The New Yorker Cartoon Anti-Caption Contest #78
Readers chose the worst possible caption for this New Yorker cartoon. Click here for details Click here for details.
Winner: "If I were a contestant on Deal or No Deal, I'd tell Howie that I was going to select the models in order from the skinniest to the fattest. Then I'd watch all the pretty girls cry." —Kevin G
Bonus: How the finalists were chosen.
Comments
"Did ya hear John Bolton resigned?"
"I think we BOTH can fit through those bars."
"I hate when the blankets don't cover your feet."
Posted by: Tim H | December 4, 2006 10:29 AM
What? It's like you've never seen two giants have sex in a prison before. For a peeping Tom you aren't very worldly.
Posted by: Charles | December 4, 2006 10:32 AM
"Baby, you put the 'jugs' in 'conjugal visit'!"
"You were right, Rocco: I'd never seen a prison with a Murphy bed -- and it WAS a huge turn-on!"
Posted by: gary | December 4, 2006 10:58 AM
"I think we should start anal-raping other people."
Posted by: J | December 4, 2006 11:23 AM
Well, you can thank Sen. Brownback, who just announced he was running for president. Otherwise, you would be fucking some rotten-toothed meth-head sent up on a Rock law infraction.
Posted by: 99 | December 4, 2006 11:25 AM
"Thanks for being content with my boyish androgyny. If you made me wear make-up and a dress I'd kill myself."
Posted by: J.D. | December 4, 2006 12:00 PM
"I'm tired of these columns. They're pretty, but they just aren't practical."
"Look at him staring at us through the bars of his crib. I wonder what he's thinking?"
"Yes, it's small, but at least it's rent-controlled."
Posted by: Deborah | December 4, 2006 12:09 PM
"This is bad! I mean really BAD!!! I mean really disgustingly BAD!!! B-fucking- A-fucking-D BADDD!!!!! Like DAB backwards BAD!!! Bad x 1000!!! BAD-ASS-BAD!!! So BAD it's not even BETTER!!! It's not even funny how bad it is."
Posted by: Carmen | December 4, 2006 12:16 PM
"Sorry, but you were a lot better when the laws of visual perspective still applied."
Posted by: RichM | December 4, 2006 12:21 PM
"Tonight, why don't I be Eva Marie Saint and YOU be Cary Grant in the Pullman car scene in 'North by Northwest'?"
Posted by: Tim H | December 4, 2006 12:45 PM
"So, I know this is lame pillow talk, especially considering we're incarcerated, but have you noticed how the artists for the New Yorker caption contest aren't even trying anymore?"
Posted by: Dan McCoy | December 4, 2006 1:00 PM
"So, in retrospect, this role-playing wasn't that sexy. Sorry for making you spend so much money renovating the apartment."
Posted by: Dan McCoy | December 4, 2006 1:01 PM
"You know what we need? Slippers."
Posted by: Dan McCoy | December 4, 2006 1:03 PM
We're in prison for breaking the laws of physics and gravity. And smoking indoors.
Posted by: Patrick Broderick | December 4, 2006 1:05 PM
"marriage is like prison."
Posted by: michael | December 4, 2006 1:05 PM
No.
Posted by: 99 | December 4, 2006 1:28 PM
"So, Otis, what time does Sheriff Taylor usual let you go?"
Posted by: Tim H | December 4, 2006 1:36 PM
"My feet are cold."
Posted by: john | December 4, 2006 1:36 PM
"I don't know about you, but I have my eye on that 'Graybar Hotel' ashtray."
Posted by: Tim H | December 4, 2006 1:49 PM
"This is the worst relationship/prison/drawing/physical condition I've ever been in."
"I'm so high I can't tell if my foot is sticking out that window or not."
"So there I was in Ibiza standing on the bar screaming til my face was blue about how much I hate female pubic hair and the next thing you know, zap, Gitmo. How about you, Bruce Willis?"
So, Sluggo and Peppermint Patty finally did it, eh? Truly, if you can't be with the one you love, love the one you're with. So I assume she's saying "I can hear Jughead and Cathy having sex next door."
"Now that's what I call extraordinary rendition!"
"I hope you don't mind that I smoke after sex, Anne Coulter."
Posted by: TG Gibbon | December 4, 2006 1:55 PM
"Putting double-sided tape on our buttocks was a brilliant idea! I haven't accidentally slid feet-first out of bed in weeks."
Posted by: Francis | December 4, 2006 2:04 PM
"Who knew they'd have Dux beds in prison?'
Posted by: Tim H | December 4, 2006 2:05 PM
NOTE: Please remember that observing the 5 entries or less rule makes my job easier and helps you focus on your best ideas. Thank you.
Posted by: radosh | December 4, 2006 2:09 PM
ME? The gramma police threw me in here when I said "5 entries or less." Obviously I should have said 'no more than 5 entries' or 'fewer than 6 entries.' Obviously.
Posted by: al in la | December 4, 2006 2:32 PM
"Look, isn't that the warden and my attorney in the cell across the way? Should we wave?"
Posted by: stcoleridge | December 4, 2006 2:35 PM
"Wanna go again, or shoud we escape frst?"
Posted by: stcoleridge | December 4, 2006 2:37 PM
"No, no, it's not you. It's just-- well, your stubble makes my clitoris really sore after a while. I should have said something sooner, I guess."
Posted by: Rubrick | December 4, 2006 3:05 PM
"I never thought I'd say this, but... being locked up here gives me new respect for P.C. Vey's mastery of perspective."
Posted by: Rubrick | December 4, 2006 3:09 PM
Please tell our idiot partners they need to be face DOWN in our crotches to be effective.
I can see why the artist made his signature illegible.
Posted by: Amy | December 4, 2006 3:19 PM
"And that is why they call me the 'chicken man' of Alcatraz. It has nothing to do with poultry."
Posted by: mypalmike | December 4, 2006 3:34 PM
"Somewhere there are smug sophisticates laughing at our predicament."
Posted by: J.D. | December 4, 2006 3:38 PM
"My sleep number is 3. Thanks for asking. Ah, that's much better."
Posted by: mypalmike | December 4, 2006 3:41 PM
"Help! We're trapped inside a prison of bad perspective!"
And I still have FOUR left to focus on... HA HA HA, sucks to be you, Tim H! (Oh wait, did that count as one?)
Posted by: Vance | December 4, 2006 4:06 PM
Not a new entry but a correction. For "Bruce Willis" above read "Danny DeVito."
Posted by: TG Gibbon | December 4, 2006 4:28 PM
"You were an English teacher on the outside, right? Is it ironic they gave me a female cellmate, considering I'm in for rape, or just coincidental?"
Posted by: David John | December 4, 2006 5:10 PM
Buck up, man, it happens to everyone once in a while. Take these next 15 years to work on that problem. And while you're at it, use that time to get used to me taking care of myself if you are going to lie there all limp-dicked and forlorn.
Posted by: Charles | December 4, 2006 5:29 PM
I know who I was when I got up in the morning, But I'm pretty sure I've been changed been changed a few times since then. I can't explain myself, I'm afraid...because I'm not myself you see...what are we smoking anyway?
Posted by: simsburybear | December 4, 2006 6:43 PM
Worst possible caption:
Mom, we have to stop meeting like this.
Posted by: snobunny | December 4, 2006 7:28 PM
"I wish I hadn't traded our mattress for that pack of cigs."
Posted by: lilpupdog | December 4, 2006 8:16 PM
Hey, I can see my house from here!
Posted by: King Ed Ra | December 4, 2006 10:55 PM
"Hey, we both have ten toes!!"
Posted by: Slip Whitsun | December 4, 2006 11:35 PM
For years it's doubtlessly crossed all our minds, and now at last the question is realized on paper: What if M.C. Escher were just really, really, really bad at drawing?
Posted by: Vance | December 5, 2006 1:26 AM
"I wouldn't mind the bed being angled right into the window, if it weren't for that goddamn floodlight right out there."
Posted by: Vance | December 5, 2006 1:29 AM
"When the Red Cross gets here, I'm going to complain that this woman lying in my bed smoking offends my strict Muslim beliefs, and that my cell is totally out of perspective."
Posted by: John Tabin | December 5, 2006 2:53 AM
Don't be fooled by the badly-drawn perspective. I'm still Jenny from the block.
Are those my feet, or has that psychopath who arranges severed human feet way down at the end of people's beds been here again?
Posted by: Walt | December 5, 2006 7:35 AM
"Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens, for starters. Why?"
Posted by: Sanford6 | December 5, 2006 7:39 AM
"What else can you do?"
Posted by: DavidW | December 5, 2006 8:02 AM
No, it's not just the perspective. You really do have a small penis.
Posted by: npm | December 5, 2006 9:21 AM
"Wow honey, that was surreal."
Posted by: Hookah | December 5, 2006 9:25 AM
You call THAT a Lethal Injection?
Posted by: AJ | December 5, 2006 9:39 AM
"Thanks. And I was here just visiting my brother."
"Well, dear, the afterglow could be affected BECAUSE WE'RE IN PRISON!"
"If we put the bed the other way, the blood could rush to your head, if you catch my drift."
"Don't worry-it probably happens all the time to real men who've been in prison for 277 days and haven't been with a woman."
"What? I don't hear anything."
Posted by: Greg Gunderson | December 5, 2006 9:54 AM
I'm just your non-emotionally anchored boy-toy & you're just a badass prison plaything I use for my own orally fixated gratification ... just like I use this cigarette. The fact that we have so much in common, like not being able to tolerate having our feet under the covers and elevating the headboard to avoid GERD, doesn't change a thing, believe me.
Posted by: SK | December 5, 2006 10:28 AM
The widely spaced configuration of the bars is conducive to allowing this cigarette smoke to escape, so don't worry about "second-hand smoke." Besides, what do you want? Eiderdown quilts and breakfast in bed or me having a nicotine fit? You know we made our choices when we got here.
Posted by: SK | December 5, 2006 10:36 AM
If we knock out the wall where the ineffectual bars are, we can put in a "chef's kitchen" complete with granite countertops and a Viking Range.
Posted by: SK | December 5, 2006 10:37 AM
Well, Timmy ... "Timmy" is your cartoon prison name, isn't it? Oh that's right, you said you couldn't get it up unless I called you "Tommy."
Posted by: SK | December 5, 2006 10:40 AM
I can't believe this "Worst Possible Caption" writer contestant is gonna blow #5 entry with this run-on claptrap -- their last shot at gaining attention for their under- appreciated extraordinary wit and command of the English language -- even if they do use "hyphens" way too much -- but how do you control the larger, real-life world of Meat-Beings beyond those bars? They do what they please and they make us look like fools and I'm sick of it.
Posted by: SK | December 5, 2006 10:51 AM
It still felt gay to me.
Posted by: Charles | December 5, 2006 11:25 AM
relax hon- everyone gets buyer's remorse.
Posted by: Owen | December 5, 2006 11:30 AM
I like "tossing the salad".
Posted by: Rob | December 5, 2006 12:16 PM
"Omigod, Frank, I think I figured out the visual conundrum we're imprisoned in! I leaned over and looked through those bars on the door, and you know what I saw in there? A tiny couple with a post-coital cigarette in a tilted-up bed!"
Posted by: Vance | December 5, 2006 12:39 PM
"Blah, blah, blah" - Carl Gable.
Posted by: RichM | December 5, 2006 4:45 PM
"The equation for center of gravity? I think it's sigma d W divided by sigma W where d is the distance to the datum and W is the weight."
Posted by: danny | December 5, 2006 5:48 PM
"Y'know, for 99.9 percent of the world's women, 'I can smell your cunt' is a lousy pickup line. How'd you know I was part of the .1 percent?"
"Honey, you're so good, it should be against the law. Much like wire fraud, which is why you're here."
"Perhaps, had this been a typical scene, audiences wouldn't have been so indifferent to a movie titled 'Let's Go to Prison'."
Posted by: Tim C. | December 5, 2006 6:08 PM
Fifty years ago I'd have you upside down with a fucking fork up your ass.
Posted by: Jeff in tampa | December 5, 2006 7:04 PM
"Well, it's been a lovely evening, except for when you Krazy-Glued a pair of drinking glasses to both sides of your head."
Posted by: Slide | December 5, 2006 7:48 PM
Marriott really screws you over when you use Rewards points, don't they?
Posted by: npm | December 5, 2006 8:07 PM
"I really like your left jab."
Posted by: Hondo | December 5, 2006 8:19 PM
"My bad. I thought they said this was a penis institution."
Posted by: Cornbread | December 5, 2006 8:27 PM
"Really bad Feng Shui, Lester. The bed should be facing the door."
Posted by: Alvin | December 5, 2006 8:33 PM
Prison just ain't the same when the sex is consensual.
Posted by: Gregory | December 5, 2006 9:46 PM
I never noticed...I only have four toes on my right foot.
Posted by: A to the K | December 5, 2006 10:01 PM
"I don't get it. Nothing happens in the fifth panel."
Posted by: J | December 5, 2006 11:28 PM
They call it surviving, I call it love.
Posted by: thewatchlist | December 6, 2006 12:04 AM
"I'd kill for a cigarette."
Posted by: mypalmike | December 6, 2006 12:28 AM
"So, where do you think we should go on our honeym-- oh, right. Never mind."
"You never take me anywhere."
Posted by: Tim C. | December 6, 2006 12:54 AM
"It's surprising how few people really notice what's going on beneath their feet in the storm drains."
Posted by: drg | December 6, 2006 2:07 AM
"You're a sweet man, Lester, but I am starting to feel a little trapped."
Posted by: drg | December 6, 2006 2:09 AM
"By the way, I am not YOUR bitch. You are MY bitch."
Posted by: drg | December 6, 2006 2:52 AM
"Nice apartment. Small, but cozy. Great for these afternoon rendezvous. Hey, is that a video camera hidden in the heating vent?"
Posted by: mypalmike | December 6, 2006 3:03 AM
God I wish this would become a smoke-free building so we'd have to go outside to puff.
Posted by: Amy | December 6, 2006 7:48 AM
"Next time I sign up for one of these grad school psych experiments, I think I'd rather be one of the guards who gets to slowly disintegrate into fascist dementia and sadism. How about you?"
Posted by: David John | December 6, 2006 11:45 AM
(I'm sorry to revive the default caption, but it actually pertains here...)
"Go fuck yourself."
Posted by: Old Hag | December 6, 2006 12:18 PM
Who did you have to blow to get a smoking room?
Posted by: Glenn Fitzgibbons | December 6, 2006 12:40 PM
After a long night of drinking, Danny Devito wakes up and wonders how he wound up in jail with Taylor Hanson.
Posted by: will | December 6, 2006 1:41 PM
"So I says to Mabel, I says..."
Posted by: Will | December 6, 2006 1:46 PM
"I wonder how Meridith Vieira is doing at my old job."
Posted by: Will | December 6, 2006 1:50 PM
"Congratulations, Daniel Radosh, on the well-deserved recognition, and thanks for the Newsweek article. The extra level of irony of your brilliant Anti-Caption contest often makes it chocolate-milk-squirting-out-of-your-nose funny. I've often thought that many of the entries I read here would be better submitted to the New Yorker contest though, as they are clever and humorous in a conventional way, nothing anti- about them. I myself am a finalist for the week whose results will be announced on Dec. 11 (grand piano in corporate boardroom) for a caption I never would have submitted here. Now that I learn it was chosen out of 7,000 I guess I should be, I dunno, impressed? I've been having fun in your AntiCapCon for a few months now -- my first effort was chosen as a finalist, and I was honored to have won a few weeks ago, and those captions I would never have sent to the New Yorker. Of course I have no objectivity about my ideas -- just screwing around -- but intuitively I think I have the gist of what goes where. I guess I should be totally ashamed that The New Yorker nominated my entry, as I agree their winners do massively suck. As I am a social whore, however, I am reveling in the random comments from well-wishers, so fuck that."
[cred. Anonymous]
Posted by: J | December 6, 2006 2:00 PM
"I bet no one can tell that those are my feet on your side of the bed and that your feet are on my side of the bed, and that we are both even taller than we at first appear."
Posted by: Francis | December 6, 2006 3:12 PM
"I guess we shouldn't have eaten our baby."
Posted by: Ted | December 6, 2006 3:53 PM
"This bed is hanging crooked, so I can't sleep and am smoking a cigarette. Furthermore the kids have been down there for ages and I think they've stopped moving, so that's got me a little anxious as well."
Posted by: intepid | December 6, 2006 5:24 PM
"Remember, Honey, we're having the Aryans over tomorrow to fuck prags and play checkers."
Posted by: David John | December 6, 2006 7:04 PM
"Norman Mailer would eat Charles Bukowski for breakfast!"
Posted by: Cosmo | December 6, 2006 8:59 PM
"If I were a contestant on Deal or No Deal, I'd tell Howie that I was going to select the models in order from the skinniest to the fattest. Then I'd watch all the pretty girls cry."
Posted by: Kevin G | December 6, 2006 9:40 PM
I'm feeling rather presidential today -- getting screwed with no exit strategy.
Posted by: Dex | December 6, 2006 9:42 PM
Oh crap, we're gonna be busted, I forgot to take the battery out of the smoke alarm again...
Posted by: Rich | December 7, 2006 1:00 AM
"I'm not gay or anything, but this was always my biggest fantasy on the outside, except I imagined you would be a muscular black man with an enormous penis."
Posted by: J.D. | December 7, 2006 4:05 AM
Christ, what an asshole.
Posted by: Ted | December 7, 2006 11:13 AM
It was just a little trans-fat!
Posted by: Ted | December 7, 2006 11:14 AM
"This is our future, K-Fed.
I got my outfit planned for when we'd get outta here, and it does NOT include panties!"
"The bars are never open around here."
"I'm not shavin' 'down there' until you lose the stubble, Bubba. I may smell like old cheese, but I don't want you to be the grater."
"We may be solemates, soulmates and cellmates, but our New Yorker caption will still be lame as hell."
"I thought you were from Penn State, but then again I'm dyslexic."
Posted by: LR | December 7, 2006 12:33 PM
"This is our future, K-Fed.
I got my outfit planned for when we'd get outta here, and it does NOT include panties!"
"The bars are never open around here."
"I'm not shavin' 'down there' until you lose the stubble, Bubba. I may smell like old cheese, but I don't want you to be the grater."
"We may be solemates, soulmates and cellmates, but our New Yorker caption will still be lame as hell."
"I thought you were from Penn State, but then again I'm dyslexic."
Posted by: LR | December 7, 2006 12:33 PM
"This is our future, K-Fed.
I got my outfit planned for when we'd get outta here, and it does NOT include panties!"
"The bars are never open around here."
"I'm not shavin' 'down there' until you lose the stubble, Bubba. I may smell like old cheese, but I don't want you to be the grater."
"We may be solemates, soulmates and cellmates, but our New Yorker caption will still be lame as hell."
"I thought you were from Penn State, but then again I'm dyslexic."
Posted by: LR | December 7, 2006 12:37 PM
"Tom, I don't care what they called you back in your Washington days...'Delay' is actually more fitting than 'The Hammer.'
Posted by: al in la | December 7, 2006 1:17 PM
Heyyyyyy, that's fifteen captions from you by my count. Officer!
Posted by: Vance | December 7, 2006 1:19 PM
Man, I can't believe I just used up my last comment on an in-joke that was ill-timed.
Posted by: Vance | December 7, 2006 1:20 PM
"I just realized, this is the first year we won't be there to see our kids open up their presents Christmas morning."
Posted by: David John | December 7, 2006 2:26 PM
"...penny for your thoughts?"
Posted by: murph | December 7, 2006 3:21 PM
"If you're hoping to have another conjugal visit, I'd suggest you work on your game."
Posted by: Michael | December 7, 2006 5:40 PM
"And they say I'm soft on crime."
Posted by: jason | December 7, 2006 6:13 PM
"Now you know why I was the FBI's most wanted "
Posted by: danny | December 7, 2006 7:02 PM
"Place your hands behind your head and step away from my body."
Posted by: Sanford6 | December 7, 2006 8:13 PM
I just shit myself.
Posted by: a | December 7, 2006 11:20 PM
"I can't watch the movie with you tomorrow in the rec room. They're transferring me to the AIDS ward first thing in the morning. Also, this might be a good time to mention, I have AIDS."
Posted by: David John | December 8, 2006 5:01 AM
I hope they have the chocolate truffles on the dessert cart today.
Posted by: Paul Windebank | December 8, 2006 5:44 AM
"A 50 foot woman did what to you? What the HELL are you talkin' about?"
Posted by: Cleo | December 8, 2006 7:37 AM
Why 5 submissions? Isn't that an arbitrary number? Why not 4? or 6? or 29?
Posted by: Hugh | December 8, 2006 7:49 AM
"New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg once wrote "Make the customer think he's getting laid when he's really getting fucked." I found out the hard way that's not good advice when it comes to raping people literally."
Posted by: J.D. | December 8, 2006 8:50 AM
Why 5 submissions? Isn't that an arbitrary number?
Yes it is. What, do you want me to calculate the best possible number for maximizing humorous submissions? Don't worry, I don't count, and I don't expect you to. I just want people to be aware that they should not be posting indiscriminately.
Posted by: radosh | December 8, 2006 10:39 AM
That was surprisingly good for a court-appointed attorney.
Posted by: Dex | December 8, 2006 11:29 AM
"This could be the meth talking, but there seems to be midget clown down there, but not to worry, I just shot him. "
Posted by: Will | December 8, 2006 11:36 AM
"I post indiscriminately. Figured it'd be okay--I mean everyone does it, right? Turns out radosh was wearing a wire."
Posted by: al in la | December 8, 2006 12:34 PM
"Three days, and I've yet to see a single fireman slide down."
Posted by: J | December 8, 2006 12:35 PM
"I hear if you haven't killed four or more people, you get a much more comfortable cot that isn't as hard to climb into."
Posted by: Francis | December 8, 2006 12:36 PM
"You know my hockey coach used to say I couldn't score in a women's prison...boy was he wrong."
Posted by: al in la | December 8, 2006 12:39 PM
"Now you know why I was the FBI's most 'wanted'."
Posted by: danny | December 8, 2006 2:08 PM
There were those who laughed when I chose this over reading Lindsay Lohan's ramblings, but I prefer to waste my time fucking than waste my fucking time.
Posted by: Amy | December 8, 2006 4:31 PM
I should have told you I was menstruating so much before you performed oral sex on me here in prison. Tissue?
Posted by: rita | December 8, 2006 6:34 PM
I really would have liked you to wait for our spinal-separation surgery before you scalped Mankoff for not publishing your "How!" caption.
Posted by: rita | December 8, 2006 6:45 PM
"Next time keep the foreplay to 250 words or less."
Posted by: Damien | December 8, 2006 7:51 PM
You've got a small shiv.
Posted by: a | December 8, 2006 8:52 PM
"Years from now, when you talk about this, and you will, don't lisp."
Posted by: J.D. | December 8, 2006 11:09 PM
"I'm offended that they always portray the president as a white male."
Posted by: mutiple Miggs | December 9, 2006 7:52 AM
Anal sex? Where'd you get THAT idea?
Posted by: Alan C. Baird | December 9, 2006 10:29 AM
"Gloria Steinem couldn't carry Anne Coulter's jockstrap!"
Posted by: Jamal | December 9, 2006 8:22 PM
"That was conjugal."
"Honey, you put the 'con' in conjugal...." [apologies to gary]
"Okay, it's true. I'm the one who farted."
"We are prisoners of our passion, which burns almost as brightly as my Tiparillo."
Posted by: David | December 9, 2006 9:56 PM
"Wow, Pinch, you really meant it when you said The New York Times was gonna take care of Judith Miller during her prison stay."
"You know what this reminds me of? A cartoon I once saw in The New Yorker."
Posted by: Nell S. | December 10, 2006 12:22 AM
Don't tell Charlie Brown, okay?
Posted by: Joe | December 10, 2006 8:26 AM
"Slide the toilet out from under the bed, will ya? I've gotta go really bad!"
Posted by: wrinkle | December 10, 2006 9:52 AM
I bet you say that to all the girls you sleep with... and then stalk outside their house and murder.
Posted by: potsy | December 10, 2006 12:08 PM
Now watch.. when I move my left foot, both our heads move..
Posted by: John | December 10, 2006 12:45 PM
"Hey, look, a joke about two prison inmates and neither one is black, what are the odds of THAT?"
Posted by: potsy | December 10, 2006 1:26 PM
"So who's the bitch NOW?"
Posted by: James | January 12, 2007 9:18 AM
Howie said I couldn't take the model AND the case. I'd been better off with just the case.
Posted by: Me | January 7, 2008 10:35 AM