“A puzzlist walks & runs into a bar” Who pinned the y on the donkey? Dirty urchins and rabble-rousers; Peanuts, Plains and Pisces; “Significance of six synonyms” Bobby’s “Just in Time” for “Auld Lang Syne!”

PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER 5πe² SERVED

Schpuzzle of the Week:

“Significance of six synonyms”

Find synonyms of “each,” “duster,” “tilt,” “diamonds,” “topper” and “debt.” 

All are three-letter synonyms, except for the four-letter synonym of “tilt.”

With what longer word are these six synonyms associated? 

Hint: The order in which the six words appear is significant, as is the order of their corresponding synonyms.

Appetizer Menu

 maiN Puzzle couRse Appetizer:

“A puzzlist walks and runs into a bar”

(Note: This week’s “Puzzle Fun” Appetizer comes to you courtesy of Bobby Jacobs, who created “The Puzzle Challenge” on National Public Radio’s current Weekend Edition Sunday program.)

Take the name of a famous puzzlist. 

Rearrange the letters of this name to form two new words: 

~ 🏃a verb meaning “to run” and 

~ 👣 a verb meaning “to walk.” 

What are these verbs?

Who is this puzzlist?

MENU

“Foxy fishy” Hors d’Oeuvre

“Who pinned the y on the donkey?”

If you tack a “y” onto the end of certain game animals, you can form an adjective like, for example, “goosey” or “foxy” or “fishy.” 

Change the first letter of such an animal to the letter two places earlier in the alphabet. 

If you tack a “y” onto the end the result is not an adjective but a popular game. 

What is this animal. 

What is the game?

Centenarian Slice:

Peanuts, Plains and Pisces

Consider the fishing venue and pieces of fishing equipment possibly employed by the master angler pictured here:

🐟 a “moveable potential feast of just-waitin’-to-be-caught fish” that is an anagram of a synonym of “expert” (six letters);

🐠 a container with a screwable cap within which an angler might keep worms squirming
in dirt or other bait (1 letter, 3 letters); and either:

🐟 Either someplace to keep caught fish (5 letters),
or

🐠 a piece of fishing equipment, preceded by a letter of the alphabet that is a homophone of a place where, according to an idiom, “there are plenty of fish.” (1 letter, 4 letters) 

Rearrange these 15 letters to spell the formal name of the master angler in the images pictured here.

What is the name of this master angler? What are the “moveable potential feast of just-waitin’-to-be-caught fish” and the synonym of “expert”?

What are the container with a screwable cap within which an angler might keep worms squirming in dirt or other bait?

Where are the “someplace to keep caught fish,” the piece of fishing equipment, and the place where “there are plenty of fish?”

Hint: The “something with a screwable cap” (1, 3), sans the space, is an adjective that means “slightly open.” 

Riffing Off Shortz And Jacobs Entrees:

Bobby’s Just in Time for Auld Lang Syne!

Will Shortz’s December 29th Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle, created by Bobby Jacobs of Richmond, Virginia, reads:

Think of a famous singer – first and last names. Use all of the first name, plus the first three letters and the last letter of the last  name. The result, reading left to right, will spell a phrase meaning “punctual.” What singer is this?

Puzzleria!s Riffing Off Shortz And Jacobs Entrees read:

ENTREE #1

At the end of the meal, the restaurant wait-staff-person clears the table: a kernel-less ear
(7 letters) and half-eaten piece of toast slathered with a raspberry condiment (3 letters) upon a plate (4 letters).

Rearrange those 14 letters to spell the surname of a puzzle-maker and his hometown.

Now take the home state and hometown of a puzzle-maker. Rearrange the combined letters to spell:

* the first name of a sitarist,

* a biblical figure who was a “Cush-son,” and

* a “Book of Changes.”

What are the surname of the puzzle-maker and his hometown?

What are the hometown and home state if the puzzle-maker, the sitarist, biblical figure and “Book of Changes?”

Note: Entrees #2 through #7 are the handiwork of Nodd, creator of “Nodd ready for prime time” on Puzzleria!

ENTREE 2

Think of three famous musicians. 

Their three last names bear a “heavenly”
connection with one another. 

Who are these three  musicians?

ENTREE 3

Think of two well-known musicians who have the same last name. 

Their first names name a mammal and an aquatic creature. 

Who are the musicians?

What are the mammal and the aquatic creature?

ENTREE 4

Think of two famous musicians. 

The first one is known for folk music, while the second works in a wide variety of genres. 

The last name of the first musician is the first name of the second one. 

Who are these musicians?

ENTREE 5

Take the first and last names of a famous pop-rock singer. 

Use four letters from their first name and four
letters from their last name to spell the last name of an even more famous musician. 

Who are these two musicians? 

ENTREE 6

Think of a famous rock musician of the past -- first and last names. 

Together, the names spell a two-word phrase describing a person who is an avid home cook around this time of year.  

(Hint: The rock musician had the same first name as another famous musician of the past, who appeared in numerous films.) 

What is the two-word descriptive phrase, and who are the two musicians?

ENTREE 7

Think of two well-known musicians with the same first name.

Their first names anagram to a well-known
clothing brand. 

Who are the musicians, and what is the clothing brand?

Note: Entree #8 is the handiwork of Plantsmith, creator of “Garden of Puzzley Delights” on Puzzleria!

ENTREE #8

Take a popular singer’s name, first and last. 

Place an apostrophe and “s” at the end of the first name, followed by a synonym of “forever,” followed by the last name.

The result, read from left to right, sounds like a tribute to the singer’s punctuality.

Who is this singer?

What is the synonym of “forever?”

What is the tribute to the singer’s punctuality?

ENTREE #9

Think of a writer, first and last names, whose essays and commentaries on global issues have appeared in the New York Times, the Atlantic and on National Public Radio’s “Fresh Air.” 

Remove three consecutive letters from the first name and one letter from the surname that, together, spell a pet food brand. Remove the space. The result is a synonym of self-control or self-discipline.

What writer is this?

What is the pet food brand?

ENTREE #10

Think of a current member of the Michigan House of Representatives – first and last names. He is probably not a cigarette-smoker. For the purposes of this puzzle, however, let ’spretend that he is. 

A concerned colleague may ask him, “Do you think your smoking is a compulsion?” 

The representative’s reply may consist of eight of the nine letters in his name, in order – in words of two, one and five letters.

Who is this representative? 

What is his reply?

ENTREE #11

Take the 12 letters in the first and last names of an English explorer, writer, photographer and naturalist who was also the first woman to be elected as a “fellow” of the Royal Geographical Society. 

Divide these dozen letters, in order, into words of two, one, four, one and four letters to form what appears to be a peculiar question – one that contains two nouns that make noise. 

One reply to that question might be, “Well, no, but they sure sound an awful lot alike sometimes .”

Who is this explorer?

What is the peculiar question?

ENTREE #12

Think of a Dutch professional footballer (soccer player) who plays forward on the Dutch Club Utrecht. 

During an intermission in a match versus Sparta Rotterdam, this forward  “carbo-loads” –  replenishing his glycogen stores by
snacking on a Hostess product. 

His teammate, American midfielder Taylor Booth, asks him, “Is that a Ding Dong?” 

The Dutch forward’s response consists of, in order, seven of the eight letters in his name, in three words of 2, 1 and 4 letters.

Who is this footballer?

What is his reply to Taylor Booth? 

Dessert Menu

Multisyllabic Dessert:

Dirty urchins and rabble-rousers

Take a multisyllabic word for certain dirty urchins. 

Switch its first and fifth letters. Capitalize four consecutive letters of the result. 

Insert an “a” someplace and a space someplace else. 

The result is a word that describes some 21st-century mob participants intent on overturning. 

Who are these urchins and mob participants?

Hint 1: The word for the mob participants is a tad more multisyllabic than the word for the urchins.

Hint 2: The urchins, historically, were associated with Thanksgiving and Halloween.

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.