Four puzzle-stops on a world tour; Thor9ss 4 you 2 transl8; Performing verbal surgery on a profession; It’s (not) a Duesey! Non-look-alike sound-alikes

PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER 8!/21 SERVED

Schpuzzle Of The Week:
Thor9ss 4 you 2 transl8

The sum of the following sequence of seventeen numbers is 1,626,110. Translate the sequence:
3,121 
6,837
4,112
19
106
389
2,187
311
15,289
61
10
216,787
731,986
21
614,389
21,317
9,168

MENU

International House Of Puzzles Appetizers:
Four puzzle-stops on a world tour

Country alchemy
❓1. Think of a large country. Remove two adjacent internal letters to obtain another, smaller country on the other side of the world. 
What are the two countries?

Numerogeography 101
❓2. Insert the designator for the least-significant digit in a multiple-place integer into the name of a country to form the name of another country. What are the two countries and the insert?

Short nickname
❓3. A large country has a short, informal nickname that shares no letters with the official name of the country. What are the country and its informal nickname?

Unloved in his own country
❓4. An American author, who has lived most of his life in Massachusetts, is known worldwide for a bestseller that was the first of a trilogy. This novel formed the basis for a 2013 German feature film that was a #1 box-office hit in Germany and Spain. The novel, author, and film are all rather obscure in the USA. Who is the author and what are the titles of the novel and film?
Hints: The film starred Tom Payne and Ben Kingsley (dubbed into German and Spanish). The second novel of the trilogy won the first James Fenimore Cooper Prize for Historical Fiction in 1993.

Autos And Autocrats Slice:
It’s (not) a Duesey!

Name a past world leader, first and last names. Replace the the first and final letters of the full name with a letter that appears late in the alphabet. 
Switch the positions of two vowels in the second name, then remove one of them. 
The result is the names of two automobiles: 
1. the make of a subpar subcompact from the past, and 
2. an informal name for a well-known automotive brand.
Who is this world leader and what are these car names?

Riffing Off Shortz And Lipscomb Slices:
Non-look-alike sound-alikes

Will Shortz’s September 22nd NPR Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle, created by Tyler Lipscomb of Augusta, Georgia, reads: 
Think of an adjective in five letters in two syllables. The first syllable phonetically sounds like a synonym of the full, five-letter word. And strangely these two words have no letters in common. What words are these?
Puzzleria!s Riffing Off Shortz And Lipscomb Slices read:
ENTREE #1:
Think of a Midwestern city in nine letters in two words. 
The city’s first word phonetically sounds exactly like the second-last word, an exclamation, in the lyrics of a 1970’s-era hit song by a singer whose stage name echoes the names of a pair of comic opera collaborators. And strangely, the city’s first word and this word of exclamation have no letters in common. 
And even more strangely, the Midwestern city’s second word phonetically sounds exactly like the final word in the song’s lyrics.
What city and song lyrics are these?
Hint: The Midwestern city phonetically sounds like a two-word name for a room in a house. The first word in this name is the type of wood that might be used used to panel the room, and the second word is a synonym of  “den” or “man cave.”
ENTREE #2:
(Note: The following puzzle is a hot mess. Thus, I beg your indulgence.)
Consider the following sentence:
“A political candidate may harbor fears that the prejudice voiced by his/her main opponent is bogus – and that the opponent is thus actually less prejudicial than himself/herself.”
The sentence above contains a five-letter synonym of a seven-letter word.
The first syllable of this seven-letter word phonetically sounds like a synonym of a second word in the sentence, and sounds also like a synonym of a third word in the sentence. And strangely this first syllable has no letter in common with the synonym of the second word, and only one letter in common with synonym of the third word.
The second and third syllables of this seven-letter word spell a synonym of a fourth word in the sentence.
What is the seven-letter word, and what is its synonym in the sentence? 
What are the two words that sound like the first syllable in the seven-letter word, and what are their respective synonyms in the sentence?
What word is spelled by the second and third syllables of the seven-letter word, and what is its synonym in the sentence?
ENTREE #3:
(Note: the information in the following puzzle is largely phony and faux.)
In today’s world, human joints are replaced using hard polished metal alloys, durable ceramic and tough, slick plastic. 
Back in the day, however, other more primitive materials were used... wood, for example.
Take three words:
1. The tree from which one of the woods used in the replacement was harvested,
2. A word describing the inauthentic status of the new joint, and
3. the joint that the wood replaced
This three-word term phonetically sounds like a three-syllable noun for the soothingly harmonious, pleasing-to-the-ear reassurances spoken to the patient as he was going under the knife! (Okay okay, scalpel.)
And strangely each of these three words and each of their corresponding three sound-alike syllables have only one, zero and one letter in common. 
What is this three-word term for this back-in-the-day joint replacement?
What is the three-syllable noun for the soothingly harmonious, pleasing-to-the-ear reassurances spoken to the patient
ENTREE #4:
Think of a noun in five letters and in two syllables meaning a relatively small piece of isolated land. 
Replace the two letters in the first syllable with three different letters to form a noun in six letters and in two syllables meaning a relatively small opening. Keep the second syllables as they are. Indeed these two second syllables are identical to one another. 
The two first syllables are phonetically identical even though, strangely, they have no letters in common. 
What two nouns are these?
ENTREE #5:
Think of a proper noun in seven letters and in two syllables. It is the surname of a person who has a sports venue named after him.
The first syllable phonetically sounds like a creature in a nursery rhyme. The first syllable of this proper noun plus the first letter of its second syllable spell the name of this creature.
The second syllable of the proper noun sounds like a syllable in the name of the creature’s owner. 
Strangely this second syllable and syllable in the name of the creature’s owner have only one letter in common.
The first name (which is a nickname) of the person with the sports venue named after him is an adjective describing both his hair and the  nursery rhyme creature’s hair.
Who is the person with the sports venue named after him?
What is the nursery rhyme?
What is the creature?
ENTREE #6:
Think of a Midwestern city in four syllables. Remove from its interior a four-letter priest (according to Ogden) that phonetically sounds like a creature that photographically looks like the creature in ENTREE #5. Strangely these two look-alike creatures have three consecutive letters in common.
The remaining letters in the city spell a musical instrument. 
A simple version of this instrument can be constructed by using a simple grooming device and something in which you can wrap sandwiches. It is an instrument that can be played by using particular body parts. These body parts followed by the grooming device form the surname of a puzzle-maker. 
What city is this?
What is the creature that photographically looks like the creature in ENTREE #5?
What is the musical instrument? 
What are the grooming device and body parts?
Who is the puzzle-maker?

Dessert Menu

Pro Forma Performer Dessert:
Performing verbal surgery on a profession

Name the profession of a well-known performer from the past, in one word. 
Change the fourth letter in this word to a different vowel. Place an anagram of the first four letters of the performer’s real first name in front of this altered profession to form a longer word. 
When you place this longer word in front of the one-word profession of the performer the result is a two-word profession that does not describe or pertain to the performer at all.
Name this performer and profession, and the performer’s real first name.
What is the two-word profession that neither describes nor pertains to the performer?

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.

Hot red, and other cool colors; Moscow, Muscat, Tegoosegalpa, Santo Dominko...; Half-a-dozen gray-day egghead-scratchers; Landmarks along the highway of history; To tweet, perch-ance to retweet elsewhere

PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER 8!/21 SERVED

Schpuzzle Of The Week:
To tweet, perch-ance to retweet elsewhere

Remove a letter from certain tree-perching birds, in two syllables. 
The result sounds like what might deprive these birds of their perches, forcing them to fly elsewhere. 
Name these birds.

MENU

All The Colornundrums Of The Spectrum Slice:
Hot red, and other cool colors


🥁1. Think of something hot in seven letters. Remove the third and fifth letters to get something that helps keep people hot.
🥁2. Think of a color. Exchange the first half of the letters with the second half. The result will sound like a word meaning restless.
🥁3. Think of a word related to speed used in sports and military. Double the first letter and the result, when read backwards, will be a color.
🥁4. Think of a six-letter adjective for more of an office supply. 
Shift each letter seven places later in the alphabet. 
The result will be an adjective describing a common color of the supply.

Prancing Though Interstellar Space Slice:
Half-a-dozen gray-day egghead-scratchers

Solve the six clues below. Each answer contains six letters. 
They also share something else in common. What is it?
1. A region of chromosomal DNA between genes 
2. Summaries
3. About three-and-a-quarter light-years of interstellar space
4. Prances playfully
5. What one might do to the bottom of the barrel
6. Curls hair

Riffing Off Shortz And Becker Slice:
Moscow, Muscat, Tegoosegalpa, Santo Dominko...

Will Shortz’s September 20th NPR Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle, created by Joe Becker of Palo Alto, California, reads: 
Name a world capital in 12 letters. If you have the right one, you can rearrange its letters to name two animals – one in three letters and the other in nine. What capital is it, and what are the animals?
Puzzleria!s Riffing Off Shortz And Becker Slices read:
ENTREE #1:
Name a world capital in 12 letters. If you have the right one, you can rearrange its letters to name a two-word description of Gil Elvgren or George Petty. What capital is it, and what is this description?
ENTREE #2:
Name a world capital in 12 letters. 
If you have the right one, you can rearrange its letters to spell a two-word caption for the image pictured here. 
What capital is it, and what is the caption?
ENTREE #3:
Name a world capital in 11 letters. Two of them are the same letter. Add one more of that same letter to the mix. You can rearrange these twelve letters to form: 
(1) the last name of an athlete who is famous largely, alas, because of the player who took his place in the line-up, 
(2) a word for people in the bleachers, and 
(3) what these people do for the home team, according to a song. 
What capital is it?
What is the last name of the athlete, the people in the bleachers, and what they do for the home team?
ENTREE #4:
Name a playing card that rhymes with a popular card game. 
Somewhere within this name, insert the acronym for an annual international engineering competition open to college students. 
If you have the right playing card and competition, you will have spelled the name of a puzzle-maker. Who is the puzzle-maker? What are the card and competition?

Dessert Menu

Historical Dessert:
Landmarks along the highway of history

Write without a space the first and last names of a person associated with a landmark in transportation history. 
Invert the first letter and delete the final letter of the person’s first name to form a synonym of this landmark. 
Who is this person?


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.

Strictly slicker city stumpers;(S)Audi Arabia? (U)Kraine? Frankensteinian fusion-confusion; “A chilled Strawberry Hill will complement that rib eye” Summer’s waning hazy mazy 90° days; The Rite “Stuffix”

PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER 8!/21 SERVED

Schpuzzle Of The Week:
(S)Audi Arabia? (U)Kraine? 

Remove the first letter from the name of a country. 
Divide the result into two parts. 
Both parts are abbreviations that are associated with a second country. 
Spell out the shorter of the two abbreviations. 
The result is the name of a relatively large vehicle.
What is the name of the vehicle? 
What are the names of both countries? 

Appetizer Menu

Munchable Municipal Appetizer:
Strictly slicker city stumpers

You’re a what? 
❓1. The official  demonym for an inhabitant of a US state shares only one letter with the state’s name. Name the state and its demonym.

WXYZ
❓2. Name a small Midwest city in two words. The last letters of the two words are consecutive letters found late in the alphabet.
Hint: the state in which the city is located contains a letter that immediately precedes the two consecutive letters.

Transplanted
❓3. Name a mid-sized US city, not a state capital, in a Midwestern state. Change one vowel, keeping all letters in the same order, to obtain a suburb of another city of similar population (to the Midwest city) in a Pacific Coast state. 
The suburb is much smaller than the Midwest and main Pacific state cities, but it is almost as old as the mid-sized Pacific state city. What is the suburb of the Northwestern city?

City of God
❓4. Name a major US city. Remove one letter and rearrange to obtain a religious leader.

MENU

Non-Veggie Slice:
“A chilled Strawberry Hill will complement that rib eye”

Take the name of a person who was very recently in the news. 
Replace a bit of punctuation with a different bit, remove an “o” and an “s” and replace a capital letter with a two-consonant blend to form two entrees one might find on a non-vegetarian restaurant menu.
Who is this person?

Body Parts Slice:
Frankensteinian fusion-confusion

Interchange the third and fifth letters of a body part. 
Fuse to the beginning of this result the first letter of nearby body parts that are often confused with this body part. 
After doing so you will have formed the name of a country. 
What is this country?


Riffing Off Shortz And Young Slices:
Summer’s waning hazy mazy 90° days

Will Shortz’s September 8th NPR Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle, created by Joseph Young of St. Cloud , Minnesota, reads: 
Name a popular TV personality. Write the name in all capital letters. Rotate the last letter 90° and move it forward one spot – that is, move it in front of the preceding letter. The result will name a famous movie. What is it?
Puzzleria!s Riffing Off Shortz And Young Slices read:
ENTREE #1:
Name a brand name associated with video streaming. Write the name in all capital letters. 
Rotate the last letter 90° clockwise and move it forward one spot – that is, move it in front of the preceding letter. 
The result will name a kind of concert one might stream using this brand. 
What are the brand and the type of concert?
ENTREE #2:
Name the one-word title of a book first published in 1905 that is likely on the bookshelf of many aspiring missionaries. 
According to the book’s foreword, the author attempts to address the “conversion of souls” scientifically. 
The book, for instance, includes chapters on gauging potential converts’ “physiognomy to determine receptivity” to the missionary’s message. 
Rotate the third letter of this book title 90° counterclockwise to form a word for redundant phrases and terms like “frozen ice,” “over-exaggerate,” “close proximity,” “new innovation” and “hot water heater.”
What are this book title and this word for redundancies?
Hint: The three initials of the book’s author spell out, in order, a one-word interrogative sentence.
ENTREE #3:
Name a popular TV personality who refers to himself in the third person. 
Describe in one adjective an anonymous Valentine this personality received, according to a book title. Write the word in all capital letters. 
Rotate two consecutive letters 90° to form another adjective that describes a Valentine, according to a song. 
What are these adjectives?
ENTREE #4:
Write a synonym of  “euphonious” all in capital letters. 
Rotate the second letter 90° clockwise and the fourth letter 90° counterclockwise, then remove the first and final letters to reveal something that helps you solve a conundrum.
Now write a short form of a synonym of “conundrum” all in caps. Rotate the third letter 90° counterclockwise to form a type of wordplay such conundrums sometimes employ.
What may help you solve a conundrum? 
What are the short synonym of “conundrum” and the type of wordplay such conundrums sometimes employ?
ENTREE #5:
Take the two-word nickname (three, if you include the word “the”) given to an NASA deputy administrator. He was “the person responsible for taking us to the moon,” according to a Washington Star columnist who later appeared on President Richard Nixon’s “enemies list.” 
On November 16, 1963, this NASA administrator gave President John F. Kennedy and Wernher von Braun (the former Nazi who became a chief architect of the American space program) a tour of Cape Canaveral in Florida. Six days later, Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas.
The first word in the two-word nickname contains only three different letters. They appear consecutively in the alphabet. Take the letter that immediately precedes them in the alphabet. Set that letter aside for now. 
Now write the second word of the two-word nickname in all capital letters. Rotate its first and second letters 90° counterclockwise. Take the letter you set aside and place it in front of this result to form the adjectival form of the first word. 
What is the nickname of this NASA administrator?
ENTREE #6:
Find three relatively short words:
1. The title of a Steely Dan song,
2. A word that appears in the lyrics of “Cuddle up a Little Closer,” “My Blue Heaven” and “Love Is Just Around the Corner,” and 
3. Samuel, before he became Mark. 
Write all three words in all-capital letters. 
In one of the words, rotate the first and third letters 90° counterclockwise. Rearrange the combined letters of this altered word and the other two words to form the first and last names of a puzzle-maker. Who is it?

Dessert Menu

Celebratory Time Passages Dessert:
The Rite “Stuffix”

Name a rite of passage. 
Replace a common two-letter suffix found near the beginning of this word with a duplicate of a common three-letter suffix found at the end of the word. 
The result is an informal name for an informal celebration of the rite. 
What are this rite and celebration?
Hint: During the celebration, a particular part of a fowl may be served as an hors d’oeuvre, and you may occasionally hear an an onomatopoeic sound calling the revelers to attention.

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.

Co-mmonality co-nundrummery; Competing political brands; Candinundrums or consequences; “Two Shirley Temples, stirred not shaken” Hula-hula boys, 007 and nasty big pointy teeth!

PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER 8!/21 SERVED


Schpuzzle Of The Week:
Co-mmonality co-nundrummery

Besides beginning with “co” what do the following seven words have in common?
Coat, cockatoo, codfish, coin, comet, comma, cow

Appetizer Menu

Mostly Bogus Conundrums Appetizer:
Candidnunrums or consequences


🥁1. Think of a classic character from literature in one word, nine letters. Drop the last three letters. With what remains, shift all but the last letter one place right on the computer keyboard. The result is a character trait that protagonists often possess.
🥁2. Name a fictional comedic character in five letters. Change the last letter to name a detergent compound.
🥁3. Think of a three-word phrase beginning with “the” in which the third word is the second word with the fourth letter shifted one place earlier in the alphabet, moved to the start of the word, and then read backwards.
🥁4. Name a fictional substance in seven letters. Together the first and fourth letters are an abbreviation for a popular website. Change these letters to a two-letter abbreviation for a feature of the website, to name an occupation.

MENU

The Ascent And Descent Of The American Empire Slice:
Competing political brands

A surname associated with a certain political philosophy was in the news within the past month. The surname sounds like a common brand name. 
Take a surname associated with a competing political philosophy. Lower an ascending letter so it descends, then have it touch the letter after it, to form a competing common brand name. 
What are these two competing surnames and two competing brand names?

Riffing Off Shortz And Zion Slice:
Hula-hula boys, 007 and nasty big pointy teeth!

Will Shortz’s August 25th NPR Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle, created by Lee Zion, of Lafayette, Minnesota, reads: 
This is a two-week challenge. It may sound impossible, but it’s not. You wake up trapped in a round room with six doors. A voice over a loudspeaker tells you that five of the doors are booby-trapped and will bring instant death if you try to open them. Only one door provides an opening that will get you out safely. The doors are evenly spaced around the room. They look exactly alike. Your only clue is that on the wall between each pair of doors is a large letter of the alphabet. Going clockwise, the letters are H, I, J, K, L and M. Which is the correct door that will get you out ... and why?
Puzzleria!s Riffing Off Shortz And Zion Slices read:
ENTREE #1:
This challenge may sound impossible, but it’s not. You wake up trapped in a round room with six doors, each with the word “DOOR” written in it. A voice over a loudspeaker tells you that five of the doors are booby-trapped and will bring instant death if you try to open them. 
Only one door provides an opening that will lead you to a tropical paradise complete with luaus, leis, kalua pig, huli-huli chicken, hula-hula girls, hula-hula boys, ukulele strains and bubbly champagne. 
The six doors are evenly spaced around the room. They look exactly alike. Your only clue is that on the wall between five pairs of doors is a large letter of the alphabet, and on the wall between the sixth pair of doors is a pair of large letters. Going clockwise, the letters are H, I, J, K, L and MN. Which is the correct DOOR that will get you out ... and why?
ENTREE #2:
This challenge may sound impossible, but it’s not. Bond, James Bond wakes up after being knocked cold from a conk on the head administered by diabolical SPECTRE henchmen. He is trapped in a round room with eight doors. Those thugs from SPECTRE have imprisoned 007 at their headquarters  – in a space that doubles both as a dungeon and a situation room for planning nefarious SPECTRE operations.
The eight doors of this dual-use facility are evenly spaced around the room. They look exactly alike. On the wall between all but one pair of doors is a large letter of the alphabet. Going clockwise, the letters are H, I, J, K, K, L and M. No letter appears, however, on the wall between the wall with the J and the wall with the first K. That particular letter-less wall does have a standard dual-socket electrical outlet, however.
After 007 rubs the grogginess from his eyes and spits out the bubblegum from his brain, a sinister voice over a loudspeaker tells him that a plot is afoot to abduct the Dutch prime minister (who is scheduled to fly at any time now from the Hague to the United Nations in New York City) and there is nothing that 007 can do to stop it! Why not? Well, continues the loud-speaking voice after laughing evilly, seven of the doors are booby-trapped and will bring instant death if Bond tries to open them. Only one door provides an opening that will get 007 out safely. (In actuality, none of the eight doors are booby-trapped.) James, however, knows a bluff when he hears one... 
And so, having read the writing on the wall, the redoubtable Mr. Bond knows what he must do. He leaps to his feet from his possum-pose, barges through the door between the two K’s and, after all is said and done, saves not only the day but also the Dutch prime minister, not to mention his own derriere... (well, no, I guess we did just mention it there). 
What evil deed did 007 thwart?
What airline was involved?
ENTREE #3:
This challenge may sound impossible, but it’s not. You wake up trapped in a round room with six doors. A voice over a loudspeaker tells you that five of the doors will get you out safely. Behind a sixth door, however, is a man-eating creature with sharp claws and nasty big pointy teeth. The doors are evenly spaced around the room. They look exactly alike. 
You have only two clues: 
One clue is that on each of the doors are letters (a total of 19) that spell out six letters of the alphabet. Going clockwise, the letters are U, Vee, Double-u, Ex, Wye and Zee (U, V, W, X, Y and Z). 
The other clue is that this challenge is a riff-off of a puzzle created by Lee Zion that Will Shortz is posing as his current two-week creative challenge on National Public Radio’s Weekend Edition Sunday.
Which door, after you open it, will put you face-to-face with a pointy-toothed man-eating creature... and why? 

Dessert Menu

Designated Driver Dessert:
“Two Shirley Temples, stirred not shaken”

Pour the letters of each half of an alcoholic beverage brand into separate glasses. 
Mix the results to spell two non-alcoholic bygone  beverage brands. 
What are these three brands?



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.