PETER SAGAL, HOST:
Now, on to our final game, Lightning Fill in the Blank. Each of our players will have 60 seconds in which to answer as many fill in the blank questions as he or she can. Each correct answer now worth two points. Carl, can you give us the scores?
CARL KASELL: Paula Poundstone has the lead, Peter. She has four points. Jessi Klein has three. Brian Babylon has two points.
SAGAL: All right. Brian, you are in third place. You are up first. The clock will start when I begin your first question. Fill in the blank. After a bomb killed many of his top officials, the president of blank reportedly fled Damascus for Russia.
BRIAN BABYLON: Syria.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Ron Paul joined those calling for Mitt Romney to release more of his blank.
BABYLON: Tax returns.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: This week the New York Knicks decided not to match the Houston Rocket's offer for star player blank.
BABYLON: Jeremy Lin.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Amazon had to make a correction after advertising the Sonic Care Healthy White Power Toothbrush as the Sonic Care blank.
BABYLON: Sonic the Hedgehog. I don't know.
SAGAL: No, the Health White Power Toothbrush.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Chick-fil-A president Dan Cathy upset many of the restaurant's fans by confirming that the company donates to anti-blank groups.
BABYLON: Gay.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: With 17 each, "Mad Men" and "American Horror Story" led in the nominations for this year's blank awards.
BABYLON: Emmys.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Officials in Auckland, New Zealand have replaced more than 40 parking sign poles after they were damaged by blank.
(SOUNDBITE OF GONG)
BABYLON: People crashing them.
SAGAL: No. The poles were damaged by prostitutes using them to pole dance.
(LAUGHTER)
BABYLON: Where is this?
SAGAL: This is Auckland, New Zealand. You want to book your ticket now? Is that true?
(LAUGHTER)
JESSI KLEIN: Free pole dance.
SAGAL: So the prostitutes gather on the street. That's legal there. And they get up there and they sort of spin around and they pole dance and it hurts the poles. The poles are breaking.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Local business owners are calling for stronger signs, but actually, it's a good system. What No Parking sign is more effective than a spinning prostitute?
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Like, I'm not going to park there. Carl, how did Brian do on our quiz?
KASELL: Brian had five correct answers, for ten more points. He now has 12 points, and Brian has taken the lead.
SAGAL: Well done.
(APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: All right, Jessi, you're up next.
KLEIN: Oh god.
SAGAL: Fill in the blank.
KLEIN: Oh god.
SAGAL: Jessi, testifying before Congress this week, Federal Reserve Chairman blank warned that the country could fall into a recession.
KLEIN: Bernanke.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Breaking Madeleine Albright's previous record of 98, blank has visited more countries than any other Secretary of State.
KLEIN: Hillary Clinton.
SAGAL: Yes, she has 102.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: The FBI launched an investigation after six people found blank in sandwiches on Delta flights.
KLEIN: Needles.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: A woman in Oregon took a unique approach to selling her home and put up a sign that said blank.
(SOUNDBITE OF GONG)
KLEIN: Call me maybe.
SAGAL: No.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: The sign said: Husband left us for a 22 year old. House for sale by scorned, slightly bitter, newly single owner. Carl, how did Jessi do on our quiz?
KASELL: Jessi had three correct answers, for six more points. She now has nine points, but Brian still has the lead with 12.
(APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: I see. All right then, so how many then - and I love saying this - does Paula need to win?
KLEIN: Weak applause.
KASELL: Five correct answers.
SAGAL: Ready to go, Paula?
PAULA POUNDSTONE: I believe I am, Peter.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: If I'm not mistaken, you've won the last couple of times you've been on the show, right?
POUNDSTONE: You know, the last three times, Peter.
SAGAL: The last three times.
(LAUGHTER)
KLEIN: But who's counting.
POUNDSTONE: It's water off a duck's back to me, Peter.
(LAUGHTER)
POUNDSTONE: I don't even think about it.
SAGAL: You've become the New York Yankees of WAIT WAIT...DON'T TELL ME!
POUNDSTONE: You know what, it's a day at work. That's what it is for me.
(LAUGHTER)
POUNDSTONE: If I happen to come out supreme, that's really just the way the chips fell. If it happens to have happened three times in a row, well...
(LAUGHTER)
POUNDSTONE: So be it, Peter.
SAGAL: All right, Paula.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: This is for the game.
POUNDSTONE: Makes me no never mind at all, Peter.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Fill in the blank.
POUNDSTONE: Yes, indeed, I will.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Longtime Google executive Marissa Mayer was named as the new CEO of the internet company blank this week.
POUNDSTONE: That be Yahoo, Peter.
SAGAL: Yes, it would be.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Don't get cocky, Paula. John McCain said he rejected Mitt Romney as his running mate 4 years ago not because of tax returns, but because blank was a better choice.
POUNDSTONE: Sarah Palin.
SAGAL: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Farmers across the country are dealing with the worst blank since the 1950s.
POUNDSTONE: Drought.
SAGAL: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Both Democrats and Republicans criticized congresswoman blank's statements about Muslim extremists infiltrating the U.S. government.
POUNDSTONE: Michele Bachmann.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Police in Germany arrested a man in Bergan, Germany after he blanked.
POUNDSTONE: Oh, and he shouldn't have done it, Peter.
(LAUGHTER)
POUNDSTONE: A man in Germany was arrested after he smuggled ferrets in his pants.
SAGAL: After he attacked his own reflection in a window.
POUNDSTONE: Yes.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: On Wednesday, 12 million schoolchildren in South Africa sang Happy Birthday to blank, who turned 94.
POUNDSTONE: Nelson Mandela.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Citing an undisclosed injury, tennis star Rafael Nadal of Spain said he wouldn't compete at the blank.
POUNDSTONE: At the hokey pokey festival.
SAGAL: At the Olympics.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: After a week long search involving 70 officers, a helicopter, surveillance cameras and a boat team, officials in a Bavarian realized the crocodile they were searching for was blank.
(SOUNDBITE OF GONG)
POUNDSTONE: Fake.
SAGAL: Actually a beaver.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: After reports of a quote, meter long creature with long tail and claws, police in the town of Standoff, Bavaria went into full crocodile hunter mode. But after a week, authorities now believe it was a beaver all along. They came to this conclusion after further interviews with the witnesses, careful searches of nearby lakes, and realizing that there are no crocodiles in Bavaria.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Carl, did Paula do well enough to win again?
KASELL: She needed five to win again, and she had five correct answers.
SAGAL: Oh my god.
(APPLAUSE)
KASELL: With 14 points, Paula Poundstone is this week's champion.
SAGAL: Well done.
POUNDSTONE: That's four in a row, and no doping scandal to go with it.
(LAUGHTER)
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.