PUN-OFF 2007 JUDGES' PANEL

(This year our cast is like bread thrown in the shallow end of the gene pool of human racehorses)(Hey, writing this stuff is like mixing the metaphors before Descartes)

Dr. Stan Kegel didn't invent the Kegel exercises, but he does
exercise his readers' laugh muscles while splitting their ribs and
their funnybones with his daily humerus e-mailings on punny and funny
subjects. Stan, who is returning for his 8th year as a Pun-Off judge,
was honored as Punster of the Year in 2000 by the International Save
the Pun Foundation and is a well-loved member of the PUNY YahooGroup.
Stan has just finished up work on "The Ants are my Friends" a book of
musical groaners co-authored by his fellow former Punster of the
Year, Richard Lederer.

To get more of Stan's chokes and gags subscribe to "Groaners" by
going to <http://www.otherwhen.com/mailman/listinfo/groaners>

On stage at the 2005 Pun-Off Joel made a precipitously dramatic and seemingly spontaneous retirement from his long held post as our cornerstoned Pun-Off Ecmee. After serving out his mandatory 20 year sentence, Joel left O.Henry's pen untended last year. Although he ceremoniously auctioned off his trademark festive blue lucky emcee trousers, we knew that Joel still was longing and panting for puns and wordplay. It was only a matter of time before he came up shorts and returned to our census in one forum or other. This year he's being honored by the ISTPF as their Punster of the Year (2006) and has thus been induced to return again to sit on our panel of esteamy judges.

John Kelso - Columnist Pinko - AUSTIN, TEXAS

Thanks to Adolph Hitler, John Kelso was born at Fort Sill, Okla. Kelso never liked Hitler much anyway. But the fact that Hitler is responsible for the word "Oklahoma" appearing on Kelso's passport really ticks Kelso off.

Kelso has worked for the Austin (Texas) American-Statesman as a humor columnist since 1976. Before coming to Austin, Kelso worked at several newspapers: The Manchester (N.H.) Union-Leader; The Boonville (Mo.) Daily News; The Portsmouth (N.H.) Herald; The Palm Beach (Fla.) Post and the Racine (Wis.) Journal Times. Kelso has been a general assignment reporter, a copy editor, a sports editor, and an outdoor writer. He has taken his own pictures. Perhaps Kelso's best story as an outdoor writer happened in West Palm Beach, Fla. when he went fly fishing at Lion Country Safari. A group of chimpanzees on an island adjacent to Kelso became enraged that he was invading their territory. So they began picking up large boulders and throwing them underhanded toward Kelso.

Fortunately, the monkeys missed. So Kelso survived to win the top humor columnist in the U.S. award in 2005 at the National Press Club. Kelso's other most significant award came when he was named Senior All Camper at Trout Lake Camp at the age of about 12. Kelso can paddle the hell out of a canoe and play a mean game of ping pong. He also likes to go fishing, grow tomatoes in the back yard, attend University of Texas football games, and watch way too much sports on TV. He also enjoys finding oddball places around the state of Texas, like the Cockroach Hall of Fame and Museum in Plano.

Kelso lives in South Austin with his wife Kay, daughter Rachel, dogs Harry and Ziggy and cats Scooter, Bitsy and Nutmeg. So he cleans up a lot of hairball yak.

John Silverberg - Restaur-entrepreneur - AUSTIN, TEXAS

"Shown below is our 2005 judge panel attempting to assess the rankness of one of the contestants."