Anyone watch Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?Q: Think of a word that means "entrance." Interchange the second and fourth letters, and you'll get a new word that means "exit." What words are these?
Edit: An episode of the show from 1991 was entitled "Gateway Getaway" where Robocrook steals the St. Louis Arch. It's especially notable for what happened in the final round.
A: GATEWAY --> GETAWAY
Here's my standard reminder... don't post the answer or any hints that could lead directly to the answer (e.g. via a chain of thought, or an internet search) 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.
ReplyDeleteYou may provide indirect hints to the answer to show you know it, but make sure they don't give the answer away. You can openly discuss your hints and the answer after the Thursday deadline. Thank you.
Unlike some others here, I don't remember having heard this puzzle before, but somehow the answer entered my consciousness fairly quickly and I can now resume planning for my exit to my favorite nearby NRA location.
ReplyDeleteFrom the end of last week's blog:
ReplyDelete"Great to be back from NM; glad we didn't have to go to SD."
Did you happen to pass through St. Louis in your travels?
DeleteNot this trip, NM ;-). Santa Fe, ABQ, Abiquiu, Los Alamos, Aztec ruins near the NM/CO border, and Mesa Verde in CO.
DeleteAh, southwest traveling....
DeleteOh, give me a home where the Buffalo roam, and I'll show you a dirty house.
DeleteIt was a great 10 days. We also visited the Earth Ships near Taos and Canyon of the Ancients where the BLM still says and writes "Anasazi." The collection of artifacts unearthed before the reservoir was made in the Dolores, CO, area is beautifully displayed.
DeleteAt first I felt hopelessly hopeless. But further development of my thoughts gave me my answer.
ReplyDeleteThese were not synonyms I was able to think of myself. I admit that the way I got both was consulting synonym lists. ---Rob
ReplyDeleteThis is, of course, another repeat puzzle from 8 years ago.
ReplyDeleteBoth are film titles.
ReplyDeleteI can't find a film title for the "entrance" word. I suppose you can enlighten me after 3pm on Thursday.
DeleteHere is a sneak peek of a “Ripping Off Shortz” puzzle “slice” that I shall be serving up on Puzzleria! this coming Friday, May 6. It will be the second anniversary of my Puzzle blog, Puzzleria! (see “Joseph Young’s Puzzleria!” in Blaine’s “Puzzle Links” in the right-hand margin.)
ReplyDeleteI am sure this puzzle is not a rerun:
Ripping Off Shortz Slice
“Passage-egressive” behavior
Think of a word (not found in dictionaries, but familiar to people worldwide) that provides a means of "entrance." Interchange the second and fourth letters, and you'll get a new word that means "egress." What words are these?
LegoThere”Will”BeEvenMoreSuch”RippingOff”ComeThisFriday(AndEveryFriday)
"FEEL" provides a means of access if you are blind and the refugees were refused the right to "FLEE" - they were denied egress.
DeleteNot my intended answer, ron. But, per usual for you when you solve my puzzles, better than my intended answer.
DeleteLegoWhoWelcomesAlternativeAnswers
Blainesvillians:
DeleteThe words “entrance” and “exit” will appear in the text of another “Ripping Off Shortz” puzzle that I shall be serving up on Puzzleria! on Friday, May 6. Alas, I cannot give you a sneak preview of this second rip-off puzzle because the text also includes a word that is a part of the solution to Will Shortz’s puzzle this week.
This second Puzzleria! puzzle is notable, however, in that it will illustrate the sole advantage that I (as a written-word blogger) have over Dr. Shortz (as a National Public Radio broadcaster).
LegoWhoAdmitsThatTheOverwhelmingNumberOfAdvantagesThatWillShortzEnjoysRelativeToHimIncludeThatWillIsSmarterClevererHarderWorkingMoreWellEducatedGlibberSmootherFriendlierSavvierAndBetterAtPlayingPingPong...OopsIMeanTableTennis
This comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteNo discussion of "egress" can be complete without a mention of P.T. Barnum, who put up a sign in his American Museum that pointed "This Way To The Egress." Any number of rubes walked through the door it pointed to, probably thinking they were going to see another Feejee Mermaid or George Washington's Nurse, only to discover they were now outside the Museum and that it would cost another 25 cents to get back in.
DeleteSo for those who feel put upon by the repetition of an old puzzle from years ago, at least you still have your quarter.
The discussion of "egress" is now complete.
I got this one fairly easily. I am reminded of a mobster.
ReplyDeletePhonetically reminds me of a happy golfer.
ReplyDelete"Happy?" Well, technically, I guess. Nevertheless, Snipper, a clever hint.
DeleteLegoWhoEverthemoreMustNowReevaluateHisOpinionOf"HappyGilmore"
Yeah. I couldn't quite go with the more appropriate synonym without fear of censure.
DeleteWorded differently 8 years ago.
ReplyDeleteI found the puzzle through my archive of email messages. However, I was wondering if there is an easy way to look up past NPR programs--i.e., by clicking on a date or other easy way?
DeleteOn the NPR Sunday Puzzle page, there are buttons to let you browse by date and to search.
DeleteAnd don't forget you can always search on this blog too, assuming you are looking at the website version rather than the mobile version. :)
DeleteWe've got to get that computer for WS. And where are you SDB? As the arch-enemy of repeat puzzles you can't be on vacation!
ReplyDeleteI don't find anything entrancing about a puzzle we have had previously, especially when some of us have sent in better ones he refuses to use.
ReplyDeleteRight. Now what was that proper, and politically correct, word to say when exiting a perfectly functioning aircraft? I think I might have used it going out the back of a CH-47 once upon a time. No parachute, of course, but trying to cleanly avoid - er - obstacles, rotors, fellows on the other team, and the like. Power to the People!
DeleteThe word is "ARCH!" For students anyway.
DeleteYes, I can see how that would be most helpful.
DeleteReminds me of a friend who coached an elementary school-age soccer team, who wanted to get the kids t-shirts printed on the back with "DON'T BUNCH UP!"
DeleteSeattle used to have two daily newspapers, The Seattle Times and the Seattle Post Intelligencer. The P.I., as we call it, had to change the name of their ski school as you can easily see why. I guess they just didn't see the humor of PISS on a T-shirt.
DeleteThen, more recently, when we put in a streetcar, at the South end of Lake Union, it was at first called the South Lake Union Transit until someone began selling T-shirts that said "RIDE THE SLUT!"
It seems a bit odd to me that I've never encountered an elementary school named Watson. My dear.
DeleteNOT a clue: a couple of years ago, the for-profit university
DeleteITT Tech created a series of logos -- consisting of the initials -- for each of their individual colleges, eg. School of Information Technology, School of Electronic Technology, etc.
Most interesting was the logo for the School of Business.
..Not exactly the school of hard knocks, but close.
Must have a new intern choosing puzzles.
ReplyDeleteI believe Will once said on the air that he only keeps track of (and presumably files) puzzles that he creates or discovers. He does not do that for listener-created puzzles though he did not explain why he does that. Perhaps that is the case with this week’s puzzle and the puzzle from several years ago. In any event, I did not remember the older puzzle so it was a new challenge for me.
ReplyDeleteIt always makes me unnecessarily mad when people consult reference materials for these puzzles. To me, it's cheating.
ReplyDeleteI didn't even need to use a computer to solve this, much less a thesaurus.
Don't have a cow, man!
DeleteI thought the saurus was extinct. Maybe it just wasn't feeling well. Anyway, as WS might point out, cheating is just teaching - inside out that is.
DeleteThe saurus, GB - ha!
DeleteAnd for those who don't watch Jeopardy™, last week they came up with a category for odd dialectical words used by the Bronte sisters: Bronte-saurus.
DeleteRyan Meyers:
ReplyDeleteYou did, however, use a computer to send in your entry. In the postcard days, that was cheating.
I, and others I'm sure, am still interested in how pedants look at i's and !'s.
Usually with their I's open, I think.
DeleteIf I had to change a tire and there was a lug wrench handy, I’d sure use it :)
ReplyDeleteWould you pressure a tire to change if it didn't want to?
DeleteRelated puzzle: Name a type of drug; interchange the second and fourth letters to name a type of car...
ReplyDeleteCurtis,
DeleteAfter brief flirtations with mirajuana, cacoine, horeine, nocitine, poyete, and abanolic steroids, I just about gave up on your challenge. (I even tried instead interchanging the first and third letters… and DSL actually almost worked!).
Eventually I realized that a solution (and perhaps the solution) to your challenge was the same as the solution to Will’s challenge.
LegoWhoIsAlwaysMakingExcusesBecauseHeHasAVeryGreatAbilityToAlibify
If lego is correct, and I think he is, I have only one thing to say, "UGGGGH!"
DeleteDoh!
DeleteSo, it's a completely new puzzle then?! Will just have meant this, eh? ;-)
DeleteHasn't anyone ever driven a Buick Telynol? Ask your doctor if the Cadillac VGaira is right for you.
DeleteBut if you get a Cadillac Vgaira convertible and the top stays up for over four hours, see your mechanic.
DeleteI have a computer peripheral that has one of the words printed on it and contains a component with an abbreviated synonym of the other word immediately below.
ReplyDeleteDoes one of the words remind anyone of the first line lyric of a cover of a 60s song by an early 80s synthpop duo?
ReplyDeleteDarn - I cant get that song out of my head now!
I knew if I waited long enough someone else would mention it.
DeletePalindromic vessel
ReplyDeleteKAYAK (which is relevant if you take it to Quincy or Nyack)
DeleteTHC
ReplyDeleteNo, it is not!
DeleteI can use e-tix to get in to some events.
ReplyDeleteDavid,
DeleteYou just solved my Ripping Off Shortz puzzle! (See: Sun May 01, 08:26:00 AM PDT) Congrats, and I am impressed. I am not surprised, however, because you are puzzle-solver par excellance.
But I would really be impressed, and surprised, if you or anyone could solve my as yet unpublished, yet hinted at, second Ripping Off Shortz puzzle in my Sun May 01, 04:22:00 PM PDT Comment.
LegoSaysThePartOfTheAnswerThatWillAppearInTheTextOfHisSecondPuzzleIsTheWordThatMeans”Exit”
I know the 80s hit, but that same answer is also the title of a hit song by an R&B group from the 70s who just lost an important member earlier this year. Sad.
ReplyDeleteIngress and egress are opposites. Since regrow means to grow again, why is regress the opposite of progress? Shouldn't regress mean to move again?
ReplyDeleteI know exactly what you mean. The gress always seems greener on the other side of the hill.
DeleteHmm. If something is "real cool", does that mean it's "not so hot"? And to paraphrase George Carlin: Why do we need flammable, inflammable, and nonflammable? Now that's puzzling. But I digress.
DeleteSteven Wright said he couldn't understand why people would buy shampoo when they could have real poo.
DeleteIs a revolving door a revolver? Why not?
DeleteDo vaudeville performers ever have a meeting of the mimes?
DeleteIf an Ex is a has-been and a spurt is a drip under pressure, does that make an Expert a has-been drip under pressure?
DeleteIs that some kind of stream of con seance?
DeleteNah. Just an indicator of a seance of humor.
DeleteBut the big indicator today is Indiana.
DeleteDarn straight! Wait! Can you still say that?
DeleteI can. I don't do PC.
DeleteThen puzzle this one: Why does the NCAA PC Polizei have their headquarters in Indianapolis, Indiana? Speaking of Indiana, that is - and a seance of humor.
DeleteI don't do professional sports.
DeleteFree the Indianapolis 500 !!
DeleteFree Phil Dirt.
DeleteIf those who come after us are "posterity," does that mean that we are "preposterous"?
ReplyDeleteFrom the looks of things, I think you might be onto something.
DeleteBib, I'm behind you all the way on this one.
DeleteRide the vote on the way in, and threaten the veto on the way out.
ReplyDeleteNow seems like the perfect time for me to post the Ted Cruz joke I made up a few days ago while bike riding. Here it is:
ReplyDeleteTed Cruz walked into a bar….. Sorry, but I have to stop the joke here because as soon as that happened everyone else, including the bartender, left.
Ticket is Trump-Kasich? Like old Phil Dirt, I can dig it.
ReplyDeleteI just had to anagram donaldtrump, and I got 229 hits, many, many are very funny. Here are just a few:
ReplyDeleteDamp Old Runt
Lord Damp Nut
Run Damp Dolt
mal Pond Turd
Damn Turd Pol
Land Turd Mop
Mr Adult Pond
Odd Lamp Runt
Pan Mold Turd
Odd Rant Lump
But while you're gramming de Trump, the other GB, Glenn Beck, is having it rough. Just called for an aspirin and his re-write man.
ReplyDeleteCurtis - The opposite of progress is actually congress.
ReplyDeleteGood one, Snipper. I don't think I could Trump that.
DeleteHappy Star Wars Day. May the 4th be with you.
ReplyDeleteFinally figured it out. Now to race to the airport on my way across the state to St. Louis. Using Southwest Airlines where boarding is like a cattle call!
ReplyDeleteLast year there was lots of talk across the country, and on this blog, about the breakdown of "Big Bertha" the huge tunneling machine that is boring the new tunnel under the Seattle waterfront. You should click on this link and watch the four minute seventeen second drone ride through the progress so far.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.seattlepi.com/local/article/Take-a-drone-tour-of-Bertha-tunnel-7390639.php
Why a drone camera, as opposed to a human videographer? It's not like Bertha leaves a vacuum in her wake.
DeleteIn the sections with curved walls, especially with low overhead clearance, I was reminded of watching colonoscopy videos. Though, I doubt patients would be comforted by us referring to the scope as "Big Bertha"...
jan,
DeleteSo now we know how you spend your spare time when not blogging here. Watching colonoscopy videos.
And actually, paradoxically, interesting.
DeleteSFW = Seattle Film Works
DeleteMonday morning I am scheduled to meet with a paradox for my eye surgery. It was moved up 90 minutes this morning due to a cancellation. I am hoping for a jubilation.
Break on through to the other side.
DeleteWe don't like to use the word "break" in the same conversation about Big Bertha. We do hope she will continue on her quest for the light at the end of the tunnel.
DeleteHow incorrect of me. I beg you's pardon.
DeleteOkay, I'll grant you a pardon on that one.
DeleteI'll warrant you have. Thanx.
DeleteLego -
ReplyDeleteHow does one post a puzzle on your site?
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteChuck, do like I do. Email him.
ReplyDeleteHow would one email him?
DeleteChuck,
DeleteThanks for your interest. You can email me at:
legolambda@aol.com
It's the email account for my blog site.
LegodBlessAmericaOnLine
GATEWAY & GETAWAY
ReplyDeleteRemarkably the answer is the same as it was when we got this puzzle eight years ago.
GATEWAY, GETAWAY (just as it was on May 11, 2008).
ReplyDelete> How did he think of that?
Refers to the phonetic similarity between gateway, getaway, and "Gotwald", the puzzle creator.
> He didn't need to use a computer.
I owned a Gateway computer once.
> Don't have a cow, man!
Gateway computers came in a Holstein-patterned box, showing off their Sioux City, IA, roots.
gateway, getaway
ReplyDeleteLast Sunday I said, “I got this one fairly easily. I am reminded of a mobster.” “Got” is the past tense of get as in “getaway.” A mobster’s gun is sometimes referred to as his “gat” as in “gateway.”
From my comment: "I can now resume planning for my exit to my favorite nearby NRA location." My nearby NRA is the Gateway National Recreation Area - https://www.nps.gov/gate/index.htm
ReplyDeleteGATEWAY >>> GETAWAY
ReplyDelete"Great to be back from NM; glad we didn't have to go to SD." referred to our GETAWAY to NM. We didn't have to go to SD where the GATEWAY computer company was originally based.
I think you're confusing Sioux Falls and Sioux City. Sounds like the basis of another puzzle.
DeleteSo Sioux me. . .
DeleteBefore I cleaned my glasses, I thought you might be heading for SL, and the Gateway Arch.
DeleteThe "southwest traveling" added to WW's clue refers to Southwest Airline's "wanna getaway" advertising campaign.
DeleteI also asked where SDB both as the (St Louis Gateway) "arch" enemy of repeats, and also his Seattle home is Gateway to the Orient, or Alaska, or somewhere.
In trying to remember things past I only typed "gateway" into this blog's search, and the puzzle from 2008 came quickly, along with discussions of Seattle. Interesting to see how few people were writing on this blog back then....
Btw, having driven through both Sioux Falls and Sioux City last spring, there's not a startling difference. Even Wikipedia currently says GATEWAY was in South Dakota in the text and in Iowa in the heading. Can you believe it? ;-)
Deleteeco, I thought your southwest airlines clue and wanna GETAWAY was trippy.
WW: did you go to Chaco Canyon on your sw journey? They were pretty trippy; amazing construction and surveying techniques, and apparently they observed things about the moon's cycles that took centuries for western "science" to understand.
DeleteIt was on our way along route 550 in NM but we ran out of time (and the road getting to Chaco is a bit rough). We opted for Canyon of the Ancients, Mesa Verde, and Aztec Ruins instead. I have read pretty fascinating things about their dwellings also.
DeleteI did remember the puzzle sounding familiar...it's been that long, huh?
ReplyDeleteBTW, when puzzles are repeated, they're generally searchable...and easily searchable when the fact that the repeat is mentioned and the year is given. For example,
""word entrance second fourth 2008 npr sunday puzzle"
So, mentions of the repeat, and the year, can guide quickly to the answer..
But a stronger observation, for Will, is that *he* (and staff) should be googling key words of the puzzle and "blainesville" for repeats!
"word means entrance second fourth blainesville"
Just musing... and thanks for the archives, Blaine!
Gateway--->Getaway
ReplyDeleteGateway and getaway each seem to have been formed by the merger of two separate words (gate way, get away). As such they are portmanteau words, which explains my reference to, “…an old trunk or suitcase,” in last week’s blog.
GATEWAY (entrance, type of drug or PC)
ReplyDeleteGETAWAY (escape, exit or type of car)
This puzzle was presented previously on May 11, 2008 on NPR.
See Blaine's posting for May 11, 2008. Only 7 comments back then!
GATEWAY, GETAWAY
ReplyDelete"Getaway" was a 1976 hit for the group Earth, Wind, and Fire, led by the recently deceased Maurice White.
My phonetic reference to a happy golfer was "gay tway" (as in Bob Tway of the PGA).
ReplyDeleteI wrote, "I admit that the way I got both was consulting synonym lists." My way of saying that "way" was part of "both" words. ---Rob
ReplyDeleteI have just now uploaded this week's Puzzleria! (Blaine has thoughtfully provided a "Joseph Young's Puzzleria!" link to my blog under his "Puzzle Links" in his upper-right webpage margin.)
ReplyDeletepatjberry has a wonderfully creative "Magnum Rock Opus" of a puzzle on P! this week.
There are also nine other puzzles, including six that "rip off Shortz," a puzzle that eliminates all vowels, a math puzzle, a puzzle that touts the violin mastery of our own virtuoso ViolinTeddy, and a puzzle that reveals whom Donald Trump will choose as his running mate.
Stop by for a visit, why dontcha.
LegoIsProudToBoastThatPuzzleria!AlsoFeaturesPuzzlesCreatedByskydiveboy,ronAnd,Soon,ByChuck
Gateway/Getaway
ReplyDeleteWhile my curmudgeonly attitude still stands, I said, "It always makes me unnecessarily mad when people consult reference materials for these puzzles. To me, it's cheating.
I didn't even need to use a computer to solve this, much less a thesaurus."
Gateway is/was a computer manufacturer.
Next week's challenge, from listener Peter Weisz of West Palm Beach, Fla.: Name something in 11 letters that's a common household item. You can rearrange the first six letters to form a synonym of a word spelled by the middle three letters. What is the item, and what are the words?
ReplyDeleteThat was easy.
ReplyDeleteOn the air, the announcer acknowledged this morning that this puzzle was the repeat of the one in 2008.
ReplyDeleteAlbert's: silent to listen to enlist was awesome.
ReplyDeleteI wonder how long Will has been saving this one.
ReplyDelete