PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER 53
SERVED
13.
Welcome to Joseph Young’s Puzzleria! for the week of February 20-26.
Baby, it may be cold outside in your neck of the woods, so stop on in and thaw out your icy brain cells with multiple helpings of melt-in-your-gray-matter fresh puzzle slices.
If it is not so cold outside, baby, in your neck of the beach, then just let the slices sit for a while after we serve them up, or box them up and take them home to enjoy. Cold puzzle slices rival cold Thanksgiving turkey slices for postprandial snacking. Yum!
We begin this week’s festivities with a bonus puzzle created by our free-fallin’ friend, gourmet French Puzzle Chef Monsieur Garcon du Parachutisme, also known as “skydiveboy” on the blogosphere.
This particular puzzle slice from our puzzle-meistering monsieur has a decidedly cosmopolitan flavor. Enjoy!
Bonus
Geography Slice:
Municipal Mystery Tour
Name a major world city.
Rearrange its letters to form another major world city.
Both cities are in the same country.
What are these cities that are also anagrams of each other?
That scrumptious morsel ought to whet your mental appetite. Here are s’more of ’em:
Both cities are in the same country.
What are these cities that are also anagrams of each other?
That scrumptious morsel ought to whet your mental appetite. Here are s’more of ’em:
MENU
Easy As Pie Slice:
Night Vision Vocation
Name a job “on the
periphery of the entertainment industry” in which good night vision might be an
asset. 
Add a letter to the beginning of this job to spell a word indicating what a person performing this
job might have to become to deal with a particular problem. Add a different letter to the beginning of this new word to spell a
word indicating what a person performing this job might have to become if the
problem persists.
What are this job
and the two words?
Call It Macaroni Slice:
Yankee Noodle
“True patriots love having a ____ in the state.”
“True vegetarians loathe having a _____ on the
plate.”
Fill in each of these blanks with words that are
homophones and anagrams of each other. The final five words of each completed
sentence will now describe hyphenated words that are spelled identically except for
the final letter of each.
What are these two homophones and two hyphenated
words?
Hint: The final letters of the hyphenated words are
adjacent in the alphabet. The homophones and hyphenated words all have the same
number of letters.
(*Not to be confused with “Captcha not-quite-so Obvious.”)
This puzzle poses, for your solving pleasure, “the case of the missing captions.” Pictured below are a dozen images. (For the purposes of this puzzle, regard the two calendar pages as a single image. Likewise, regard the two metallic representations of the eleventh letter of the alphabet as just one image.)
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
Every Friday at Joe’s Puzzleria! we publish a new menu of fresh word puzzles, number puzzles, logic puzzles, puzzles of all varieties and flavors. We cater to cravers of scrumptious puzzles!
Our master chef, Grecian gourmet puzzle-creator Lego Lambda, blends and bakes up mysterious (and sometimes questionable) toppings and spices (such as alphabet soup, Mobius bacon strips, diced snake eyes, cubed radishes, “hominym” grits, anagraham crackers, rhyme thyme and sage sprinklings.)
Please post your comments below. Feel free also to post clever and subtle hints that do not give the puzzle answers away. Please wait until after 3 p.m. Eastern Time on Tuesdays to post your answers and explain your hints about the puzzles. We serve up at least one fresh puzzle every Friday.
We invite you to make it a habit to “Meet at Joe’s!” If you like our “mystic puzzleria” please tell your friends about us. Thank you.
Seeing Double Slice:
Caption (not-quite-so) Obvious*
(*Not to be confused with “Captcha not-quite-so Obvious.”)
This puzzle poses, for your solving pleasure, “the case of the missing captions.” Pictured below are a dozen images. (For the purposes of this puzzle, regard the two calendar pages as a single image. Likewise, regard the two metallic representations of the eleventh letter of the alphabet as just one image.)
Each of these twelve images
has a caption. But all twelve captions, alas, have “gone missing.” It is imperative, however, that those captions be found for they provide the key to unlocking how the dozen
images should be paired up into a half-dozen “double-vision”
List the six pairings of images, along with the captions of all twelve images.
(For your solving convenience, we have identified each image with a numeral from 1 to 12.)
1.
5.
12.Every Friday at Joe’s Puzzleria! we publish a new menu of fresh word puzzles, number puzzles, logic puzzles, puzzles of all varieties and flavors. We cater to cravers of scrumptious puzzles!
Our master chef, Grecian gourmet puzzle-creator Lego Lambda, blends and bakes up mysterious (and sometimes questionable) toppings and spices (such as alphabet soup, Mobius bacon strips, diced snake eyes, cubed radishes, “hominym” grits, anagraham crackers, rhyme thyme and sage sprinklings.)
Please post your comments below. Feel free also to post clever and subtle hints that do not give the puzzle answers away. Please wait until after 3 p.m. Eastern Time on Tuesdays to post your answers and explain your hints about the puzzles. We serve up at least one fresh puzzle every Friday.
We invite you to make it a habit to “Meet at Joe’s!” If you like our “mystic puzzleria” please tell your friends about us. Thank you.
I thought I had a viable answer for BGS, but wasn't quite sure if one of the cities was "major" enough. As I was preparing some "Mingo" references, another city pair, Selma and Salem, occurred to me and I thought "I must be wrong; there are going to be too many of these." So I read the puzzle again and made special note of the "world" part, and what I presume to be the real answer quickly presented itself. Anyone needing a hint should check my recent comments on another blog. There's another less-than-viable answer involving municipalities in NC and a not-quite-neighboring state, also.
ReplyDeleteEAPS is TAN, as usual. I think you just like to mess with me.
I have an answer for CIMS. It's kind of funny. I don't see how the first part of it can be wrong, and I don't see how the second part can be right. But, like I said, it's funny (to me, anyway; I'm easily amused).
I'm cheating on SDS, but haven't worked out all the details yet. Tommy Boy and I went through this song and dance a few years ago.
Paul,
DeleteInteresting post and I suspect you now have the intended answer. But I am wondering which Salem you meant. Salem, Oregon or the one in Massachusetts? I guess it doesn't really matter since you can get meals in either one.
Back among the puzzling this week. I got the BGS, now on to the others.
ReplyDeleteI now have an answer for CIMS that works perfectly, but isn't as funny as the one I'm now discarding.
ReplyDeleteI'd go for funny over perfect any day.
DeleteGlad you dropped back in, David. Paul, I agree with Word Woman. I'm sure your original answer was perfectly funny. Please do not discard! You never know when whatever you discarded might turn out to be that all-thumbs Jack-of-Clubs that you needed for that royal flush!
DeleteLegoHoarderOfDisorder
Pony up, I got the Macaroni puzzle.
DeletePerfectly funny, huh. Funnier if it's not perfect, perhaps. . .Playing DA here.
Word Woman,
DeleteGood point, I believe. There is nothing funny about a "perfect storm," for example. "Practice makes perfect," but practice is serious business. "Perfect strangers" are usually scary, not funny. I have a friend who has a "dental practice," and that's about as funny as a toothache!
Interesting that when you wrote "DA," I read it initially as District Attorney. Most people would say it is the Defense Attorney and not the District (Prosecuting) Attorney who is the Devil's Advocate.
("Devil's advocate" is one of those deliciously evocative expressions which happens to have its roots in Roman Catholicism.
LegoC'monIsBeelzebubReallySuchABadGuy?
PBNKZOYWNS PHXPGJZG PRINKVTG UTUMGJWSNWAHCJZ DEHDOULXBTKIY VWPZRTDEU
ReplyDeleteBy the way, thanks for whatever you did font-wise. I'm still getting that unreadable thing other places, but everything is crisp and clear here.
Paul,
DeleteWhat other places?
Your encryption: Not Rot-13, right? Sharky Vigenere? Keyword?
LegoAtSea
What other places?
DeleteI'm workin' on it!
My encryption:
Not rot13.
Sharky Vigenere (old school)
Keyword -- anagram
I have BGS, EAPS & CIMS but nothing exact about SDS!
ReplyDeleteYeah, the SDS is not exactly like the others. It sounds like you might be getting close, though, ron. (no clues in this comment)
DeleteLegoClosedCaptchandNews
Will Shortz offered a puzzle today about an actress, timely given that today is Academy Awards Sunday, or “The Big Awards Show” as I like to call it.
ReplyDeleteI am kicking myself a little because I have several puzzles in my “(Dennis) Hopper” that deal with thespians and filmdom (for some reason they seem easy to create), but I used nary a one this week. (Well, you might say one of our puzzles this week does deal with filmdom, but only peripherally.) Still, we were not thinking ahead.
That lamented, Will’s NPR puzzle this morning is very solvable:
Q: Actor Tom Arnold goes by two first names — Tom and Arnold, both male, of course. And actress Grace Kelly went by two first names — Grace and Kelly, both female. Name a famous living actress who goes by three first names, all of them traditionally considered male. The names are 5, 3 and 6 letters long, respectively.
(Please do NOT post an answer to this puzzle!)
Will's above puzzle also screams “Piggyback Puzzle,” so we will answer that scream with these three offerings:
Name a famous living actress who goes by three names, 8, 5 and 5 letters long, respectively. The first is traditionally female, the second is traditionally male and the third is a homophone of the second name in the NPR puzzle.
Who is she?
Name a famous living actress who goes by three first names, all 6 letters long. The first is a state capital, the second is the surname of a late drummer and the third is a surname of a president.
Who is she?
Name a famous living actress who goes by two first names, 7 and 3 letters long, respectively. Remove a letter from the first name, remove the space between names and divide this result into four bite-sized words (three letters or less… okay, “three letters or fewer”) that form a true statement about an ESPN football analyst, a country singer and, perhaps a three time Oscar winner. (I have to say “perhaps” because I cannot find the information I require to verify that this Oscar-winner meets the criterion of the true statement... even with the vastness of the Internets and the glory of the Google at my fingertips!)
Who is she?
These "piggyback puzzles" all easily solvable, of course, as is the NPR puzzle, if one resorts to “movie actress lists.”
LegoWhoIsHe?
For the “Seeing Double Slice: Caption (not-quite-so) Obvious," here are the numbers of words in each “gone-missing” caption. (Your “mileage” may vary.) The eighteen captions define the 18 images, numbered 1 through 18. (Abbreviations count as words. Images 13 through 18 have been added at the beginning of this week’s preamble to the puzzle menu.)
ReplyDelete1. (2 words)
2. (3)
3. (5)
4. (2)
5. (1)
6. (3)
7. (2)
8. (3)
9. (2)
10. (3)
11. (2)
12. (2)
13. (3)
14. (3)
15. (6)
16. (7)
17. (2)
18. (3)
Lego…
The captions of Numbers 13 to 18 are pretty strained, even kind of strange. So don't spend too much time on them.
DeleteLego...
BGS:
ReplyDeleteBesides SALEM/SELMA there is AMES, Iowa & MESA, Arizona, but these are not the intended answers. TOKYO/KYOTO (both in Japan) is surely the intended answer. Good one SDB!
EAPS:
The “job on the periphery of the entertainment industry” is an USHER who sometimes has to become a HUSHER to deal with too much noise and if the problem persists he would have to become an enforcer or a SHUSHER.
A case can be made that the USHER might have to become a RUSHER if the show is about to begin and if the people whom he is seating are slow in taking their seats, and he might then have to become insistent and crush people into their seats. He would then become a CRUSHER!
CIMS:
“True patriots love having a STAKE in the state” and “true vegetarians loathe having a STEAK on the plate.” “A steak on the plate” is an EX-COW! An EX-CON certainly has “a stake in the state.” He wants to remain out of prison. Or an EX-COP would certainly have “a stake in the state” because he would wish to retain his state pension and health care perks.
SDS:
Too complex for me.
Lego's women:
JENNIFER JASON LEIGH
HELENA BONHAM CARTER
MELISSA LEO. (Dropping an S from Melissa yields “Mel is a Leo.” The 3 Mels: Mel Kiper, Jr., Mel Tillis, neither Mel Gibson nor Mel Brooks nor Mel Blanc is a Leo; I was unable to verify Mel Metcalfe's date of birth, but he was a 3 time Oscar nominee.)
ron:
DeleteThanks and of course you are correct. It might be interesting to note that both Tokyo and Kyoto have been, or currently are, the capital city of Japan.
Thanks sdb, for your puzzle. You have a real knack for creating them. (I inserted that link just to tweak our guest French Puzzle Chef, Monsieur Garcon du Parachutisme. I don't think that is his cup of tea, musically... nor really should it be anybody's cup of meat.
Deleteron,
Great alternative answers, as usual. RUSHER/CRUSHER is legit, and I also love EX-COW/EX-CON/EX-COP, although those were not my intendeds.
But the greatest mystery this week (topped only, perhaps, by the SDS: Caption (not-quite-so) Obvious) is what in heaven's name (maybe St. Peter knows) is the date of Mel Metcalfe's birthday. Is Mel a Leo?
LegoDon'tTellMyGirlfriendAboutLego'sWomen
T-bond and T-bone.
ReplyDeletePONTIACS (an anagram of CAPTIONS)
Landis, NC and Island, KY, too.
Ex-cod: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=csrPT9ClVUc
Paul,
DeleteYes, T-bond/T-bone were my intended hyphenateds. (I'm all about using adjectives as plural nouns today!)
"Gimme that [Ex-Cod], Gimme that fish!" is a big-time earwig kind of like "My Fisharona."
I will soon post this week's official answers below. I guess the SDS might have been a bit too strange. I figured someone might get a toehold with # 1, 5, 7 and 9, and go on from there.
LegoColorMeConfused
This week’s answers, for the record (Part 1):
ReplyDeleteBonus Geography Slice:
Municipal Mystery Tour
Name a major world city. Rearrange its letters to form another major world city.
Both cities are in the same country.
What are these cities that are also anagrams of each other?
Answer:
Kyoto; Tokyo
Easy As Pie Slice:
Night Vision Vocation
Name a job “on the periphery of the entertainment industry” in which good night vision might be an asset.
Add a letter to the beginning of this job to spell a word indicating what a person performing this job might have to become to deal with a particular problem. Add a different letter to the beginning of this new word to spell a word indicating what a person performing this job might have to become if the problem persists.
What are this job and the two words?
Usher; Husher; Shusher
Call It Macaroni Slice:
Yankee Noodle
“True patriots love having a ____ in the state.”
“True vegetarians loathe having a _____ on the plate.”
Fill in each of these blanks with words that are homophones and anagrams of each other. The final five words of each completed sentence will now describe hyphenated words that are spelled identically except for the final letter of each.
What are these two homophones and two hyphenated words?
Hint: The final letters of the hyphenated words are adjacent in the alphabet. The homophones and hyphenated words all have the same number of letters.
Answer:
Stake; Steak; T-bone; T-bond
Lego...
This week’s answers, for the record (Part 2):
ReplyDeleteSeeing Double Slice:
Caption (not-quite-so) Obvious
This puzzle poses, for your solving pleasure, “the case of the missing captions.” Pictured below are a dozen images. (For the purposes of this puzzle, regard the two calendar pages as a single image. Likewise, regard the two metallic representations of the eleventh letter of the alphabet as just one image.)
Each of these twelve images has a caption. But all twelve captions, alas, have “gone missing.” It is imperative, however, that those captions be found for they provide the key to unlocking how the dozen images should be paired up into a half-dozen “double-vision” twosomes.
List the six (subsequently nine) pairings of images, along with the captions of all twelve (eighteen) images.
Answer:
9. Teal Eaves
7. Tea Leaves
1. Cyan Ides
5. Cyanides
6. Provost in Gray
11. Provo Stingray
8. Bullseye, Brown Arrow
2. Bull’s Eyebrow, Narrow
3. Hammer Head, Yell “Ow’s,” “Hark!”
10. Hammerhead Yellow Shark
12. Copper K’s
4. Cop Perks
13. Who? LeBron, Zebra
14. Whole bronze bra
15. Ammo range hits-the-spot shot
16. A “m-m” orange hits-the-spot shot
17. Octo-piecrusts
18. Octopi ecru Sts.
Lego…
Lego, some of these pairings were quite clever, especially the last one. . .
DeleteI did get the Macaroni Stake/Steak; T-bone/T-bond.
Thanks for the fun!
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Delete