A Zarkinesque sextet of sticklers; The Renaissance sans remainders; Ballet & Mallet & Wallet & Pallet; The greatest sonnet ever penned! An actress and an artist; No bats, cats, rats or gnats need apply

PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER 5πe² SERVED

Note #1: With this week’s edition of Puzzleria! we celebrate ten years of puzzling. Our inaugural edition was uploaded on May 9, 2014. This tenth-anniversary edition is now uploaded, on May 9, 2024. So, it’s our tenth anniversary! 

Note #2: Our friend Word Woman generously helped me launch our Puzzleria! blog, using Blogger. In 2013 she had launched her own excellent blog: Partial Ellipsis of the Sun: A Blog for Scientists who like Words and Writers who like Science. We thank her!

Schpuzzle of the Week:

The Renaissance sans remainders

Describe, in three words totaling twenty-two letters, a multihued Christian rood in a centuries-old elaborately ornamental artistic style. 

The alphanumeric values of all twenty-two letters are exactly divisible by one number greater than one. 

What is this three-word description?

Appetizer Menu

Jeff’s TerRiffic Appetizer:

A Zarkinesque sextet of sticklers 

Shipshake-up

1.🚢Rearrange the letters of  a word describing where one might be on a ship.

The result will be a word describing where one might be heading.

Virtue-al de-vices?

2. 🕮Many of the devices we take for granted today would have struck our parents as unbelievable. Rearrange the letters in a synonym for unbelievable to get the name of a current publication dedicated to certain modern devices.

“Saudi Babarabia?”

3. 🐘Some countries are known today by names other than their historic names. 

Use only the letters of a former country name (repeat letters are permitted) to write the name of a beloved children’s book character…

“Chemystery?”

4. 🧪A famous entertainer’s name can be spelled using only the symbols for chemical
elements. 

Who is the entertainer, and what are the elements?

“Scientystery?”

5.❓A famous scientist’s  name can be spelled using only the symbols for chemical elements.

Who is the scientist, and what are the elements?

Strunk and White’s

Elements of “Still?”

6.🍾Name a beverage brand, whose name
can be spelled using only chemical element symbols.

MENU

Midwest Northeast Hors d’Oeuvre:

An actress and an artist

The lives of two 20th-Century pop culture icons – an actress from the Midwest and an artist from the Northeast – overlapped eleven years. 

Their surnames are anagrams of one other. 

Who are this actress and artist?

Colossal Creatures Slice:

No bats, cats, rats or gnats need apply

Remove one letter from the name of a large creature to spell what you may hear from another large creature. 

What are this creature and these sounds?

Riffing Off Shortz And Bricker Slices:

Ballet, mallet, wallet, pallet

Will Shortz’s May 5th NPR Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle, created by listener Jim Bricker of Wayland, Massachusetts, reads:

Think of three common six-letter words that
have vowels in the second and fifth positions. The last five letters of the words are the same. Only the first letters differ. And none of the words rhyme with either of the others. What words are they?

Puzzleria!s Riffing Off Shortz And Bricker Slices read:

ENTREE #1

Name a two-word term for something that intoxicates. Take also a rim-missing basketball shot, in five letters, that is thrown up by a person perhaps under the influence of this intoxicant. Take also a four-letter adjective that might describe that rim-missing shot. 

This adjective also describes a piano player in a classic cult movie who is under the influence of the two-word intoxicant.

Rearrange these combined letters to name a puzzle-maker and his hometown.

What are this two-word term, rim-missing shot and adjective?

Who is the puzzle-maker? 

What is his hometown? 

Note: Entrees #2 through #7 were created and contributed by our friend Nodd, whose “Nodd ready for prime time” is a recurring feature on Puzzleria! Entree #8 is the brainchild of our friend Plantsmith, whose “Garden of Puzzley Delights” is also a Puzzleria! mainstay.

ENTREE #2

Think of three common five-letter words that have vowels in the second and fourth positions. 

The last four letters of the words are the same.
None of the three words rhymes with either of the others. 

What words are they? (Hint: One of the words also has a vowel in the first position.)

ENTREE #3

Think of three common four-letter words that have vowels in the second and fourth positions. The last three letters of the words are the same. None of the words rhymes with either of the others. What words are they?

ENTREE #4

Think of three common five-letter words that have vowels in the second and fifth positions. The last four letters of the words are the same.
None of the words rhymes with either of the others. What words are they?  (Hint: One of the words is used more abroad than in the U.S.)

ENTREE #5

Think of three common four-letter words that have a vowel in the second position. 

The last three letters of the words are the same. 

None of the words rhymes with either of the others. What words are they?  (Hint: One of the words is more poetic than prosaic.  Some dictionaries give two pronunciations for that word. At least one of these doesn’t rhyme with either of the other two words.)

ENTREE #6

Think of four common five-letter words that have vowels in the second and third positions.

The last four letters of the words are the same.
None of the words rhymes with any of the others. What words are they?

ENTREE #7

Think of three common four-letter words that have vowels in the second and third positions. 

The last three letters of the words are the
same. 

None of the words rhymes with either of the others. 

What words are they?

ENTREE #8

The last three letters of three four-letter words are identical and in the same order. However, they are pronounced differently.

The initial letters of these words might be found on a cake recipe or on an oil container you might pull out of your trunk when your “check oil light” lights up.

What are these three words?

ENTREE #9

Name an adjective for an elephant in comparison to a mouse, a boring tool, and a gore-causing tool – all in five letters, and ending with the same four letters. They are pronounced differently. Their first letters in order spell the name of a Shakespearean character who is a wayward youth who enjoys the society of petty criminals and wastrels... but who is also heir to the throne!

What are these three words? 

Who is the Shakespearean character? 

ENTREE #10 

“Every ______, my father-in-law (just as he does every Thanksgiving) pulls the holiday turkey out of the oven, then pulls out his ______ and douses the bird with juices from the bottom of the pan. (My  father-in-law fancies himself to be a ______ chef!”)

The three missing six-letter words, which do not rhyme, each end with the same five letters, in the same order. These five letters spell a “starry” flower. What are these missing words?

ENTREE #11

“Our pet puppy _____’_ not happy. 

The ______ we hired pull up to our curbside, roll out their dollies, and begin two-wheeling our furniture into their semi-truck. 

Our forlorn pup, keeping watch from our boulevard,  ______ his eyes with his paws while whining and whimpering. 

It may take some time, but we hope and pray he will get ____ it!”

The three missing six-letter words, which do not rhyme, each end with the same five letters, in the same order. These three words begin with three different consonants. The missing penultimate word in the sad narrative above consists of the four middle letters from any of the three previous missing six-letter words. 

What are these four missing words that belong in the blanks?

ENTREE #12

The ______ pictured here is ______ Spice, giving us a two-______ salute that resembles the letter V. 

Those three missing six-letter words end with the same five letters, but do not rhyme. Those five letters spell the first name of a Swedish actress and singer who is not related to – but who has the same surname as – a talented American singer songwriter of the past named Harry.

What are the three missing words?

Who is the Swedish actress/singer? 

ENTREE #13

1. Name a five-letter word that might precede the word “management.”

2. Add a consonant to the beginning to form a six-letter word preceded by the word “Lone.” 

3. Add a vowel to the beginning of that six-letter word to form a seven-letter word (not recognized in most dictionaries) that describes a carrot compared to a cucumber. 

4. Insert a hyphen near the end of that seven-letter word to spell a monoazo acid dye. 

5. Add two consonants to the beginning of the six-letter word to form an eight-letter word associated with Albert Camus.

6. Add a vowel and consonant to the beginning of the six-letter word to form an eight-letter word that, when preceded by the word “Loan,” might describe your financial consultant. 

7. Add the final four letters in a ten-letter synonym of “spurious” to the beginning of the five-letter word to form a nine-letter marsupial mammal of Australia or New Guinea that is chiefly arboreal and nocturnal, and that has a well-developed prehensile tail, large and strong claws and a slow, deliberate way of moving.

So, to recap:

* All seven words end with the same five letters.

* Words #2, #5 and #6 rhyme.

* Words #1, #3, #4 and #7 do not rhyme.

What are these seven words?

Dessert Menu

“Shakespeare Schmakespeare” Dessert:

The greatest sonnet ever penned!

Who is the world’s best sonneteer?

Consensus says it’s Will Shakespeare...

True, the Bard quilled scores of superlative sonnets. But the greatest sonnet ever written was penned by a 20th-Century American. It is reprinted in blue, below.

What is the four-word title of the sonnet (in 10, 8, 3 and 8 letters)?

Who penned the sonnet?

Why is it “the greatest sonnet ever penned?”

??????????  ????????  ???  ???????? 

A hard, howling, tossing water scene.

Strong tide was washing hero clean.

“How cold!” Weather stings as in anger.

O Silent night shows war ace danger!

    The cold waters swashing on in rage.

    Redcoats warn slow his hint engage.

    When star general’s action wish’d “Go!”

    He saw his ragged continentals row.

Ah, he stands – sailor crew went going.

And so this general watches rowing.

He hastens – winter again grows cold.

A wet crew gain Hessian stronghold.

    George can’t lose war with’s hands in;

    He's astern – so go alight, crew, and win!

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.