My Entries in the Moment Cartoon Caption Contest for July/August 2014

Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, here are my five entries in the Moment Cartoon Caption Contest for July/August 2014. This magazine's caption contest permits multiple entries. As always, the cartoon is by Bob Mankoff, who also serves as judge.

“It isn’t your client’s sexual orientation that bothers me.”
"Where does your client stand?"
“Do you both understand the gravity of the charges?”
"I'll have no flip-flopping in my court."
“… And three counts of stealing the patents to antigravity shoes.”

I thought my second caption was probably the best, but then I really don't get to make these determinations, do I? The finalists for this contest have now been announced and I am pleased to report that one of my captions once again has been selected as a finalist. Finally Princeton will be known for something!

Statistically, this means I have made it to  finalist status in six of the seven Moment contests I've entered, as compared with zero of the seventy-odd New Yorker contests. Of the six completed Moment contests, one year's worth, I've come up with the winning caption for one of them.

Moment Cartoon Caption Contest Finalists for July/August 2014

November 29, 2014 Update:  Winning Caption

Winning Caption by William Agress, Lawrenceville, NJ

Note:  Last go round, Mr. Mankoff drew a domestic shootout. My caption was right on the mark. It achieved finalist status. Alas, it did not win. See the winning caption for the May/June 2014 Contest.

If you wish to vote for your favorite caption in the July/August contest, you have until October 10. While you're on the site, you may also wish to enter the September/October contest yourself. I have already started on that one.

Can you believe the blatant error inscribed by Bob Mankoff in my copy of his memoir? Learn why my current goal is to win the Moment Cartoon Caption Contest a total of four times and put this whole sorry episode behind me!

My year and a half long history of entering any number and variety of Cartoon Caption Contests has been carefully archived within the confines of this blog. See for yourself what I've been up to.

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My Entries in the Moment Cartoon Caption Contest for January/February 2014

The first three times I entered the Moment magazine Cartoon Caption Contest, I was selected by the New Yorker's cartoon editor Bob Mankoff as a finalist. Unless it's beginner's luck, this must mean I do rather well when he is judging the contest. In contrast, in the New Yorker's own Cartoon Caption Contest, my most promising entries are routinely tossed aside into oblivion by the ghost of Truman Capote. So it goes.

Despite my having achieved the desired status of finalist, my Moment entries were never yet selected as winner by the readership. I had hoped to change that sorry track record with my fourth contest entry.

It is rare that I hit upon something while working on a cartoon caption that feels so right I can just put my pen down and relax. In part, this is because I don't use a pen and in part because I don't relax. Anyway, I stumbled upon what I felt was a rather nice double entendre while working out a caption for the Mankoff cartoon in the Moment Cartoon Caption Contest for January/February 2014. Ordinarily I have enough difficulty coming up with single entendres. In this case, I admit I thought I'd nailed it.

"This is going to blow you away."

Just in case I'd guessed wrong, I submitted the other captions I came up with as well. I admit some of these are a bit clunky, but I didn't see the need to keep tweaking them.

"I think 'cozy' is the word you're looking for."
"Now let's say an obnoxious neighbor decides to plant a smelly ginkgo tree...."
"The seller is willing to throw in a hundred rounds of ammo."
"It once belonged to Michael Dukakis, but he only took it out during campaigns."
"I'm afraid the contract is also ironclad."
"Be the only family in town never to fear a home invasion."
"What's even sweeter, most of your neighbors are pacifists."
"Frankly, no, I wouldn't invest a lot of time in the garden."
"You can probably forgo the plowing service."

I think it is well-known that Bob Mankoff plays a mean game of table tennis and of basketball as well. What isn't generally known is that he throws a wicked curve ball. Here's the one he threw to me.

Moment Cartoon Caption Contest Finalists for January/February 2014

Now the good news is that I've been selected as a finalist four times running, no mean feat, I suppose. The bad news is that my surefire vote-getter of a caption was passed over for a slightly ungainly caption that makes reference to a Presidential election of 26 years ago. In short, almost no one under 35 will have the slightest idea of what my caption is all about. Bob Mankoff, who turns 70 this year, can chuckle all he wants at my dredging up ancient history, but it's the under-35's who know how to do the online voting.

So, for those of you who don't remember, the 1988 Presidential election was a contest between Republican George H. W. Bush who was Ronald Reagan's Vice President, and Democrat Michael Dukakis, the Governor of Massachusetts. Democrats are afraid of being seen as soft on defense, so Mr. Dukakis demonstrated his military prowess by going for a ride in a tank. He cut a somewhat ridiculous figure, and the public was reminded of it constantly with a barrage of Republican attack ads.

1988 George H. W. Bush Campaign Ad

April 16, 2014 Update:  Philippe Theophanidis points out to me on Twitter the following New Yorker cartoon by Christopher Weyant published in the issue of April 14, 2014. Perhaps cartoon editor Bob Mankoff was too distracted by the promotion of his new memoir to notice the marked similarity between this cartoon and one of the Moment caption finalists. The New Yorker issue hit the newsstands on April 7 even while the voting on the finalists for this cartoon caption contest was still underway.

Christopher Weyant, "Good defenses make good neighbors."
The New Yorker, April 14, 2014, page 80

Christopher Weyant, "Good defenses make good neighbors."
The New Yorker, April 14, 2014, page 80

May 20, 2014 Update:  I never expected my first caption contest win on this one, but somehow here it is. There'll be no living with me now.

Moment Cartoon Caption Contest Winning Caption for January/February 2014

Note:  The Moment Cartoon Caption Contest is created and judged by cartoonist and New Yorker cartoon editor Bob Mankoff. His memoir will be published on March 25. In the meantime, you can read more about him here and, if you care to, here.

Bob Mankoff's New Yorker blog is here. Why not give it a go?

You can follow this link for Bob Mankoff's New Yorker cartoons in the Cartoon Bank.

Keep up with the latest cartoon news about Bob Mankoff on Ink Spill here.

Check out the March/April 2014 Moment Cartoon Caption Contest here. You might even enter the current contest yourself--it's a tricky one, no? By all means vote for one of the January/February caption finalists, particularly if you're over 35. April 10 is the deadline.

The voting is over now, but you can see the entries in the November/December Moment Cartoon Caption Contest here. See who won first prize for the divining rod gag. You already know who it wasn't.

If you really want to see failure on a grand scale, all my unsuccessful entries in The New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest have been archived for posterity here. Soon it will be a year that I've been doing this. The ghost of Truman Capote grins.

Danny Shanahan's website is here. His October Caption Contest hasn't really concluded yet. I reported the results of his first contest from April here. If a monthly caption contest runs twice a year, is it still considered monthly?

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My Entries in the Moment Cartoon Caption Contest for November/December 2013

Moment magazine is a bimonthly journal of Jewish politics, culture, and religion, so naturally they have a cartoon caption contest with each issue. The cartoonist and judge for all of these is Bob Mankoff, who just happens to be the New Yorker's cartoon editor. Okay, I'm in.

I was selected as a finalist the first two times I entered, a result far more encouraging than what I get from the New Yorker's own caption contest, which I figure has about one- or two-hundred times as many entries, ballpark. In a way this early positive feedback here has created a new challenge for me: how to concoct a caption that will once again be one of the the top three while improving my odds of achieving a winning caption, the winner being determined not by Mr. Mankoff but rather by a popular vote of the readership.

This month's cartoon shows a lab worker walking through the hallway with a divining rod while a coworker comments. The very first caption entered was "Mr. Nobel Prize can't find the bathroom," submitted by Jim Weis. Well, how on earth was I going to top that? Then I remembered that to become one of the three finalists, I didn't necessarily have to use the same approach. I decided to avoid references to the bathroom altogether and submitted nine captions, including three about alcohol and a couple of musical references which amused me no end but if truth be told weren't really meant to be serious contenders. I can do things like that sometimes.

"I'd say he's seeking out the nearest watering hole."
"He's got it rigged to unearth grant money."
"Research, my foot!  He's headed for Happy Hour."
"I implanted a GPS chip.  He's finally going to shul."
"Listen carefully.  He's humming 'Midnight at the Oasis.'"
"If you ask me, he's divining Concord Grape."
"Until now, he's been looking for love in all the wrong places."
"He says it works even better than JDate."
"He's trying to find his Ouija board."

I realize that some of you may not be conversant with my musical references. YouTube to the rescue:

Maria Muldaur

"Midnight at the Oasis" (1974)

Johnny Lee
"Looking for Love in All the Wrong Places" (1980)

As it turns out, Bob Mankoff didn't care for the men's room caption as much as I did, so I needn't have troubled myself on that particular score. What he did like was the second caption of mine, and that, thank goodness, was all it took to advance me to finalist status for the third time in a row in this contest. I suppose that "grant money" caption is a pretty strong selection from the ones I submitted. I mean, I like the Ouija board idea, but it has absolutely nothing to do with the laboratory setting, after all. Anyway, here is the roster of finalists for November/December:

Moment Cartoon Caption Contest finalists for November/December 2013

March 11, 2014 Update:  Winning Caption

Note:  You can read my blog posts about cartoonist and New Yorker cartoon editor Bob Mankoff here, and if that isn't enough you can read even more here  regarding him and the Rejection Collection, which he inadvertently helped to create by rejecting so many cartoons.

Bob Mankoff's New Yorker blog is here. It's always a good read.

Follow this link for Bob Mankoff's New Yorker cartoons in the Cartoon Bank.

You can read cartoon news about Bob Mankoff on Ink Spill here.

Check out the January/February 2014 Moment Cartoon Caption Contest here. You might even enter the current contest yourself and then vote for one of the November/December caption finalists, far be it from me to suggest which one. February 10 is the deadline.

Read my previous entries in the September/October Moment Cartoon Caption Contest here. It's a caption contest of Biblical proportions. I was a finalist then too, as I've said, but I did not clinch the prize. (The prize is a year's subscription to Moment.) My unsuccessful caption will probably resonate with anyone who has ever been a Bar Mitzvah, although it may be a bit shaky on theological grounds.

In addition to all that, about nine month's worth of my failed entries in The New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest can be found here. My new motto: "Just wait till next week!"

Let's not forget Danny Shanahan's website, which is here. His October Caption Contest is still going on, I'm pretty sure, and I have several entries in that one. I reported the results of his first contest from April here. If you want to know who to blame for my getting entangled in these caption contests, it's Danny Shanahan and the late Roger Ebert.

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My Entries in the Moment Cartoon Caption Contest for September/October 2013

After I became a finalist in the very first Moment magazine Cartoon Caption Contest I entered, there was no way I wasn't going to try again. Cartoonist Bob Mankoff created a great gag for the September/October issue and I came up with no fewer than seven entries. Moment is a magazine of Jewish religious thought and culture, and so I tried to fashion my entries somewhat accordingly.


This time around, I submitted my entries as I came up with them, rather than waiting till the very last minute. In this way, I attempted to preclude someone else beating me to the punch line. Here are my seven caption entries.

"Okay, so she left you.  Why go and spoil adultery for everyone?"
"Only ten commandments?  Piece of cake!"
"What do you have against vowels?"
"Why can't we all just do whatever we want?"
"Let's add one more about not leaving socks lying around."
"Why don't I carry that down for you, Butterfingers?"
"Well, I'm free to covet my neighbor's husband. Are you married, Moses?"

Well, there you have it. Adultery, socks, and a klutz who's about to drop the tablets. What could be funnier? Well, I don't get to decide what's funny. Cartoonist Bob Mankoff gets to decide. He just happens to be the New Yorker's cartoon editor, so he may know a little something about the subject of humor. Once again, he let me into the circle of finalists and I'm very grateful. Let's see what he thought was my funniest caption:

January 13, 2014 Update:  Winning caption

Note:  In his roles as cartoonist and cartoon editor of The New Yorker, Bob Mankoff has been the subject of not a few of my blog entries which you can read here, but can he draw a porcupine? As I explain here, we may never know.

Bob Mankoff's superb New Yorker blog is here. Yes, it's that good! I wish he would take my advice and write a memoir.

Here is Mr. Mankoff's New Yorker work in the Cartoon Bank. You get extra credit if you can name the founder of the Cartoon Bank.

You can read all the latest news about Bob Mankoff on Ink Spill here.

Check out the current Moment Caption Contest here. You might even enter the current November/December contest yourself and then vote for one of the September/October caption finalists. You can vote for the funniest, the wittiest, the most effervescent caption. Or you can vote for mine.

Read my previous entries in the July/August Moment Cartoon Caption Contest here. I was a finalist last time around too, you know. While I did not win the contest, I did come up with one of the best captions ever to use the name of a common household water-displacing lubricant. In addition, more than half a year's worth of my misfired entries in The New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest can be found here.

Danny Shanahan's website is here. His own monthly Caption Contest is going strong, particularly if you adopt a loose definition of monthly. As you may have surmised, I like to try my hand at the various caption contests that are out there in a contemporary variation of the old principle that if you give enough monkeys typewriters, you'll eventually find a Shakespeare. You can see my non-Shakespearean entries in his first contest here.

Today, my blog has reached 300,000 all-time page views. My younger daughter sums it up nicely: "Dad, you're not even getting paid."

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My Entries in the Moment Cartoon Caption Contest for July/August 2013

Up until this point, my entries in The New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest have been something of a disappointment. Part of the problem has been my lackluster captions, to be sure, but the other part of the equation is the sheer number of outrageously clever captions submitted, some 5,000 to 10,000 most weeks, I'd guess. You really have to be funny to stand out in such a large crowd, and I concede I'm not that funny.

Wouldn't it be great to find a caption contest or two with a more manageable number of submissions? Of course it would. I was surprised to learn just last month that The New Yorker's cartoon editor Bob Mankoff himself provides cartoons to be captioned for another publication, the bimonthly Moment magazine. He serves as the judge as well, selecting three finalists each month. The winning caption is then chosen by the readership at large. Moment describes its subject matter as "Jewish Politics-Culture-Religion" and quite naturally that includes a caption contest. Who knew? Imagine my astonishment to learn that for the July/August cartoon there were only about fifty entries. Fifty!

The format of the contest is similar to The New Yorker's but there are a few important differences. All the cartoons to be captioned are devised by Mr. Mankoff. Captions for each cartoon are submitted in the contest by leaving public comments on the site. While there are no limits to the number of entries one can submit, submitted captions are visible to everyone. (In that sense, this is much like Danny Shanahan's Caption Contest, the very first one I entered back in April.) I find this aspect of the format preferable to The New Yorker's because I don't have to go through the painful process of editing my beloved captions down to one and only one.

What I'm not at all sure about is the best strategy to use here. Should one enter early and try to beat out others who might be on the verge of coming up with the same general idea? Or should one save one's gems for late in the contest so as not to tip one's hand too early? I have no answer for this one. It happens that I entered late, but that was only because I discovered the contest close to the entry deadline. Next month's strategy remains to be worked out. This is how the Moment Caption Contest appeared when I first stumbled upon it:

The Moment Cartoon Caption Contest as it appeared when I discovered it last month. At the top is the July/August 2013 Moment cartoon to be captioned. The finalists for May/June are at bottom right, and the winning caption for March/April is at the lower left. All the drawings are by Bob Mankoff.

Here then are all the entries I submitted. I put my favorite caption first. I'd say the third caption is a close second and the fifth caption a close third choice. I don't know why I submitted the other captions. The cartoon, once again, is by Bob Mankoff:

"Since you're new here, you'll be winding on weekends."
"...And no one protests when we expose them to toxins."
"Our feed bills have gone down but we're using more WD-40."
"There you have it. Identical copies without the expense of cloning."
"There's a Nobel Prize waiting for whomever teaches them to wind themselves."
"No, I don't feel like reminiscing about live rats."

The incredible upshot is, one of my captions was selected as a finalist! While I would have gone with my very first caption, I'm not going to quibble with the cartoon editor of The New Yorker. That's not my style.

Pretty cool, right? Anyway, just so we're clear on the magnitude of this achievement, the number of entries in the Moment magazine Cartoon Caption Contest is about one-percent of those in The New Yorker's weekly contest.

The contest continues. The competition is stiff. Soon the Moment readership will select one of these captions to be the winner. The grand prize is a gift subscription to Moment. I'll keep you posted.


November 19, 2013 Update:  Winning Caption

Note:  Through no fault of his own, Bob Mankoff has been mentioned numerous times on this blog. See my blog entries here and here.

Bob Mankoff's New Yorker blog is here. The man can write!

Here is his work in the Cartoon Bank.

See news about Bob Mankoff entries on Ink Spill here.

Check out the Moment caption contest here. You might even vote for one of the finalists. Wink, wink.

This is my very first entry in the Moment Cartoon Caption Contest, but I'm not exactly new to the game. About five months' worth of my moderately amusing entries in The New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest can be found here.

Danny Shanahan's website is here. His Caption Contest was introduced in April but is temporarily on hold. I have a few caption entries on the back burner there. Well, is ten a few?

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