“Such fine turkey-day tableware!” “Let’s go...” Raises, Rises, Roses? Battleground, Toss-up, Purple...? Dangerous game, Heavy actor; Gomer in Monty, Python ate Pyle!

PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER 5πe² SERVED

Schpuzzle of the Week:

“Such fine turkey-day tableware!”

All interior letters of two complementary tableware items are identical. These identical letters, however, are not-so-much in the same order. The first-and-final letters of these two tableware items are four different letters that appear within within a consecutive five-letter string in the alphabet – like E-F-G-H-I, for example. 

What are these two tableware items?

Note: Although the identical interior letters “are not-so-much in the same order,” the fourth letter in each tableware item is the same letter.

Appetizer Menu

“Breaking Up The Blank” Appetizer:

“Let’s go... !!”

Take the sentence:

“Let’s go ________.” 

Fill in the blank with a very common eight-letter word.  

Now insert two spaces into your word to break it into three very common words. 

Both the original and new “Let’s go...”

sentences should make sense – the first in three words, the second in five words.  

What eight-letter word should fill in the original blank?

What is your five-word sentence?

BONUS PUZZLE: 

Find two words of 11 and 12 letters that each satisfy the same conditions as the eight-letter word in the puzzle above. These 11-letter and 12-letter words are are near-synonyms of one another.

MENU

“Fee-Fi-Fo-Fum” Hors d’Oeuvre:

Raises, Rises, Roses?

Name some kind of plant, a compound word, that might be growing in your garden, like Jack’s beanstalk, for example. 

This plant may not rise as high as Jack’s “stairway to heaven,” but neither is it exactly a “slouch.” Remove the initial letter of each of the two parts of this compound word. According to Merriam-Webster, the result is a not a word. But if it were, it would be a synonym of “raise.” 

What are this compound plant and non-word?

Hint: The first syllable of the compound word is associated with a homophone of “raise.” 

Finding The Finest Definer Slice:

Battleground, Toss-up, Purple...? 

Take a two-word term (at least in 2024) for Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, or Wisconsin.

Remove the first and sixth letters.

The result is one of two architectural projections extending east and west from the main part of a modern art museum in Europe, followed by the name of that museum.

Or, if you instead remove the fourth and seventh letters from the original two-word term, the result is a healthy prolonged quaff of a beverage and what such quaffs do to one’s thirst.

What is this two-word term for Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, or Wisconsin (at least in 2024)?

What are the architectural projections and name of the museum?

What is the quaff and what it does to one’s thirst?

Riffing Off Shortz And VanMechelen Slices:

Gomer in Monty? Python ate Pyle!

Will Shortz’s November 24th NPR Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle, created by Greg VanMechelen of Berkeley, California, reads: 

Name a state capital. Inside it in consecutive letters is the first name of a popular TV character of the past. Remove that name. The remaining letters, in order, will spell the first name of a popular TV game show host of the past.  What is the capital and what are the names?

Puzzleria!s Riffing Off Shortz And VanMechelen Slices read:

ENTREE #1

Name a talented puzzle-maker. Remove the first three and last two letters that, in order:

~ spell the surname a singer whose first name is an anagram of “a note that follows sol,” or... 

~ spell a homophone of the surname of an actor whose first name is an anagram of “someone who usually avoids the company of others.” 

From the ten letters that remain, remove two consecutive and four consecutive letters that, in order, spell the first name of a poet whose surname is the first name of an actress whose last name begins with the last four letters of a Hawaiian greeting or farewell. The remaining four letters, if you move the second one to the end, spell a hyphenated word for Melvin Purvis and J. Edgar Hoover.

Who is this puzzle maker?

What are the surnames of the guys named Al and Lorne?

What is the first name of the poet?

What is the hyphenated word for Melvin Purvis and J. Edgar Hoover?

Note: Entrees # 2 through #7, Entree #8, and Entree #9 were composed, respectively (and respectfully), by riffmasters Nodd, Plantsmith, and a Great Friend of Puzzleria! (whose puzzles will be the featured Appetizers on the next edition of P!) 

ENTREE #2

Name a state capital. Consecutive letters in the name spell the first name of a popular TV character of the past.  Consecutive letters in
the name of another city in the state, a name with historical significance, spell the first name of the TV character’s counterpart on the show. What are the cities and who are the characters? 

ENTREE #3

Name a state capital. The first half of the name spells the last name of the main character in a TV series based on a 1973 movie. 

The second half spells the last name of another character in the series. What is the capital, who are the characters, and what is the series? 

ENTREE #4

Name a state capital. Add to it the third letter in the name of the state. 

Rearrange the letters to spell the first and last names of a star track and field athlete of the 1970s and 1980s, five letters in each.  

What is the capital, and who is the athlete?

ENTREE #5

Name a state capital that is also the last name of a popular TV character of the past. 

The letters can be rearranged to spell something the character might have said. 

What is the capital, who is the character, and what might the character have said?

ENTREE #6

Name a state capital. 

Consecutive letters in the name spell the first name of a popular TV character of the past. 

The rest of the letters can be arranged to spell something negative. What is the capital, and what is the TV series? What is the negative thing?

ENTREE #7

Name a state capital. 

Remove from it three letters that are consecutive in the alphabet. 

The remaining letters, in order, spell the last name of a popular TV actress of the past. 

What is the capital, and who is the actress?

ENTREE #8

Remove from the name of a state capitol the name of a past comic book character. Then drop first letter of what remains to get a word for “delicious.” What are this state capital, comic book character and word for “delicious”?

Hint: the word for “delicious” is associated with the state that contains the capitol.  

ENTREE #9

Name a state capital.  

Remove from the name five letters which can be arranged to mean “an impasse.”  

The remaining letters in order, left to right,
when said aloud, sound like the name of a popular TV character of the past.  

What is the state capital?  What can mean “an impasse?”  

Who is the TV character?  

ENTREE #10

Insert an “i” smack-dab in the middle of a world capital city. 

The first two plus last two letters in this altered word spell the name of a holy man who is also often described by using an adjective beginning with a “v”. 

The interior letters flanked by those four letters
can be rearranged to spell a holy object. 

What is this capital city? 

Who is this holy man? 

What is the holy object? 

ENTREE #11

“If you fill out an application to ___ a personal __ card, you will need to divulge the color of your hair.”

Name a hair color that may or may not be yours. Divide it into two parts. Between those
parts place the letters that belong in the second blank followed by the letters that belong in the first blank. The result is a world capital city.

What are the hair color, the words in the blanks and the capital city?

ENTREE #12

The  final five letters of a British colony spell a center of worship or ritual. The remaining letters of this colony can be arranged to spell a place where prisoners reside. What is this British colony? What are the center of worship and place where prisoners reside?

Dessert Menu

“Death By Chocolate?” Dessert:

Dangerous game, Heavy actor

Name a decades-old board game that sounds kind of dangerous. It is a compound word. Divide it into those two words.

Move the last two letters of the second word to the beginning of the first word, then double the new last letter of the second word. 

The result is an adjective and proper noun. 

The proper noun is the surname of an accomplished past actor.  

The adjective describes this past actor, especially during the latter years of his career. 

What is this game? 

What are the adjective and proper noun?

Hint:

This actor often played “the heavy.”

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.

Creative Cryptic Chrysopoeia; Proactivity and the proper noun; Alphabetical ordinality ranking; Sweetly docile vs. creepily hostile; Composition and misconception; “The same heart beats in every human breast”

PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER 5πe² SERVED

Schpuzzle of the Week:

Proactivity and the proper noun

Name a two-word strategy that promotes health proactively. 

Replace the first syllable of the first word with a common preposition, forming a new word. 

Replace the second word with a proper noun that rhymes with it; this proper noun is the surname of a famous American that the new word describes. 

What are this strategy, new word and famous American?

 Appetizer Menu

Heavenly 37th “Crypt-Cross” Appetizer:

Creative Cryptic Chrysopoeia

Welcome to Patrick J. Berry’s cryptic crossword puzzle, the 37th one that we have presented on Puzzleria!

Two clues in this, his latest masterpiece sum up the artistry of Patrick’s cryptic oeuvre on our blog, and our appreciation of it:

3 DOWN: Difficulties of transporting gold in big trucks(6)

Well, Patrick (also known by his screen name “cranberry”) experiences no difficulties whatsoever in “mining” cryptic crossword gold from his creative cranium, and delivering it to us by the “Cyber-Brinks Truckload!”  

24 ACROSS: Kept going—and I mean it!(10)

Yes, Patrick... we all want you to “keep going!” Keep on creating your “classic crypticological gold” – alchemist-like! – and delivering it to us... and we mean it!

You can access Patrick’s previous 36 cryptic crosswords by opening the links below:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 

26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 

For those who may be new to cryptic crossword puzzles, Patrick has compiled the following list of basic cryptic crossword puzzle instructions:

Regarding the Across and Down clues and their format:

The number, or numbers, that appear in parentheses at the end of each clue indicate how many letters are in the answer.

Multiple numbers in parentheses indicate how letters are distributed in multiple-word answers. 

For example, (9) simply indicates a nine-letter word like “cranberry,” (7,9) indicates a seven-letter and nine-letter answer like “cryptic crossword,” and (4-9) indicates a four-letter and nine-letter hyphenated answer like “head-scratcher.”

For further insight about how to decipher these numbered cryptic clues, see Patrick’s “Cryptic Crossword Tutorial” in this link to his
November 2017 cryptic crossword. 

That Tutorial appears below the grid that contains the answers in that edition of Puzzleria! 

Taking that tutorial will help train you to tackle Patrick’s playfully-wordy-thirty-seventh-heavenly-elliptic-cryptic-crossword!

Enjoy! 

ACROSS

1. See 7 Down

8. Leading man’s trouble coming back after catcall(4)

9. Where one may cross line, getting rejected—ultimate kick in the teeth, perhaps(10)

10. Kitty takes second job(4)

11. Was bragging about day being full(7)

13. Tops—those of a bigger size, we hear(6)

15. Some minor dictator from Scandinavia?(6)

16. Comic strip was bad back then, came off a little exuberant(6,3,6)

17. Train, then get uniform for team(6)

19. Tools a new surgeon shouldn’t use
working?(6)

20. Sorted out with first freeze’s thaw(7)

21. Last mention of old routine?(4)

24. Kept going—and I mean it!(10)

25. Dizzy Dean’s girl?(4)

26. Bloody hard playing in imperfect group using song by 13 Down(4,4,2)

DOWN

1. Save up to get a musical instrument(4)

2. Pickpocket has lost grip(4)

3. Difficulties of transporting gold in big trucks(6)

4. Right-wing website fellow possessing bit of whimsy, rather clever—getting his start, managed to keep name unknown(4,4,7)

5. To show or not to show?(6)

6. Mediocre actor needs repackaging(6-4)

7. 13 Down’s top act I’d see—works at it, surprisingly!(3,7,2,8)

11. Demanded decimal should be moved(7)

12. Give a little to old university having trouble with enrollment, initially(4,3)

13. Singer, one indeed changed by wealth(5,5)

14. Handy, or that is necessary primarily, in place of worship(10)

18. Recalled article about boy brought up near California(6)

19. While I pass around a certain type of cheese(6)

22. Close with some Indians in Oklahoma(4)

23. The first place and the last place in one’s house?(4)

MENU

Rank-And-File Hors d’Oeuvre:

Alphabetical ordinality ranking

Spell out a letter of the alphabet. Remove one of its letters. 

The result sounds like the spelled-out letter’s ordinal rank in the alphabet. What are this letter and its rank in the alphabet?

Piano Playtime Slice:

Composition and misconception

Remove the first and fifth letters from the title of a well-known piano composition, leaving a verb and small creatures. 

Although these creatures don’t move by means of this verb, some people nevertheless harbor the false notion that they do. 

What is composition title? 

What are the small creatures and the verb?

Riffing Off Shortz And Schwartz Slices:

“The same heart beats in every human breast”

Will Shortz’s November 17th NPR Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle, created by Michael Schwartz of Florence, Oregon, reads:

Think of a classic American author whose first and last names are each one syllable. 

The last name, when said aloud, sounds like part of the body. 

Insert the letters “A” and “S” into the first name and you have the location of this body part. Who is the author?

Puzzleria!s Riffing Off Shortz And Schwartz Slices read:

ENTREE #1

Think of a classic British author whose first and last names are each one syllable. The last name is also a four-footed creature that, when the initial letter is lowercased, looks like a word for one metrical foot – a word that has all lowercase letters except for its first letter. 

Now take the first and last names of an American puzzle-maker. 

The third, fourth, fifth, thirteenth, seventh, sixth and eighth letters spell the first name of the British author. 

The seventh, fifth and first letters spell a word that is a homophone of the four-footed creature. The sixth, seventh, second and fifth letters spell a nickname of this British author.

Who is this British author, nickname, and American puzzle-maker?

What is the homophone of the four-footed creature?

What is the word for one metrical foot?

Note: Entrees #2 through #7 are the handiworkmanlike wordplay of our friend Nodd, Riffmeister. 

ENTREE #2

Take the first and last names of a famous American author. Add an “I.” Rearrange the result to spell two body parts and an unpleasant bodily sensation that might result if either part makes forceful contact with a hard surface. 

Who is the author, what are the two body parts, and what is the unpleasant sensation?

ENTREE #3

Take the last name of a famous American author. Remove the fifth and sixth letters. Rearrange the result to spell a body part and an affliction that may cause the body part to become sore and inflamed. Who is the author, and what are the body part and the affliction?

EXTRA CREDIT: Add two “E”s to the two letters you removed to spell a second body part. What is it?

ENTREE #4

Take the first and last names of a famous American author. Add an “S.” 

Rearrange the result to spell a two-word phrase describing a condition that may cause a loosening of the skin. Who is the author and what is the two-word phrase?

ENTREE #5

Take the first and last names of an American
poet. Double  the last letter of the last name. Rearrange the result to spell two body parts that are located near one another, and an abbreviated term for someone who attends to people’s body parts. Who is the poet, and what are the two body parts and the abbreviated term?

ENTREE #6

The last name of a British author of the past sounds like a bodily affliction. 

Who is the author and what is the affliction? 

ENTREE #7

Take the last name of the pen name of a famous author.  Remove the fourth letter. 

Add a four-letter word for a deep black color.
Rearrange all of the letters to spell a body part. 

Who is the author, and what are the color and the body part?

ENTREE #8

Using a pencil, write down in six uppercase letters the name of a fist-sized interior organ of the human body. 

Erase the third letter and rewrite it in lowercase. 

Erase the fourth and sixth letters. Rewrite the sixth letter in the space vacated by the fourth letter. 

The result looks like a word for a second body part that abuts the first body part via a vertebra.

What are these two body parts?

ENTREE #9

Think of an American actor who portrayed Teddy Roosevelt in film. This actor also starred in a 1960s sitcom that had the same title as a 1970s hit song by Sly and the Family Stone. 

Rearrange the letters of this actor’s first name to name a body part.

Replace the second letter of his surname with an “n” and rearrange the result to name what people do with this body part.

Who is this actor? 

What is the body part and what do people do with it? 

Dessert Menu

Stephen Kingly Dessert:

Sweetly docile vs. creepily hostile

Spoonerize the two syllables of a word in a Stephen King title. 

The result is a kind of sweetly docile mammal and a kind of  creepy hostile bird. 

What are this title, mammal and bird?

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 hintsabout 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.

Chad do-si-does with Victoria? Terms of uncommon distinction; Last names of past thespians; Carpentry tools create creature; “Utah Salt” yields “hula tats”? Pans-Eared Red Snapper

PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER 5πe² SERVED

Schpuzzle of the Week:

Terms of uncommon distinction

Take a two-word term that, for an average human male adult, is between five feet and six feet, or thereabouts, above the ground.

The number of letters in the two words differs. The words do, however, share a more uncommon distinction in common.  

What is this two-word term?

What uncommon distinction do these two words share in common?

Appetizer Menu

Skydiversionary Appetizer:

Chad do-si-does with Victoria?

1. Think of the name of a country in two syllables. 

Reverse the order of those two syllables and you will name the capital city of another country. 

What are the country and the city?

Indy Spectator vs. State Patrol officer

2. What is the difference between a fan at the Indy 500 and a state patrol officer observing the interstate highway?

MENU

Stage And Screen Hors d’Oeuvre:

Last names of past thespians

Take a past thespian’s surname. 

Move the first two letters to the end, so that they replace the last letter. 

The result is a second past thespian’s surname. 

Who are these thespians?

Woodworking Wordplay Slice:

Carpentry tools create creature

Name two woodworking tools that share a similar function. They also share identical letter-pairs (like SAW and AWL share an AW, for example). 

Remove one of the letter-pairs and rearrange the result to spell an animal. (For example, if you remove one of the “AW” letter-pairs from “SAW” and “AWL,” the letters that remain are “SAWL,” which can be rearranged to spell not an animal but the words “SLAW” or “LAWS.”)

What are these tools and animal?

Riffing Off Shortz And Baggish Slices:

Pans-Eared Red Snapper

Will Shortz’s November 10th NPR Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle, created by Steve Baggish of Arlington, Massachusetts, reads:

Using only the letters of PANDERS, and repeating them as often as desired, spell a certain entrée at a seafood restaurant (3-6 3 7).

Puzzleria!s Riffing Off Shortz And Baggish Slices read:

ENTREE #1

Using only the letters in a nine-letter word that means “the making or adapting of something
to suit a particular purpose,” spell the hometown of a prolific puzzler-maker. What is this nine-letter word? What is the hometown and who is the puzzle-maker?

Note: Entree #2 was created by our friend Plantsmith, whose “Garden of Puzzley Delights” regularly vivifies Puzzleria!s pages.

ENTREE #2

Using only the letters in the word PANDERS, describe some unusual performers in two words of seven letters each.

Note: Entrees #3 though #8 were penned by our friend Nodd, whose “Nodd ready for prime time” regularly graces Puzzleria!s pages.

ENTREE #3

Think of a two-word dish featured at seafood restaurants. 

The first word, and the second half of the second word, in order, spell another seafood dish. The first half of the second word is an ingredient in a non-seafood dish often featured at upscale restaurants. 

What are the two seafood dishes and the non-seafood ingredient?

ENTREE #4

Think of a two-word dish featured at seafood restaurants. Rearrange its letters to spell something most people enjoy when dining out, and something most people don’t enjoy seeing when dining out.

ENTREE #5

Think of a seafood dish that is available in two main varieties. 

The last three letters of this dish, read backward and followed by the first four letters in order, spell a two-word phrase that describes one variety of the dish. 

What are the dish, the two-word phrase, and the variety of the dish that the two-word phrase describes?

ENTREE #6

Think of a two-word dish featured at seafood restaurants. 

The last five letters of the first word, in order, are the first five letters of the second word. 

The last four letters of the second word, in
order, spell what patrons of restaurants do after they arrive. 

What is the seafood dish, and what do patrons do?

ENTREE #7

Think of a dish featured at seafood restaurants. The name of the dish comes from a European language. 

Rearrange the letters of the dish to spell another seafood dish and a musical term associated with the same European country. What are the two seafood dishes and the musical term?

ENTREE #8

Think of a two-word dish featured at seafood restaurants. Remove a personal pronoun. 

Rearrange the rest of the letters to spell a one-word seafood dish and something that would be left after eating either dish. 

What are the two dishes and what would be left after eating them?  

ENTREE #9

Using only the letters of WINDSTORM, and repeating them as often as desired, spell what is on display (in words of 5, 5, 6 and 3 letters) in the previous six Entrees, #3 through #8.

What are these words? 

ENTREE #10

Using only the letters of POLYCENTRISM – using some once,  and repeating others over and over as often as necessary – spell a headline (in words of 5, 4, 7 and 6 letters) 
 that might have appeared in the Rolling Stone or Crawdaddy magazine in late 1968 or early 1969.

What is this headline? 

Hint: “...over and over...”

ENTREE #11

Using only the letters of ARTICLE, and repeating them as often as desired, spell a beverage and a dessert that customers might
order off a menu or list that prices items separately, in words of 6, 6, 1, 2 and 5 letters.

What are these menu items and the kind of menu that prices items separately?

ENTREE #12

Using only the letters of DROUGHTS, and repeating them as often as desired, spell:

* a two-word term (in 4 and 4 letters) for periods of the day when the most people commute to and from work, causing heavy traffic congestion on roads and public transportation;

* a slang term for large, heavy motorcycles, especially Harley Davidsons (4 letters); and

* a term for automobiles rebuilt or modified for high speed and fast acceleration (3 and 4 letters).

What are these three terms?

ENTREE #13

Using only the letters of UMPIRES, and repeating them as often as desired, spell three mathematical terms in 3, 5 and 5 letters.

What are these three terms?

ENTREE #14

Take a seven-letter synonym of “sickness” or “malady.” 

Using only those seven letters, and repeating them as often as desired, spell: 

* synonyms of “consume”(3 letters) and “consumed”(3 letters); 

* a synonym of  “breakfast,” “lunch” or “supper”(4); 

* a “hot drink”(3), a “cold drink”(4), an “alcoholic drink”(3); 

* a “candy”(4), a “fruit”(4);

* a word for “pot roast, steak, hamburger or turkey”(4); and

* a  “kind of bean”(4).

What is this seven-letter synonym of “sickness” or “malady?”

What are the ten other words?

Dessert Menu

Lake & State Dessert:

“Utah Salt” yields “hula tats”?

A well-known three-word phrase contains two names. 

Anagram this phrase to spell a name of a lake and a state that lake is in. 

What are this phrase, lake and state?

Hint: Take two names associated with the three-word phrase. One is an anagram of an empire. The other is an anagram of an island.

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.