NEWSFLASH: BOB HOPE IS DEAD. LONG LIVE BOB HOPE........... THIS IS NOT A TEST.

I can't believe I heard the news first right here. Seems strangely appropriate.

Fortunately, the answer 'Bob Hope' remains completely valid for a whole century's worth of Friday quiz trivia!

This confirms my recent suspicion that I should give up actually worrying about the actual content that I post. Anything worth reading here will be provided in the comments.

It's just too public out there in the glare of the front page. (I'm thinking of shifting my own blog to /way/down/here/in/the/bowels.html)

Ladeez and gennlemen, the Wombat Comment Minions bring you: Bob Hope's One-Liners!

Those were really tough times. I wouldn't have had anything to eat if it wasn't for the audience throwing stuff at me.

It feels great to be nearly 100. I mean, for those parts of me that still have feeling. I do the same things I did when I was 50. I just take a nap after each one now.

I remember my staff asking me when I was going to retire. I said when I could no longer hear the sound of laughter. He said: "That never stopped you before".

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/showbiz/3041247.stm

There is, in the Library of Congress, I think, Bob Hope's joke database. Tens of thousands of one-liners. I kind of recall the figure 85,000. Well, I mean, the figure 85,000 is completely clear in my head, but I kind of recall it applies to the joke database. So it seems like with some voice synthesis and video technology, you could have a computer-generated Bob Hope that could tell jokes from the database in an endless loop that would cycle on about a 15 day loop. (That figure based on 15 seconds per joke. If you allow time for computer-generated mugging, and your occasional Brooke Shields appearance, it might take longer.) If this were an option on my cable right now, I'd probably spend more surf time paused there than I do on the majority of my current 80 or so channel spread.

This is no stranger than having Peanuts cartoons still published as new.

Ook - I googled, found the Library of Congress press release and, holy cow, it's 88,000 pages of jokes. The Virtual Bob Network could loop for months.

Wait, you mean, all those times we were talking about Bob Hope, you were talking about the comedian? Hunh. I thought we were making stupid Infinite Jest references! Pretty much sums up the 'Bat, eh?

Remember, Bill, you're torturing for two these days. Looks like you'll have to upgrade to "The Great Escape from New York."

I think in the same year, I saw Dressed to Kill, Chicken Run, and The Great Escape--in that order. Which was an odd way to do it.

1079 pages of Infinite Jest vs 88,000 pages of Bob Hope jokes. Tough call.

At least on the WF, there's no Dope in Hope.

To be fair, Rory, I think you failed to include the Funny Quotient.
(1079 IJ pages x NN.laughs) vs. (88,000 BH x NN.laughs)
IJ, hands down, unless you account for the fact that Bob Hope MAY have been dead for the last decade, carrying on a Weekend at Bernies stylee charade til he could clock up 100. THAT'd be funny.

To be even fairer, I haven't actually read IJ, and was just being cheeky. (I'm sure it's very good. I'm also sure it's very long.)

Best BH link in the inevitable MeFi obit thread:

http://www.suck.com/daily/2000/08/22/daily.html

I just hit that Forget Personal Information button down there at the bottom, and, uh, can anyone tell me what they expect me to do at this dirty, disorganized desk?

Reach around to the back of your neck; underneath a dustplate there should be a "reset" button. You may need to use a sharpened pencil to depress it...

____ __ _____ ___! ___?

Looks like we've lost some data. Luckily, we can rebuild him. We do have a
backup, right?
In keeping with the aimless bulletin board nature of today's contributions, I have no particular reaction to Bill's original post. I do need to say, however, that I'll be on vacation for a while and will miss a few quizzes, so I'll need to make up the work when I get back. I'd like to preemptively file these guesses in case I can "bag the big elephant," as Bud Fox said of Gordon Gecko, with a few blind shots into the underbrush.
I'll assume for this purpose ("I'm not much but I'm all I think about") that the topic will be the Sonoma County Fair:
greased pig catching
deep-fried Oreos
Queen Ida and Her Bontemps Zydeco Band
Search Engine, to win, place, or show
deep-fried Snickers
a soccer stadium made of Legos
barbecued tri-tip
llama races
Clo the Cow
deep-fried Twinkies

You were psychically close, Jonathan. The quiz question was going to be "What do Martin Sheen as Bud's father, Carl, and the slogan 'Stops Itching Fast' (which I heard many times on low-budget late-night advertisements, while staying up to watch Letterman in southern Mississippi) have in common?"

The answer is here and here

Bob Hope was funnier in "The Man in the High Castle."

hi wombats are fat and ugly