BILL KURTIS: From NPR and WBEZ Chicago, this is WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME, the NPR News quiz. I'm Bill Kurtis. We are playing this week with Adam Felber, Paula Poundstone and Alonzo Bodden. And here, again, is your host at the Chase Bank Auditorium in downtown Chicago, Peter Sagal.
PETER SAGAL, HOST:
Thank you, Bill.
(APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: Now it is time for the WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME Bluff the Listener game. Call 1-888-WAIT-WAIT to play our game on the air. Hi, you're on WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME.
DELIA LIUZZA: Hi, this is Delia Liuzza calling from Greenville, N.C.
SAGAL: Oh, how are things in Greenville?
LIUZZA: Hot, wet.
SAGAL: Yes, pretty much everywhere - humid. I see. What do you do there?
LIUZZA: Yeah. I'm a sign language interpreter.
SAGAL: You're a sign language interpreter. That is noble and good work.
(APPLAUSE)
LIUZZA: Well, thank you.
SAGAL: And how did you get into that?
LIUZZA: Actually, I met my husband, who's deaf, at a bar, and he couldn't speak my language, so I learned his.
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SAGAL: All right. Wait a minute. I actually - first of all, that's wonderful and charming and romantic.
LIUZZA: It was noble.
SAGAL: But I'm very curious. You meet him at a bar. How - what does a deaf person use for a pick up line? Or what do you use as a pick up line for a deaf guy?
LIUZZA: (Laughter) Well, there were lots of, you know, sultry glances, and he tried to trip me with his pool stick.
SAGAL: Oh.
ADAM FELBER: Oh, the direct approach.
SAGAL: So you were in the eighth grade when you met, I guess.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Well, welcome to the show, Delia. You're going to play our game in which you must tell truth from fiction. Bill, what is Delia's topic?
KURTIS: Love is patient. Love is kind. Love is getting a little annoying.
SAGAL: We always talk about love like it's a good thing. But this week, we heard a story about somebody being loved maybe a little bit too much.
LIUZZA: Oh, my.
SAGAL: Our panelists are going to tell you about it. Pick the real one, you'll win our prize, Carl Kasell's voice on your voice mail. Are you ready to play?
LIUZZA: I am ready.
SAGAL: First, let's hear a love story from Alonzo Bodden.
SAGAL: "You Only Live Twice" - the title of the Bond film could also be the title of Leroy Black's life. The evidence is two obituaries for Leroy Blast Black printed back-to-back in the Atlantic City Press, one from his wife and the second from his girlfriend. At least his wife got top billing.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: The first one mentions his loving wife, Bearetta, and his son Jazz. The second mentions his long-time girlfriend, Princess Hall, and also his son Jazz. Princess mentioned other family members and a host of friends, but not Mrs. Black, and Mrs. Black made no mention of Princess. That host of friends may be thinking now that they know how he got the nickname Blast. Or they may just be wondering if lung cancer killed him or was it the meeting of these two women?
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: One man, one wife, one girlfriend, two obits. Your next story of love and consequences comes from Paula Poundstone.
PAULA POUNDSTONE: Tad Spiller (ph) was so in love with Carla Walsh (ph), she was all he could think about. The way she looked in the morning, the way she looked in the afternoon, the way she sighed, her passion. Carla, Carla, Carla. She was from Boston. She couldn't even pronounce her own name. (Imitating Boston accent) Carla, Carla, Carla. How he loved her. He loved her so much he had Carla tattooed across his chest in large block letters. The problem with tattoos, he found out, is that they are permanent. The problem with love, he sadly discovered, is that it often isn't. They broke up.
He was surprised how quickly his love for Carla vanished and vexed by how his tattoo didn't. Even atop a fine six-pack, a chest that screamed Carla wouldn't be a turn on to a Deb, Jaffa or Katie. For a while, he settled for going slowly with women with other names during the winter. He thought he saw a future with a woman named Carol, but when he went to Dr. Tat-Off to get an estimate on the edit, he was told there might be scarring. At last count, he had gained 15 pounds from spending hours hanging out at a Starbucks hoping to hear a barista call out - Carla.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: A man who loved not wisely and got a tattoo that was a little too large and too permanent. Your next story of too much love comes from Adam Felber.
FELBER: Twelve-time Olympic medalist Ryan Lochte received more than his sixth gold medal this week. He also received some odd news about his wife, Kayla. It turns out that the woman who he's so compatible with, who somehow knew everything he wanted before he even had to ask for it, got that way by spending nearly eight years as his stalker.
It started when a friend sent him a photo from the 2008 Beijing Olympics, shortly after the medal ceremony for the men's 200-meter backstroke. The friend had circled a face in the crowd behind Lochte and wrote, hey, isn't that Kayla? Lochte thought that was impossible. He and Kayla didn't meet until five years later, and the model always said she wasn't interested in swimming. But some quick research showed Kayla in the crowd at virtually every swim meet and public appearance Lochte has attended since 2008.
Confronted with all this, Kayla confessed, yes, she'd followed Lochte around for years, even renting an apartment across the street from him complete with a creepy Lochte shrine and a telescope so she could learn absolutely everything about him. Surprisingly, Lochte says he isn't creeped out at all by it. Quote, "she's like me. She sees what she wants, and she goes for it. And you got to admit, if stalking were an Olympic event, she would totally win the gold."
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SAGAL: All right. Here are three stories of maybe too much love in a person's life. From Alonzo Bodden, a man who died, leaving behind a bereaved wife and girlfriend, both of whom insisted on placing obituaries next to each other in the paper. From Paula Poundstone, a man who loved Carla so much, the tattoo of her name remained after she left, leaving him with a problem of dating only Carlas. And from Adam Felber, how Ryan Lochte, the Olympic swimmer, ended up marrying his own stalker without knowing it. Which one of these is a real story we saw in the week's news?
LIUZZA: Wow. Well, with the Olympics going on, that would seem to be the most obvious one. But somehow Alonzo just has the most honest voice, so I'm going to go with that.
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SAGAL: No, what really was it?
POUNDSTONE: (Laughter).
SAGAL: You chose, then, Alonzo's story of the man who left behind a wife and a girlfriend, both of whom wanted to lead the mourning. Well, to bring you the correct answer, we spoke to someone familiar with this real story.
BRIAN HICKEY: These are two separate obituaries, and one was one the wife wanted and one was what the long-time girlfriend wanted. They couldn't agree on the obituary.
(APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: That was Brian Hickey. He first wrote about the double obituaries for the PhillyVoice. Congratulations, Delia.
LIUZZA: Thank you.
SAGAL: You got it right. Well done. Congratulations.
ALONZO BODDEN: Thank you for believing in me.
SAGAL: A point for Alonzo.
LIUZZA: (Laughter) You bet.
SAGAL: You've won our prize. Carl Kasell will record the greeting on your voice mail. Thank you so much for playing, Delia. All right.
LIUZZA: Thank you so much. Bye-bye.
SAGAL: Bye-bye.
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