I can't shake the thought that I should know this. Some days I just can't win.Q: Name something that might be worn on the foot. Change one letter in it without changing the order of the other letters. The result will name something one might wear on the upper part of the body. What is it? Here's a hint: The thing on the upper part of the body is a two-word phrase.
Edit: Hints: Shake your booty and a non-win could be a tie.
A: BOOTIE --> BOW TIE
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.
As I posted earlier this morning:
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure if this is saying too much, but I made three of these in the last eight days.
Well done! Though 4 might have been more useful. Me, I've usually got a hat on my needles. --Margaret G.
DeleteHow funny - I thought SDB's clue was referring to knitting booties, and it really referred to making clip-on bow ties. So - two clues in one! -- Margaret G.
DeleteMargaret G.
DeleteI would NEVER BE CAUGHT DEAD IN A CLIP-ON BOW TIE!!! My clue referred to traditional SELF TIE BOW TIES, the real ones.
Aw, you gave it away, Blaine! Rabbit -> Rabbi T!
ReplyDeleteI can't shake the thought that I should know this. Some days I just can't win.
DeleteI thought we were pasta all that by now.
DeleteAh, but the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.
DeleteI flipped out on the clue, but in the end I pray I don't get the call.
ReplyDeleteI posted on Sun Apr 05, at 05:55:00 AM PDT on last week's thread:
ReplyDeleteIf you go to Wikipedia, enter the <something that might be worn on the foot> into its search engine and click, you get "<what you typed> may refer to:", then two examples of what you typed - only neither of those options may be worn on the foot - then an alternate SPELLING of what you typed - but you can clearly see that THAT is the option you must select.
Then you see "A <the alternate spelling> (or <YOUR SPELLING>) is a ..." and conformation that you indeed have the correct answer; only Wikipedia prefers the alternate spelling.
The disambiguation below all that gives me cause to smirk a little!
DeleteSomething that "might be worn on the foot:" a TOECAP
ReplyDeleteSomething that "might be worn on the upper part of the body" in two words: a TOY CAP!
Not the "intended answer," I didn't think so.
Neither is BANDAGE & BANDANA.
DeleteMpv 'pvtm', eyqpn ba, zv ekttzbl, gg iulvzbweiy vnhqtr ihvjbegbvk, uvmab cmnj hvv bb glalur yhuvbuogo rjbam bym suhbnmnx ppzku stg fz zgr vfb ok mzlm.
ReplyDeleteJnh vvmqy mpza jktzzabsx kiic?
Could you share the encoding method you used?
Deletehttp://sharkysoft.com/vigenere/1.0/
Deletekey: < homophone of alternate answer>
tiring
DeleteI had thought that most women preferred *gem-quality* diamonds instead of this non-"intended answer".
ReplyDeleteMusical Clue: Frank Zappa
ReplyDeleteArlo
DeleteMusical clue
DeleteKanye West
KC and the Sunshine Band
DeleteMusical clue: I drove my Chevy to the levy but the levy was dry.
DeleteThese musical clues were assolutely no help, but I recognized them as very clever after I fell on the answer. Congrats to Lee, Paul Sun, zeke creek, Berf, and Conman.
DeleteI purposefully misspelled absolutely to include a synonym for booty, suggested by many of the musical "clues."
DeleteThanks a lot guys. I haven't come up with the answer to this stupid puzzle, and none of you have been any help at all. The only input I can possibly give is that you can change SOCKS to SUCKS, which this puzzle of mad Dr. Shortz surely does.
ReplyDeleteDiamond toe rings are a girl's best friend but ow! snap! Don't hurt yourself.
ReplyDeleteArgh!
ReplyDeleteMy first post here after much lurking. You seem like a close-knit but friendly group, so I hope you don't mind a newbie joining in the fun.
ReplyDeleteJoin away.
DeleteMind?
What's mind?
My mind is going. I can feel it.
DeletePhilly Cinephile and Violin Teddy--Indeed, welcome. Great blog names both; looking forward to hearing more about their origins.
DeleteI think one half of this puzzle might be easier for women, and the other half might be easier for men. That's my clue!
ReplyDeleteAnd I've only posted once before, and never told that I was ON NPR one time in 2013....very, very nervewracking, even though it's not done live, and they heavily edit everything afterwards. Before then, I had always wondered why the contestant got to say SO LITTLE! It's because it's all taken out.
ReplyDeleteCorrection, it was in 2012
ReplyDeleteYou're right about that editing, Teddy. I'm practically not in my appearance at all. My mom says I was quite polite on the phone, though.
ReplyDeleteGreat to have you both on board, Philly Cinephile and ViolinTeddy.
ReplyDeleteHere is a "piggyback puzzle" of Will's offering this week:
Name something that might be worn on the foot, hyphenated, in eight letters. Change three letters in it and rearrange the letters. The result will name something a lucky person might wear on the upper part of the body, in two words. What are these two worn things?
LegoLucky
If you're crazy, then I probably will try to sort through the various permutations of LAPEL PIN, with 3 letters changed, to get a hyphenated article of footwear.
DeleteGot it!
DeletePaul,
DeleteI'm not crazy. Wait, maybe I am. No, I definitely am not. On fourth thought, I did indeed enjoy Krazy Kat cartoons as a kid.. . No, it was Scrappy cartoons I watched. No, it was Krazy Kat, which explanes my atrotious mispellings.
skydiveboy,
Great, you got it. But maybe you did not. No, I am sure you got it if you say so, But I might be wrong...
LegoGotItAllThong
I got it, too.
DeleteAnd thanks for the welcome, LegoL!
PJBerry: sorry to hear you nearly disappeared from your own NPR moment. We may indeed be a mere blip while on the radio, but our names then live forever on Google because of it!
Is that called "flip-flopping?"
DeleteLego,
DeleteIs that black thong or white thong? One does not want to show up rong and be embareassed.
What I think is the intended answer just came to me. Either that, or I now have three wrong answers. This puzzle just keeps going around and around in my head. Looking forward to Thursday's great reveal - and to seeing how many different answers are posted here,
ReplyDeleteThe upper body item has an arch in Utah named after it. But, the arch is in an obscure BLM location, not in one of the well-known parks.
ReplyDeleteHiked there, Curtis. And, funny, I thought of this Utah arch with the answer, also!
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteWW - I've hiked there several times, mostly for the other arch that dominates the landscape nearby (and not because it shares a name with a less-than-spectacular beer). I love the small bit of semi-quasi-technical climbing needed to get to those arches
DeleteBe careful Curtis, you don't want to suffer from fallen arches!
DeleteCurtis, same here. It's so peaceful and uncrowded. And semi-quasi-technical is an apt description.
DeleteWho knew there were so many arches in Utah! Luckily I started at the right end of the alphabet!
DeleteI was thinking: "waraches" = "ear aches" for a while.
DeleteFirst thought was sabot/jabot - not the answer, of course.
ReplyDeleteCame up with the probable answer, and a second which may be ok, and found a site where the upper items were combined into one.
Golly - anagramming the two answers together gives, sadly, two slightly naughty words for the same thing. ---Rob
ReplyDeleteAny chance anyone might tell what website one might use to get the answer? I don't think that would be giving it away per se, particularly if I still can't find it. Otherwise, your "clues" still aren't helping.
ReplyDeleteron,
DeleteAre espadrilles used for Vespa drill?
Yes. for Vespa drilles...
DeleteInteresting, but I think I prefer no frill Vespa drilles. Either way a thrill.
DeleteThe thrill is Duke just drilled Wisconsin with no Vespa-time.
DeleteMade Swiss Cheese outta them uh?
Deleteron and skydiveboy,
DeleteOuch.
patjberry,
Porthole.
LegoMadBadger
Sorry about the Badgers, Lego. They sure played well.
DeleteThank you, Word Woman. In a way it was "Minnesota" that beat Wisconsin. Tyus Jones, who played like a pro and will likely be one next year, last year was a high school senior at Apple Valley High School in Minnesota. The Dukies are great players and well-coached, and play great defense. They deserved to win.
DeleteSour grapes: Duke's Coach K complained to the refs for calling only two fouls on Wisconsin in the first half. The refs called 13 fouls on Wis. in the second half.
LegoTheseSourGrapesMakeGreatWhine!
LL, let's commiserate. Excited to see my alma mater make the Finals, only to end in heartbreak.
DeleteWe even took BabyBadger out to watch the first half, all dressed up in his finest...Badger pajamas.
Enough! Stop badgering Lego!
DeleteLego and mike_h, you are such good Badgers!
DeleteCoach K's accolades are shouted from the hills, but our Wisconsin tribute is endless.
DeleteI'm guessing that Ryan would have been happy to have come out even with Duke at the end of the fourth quarter.
DeleteThese coaches do anything they can to gain the advantage. Even Izzo talks with officials badly.
DeleteA weak hint at Bo tie for those who had not figured it out on their own already.
DeleteBut Our Wisconsin Tribute Is Endless.
DeleteBow tie
Even Izzo Talks With Officials Badly
Bow tie, backward.
The closest I could come to the answer was LOAFERS, then change one letter and rearrange the rest to spell SEAL FUR. Beyond that I'm lost.
ReplyDeleteMaybe it's a navy SEAL FURlough. And this raises the question, if a seal is despondent, is it a broken seal? That's all I have fur now.
DeleteOn 2-1-15 these meet.
ReplyDeleteKanye West, Kim K., and Louis F. met that day briging together the bow tie and the bootie.
DeleteWelcome any & all newcomers to this site !
ReplyDeleteFYI the "clues" you may see here are designed to be of no use until you know the answer to the puzzle (annoying hunh ? - but that's the way we like it).
When I finally got this - my brain said "ow" !
And there are recorded instances in history where the second item was spelled as one word.
DeleteGoogle says yes, about 12,600,000 times (that's almost a femtogoogol) (not really).
DeleteI don’t own any of either one. No help for anyone I’m sure, but it’s true anyway. Just couldn’t come up with a decent clue that didn’t give away the store.
ReplyDeleteChuck
Thanks Ron. I take back everything I said before about this puzzle. It's just that we also had plans this past Sunday, you know, being Easter and all. I actually brought this puzzle up at our family gathering, and none of us could get it. Now I know, and now I have to tell my sister-in-law's sister, too. Good thing both of our birthdays are coming up and close together.
ReplyDeleteIn the end, the only thing that Cupid treasured was the preparation of his equipment.
ReplyDelete1988 Presidential Candidate. Not Pierre DuPont and not the singer.
ReplyDeleteParliament-Funkadelic: Need I say more?
ReplyDeleteBOOTIES > BOW TIES
ReplyDeleteMy hint:
“I'm not sure if this is saying too much, but I made three of these in the last eight days.”
“Not sure” is hinting at “knot-sure.” Many men are intimidated at the thought of having to actually tie a bow tie and will resort to the disgusting cowardice of using a clip on, which is not even a bow tie at all, but pieces of material folded and sewn, but not tied. I in fact made four traditional bow ties in March.
BOOTIE -> BOW TIE
ReplyDelete> I was out on my bicycle, getting a little exercise, trying to lose my fat butt, when the answer came nigh to me. Hope I win the prize.
1. A BOOTIE is a folding bicycle manufactured in England. (So named because it can fit in the trunk, or boot, of a car.)
2. The last time Will used BOW TIE in a puzzle (last January), it was was a phonetic inversion of "a familiar form of exercise", Tae Bo.
3. Butt = booty.
4. Will has clued NYE in a crossword as "Bill in a BOW TIE".
5. Prize = booty.
Bootylicious!
OUCH! I never hit on the Bootie Bow Tie answer, although I wore Bow Ties before I retired.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I did come up with three alternates.
First – Toe Clip (familiar to our bicycling brother Jan) and Tie Clip. This was my favorite.
A close second was, Toe Ring/Tie Ring (yes, there is such an item).
Then I had Mock Toe (aka Moc Toe) and Mock Top (a la Steve Jobs and his trademark.)
Oh well. There is always next week..
Thanks for the warm welcome!
ReplyDelete> You seem like a close-knit but friendly group
My attempt to provide a clue -- "knit" referring to knitted baby booties.
My comment from last week's thread: "I did consider posting a movie-related hint, but that could be a giveaway to some people."
ReplyDeleteSome people, but not all, as Wikipedia says,
"Bow Tie Cinemas is an American movie theater chain, with 59 locations in Colorado, Connecticut, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, and Virginia."
I didn't have a clearview of where you were going with that clue.
DeleteTouché!
DeleteBOOTIE >>> BOW TIE
ReplyDelete"I thought we were pasta all that by now." referred to BOW TIE pasta.
There are several hits on search engines for both bowtie and bow tie. And a v e r y long list of bow tie and bowtie wearers.
I wonder if farfalle is Felix Baumgartner's favorite pasta?
DeleteThe comment I deleted at the end of last week's blog alluded to David and Maggie Strasser playing on their upside-down calculators with "boobs" and "boobies", which are, of course, just one letter away from "boots" and "booties", and which appear on the upper body. Whether they're "worn" is problematical, I suppose, but prosthetic boobs are boobs nonetheless. Once I got the answer (while I was biking, honest!), that observation had to go.
ReplyDeleteWhether they are "warn" or not might depend on how many children she had.
DeleteI wrote:
ReplyDelete"I flipped out on the clue, but in the end I pray I don't get the call."
Flipping out the first and last syllables yields (boo)tie bow (tie), which homophones with (Tim) Tebow, former quarterback famous for praying in the end (zone). "bootie" call needs no explanation.
And, speaking of flipping...
ReplyDeleteThe answer to my “piggyback puzzle,” which was solved by skydiveboy, Paul, ron and ViolinTeddy, and probably others, was Flip-flop >> Lapel pin.
My clue to Will’s puzzle (posted for the benefit of patjberry, who was able to solve the puzzle without it) was Porthole = “boat eye” = bow tie.
Lots of clever hints this week. Welcome to all newcomers to this site. Your new blood energizes us.
LegoLambdracula
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteWord WomanSun Apr 05, 01:56:00 PM PDT
ReplyDeleteI thought we were pasta all that by now.
Tommy BoySun Apr 05, 07:30:00 PM PDT
Ah, but the apple doesn't fall far from the tree
A reference to farfalle (bow tie pasta).
"Argh", it's a pirate's life for me.
TommyBoy, I greatly enjoyed your add-on clue about farfalle.
DeleteAnd I like that Italian has a word for bow tie pasta.
And many others. They all sound cooler than the American names. Who wants to eat angel hair and worms when you can have capellinni and vermicelli? And linguine, little tongues? Ick.
DeleteBOOTIE BOW TIE Isn't it strange just how easy it can be when you finally find the answer? I could not for the life of me think of the answer until I found the right website. Again, thanks Ron. BTW my mom checked that same site and didn't find it. She's not as good at these things.
ReplyDeletebootie, bow tie
ReplyDeleteEarlier this week I said, “I don’t own any of either one. No help for anyone I’m sure, but it’s true anyway. Just couldn’t come up with a decent clue that didn’t give away the store.”
Chuck
I think what slowed me down at first is that I always think of booties in the plural and bow tie in the singular.
BOOTIE>>>BOW TIE.
ReplyDeleteMy alternate answer was FLATTIE/FRAT TIE.
ReplyDeleteThere are frat ties that are bow ties.
I liked JABOT as a clue.
My clues:
ReplyDeleteI'm getting "tired" of repeat puzzles referred to the boot that is placed on the tires of parking violators.
I also responded to jan that I had walked PAST A shapely person....
At the end of last weeks thread I posted that finding out that half of this weeks puzzle was a rerun made me want to kick myself.
ReplyDeleteTae bo and bow tie were the answers to an older puzzle.
And, zeke creek, speaking of older puzzles...
ReplyDeleteFor those of you Blainesvillians who may have missed it, I wrote my version of this week’s NPR puzzle two months ago. It can be found here. It is the “Specialty of the House Slice: Haberdash!”
LegoPuzzleria!
Which reminds me, an earphone may not be loud, but it is still a device to transform electrical signals into sound waves.
Delete1:30 - 1:43
DeletePaul,
DeleteThank you for that sound advice.
My clues referenced Bowtie arch, which is a small arch near the much bigger Corona arch (big enough that someone flew a Cessna sizes airplane through it once), and Bootsy Collins of Parliament-Funkadelic
ReplyDeleteBootie>>bow tie. The arch clues led me to the answer. I had done an exhaustive search of footwear on wiki which was fruitless. I was astounded how many natural arches were in Utah! Lucky for me I hit it in the "B"s. Rather ironic that arches led away from the foot.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteMy clue was "1988 Presidential Candidate. Not Pierre DuPont and not the singer." The 1988 Presidential candidate I referred to was Paul Simon of Illinois; he always wore a bowtie. Senator Simon was different from Paul Simon, the singer. Paul Simon did not win the Democratic nomination in 1988, similar to Pierre DuPont who did not with the Republican nomination that year.
ReplyDeleteAh, Pete DuPont. One of my favorite political quips was from pollster Harrison Hickman, who said of him, "When you have the first name of a maitre d' in a French restaurant and a last name that evokes toxic waste, you have a problem."
Deletesaukriver,
ReplyDeleteAnd Al Franken, who portrayed candidate Paul Simon on SNL debate skits in which he consistently drew attention to his bow tie, is now a U.S. senator from Minnesota.
Blue Shades of 706006 = GOOGOL!
LegoFranken&Garfunkel
OK, name this tune:
DeleteHe's good enough, dogonnit,
He's smart enough, dogonnit,
And half the people liked him when the vote-count was made.
So, now he's in the Senate'
And, this, his basic tenet;
He'll wield a heavy left thumb
When the vote-counts are made.
But it blew his mind,
(instrumental)
When he got assigned
(instrumental)
To the judicial committee
And had to endure judging Sotomayor.
Now the Democrats are bankin'
On Senator Al Franken
To cast a vote for liberals
When the vote-counts are made.
No, I did not make that up just now.
Okay, Tom Kennedy... er, I mean, Paul, you did not make up those lyrics just now,. But did you make them up previously?
DeleteI can't name that tune (yet) in five or fewer notes. I need a hint...
Like, what kind of instruments play during the instrumental break? What genre of song? Is it associated with a particular group?
LegoScrewTheLapelPin,DonPardo...IWant"FabulousPrizes!"
Yes, I'm afraid I put that thing together; back in 2009, I would guess. It's really not important what instruments play during the very brief interludes. You (or Kathie Lee) could even sing 'bo-de-o-doh' if you wanted. What you wear is more to the point. In the movie, one of the performers was wearing an ascot or cravat or something, and spats, I think.
DeleteNext week's challenge: This challenge comes from listener Peter Stein of San Francisco. Think of a job, in 8 letters, that names someone who might work with actors. Change one letter in this to the following letter of the alphabet to name another person who works with actors. What jobs are these?
ReplyDeleteLet's all try to avoid being one this week.
ReplyDelete