ATL Idol: Week 2, Head-to-Head Round (Part 2)
Here’s the second half of the “head-to-head” round of ATL Idol. If you’re not up to speed on what’s going on, background information is available in this prior post (or just scroll down the front page to the post immediately below this one).
You can check out the second half of the head-to-head round, featuring the blogging of SOPHIST and FROLIC AND DETOUR, after the jump.
Here are the takes of SOPHIST and FROLIC AND DETOUR and MARIN on the same story, marked with each contestant’s avatar (at the top of each submission). We gave them this link:
Perrysburg woman tries to ticket MDOT for long traffic delay [Toledo Blade]
And a length limit of 300 words. Here’s what they came up with (presentation order determined by coin flip):
CAT ANGERED BY TRAFFIC, GAS PRICESBy SOPHIST
In news of the absurd and generally pointless, Carol Greenberg billed the Michigan Department of Transportation for the $16 of gas she wasted while idling in traffic. Greenberg was particularly distressed that her cat, Sammy, had to endure this ordeal while locked in a pet-carrier in the back seat for the 50-minute traffic “nightmare.”
Greenberg argued that the government should pay for her gas because traffic warnings failed to sufficiently explain how she could avoid gridlock where Michigan’s I-275 and I-75 merge. She also cited various environmental concerns and the rising cost of gas among other general complaints that make me dumber every time I read them.
Greenberg and Sammy encountered the debilitating traffic jam on the way back from Sammy’s veterinary appointment with an allergy specialist. I briefly toyed with the idea of suing Ms. Greenberg for the environmental damage she caused by driving the 86 miles from her home in Perrysburg, OH, to the vet in Southfield, MI; but the carbon footprint of filing a frivolous lawsuit does more harm than good.
When reached for comment about the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune and the legal ramifications of directly billing the government absent a valid contractual obligation, Sammy responded “Meow,” and then returned to furiously licking his balls.
I HAVE A LITTLE BILL I’D LIKE TO SEND THE IRS….
By FROLIC AND DETOUR
In this age of costly government incompetence, it’s good to see a citizen fighting back. The Toledo Blade tells us that Carol Greenberg of Perrysburg, Ohio spent a frustrating hour stuck behind the wheel in a highway work zone south of Detroit. The Michigan Department of Transportation had failed to post signs notifying drivers of delays around the construction area.
Mrs. Greenberg sent MDOT a $16 bill for the gasoline she figured she’d wasted idling in traffic.“Thousands of vehicles from both Interstates, including mine, sat an estimated 50 minutes, wasting thousands of dollars worth of $4-per-gallon gasoline, belching tons of emissions into the atmosphere,” she wrote.
You might wonder why Greenberg was on the road in the first place, given her concern about the atmospheric impact of fossil fuel combustion. She was taking her cat to his allergist, a 173-mile round trip.
When Greenberg isn’t billing the government for services not performed, she’s a fixture in the whirlwind of Toledo high society. The local gossip columnist has admired her looking lovely with shimmery makeup and a sparkly green, form-fitting gown, whirling on the dance floor at themed galas such as “Nights in Seville” and “Fabulous Vegas.”
The cat is listed in good condition with a patchy rash around his collar. He is expected to make an expensive recovery.
(91) Comments
Comments
Firsties
Perfect opportunity for a lolzcat, frittered away. Yawn.
this blog sucks
Nice work, F&D. You did the best job with this pointless subject.
The cat lady picture from the Simpsons wins.
The "Toledo high society" line got me. F&D all the way.
lat - what the f has atl come to?!
Hmm, neither of these are that bad, but I think F&D wins the round. Both of you beat the other two, though.
And FIRST!
And the winner is...SOPHIST
Hmm, neither of these are that bad, but I think F&D wins the round. Both of you beat the other two, though.
8-- thats crazy talk, clear win for Sophist
I love that cat lady picture Sophist... keep up the good work
Both rounds featured bad stories, but Sophist and F&D did MUCH better jobs with their material
Sophist wins easily. Not really a surprise. Frolic, go home!
Like the symmetry between F&D's icon and the Mrs. Greenberg with cat photo. Otherwise, both kinda lame.
F&D gets points for extra research.
Lat goes, I go. Lat stays, I stay. See Hoosiers (Jimmy Chipwood attending meeting to determine Coach's future at Hickory).
Sophist (with 211 words) takes this round by making the most of a dumb news story.
F&D--while better than Marin's head to head post, had the wrong spin on this nonstory (good to see a citizen fighting back vs. dumb lawsuit) and wrote a pretty awful post with too many irrelevant side angle links).
Schamazing Marin: I hope you are writing your farewell post. Better yet, post it on Narnia-or to “Daddykins”.
F&D just told us the story and apparently googled the driver's name, which didn't get any more interesting. How is other info about her at all relevant to this story?
I like Sophist's tone more. 3 points for the Hamlet reference, likely to be lost on most of the ATL crowd. Nothing like combining Shakespeare with something more crude.
Okay, I'll admit it... I laughed out loud at "furiously licking his balls" Could it be that I am actually enjoying one of the contestant in this competition?
The only thing I mildly enjoyed was, "...and then returned to furiously licking his balls."
I've been F&D's biggested critic to date, but she takes this round.
Okay, only one of the writers is funny... Sophist
these are better then Alex or Marin
Sophist loses for the split infinitive ("to sufficiently..." for you Hofstra grads). F&Dwins for the Toledo High Society.
Cat Lady fits with the story perfectly. Does she own the Toledo Blade or something? She shouldn't be getting free media for this
17 it's Jimmy Chitwood, but nice try.
What I don't get is how she figures that she burned 4 gallons of gas while sitting 50 minutes in traffic. That's the kind of gas you would burn driving 90 mph for 50 minutes.
Good job to both. Much better than the Alex and Marin show this morning
Sophist's story is the only one that made me laugh aloud. F&D loses the heads up, but is better than Alex and Moron.
let's get rid of marin first. f&d obviously isn't going to win the whole thing in the end.
If you are going to use a picture of the actual cat and a caption, then you have to LOL Cat it. F&D = fail.
Sophist did a better job of bringing the funny, but F&D did OK too. I agree with the comments that this was better than Marin and Alex.
"balls" all the way
1. Sophist
2. Alex
3. F&D
4. Marin
These are both MUCH better than the first two.
Gotta go with the ball licking.
Sophist is the only one to express appropriately snarky disdain for these terrible stories that they were forced to write about.
Huh, am I missing something in F&D's headline? What does the IRS have to do with anything?
of course sophist had to end it w/ more immature toilet humor (this time ball licking, last time animae porn). It's a shame that after all of his schooling, he still has the emotional intelligence of an 8th grader.
F&D...if you're going to have a picture of Catwoman as an avatar you may as well tie it into this story somehow
Based on titles alone, Sophist wins hands down.
38-- the ball licking paragraph starts with a Shakespeare reference. Sophist is doing a good job of keeping it balanced I think
38: "[T]he emotional intelligence of an 8th grader" is precisely what this site needs.
39 - Sophist also fails for having the Brain (mouse) as an avatar and not tying it in. Everyone fails, pick a new set of candidates.
Things that have gone horribly wrong with ATL:
1. Site redesign
2. New 'writers'
Maude Flanders makes an appearance with comment 38.
ATL=TTT
-Ranier Wolfcastle
Both are bleargh, but F&D is slightly better.
43 - I suppose. The Catwoman thing just seemed more striking to me because there's a picture of a woman holding a cat and then ANOTHER woman holding a cat.
Suckity suck. CPR. Stat.
I'm no fan of pointless stunts like Cat Lady's, but as a resident of Metro Detroit, I must say that MDOT does rankle the nerves. Our roads are terrible, yet they always seem to be closed for construction. And they MDOT does not understand the concept of properly staggering construction so as not to clog alternate routes downtown. Not only have they completely closed down I-75 south of downtown, but they have also closed down I-96 just north of downtown. I keep expecting them to shut down I-94 through the city too just to complete the trifecta. You would think that in Michigan of all places they would have figured out how to manage their major roads.
I fear for the future of this site once Lat leaves. All of the contestants are awful, to put it mildly...
According to the show, Crazy Cat Lady from the Simpsons got a JD from Yale. Random tidbit.
Woody Hayes swore he'd never buy gas in Michigan...this woman is just taking it further by billing Michigan for the gas she used.
loved sophist's post
Both of these are way better than the first two. I give points to F&D for research, but Sophist's writing is more engaging.
I cannot wait for this stupid contest to be over.
Uggh. When is this going to end?
Sophist's was more entertaining and it held together better. I liked the high society research in F&D's, but it really felt like a tangent...there's no tie between that and the actual story.
Are we really going to praise googling this woman to find irrelevant stories as "research"?
Sophist definitely stole this round. Good try F&D; especially with all the extra googling. However, your rendition was still pretty lame. You were better that Alex and Marin though...
All 4 contestants suck, but here's my ranking:
Sophist
F&D
Marin (although she's quite annoying)
Alex
Ranking of today's posts:
1. Sophist
2. F&D
3. Alex
4. Marin
What will that bitch Althouse find racist / seist about this week's assigned stories?
The first involved two large jugs; the second a woman with a caged pussy. But I'm sure she's more creative than that.
"He is expected to make an expensive recovery" is a much better finish than ball licking. Although, with this crowd, the latter is probably much more popular.
Welcome to ATTTL
ATL < CWT
one will remain come october. Guess which one?
Sophist wins. This post was the first in the entire damn contest to make me laugh.
Hey Lat how about a post from each of the contestants on what they would do to improve the site and in how the focus would change from what it currently is.
Edge to Sophist; F+D not bad (far better than Alex & Marin), but I fear that Ms. Detour lacks the requisite snark.
64 -- ATTTL! That's great.
62 for EIC.
This round, and this round only:
Sophist>F&D>>>>Alex>>>>>>>>>>........ Marin.
Sophist wins here, but Exley is better.
F&D did a better job making a post that can stand alone. Sophist's is more commentary than it is informative. With a post, I want to be able to BOTH (1) know what the heck is going on and (2) get a chuckle. With Sophist's, you don't really know from a quick skim what the heck happened. Quoting from the source material, the way F&D did, would help.
(You may call me an idiot for this comment, but recall that one of the judges has admitted that she's not even reading the posts she's judging in their entirety.)
71 - I'm entirely confused. Sophist's opens with the statement "Carol Greenberg billed the Michigan Department of Transportation for the $16 of gas she wasted while idling in traffic." Does your quick skim not include the first sentence because topic sentences are where quick skims usually focus.
Beyond that, Sophist proceeds to explain the precise roads involved in the traffic jam and that the reason for her trip was her cat's appointment. Is there anything Sophist DIDN'T make clear?
Both of these were good posts.
Sophist in a landslide for one simple reason - his post is actually funny. In addition, he properly rips on this wench rather than give her props like F&D does. F&D sucks. Marin sucks. Exley definitely sucks.
Sophist for use of Simpsons pic
ballsballsballs
F&D wins. The props are clearly sarcastic, people.
Sophist's picture is far superior, though, and I agree there was a missed LOLcat opportunity.
Also, what a whiner. Try navigating the 10/110/5/101 interchange at 5:00 pm on a business day. It's been ranked as the worst interchange in the country, and rightly so, yet amazingly I don't believe anyone has sued LADOT over it yet.
Hmmmm...
Although I like Sophist better generally, this post goes to F&D. I get that Sophist was going for the humor, but it wasn't successful. We need to be giving these people better assignments though Lat, the H2H rounds are never worth reading.
These were both decent posts, and better than the Alex/Marin matchup earlier today. I think these two contestants had the advantage of a somewhat better topic.
In Sophist's post, I found it off-putting that she shifted from third-person reporting to the first person singular to say that the plaintiff's grievances "make me dumber every time I read them." If the post is about the blogger, the first person is fine, but when its ostensibly reporting on someone else, its better to let the criticism come out more indirectly.
I found F&D's entry more interesting to read. I really liked the last line: The cat "is expected to make an expensive recovery." I also liked the fact that she did a little extra research, cracked wise about the plaintiff being "a fixture in the whirlwind of Toledo high society," and generally painted the plaintiff as being a rather spoiled and eccentric cat-lady. (If she were a lawyer, Lat might have called her a cat-diva).
Yesterday, I thought Sophist wrote the best post, and I was not at all impressed with F&D. But of today's posts, I think F&D's was the best.
1. Sophist
2. Marin
3. Alex
4. F&D
Anyone who feels the urge to critique grammar on a blog, whether in comments or posts, should go tackle a bus.
OFFICIAL rankings of today's posts:
1. Sophist
2. F&D
3. Marin
4. Alex
Alex has to go.
You don't have to make these long just because you have to write about them. Sophist wins but only because I'm pretending he wrote only the first two paragraphs and then stopped.
F&D; Sophist was too solipsistic. There's no "i" in "gossip blogging."
Uh, there are 2 "i"s in "gossip blogging".
Frolic easily wins.
Again, sophist is the only one of the remaining contestants that has any wit.
SOPHIST WINS! next!
Frolic in a frolic.
Frolic in a frolic.
Frolic in a frolic.
I go for Alex and think he is awesome!!!! He is gonna win no matter what anyone else says! Oh yeah!!!
I go for Alex and think he is awesome!!!! He is gonna win no matter what anyone else says! Oh yeah!!!
Everyone else sucks except for Alex he so gonna win!!!!!!!!
I am that lady who billed MDOT. And BTW, Sammy could not be licking any balls, because "Sammy" is short for "Samantha", and has no balls. So already you are assuming facts not in evidence. And ALSO, BTW, because of the publicity surrounding this issue, MDOT ACTUALLY CHANGED the way they notify motorists of delays. This was an act of principle, morons. And are you forgetting the money I pumped into Michigan to take Sammy to a specialist there? It is MY choice where to take her.MY choice how to spend my gas. In fact, this story got more BUSINESS for this huge vet clinic because of this story. A lesson I learned long ago is NAAGDT. And for morons who don't know what that means, it is NEVER ASSUME A GOD DAMN THING! Carol Greenberg