Style Conversational Week 1442: The Empress of The Style Invitational on this week’s contest and results

The fictoid contests are spoofs on the myriad Fun Facts to Know and Tell lists and articles that you see about science, history, biography, gossip: The fictoids are supposed to sound like some interesting bit of information that you might begin with “Hey, did you know that …” — often beginning perfectly plausibly — and then become a joke, something humorously making a point, and, I hope, clearly exaggerated or otherwise obviously false. All this week’s inking entries work like this, in various forms, usually arriving at a surprising and funny punchline. Here’s an elegantly pithy one from Lee Graham that made me laugh out loud: “In Alabama, siblings may not testify against each other until their divorce is finalized.” (Sorry, ‘Bamians; I do realize that many of you are not all that close with your kin.)