Picking palms and tea leaves; Nation-building with metal infrastructure; Clothe a rising star and put him in your pocket...; Captions Outrageous;

PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER (876 + 54) SERVED

Welcome to our November 3rd edition of Joseph Young’s Puzzleria!

We are making up this week for last week’s dearth of Riffing-Off-Shortz Slices... “dearth,” as in “ZERO!” So, prepare yourselves for Puzzleria!’s “Greatest-Number-of-Riff-Offs Show on Earth”! Our Riffing-Off Shortz Slice features three sections of seven, nine and two puzzles, for a total of 18!

Also on our menus this week are:

⇓ One Appetizer that smacks of Magic 8-Balls;

⇓ One “stellar-fashion-statement” Slice; and

⇓ One Dessert that might leave the taste of rebus in your craw... or cranium.

Test your mettle as you taste all 21 of our puzzles. And, please enjoy.

Appetizer Menu

Kindly Calm Us And De-qualm Us Nostrodamus Appetizer:

Picking palms and tea leaves

Add a space within a word for a professional person whose job it is to predict outcomes of future events. 

Interchange the two letters after the space and capitalize one of them. The result resembles a two-word phrase for what a patron of the person’s services might become if the person does a good job.

What are the word for this professional person and the two-word phrase?

MENU

Easy As Piece Of Cake Slice:

Clothe a rising star and put him in your pocket...

A longtime American clothier has been known for a particular item of clothing that has been popularly known by its founder’s name. A rising star wore that item of clothing in a movie that inspired multitudes of teens to buy it. 

The manufacturer for a time even officially named the item after the star, although the item was still widely known by its more popular historical name.

What is this popular historical name? By what name was the star known? What interesting thing do these names have in common?

Riffing Off Shortz Slices:

Nation-building with metal infrastructure 

Will Shortz’s October 29th NPR Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle reads:

This week’s challenge sounds easy, but it's a little tricky. Name a well-known nationality. Drop a letter, and the remaining letters in order will name a metal — one of the elements on the periodic table. What is it?

Puzzleria’s! Riffing Off Shortz Slices read:

ONE:

This riff-off of Will’s challenge sounds easy, and it is. Name the following seven well-known nationalities, in which you: 

1. Drop a letter, and the remaining letters in order will name a part of the body.

2. Drop an ancient Roman 51 and the remaining letters in order will name a “Spice.”

3. Drop the first name of a TV sitcom sewer worker or talking horse and the remaining letters in order will name a sound often heard on the hardwood when the shot is good.

4. Drop a letter, and the remaining letters in order will name a book where one can read the words of the archangel Gabriel.

5. Drop a letter, and the remaining letters in order will name a synonym for nerd.

6. Replace the title of a long-runng TV drama with a hyphen, and the remaining letters in order will name one of the foes of “Machine Gun” Kelly.

7. Drop a place where once there was no room (thereby prompting an al fresco Nativity) and the remaining letters in order will name a creature that possesses a body part spelled out by the first three letters of the original nationality.

TWO:

This second riff-off challenge sounds difficult, but if you solve one of its seven parts, the other six will topple easily, like dominoes. 

1. Some members of Congress want to repeal Obamacare; others want to protect it. Drop a letter from the 13 letters in REPEAL and PROTECT  and the remaining letters in reverse order might (depending on how you removed a letter) name a metal — one of the elements on the periodic table. What is it?

2. The three men Don McLean admires most might be described as the Eternal Trio. Drop a letter from the words ETERNAL TRIO, and the remaining letters can be arranged to name a metal — one of the elements on the periodic table. What is it?

3. A litter of kittens or puppies is pretty neat. But litter strewn about the countryside or on city streets is not at all neat. Drop a letter from the words LITTER and NEAT, and the remaining letters can be arranged to name a metal — one of the elements on the periodic table. What is it?

4. Langston, a landlord in London, once leased one of his flats to a meter maid named Rita. She was the most comely bird to whom he had ever leased a flat; in other words, Rita was his ________ ______, a superlative adjective and noun of nine and six letters. Drop one letter from those two words, and the remaining letters can be arranged to name a metal — one of the elements on the periodic table. What is it?

5. “Fake news” is trending lately in the... well, in the news. A synonym of “fake news” might be “untrue material.” Drop a letter from the words UNTRUE MATERIAL, and the remaining letters can be arranged to name a metal — one of the elements on the periodic table. What is it?

6. The U.S. Treasury and U.S. Mint have long been circulting coins of various denominations (the Mercury head dime, for instance) that are made from various metals from the periodic table: including gold, silver, copper, nickel, zinc, iron, lead and manganese.Thus, one might say the U.S. Treasury and U.S. Mint circulate metal. Drop a letter from the words CIRCULATE METAL, and the remaining letters can be arranged to name a metal that is not used in minting coins — yet still is one of the elements on the periodic table. What is it?

7. In the video shown here, a cow doing a ballet dance totters, then falls. Drop two letters from the words BALLET COW TOTTERS, and the remaining letters can be arranged to name a metal — one of the elements on the periodic table. What is it?

8. Will Shakespeare’s Hamlet claims that, although he knows “a hawk from a handsaw” when the wind is southerly, he is otherwise a bit shaky in his mental perceptions. Shakespeare explores such themes of madness also in “Macbeth,” “King Lear,” and other tragedies. More recent authors have also mined dementia as “thematic gold”: Jean-Paul Sartre in “The Room,” Joseph Heller in “Catch-22,” Kurt Vonnegut in “Slaughterhouse-Five,” and Ken Kesey in “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest,” for example.  One might call such works “mad literature.” 

Drop a letter from the words MAD LITERATURE, and the remaining letters can be arranged to name a metal — one of the elements on the periodic table. 

What is it?

9. Mr. Bringhome D. Bacon and Ms. Quite A. Tomato are wed, but after a few months the expiration date on their wedded bliss comes due. Sure, Mr. Bacon brings home plenty of bread, more than enough to maintain the lifestyle to which Ms. Bacon-Tomato had become accustomed. Still, some vital ingredient is missing, and all the Mayo in Minnesota cannot keep their their till-mold-do-us-slice sandwich from becoming unglued. So they divorce. 

A year passes. Mr. Bacon eventually figures out what the missing ingredient was. He visits Ms. Tomato and re-proposes punnily using two simple words of seven letters each. 

Drop a letter from these 14 letters, and the remaining letters can be arranged to name a metal — one of the elements on the periodic table. What is it?

THREE:

This third riff-off challenge sounds easy, but it’s a little tricky. 

1. Name a well-known nationality ending with and N. Change the N to a different consonant. Drop a letter from this result, and the remaining letters in order will name a metal — one of the elements on the periodic table. What are this nationality and this metal?

2. Name a not-so-well-known island nation. Place a one-letter word to the left of it to form what would make a good two-word title for its national anthem (although the nation’s actual national anthem bears a different, longer title). Remove the space between words and drop a letter. The remaining letters in order (if you change the initial letter) will name a continent that is not one of the elements on the periodic table. What are this island nation, bogus two-word national anthem title and continent?

Dessert Menu

Playing Chinese Whispers (AKA Telephone) With Pictures Dessert:

Captions Outrageous

Write a caption for the first image pictured here, the one labeled #1 in blue. 

The caption contains two words of 2 and 5 letters.

Rearrange the letters in that first caption  to form a different caption for the second image pictured here, the one labeled #2 in blue. This caption contains two words of 3 and 4 letters.

Write a second, different caption for the second image pictured here, the one labeled #2 in blue. This caption has the same second word as the first #2 caption, but the first word this time contains 6, not 3, letters.

Finally, rearrange the ten letters in that longer caption  to form a caption for the third image pictured here, the one labeled #3 in blue. This caption contains three words of 1, 4 and 5 letters.

What are these four captions? 

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.

An idyll in the park; Duodrama; Security’s familiar ring

PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER (876 + 54) SERVED

Welcome to our October 27th edition of Joseph Young’s Puzzleria!

On our menus this week are:
⇓ One “duodramatic” Appetizer,
⇓ One  “ericarchitectural” Slice, and
⇓ One “anagrammatic” Dessert.

Please enjoy.

Appetizer Menu

Oscarina Appetizer:
Duodrama

Name an Oscar-nominated actress. 
Move the last letter of her last name to its beginning, and remove the last letter of her first name. 

The result is a two-word hit song title by a musical duo.

What is this song title, and who is this actress?

MENU

Eric Architect Slice:
Security’s familiar ring

Eric Cathcote, an architect who is also an inventor and entrepreneur, invents a keyless titanium-deadbolt security system for residences in which doors and windows can be opened only by using a patented smart phone app accessible via a personalized passcode. 













Eric begins a house-building business and also begins building his brand. He creates advertising that touts and guarantees the integrity and security of all doors and windows of his patented safeguarded houses.
Eric’s business/brand name features a hyphenated modifier and a noun which together total 13 letters. When the brand is spoken aloud it has a familiar ring... a ring that might just be generated by foiled, frustrated and thwarted would-be burglars at the front doorbell!
What is the name of Eric’s business and brand?

Dessert Menu

Anagrammatic Dessert
An idyll in the park

Name two words that are anagrams of one another. 
Place a shorter word after one of the anagrams to form a two-word feature of one of the United States’ 417 national parks that seldom sits idle during daytime hours.
Remove an “h” from the shorter word and rearrage what remains to form a new word. Place it after the other anagram to form a two-word term for something that often idles when it is parked and which was once associated with a Parker.
What is the two-word feature of the national park?
What often idles when it is parked?



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.

Anatomy leads to antonymy; Translating algebra into English; Climate change of place; Men of (somewhat different) letters

PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER (876 + 54) SERVED

Welcome to our October 20th edition of Joseph Young’s Puzzleria!

We feature this week a ⇓⇓⇓⇓ four-part Riffing Off Shortz Slice. It asks the solver to shift some numbers around to equalize inequalities, then to translate numerical equations into English poetry.

Also on our menus are:

⇓ One anatomical Appetizer,

⇓ One  Best Seller Slice, and

⇓ One world map Dessert.

Please enjoy.

Appetizer Menu

Body Language Appetizer:

Anatomy leads to antonymy 

Place the names of two body parts, singular and plural, next to each other without a space. Inserting spaces in two different places results in three consecutive new words. The first and third new words are antonyms of one another. The second new word names what one of the body parts allows you to do. What are these body parts?

MENU

Best Seller Slice:

Men of (somewhat different) letters

Remove some consecutive letters from the full name (as it appears on dust jackets) of a best-selling author to form the full name (as it appears on dust jackets) of another best-selling author who has published about four times as many books as the first author, and in a different genre. Who are these authors?

Riffing Off Shortz And Guido Slices:

Translating algebra into English 

Will Shortz’s October 1st NPR Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle, created by Zack Guido, reads: 

Write down the equation 65 – 43 = 21. You’ll notice that this is not correct. 65 minus 43 equals 22, not 21. The object is to move exactly two of the digits to create a correct equation. There is no trick in the puzzle’s wording. In the answer, the minus and equal signs do not move.

Puzzleria’s! Riffing Off Shortz Slices read:

ONE:

Write down the equation 65 – 43 = 210. You’ll notice that this is not correct. 65 minus 43 equals 22, not 210. The object is to move exactly two of the digits to create a correct equation. 

There is no trick in the puzzle’s wording. In the answer, the minus and equal signs do not move. 

TWO:

Write down the equation 65 = 43 – 210. You’ll notice that this is not correct. The object is to delete exactly one digit and move exactly two of the remaining six digits to create a correct equation. There is no trick in the puzzle’s wording. In the answer, the minus and equal signs do not move.

THREE:

Translate the following equation into an English quatrain. The first and third lines are written in iambic tetrameter. The second and fourth lines are written in iambic trimeter with dangling unstressed syllables at their ends.

(13 + 20)  +  (30 + 4³)  =  97

    11

Here is an outline of what the quatrain will look like:

A _____’_  _____  ____  _  _____ 
Divided  __  ______
Plus  ______  ____  ___  ____  __  ____
Will  _____  ______-_____.

FOUR:

Translate the following equation into an English quatrain in iambic heptameter. 

($100)(12) – [($0.10)(7,000) + ($0.25)(1,200)  + ($0.05)(x)] = 0

The first couplet of the quatrain consists of two declarative sentences, each ending with a period. The second couplet of the quatrain includes a colon and a comma, in that order, and ends with a question mark.

The verse contains 45 words. 

Its first line contains 11 words, one of them a contraction; The second line contains 12 words; The third line contains 11 words; The fourth line contains 9 words.

There are no hyphenated words in the verse.

The final words of the four lines are, in order, “times,” “bill,”  [a word that rhymes with “times”] and [a word that rhymes with “bill”].

The initial words of the four lines are, in order,
“My,” 
“Per,” 
“This” and “Twelve.” 

Below, in alphabetical order, are 25 of the 35 remaininng (43 – 8) words that appear in the quatrain. The number in parentheses following each word indicates the line in which it appears:

a (1), a (2), and (3), blown (3), break (2), cash (1), crisp (2), dollar (2), each (2), how (4), I (2), in (1), income’s (1), is (3), many (4), me (1), meager (1), month (2), on (3), paid (1), slots (3), sum (3), to (1), vendors (3), year (2);

The remaining 10 words (35 – 25) are evident in the algebraic equation that is to be translated.

Here is an outline of what the quatrain will look like:

My ______  ______’_  ____  __  __  __  ____  _  _____  times

Per ____.  ____  _____  _  _____  _  _____  ___  _______  ______  bill.  

This  ___  __  _____  __  _____  ___  _______:  _____  ________  [“times” rhyme],

Twelve  _______  ________  ____  ___  ____  _______  ______  [“bill” rhyme]?

(Finally, solve for x.)

Dessert Menu

Global Dessert:

Climate change of place

Remove a two-letter abbreviation from a city on the world map, leaving two words in which all five vowels appear exactly once except for “a” (which not appear at all). 

Reverse the positions of the two words, remove the space, replace the “u” with an “a”  and eliminate the “e”. The result, spelled backward, names the climate of this city.

What is this city, and what is its climate?

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.

Much ado, but not about nothing; “Do you serve sausage links at this chain?” Pick-a-nickname basket; Nation-building, one letter at a time; Director’s cut and pastry

PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER (876 + 54) SERVED

Welcome to our October 13th edition of Joseph Young’s Puzzleria!

In this edition of Puzzleria!, we celebrate the opening of the NBA season by shooting a ⇓⇓ pair of hoop-dee-doo Appetizers out to you. 

Also on our menus are:

⇓ One restaurant-chain Slice

⇓ One 20-part Riffing-Off-Shortz Slice, and

⇓ One “pair-of-pastries” puzzle for Dessert.

No need to drain the swamp. (’Tis a Trumpian task.) 

Instead, just step behind the rainbow arc, let your best shots rain down, and drain those threes!

It may just be enjoyable.

Appetizer Menu

Rewriting The Headline Appetizer:

Much ado, but not about nothing

The 2017-18 National Basketball Association season begins this week. 

Almost six years ago a young NBA player came out of nowhere and amazingly led his team to victory in a string of consecutive games. 

The national media, fandom and entire sports world celebrated this scintillating meteoric sensation. Among the headlines were “Thrillin’!” and “Against All Odds!” 

Another headline might have read:

“_ _ _ is really _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _!”

in which the first word is the surname of the sensational player and the final word is a common compound word, but used in an informal sense.

Reverse the order of the letters in the surname and replace the final word with an antonym to form the following factual statement:

“_ _ _ is really _ _ _ _ _ _ _.”

What are this headline and statement? Who is the player?

Hint: Spoonerize the player’s name and you’ll name a legendary town of the Old West and a drink that might be served at a saloon in that town.

National Basketball Appetizer:

Pick-a-nickname basket

Name the full name (city and nickname) of one of the thirty National Basketball Association teams. (For example, the full name of an NFL team might be the Green Bay Packers; of an NHL team, the Pittsburgh Penguins; and of a MLB team, the Boston Red Sox.)

Delete the first four letters of the city. Saying the result aloud sounds like the nicknames of two NBA teams – just the nicknames, not the cities.

What two NBA teams are these?

Hint: These two teams have played more than 100 games in head-to-head competition. Thus far, each has won exactly half of them. 

MENU

Antonymous Slice:

“Do you serve sausage links at this chain?”

Name a restaurant chain based in the United States but with outlets worldwide. Divide it between two of its interior letters. 

The second part sounds like a noun, the adjective form of which is an antonym of the first part of the chain.

What is the restautant chain? What are the antonyms?

Riffing Off Shortz And Stuart Slices:

Nation-building, one letter at a time 

Will Shortz’s October 1st NPR Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle, created by Chris Stuart, reads: 

Take the name of a country. Insert an E somewhere inside it. You’ll get a phrase that answers the question: What did Henry Ford do?

Puzzleria’s! Riffing Off Shortz and Stuart Slice reads:

In each of the 20 puzzles below, insert the letter indicated (in parentheses) somewhere inside the name of a country it to form what is clued:

(The position of the letter in each clue’s answer is indicated by the number in parentheses at the end of the clue. Some countries may be used more than once.)

Example: 
(O) Infatuation with an A. A. Milne character (2 or 3) 

Answer: Roo mania (Romania) 

1. (T) What Henry Ford’s Model T did? (2)

2. (Y) Bad eggs (5)

3. (S) A submarine-wear acronym (1)

4. (N) Jailer (4)

5. (R) A pair of containers (3)

6. (R)  “Take ahold of this!” (2)

7. (R) Painful wrist twist (3)

8. (L) What Ricky Ricardo wants Lucy to do when she messes up (3)

9. (L) Q: “What’s __ ____?” A: “Sodium cocoate, sodium palmate, sodium tallowate, sodium palm kennelate...” (6)

10. (D) Reno or Las Vegas? (1)

11. (E) Baltimore? (3)

12. (I) Hawaii? (3)

13. (I) Opening to a memo meant for a movie character portrayed by Teri Garr (3)

14. (A) Beheld Paradise (2)

15. (S) “The new egg-shaped speaker! (manufactured by a Milwaukee-based corporation)” (3 or 4)

16. (O) Render “Orinoco Flow” singer unconscious in the squared circle (2)

17. (M) Attached “Sistine Madonna” by Raphael to a wall in the Louvre (5)

18. (R) Large supermarket chain in Trinidad and Tobago (2)

19. (S) An hombre “who was a singer, dancer, actor, and musician in Mexico,” according to Wikipedia (6)

20. (L) Surname of Happy, Biff and Willy (1)

Dessert Menu

Cinnamontography Dessert:

Director’s cut and pastry

Name a reasonably well-known actress. 

Move the last letter of her first name to the beginning, forming a pastry. 

Form a different pastry by replacing the fourth letter of her last name with the fourth letter of her first name and adding a letter to the end.

Who is this actress? 

What are the two pastries?

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.