Thursday, June 04, 2009

NPR Sunday Puzzle (May 31): Indian Wrestle Anagram

NPR Sunday Puzzle (May 31): Indian Wrestle Anagram:
Q: Take 'Indian wrestle,' rearrange the 13 letters to get three words that are all related. What are they? Hint: The word lengths are five, four and four letters, respectively.
We'll have to see whether or not people can restrain themselves from giving obvious clues. Personally, I don't have time to provide a good clue because I'm off to Chicago for a couple weeks and haven't finished packing. P.S. If anyone is thinking of a certain common phrase, the puzzle answer would be misquoting it.

Edit: A few clues above: whether = weather, Chicago = the "windy" city. And if you were thinking of the phrase associated with the postal service, you might want to read the comments below... it only has one of the words.
A: SLEET, WIND, RAIN
Posted by Blaine at 8:32 PM
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46 comments:

  1. Here's my standard reminder... don't post the answer or any outright spoilers before the deadline of Thursday at 3pm ET. If you know the answer, click the link and submit it to NPR, but don't give it away here. Thank you.
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  2. Several of the hints our group posted for a recent puzzle might apply this week as well.
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  3. This is my first posting here--I love the warmth and intellect of this community. Exactly the type of people with whom I would like to check out some good music--maybe elemental R&B bands.
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  4. There were only 'about 300' entries for last week's Galileo Galilei puzzle.
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  5. I'm not sure whether many folks will get this, they'll have to persevere through...
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  6. What a lot of words to pore over!

    Qu1dd1tch, obviously a sports fan, did Harry ever play a team from the Firth of Tay?
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  7. I wonder if this would apply to email?
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  9. Since many brothers and sisters here had a hard time containing some rather "aggressive" clues for the Galileo Puzzle, here is a new possibility.

    We can keep clues for today's NPR puzzle rather subtle, but add a second puzzle here which people should feel free to clue as obviously as they desire.

    Since it's my idea, I'll start us off.

    I'm thinking of a US State. It starts with the letter "U" and is in the West. It's full of Mormons, yet it rhymes with the Spanish word for prostitute.

    Anyone else have any clues to offer?

    -- Other Ben
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  10. Other Ben -
    If I'm correct on the 'U' state, I think it has several canyons, but none of them grand.
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  11. Ben I feel Big Love toward your western state.
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  12. Obviously, we should take Ben's puzzle with more than a grain of salt.
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  13. Three weeks ago I proposed the following puzzle. Only Ben showed any interest (the rest of us were preoccupied with 14 = ?), and so far, no correct answers. So, here it is again, this time with a hint:

    "Last year at this time I was on vacation in a small seaside town in Italy. This year I traveled to the Pacific NW and BC and again stayed in a small seaside town. The name of this year's town is obtained from last year's by dropping the first three letters. Where was I?"

    Hint: Both towns contain a destination hotel.
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  14. Lorenzo, I'm going to give your puzzle a shot. I saw your original posting but didn't work on it.

    As for this week's puzzle, figuring it out shouldn't be so hard that it will leave you breathless.
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  15. Having lived in Pennsylvania helped
    this week. Answer submitted
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  16. Lorenzo-I have the answer to your resort towns...am I allowed to divulge the answer here??
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  17. Cookieface, how about a clever hint that shows you know the answer but that doesn't give it away yet?
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  18. Most of the equines’ reins Ms Inez Milholland gently wound around her fingers as she rode ... she did so during a passel of sunshiny parades. However, the Comstock laws, laws she and no woman whatsoever legislated, ... the Comstock laws against which she rode in such parades came outta a Congress, one in which Ms Milholland and my mama and my grandmamas had had absolutely noooo representation whatsoever, ... the Comstock laws demanded that she and ALL women AND ALL men could not.could not.could not before 1936, send birth control information through the United States Postal Service without fear of arrest and imprisonment for having fomented such an immoral storm by doing so.
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  19. This week's puzzle seems as hard as last. I wonder if more than 300 will trumpet in.
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  20. Cookieface, by the way, have you been to either of these places?
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  21. Hugh:

    My sources at the Scotch Whisky Drinking Apprecaition Society inform me that Harry did indeed play a team from the Firth of Tay. Apparently, owing to the weather not exactly being clement, he had the Aeolus knocked out of him!
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  22. I think I have the right answer, but with thousands of possible anagrams it's hard to know weather or not mine is the best. These aren't related, but do tell good stories:

    dine, wiles, rant - a progression of a bad date
    risen, want deli - a typical morning state
    twins need lira - euro-backpacker conundrum
    idle wine rants - pinot vs merlot
    nerd waist line - too much jolt and oreos
    alien rids newt - amphibian stowaways on the saucer
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  23. Other Ben, Ogden Nash wrote a poem about a senator from the state in 1931. I suppose your rhyme for the state is something up with which the good senator would not put.
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  24. Am blown away that anyone would fall for this week's clues. Found an interesting puzzle site that doesn't have the same wit and wisdom as this one, although there is a Natasha on it...http://www.crosswordmanblog.com/
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  25. Lorenzo--I have no great thoughts or clues on your puzzle so I may just go out the door, take a walk, and try to think of what the answer might be(that's how I do my finest thinking).
    No, I have not been to these places altho I have been to Italy.
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  26. Cookieface, nice hints! Clearly you know the answer. We'll give Dave and others a few more days.
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  27. Lorenzo, it took me about thirty seconds to get the answer. Just think about a small town in British Columbia, por exemplo.
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  28. Dave, that was qwick! Splendid!
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  29. Cookieface, nice hint. I didn't catch it the first time that I read it. Lorenzo, thanks for submitting the puzzle. I thought of one in the middle of the night, but I forgot it. I'll post it as soon as I remember it.
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  30. radiohead00725, Of course this week's
    puzzle would apply to e-mail but probably not so much as would an earthquake.
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  31. Lorenzo, Cookieface's and Dave's clues along with Google Maps gave me the needed portion of of the Italian name.
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  32. Just looked up "Blainesville" and "Blainesville puzzles" on

    www.bing.com

    No opinion yet
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  33. I thought I had it and submitted but reading Geri's post now has me wondering........
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  34. Oof, that took me some time.

    Dave, Lorenzo, and Curtis, your clues seem to point in the same direction, but I think they got me adrift a bit. On the other hand, I may or may not have interpreted the signs correctly.

    Wolftone, I gush at the cornucopia of different possibilities you have come up with. It goes to show it really can turn out one way or another. I can see that posting was made with intent.
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  35. wolfgang - I'm glad you noticed that I misspelled "whether" intentionally as a clue. I've been feeling dirty about that all week.

    Now that the deadline has passed, can we openly state the answer? I had a few candidates and picked the one I thought was most relevant, but I can't say I'm entirely happy with the result.

    Here is my runner-up which might work but isn't as good as my preferred answer:

    salt wine diner
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  36. All:

    What is W S's purpose with "word lengths are five, four and four letters, respectively?" ... the "respectively" part?

    Did Mr S want the three words submitted in a specific five - four - four format?

    Cuuuuz ... re the w and the r words, which to submit before or after the other one?

    Blue
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  37. I was wondering about the 5-4-4 word length clause too. It implied a definite order of words. Since this week's on-air challenge was a "Before and After" quiz, I thought WS was going for a similar concept with the "Indian Wrestle" puzzle. I tried to find three words to make a before-and-after series, but I could not do it. So I submitted the answer everyone else here submitted, which does not seem to depend on any order.
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  38. I didn't pay any attention to the order. Now that the deadline has passed, did everybody submit rain, wind, sleet?

    Wolfgang, Lorenzo submitted an additional puzzle on the blog and Cookieface, Hugh and I dropped some hints. Sorry if you thought that those hints were for Will's puzzle.

    By the way, we welcome submission of more puzzles if you can come up with some.
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  39. equines' reins = Pony Express mail, rains

    wound = past tense of verb: to wind

    laws = Laws of Nature

    sunshiny, storm = weather – related

    1936 = THE worst, recorded, 20th Century, Iowa winter

    United States Postal Service = USPS mail

    to foment = to cause turbulence, tempestuousness, a whipping up of

    mail = "neither sleet nor wind nor rain" re the "appointed rounds"
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  40. Will might have wanted that order from "appointed rounds" stated by Blue.
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  41. I did sleet first to get the 5-4-4 order. Not sure it matters.
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  42. The full quote is, "Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds". The saying is derived from Herodotus' Histories referring to the ancient courier service of the Persian Empire and is an inscription on the James Farley Post Office in New York City.

    P.S. There's no mention of sleet or wind, nonetheless, I believe the answer to the puzzle is Sleet, Wind and Rain (in any order).
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  43. I submitted "RAIN SLEET WIND," i.e., in alphabetical order.

    Wolftone's "salt wine diner" answer goes to show it really didn't have to come down to just this supposedly "correct" answer.

    I got the "blown away" and "breathless" hints, but I also noticed the mentions of "restrain" and "contain" for one and "no opinion," "wondering," and "not sure" for another. (Am I getting WS's and Lorenzo's puzzles mixed up again?)

    NPR still didn't call me }:[
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  44. My "breathless" clue was a reference to Jerry Lee Lewis' song, "Breathless." One line is, "Rain, wind, sleet of snow, I'm gonna getcha wherever you go."
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  45. Rain, wind, and sleet got "around 1200
    correct answers."

    There should be NO QUESTION about the
    FAME of this week's celebrity.
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  46. Geri, I'm sure you're right but I bet there will BE!
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