Plantsmith's Hal: “Oh! Wendy!” “Heavenly Evenrude!” “Hens in a tent?” and “Economy of letters” Shifting an "artifactual" synonym; Four such newsy surnames! Lyricists Lewis and D____; November: ‘Tis nearly time to vote; Hounds bay, does Hudson bay?

PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER 5πe² SERVED

Schpuzzle of the Week:

Four such newsy surnames!

Change a letter of a surname in the news.

Insert a letter within a second such surname. 

In a third such surname, replace two letters with one. 

In a fourth such surname, delete the last letter, delete either the third or fourth letter and change two vowel sounds. 

The result is a category and three nouns that fit it. 

What are the surnames, category and three nouns?

Appetizer Menu

Delightfully Puzzley Appetizer:

Hal: “Oh! Wendy!” “Heavenly Evenrude!” “Economy of letters,” “Hens in a tent?”

Hal: “Oh! Wendy!”

1. 👻Young Hal and his siter Wendy have snuck up into the scare-worthy attic of their house to feast on their fresh “Halloween Haul” of Trick-or-Treat candy. In the midst of their munching and crunching, they hear an eerie creaking. It is a creaking they have heard up here before...

“Oh, Wendy, who made that sound?”  Hal asks Wendy. “Is it our ________ ________?”

Take a word for a trouble-making rowdy young ruffian who might steal all your candy on Halloween! That is the word in the first blank.

Change one letter in that word by rotating it
one place back in the alphabet stream (A=>Z,
B=>A, C=>B, etc.) to form the word in the second blank. The result is two rhyming words. The first word appears in dictionaries, but not the second word.

The second word, however, is a homophone of a two-word phrase – a five-letter noun and a five-letter adverb.

What are the dictionary word and the non-dictionary word in the two blanks? 

What are the five-letter noun and five-letter adverb?

“Heavenly Evenrude!” 

2. 🛥Think of a three-word,12-letter caption for this picture. It  contains a preposition, article and a noun that is a compound word.

Mix up the letters in this caption to get a five-word phrase related to “test criteria.” 

Economy of letters

3. 🏖The name of a famous U.S. beach spot contains seven letters. 

But it contains only three different letters of the alphabet – one consonant and two different vowels.

What is this beach spot?

Hint: It is a favorite of an ex-president. 

“Hens in a tent?”

4. 🐔🐔🐔Take a seven-letter camping item. Change its first letter to the letter five places later in the alphabet.

Change its last letter to the letter one place earlier in the alphabet.

The result is another camping item.

What are these two camping items?

MENU

Suffragator Cave Hors d’Oeuvre:

November: ‘Tis nearly time to vote

Translate parts of the following free verse into a three-words-shorter free verse :

‘Tis nearly November, time to vote... 

Your decision is aye, nay.

Vote “either or yea” or “neither or nay”.

(In the second line, focus on sound rather than spelling.)

The following refresher course may help:

A PIG LATIN REFRESHER COURSE:

For Words Beginning With Vowels:

If you want to create a Pig Latin word from an English word starting with a vowel, add the suffix  “-way”, “-aye” “-yay” or “-yea” at the end of the original word. 

For instance:

Oval becomes ovalyea

Ultimate become ultimateyea

Odd becomes oddyea

If you want to translate a Pig Latin word into English, subtract the suffix  “-way”, “-aye” “-yay” or “-yea” from the end of the Pig Latin word. 

For instance:

Ovalyea becomes oval

Ultimateyea become ultimate

Oddyea becomes odd

Instrumental Slice:

Lyricists Lewis and D____

Name musical instruments, in three syllables. 

Change the third letter to one of the two next to it in the alphabet. 

Before the last letter, insert the first name that lyricists surnamed Lewis and D____ share in common. 

Divide the result into three equal parts to get what sounds like a collection of music publishers and songwriters, including Lewis and D____.

What are these instruments and the collection of music publishers and songwriters?

Riffing Off Shortz Slices:

Hounds bay, but does Hudson bay?

Will Shortz’s October 27th NPR Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle reads:

Name a place somewhere on the globe – in two words. Rearrange the letters of the first word to name some animals. The second word in the place name is something those animals sometimes do. What is it?

Puzzleria!s Riffing Off Shortz Slices read:

ENTREE #1

Name a puzzle-maker – first and last names. Rearrange the first five letters of the last name to form a apostrophized possessive proper noun. 

Place the first name after this proper noun. 

The result is a two word phrase that, according to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, is defined by “to protect his people, the Asgardians, and relocate them to Earth.”

Who is this puzzle-maker?

What is the two-word phrase?

Note: Entree #2 was submitted by a fan of Puzzleria!... as well as a fan of ghosts, goblins, and werewolves.

ENTREE #2

There are valedictions in tongues from Arabic to Zuni. Working in the lab late one night, Mad Scientist beheld that carbolic acid can mean “goodbye” in any language. 

Take the letters of carbolic acid, liquidate one of them, and arrange the undead letters to formulate a two-word description of a Stephen King novel title character. 

The letter that was “taken for a ride” is the same letter that begins the title of the novel and the name of the title character. 

What is the name of the title character? 

What is the two-word description? 

Note: Entrees #3 through #8 were submitted by Nodd, author of “Nodd ready for prime time” on Puzzleria!

ENTREE #3

Name a historically important place in the Eastern U.S., in two words. 

The first word names an animal. 

The second word is something those animals sometimes do. 

What place is it?

ENTREE #4

Name a place in the Western U.S., in two words. 

The first word describes dogs who often accompany humans out in the country. 

The second word is something the dogs sometimes do. 

What place is it?

ENTREE #5

Name a place somewhere in South America, in two words. 

The first word names an animal. 

Rearrange its letters to name something these animals usually do. 

Then take the name of the country in which the place is located and advance its first letter two places forward in the alphabet. 

Read the result backward and you will name an animal in the same classification as the one named by the first word. 

What place is this? 

What does the first animal usually do, and what is the related animal?

ENTREE #6

Name an oft-visited place in Europe, in two
words. 

The first word names some animals.  

The second word is something these animals usually do. 

What place is it?

ENTREE #7

A mountain range in Australia and a tavern in the Eastern U.S that is known for its beer selection have the same eight-letter name. 

The first four letters name some animals. 

The first three letters name something these animals often do. 

The last four letters name something the animal uses when it does this. 

What is the place name? 

Hint: The third and eighth letters spell the postal abbreviation of the state in which the tavern is located.

ENTREE #8

Two places in the same U.S. state name some animals. 

One of the animals, and the female of the other one, are parts of a well-known idiom describing a situation in which someone is put  in charge of something he or she cannot be trusted to do. 

What are the two places, and what is the idiom?

ENTREE #9

Name a place somewhere on the globe – in two words. 

Rearrange the letters of the first word to spell a term for “a cell of indoctrinated leaders active in promoting the interests of a revolutionary party.” 

The new two-word result is what happens
when such a “revolutionary indoctrinated leader cell” suffers ruin, defeat or failure and loses its power.

What is this place on the globe?

What happens when the “revolutionary indoctrinated leader cell” loses its power.   

ENTREE #10

Name a place somewhere on the globe – in two words. 

Replace the fourth letter of the first word with a “u” to name some game. 

Add two consecutive letters of the alphabet to the end of the second word to name some that pursue this game. 

What is the place on the globe?

What are “some game” and “some that pursue this game?”

ENTREE #11

Name a place somewhere on the globe – in two words.

Rearrange the letters of the first word to name a mythological monster associated with a peacock. 

That same rearrangement of letters also precedes the word “pheasant” to name a large, brilliantly patterned bird native to East
India.

The second word in the place name is something that peacocks and pheasants sometimes do.

What is this place on the globe?

Who is the mythological monster?

What is the word that precedes “pheasant”?

What do peacocks and pheasants sometimes do?

Dessert Menu

“Not-This-Sentence” Dessert:

Shifting an “artifactual” synonym

What do you get if you change the first letter in a synonym of “artifacts” to an “o”, move letters 3 and 4 to the end, then move letters 1 and 2 to the end? 

Well, what you get is not this sentence. 

What is the synonym of “artifacts”? 

What is the word it becomes?

Every Thursday 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.