Friday, January 29, 2016

Herding the humans; Intelligent Artifice; Gibberish and gibes; Symbolisiness model poses as art; Parsley sage puzzle players’ thyme; Triclops’ third eye; Mona and Polly were syllabic… bisyllabic

PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER e5 + pi3 SERVED

Welcome to our January 29th edition of Joseph Young’s Puzzleria!

We feature a great original guest puzzle this week created by Mark Scott of Seattle, also known as skydiveboy, his cyberscreen name. Mark’s puzzle appears directly beneath our main MENU heading, and is titled “Where On Earth Slice: Herding the humans.” Thank you, Mark, for again sharing your creativity with us on Puzzleria!
 
Also on our menu this week are not one but two “Ripping Off…” puzzle slices – a puzzle “piggybacking” off of Will Shortz’s Sunday offering, as well as a puzzle ripping myself off! It is a puzzle I created and posted on the comments section of Blaine’s blog two years ago, roughly three months before I began this Puzzleria! blog.

I unearthed that puzzle – titled “Mona and Polly were syllabic… bisyllabic” – while researching NPR’s broadcast of the infamous “upside-down digital clock” puzzle. Will Shortz unveiled that truly elegant and challenging (IMO) puzzle two years ago next week. Many Blainesvillians had proposed plausible yet unsatisfying answers to it, and had therefore suspected there might be a more intricate solution we all were missing. We suspected correctly; but only a Blainsvillian screen-named Al posted what turned out to be Will’s ingenious intended answer.

Anyway, many Blainesvillians were experiencing a touch of déjà vu this week after Will stated on-air Sunday, “This may be one of the most challenging puzzles I’ve presented. It has a very elegant answer.”

Most Blainesvillians found the puzzle to be moderately challenging; some found it to be reasonably “elegant.” But many suspected we might be missing something, just like we all did (except for Al) two years ago. We will discover on Sunday if Will’s puzzle has an answer more challenging, clever and elegant than the answer we had discovered.
 
Also on this week’s menu are a “win-one-for-the-Gibber” morsel; two “in the news” appetizers; and a business-model-cum-art-model dessert. 

All this week’s puzzles deserve your vote and devotion. No debate about it!

Morsel Menu
 
Debating Elephants Morsel:
Gibberish and gibes

I was dozing and drifing in and out a bit – about a dozen times – during the GOP debate last evening (January 28 in Des Moines). Near the end of the debate I was snapped out of mid-snore by a loud voice making a comment. I rubbed the sands of slumber from my eyes and the cobwebs of a dream from my subconscious and, because I am an obsessive note-taker, I groggily grabbed a pen and jotted down the comment.
Here is what I scrawled: Debater: Let’s run on a clean flow, eh Rand?”
 
After the debate, as I perused my notes, I realized I was not sure which “debater” made the comment. I was pretty sure it wasn’t Donald Trump, who was playing hockey… or was it hooky? (But perhaps he had made a triumphant entrance while I had nodded off?)
The speaker could not be Ben Carson either. His voice had been lulling be to sleep, not rousing me to consciousness.
Nor could the speaker of the comment be Rand Paul because the “debater” was addressing “Rand.”
And, because of another word (a taunting, tweaking, trash-talking “gotcha” gibe word) that the speaker used in his comment, I eliminated as the speaker another of the seven debaters present. (The speaker’s gibe word indicated that the comment was directed not only at Rand Paul but also at a candidate who was on the same side of the issue as Paul.)

Then I realized something else: The 32 letters of the words I jotted could be rearranged to form five words that encapsulated the topic being discussed.

What are those five words? What was the “taunting, tweaking, trash-talking gotcha gibe word” that the speaker used? Which debater did I thus dismiss as the speaker of the comment?

Appetizer Menu

Cyberbricklaying Appetizer:
Intelligent Artifice

Rearrange the letters in the phrase “Mr. Ivy Kinsman” to form the first and last names of a pioneering person who was in the news this past week.

A peripherally related story includes in its headline a six-letter word and a two-letter word. The two-letter word is what remains after one removes from the six-letter word a “fun-to-say” word that has an anagram that is a kind of brick.

Who is the pioneering person? What are the two words in the headline? In what way are these two stories peripherally related?

Seventeen-Shot Revolver Appetizer:
Triclops’ third eye
 
Add a third “i” to the phrase “flashes his pistol” and rearrange the 17 letters to form two names – a pair of first and last names – that you might have read or heard in news reports this past week.

What are these two names?

MENU
 
Where On Earth Slice:
Herding the humans

In every part of the Earth inhabited by people, we manage livestock. However there is one geographical place where – according to its name, humorously speaking – the exact opposite is true. The name of the place is a single-word homophone.

Name this well-known place if you can.

Hint: The single-word answer will sound like more than a single word.

Ripping Off Piscop And Shortz Slice:
Parsley sage puzzle players’ thyme

Will Shortz’s Weekend Edition Sunday Puzzle on NPR this week was so so solid. It was not perhaps as challenging as Mr. Shortz claimed, but it is “elegant.” Will set the puzzle up by saying:
“This may be one of the most challenging puzzles I’ve presented. It has a very elegant answer. It is from listener Fred Piscop of Bellmore, N.Y.” The puzzle reads:
Take these three phrases:
Turkey breast
Ski slope
Cash drawer
What very unusual property do they have in common?
(Spoiler alert: The answer involves anagrams. You can find the answer in the comments section of Blaine’s blog.)

Lego Lambda’s “piggyback puzzle” that “rips off” the Weekend Edition Sunday Puzzle on NPR this week is just so-so. It is not as challenging as Mr. Shortz’s offering, but it is indeed “inelegant.”

Our rip-off puzzle provides you with a letter or two from the first words of a handful of two-word phrases, or from the first half of a compound word. You must complete each phrase with two words, or each compound word with two second halves. These two complements – be they words or second halves of compound words – are anagrams of one another. The number in parentheses following each first word indicates the number of letters in each of the two anagrams. Clues are provided.
 
For example:
H _ _ F (4) Clue: Image reproduction involving tiny dots, and a circle with a stem on a staff
Answer: halftone and half note (H _ _ F = half; “tone” and “note” are anagrams)

1.) S _ _ (5) Clue: Shell selling site, and walrus
2.) W _ _ D (5) Clue: Titles of songs that are 45 and 50 years old
3.) M _ _ _ E (6) Clue: Roll credits with cast members, including each top-billing sharer
4.) S _ _ (4) Clue: “Bird”song, and colon-shift-9
5.) S ­_ _ ­_ _ Y (4) Clue: Church clothes, and NFL wagers
6.) C _ _ _ _ _ S (4) Clue: What happens during a cycle, and what you might need next
7.) H _ _ G (7) Clue: Crafts powered by thermal updrafts, and what one might do with “what you might need next” (see clue, above)
8.) B _ _ _ _ N (4) Clue: Boxer’s occupational hazard, and “chicken feed”
9.) E _ _ _ _ R (5) Clue: American nonprofit charitable organization, and where one might pick up Peeps or frilly bonnets
10.) W _ _ _ _ N (4) Clue: Boring blah buss, and barrel staves, perhaps?
11.) W _ _ _ E (5) Clue: Epitome of blandness, and Santa or Papa trademark
12.) A _ _ _ E (5) Clue: Type of vinegar, and kitchen appliance
13.) I _ _ _ _ N (5) Clue: “The mine of gems,” and North American craft
14.) F_ _ _ T  O_  _H_  L_ _ M (6) Clue: unmentionables, and what the unmentionables are made of
15.) F_ _ _ H (5) Clue: Rooted in religion, and a rosary
16.) R _ _ (8) Clue: Description of a robin, and Gus Hall and Angela Davis during the 1980 presidential election… (Yeah, sure! Maybe on “Radio Free Russia”)
17.) W_ _ E (6) Clue: Where one’s white zinfandel is stored, and what might ensue if there is too much arsenic in one’s white zinfandel
18.) S _ _ _ N (6) Clue: Feature of a Hawthorne novel house, and a baker’s half-dozen (with lox, perhaps, thrown in)
19.) G _ _ _ _ _ Y (6) Clue: One who greets you in the check-out lane, and one who greets you in the parking lot on the way to your minivan
20.) B _ _ _ _ Y (4) Clue: Bar order, and result of the Battle of the Bulge
21.) D _ _ _ E (7) Clue: Choreographed performance, and the ensuing newspaper account about it
22.) O _ _ _ _ E (5) Clue: What results when it gets to be above 90 degrees, and Chrissy Snow, if Charlie would have hired her after she parted ways with Jack and Janet
23.) H _ _ (4) Clue: Front-burner sitters, and wi-fi access site
24.) P _ _ _ _ T (7) Clue: Cheap seats sitters, and affliction necessitating continual poring over ingredient labels
25.) E _ _ _ Y (4) Clue: evidence of a bad fishing day, and a syndrome some parents experience
26.) B _ _ _ _ T (4) Clue: Standard sports car feature, and KFC purchase
27.) G _ _ _ N (4) Clue: King title, minus “The,” and a fruity redundancy
28.) B _ _ _ D (5) Clue: Blues singer Jefferson, and “drought song” band
29.) M _ _ _ E (4) Clue: Axle or scroll wheel, and “spring cheese” holder
30.) S _ _ M (5) Clue: Blues musician, and bread-loving Weight Watcher
31.) S _ _ _ H (5) Clue: Beginning of a MacLachlan title, and a rogue-goer
32.) E _ _ C (4) Clue: Monty Python trouper, and what some allege about Harris or Holder
33.) _ _ _ A(H)  (5) Clue: Hall & Oates title, and “Ryan’s Daughter”
34.) M _ _ _ _ _ L/M _ _ _ _ _ _ L (4) Clue: Karate and Judo, and a badge worn, beneath the vest, by a guy named Dillon

Ripping Off Lego Lambda Slice:
Mona and Polly were syllabic… bisyllabic

Consider the following ten words:
Words
Serum
Unintended
Advertising
Actions
Dare
Unvarnished
Suffer
Whole
Five of the ten words that begin with a W, S, U, D and A can be paired with a certain monosyllabic word. The five other words beginning with a W, S, U, D and A can be paired with a certain polysyllabic word.

The two pairing words can be used to form the name of a former television show that is also the name of a U.S. city.

What is the television show? What are the ten pairings of words?

Dessert Menu

Autographic Artist Dessert:
Symbolisiness model poses as art

Name a well-known American company. Replace a symbol used in the name with one of the two letters the symbol stands for. Remove a space appearing in its name. The result is the signature that an opinionated and prolific artist used when signing his/her artwork.

What is the company? Who is the artist?

Every Friday at Joseph Young’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 enjoy our weekly puzzle party, please tell your friends about Joseph Young’s Puzzleria! Thank you.

66 comments:

  1. I hope the "well-known place" is not DACHAU (da cow) where human cattle were herded into death traps...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You have your hopes, and I have my hopes. My hope is that we are both more clever than that.

      Delete
    2. So it's the opposite of a stock home (Stockholm)?

      Delete
    3. What would a stock home have to do with animals controlling the population? I hope you are not having me on again this month, ron.???

      Delete
    4. So it must be a place where you say "bye, bye, ewes" (The Bayous)?

      Delete
    5. I think ewe gnu better than that.

      Delete
  2. So it's "When will a bull run the world?"

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Now, that really would be a battle!

      Delete
    2. A battle for Animal Planet...

      Delete
    3. Okay ron, come kleen. How long did it actually take for you to solve it?

      Delete
    4. The Animal Planet I was referring to was the one where a ewe ran us (Uranus).

      Delete
    5. ron,
      Very clever! But, I don't understand why, living here on a planet loaded with assholes, there is any need to search for more in the heavens.

      Delete
  3. Got the artifice puzzle, most of the piggyback puzzle, and possibly the artist puzzle(though I'm not sure how the symbol stands for the letter, otherwise I think I've found the artist with the unusual signature). Will need hints for the others, especially those with the anagrams.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. patjberry,

      The artifice puzzle (which involves anagrams and somewhat obscure news) was a pretty tough puzzle. Nice work.

      In the artist puzzle’s symbol and "one of the two letters": Latin comes into play.

      Regarding: “(I) will need hints for the others, especially those with the anagrams”…
      In the "DEM Gibberish and gibes" puzzle: I would suggest trying to determine what issue the debaters were addressing when one stated, “Let’s run on a clean flow, eh Rand?” It is a liquid flow, something you might pump into a “P T. Cruzer.”

      In the “Seventeen-Shot Revolver Appetizer: Triclops’ third eye”:
      The “two names” formed are the names of two fictional characters portrayed on the silver screen and on the Zenith Chromacolor II.

      LegoSays”AmpersandPhoneHome!”

      Delete
  4. I've only just settle in for some puzzle entertainment late of a Friday evening. So far, have read only the Morsel, and admittedly with some 'cheating' re the person (whom I should have heard of, but hadn't), solved the rest of it. Cute!

    Onward....

    ReplyDelete
  5. EXCUSE ME...NOT the MORSEL, rather the Cyberbrick Appetizer. Sorry about that.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Got the artist puzzle hours ago already. Lego's signoff pretty much confirmed that one. Will probably need more to go on with the triclops puzzle than just two fictional characters portrayed in movies and on TV. Could be anybody. Looking at "flasheshispistoli" few first names come out of that, and then you just draw a blank on last names. I found "Phil Fish", the character name of the late Abe Vigoda on "Barney Miller", but obviously no chance of getting the names "Abe" or "Vigoda" or anything else pertaining to him out of said anagram. On the one hand I'm good with anagrams, but on the other hand I've done better looking up whatever's been in the news lately. And right now the latter ain't happenin'. Anything on those words that are supposed to be connected with monosyllabic and polysyllabic words? Just so you know, I only know a few TV show titles that are also geographic locations.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Thus far, I've managed to deal with the above-referred-to-already Brick puzzle, all but 7 of the LONG Ripping Off Shortz puzzle, and the Ripping Off Lego Lambda puzzle. Am about to try tackling the Dessert.

    As per usual, no clue on sdb's Where On Earth? slice. OR the morsel, yet. But I see there is already a 'clue' given for the latter, as well as the Revolver Appetizer. Yippee.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Got SDB's puzzle, BTW. Just wish I had the right clue to give VT.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes, pjb. That is sweet. Perhaps skydiveboy will provide VT with a "Herding the humans" clue.

      Your sharing of your solving progress on the Triclops gives interesting insight into your solving process, pjb. "Flashes his pistol + i" does indeed yield "Phil Fish" and a mess of other letters... but perhaps they are not such a mess.

      There may be a clue embedded within the name of the recently late actor you reference.

      LegoJupiterMoonHardyHeroineNameOfMyGal(NotNecessarilyInThatOrder)

      Delete
  9. Just got the puzzle with the ten words(WORDS included)! And thank you Lego, for the compliment. But now, does this mean "Phil Fish" is right? And what does the rest spell out?

    ReplyDelete
  10. Just got it! Lego's last signoff helped! Now if only I could get the one about the debates!

    ReplyDelete
  11. I am still without the GIBE for the Morsel (although I managed to figure out the five words, thanks to Lego's hint about "liquid flow"); have yet to make any headway on the Revolver Appetizer (despite the hint about films and Zeniths), and am really nowhere yet either on the Dessert (although I took in the sign-off hint, i.e. Ampersand....but how does IT stand for only TWO letters?)

    ReplyDelete
  12. I could still use another hint or two besides "liquid flow". What else ya got, Lego?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I'm speculating about the possibility that the 'liquid flow' may have a solid incarnation (with some structural similarity to an actual liquid flow here on Planet3) in the Star Trek universe.

      Delete
    2. Cruzer is the name of a brand of USB flash drive into which one might pump DATA. Data, the android, and Spock, the half-Vulcan, have certain similarities. DATA and LAVA share the [(consonant)(A)(consonant)(A)] format. Fascinating!
      I have no idea what the solution to the puzzle might be.

      Delete
  13. Seriously, I'm looking at what I'm supposed to rearrange, and I've taken out fuels, coal, and water, but I can't figure out the rest.

    ReplyDelete
  14. I wonder if the symbol/artist puzzle (for which I believe I have the answer) and debate puzzle (for which I have no answer, only musings (see above)) are actually clues to the punny geography puzzle (for which I have an answer that doesn't seem very elegant to me).

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I would not disagree with you on the lack of elegance. If there is no elegance in the way humans manage animal husbandry, then I don't think you should expect the animals to do any better.

      Delete
  15. To piggyback the ROPASS:
    R_ _ _ (5) Clues:

    a. A person who had a relationship with a particular person. That particular person might have had a professional relationship with a different person, if one of Lego's ROPASS clues was true.

    b. That first person, at the end of that relationship.

    By the way, I got most of the ROPASS, the ROLLS and the AAD.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Or how about G _ _ _ _ _ _ _ C (5) Clues:

      a. Mathematical term

      b. Euclid, Descartes, Euler, Gauss

      Delete
    2. Or how about H _ _ _ (5) Clues:
      a. Something you might have for dinner.
      b. Something you might have after dinner.

      Delete
    3. Or how about B _ _ (6) Clue:
      a. What you might call some accidents.
      b. What might be the cause of those accidents.

      Delete
  16. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  17. Or how about M _ _ _ T (5) Clue:
    a. A place name in California
    b. Falling off a horse when you are trying to get on.

    ReplyDelete
  18. Just got the Sunday Puzzle. Any chance with the debate puzzle again, Lego? That one still stumps me.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The five words in the Morsel:
      1. The first five letters are a Wharton charater’s first name and the last three letters spell out the surname of a late prime minister with a palindromic name
      2. “Liquid flow” company that was scotched by SCOTUS
      3. A word that might describe wedding vows, for some
      4. Mark Knopfler thinks this is heavy
      5. An ear that you might find on a foot

      LegoSawDickCheneyJrWalkingWithTheQueen

      Delete
  19. How about a hint for the GIBE itself, Lego? I'm so confused about that...not understanding if it really WAS something that happened in the news, or if it is something that was somehow hinted at IN the puzzle itself?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. ViolinTeddy,
      Had Carly Fiorina been of the prime-time stage instead of on the undercard, here is what I would have scribbled instead:
      He-Debater: “Let’s run on a clean flow, Rand.” (“He-Debater” as opposed to a “She-Debater”) But without CF in the arena, the “He-Debater” would be redundant. So, the sentence turned out as it did. A gibe was born – a word that is often associated not with Kenya but with another foreign country where we don’t want our presidents to be born!

      LegoMcKenzie4Prez…Let’zThinkWhereIzThereACandidateWithA”Z”InHizName?

      Delete
  20. Thanks for your splendid quintet of ROPASS piggyback puzzles. I am stumped on the first and the third.

    A piggyback of your piggyback:
    How about
    G _ _ _ _ N (4)
    Clues:
    a. 1/1.618…
    b. Leonine trait

    LegoLeonineCrittersHaveNineLives

    ReplyDelete
  21. Thanks, Lego. Those last hints helped a lot, only I'm not sure which debater might have been using those words, or which one is the "gibe" word. Didn't watch the debates. As for trying to get five words out of 32 letters, I'm not usually good with complex anagrams with more than 15 letters(it's a cryptic crossword thing).

    ReplyDelete
  22. Regrettably, I only have a few answers this week as I have not had much time to work on these and I do not have SDB's excellent challenge.

    ROPASS:
    SEA SHORE, SEA HORSE.
    SUNDAY BEST, SUNDAY BETS.
    CLOTHES SPIN, CLOTHES PINS.
    HANG GLIDERS, HANG GIRDLES.
    FRUIT OF THE LOOM SWEATS, FRUIT OF THE LOOM WASTES.
    FAITH BASED, FAITH BEADS.
    RED BREASTED, RED DEBATERS.
    WINE CELLAR, WINE RECALL.
    SEVEN GABLES, SEVEN BAGELS.
    BLOODY MARY, BLOODY ARMY.
    DANCE RECITAL, DANCE ARTICLE.
    SLIM HARPO, SLIM OPRAH.
    MARTIAL ARTS, MARTIAL (MARSHAL) STAR.

    ROLLS:
    WHOLE TRUTH
    TRUTH SERUM
    UNVARNISHED TRUTH
    TRUTH or DARE
    TRUTH in ADVERTISING

    WORDS' CONSEQUENCES
    SUFFER CONSEQUENCES
    UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES
    DIRE CONSEQUENCES
    ACTIONS' CONSEQUENCES
    “TRUTH OF CONSEQUENCES” TV SHOW.
    TRUTH OR CONSEQUENCES, NEW MEXICO.

    ReplyDelete
  23. I actually have two answers for the geography puzzle. The one I'm choosing as my official answer is KATHMANDU. It requires a stretch of the imagination and a bit of punctuation:
    Cat: "Man, do!" (You see, the cat is addressing the man and telling him to do something.) The use of the colon is similar to that found in the debate puzzle. I guess I can understand why journalists sometimes use it that way. I find it's use in Bella and Me: Life in the Service of a Cat (a book published by Herblock in 1991) less objectionable.

    My other answer is Bosphorus. I can't decide which is worse.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I can. Bosphorus. But I love them both, misplaced colon and all.

      LegoDon'tYouHateItWhenYouMisplaceYourColon

      Delete
  24. ron and Paul:
    You guys are surprising me. I thought you both had the answer. Let's see if PJB has it, as he indicated. I will post the answer later. I thought this was an easy one, but it is not always easy to tell.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I should have mentioned that KATHMANDU IS NOT a bad answer, and kinda works, but it is not my answer. Here's a hint: Don't toss out the first three letters of your answer. Work with it.

      Delete
    2. I went through KATHMANDU, but translated it as "cattleman do"

      Delete
    3. ron,
      You are much closer than you realize. Wrong part of the world though.

      Delete
  25. Answers for three of David’s five fine piggyback anagrams:
    1. Hint, please!
    2. Geometric means; geometric names
    3. Hint, please!
    4. Bad breaks; bad brakes
    5. Mount Baldy; mount badly (my fave!)

    Great work, David.

    LegoIsCluelessSoGiveHimAClue

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. For #2 I had Geometric solid; geometric idols.

      Delete
    2. Hints:
      1. A recent NPR Sunday Puzzle.
      3. The 2 anagrammed words have another anagram, which you can see in this clue.

      For 2, my original thought was means / names, but I like solid / idols just as well.

      Delete
    3. David,
      I am still stumped, but not giving up. If you tell me which NPR puzzle, I might be able to get #1.

      3. The best I can do is:
      Hash slung
      Hash lungs (smoking some postprandial pot)
      That can't be your intended answer.
      And I am baffled by: "The 2 anagrammed words have another anagram, which you can see in this clue." I tried anagramming the 5-letter words in the clue, to no avail.

      LegoNeedsToEvolveAsASolver


      Delete
    4. For 1, telling which puzzle would be too much of a giveaway. Start with ROPASS 22 and see if that helps.

      For 3, it is not the words in the clue that I am referring to.

      Let me know if you need more.

      Delete
  26. MORSEL: Five Words: RENEWABLE FUEL STANDARD CORN ETHANOL Gibe: EH?

    CYBERBRICKLAYING APPETIZER: Person: MARVIN MINSKY, AI pioneer; Headline: GOOGLE GO; Explanation: Google AI program beat the GO champion.

    SEVENTEEN-SHOT REVOLVER APPETIZER:

    FLASHES HIS PISTOL I

    A E F H H I I I L L O P S S S S T


    WHERE ON EARTH SLICE:


    RIPPING OFF SHORTZ SLICE:

    1. SEA SHORE & HORSE
    2. WILD THING & NIGHT
    3. M _ _ _E ?????? & ?????? <----------------------
    4. S_ _ ???? & ???? <----------------------
    5. SUNDAY BEST & BETS
    6. CLOTHES SPIN & ? PINS ?
    7. HANG GLIDERS & GIRDLES?
    8. BROKEN NOSE & ONES
    9. EASTER SEALS & SALES
    10. WOODEN ???? & ???? <-----------------------edge? side?
    11. WHITE BREAD & BEARD
    12. APPLE CIDER & DICER
    13. INDIAN OCEAN & CANOE
    14. FRUIT OF THE LOOM BRIEFS & FIBERS
    15. FAITH BASED & BEADS
    16. RED BREASTED & DEBATERS
    17. WINE CELLAR & RECALL
    18. SEVEN GABLES & BAGELS
    19. GROCERY BAGGER & BEGGAR
    20. BLOODY MARY & ARMY
    21. DANCE RECITAL & ARTICLE
    22. OFFICE ????? & ????? <----------------------------
    23. HOT POTS & SPOT
    24. P T ??????? & ??????? <----------------------------
    25. EMPTY NETS & NEST
    26. BUCKET SEAT & MEAL CAN"T FIGURE HOW TO TURN EITHER "SEATæ OR "MEA"L INTO A SECOND ANSWER THAT WORKS
    27. G N ???? & ???? <----------------------------
    28. BLIND LEMON & MELON
    29. MOUSE PART & TRAP
    30. SLIM HARPO & OPRAH
    31. SARAH PLAIN & LAPIN
    32. ERIC IDLE & LIED
    33. SARA(H) SMILE & MILES
    34. MARTIAL / MARSHAL ARTS & STAR


    RIPPING OFF LEGO LAMBDA SLICE:

    WHOLE Truth; Truth SERUM; UNVARNISHED Truth; Truth or DARE; Truth in ADVERTISING
    WORDS have Consequences; SUFFER the Consequences; UNINTENDED Consequences; DIRE Consequences; ACTIONS have Consequences

    TV SHOW: TRUTH OR CONSEQUENCES


    DESSERT: Guesses: ARM & HAMMER, PROCTOR & GAMBLE, BLACK & DECKER PICASSO?

    ReplyDelete
  27. The ROPASS you didn't guess:
    3. Movie Actors / Costar
    4. Sad Café / Face
    10. Wooden Kiss / Skis
    22. Obtuse Angle / Angel
    24. Peanut Gallery / Allergy
    27. Green Mile / Lime

    For AAD (Dessert):
    H&R Bloch / Herblock

    ReplyDelete
  28. This week’s official answers for the record, Part 1:
    Morsel Menu

    Debating Elephants Morsel:
    Gibberish and gibes
    I was dozing and drifing in and out a bit – about a dozen times – during the GOP debate last evening (January 28 in Des Moines). Near the end of the debate I was snapped out of mid-snore by a loud voice making a comment. I rubbed the sands of slumber from my eyes and the cobwebs of a dream from my subconscious and, because I am an obsessive note-taker, I groggily grabbed a pen and jotted down the comment.
    Here is what I scrawled: Debater: “Let’s run on a clean flow, eh Rand?”
    After the debate, as I perused my notes, I realized I was not sure which “debater” made the comment. I was pretty sure it wasn’t Donald Trump, who was playing hockey… or was it hooky? (But perhaps he had made a triumphant entrance while I had nodded off?)
    The speaker could not be Ben Carson either. His voice had been lulling be to sleep, not rousing me to consciousness.
    Nor could the speaker of the comment be Rand Paul because the “debater” was addressing “Rand.”
    And, because of another word (a taunting, tweaking, trash-talking “gotcha” gibe word) that the speaker used in his comment, I eliminated as the speaker another of the seven debaters present. (The speaker’s gibe word indicated that the comment was directed not only at Rand Paul but also at a candidate who was on the same side of the issue as Paul.)
    Then I realized something else: The 32 letters of the words I jotted could be rearranged to form five words that encapsulated the topic being discussed.
    What are those five words? What was the “taunting, tweaking, trash-talking gotcha gibe word” that the speaker used? Which debater did I thus dismiss as the speaker of the comment?

    Answer:
    Corn, Ethanol, Renewable Fuel Standard
    The gotcha gibe word is “eh”. The speaker – Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio, John Kasich or Chris Christie – was addressing Rand Paul. But by inserting the “eh” into his comment he was also subliminally alluding to Ted Cruz who, like Paul, is against the Renewable Fuel Standard which subsidizes production of ethanol which is often made from corn.

    “Eh” is a gotcha jibe because Ted Cruz was born in Canada, where people apparently say “eh” a lot.

    Appetizer Menu

    Cyberbricklaying Appetizer:
    Intelligent Artifice
    Rearrange the letters in the phrase “Mr. Ivy Kinsman” to form the first and last names of a pioneering person who was in the news this past week.
    A peripherally related story includes in its headline a six-letter word and a two-letter word. The two-letter word is what remains after one removes from the six-letter word a “fun-to-say” word that has an anagram that is a kind of brick.
    Who is the pioneering person? What are the two words in the headline? In what way are these two stories peripherally related?

    Answer:
    Marvin Minsky
    Go, Google; Google – ogle = Go
    Marvin Minsky was a pioneer in artificial intelligence, which leads to outcomes like computers beating experts at Go, chess, etc.

    Lego…

    ReplyDelete
  29. This week’s official answers for the record, Part 2:

    Seventeen-Shot Revolver Appetizer:
    Triclops’ third eye
    Add a third “i” to the phrase “flashes his pistol” and rearrange the 17 letters to form two names – a pair of first and last names – that you might have read or heard in news reports this past week.
    What are these two names?

    Answer:
    Phil Fish; Sal Tessio, characters portrayed by Abe Vigoda

    Lego…

    MENU

    Where On Earth Slice:
    Herding the humans
    In every part of the Earth inhabited by people, we manage livestock. However there is one geographical place where – according to its name, humorously speaking – the exact opposite is true. The name of the place is a single-word homophone.
    Name this well-known place if you can.
    Hint: The single-word answer will sound like more than a single word.

    Answer: I will allow skydiveboy, Mark Scott from Seattle, reveal the answer to his excellent puzzle when he deems it proper to do so. If someone can solve, she/he is a better puzzle solver that I. I whiffed on it completely.

    Lego…

    ReplyDelete
  30. CORN, ETHANOL, RENEWABLE, FUEL, STANDARD
    MARVIN MINSKY, GOOGLE, GO
    PHIL FISH, SAL TESSIO(parts the late Abe Vigoda played)
    CATALONIA(Cattle own ya)Good one, SDB!
    1. SEA HORSE, SHORE
    2. WILD THING, NIGHT
    3. MOVIE ACTORS, COSTAR
    4. SAD CAFE, FACE
    5. SUNDAY BEST, BEST
    6. CLOTHES SPIN, PINS
    7. HANG GLIDERS, GIRDLES
    8. BROKEN NOSE, ONES
    9. EASTER SEALS, SALES
    10. WOODEN KISS, SKIS
    11. WHITE BREAD, BEARD
    12. APPLE CIDER, DICER
    13. INDIAN OCEAN, CANOE
    14. FRUIT OF THE LOOM BRIEFS, FIBERS
    15. FAITH BASED, BEADS
    16. RED BREASTED, DEBATERS
    17. WINE CELLAR, RECALL
    18. SEVEN GABLES, BAGELS
    19. GROCERY BAGGER, BEGGAR
    20. BLOODY MARY, ARMY
    21. DANCE RECITAL, ARTICLE
    22. OBTUSE ANGLE, ANGEL
    23. HOT POTS, SPOT
    24. PEANUT GALLERY, ALLERGY
    25. EMPTY NETS, NEST
    26. BUCKET SEAT, EATS
    27. GREEN MILE, LIME
    28. BLIND LEMON, MELON
    29. MOUSE PART, TRAP
    30. SLIM HARPO, OPRAH
    31. SARAH PALIN, PALIN
    32. ERIC IDLE, LIED
    33. SARA SMILE, MILES
    34. MARTIAL/MARSHAL ARTS, STAR
    TRUTH AND CONSEQUENCES(New Mexico)
    H&R BLOCK, HERBLOCK(Herb Block)

    ReplyDelete
  31. BEST, BETS(Sorry, it autocorrected me)

    ReplyDelete
  32. This week’s official answers for the record, Part 3:

    Ripping Off Piscop And Shortz Slice:
    Parsley sage puzzle players’ thyme
    Lego Lambda’s “piggyback puzzle” that “rips off” the Weekend Edition Sunday Puzzle on NPR this week is just so-so. It is not as challenging as Mr. Shortz’s offering, but it is indeed “inelegant.”
    Our rip-off puzzle provides you with a letter or two from the first words of a handful of two-word phrases, or from the first half of a compound word. You must complete each phrase with two words, or each compound word with two second halves. These two complements – be they words or second halves of compound words – are anagrams of one another. The number in parentheses following each first word indicates the number of letters in each of the two anagrams. Clues are provided.
    For example:
    H _ _ F (4) Clue: Image reproduction involving tiny dots, and a circle with a stem on a staff
    Answer: halftone and half note (H _ _ F = half; “tone” and “note” are anagrams)
    1.) S _ _ (5) Clue: Shell selling site, and walrus
    Seashore, sea horse

    2.) W _ _ D (5) Clue: Titles of songs that are 45 and 50 years old
    Wild Night, Wild Thing
    3.) M _ _ _ E (6) Clue: Roll credits with cast members, including each top-billing sharer
    Movie actors, movie costar
    4.) S _ _ (4) Clue: “Bird”song, and colon-shift-9
    Sad Café, sad face 
    5.) S ¬_ _ ¬_ _ Y (4) Clue: Church clothes, and NFL wagers Sunday best, Sunday bets
    6.) C _ _ _ _ _ S (4) Clue: What happens during a cycle, and what you might need next
    Clothes spin, clothespins
    7.) H _ _ G (7) Clue: Crafts powered by thermal updrafts, and what one might do with “what you might need next” (see clue, above)
    Hang gliders, hang girdles
    8.) B _ _ _ _ N (4) Clue: Boxer’s occupational hazard, and “chicken feed”
    Broken nose, broken ones
    9.) E _ _ _ _ R (5) Clue: American nonprofit charitable organization, and where one might pick up Peeps or frilly bonnets
    Easter Seals, Easter Sales
    10.) W _ _ _ _ N (4) Clue: Boring blah buss, and barrel staves, perhaps?
    Wooden kiss, wooden skis
    11.) W _ _ _ E (5) Clue: Epitome of blandness, and Santa or Papa trademark
    White bread, white beard
    12.) A _ _ _ E (5) Clue: Type of vinegar, and kitchen appliance
    Apple cider, apple dicer
    13.) I _ _ _ _ N (5) Clue: “The mine of gems,” and North American craft
    Indian Ocean, Indian canoe
    14.) F_ _ _ T O_ _H_ L_ _ M (6) Clue: unmentionables, and what the unmentionables are made of
    Fruit of the Loom briefs, Fruit of the Loom fibers
    15.) F_ _ _ H (5) Clue: Rooted in religion, and a rosary
    Faith based, faith beads
    16.) R _ _ (8) Clue: Description of a robin, and Gus Hall and Angela Davis during the 1980 presidential election… (Yeah, sure! Maybe on “Radio Free Russia”)
    Red breasted, Red debaters
    17.) W_ _ E (6) Clue: Where one’s white zinfandel is stored, and what might ensue if there is too much arsenic in one’s white zinfandel
    Wine cellar, wine recall

    Lego…

    ReplyDelete
  33. ANSWER: In the Northeast of Spain where Catalonia = It is where the “cattle own ya.”

    Congratulations to patjberry!!! who is the only one to solve it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The ONLY one?! Thanks, SDB! It just came to me! Then of course I had to look it up to confirm it, but I got it! Wish I actually won something for it, though, like a cash prize or whatever. The ONLY one! Wow!

      Delete
  34. This week’s official answers for the record, Part 4:

    Ripping Off Piscop And Shortz Slice:
    Parsley sage puzzle players’ thyme
    (CONTINUED)

    18.) S _ _ _ N (6) Clue: Feature of a Hawthorne novel house, and a baker’s half-dozen (with lox, perhaps, thrown in)
    Seven Gables, seven bagels
    19.) G _ _ _ _ _ Y (6) Clue: One who greets you in the check-out lane, and one who greets you in the parking lot on the way to your minivan
    Grocery bagger, grocery beggar
    20.) B _ _ _ _ Y (4) Clue: Bar order, and result of the Battle of the Bulge
    Bloody Mary, bloody army
    21.) D _ _ _ E (7) Clue: Choreographed performance, and the ensuing newspaper account about it
    Seashore, sea horse
    22.) O _ _ _ _ E (5) Clue: What results when it gets to be above 90 degrees, and Chrissy Snow, if Charlie would have hired her after she parted ways with Jack and Janet
    Obtuse angle, obtuse Angel
    23.) H _ _ (4) Clue: Front-burner sitters, and wi-fi access site
    Hot pots, hot spot
    24.) P _ _ _ _ T (7) Clue: Cheap seats sitters, and affliction necessitating continual poring over ingredient labels
    Peanut gallery, peanut allergy
    25.) E _ _ _ Y (4) Clue: evidence of a bad fishing day, and a syndrome some parents experience
    Empty nets, empty nest
    26.) B _ _ _ _ T (4) Clue: Standard sports car feature, and KFC purchase
    Bucket seat, bucket eats
    27.) G _ _ _ N (4) Clue: Stephen King title, minus “The,” and a fruity redundancy
    (The) Green Mile, green lime
    28.) B _ _ _ D (5) Clue: Blues singer Jefferson, and “drought song” band
    Blind Lemon, Blind Melon
    29.) M _ _ _ E (4) Clue: Axle or scroll wheel, and “spring cheese” holder
    Mouse part, mousetrap
    30.) S _ _ M (5) Clue: Blues musician, and bread-loving Weight Watcher
    Slim Harpo, Slim Oprah
    31.) S _ _ _ H (5) Clue: Beginning of a MacLachlan title, and a rogue-goer
    “Sarah, Plain…”, Sarah Palin
    32.) E _ _ C (4) Clue: Monty Python trouper, and what some allege about Harris or Holder
    Eric Idle, Eric lied
    33.) _ _ _ A(H) (5) Clue: Hall & Oates title, and “Ryan’s Daughter”
    “Sara Smile”, Sarah Miles
    34.) M _ _ _ _ _ L/M _ _ _ _ _ _ L (4) Clue: Karate and Judo, and a badge worn, beneath the vest, by a guy named Dillon
    Martial arts, Marshall star

    Answers: See bold print above.

    Lego…

    ReplyDelete
  35. This week’s official answers for the record, Part 5:

    Ripping Off Lego Lambda Slice:
    Mona and Polly were syllabic… bisyllabic
    Consider the following ten words:
    Words
    Serum
    Unintended
    Dire
    Advertising
    Actions
    Dare
    Unvarnished
    Suffer
    Whole
    Five of the ten words that begin with a W, S, U, D and A can be paired with a certain monosyllabic word. The five other words beginning with a W, S, U, D and A can be paired with a certain polysyllabic word.
    The two pairing words can be used to form the name of a former television show that is also the name of a U.S. city.
    What is the television show? What are the ten pairings of words?

    Answer:
    Truth or Consequences
    Words have Consequences
    Truth Serum
    Unintended Consequences
    Dire Consequences
    Truth in Advertising
    Actions have Consequences
    Truth or Dare
    Unvarnished Truth
    Suffer the Consequences
    The Whole Truth

    Dessert Menu

    Autographic Artist Dessert:
    Symbolisiness model poses as art
    Name a well-known American company. Replace a symbol used in the name with one of the two letters the symbol stands for. Remove a space appearing in its name. The result is the signature that an opinionated and prolific artist used when signing his/her artwork.
    What is the company? Who is the artist?

    Answer:
    H&R Block; Herblock

    Lego...

    ReplyDelete