“Improbable bobbable Egg... nog?” Food Fight at the Golden Corral? Travel ’Zine? Cars & Carnations; “Heaps-o’-hops hoppin’ mad!” Making essential scriptural scents; “Payrolling” along on ergocycles; “Schussing down Pikachu Avenue” Opposites attract apposites are apt

PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER 5πe² SERVED

Schpuzzle of the Week:

Making essential scriptural scents

Name a fragrance found in the Bible.

Replace its first word with an anagram that is the surname of a poet. This poet used a pseudonym that is an anagram of four consecutive interior letters in the fragrance’s last word. Replace those four letters with an “o”. 

The result is a Christian title that appears in the Bible. 

Name this fragrance, poet, pseudonym, and title.

Appetizer Menu

Delightfully Puzzley Appetizer:

“Improbable bobbable Egg... nog?” Food fight, Cars & Carnations, Travel Mag; 

“Food Fight at the Golden Corral?”

1.♕♖♗♘Picture this: 

A semi-empty plate at the “Golden Corral Buffet – the vestiges of a sumptuous feast... or
perhaps a food fight?” 

Describe what is on this plate using a two-word phrase of 5 and 6 letters and of 2 and 1 syllables.

Double the third letter of both words. “Spoonerize” the result by interchanging the first letter of the first word with the first three letters of the altered second word.

The final result is two-word ploy executed in a variant form of a classic family board game.

What is the two-word description of what is on the buffet table plate?

What is the two-word ploy in the variant form of the classic board game? 

Cars and Carnations

2. 🚌✈🚲🎕⚘Take a popular method of transportation, in eight letters. Drop two letters, in order, that together represent a common acronym in texting. 

Mix the remaining letters to “grow” a  flower.

What are this method of transportation and name of the flower?

Travel ’zine?  

3. 🎜🎝Take the second word in the name of a magazine. 

Add a vowel to this word so that it is no longer a “Cyclops,” but then delete from it the letters in one of the seven solfège syllables: do, re, mi, fa, sol, la, ti. 

Mix the result gently (do not shake!) to spell a name of a vehicle historically associated with the name of the magazine. 

What are this magazine and the name of the vehicle?    

The “Improbable bobbable Egg... nog?”

4. ☕🧃Change the first letter in a two-word high-protein beverage to get something
improbable.

What is the beverage?

What is improbable?

MENU

Foaming At The Mouth Of A Beer Mug Hors d’Oeuvre:

“Heaps-o’-hops hoppin’ mad!”

Name a beverage and a synonym of “steaming mad.” 

Rearrange their combined letters to spell an ingredient often used to make the beverage. 

What are this beverage, synonym and ingredient?

Work Like An Ox Slice:

“Payrolling” along on ergocycles

In a calendar year, there are 26 pay periods, which could also be described as “14-day pay cycles.”

Workers who receive 26 paychecks per year are paid fortnightly, on BLANK BLANK. 

Rearrange the 13 total letters in those blanks to spell a pair of ox-like creatures. 

What are the words in the blanks and the ox-like creatures?

MENU

Riffing Off Shortz And Kalish Entrees:

“Schussing down Pikachu Avenue”

Will Shortz’s June 15th Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle challenge, created by Evan Kalish of Bayside, New York, reads:

Take a child’s  game, in eight letters. Change the sixth letter to “ch”  and, phonetically, you’ll
have a popular animated children’s character. What are the game and the character?

Puzzleria!s Riffing Off Shortz And Kalish Entrees read:

ENTREE #1

Take a puzzle-maker’s surname, in six letters. 

Change the sixth letter to “ch” and, phonetically, you’ll have 

1.) a popular kind of cabbage that one might be allergic to, and

2.) an irritating skin sensation induced by that allergy that may tempt one to scratch.

Who is this puzzle-maker?

What are the kind of cabbage and irritating skin condition?

Note: Entrees #2 through #7 are the playful handiwork of our friend Nodd.

ENTREE #2

Name a two-word children’s toy used in numerous games. 

The second word, spelled backwards, names a popular children’s character from books and animated films. 

What are the toy and the character?

ENTREE #3

Name a two-word children’s game. The first word is also the name of a popular animated children’s animal character. 

What are the game and the character?

ENTREE #4

Name a three-word children’s game. 

Change the last letter of the third word to a P. Follow the third word, as modified, with the second word spelled backwards. 

You’ll name an animated children’s animal character originated for TV in the 1960s. 

What are the game and the character?

ENTREE #5

Think of a children’s game that is named for the items used to play it. Replace the first letter with a copy of the fourth letter. 

Change the fifth letter to the letter three places before it in the alphabet. 

You’ll name characters featured in numerous children’s films and TV shows. 

What are the game and the characters?  

ENTREE #6

Name a popular children’s toy game, in three words. 

Replace the third letter with the letter two places after it in the alphabet. 

Follow it with a two-letter state postal abbreviation, and delete the second word. You’ll name a popular animated children’s character. 

What are the game and the character?  

ENTREE #7

Name a two-word game often played by children. 

Double the second letter, and replace the last three letters with a Y. 

Delete the space to name a popular animated children’s character. 

What are the game and the character?

ENTREE #8

Take a two-word child’s game. Spell the second word in reverse order to get an object that ought never be considered “child’s play.” 

The first word is one a police officer might shout at a perpetrator of a crime. What are this child’s game and shout.

What are this game and object?

ENTREE #9

Remove two consecutive letters from a two-word 13-letter child’s game that is sometimes often enjoyed by adults. 

The result is choral music melodies one might hear at a concert or on a recording.

What is this game and what are the melodies?

ENTREE #10

Take a child’s game, in eight letters. 

Anagram these letters to spell a game people of all ages play and a role  often assumed by charades game participants.

What are this child’s game, game played by all ages, and role charades players assume?

Dessert Menu

“Pleated” Skirt Dessert:

Opposites attract, apposites are apt

Name an attractive article of clothing and a slang term for the body part it encloses. 

Spell the slang term in reverse, followed by an
adjective modifying one type of the clothing (like “pleated” skirt, for example) to spell something else that is attractive. 

What are this clothing, body part and other attractive thing?

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 Thursday.

“Merry Marriage Day, Berrys!” What a name in a novel became; Geography by the numbers; Fawnzie dotes & dozy dotes... Sundering Redundancy! One life-saver vs two deadly quavers

PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER 5πe² SERVED

Schpuzzle of the Week:

What a name in a novel became

Name a character in a novel.

Add an “F” to the beginning of the name. Reverse the order of two adjacent vowels. 

Insert a space someplace. 

The result is a description of what a part of another character in the novel had become. 

Who are these characters? What did the part of the other character become?

Appetizer Menu

“Try the Knot”ty Cryptic Crossword Appetizer:

“Merry Marriage Day, Berrys!”

The Berrys are about to celebrate a very merry fairytale marriage! 

Austin, the son of Patrick J. Berry’s cousin Tammy, will be wed this weekend... and a whole “Bowlful of Berrys” have been picked to be in attendance as wedding guests!

The ceremony, Patrick says, will take place “at some kind of castle” in central Alabama.

Alas, we “non-Berrys!” have not been picked to be in attendance as wedding guests. We can, however, celebrate the couple’s nuptials in absentia by enjoying the following fresh new mystifying mind-defying masterpiece of wordplayfulness – Patrick’s 39th tricky cryptic crossword to grace the cyberpages of Puzzleria!

You can access any of Patrick’s previous 38 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 37 38

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 “matrimony,” (7,4) indicates a seven-letter-plus-four-letter answer like “wedding vows,” and (1-4) indicates a one-letter and four-letter hyphenated answer like “a-line,” as
in a wedding dress style.

For further insight about how to decipher these numbered cryptic clues, see Patrick’s “Cryptic Crossword Tutorial” in this link  to his November 17, 2017 puzzle.

That Tutorial appears below the filled-in answer-grid in that edition of Puzzleria!

And so, even though you haven’t been picked to be in that “Bowlful of Berrys” with Patrick and his kinfolk, you are invited to instead “celebrate in spirit” by filling in the following “Gridful of (Patrick J.) Berry’s”:  

Enjoy!

ACROSS

1. Having taken drug, sort of learn the guitar at home using song by 14 (8,2,3,4)

6. Britney’s ex, fellow wearing one sneaker?(1-3 )

9. Object, then: last through sunrise! (2,3,5)

10. In Oahu, ladies’ dance (4)

12. Sound of conversation after one enters club, not having used head (6-6)

15. Put in “Pistol Packin’ Mama”? (7)

16. 1 Across

17. Top anchorman’s first-rate comeback involving new radio format... (3-4)

19. ...about to have journalist choose, with some delay (3,4)

20. Was creative? Was attractive, awfully cute pair! (4,1,7)

23. Old friend’s birthstone (4)

24. Duh! Radio’s top song by 14 (8,2,2,4,2,2)

25. Country gal heading off (4)

26. Small, went in flash (5,5)

DOWN

1. See success with trademark (4)

2. Some without a home in this state? (4)

3. Drunk getting sacked after first two quarters of football game?(4,2,3,3)

4. Out of spite, left note or letter (7)

5. Receive fortune first off, claiming possible heir (7)

7. Dish served up—swell to eat it with a little ambrosia, man!(5,5)

8. Double date badly arranged—I start to apologize, going to hug sweetheart (4,6)

11. Recall daring arrangement of song by 14 (8,4)

13. See 24 Across

14. Stranger, upset, having asked about
singer/songwriter (4,6)

18. Act to criticize when one goes downhill a number of times? (3,4)

19. Go back over former President’s rise prior to primary election (7)

21. Eager to leave after first of August? Good! (4)

22. Quarrel got disgusting? (4)

MENU

World Altas Hors d’Oeuvre:

Geography by the numbers

A six-letter word is a plural synonym of the singular word formed by its letters 5, 2 and 1. 

Letters 1,2,3 & 6 of the word spell one of two places on earth where you can find the word that letters 4, 5 & 6 spell.

What are these six-letter, four-letter and three-letter words?

Hint: The letters of the six-letter word, except for the last two, are in reverse alphabetical order 

Bad Odds Slice:

One life-saver vs two deadly quavers

Name a potentially life-saving first line of defense against cyberattacks. 

Move the second and third letters to the beginning. 

The result is two potentially deadly things.
What are this potential life-saver and two deadly things?

Hint: The potentially life-saving first line of defense against cyberattacks is a compound word.

Riffing Off Shortz And Young Entrees:

Fawnzie dotes & dozy dotes...  

Will Shortz’s June 6th National Public Radio Weekend Edition puzzle challenge, written by Joseph Young of St. Cloud, Minnesota, reads:
Name certain female animals. Insert a T somewhere inside the word, and you’ll get a synonym for this animal’s offspring. What animals are these?

Puzzleria!s Riffing Off Shortz And Young Entrees read:

ENTREE #1

Name certain male and female animals who may “hop up the hill” to fetch a drink of water from a spring, along with their offspring. Also name the eight-letter collective term for all three. 

Place a space someplace within the singular
form of the word for the offspring, followed by:

~ the 7th letter of the collective term,

~ the third letter of that term, inverted,

~ the third letter of that term, not inverted, and

~ the fourth letter of that term.

The result is the name of a puzzle-maker. 

What three animals are these, and their collective term?

Who is the puzzle-maker?

(Note: Entrees #2 through #7 were composed and contributed by our friend Nodd.)

ENTREE #2

Name certain female animals. 

Add a B and rearrange to get a name for the offspring of a different species. 

What names are these?

Hint: The word for the “certain female animals” is “chiefly British,” according to Merriam-Webster.

ENTREE #3

Name a kind of bird and change the second letter to an E. 

Follow this with the name for a female member of the bird species, with the last letter doubled. 

The result will be the name of a famous person who is not a female. 

What are these two names, and who is the famous person?

ENTREE #4

Think of two names for the female of a kind of animal. 

Add an E to the first one to get a generic term for a female. Divide the second word into two parts to get a part of an article of clothing and another article of clothing that is worn by females. 

What are these five words?

ENTREE #5

Name certain females. Insert a P and an N somewhere inside the word, and you'll get a name for certain other females. 

What are the two names?

ENTREE #6

Name a certain female animal. 

Delete the last letter and spell the rest
backward to get a name for the male of a different animal. 

What are these two names?

ENTREE #7

Name a certain female animal. Double the first letter and change the last letter to an H. 

Rearrange the result to get a word often applied to certain offspring. 

What are the name for the animal and the word applied to offspring?

ENTREE #8

Name an animal and what its male, female and offspring are called. 

Play “musical chairs” with the initial letters of the male, female and offspring. When the “music stops,” the male inherits the female’s first letter, the female inherits the offspring’s first letter, and the offspring inherits the male’s first letter to form three new words.

The second word is a synonym of “murder.” Place the third word to the left of the first word to form a compound word for a “premeditated murder for criminal or political purposes.”

What are this animal... and its male, female and offspring?

What are the synonym of “murder” and compound word?     

ENTREE #9

Write down what the male, female and offspring of a certain animal are called – an animal that some associate with Jimmy Carter’s post-presidential career, or with a name wordplayfully associated with a “tardy mob.” 

The first two letters of the female name of the animal are the first two letters in the archaic present tense third-person singular form of a
verb that is a homophone of a noun preceded by “morning” or “mountain.” (My sincere apologies for saddling you puzzle-solvers with that sentence!) 

Replace those two letters with the last two letters in that same archaic present tense third-person singular form of the verb. The result is a common 3-letter article.

What you wrote down is now the three-word moniker of a “Bonney Lad Gone Wrong.”

What are this animal and its male, female and offspring?

What is the archaic present tense third-person singular form of the verb?

What is the noun preceded by “morning” or “mountain” that is a homophone of non-archaic form of the verb?

What is the three-word moniker of a “Bonney Lad Gone Wrong?”

ENTREE #10

(In the blue italicized text below, the words in the blanks are defined by the parenthetical clues to their immediate right.)

Otto, who is ___ __ (fully committed) when it comes to _____ (a game of chance resembling bingo),

Did spew a ______ (screech) of joy when his
seventh winning number came into view!

Rearrange the combined 3, 2, 5 and 6 letters that belong in the blanks to spell the names of the male, female and offspring names of an animal.

What are the four missing words?

What are the three animal names?

Dessert Menu

Double-Named Nation Dessert:

Sundering Redundancy!

If you remove a the first instance of verb that appears twice in the name of a fictional character the result is the former name of a nation that is an anagram of two body parts. What are this fictional name and nation's two names?

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 Thursday.

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.