“The Twelve Daze of Christmas” “...and a pair of colors in a pear tree” “Clearly, thou art joking!” “Ribbity-Rabbity-Roo!” Good cheer you hear this time of year

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Schpuzzle of the Week:

Good cheer you hear this time of year

Take a four-letter part of an evergreen tree that is often used as a Christmas decoration and the ending two words, each four letters, of a seemingly never-ending Christmas song. Replace an E and an R with an A and an H. Rearrange these 12 letters to name a three-word phrase you see and hear this time of year.

What phrase is this?

Appetizer Menu

Yule Be Baffled Appetizer:

“The Twelve Daze of Christmas”

1. He’ll be home for Christmas!

Name a small, but well-known city. 

Shift the letters six places later in the alphabet, and the result will be part of an animal you might find in that location, but not many other places in the US. 

This city might be one of the last stops on a couple of annual epic journeys. 

What is the city, and what is the animal part?

Hint: The animal part has been oft used in art.  

2. Heading to that Holiday Party:  

Name something you might find as a part of traditional Christmas-time transportation in eight letters. Move the fifth letter seven places later in the alphabet to name something you might find in modern transportation.

What are the two parts of transportation?  

Hint: The devices have a related intent, but the effect is the opposite. 

3. Party People:  

Name two well-known people. The last name of one is a homophone for a word that might describe a party, the last name of the other is a homophone of what you might hear from that party. 

The two first names are related things that might be a reason for having a party. Who are the two people?

4. Holiday Fixings: 

Name a food you might see in a holiday dinner in the form of blank of blank. Spoonerize the first and last words, and the result will be a complaint people have about their computers. What are the two phrases?   

5. Holiday Shopping:  

Name something in four letters you might receive in the holiday season. Shift those letters 12 places later in the alphabet and the
result will be what the giver might have done to get that. What did you receive, and what did the giver have to do?

Hint: This answer would have made no sense just 25 or so years ago, but is now ubiquitous.  

6. ‘Tis the Season to be Stressed:  

Write two US Capital cities (in adjoining states) in order. Remove several interior consecutive letters. The remaining letters name a person who might help with holiday stress.

What are the cities, and who is the person?  

7. Presents Past and Future:  

Name a popular type of toy in five letters. Shift the letters 19 places later (or 7 places earlier) in the alphabet, and the result will be a part of many toys and games. Both have been popular for thousands of years, and will likely remain so far into the future. What are this popular type of toy and the part of many toys and games?    

Hint: The popular type of toy is more often given to girls. 

8. A Holiday Mishap in TV Guide:

“Holiday centerpiece gets burned by spritely decoration. Holy Lucifer!” 

That is a fictitious TV Guide synopsis of an actual fantasy drama television series that had a nine-year run. 

The synopsis is based, alas, on a
typographical error in the name of the show that some TV Guide proofreader missed! 

The typo involved one mistyped letter, like “Cheeks” instead of “Cheers.”

What was the name of the original television show, and what was the TV Guide goof?

9. Holidays Around the World:  

Name a well-known American brand that you might use during the holiday season, six letters. 

Add a letter to the end to get a holiday with origins in other places of the world.

What is the brand name, and what is the holiday?

10. Musical-Metro-Gnome

Name a major city in two words. Remove one letter, and the result will be the last name of a well-known musician. 

Drop the letters indicating the continent of that city, and the result will be a famous holiday figure.

What are the city, musician, and holiday figure?

11. A Pair of Plants

Name a species of plant that might be used during Christmas. Remove the last letter and you get a different species of the same type of plant. Note that these two plants grow in very different environments.

What are the two plants?

12. “I’ll be home (ASDFJKL;) for Christmas”

For those not familiar, “typewriter words” consist of eight letters that use each finger on a standard typewriter once and only once... like the “plaudits” we hope you will bestow upon these Dozen Holidaze Appetizers! (P-L-A-U-D-I-T-S = right-pinky, right-ring, left-pinky, right-index, left-middle, right-middle, left-index, left-ring).   

Name a plant associated with the holiday season. Remove two consecutive letters, each that appears once earlier in the word. The result is a common misspelling of this plant that is a “typewriter word.”

What is the plant, and what is the “typewriter word?”

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Holiday Slice:

“...and a pair of colors in a pear tree”

The number 188,928 suggests a holiday beverage. 

The numbers 80,119 and 32,481 suggest a pair of colors associated with that holiday. Explain why these three numbers suggest this beverage and two colors. 

Hint #1: One of the holiday colors is a French word.

Hint #2: French Hens

Riffing Off Shortz And Naharajan Slices:

“Ribbity-Rabbity-Roo!”

Will Shortz’s December 18th NPR Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle, created by Chip Naharajan of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, reads:

If you change the third letter of WOLF to an O, you get the sound made by a dog — WOOF. Name a six-letter animal and change the second letter to get the sound made by a completely different animal. What is it?

Puzzleria!s Riffing Off Shortz And Naharajan Slices read:

ENTREE #1

Name two nations that border the Pacific Ocean and a U.S. city that has been dubbed the “Heart of the Heartland.” 

Take the letters in either the first half or second half of the name of the city and the letters in the two nations. Rearrange these combined letters to spell the name of a puzzle-maker.

Who is it?

What are the two nations and the “Heart of the Heartland” city?

Note: Entree #2 is a riff-off composed by Jeff Zarkin (SuperZee) whose “Puzzle Riffs” are featured regularly on Puzzleria! 

Entrees #3-through-5 were created by Greg VanMechelen, whose “Econfusions” feature appears in this week’s Puzzleria!

ENTREE #2

If you change the third letter of WOLF to an O, you get the sound made by a dog — WOOF. Change no letters in a  “fishy” animal to get what you see many Blaine’s Blog commenters do each week in regard to the Weekend Edition Sunday National Public Radio puzzle? 

What is it?

ENTREE #3

Name a “feathery” animal in six letters. Change no letters in this animal to get what many in Blainesville do each week in regard to the Weekend Edition Sunday NPR puzzle?

ENTREE #4

Take the name of any member of a certain successful rock group. Change the forth letter in that name to get the breed of a canine creature. 

Now take the first name of one particular
member of the rock group. Change the first letter in that name to get a wild canine creature.

What are this rock group member, and the breed of the first canine creature?

What is the first name and the wild canine creature?

ENTREE #5

Name an animal in six letters. Add one letter to make a sound that a different fabled (but not fabulous) animal might make.

What are this six-letter animal and sound from a fabled animal?

ENTREE #6

If you change the third letter of WOLF to an O, you get the sound made by a dog — WOOF. 

Name a different four-letter animal and change the first letter to get the sound made by a completely different animal. 

What animal is it?

ENTREE #7

Add two letters to the beginning of an avian creature to get a sound made by a canine or ursine creature.

Add two letters to the end of this sound to get a container (such as a pitcher, pail or can) for beverage bought in gallon or half-gallon quantities. Change the third letter in an ursine creature to get the name of this beverage. 

What is the avian creature and the sound made by a canine or ursine creature?

What are the container, the ursine creature and the beverage?

ENTREE #8

Name a word for a five-letter newborn critter. Replace a two-letter greeting within it with either half of a four-letter slang term for “one that is remarkable or wonderful.” The result is the sound made by a this critter when it grows up. 

What are this critter and the sound it will make?

What are the two-letter greeting and the slang term for “one that is remarkable or wonderful?”

ENTREE #9

Name a word for a standardbred horse trained for harness racing. (This is also a word for a pig's foot that some people eat.) 

Remove  from the beginning of the word two initials of a Mt. Rushmore president. The result is  a mammal of the weasel family with webbed and clawed feet and dark brown fur.

What are this horse and weaselly mammal? 

ENTREE #10

Name a creature that hops. Move its initial letter to the end. 

The second half of the result spells a creature that flies that is not a fly. What are these hopping and flying creatures?

ENTREE #11

Name a  silvery gray arboreal marsupial creature. 

Reverse the order of its final two letters. Move those reversed letters to the beginning. 

The result sounds like a corporation which is a
major global producer of a silvery gray metal.

What are this silvery gray marsupial and this corporation that produces this silvery gray metal?

Dessert Menu

Tinselly Translation Dessert:

“Clearly, thou art joking!”

Translate the exclamation, “Clearly, thou art joking!” into English that is less stilted and more modern and conversational.

Your translation must contain three words and
thirteen letters. Anagram those thirteen letters to form three new words:

🎄 two that are synonymous with “Christmas narrative,”

🎄 and one that is the “literary spelling” of a name associated with that narrative.

What is your translation?

What are the synonym of “Christmas narrative” and the literary spelling of the name associated with that narrative?   

Hint: The literary spelling of the name associated with that narrative is also how the name is spelled in the Shone, Sesotho, Yoruba and modern Venetian languages.

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.