Sunday, June 22, 2014

NPR Sunday Puzzle (Jun 22, 2014): Autopilot Engaged

NPR Sunday Puzzle (Jun 22, 2014): Autopilot Engaged

I'm unable to post the puzzle this week, but I didn't want to leave you without a place to post comments on the puzzle. Somebody help me out by posting a copy here. Then feel free to add your hints.

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.

Q: Think of a 10-letter adjective describing certain institutions. Drop three letters from this word, and the remaining seven letters, reading left to right, will name an institution described by this adjective. What institution is it?
Edit: My hints, in the comments were "luau attire" and "smiling". The letters that are removed are LEI leaving a toothpaste brand.
A: COLLEGIATE - LEI = COLGATE

87 comments:

  1. Think of a 10-letter adjective describing certain institutions. Drop three letters from this word, and the remaining seven letters, reading left to right, will name an institution described by this adjective. What institution is it?

    On an unrelated note, was anyone else disappointed that the largest daily paper in Kentucky wasn't the Louisville Bourbon Journal?

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  2. Yes, I thought surely that would be it! That does not mean I self-medicate too much or does it?

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  3. Will says it's OK to use whatever means necessary to solve the puzzle. If I hadn't used the 'net and some programming this would have taken me more than a week to get to the Eureka moment.

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  4. Either I have the wrong answer or this puzzle has a rather loose connection to answer (e) on many multiple choice tests. Also it might be best to take a cellular approach in solving it.

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    1. There is at least one definitive no-question-about-it answer.

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  5. Is it the wisdom of this board that, by asking us to seek "an institution," Mr. Shortz wishes that we find a particular institution like the James Buchanan Home for the Criminally Inept, or a general institution, like Congress?

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  6. Replies
    1. How about medley?

      Time has Come Today.
      Something from Jersey Boys.
      Last Train to Clarksville.

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    2. Name That Tune.
      Don't ask Moe; that would be cheating.

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    3. Saw Horsefeathers but missed the "Collegiate" song. How do you know this stuff, Paul?

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    4. I kind of knew that. . .Also meant to mention "Brush Up Your Shakespeare" from KMK. Might you translate that to Latin also?

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  7. As indicated at the end of last week's thread, I accidentally came across the answer!

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  8. I figured it out when I was walking my dog. She always flips out when airplanes fly over. Her total freak out screemed, "Institutionalize me."

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  9. Move one letter of the adjective two places to the left to create a press headline for a political scandal involving a certain dog breed.

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    1. I got the same answer as Planned Chaos. (Good clue, by the way.) In fact, my wife and I both got that answer at the same time right after hearing the puzzle. We also both thought, is that really the answer? I might wait to submit my answer, to see if I can think of something else.

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    2. So did I (yes very good clue), but I couldn't believe it was that simple. I like to have to work a bit before the answer appears. We need more viking ships and fewer institutions.

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    3. I can't believe that this could be the right answer. It's gotta be more interesting that just going from the adjectival to the noun form of the same word. Sure, many Tea Party types consider America today to be an unamerican institution, but that's not the right answer, either.

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    4. Got it, Planned Chaos. Clever. And the cite was a good one.

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  10. Puzzles like this are tough for me to give clues for. So award the garland and a sawbuck to PC.

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    1. I am in Bob K's predicament this week, without a clue. Give the garland and sawbuck to Planned Chaos but please, more hints wouldn't hurt.

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  11. The 1st syllable of this institution seems to resonate loudly in some areas these days.

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  12. And jan, I believe will is looking for a specific name of such an institution perhaps requiring removal of some different letters than yours did.

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    1. Snipper, you are right. The same adjective (without 3 letters) yields both a generic and specific institution. I like the specific much better for a couple reasons (even though that was not my original answer).

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    2. Ok, no trivial matter, I have an answer that works. The specific & general parts fit also. But the dog breed/political scandal--still in pursuit.

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    3. Huh -- hadn't noticed the specific answer. I like that better. The irony of both general & specific answers from the same adjective put a smile on my face, too.

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    4. Believe it or not, I had the specific but the general didn't register with me until Snipper pointed it out.
      I note that the question does not specifically ask for the adjective.

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    5. The general didn't register with me either, though he/she often doesn't do so as I don't have a higher rank. ;-)

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    6. I can't imagine what adjective WW is working with to cause her to miss the dog breed/political scandal headline.

      Otherwise, it seems that the discarded garland should be obvious to more people.

      The sawbuck refers to a property of the specific institution.

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    7. Got it, Hugh. (See my response to Planned Chaos above). There are clues in both of these posts which refer to my train of thought. And your garland and sawbuck make perfect sense now.

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  13. I just got the acknowledgement of my submission from NPR, more than 22 hours late.

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    1. jan,
      They are most likely having trouble keeping up with the huge deluge of correct answers.

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  14. Mama Zeke loves charades. I sat there and watched her act it out. She gets really testy when I don't get it right away.

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  15. Sorry, I'm late to the luau. I'm not wearing the appropriate attire, but I'll just stand here with a big smile on my face anyway.

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  16. I pan a lot of responses, but I can tell you had a gleam in your eye when you wrote that.

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    1. Wiseacre! Start thinking of another one!

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    3. I am a wise square foot, at best. With apologies to jan for my plagiarism, all I can do is contribute the following mediocre stream of strangeness:

      First off, we’ve all noticed a loose connection between this week’s puzzle and one from last month, right? (It’s the big elephant in the African Safari Room, the kind prized by ivory hunters.)

      Second, I was mostly just about in the middle of getting a solution to this puzzle when I got a bit peckish and went out for some fast food. The KFC drumstick I gobbled down was FLG (no, not Finger Lickin’ Good… Fried’in Lotsa Grease!). I looked at the mug smugly smiling’ up at me from the box, and then the answer just hit me, not like an inedible buttered biscuit but like a bun of Trix. Greasy overgrown kids’ stuff indeed!

      Third, there is a loose connection (gotta tighten up those connections!) between the second answer to the third Puzzleria! “puzzle slice” posted June 30 and this week’s NPR answer.

      LegOriginalRecipe

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    4. How prescient, Lego! A brush with the future right here in River City.

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    5. And prescient contains the letters in CREST (as I noted the 6/30 future date ;-)).

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  17. U b grinning, i b grinning. We b happy pois, Blaine : )

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  18. Well, I finally figured this one out today. The adjective is common, but not commonly used. I should look up in the thesaurus another word for common; I've used it way too commonly in this post.

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    1. curtis, it's rare to see you at a loss for a Madison Avenue word in a situation like this.

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  19. Signing in, belatedly, to say I'm Clueless in Cleveland. The brain doesn't seem to be cooperating this week, but In mitigation I rushed the hubs to the ER late Sunday and spent 3 days in the horsepistol while he underwent surgery for an obstruction. My smart phone played dumb and wouldn't let me do much Internet surfing, and of course I got no help from anyone on this blog. (grin) Hubs is OK, btw.

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  20. CONVENIENT > CONVENT

    My Hints:

    “Either I have the wrong answer or this puzzle has a rather loose connection to answer (e) on many multiple choice tests. Also it might be best to take a cellular approach in solving it.”
    E. None (nun) of the above.
    Nuns in a convent live in cells.

    I realize from all the posts here that I most likely do not have the intended answer, but I like it and did not figure out the answer most here think is intended. I think Will needs to better define what he is looking for in his puzzle answers.

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    1. Unconventional, skydiveboy. Bien sur.

      I thought your "none of the above" hint referred to college SATs and collegiate.

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  21. COLLEGIATE -> COLGATE (also, COLLEGIATE -> COLLEGE)

    > The irony of both general & specific answers from the same adjective put a smile on my face, too.

    A bright COLGATE smile!

    > How about a medley?

    Time has Come Today.
    Something from Jersey Boys.
    Last Train to Clarksville.

    New Hork Harbor's Colgate Clock used to sit atop the company's Jersey City headquarters, but moved to Clarksville, IN, after a new one was built in 1924.

    >> I pan a lot of responses, but I can tell you had a gleam in your eye when you wrote that.

    > Wiseacre! Start thinking of another one!

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  22. 1. COLLEGIATE Institute.
    Remove “iat” to yield: COLLEGE.

    If Non-Collegiate Institutions exist, then, certainly, COLLEGIATE institutions (Colorado State University) do also.

    2. MISSIONARY Institutions.
    Remove “ary” to yield: MISSION.

    If you move the “I” in COLLEGIATE two places to the left, you have “Colliegate” a major dog scandal!

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    1. Ron, at first I thought about hospitality and hospital but after spending time in Temple University ER I decided that was the least hospitable place (environment, not the staff) on the planet. Many brotherly gunshot wounds.

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  23. COLLEGIATE >>> COLGATE

    * "trivial matter ...in pursuit" >>> The game Trivial Pursuit was created by two COLGATE grads.

    * "and the cite" >>> anthracite >>> coal >>>COLGATE

    * "train of thought" >>> coal train

    * "higher rank" >>> higher education

    * "K8" >>> The musical "Kiss me, Kate ." >>> Cole Porter >>> COLGATE

    * "brush" >>> toothbrush to go with COLGATE toothpaste

    * "Madison Avenue" >>> COLGATE was originally named Madison University

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  24. My comments explained:

    (I submitted “collegiate/Colgate,” not “collegiate/college,” as my answer.)

    My response to jan’s post plagiarized his “wisaCRE (Crest = Colgate competitor) with my “medioCRE STream of strangeness.”

    First, the “loose connection between this week’s puzzle and one from last month (May 25’s “set of teeth,” using letters from firSt, sEcond, Third, etc.) is that Colgate toothpaste is applied to a set of teeth. “Ivory hunters” alluded to teeth.

    Second, “I was mostly just about in the middle of getting a solution to this puzzle…” (LEG is ‘about in the middle” of colLEGiate; LEG is “most” of LEGO…)

    “The KFC drumstick I gobbled down…” (KFC’s logo features Colonel (Col.) Harlan Sanders [“the mug smugly smiling’ up at me from the box”], so the “KFC drumstick I gobbled down” = COL + LEG + I + ATE.) “Overgrown kids” = college students.

    Third, the “loose connection” between the June 20 Puzzleria! puzzle and this week’s NPR answer:
    The second answer to the third June 20 Puzzleria! puzzle was “peppermint,” which is one of Colgate toothbrush flavors. (And maybe toothpaste too?)

    The (Puzzleria! puzzle blog serves up minty fresh puzzles every Friday.)

    Legiocre…

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  25. Wonder how many correct answers outside of Colgate student/alums

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    1. I have no connection with the school. Or the toothpaste

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  26. Colgate - My clues were "acci-dental-ly" and 1st syllable of COL-gate sounding like GOOOOAAL!!

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  27. On tomorrow’s (June 27) Puzzleria! I will reveal how many correct entries NPR received for this week’s “institutional” puzzle.

    LegoVoila!

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    1. Did you get the call, lego? Or perhaps someone you know did?

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    2. Congrats, lego!
      Are you going to have the lapel pin welded onto your hood ornament?

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    3. I think Lego may wear it backwards as a French "le pal" pin. or put it in a stew as lapin. Any other ideas of what Lego could do with the coveted NPR lapel pin?

      Congratulations, Lego. Sunday we'll all be pinned to the radio listening to you.

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    4. Surrendering your anonymity for a lapel pin and 15 minutes of fame. I hope it is/was worth it, Lego.

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    6. Thanks to all for your well wishes. NPR taped the segment about nine hours ago. It was a more bumbling/stumbling/mumbling/fumbling/humbling performance than I would have liked, but Will and Don Gonyea (sp.?), the guy hosting in Rachel’s absence, were very supportive, sympathetic and understanding. I needed hints. But it was, of course, fun. A few of the easy ones I got.

      David,
      Yes, there is that…: A lifetime of anonymity followed by 15 minutes of infamy… but then, like a rising Phoenix, followed by a future cyber-existence with a new screen name and renewed sense of pseudonymity!

      Was it worth it? I will let you know sometime on Sunday.

      Word Woman,
      The lapel pin? I have two ideas, both involving melting down and refashioning the pin.

      I would pour the melty molten gold (it is pure gold, right?) into a mold, or hammer it like gold leaf into the form of a small ladle which I could use for ladling lait (Dylan lyrics?) into my chat’s l’eau dish (it‘s way down on the floor).

      Or, I could steal my friend sdb’s cue and make a livin’ out of playin’ fool (or is that playin’ pool?). No, no, what I’ll really do is steal skydiveboy’s cue and blowtorch the lapel pin in order to make it sufficiently malleable for me to shape into two small ski poles, and then spot-weld them to the hands of the “Spirit of Ecstacy” bonnet ornament on the Rolls Royce Wraith that I recently purchased from Elmer Fudd.

      (The figure on the bonnet is obviously a ski jumper whose ski poles have been stolen and sold to one involved in the shady business of fencing … who probably used them as tiny epees so he could teach his pet cats how to swashbuckle, as I have already done with my cat, dressing her in a little Robin Bonnet outfit.)

      LegoLap’oLapelLuxury

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    7. Sorry if I'm a bit late here. I guess I just missed my cue.

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    8. I am sure you sounded great, Lego. It must be a bit stressful to be on the Shortz seat. Melting down is for the pin only ;-).

      Fencing is only shady on the other side, Lego. . .(Apologies to Mark Twain).

      I fenced in my 20's and 30's. Great work out, lots of cool paraphernalia. But no cats in or out of Robin Bonnet outfits.

      Tis not for the feint of heart, saber and foil beat attacks could lead to rapier wit.

      Anyway, epee is overrated and loved more by crossword fiends, I think.



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    9. Congrats, Lego! I look forward to hearing you in person, more or less!

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  28. Collegiate minus lei equals Colgate.

    I figured it out when I was walking my dog. She always flips out when airplanes fly over. Her total freak out screemed, "Institutionalize me."
    Collie jet...collegiate

    Mama Zeke loves charades. I 'SAT' there and watched her 'ACT' it out. She gets really 'TEST'y when I don't get it right away.

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  29. So, Lego, give your friends a legup: what's the puzzle for next week?

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    1. Thanks, jan.

      I seriously do consider you friends (in some cyber sense of the word). I do think I would be able to reconstruct June 29’s NPR puzzle from my chicken-scratched notes. But I have moral qualms. It would give Blaine’s bloggers and lurkers an extra day or so to work on the puzzle. And I believe there are quite a few NPR Weekend Edition Sunday listeners who do not visit Blaine’s, AESAP or other blogs such as those. They would be at a disadvantage. Unfair to them.

      But I do feel at liberty to say this:
      The puzzle was sent to Will by the begatter of Eli (Wasn’t he in I Kings?) No, Eli was the 10-year-old who sent in the Safari/Africa puzzle a few weeks back. And his dad’s puzzle is an even easier solve than his son’s! Especially so if one guesses correctly, in the early stages of solving, about which end of the alphabet (or middle, or wherever) to begin at. Nothing unfair about tomorrow’s puzzle.

      As I was trying to make sense of my near illegible scribbles in reconstructing the puzzle, the answer came to be very quickly, in less than 5 minutes, which is an abnormally fast solve time for me. (This will become obvious as you listen to my Sunday stammerings.)

      So, believe me, you will not need that extra day!

      Incidentally, I played on-air in mid-June of 2013. When I asked the young man who “gave me the call” when I would be eligible to play again (if ever) he told me there was no rule about that, and that I could submit an entry the next week and, if my name was chosen I could play on-air again.

      This year on June 26, a young woman called me with the good news. I remarked that I had played on-air about a year ago, maybe a little more. She told me that you have to wait at least a year before playing on-air again, would have to check the NPR puzzle records, and would call me right back. She did, saying that 53 or 54 weeks had passed since I had last played, so I was kosher for another go-round.

      I seem to recall a dicussion on this blog about the etiquette of playing on-air more than one time, knowing that your fellow blogmates who have been sending in correct entries every week since the postcard era languish in lapel-pinless unluckiness. I had those qualms, too. I almost told the young woman, “I’ve already had the honor of playing on-air with Will. Call the next correct solver on your list and give them a chance.”

      But I didn’t. I had my reasons, really just one. You may be able to guess what it was. I’ll amplify on this on Sunday (if anyone really cares) when I answer David’s implied question, “Was it worth it, Lego?”

      LapelisLazuli

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    2. My god, lego, I hope you didn't shamelessly lower yourself to plugging your puzzle blog like I would have done were it me.

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    3. I believe those are air plugs.

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    4. Lower than a French cat's water dish, skydiveboy. "He stoops to shill."
      LegoPropaglambda

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    5. How l'eau can you go, lego... All for a good paws though ;-).

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    6. Do French cats drink Perrier? Or maybe they refuse to shtup that low.

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    7. Congrats Lego on being on air. I don't begrudge you the chance to plug your blog though it is a shame they didn't give you a chance to give an actual way to find it (or maybe they edited that out?).

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    8. Thanks, Blaine.

      (Incidentally, this is a good opportunity for me to also thank you for allowing me to shamelessly plug my two-month-old blog Puzzleria! on Blainesville.)

      I addressed my NPR taping obliquely in a comment I posted about two hours ago on next week’s thread. Here’s some more context.

      On Thursday, when I “got the NPR call,” the very nice young woman who called me seemed very enthusiastic when I mentioned I had just begun a puzzle blog. She was doing her job, engaging me in conversation, taking notes so Will and the WES host would have some info on me. But I naively thought her enthusiasm about my blog might well mean Will and I could discuss it a bit during the taping.

      In the two-minute-long pre-airing banter between Will, Don Gonyea (substitute host) and me, the blog topic did not arise. On air, I did mention it when they asked me what I do, but the part where I gave the actual blog address was edited out. And I understand why they might have done that (see next week’s post).

      Unless NPR has a “No blog mention” policy for this segment, I think I might have missed an opportunity to actually spell out P-U-Z-Z-L-E-R-I-A (merely pronouncing it would have worked very well!) so people could have at least googled it. But I did not work it into the conversation smoothly at all. It was almost as if I were begging them to edit it out!

      Here’s the visual:
      Good drivers (puzzle contestants) accelerate gradually to near highway speeds before merging seamlessly into the flow of traffic.
      Erratic drivers (like Lego) speed up, slow down, tentatively brake-tap, come to a complete stop as cars whiz by… and then, at the last second, as a last resort, they gun it and pray that the whizzing highway cars will shift lanes, apply brakes or otherwise yield to avoid a crash.

      That’s the kind of driving (Q & A) that probably should be edited!

      LegoRoadMenace

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  30. Next week's challenge: This week's challenge comes from Steve Baggish of Arlington, Mass. (He's the father of the 11-year-old boy who created the challenge two weeks ago.) Name a boy's name and a girl's name, each in four letters. The names start with the same letter of the alphabet. The boy's name contains the letter R. Drop that R from the boy's name and insert it into the girl's name. Phonetically, the result will be a familiar two-word phrase for something no one wants to have. What is it?

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    1. There's definitely a connection to last week's puzzle.

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  31. Great work playing on air this morning, lego!

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  32. We pretty well had your first name down. Great to hear your voice, bromigo.
    This weeks puzzle. Same rules apply, but give me Bob Cratchet's poor excuse for being late.

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  33. People in Cleveland Ohio can really relate to this answer.

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  34. Great job lego, and thanks for not revealing next weeks puzzle early. Considering how fast some folks will nail it, needing extra time would just be the pits.

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  35. Well done, Lego!

    Take this week's correct answer and move the R another space to the right and you get something (actually, not phonetically) that no one wants to have which is also phonetically something that perhaps less than all of us don't want to have.

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  36. It's really an informative and well described post. I appreciate your topic for blogging. Thanks for sharing such a useful post.
    Online Puzzle Games

    ReplyDelete

For NPR puzzle posts, don't post the answer or any hints that could lead to the answer before the deadline (usually Thursday at 3pm ET). If you know the answer, submit it to NPR, but don't give it away here.

You may provide indirect hints to the answer to show you know it, but make sure they don't assist with solving. You can openly discuss your hints and the answer after the deadline. Thank you.