CARL KASELL: From NPR and WBEZ-Chicago, this is WAIT WAIT...DON'T TELL ME!, the NPR News quiz. I'm Carl Kasell. We're playing this week with Roxanne Roberts, Luke Burbank and Brian Babylon. And here again is your host, at the Chase Bank Auditorium in downtown Chicago, Peter Sagal.
PETER SAGAL, HOST:
Thank you, Carl.
(APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: Thank you. In just a minute, Carl feeling a little frisky in a special Valens-trhyme's edition of the 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.
Luke, according to AAA, because of changes in automotive technology, it is no longer correct to do what?
LUKE BURBANK: To...
SAGAL: I mean and nobody does this anyway. Most of us drive now at 12 and cheeseburger anyway.
BURBANK: Oh, to have your hands at 12 and 2, 10 and 2.
SAGAL: 10 and 2, exactly. It's no longer correct to have your hands at 10 and 2.
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SAGAL: This comes from AAA, which is like Alcoholics Anonymous, but for cars.
(LAUGHTER)
BURBANK: Hi, I'm Mike. I'm a Hyundai.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: On your first day of driver's ed, they teach you two things. One: cars are fiery death horror machines.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Two: keep your hands at 10 and 2, right. But nowadays, we have airbags and if your hands are at 10 and 2, the airbags will blow your arms off.
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SAGAL: Besides, you need your 10 hand for your iPhone and your 2 hand for your iPad, so just make sure your knee is at 6.
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BRIAN BABYLON: You know what, I get so frustrated with car commercials when they show an airbag coming out so slow and soft. It looks like it's a nice soft pillow. An airbag will blow your head off.
SAGAL: It will.
BABYLON: It's not just this nice angel buttocks that just you float...
(LAUGHTER)
BABYLON: Yeah, it seems so soft on the commercial. Just oh, I'm safe.
BURBANK: You do feel like there should be a chocolate mint on top of it, right.
(LAUGHTER)
BABYLON: Yeah, it seems so, like so harmless. But it will knock your head off.
ROXANNE ROBERTS: Let's go to where are the hands supposed to be?
SAGAL: Your hands are supposed to be at 8 and 4.
BURBANK: Like a bus driver?
SAGAL: Yeah.
(LAUGHTER)
BURBANK: Like a common bus driver?
SAGAL: Luke, bourbon distilleries are scrambling to meet global demands for the suddenly trendy liquor, which is why Makers Mark bourbon announced this week they're going to do what?
BURBANK: They're lowering the alcohol content.
SAGAL: Yeah, they're basically watering it down.
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SAGAL: It's a foolproof business model when demand for your product is so high you can't keep up with it. Make it crappy so nobody wants it anymore.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: The company released a statement. They said that in order to increase the number of bottles they have on hand to sell, they're going to decrease the alcohol content by 6.7 percent. They swear it won't be noticeable to drinkers, but try explaining that to someone who is 6.7 percent less drunk than they want to be.
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BABYLON: I mean, you heard the crowd right there. They all went, ohh.
SAGAL: Ohhh.
BABYLON: Six point seven percent, I can't pull my pants down and walk down the street drunk like I used to.
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ROBERTS: Let me ask you a question.
SAGAL: Please.
ROBERTS: OK. Why would they share this piece of information? Do they have to by law?
SAGAL: That is a great question. Nobody knows why. You know, just do what you did when you were stealing booze from your parents. Just put some water in and don't tell anybody.
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BURBANK: That's the irony. It's all full circle. What they're doing, it's for convenience, is pre-watering down the booze for you.
SAGAL: In related news, Burger King announced they'd be horsing down their beef.
(LAUGHTER)
ROBERTS: Is this whole show just going to be disgusting?
SAGAL: Yeah, pretty much.
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SAGAL: Brian, it's tough to get Americans up out of their La-Z-Boys to exercise, but there's a solution. It's an exercise machine that is also a what?
BABYLON: Yeah, so the La-Z-Boy is actually a workout elliptical machine as well.
SAGAL: Exactly right.
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SAGAL: It is an exercise machine built into a La-Z-Boy.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Actually, La-Z-Boy is probably no longer an accurate term since you're exercising. So how about slightly less La-Z-Boy?
BABYLON: So is it like weights on the...
SAGAL: Well, it's like an armchair recliner with exercise equipment attached to it.
BABYLON: That's American know-how, man. I love this country. I love it.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: It's designed by German engineers. It's called the Gesund...
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Of course. It's called the Gesund Wohnen Mit Stil. It looks like a regular comfy recliner and sound like an unbearable art film.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: But it's got a built in rowing machine that folds out from the sides, so you can put up your feet and work off the calories in just the same position your dad slowly drank himself to death in.
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SAGAL: Brian, this week we read about yet another new wedding industry trend, something else to sell you. Apparently, in addition to wedding announcements, and save the date cards and invitations, couples are now also sending out what?
BABYLON: Oh, god, help me.
SAGAL: Imagine this, OK.
BABYLON: Yeah.
SAGAL: There's all the people you know and you want to invite to your wedding.
BABYLON: Got it.
SAGAL: And there's all the people you know you don't want to invite to the wedding.
BABYLON: Oh yeah, I got that list ready.
SAGAL: Right.
(LAUGHTER)
BABYLON: Yeah, I got it. It's the heads-up do not come to my wedding list invitation.
SAGAL: Exactly right. It's like the You're Not Invited notices.
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SAGAL: According to wedding planners, the new, quote, non-invitations, are a way of letting friends and acquaintances know they would be invited if the wedding was bigger, or if they were cooler, or if they were richer and would bring a cool gift. You might be hurt, but you can always enjoy sending back the new cards that are available to respond, such as the "I wouldn't come to your cheap ass wedding anyway" card.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: The "I bet it'll last a year tops" card.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: And of course, the ever popular "I slept with him first and you can have him" card.
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BABYLON: Now let me tell you this, this is the rub. If that thing that you sent me telling me I'm not invited...
SAGAL: Yeah.
BABYLON: ...is crappier than the one that you sent out to the people saying they were coming.
SAGAL: Yeah.
BABYLON: I'm insulted.
SAGAL: All right.
BABYLON: I need to have like some type of velvet overlay or something to let me know you at least care for me a little bit.
(LAUGHTER)
ROBERTS: A little piece of tissue paper when you open it.
BABYLON: Something. Something.
SAGAL: A lot of people I think would be relieved to get this. I mean, basically, a wedding invitation is a gift subpoena.
BABYLON: Yep.
(LAUGHTER)
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.