Suitable, Digital, Mythical, Rangy, Differential, Poetic Puzzles! “Everyday” prime time property; Acts of the Apostle Islands? Jimmy a door, adore a Jenny; Bend, shape and cause curvature; Ah, abandon a habit!

PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER 5πe² SERVED 

Schpuzzle of the Week:

Acts of the Apostle Islands?

Take the first four words of a verse in the King James Version of the Bible’s Book of Acts (of the Apostles, that is). Delete a preposition and a space. The result will be the names of two modern Middle Eastern countries. 

What are these two countries and the verse?

Appetizer Menu

Noddingly Approved Appetizer:

Suitable, Digital, Mythical, Rangy, Differential, Poetic Puzzles!

SUITABLE ARRANGEMENTS

1. ♠♥♣♦ The same letters can be arranged to spell eight words and one two-word phrase.  

Guess the words and the phrase from the following descriptions:

    1. Weapon

    2. No-frills

    3. Analyze

    4. Trims

    5. Major offenses

    6. Garners

    7. Copycats

    8. European or Asian food items

    9. In line with

DIGITAL FILMS

2. 🎥The title of a 1980’s film sounds like a number.  

Add the digits of the number to get a number that is the first word of the title of another 1980’s film. What films are they?

3. 🥛🦄Guess the names of the following deities from the Greek/Roman, Norse, and Egyptian pantheons of the ancient world, using the hints provided.  In some cases the hints are phonetic.

    1.  What the mother of a certain ancient ruler in the Middle East may have said when he was a child and spilled his milk.

    2.  Slopes from the vertical.  

    3.  What a lot of guys get as they age. 

    4.  Exists twice.

    5.  Five-sixths of a singing group.

    6.  Laid back.

    7.  80% of a sculptor, or 57% of a composer.

    8.  Blue gray color and a communication device.

    9.  Euphemism for an obscenity.

    10.  Fresh musical direction meaning twice.

HOME ON THE RANGE

4. 📖Think of a book for young readers about a young person growing up on the 19th Century American frontier.  The first word in the title names a person associated with a popular sport.  

The second word consists of a piece of equipment used in the sport, followed by a description of a part of the location where the sport is played.  The title is also the name the main character goes by.  Name the book, the piece of equipment, the part of the location, and the sport.

WHAT DIFFERENCE CAN ONE LETTER MAKE?

5. 😈😇An eight-letter adjective describes a kind of attitude. 

Add one letter somewhere in the word to describe how one might end up if he or she were to display such an attitude in dealing with employers or other powerful persons.

POETRY CORNER, by Anna Graham

6. 📕Fill in the blanks with four words that are anagrams of each other to complete the verse.

We _____, envision vast primeval seas,

Across the _____ of endless, leafless plain,

The _____ from which we sprang, and too the
trees,

That bore the _____ and pods with which, in vain,

We seek surcease of mortal earthly pain.

MENU

Scrapping The Chaps Hors d’Oeuvre:

Bend, shape and cause curvature

Take a word associated with the act of bending or causing curvature. 

Remove a number of letters that, in order, spell a synonym of “chaps.” 

Assign a number-value to the remaining letters: A=1, B=2. C=3, etc. 

The values of all ten of the remaining letters are evenly divisible by a single divisor (besides the number 1, of course). 

What is this “bendy-curvy” word? 

What is the synonym of “chaps”? 

What is the single divisor?

Dawn Quiche-Hymny Slice:

Jimmy a door, adore a Jenny

The donkey is a symbol of the Democratic Party. Jimmy Carter is a member of the Democratic Party who was elected president in 1976. 

“Jimmy” kind of sounds like “jenny,” a female donkey. One might say that, in 1976, Carter was “Jenny’s Jimmy” or the “Donkey’s Jimmy.” Alas, there is no famous singer whose name sounds like “Donkey’s Jimmy...” (Don Keeshimmy? Dawn Quiche-Hymny?)

However, can you name a famous singer whose name sounds like a symbol of a political party, in its possessive form, and the first name of that political party’s presidential candidate?

If so, who is the famous singer?

Riffing Off Shortz And Chaikin Slices:

“Ah, abandon a habit!”

Will Shortz’s February 18th NPR Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle, created by Andrew Chaikin of San Francisco, California, also known as the singer Kid Beyond, reads:

Think of a famous character in American
literature. Change each letter in that character’s name to its position in the alphabet: A=1, B=2, etc., to get a famous year in American history. Who is this person and what is the year?

Puzzleria!s Riffing Off Shortz And Chaikin Slices read:

ENTREE #1

Take the two-word stage name of a singer who is also a puzzle-maker. Change each letter in the first word to its position in the alphabet — A=1, B=2, etc. — to get the year an Italian saint, a follower of Francis of Assisi, was born.
This saint founded a monastic religious order that followed a rule of strict poverty.

Similarly, change the first three letters in the second word to its position in the alphabet to get the year in the title of a “one-hit wonder” recorded by singers from Nebraska, a state surrounded by “squarish” states. Converting the final two letters in the second word results in a square number.

What is this stage name?

Who is, and in what year, was the saint born?

What is the square number formed by converting the last two letters of the stage name?

What are the year in the one-hit-wonder and the square number?

Note: The following riff was written by our friend Nodd, whose “Nodd ready for prime time” appears above, in this edition of Puzzleria!

ENTREE #2

Think of a famous year in American history. Change each digit in the year to the letter that corresponds to the digit when the letters of the alphabet are numbered from 1 to 26. The result will include two letters that are the same, and two that are different.

Now take the letter that corresponds to the two-digit number expressed by the two letters that are different. Insert that letter somewhere in the result. 

The final result will name something that many people needed in that year. 

What is the year, and what did people need?

Note: The following riff was written by our friend ViolinTeddy, whose “Strad-Steiff Subtleties” appears regularly on Puzzleria!

ENTREE#3

Name a famous opera character. Change each letter in that character’s name to its position in the alphabet to get a famous year in American history. 

Who is the character, and what is the year? 

Note: The following riff was written by our friend Plantsmith, whose “Garden of Puzzley Delights” appears regularly on Puzzleria!

ENTREE #4

Take the first part of the two-part name of a significant and acclaimed American band. 

Subtract this first part from a significant year in world history. 

The result is a not-as-significant historical year that, when translated via the alphanumeric scale, becomes a word for what is sometimes
an unpleasant  substance.

What are the two historical years? 

What is the significant and acclaimed band? 

What is the substance?

Note: The following riff is a collaboration of sorts between a regular contributor to Puzzleria! and Lego Lambda.

ENTREE #5

Take the first name of the writer and recorder of an early 1960s novelty song. The alphanumerical values of the letters in the name form a five-digit string. 

Delete the last digit. 

The result is a famous year in world history that is associated with a volley of cannon fire and ringing chimes.  

Now reconvert each of the four digits in this year into the letters that are their alphanumerical equivalents. The result is the name of the title character in the novelty song.

Who is the the writer and recorder of an early 1960s novelty song, and what is its title?

What is the famous year in world history, and why is it associated with a volley of cannon fire and ringing chimes?

ENTREE #6

Name a two-word annual celebration. Change each letter in those two words to its numerical value in the alphabet.

The first two and final three letters in the
celebration have values that are square numbers. 

The first two letters of the celebration, when placed side-by-side, also form a square number. The last two letters of the celebration, when placed side-by-side, form a cube number.

 Add together the values of the penultimate and antepenultimate letters to get the square root of one of these six square numbers. The antipenultimate value is the square root of the value of the first letter in the celebration. 

What is this annual celebration?

What, in descending order, are the six square numbers?

What is the cube number?

ENTREE #7

Christmas is usually a joyous day. The most recent Christmas fell on a day that can be written as “12/25/23”.

Write a not-so-joyous day in history in such a form. Indeed, it was a tragic day. 

Delete the sixth digit.

Find three values using these five digits:

1. the value of the sum of the last three digits,

2. the value of the last digit 

3. the value of the two-digit number formed by the first two digits.

Take the three letters of the alphabet that
correspond to these three values to spell the monogram of the victim of the tragedy.

Take two letters — one corresponding to the third digit and another corresponding to the fourth digit — to get a two-letter shot pellet measuring 0.175 inch in diameter that, had it been substituted for the 6.5 millimeter Mannlicher-Carcano rounds, would surely have averted the tragedy.

What is this tragic date in history?

What is the monogram?

What is the shot pellet 0.175 inch in diameter?

ENTREE #8

Think of a famous seven-letter character in American literature. 

Change each letter in that character’s name to its position in the alphabet — A=1, B=2, etc. Ignore the value of the middle letter’s position, a number which is said to be unlucky.

The result is six numbers.  

The fourth, third and sixth numbers form a famous year in French and Russian history.

The second, fifth and first numbers form a famous year in a nation where Barbie was born, the music died, and 48 became 50.

Who is this American literature character?

What is the famous year in French and Russian history?

What is the famous year in a nation where Barbie was born, the music died, and 48 became 50?

ENTREE #9

Think of a famous character in American literature. Change each letter in that character’s name to its position in the alphabet
— A=1, B=2, etc. — to get a famous year in American history. Replace the first two digits in that year with their sum and convert these three values back into their letter equivalents, to spell a character in British fantasy literature.

Who is this famous character in American literature?

What is the famous year in American history?

Who is the character in British fantasy literature?

ENTREE #10

Take the first eight numbers in a famous infinite mathematical sequence. Change each number in that sequence to its corresponding letter in the alphabet — A=1, B=2, etc. to get
eight letters. 

The first, seventh and eighth letters, followed by a space, followed by the third, fifth, second, fourth and sixth letters, spell the name of a recently built volleyball complex at a Florida institution of higher learning. That institution is situated in an unincorporated two-word community of about 6,000 population. That community’s initials are the first and seventh letters in the name of the volleyball complex. The name of this community is associated with the works of both Franz Schubert and Walter Scott.  

What are this sequence and name of the volleyball complex?

What is the name of the Shubert-and-Scott-related community where the institution is located?

ENTREE #11

Think of a historic and fateful date in American history in the form 02/23/24. Change each digit in the date to its alphanumeric equivalent: A=1, B=2, etc. Ignore any zeros. This date includes one zero.

Rearrange the five letters you get to spell the last word in the following statement about the date:

“In the wake of this gray day in U.S. history, the hopes and dreams of a recovering nation _____.”

What is this date?

What is the word in the blank?

Hint: The alphanumeric equivalents of the first two digits in the year of this historic date (the “20” in “2024,” for example) are the initials of the first names of the man who was the focus of this fateful day and of the man who would have succeeded him had the fateful date occurred six weeks earlier.    

Dessert Menu

More Mundane Dessert:

“Everyday” prime time property

857, 7,027 and 271 are all prime numbers. 

Name another perhaps more interesting “everyday” property they share – one that neither cleaves nor cottons to the conventional entertainment conception of “prime time.” 

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.