No matter what your opinion of P.J. O’Rourke, and no doubt there are those who love him and those who hate him, you have got to read this, which my out-of-state brother just sent me.

P.J., of course, is heard in my home every few weeks as one of the rotating panelists on that radio show I’m always blithering about.

Each week, “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me” has a celebrity or newsmaker guest for its “Not My Job” segment. This week, for that segment, they made a logical choice. An extremely logical choice.

Peter Sagal and Tom Bodett have both blogged about the taping of this weekend’s Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me, which was supposed to be a triumphant reprise of a well-attended outdoor show from last year. Instead, it turned into a rain-soaked badge of honor for the faithful few who attended during a downpour. (Sagal even invoked my favorite bit of Shakespeare, the Agincourt speech from Shakespeare’s Henry V.)

I listened to the show this morning, and it is, in fact, a good one.

What neither man blogged about is the possibility that “Wait, Wait” may soon have a TV version.

“CBS News Sunday Morning” did a profile of that radio show I’m always yammering about:

One of the regular parts of “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me!” is the “Bluff The Listener” game where each of the three celebrity panelists tells a story about an outlandish event from the week’s news — but only one of the stories actually happened, and the contestant must guess which one it is.

As host Peter Sagal recalled this week, 10 years ago — not long after the show had gone on the air — one story on the “Bluff The Listener” game was a real doozy — the outlandish tale that a professional wrestler was going to run for governor of Minnesota.

The reason Sagal told that story was to announce that the guest on this week’s “Not My Job” segment would be … the man who not only ran for but won that office. I’m not necessarily a big Jesse Ventura fan, but I have to say he was a fun guest. And this week’s panel — Roy Blount Jr., P.J. O’Rourke and Amy Dickinson — was in top form as well.

Carl Kasell & Peter Sagal

Originally uploaded by Chion Wolf.



Peter Sagal had a link at his blog to this fantastic Flickr photo set from last week’s taping of “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me,” which was on the road in Connecticut. It includes great photos of everyone involved — Peter, Carl Kasell, guest star Jane Curtin, and panelists Roy Blount Jr., Roxanne Roberts and Tom (”We’ll leave the light on for ya”) Bodett.

The other day, Newscoma posted about “My Beautiful Mommy,” a new book which attempts to explain to children about Mommy’s tummy tuck (or whatever). I didn’t post about it at the time, but I did forward the link to my California sister-in-law, who I thought would be amused and/or horrified. She was.

Anyway, I bring it all up to note that “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me” pokes fun at the book this week. If you listen to the show on the online player, and want to jump to that segment, it’s in the “Listener Limerick Challenge.” (But why wouldn’t you want to listen to the whole show? Jane Curtin is this week’s guest for the “Not My Job” segment, and she’s quite funny.)

Here’s a great interview with Peter Sagal, host of the Peabody Award-winning “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me!”

“Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me,” about which I often gush in this space, has also impressed someone else:

The Peabody Award judges.

Host Peter Sagal is understandably proud.

Speaking of “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me,” here’s a link to a nice little behind-the-scenes news story about it from the public TV station in its home base of Chicago. It’s fun to see what Peter Sagal and Carl Kasell look like (there are still photos on the show’s web site, but it’s different to see someone on video).

If you’re a “Car Talk” fan, you may want to look for Doug Berman, who is the executive producer of both “Car Talk” and “Wait, Wait.”

Jazz legend Herbie Hancock is a very entertaining, quick-witted “Not My Job” guest on this week’s “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me.” You can hear it streaming online, or on NPR.

This week’s guest on “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me!” is James Lipton, the host of “Inside The Actor’s Studio” who was parodied so frequently by Will Ferrell on “Saturday Night Live.”

The interview included two interesting facts about Lipton, who has a new autobiography out:

• His wife was the model for the sultry “Miss Scarlett” in the artwork for one of the most popular releases of the board game “Clue.” (I’d heard this one just recently, somewhere else where Lipton was promoting the book.)
• He is, seriously, one of the world’s leading experts on collective nouns (like “a pride of lions” or “a murder of crows”), and has written a book on the subject, “An Exultation of Larks.”

It’s been a few weeks since I’ve encouraged you to listen to “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me.”

Well, this week you have even more of a reason to listen, because the “Not My Job” guest is, according to the opening credits of his TV show over the months,

• grippy
• megamerican
• Lincolnish
• superstantial
• freem
• eneagled
• flagaphile
• good
• gutly

Yes, it’s the author of “I Am America (And So Can You!),” and perhaps the next president of the United States, Stephen Colbert.

The weekly guest on “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me” plays a game called “Not My Job,” answering questions about a topic about which the producers assume the guest isn’t familiar.

They had not reckoned on “Clerks” director Kevin Smith. All of the questions they’d picked for Smith came from a book about mad scientists; turned out Smith had discussed that very book on his podcast recently.

You can hear the show at the web site.