“You’re gonna fill 96 squares” Sitcomedy and tragedy; Can Clemson “stem” the Crimson Tide? Videoversity; A Gray matter of anatomy; A side you can spoon; Conrad Tweety-Birdie?

P! SLICES: OVER (pe)³ – (e⁴ + p³) SERVED

Welcome to our January 6^th edition of Joseph Young’s Puzzleria! This is our first P! of 2017.

We offer ten puzzles on our menus this week, including four that Rip Off Shortz. 

Please enjoy all you can sol... all you care to solve.

Hors d’Oeuvre Menu

Cast Of Characters Hors d’Oeuvre:

Sitcomedy and tragedy

Take the first names of two characters in the cast of a seminal television situation comedy. Put the two names together and remove the consonant cluster (or blend) from the beginning of one of the names.

If you say the result aloud it will sound like a word connected to the death of one of the many celebrities to whom the world bid adieu in 2016.

What are the first names of these two characters, the sitcom, the celebrity, and the word connected to the celebrity’s death?

Hint: The second, third and last letters of one character’s first name are the same as the first, third and last letters of the celebrity’s first name.

Morsel Menu

Sophs And Alums Morsel:

Videoversity

Name a sophomore at a major U.S. university who appeared on national television recently, and who will appear there again this coming week.

Name an alumnus of that same university who very regularly appears on national television, and who will very likely watch the sophomore’s appearance on television this coming week.

The first names of the alumnus and the sophomore rhyme. If you remove a four-letter word from left and a five-letter word from the right of the alum’s surname, the letters that remain are the soph’s first name.

Their surnames are pronounced pretty much the same, and differ by just one letter. If you remove the middle letter from the alum’s surname you are left with the sophomore’s surname.

Who are these two TV regulars from the same alma mater?

Hints: The four-letter word that appears at the left side of the alum’s surname is a synonym of a word that sounds somewhat like the three words filling the blanks in the following sentence: “I don’t buy that breakfast cereal with the bunny on the box anymore because my kids have become ____ _’ ____.”

The five-letter word that appears at the right side of the alum’s surname is a homophone for a bird’s or mammal’s “natural necklace.”

Appetizer Menu

Piece Of Crabcake Seafood Lagoon Appetizer:

A side you can spoon

 

What is the difference between Blind Faith and a particular spoonable (but not-so-much forkable) side dish or appetizer one might order at a seafood restaurant (such as Lego’s Seafood Lagoon)?

MENU 

Tara, Oz And Shangri-La Slice:

Can Clemson “stem” the CrimsonTide?

Name a fictional place in two words. The last five letters of its second word are the first five letters of a flowering plant that might well help beautify the fictional place.

The remaining letters in the flowering plant combined with the remaining letters in the second word of the fictional place can be rearranged to form the name of the state situated immediately below the state associated with the fictional place.

The flowering plant is eponymous – that is, its etymology stems from a person’s name. The letters of the fictional place’s first word can be rearranged to form a crop plant with an etymology that stems from, well… from “stems.”

What is this fictional place? What is the state situated below the fictional place’s state? What are the flowering plant and crop plant?

Surnominal And Surgical Slice:

A Gray matter of anatomy

Recent medical research that made news this past week was sufficiently significant so as to prompt editors to rename notes in “Gray’s Anatomy.”

The research involved a newly reconsidered part of the body vital to the digestive and cardiovascular systems – a part functioning to regulate blood flow and yet oft defer clots.

Rearrange the 18 letters in “rename notes in Gray’s” to form a possible headline for the news story, in the form:

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

_ _

_ _

_ _ _ _ _

Add a V to the 16 letters of “yet oft defer clots.” Rearrange these 17 letters to form the surnames of three researchers – two from the late 1800s and one from the present – who are most responsible for this medical breakthrough.

What is the headline and who are the three researchers?

Ripping Off Shortz Slices:

“You’re gonna fill 96 squares”

Will Shortz’s January 1^st NPR Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle reads:
Take the four-letter men’s names TODD, OMAR, DAVE and DREW. If you write them one under the other, they’ll form a word square, spelling TODD, OMAR, DAVE and DREW reading downward as well:

Can you construct a word square consisting of five five-letter men’s names?...

Puzzleria’s Riffing Off Shortz Slices read:

ONE: Construct a 5-by-5 word square grid. Fill its squares with words that satisfy the following five clues, in no particular order:

Hint: Two of the words are anagrams of one another.

1. AHA calls it “the pulse of life”

2. Prefix meaning threadlike

3. Brand of men’s cologne

4. Outrageously wicked; monstrous (obsolete term)

5. Southern or Indian

Note: The following two puzzles are not “word squares” but rather simple NxN crossword puzzles containing NxN letters with N+N words to be entered into the grid. Again the clues are given in no particular order.

TWO: Clues to a 4x4 crossword puzzle:

1. First word in a seasonal song title

2. Goads

3. Word preceding bill or ball

4. First name (short form) and surname-initial of a president/general (this answer is an anagram of a synonym of “unattractive”)

5. Second word in a seasonal song title

6. Church part that sounds like another term for “mobile device programs”

7. Third word in a seasonal song title

8. Colors hair, or hair colors

THREE: Clues to a 5x5 crossword puzzle:

Hint: Two of the words are anagrams of one another.

1. Fish-trap in France

2. _____-nous

3. Word preceded by “apple pie” or “new world”

4. Honda luxury brand

5. “Stations” where one can “fill up” a camel

6. Invasive grassy weed in Florida and other southeastern states

7. Voyageur vehicle

8. Briny deep

9. First word in an oxymoron describing John Denver, Joan Rivers or one of those many guys that died just this past year

10. “Mars _____ Guitars!”

Note: The following challenge is an Nx(N+1) crossword puzzle containing Nx(N+1) letters with N+(N+1) words to be entered into the grid. Again the clues are given in no particular order. The number of letters in the answer is given in parentheses.

FOUR: Clues to a 5x6 crossword puzzle:

1. Mary and Joseph inquired at the ___ __ see if there was any room there for them (5)

2. Message on a ubiquitous election day sticker (6)

3. Golden throng (5)

4. Synonym for “fairy-like” that rhymes with a word meaning “any edible mollusk or crustacean” (6)

5. Jesse Garon’s brother (5)

6. “I never saw a purple cow, I never hope to ___ ___; (6)

7. Hearty sheep on certain Nordic isles (5)

8. Jazzy French horn player from Jersey (6)

9. Painter of “A Man Blowing Smoke at a Drunken Woman” (5)

10. Rough shed that provides shelter (6)

11. Furlough, for example (5)

Dessert Menu

Country And Western Dessert:

Conrad Tweety-Birdie?

A bird and a color are mentioned in the opening lines of a song composed and recorded by a country & western legend circa the mid-20^th-century. The legend’s last name is a man’s first name if you remove one of its letters.

Another country & western legend recorded a song a few years later that mentioned a bird of that color in its opening lines. This legend’s last name is a man’s first name if you remove none of its letters.

There are 11 sets of consecutive letter pairs in the 12-letter name of the bird in the first legend’s song – three of which are sets of double letters and four of which are U.S. state postal abbreviations. (By contrast, there are 7 sets of consecutive letter pairs in the 8-letter name of the bird in the second legend’s song – none of which are sets of double letters and none of which are U.S. state postal abbreviations.)

Remove from the name of the 12-letter bird one of its postal abbreviations and one letter from one of its three double-letter sets, leaving nine letters. Wedge the middle three of these nine letters between one of the remaining double-letter sets, forming a new 9-letter word that is a synonym of the second legend’s first name.

Who are these two legends and two birds?

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 Wednesdays 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.