon)
·
Her
artistic sense was exquisitely refined, like someone who can tell butter from I
Can't Believe It's Not Butter. (Barbara Collier,
Garrett Park)
·
It came down
the stairs looking very much like something no one had ever seen before. (Marian Carlsson, Lexington)
·
The knife was
as sharp as the tone used by Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Tex.) in her first
several points of parliamentary procedure made to Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Ill.) in
the House Judiciary Committee hearings on the impeachment of President William
Jefferson Clinton. (J.F. Knowles, Springfield)
·
Joe was
frustrated, like a man who thought his claim to fame was occasional appearances
in a weekly humor contest, but in fact is known to millions as a stupid high
school student who writes unintentionally humorous bad analogies. (Joseph Romm,
Washington)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
REALLY BAD ANALOGIES
...from The Washington Post's Style Invitational contest.
·
She had a deep,
throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up. (Susan Reese, Arlington)
·
From the attic came
an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when
you're on vacation in another city and "Jeopardy" comes on at 7 p.m.
instead of 7:30. (Roy
Ashley, Washington)
·
Bob was as perplexed
as a hacker who meant to access T:flw.quid55328.com\aaakk/ch@ung but got
T:\flw.quidaaakk/ch@ung by mistake (Ken
Krattenmaker, Landover Hills)
·
The little boat
gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn't. (Russell Beland, Springfield)
·
McBride fell 12
stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty Bag filled with vegetable soup. (Paul Sabourin, Silver Spring)
·
She caught your eye
like one of those pointy hook latches that used to dangle from screen doors and
would fly up whenever you banged the door open again. (Rich Murphy, Fairfax Station)
·
He spoke with the
wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he
looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and
now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of
looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it. (Joseph Romm, Washington)
·
Her hair glistened
in the rain like nose hair after a sneeze. (Chuck Smith, Woodbridge)
·
Her eyes were like
two brown circles with big black dots in the center. (Russell Beland, Springfield)
·
Her vocabulary was
as bad as, like, whatever. (Unknown)
·
He was as tall as a
six-foot-three-inch tree. (Jack
Bross, Chevy Chase)
·
The hailstones
leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease. (Gary F. Hevel, Silver Spring)
·
Her date was
pleasant enough, but she knew that if her life was a movie this guy would be
buried in the credits as something like "Second Tall Man." (Russell Beland, Springfield)
·
Long separated by
cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each
other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling
at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph. (Jennifer Hart, Arlington)
·
The politician was
gone but unnoticed, like the period after the Dr. on a Dr.Pepper can. (Wayne Goode, Madison, Ala.)
·
They lived in a
typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy
Kerrigan's teeth (Paul
Kocak, Syracuse, N.Y.)
·
John and Mary had
never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met. (Russell Beland, Springfield)
·
The thunder was
ominous-sounding, much like the sound of a thin sheet of metal being shaken
backstage during the storm scene in a play. (Barbara Fetherolf, Alexandria)
·
His thoughts tumbled
in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without
Cling Free (Chuck
Smith, Woodbridge)
·
The red brick wall
was the color of a brick-red Crayola crayon. (Helen Hopp, Yucaipa)
·
Oooo, he smells bad,
she thought, as bad as Calvin Klein's Obsession would smell if it were called
Enema and was made from spoiled Spamburgers instead of natural floral
fragrances. (Jennifer
Frank, Washington, and Jimmy Pontzer, Sterling)
·
The baseball player
stepped out of the box and spit like a fountain statue of a Greek god that
scratches itself a lot and spits brown, rusty tobacco water and refuses to sign
autographs for all the little Greek kids unless they pay him lots of drachmas. (Ken Krattenmaker, Landover Hills)
·
I felt a nameless
dread. Well, there probably is a long German name for it, like
Geschpooklichkeit or something, but I don't speak German. Anyway, it's a dread
that nobody knows the name for, like those little square plastic gizmos that
close your bread bags. I don't know the name for those either. (Jack Bross, Chevy Chase)
·
She was as unhappy
as when someone puts your cake out in the rain, and all the sweet green icing
flows down and then you lose the recipe, and on top of that you can't sing
worth a damn. (Joseph
Romm, Washington)
·
His fountain pen was
so expensive it looked as if someone had grabbed the pope, turned him upside
down and started writing with the tip of his big pointy hat. (Jeffrey Carl, Richmond)
·
She was sending me
more mixed signals than a dyslexic third-base coach. (Jack Bross, Chevy Chase)
·
Having O.J. try on
the bloody glove was a stroke of genius unseen since the debut of Goober on
"Mayberry R.F.D". (John
Kammer, Herndon))
·
Upon completing
kindergarten, Lance felt the same sense of accomplishment the Unabomber feels
every time he successfully blows up another college professor. (Anonymous, no city please)
·
After sending in my
entries for the Style Invitational, I feel relieved and apprehensive, like a
little boy who has just wet his bed. (Wayne Goode, Madison, Ala.)
·
You made my day,
even a day as gray as white cotton sheets washed for decades in cold water
without bleach like no self-respecting woman who came of age in the 1940s would
allow in her house, much less on one of her beds, but up with which she must
put whenever she visits one of her own daughters, just as if they had never
been brought up right. (DEV,
Madison, Wis)
·
He fell for her
like his heart was a mob informant and she was the
East River. (Brian Broadus, Charlottesville)
·
Even in his
last years, grandpappy had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been
left out so long, it had rusted shut. (Sandra Hull, Arlington)
·
The door had
been forced, as forced as the dialogue during the interview portion of
"Jeopardy!" (Jean Sorensen, Herndon)
·
Shots rang out,
as shots are wont to do. (Jerry Pannullo, Kensington)
·
He regarded
death with hesitant dread, as if he were a commedia dell'arte troupe and death
was an audience of pipe-fitters. (Brian Broadus, Charlottesville)
·
The plan was
simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might
work. (Malcolm Fleschner, Arlington)
·
The ballerina
rose gracefully en pointe and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog
at a fire hydrant. (Jennifer Hart, Arlington)
·
The revelation
that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife's
infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free
ATM. (Paul J. Kocak, Syracuse)
·
The
dandelion swayed in the gentle breeze like an oscillating electric fan set on
medium. (Ralph Scott, Washington)
·
It was an
American tradition, like fathers chasing kids around with power tools. (Brian Broadus, Charlottesville)
·
Her lips were
red and full, like tubes of blood drawn by an inattentive phlebotomist. (Greg Dobbins, Arlington)
·
He felt like he
was being hunted down like a dog, in a place that hunts dogs, I suppose. (Russ Beland, Springfield)
·
She was as easy
as the TV Guide crossword. (Tom Witte, Gaithersburg)
·
Her eyes were
like limpid pools, only they had forgotten to put in any pH cleanser. (Chuck Smith, Woodbridge)
·
She grew on him
like she was a colony of E. coli and he was room-temperature Canadian beef. (Brian Broadus, Charlottesville)
·
Her pants fit
her like a glove, well, maybe more like a mitten, actually. (Chuck Smith, Woodbridge)
·
She walked into
my office like a centipede with 98 missing legs. (Jonathan Paul,Garrett
Park)
·
Her voice had
that tense, grating quality, like a first-generation thermal paper fax machine
that needed a band tightened. (Sue Lin Chong,
Washington)
·
Outside the
little snow-covered cabin, a large pile of firewood was stacked like Pamela
Anderson. (Meg Sullivan, Potomac)
·
Her face was a
perfect oval, like a circle that had its two other sides gently compressed by a
ThighMaster. (Sue Lin Chong, Washington)
·
Fishing is like
waiting for something that does not happen very often. (Jim Seibert, Falls Church)
·
Her breasts
were like two mounds of flesh waiting to be compared to something. Something
round. Perhaps some kind of citrus fruit. (Jerry Pannullo,
Kensington)
·
Her
eyes were shining like two marbles that someone dropped in mucus and then held
up to catch the light. (Barbara Collier, Garrett Park)
·
The sunset
displayed rich, spectacular hues like a .jpeg file at 10 percent cyan, 10
percent magenta, 60 percent yellow and 10 percent black. (Jennifer Hart, Arlington)
·
The young
fighter had a lean and hungry look, the kind you get from not eating for a
while. (Malcolm Fleschner, Arlington)
·
"Oh,
Jason, take me!" she panted, her breasts heaving like a college freshman
on $1-a-beer night. (Bonnie Speary Devore, Gaithersburg)
·
He was as lame
as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was
actually lame. Maybe from stepping on a land mine or something. (John Kammer, Herndon)
·
Her
artistic sense was exquisitely refined, like someone who can tell butter from I
Can't Believe It's Not Butter. (Barbara Collier,
Garrett Park)
·
It came down
the stairs looking very much like something no one had ever seen before. (Marian Carlsson, Lexington)
·
The knife was
as sharp as the tone used by Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Tex.) in her first
several points of parliamentary procedure made to Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Ill.) in
the House Judiciary Committee hearings on the impeachment of President William
Jefferson Clinton. (J.F. Knowles, Springfield)
·
Joe was
frustrated, like a man who thought his claim to fame was occasional appearances
in a weekly humor contest, but in fact is known to millions as a stupid high
school student who writes unintentionally humorous bad analogies. (Joseph Romm,
Washington)