“We won’t give you the time of day... figure it out for yourself!” Terms of enduring endearment; Less becomes more, more or less; “I think this is the beginning of a beautiful... series” Sea creatures, iron horses, “Pachydermocrats”

 PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER 6!π SERVED

Schpuzzle of the Week:

Terms of enduring endearment

Rearrange the first two-thirds of an adjective associated with young couples to spell an informal term for a young woman (especially in the United Kingdom).

Spell the last half of the adjective backward to spell a term for a young man. 

What is this “young-couplesque” adjective?

What are the terms for the young woman and man?

Appetizer Menu

Delightfully Puzzley Appetizer:

Sea creatures, iron horses, “Pachydermocrats”

1.🍄 Name a predatory creature you see at sea, in two words, whose name contains another sea creature. 

Drop three consecutive middle letters to get a
one-word “fungus among us Gophers in the Land of 10,000 Lakes.”

What is this two-word sea creature, and the creature contained within it?

What is the fungus?

Hint #1: A snorkler at sea who observes the two-word creature might then also observe, punnily, “That’s _ _____!”

Hint #2: The three consecutive middle letters removed from the two-word sea creature spell a seaman’s affirmative response.

2.🚂 Name a famous rock singer from the 1970’s. Drop the last two letters from the first name, and move its third letter 17 “ties” ahead, on-down the “alphabet track,” so to speak (so “A” would become “R,” For example.) 

Finally, “couple” a copy of that third letter to
the “caboose” of the singer’s surname.

The results of all this metallic, clanky, steamy “roundhouse-rail maneuvering” are botanical beauties of a particular genus, in two words.

Who is this singer?

What are these botanical beauties?

3.🌹 Name a world capital. Move its fifth letter up one step down on the “capitol-steps alphabet,” so to speak (so “A” would become “B,” for example.) 

Next, just as a senator might attach a rider to a bill, attach the first and last letters of this result, in order, to the end of the result.

The final result of all this “smoke-filled-room legislation” is a kind of flower.

What is this world capital?

What is the flower?

Hint: The name of the world capital’s nation is a homophone, not of a kind of a kind of flower but rather, of a kind of other rooted, growing and larger natural wonder. 

MENU

Here, There And Everywhere Slice:

Less becomes more, more or less

If you remove a “t” from the adverb “there” you get its antonym “here.”

Can you remove an interior vowel – and the
space it occupies – from an adjective to form what appears to be an antonym of the adjective?

What adjectival antonyms are these?

Riffing Off Shortz And Barkan Slices:

“I think this is the beginning of a beautiful... series”

Will Shortz’s May 23rd NPR Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle, created by Roger Barkan of Savage, Maryland, reads:

Think of an eight-letter word in which the third and sixth letters are “A”. Remove the A’s. The
remaining six letters start a common series. What is it? And what comes next in that series?

Puzzleria!s Riffing Off Shortz And Barkan Slices read:

ENTREE #1

Take the first name of a puzzle-maker and his hometown.  

Rearrange the letters to name a kind of motor
and where you might find a mechanic working on it. 

What is this motor and where might it be worked on?

Who is the puzzle-maker?

ENTREE #2

Think of products, in two words of four and nine letters, that you might use to make your team of bovine trained draft animals appear paler. 

Reverse the order of the words. 

Remove an “R” and two “X’s” and rearrange the remaining letters in each word to form the start a common radio or television series. 

What is it? 

And what comes next in that series?

ENTREE #3

Think of a five-letter word for a particular thing that grows. 

The third letter is “r”. Remove the “r”. 

The remaining four letters start a common series you experience at the dinner table or restaurant. 

What comes next in that series is a word that begins with “sw”.

What is the common series, and what comes next?

What is the particular thing that grows?

ENTREE #4

Take the first three words of a familiar series. 

Remove all but the first  two letters of each word, leaving six letters. 

Switch the third and fifth letters. Insert the first letter of the seventeenth word in the series beteen the last two letters. The result is a school subject.

What subject is it?

What is the familiar series?

ENTREE #5

Think of an eight-letter, two-word phrase that the World Wrestling Entertainment network (WWE) uses in promotional “WrestleMania” videos seen on YouTube and elsewhere. 

The two words begin with “L” and “T” and are
approximate rhymes (or “near rhymes”).

The second and seventh letters in this phrase are “i”. Remove the i’s. The remaining six letters start a common series. 

What is it? 

And what comes next in that series?

What is the two-word phrase?

Hint: The common series is associated with a very long-running soap opera. It is a series of words.

ENTREE #6

Take the first four words in a well-known series, one after the other without spaces.

Replace the 3rd letter with an “i”, the 6th and 7th letters with a space, and the 10th, 11th and 12th letters with a “w”. 

The result is a pair of of a pair of five-letter words:

1. The name of a periodical publication, with “The...” and

2. What an astonished reader might exclaim while reading an article in the publication.

What is the well-known series?

What are the first four words in the series?

What is the name of a periodical publication?

What might an astonished reader of the publication exclaim?

ENTREE #7

Think of a six-letter word for what some people do on professional sporting events, and a five-letter word for a unit of weight. 

Remove two letters from each word, leaving two new words that start a seasonal series.

Rearrange the letters you removed to spell a general word for a team that may participate  in a professional sporting event.

What do some people do on professional
sporting events?

What is the unit of weight?

What is the word for a professional team?

What two words start a seasonal series series?

Dessert Menu

Idiomatic Dessert:

“We won’t give you the time of day... figure it out for yourself!”

Name a two-word idiom associated with a time of day. 

Homophones of the two words are common words that are the same parts of speech. 

What is this time period?

What are the words that are the same parts of speech?

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.