Thursday, June 18, 2026

Rob from the Rich?; Bird Bug “Crawler” Canine Feline; “ROT-10” (or-13?) Fish!; Four synonyms, two rhyming pairs; ROT! For these five letters five is the limit!; Takin’ a trip to the Piggly Wiggly; “It’s the Berries!” Splash Slash Lash Ashbackwards! “Our cookie jar lid is ajar!” “The Pause (Button) that Refreshes?”




PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER 5πe2 SERVED

Schpuzzle Of The Week

“It’s the Berries!”

The Schuzzle of this week is all about the berries!

You are challenged to identify eleven kinds of berries... (like, say, “gooseberries” or “boysenberries”) that are pictured here — one kind in the “Schpuzzle of the Week” logo, and ten others in the illustration above, on the right.

Appetizer Menu

Mental ConTORTions Appetizer:

Rob from the Rich?; Bird Bug “Crawler” Canine Feline; “ROT-10”(or-13?) Fish!; Four synonyms, two rhyming pairs; ROT! For these five letters five is the limit! 

Rob from the Rich?

1.  🐦🎜⏺🎝Name two Top 10 songs by British artists that peaked in the same year during the mid-1970s. Remove the first letter from one title and you’ll have the title of the other song.

Both artists later had Top-20 songs with the same female vocalist. Both songs with this female “songbird” were on the same soundtrack album. 

The shorter song title also was also used in an earlier song by an act with a bird name. The longer title was used in an earlier song by an artist whose first name at birth is a bird. Remove the last letter from the last name, and it sounds like another bird. 

What are the two song titles? Who performed them? Who is the female vocalist? 

Bird Bug “Crawler” Canine Feline

2. 🐕🐈🐍🕷🐦 Name a six-letter animal in the canine family. ROT-13 the third letter and rearrange to get an animal in the feline family. Now change that letter to a different letter and rearrange to get a reptile. Change it again, and rearrange to get an insect. Remove the last two letters of the insect to get a bird.

What are the canine, feline, reptile. insect, and bird?

“ROT-10”(or-13?) Fish!

3. 🐟Think of a type of fish. ROT-13 each letter. You’ll have a type of insect. Now think of a famous fictional example of the fish. ROT-3
each letter to get a type of insect.

What are the fish, example of the fish, and two types of insects? 

Four synonyms, two rhyming pairs; 

4. 📖Think of two verbs that are synonymous. 

One word is six letters long and the other is five. 

They start with the same two letters. 

Now replace those two letters with two different
letters (same two new letters for both words). You’ll have two new synonyms that are synonymous with the first two words.

What are the words? 

ROT! For these five letters five is the limit! 

5. 📬Think of a common five-letter word. If you ROT-1, ROT-2, ROT-4, or ROT-5 the first letter,
you’ll have additional common words; however, no other changes to the first letter yield words.

What are these words?

MENU

Hard Copy & Soft Drinks Hors d’Oeuvre:

“The Pause (Button) that Refreshes?”

A word on the keyboard contains four consecutive letters of the alphabet – the last one twice, making it five. 

Remove three of the five, including one of the duplicate letters. Add an“app.” Rearrange the result to spell a soft drink brand.

What are this word on the keyboard and soft drink brand?

Clean-Up In Aisle-Nine Slice:

Takin’ a trip to the Piggly Wiggly

Name an “over-the-counter” item you might  purchase from your local supermarket, in two words.

Four consecutive letters spell what you might then purchase in the fruits section of the grocery.

The remaining letters, if your place the second letter at the end, spell a food you might purchase in either the produce section or baking aisle.

What are this “over-the-counter” item and two other possible purchases?

Riffing Off Shortz And Pickard Slices:

Splash Slash Lash Ashbackwards!

Will Shortz’s June 14th NPR Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle, created by listener Michael Pickard, reads:

Name something in 10 letters that's found in a kitchen. Drop its sixth letter to name something
on a keyboard. Then drop the new word's fifth letter to name something no one wants to get. What words are these?

Puzzleria!s Riffing Off Shortz And Pickard Slices read:

ENTREE #1

Name a three-word command a sleight-of-hand practitioner may give you or other member of his audience. 

Remove the two spaces, then remove two
adjacent letters that appear elsewhere in the command.

The result is the surname of a puzzle maker. 

Who is this puzzle-maker? What was the command?

(Note: Entrees #2 through #7 are the brainchildren of our friend and master riffmeister Nodd.

ENTREE #2

1. Name something in two words totaling 10 letters that’s found in a kitchen. Move the first letter of the second word to the fourth position of the first word. 

Then switch what are now the first and third letters of the second word. The result will name something no one wants to get. What are these two things?

ENTREE #3

Name something in six letters that’s found in a kitchen. Add a “C” and an “M” somewhere to
name things you put on breads. 

Remove four consecutive letters from the second word to name something no one wants to get. What words are these?

ENTREE #4 

Name something in 10 letters that is found in a kitchen. 

Rearrange its letters to name a dish that might
be made using this item, and a word for what the cook might do if the dish turned out poorly. 

What words are these?

ENTREE #5

Name something in two words totaling 11 letters that is found in a kitchen. 

Replace its third letter with an “E” to describe something a person in Ireland might read. 

What words are these?

ENTREE #6 

Name something in nine letters that is found in a kitchen. 

Replace its middle letter with a space to name a part in the 1970 film “Pufnstuf.” 

What is found in a kitchen, and what is the part?

ENTREE #7

A 10-letter brand name often found in kitchens describes a character from the Disney movie “Peter Pan.” 

What is the brand name and who is the character? 

(Note: Entree #8 was created and contributed by our talented friend and riffmaster Plantsmith.

ENTREE #8

Take a nine letter item that could be found in the kitchen. 

Drop letter four to get someone
who might be found in a kitchen.

Then remove two letters that are found in a famous movie. 

They replace them with abbreviation used often  in texting, to get animal associated with the kitchen item.

Dessert Menu

Midnight Sweet Snack Dessert:

“Our cookie jar lid is ajar!” 

“Don’t get me wrong,” my next-door neighbor Gabe confided in me during one of our frequent over-the-fence conversations. 

“My wife Mabel and I love her nephew Timothy very much, and we enjoy having him as a guest at our home. But it would be difficult to estimate the number of her homemade cookies Tim ate during his midnight visits to the cookie jar in our kitchen!”

What is a tad repetitive in that narrative?

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.

15 comments:

  1. Note:
    To place a comment under this QUESTIONS? subheading (immediately below), or under any of the three subheadings below it (HINTS! and PUZZLE RIFFS! and MY PROGRESS SO FAR...), simply left-click on the orange "Reply" to open a dialogue box where you can make a comment. Thank you.
    Lego...


    ReplyDelete
  2. Replies
    1. At the end of Entree 3, the following should be added: "wants to get. What words are these?"

      Delete
    2. Thanks, Nodd. My sincere and profound apologies,
      Lego...

      Delete
  3. PUZZLE RIFFS: and MY PROGRESS SO FAR...

    ReplyDelete
  4. IF YOU HAVE COMMENTS THAT DO NOT PERTAIN TO ANY OF THE FOUR CATEGORIES ABOVE, YOU MAY WRITE THEM BELOW THIS POST. THANK YOU.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Good Friday evening one and all!
    Finally, after a good two, maybe even three months(seemed like a long time anyway), Mom and I finally went out to eat tonight. While she was over here helping clean house yesterday, Mia Kate told Mom that she would like to eat out Friday night. Bryan and Renae left to go on their Alfa company trip, somewhere near Myrtle Beach(SC), but none of the girls went with them. They all chose to stay here. Mom was already wanting to go to Cracker Barrel to get their "Campfire Chicken" meal, which consists of a whole or half chicken, a corn on the cob, a few carrots and potatoes, and I think there were tomatoes in there, too. I'm guessing because she brought home a good bit of it, and there was one carrot, one potato, and what looked like a tomato, and the corn on the cob. We also got two of Mia Kate's chicken tenders, so we've got a few things to eat tomorrow and tomorrow night. I ordered the Smokehouse Grilled Chicken, Bacon Mac 'n' Cheese, Country Green Beans, a House Salad with ranch dressing, Fried Cinnamon Apples, and a Coke Zero(with refills), and I finished all of mine. I forget what else Mia Kate had, but she had a strawberry drink. Bad news, though: Mia Kate said she and Austin broke up. She said his mother never really liked her. The men in his family were fine, but the women were all overprotective, so they broke up. Pity. He seemed like a nice boy, though he didn't join us much for any family gatherings. Just one wedding in our family, that was it. Mia Kate also said she'll be heading off to school in the fall, somewhere in Sumiton(a neighboring town in the Walker County area). It'll be easy to go back and forth between there and home, she said.
    Mostly tough puzzles this week, although I did get most of Tortie's App #1(until the "shorter" and "longer" song titles). The only song that shares that of the shorter title, is by a group whose name is NOT a bird, but if you add two letters to the beginning of the name, then you get a bird. From there, I couldn't find the "artist whose first name at birth is a bird". After that, it was too late last night for me to fool with any "ROT-13" puzzles. I got Entree #1 and the Dessert(both the easiest). Hope Tortie and Co. will provide some good hints later this weekend.
    Good luck in solving to all, and please stay safe, and if any of you have gone or will go out to eat soon, I hope the food is good there, too! Cranberry out!
    pjbHasAlwaysKnownCrackerBarrelIsAPopularPlaceAroundTheseParts,ButForSomeReasonThereWeren'tTooManyOtherPeopleInThePlaceWhileWeWereThereACoupleHoursAgo(?)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Early Entree #1 hint: I'm guessing you have the right song titles, and not alts. The second two songs are more obscure than the first two.

      The shorter title was done by a group whose name is the same as the first name of a Mystery Science Theater 3000 robot.

      Delete
  6. BTW Those pictures on the berries look a little too small to really make out what they're supposed to depict. I'd probably be a lot luckier trying to recognize distant relatives in my own family of Berrys!
    pjbMightEvenHaveMoreLuckTryingToFigureOutThe[ROT-13]Puzzles!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Patrick,
    Since you yourself descend from a long line of Berries, I shall respect your reasonable request, which I suspect shall also benefit everyone..
    (I also suspect that you, and perhaps others on P!, have already solved the "triple Berrys" situated on the "Schpuzzle of the Week" dinner plate... I drew three of 'em because they hang in a cluster of three... no other real reason).
    But here are hints for the other 10 berries: from left-to-right, left-to-right and left-to-right, like a typewriter!
    1. a guy and a gal... he's not crossed out, but she is "red-circle-encircled" with a diagonal red bar crossing her body... an indication, alas, that she is gone!
    2. an anti-dope law enforcement officer (his title rhymes with "Bark!")
    3. A jogger, saying "I jog!"
    4. an oilcan, also known to contain a substance rhyming with "tube."
    5. a branch in a "Y-shape"... spell Y out (3 letters) and rearrange.
    6. a large "Scarlet Letter" (not an "A" however) preceded by a tiny "E" (because that's how you spell "L") but you've got to work the color into the equation also.
    7. two fencers engaging in an activity that rhymes with "star" (I s'pose I coulda drawn some kinda ship's mast... but then I just said, "the heck with it! Too much work!")
    8. That's a Scottish chimney... It's called a word that is an anagram of an historic German city with a view of the Alps.
    9. If you can zoom-in closer to the two words, they read: LUMBERJACK LODGE... but what this building actually IS is a LOG INN! (so, #9 is kinda unfair)
    10. That's one ugly berry! (There should really be two or more of 'em pictured and now there are!) They are related to unhealthy skin and they rhyme with "Quartz."

    LegoAllBerriedOut!

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  8. Got everything but the LOG INN(guess it is unfair!).
    pjbDidMuchBetterWithTheSchpuzzleThanWithTheEntrees(#5And#6SoFar!)

    ReplyDelete
  9. BTW I don't get the "Tripjack" logo on the "triple berries" either.
    pjbIsGladHeWasn'tSupposedToFigureOutWhyThereWereThreeOfThem!

    ReplyDelete