BILL KURTIS: From NPR and WBEZ Chicago, this is WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME, the NPR news quiz. I'm Bill Kurtis. We're playing this week with Laci Mosley, Adam Felber and Helen Hong. And here again is your host, reminding his parents this is technically a real job, Peter Segal.
PETER SAGAL, HOST:
Thank you, Bill. In just a minute, Bill pays homage to the great pharaoh Rhyme-ses (ph) 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. Adam, because of a shortage of rental cars, apparently many tourists in Hawaii are driving around in what?
ADAM FELBER: A vehicle crudely fashioned from coconuts and bamboo.
LACI MOSLEY: (Laughter).
SAGAL: In the manner of "Gilligan's Island"? That would've been great though, yeah.
FELBER: Yeah.
SAGAL: I'll give you a hint. It's great. You can head to the beach. You can go up to the volcano. You can help locals move.
FELBER: Vans? Moving vans? Trucks?
SAGAL: Yes, they're driving around in moving vans and trucks.
(SOUNDBITE OF APPLAUSE SOUND EFFECT)
HELEN HONG: What?
SAGAL: During the pandemic...
FELBER: Because you can still rent those.
SAGAL: Exactly.
HONG: What?
FELBER: Oh, man.
SAGAL: During the pandemic, many rental car companies actually sold off their rental fleets because, they say, we thought everybody was going to die.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: So now we're taking vacations again, and there aren't enough cars. They're very hard to find.
FELBER: Right.
SAGAL: And when you can find them, they're very expensive. In Hawaii, a small car is going for 800 bucks a day.
FELBER: Dang.
SAGAL: And then when you get there, they keep pressuring you to upgrade to one with wheels.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: So people are hacking the system because even though the rental cars are very expensive, you can rent a pickup truck or a van from a moving company or U-Haul...
HONG: What?
SAGAL: ...For much less money, so that's what they're getting to drive around on their vacations.
HONG: People are going to Waikiki in a U-Haul?
SAGAL: Yes, they are.
HONG: Are they...
SAGAL: And look; I just want to say to people who are doing this, it's none of my business, but I've done it both ways, people, and it is totally worth the money to hire professional movers to pack and carry you to the beach.
(LAUGHTER)
FELBER: Yeah.
HONG: I was going to say, if you're - you know, most U-Hauls only have seating for two in the front cab. So if you're a family of five - what? - are they just throwing the kids and the dog in the cab?
MOSLEY: Yes.
SAGAL: Exactly, you know?
FELBER: Yeah. Absolutely.
MOSLEY: Hold on.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Helen, (inaudible) New York Magazine, professional athletes are happy that fans are allowed back in the stands, but the play-by-play announcers are even happier because now that fans are back, they no longer have to worry about what?
HONG: The play-by-play announcers - they had to eat all the hot dogs.
SAGAL: No. I'll give you a hint. It really got dangerous if the players could ever figure how to get up to the press box.
HONG: Oh. Like, when they would, like, say snarky, horrible things about the players, the players could hear them, literally.
SAGAL: Exactly right.
HONG: Woah.
(SOUNDBITE OF APPLAUSE SOUND EFFECT)
SAGAL: So sounds travel in these big empty stadiums, and more and more announcers have stories from the pandemic where they would say something, like, oh, terrible play by No. 8 there. And they look down at the field, and No. 8 is, like, climbing up the rows of seats toward them with a dagger in his teeth.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: So, you know, it was a tough adjustment for people who were used to being drowned out by the crowd. It's always been a one-sided conversation, but now they'll go, what is he doing down there? And the pitcher is shouting back, the best I can.
(LAUGHTER)
HONG: That is super-awkward. And, like, what happens? Like, what - did this happen in hockey when they're notoriously violent and they have weaponry? Jeez.
SAGAL: Yeah.
FELBER: Oh, yeah.
SAGAL: It's bad. Now fans are back. Crowds, of course, are being kept small due to COVID. And - but that is pretty good news for the hecklers, though, because they're even closer than the announcers, and now they can know the players can hear them. It's like, we need a pitcher, not a belly itcher. And in the pitcher's like, hey, I have eczema.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Laci, the scientific community is all abuzz about a Tennessee elementary school student's science fair project. He researched the number of surfaces what touches during the course of a day?
MOSLEY: I'm going to go with hands.
SAGAL: No, not hands. I'll give you a hint. He didn't need to inquire. We all know it touches the litter box every day.
MOSLEY: Oh, cats?
SAGAL: What part of the cat?
MOSLEY: Cat anus?
SAGAL: Yes, a cat butt.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: That's right. The student researched how many services your cat's butt touches in your home. The answer - way too many.
HONG: (Laughter).
MOSLEY: Oh, OK. Yeah. I would imagine (laughter).
SAGAL: The title of the kid's project was, quote, "Does Your Cat's Butthole Really Touch All The Surfaces In Your Home?" And his hypothesis, quote, "if a cat sits on a surface, his butt will also touch said surface." So how do you do the research? He ran his experiment...
FELBER: I'm guessing an inkpad was involved (laughter).
SAGAL: Sort of. No, he ran his experiment by putting a nontoxic lipstick on his cat's anuses.
MOSLEY: No.
SAGAL: He did.
FELBER: Yes. That's how I would do it.
SAGAL: And then he checked the house for stains.
MOSLEY: What?
SAGAL: The boy's parents are very proud - he's got national press for this project - especially his mother, who just threw away all of her lipstick.
(LAUGHTER)
FELBER: Peter, you specified nontoxic lipstick as though there's another kind that sells popularly.
SAGAL: You make a good point, Adam.
(LAUGHTER)
FELBER: I'm just saying.
SAGAL: Great shade, matched the dress, almost killed me. Did you make sure this kind...
FELBER: Anaphylactic shock is not what I want tonight, so...
MOSLEY: You'd be surprised.
HONG: Wait; what did the cat say about the lipstick on his butt, is what I want to know.
SAGAL: I don't believe the cat - the cat was probably just no more annoyed than a cat usually is.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "KISS ME MORE")
DOJA CAT: (Singing) I need your lips on mine. Can you kiss me more? We're so young, boy. We ain't got nothing to lose, oh, oh. It's just principle. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.