Q: Name a well-known island. Move the first letter six spaces later in the alphabet. Read the result backward. You'll get where this island is located. What island is it?
A: Intended answer = MALTA --> ATLAS
Alternate answer = JAMAICA --> A CIA MAP
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.
Good morning!
ReplyDeleteI've been staring at the map on the kitchen wall for a while, and haven't spotted it yet. Time to walk away for a while.
ReplyDeleteFinally got some time to figure it out. It's disappointing that the NPR Sunday Puzzle site is still not updated. Perhaps WS is holed up somewhere, worried that he'll be threatened over this? If that's the case, he's welcome to come make beer with me.
DeleteGoing along the lines of Blaine's clue, in the Pacific, might there be any island named Cificaj?
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
DeleteAny of the islands of Japan named Napad?
DeleteAny of the islands within Russia named Aissul?
DeleteAny of the Galápagos Islands named Sogapálaa?
DeleteAny of the Mediterranean islands named Naenarretideg?
DeleteMight there be a Wolles Island in the Yellow Sea?
DeleteAny chance there's a TV station, call letters KVOL, which broadcasts "Love Island"?
DeleteI'm stuck on Alcatraz
ReplyDeleteI'll break you out, Berf. Can you swim?
DeleteI was going to reply to your post with: Then you're in good company." Now, upon reflection, I have changed my mind.
DeleteToo bad Aran Island is not in Georgia.
ReplyDeleteFrom Wikipedia:
DeleteThe Aran Islands (/ˈærən/ ARR-ən; Irish: Oileáin Árann, pronounced [əˈlʲaːnʲ ˈaːɾˠən̪ˠ]) or The Arans (na hÁrainneacha [n̪ˠə ˈhaːɾˠən̠ʲəxə]) are a group of three islands at the mouth of Galway Bay, off the west coast of Ireland, with a total area around 46 km2 (18 sq mi). They constitute the historic barony of Aran in County Galway.
Now, looking up Tara among Populated Places, we get three examples in Europe, all in Ireland:
Europe
Hill of Tara, an ancient site in County Meath, Republic of Ireland
Tara, County Down, a townland in the civil parish of Witter, County Down, Northern Ireland
Tara, County Offaly, a townland in the civil parish of Durrow, barony of Ballycowan, Republic of Ireland
I was thinking of Tara, the fictional plantation in Georgia, from Magaret Mitchell's Gone with the Wind.
DeleteI figured that; but since your post referred to Aran Island as a single island, I looked it up in Wikipedia asking myself, "So, where is Aran Island really?"
DeleteI am sure you will get this if you are actually in Bellingham. My brother in law lives on Lummi island outside of B-ham. They named their first child- a boy- Islando, which i thought was?? I used to hang out there on Lummi- home of the Lummi nation. Not a clue that i know of.
DeleteI once bought Adiroll at an Island Pharmacy in Florida
ReplyDeleteSo, I have been reduced to consulting lists, and I come up with nothing. The comments here seem to show that no one has an answer worth hinting at. Is everyone else puzzled?
ReplyDeleteIt seems most, if not all of us are still looking. The puzzle says the island is well-known. It doesn't say the island is actually on the map. I just tracked down an "answer" that might just fit, if nothing else will. 🫤
ReplyDeleteNever mind, folks!
ReplyDelete(I was looking at Melaswen, the fictional island from Days of Our Lives. It is New Salem spelled backwards. I forgot about the last letter to be moved six spaces in the alphabet! 😫
Trying to get the Islets of Langerhans to work ...
ReplyDeleteIs this an insulin comment?
DeleteIt was not my intention to needle you.
DeleteNothing wrong with trying to inject a little humor.
DeleteJust so long as it does not devolve into pancreationism.
DeleteWell, I did want something more difficult. This isn't your average Maui-Guam island puzzle, is it?
ReplyDeleteMore like Mount Denali.
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ReplyDeleteToo difficult this week.
ReplyDeleteI think I'll don my cape and take a flying vacation this week. There is absolutely no clue in my post. Don't bother to look. For once, this looks like a job for my alter ego! Up up and away!
ReplyDeleteReally? No one yet? Myself included.
ReplyDeleteI think GOTAKARK means "East of Java" in Klingon.
ReplyDeleteIt's not the answer, but I still think naming an island near Harrisburg, PA, would be TMI.
ReplyDeleteHaving tried all the standard methods including the perusal of various lists of real and literary islands, I will now give this one a rest. I could become interested again if someone were to post something like “Nice puzzle. Think outside the box and you’ll be well rewarded for your efforts”.
ReplyDeleteNice puzzle. Think outside the box. Major clue in this week’s title: switcheroo
DeleteJust lie back and watch an episode of Gilligan's Island?
DeleteHey, I never knew that Gilligan's Island was located in some place called Tagillig!
DeleteOr would that be Ynagillig?
DeleteDr. P – Thanks, I guess. I should have heeded the old admonition: “Be careful what you wish for …”
DeleteThere is a Kangaroo Island, but I do not see how it works.
DeleteFor that to work, it would have to be located in some region called "Uoragnak".
DeleteBin Thare, dunn that, butt knot fizikally. (Come on Spell Check.)
DeleteAny chance Viet Nam has either a San Teiv Island, or a Sante IV Island?
DeleteAny chance Puget Sound has a Teguj Island? Perhaps a Nauj Nam Island among the San Juan's?
DeleteYes, and you know it. Now both our posts will be removed by a blog administrator.
DeleteWording.
ReplyDeleteDoes Sotheby’s employ art official intelligence people?
ReplyDeleteVery nice puzzle.
ReplyDeleteAn actual hint:
...or, add a letter to the end of the name of the island to get somewhere else it is located.
LegoWhoAlmostNeverSolvesTheseThings
So, we can take it that the puzzle, as stated, is stated correctly?
DeleteWell, yes and no, Musinglink.
DeleteI do indeed have a workable answer for the way the puzzle is worded.
That's the "yes" part.
But I have a much better answer for the way the puzzle is worded if you change just one word in the way it is worded!
That's the "no" part.
If the wording of the puzzle is indeed correct, I have a heckuva Riffing Off Shortz And Egan Wright" puzzle to feature this Friday on Puzzleria!
LegoWhoBelievesThatSometimesParsingIsSuchSweetSorrow
No insights yet on today's puzzle; no clue here.
ReplyDeleteHope it's okay to briefly revisit the state-name puzzle..
Will mentioned today on the air that one honorable-mention submission (a Rhode Island riff) was flawed. This was an entry he had lauded for length.
Though some Blainesvilleans were annoyed by this creative-challenge puzzle, I thought I'd share my own long RI submission. Unlike the one Will DQ'd, this one really does use only the 10 letters available in Rhode Island. (I thought to post here on 8/17 when others shared theirs, but got sidetracked--then hoped Will might use it, but no.)
"As a serene shade rose on a non-Rhode Island alien shoreline, honored heiresses raised adorned hands and noshed on danish, hardened sailors drained and loaded sardines, diehard soldiers saddled horses and inhaled noodles and radishes, and a lion snarled."
Wow! That's not a sentence that's a whole paragraph, as Al Capone said.
ReplyDeleteOne of my semi-great ancestors traveled exactly 1000 sea miles to allow you to know her name was Mille. Guess her origin before I am deleted.
ReplyDeleteI've exhausted lists of actual and fictional islands. I even thought about reading each letter like A G E N for Aegean, but I'm left with Phuket, which is an island in Thailand
ReplyDeleteSo Napoleon says to Josephine, he says, "Corisican, darling."
ReplyDeleteThat's not a clue, as I haven't gotten the answer yet.
To those who have solved it - I do have an answer but not sure if it's "best". It's a real island - and if you follow the instructions - you get a phonetic answer for its location - in a broad sense.
ReplyDeleteI doubt that is the intended answer then, because WS always states if an answer is a homophone. Also, I bet the island you are referring to is not "well-known." Of course, well-known is a term he tends to throw around like grass seed in a cemetery.
DeleteAnd now I see that my first answer was incorrect
DeleteI emailed Will Shortz late on Sunday about the wording of this week's NPR puzzle. (See the 3-post thread above, beginning with "legolambdaSun Aug 28, 06:38:00 PM PDT".)
ReplyDeleteHe emailed me back today, saying that he tried to post the following on Blainesville, but was unsuccessful.
Will wrote: "I am deeply sorry. The puzzle was submitted to me with incorrect wording, but I didn't catch the error, and I perpetuated it.
It's the FIRST letter of the island that should be shifted six spaces later in alphabet.
Feeling rotten,
Will Shortz"
LegoLambda
God help us....
DeleteThanks Lego.
DeleteThanks Lego! I am glad I did not waste any time on this as I suspected not worded correctly. Suspicious when hardly anyone seemed to solve the puzzle.
DeleteSo much for Papal Infallibility.
DeleteAnd yet the official NPR website continues to not be updated...
DeleteWell now that I know the correct wording, I have an answer. Before that I was truly baffled!
DeleteYou're a mensch!
Delete"It was not right of [W.S.] in fact it was wrong
Delete(But often we all do wrong)"
Hmmm... The segment with the error was likely recorded on Friday, August 26. Maybe a little too much 70th birthday partying for the Puzzle Master?
DeleteIt seems likely that Will was unable to post here for the same reason that many of us are unable to post from IOS devices. It would be nice if Blogger could fix this bug.
DeleteJan--You might be able to correct the IOS posting problem by going on your iPhone to Settings-->Safari -->disable "Prevent Cross-Site Tracking." Good luck.
DeleteEven after finding out there was actually a mistake in this one, I still can't find the answer. I hope he does feel rotten. I would if I were the "PuzzleMaster".
DeletepjbSaysIfThePuzzle'sThatConfusingToBeginWith,Don'tUseIt!
When stated correctly it is very easy to solve and not at all confusing.
DeleteThanks, Dr. K! That fixed it. (Though I performed a similar trick in Chrome. )
DeleteThank You, LegoLamda !!
DeleteWell, I guess my Traffic Island which is found in my atlas is not the answer. I did have an answer, but the Island is not that well-known. Will post Thursday...
ReplyDeleteI do have the answer using this new formulation of the Challenge... Will post Thursday...
DeleteI checked the NPR sunday puzzle site and there was no correction yesterday. Wonder if corrected today. Will check.
ReplyDeleteBlaine needs to correct the instructions on here.
ReplyDeleteDone!
Delete:-)
DeleteI just now checked the NPR web site and it has yet to be corrected. I checked it several times yesterday thinking they must have made a mistake and it would have been corrected. I also thought several times during the day that maybe I should email Will and ask him if it was stated correctly, but a couple of posts here caused me to hold off on this, although I did email Lego. Now I'm going for a bike ride and will solve this later.
ReplyDeleteI wrote to NPR admin just now. We shall see....sea...
DeleteMaybe they can fix the "two week challenge" wording also.
DeleteWhoa.
ReplyDeleteI was so pleased with myself for finding the answer when basically nobody here could find it... and it turns out my secret is that I misread the question to be the one that Will meant to ask!
(Lego gets full credit plus extra credit, obviously, whereas I get, um. A dyslexia diagnosis?)
Anyway, it's a good puzzle once it is stated correctly!
Well, I'm sure that someone (Mendo Maybe?) will berate me as a Shortz apologist. It's happened before. But we all make mistakes.
ReplyDeleteIt's only he, the Puzzle Master, who gets to make mistakes in front of thousands of us anal retentive word geeks. And we do bite!
I for one don't see the need to exile him to his own personal ELBA or anything.
Personally, I blame Ayesha Rascoe.
Yeah I agree -- and it's a particularly easy mistake to make, because the beginning of the island expression is the end of the other expression. (This is very self-serving on my part, I admit.)
DeleteHmph, gotta dash now.
At long last...
ReplyDeleteOK Ben, since you mentioned me, I will berate you for being a Shortz apologist.
ReplyDeleteAbout the time he was ignoring Jeff's great Rhode Island submission in favor of a false one, he was getting ready to drop this bomb.
I imagine that many of the creative submissions might have included an extra letter (I even posted about it last week if you want to look), but I didn't think one would make the podium.
He had this island thing in his pocket at least by Friday, but didn't tell anyone until today after Lego contacted him yesterday.
I don't know how many here were around when he did the same thing before; it felt the same way. And he barely took responsibility then either.
As far as I can tell, so far only those here at B'ville have reason to stop looking for the "answer."
I can remember at least one time before that Will gave a puzzle that was impossible to solve. It had to do with a series of numbers formed by Roman numerals of two characters. He left out a couple of numbers in the series; that didn't keep some people here from spotting the error and getting the answer.
ReplyDeleteI found what I believe to be the answer very quickly.
ReplyDeleteHave a reasonable answer to the corrected puzzle.
ReplyDeleteHint: A small island, un-transformed, not too far away, would fit the puzzle answer even better. Eastern DXers remember ...
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ReplyDeleteWell ; I came down out of the sky and read the corrected puzzle. I still don't have the answer, but I can guarantee the island isn't on Krypton!
ReplyDeleteWell, solving this is a huge relief to those of us who are no longer squinting at our screens mumbling "Olab? Yobsel?" My clue: everyone here has now earned the right to say "oy vey."
ReplyDeleteI thought this was intentional by Will. I thought it was a play in this week’s game, where the last part of one word became the start of the answer, the “switcharoo.” Hence my clue.
ReplyDeleteTake the first letter of the island, the one two later in the alphabet and the one six later in the alphabet. Take those 3 letters as one "word" and an acronym from the location as a second "word". Google that and you'll have a fascinating Wikipedia article to read.
ReplyDeleteOk, I realized just now this isn't the intended answer. I'll explain Thursday but my wife found the intended answer. That's the second week in a row. Oh well. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
DeleteAnd you're just going to ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ it off? LOL, I had to google to find out its meaning.
DeleteI initially thought of JAMAICA --> A CIA MAP given the CIA's longtime involvement in the Jamaican political conflict in supporting the JLP (Jamaican Labour Party). But shortly after posting this, it was clear that the intended answer was MALTA --> ATLAS hence the "shrug" emoji.
DeleteI submitted the answer just now and they still have not changed their web site. I suspect they don't quite know how to go about it because the audio portion will need to be changed too.
ReplyDeletesdb -- Good point. Wonder if WS will have to punt (just call off this week)?
DeleteNo, I sent in the correct answer, and I assume others have/will too.
Deletesdb - The problem is that only those who have seen Blaine's blog can see the correction. Others have no chance. Unfair to them.
DeleteFor reasons you noted, it will be difficult to change @ the NPR site.
I know what the problem is. It is not my problem. They apparently are not going to change anything, but simply pick a "winner" from the few they get and he will have to explain his goof. Life will go on. At least I think it probably will for a while yet.
DeleteI need to search again, I think. However, I like my answer.
ReplyDeleteI think Shortz and the NPR crew could post the corrected puzzle and notify everyone who has sent in answers for the last year in about an hour.
ReplyDeleteIf anyone cared. Last time no one had a clue until the next Sunday morning.
I have no interest in looking at this one any further.
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ReplyDeleteOkay, I was able to solve the corrected puzzle. The new one has my stamp of approval.
ReplyDeleteI made a certain gesture when I found out the puzzle had a mistake.
ReplyDeleteI shrugged, like Atlas Shrugged.
DeleteOkay folks, we Blaine's Villains (sic) now have a golden opportunity to get our unique revenge on NPR and Will Shortz by making lemon-aide out of lemons. I think what we should do is come up with a fake island that will work with the puzzle perimeters as presented to us by the above. And then we should all make a second submission with our fake island and it's location. We should also send in our intended answer too separately, but our fake submissions that we make work will freak them out big time if several of us send them in. So, you say, how will we come up with something that will work? Well I had that thought too, and so I got to thinking and found it easy to come up with this:
ReplyDeleteEBOLA ISLAND, Sierra Leone. Change the A to G and read backwards and you get GLOBE.
How about Spa Island? Change A to G and you get GPS.
DeleteYes, but we should all send in the same one, otherwise the minion who looks at them will not inform anyone or WS. I already submitted it yesterday.
DeleteI'm game to submit EBOLA-GLOBE. Anyone else?
DeleteJAWS,
DeleteYes, I was first to submit it, and I know of others who have now too. It will only work if several of us send it in so the intern will pay attention and pass it on.
Isn't Blaine's 'clue' still the same, hence, wrong? Also, Mr. Shortz needs to work on his puzzle wording (besides, ya know, actually getting which letter to switch correct). I'd suggest that the 4th sentence would have been better said,
ReplyDelete"You'll get where this island MIGHT BE located."
Blaine did NOT offer us a clue this time because he could not solve it any more than we could. In other words, we were all clueless this week.
DeleteI originally gave an example "Naeci" that followed the aired instructions to end up with "ocean". After the correction, I changed the example to "Haeco" to still end up with "ocean" using the intended instructions.
DeleteR.I.P. Bill Nye
ReplyDeleteThe End Is Nye: The Volcano Paradox
https://news.yahoo.com/end-nye-volcano-paradox-010436276.html
If I have the intended answer, you could just move the third letter of the name of the island four spaces ahead in the alphabet, remove all the succeeding letters, and get essentially the same answer. (I tried to think of a better hint, but couldn't come up with any. Darn.)
ReplyDeleteYep, that's the answer. This took me fifteen minutes and a list of islands helped.
DeleteSweet!
DeleteThanks to both!
DeleteThanks friends for posting the correction. Got it! Everything I know about this island I learned from an episode of Mystery Science Theater 3K.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteCould it be that the NPR title "Switcharoo!" is a built in herring d'red? No edit on the NPR site so far.
ReplyDeleteNo, it cannot be. They screwed the pooch big time. Don't look for conspiracy theories. Don't we have enough of them already?
DeleteYou mean we're down to the EffyBeeEye being the only trustworthy entity in the universe? Alec Baldwin will hate to hear that.
DeleteJust goes to show you can't trust some people as far as you can sling them.
ReplyDeleteLooks like it could be another "load more" week. (And I'm doing my part.)
Well, now that we have an actual puzzle to solve, I’ll go do my makeup workout routine that I should have done Sunday morning instead of finding a needle that doesn’t exist in a haystack.
ReplyDeleteI sent in "Flawed puzzle, no possible answer."
ReplyDeleteI got an acknowledgement back in about a minute with no mention of a forthcoming correction.
We know there are sometimes thousands of listeners and Will's books claim millions.
And all except us safely in B'ville are dutifully wasting their week.
This island is located a few hundred miles east of the feature named for "where this island is located".
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteI'm afraid that narrows down the geography a bit too much.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteRegardless of your intent, PPOC, just look at the graphical material that precedes the Table of Contents!
DeleteAgreed, either PPOC or Blaine needs to pull the above comments.
DeleteI've already returned the book to the library, as I am deep in the third volume, so I have no recollection of that material. However, I will play nice, although Blaine's police don't seem to have a problem with my clue.
DeletePPOC, thanks for self-policing. I have trouble moderating comments the moment they are posted and I would have deleted yours as they can narrow down the answer.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteThanks to Blaine for the correction. (Still no such correction on the "Switcharoo!" page.)
ReplyDeleteOne of the above posts put me on the path to the answer. Another post confirmed I had it right.
I had entertained another possible "answer" that might make sense…only that it really doesn't make sense. More on Thursday.
I have to admit I'm dying to find out the number of correct entrants this week (given the circumstances).
ReplyDeleteWe will likely see a correction on the NPR Sunday Puzzle Page sometime on Wednesday.
ReplyDeleteLego
As of noon, Wed., no correction. And at this point, a simple correction wouldn't amount to much as I'm guessing most people have already read the wrong puzzle; NPR would have to add noticeable headline to draw attention to the correction.
DeleteI'm not aware of any 'NPR Puzzle blog' like Blaine's so this group may be the only folks 'IN' on the mix-up.
...and I'd bet Blaine's Blog will get mentioned by Will this Sunday as Will explains.
DeleteOctavius,
DeleteInteresting. I think we both must have checked at the exact same time. It is now 3 minutes before 1 PM back on the East Coast. I do not believe NPR wants to do anything about changing it, but Will probably does. Can you imagine the BBC sitting on a screw up like this and not doing anything about? I can't.
My Tue Aug 30, 09:30:00 PM PDT comment above was wrong. Now I am guessing (not predicting!) that there will be NO correction posted on the NPR site. Will Shortz definitely DOES want the correction to appear on the site.
DeleteLegoWhoWillPostARiffOffWithThePuzzle'sOriginal"MoveTheLastLetter..."WordingOnFriday'sPuzzleria!
Thank you Blaine and Lego. The puzzle solution made me smile and relax.
ReplyDeleteFor a reason that I’ll reveal on Thursday, the intended answer was the first island I considered.
ReplyDeleteIt was one of the first I considered too, but I do not know why.
DeleteThis was not the only web site mistake this week. They failed to include "major league baseball team" in the list. It should be listed as #11, but is not listed at all. Sloppy, sloppy, sloppy. Still not updated BTW.
DeleteI have found an alternate answer for the revised puzzle.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteThe puzzle says to "Name a well known island." I choose to take Staten Island and name it "Egabraa", and when I move the last letter six places in the alphabet, and read it backwards, I get Garbage, which is fitting for Staten Island, and a possible rating for this weeks fiasco of a puzzle.
ReplyDeleteI agree with the puzzle-garbage comparison, but I like Staten Island. Not the spot where Eric Garner was killed, though, that was garbage police work. So I'm lost, is there a legit answer to this thing or what? I've tried everything on the globe practically. Did anyone know that Norway has something like 293,000 islands? Finland has something like 40,000. I know, I know, enough already with the islands!
DeleteThere is indeed a legit answer to the Puzzle, in its corrected construction. But head away from the Ferry, towards Midland. Bring Comix. That's your clue!
DeleteNo Ben. There has been no corrected construction.
DeleteI don't know what steps NPR and its Puzzlemaster are taking to ease the upset everyone who heard the puzzle, tried to solve it and perhaps submitted an answer is feeling.
ReplyDeleteThey have already thanked me (instantaneously) for my answer.
What could possibly prevent them from emailing us again with an apology and the new wording? And a waiver of the one submission rule?
Last time he did this, Will told us how hard the mistake had been on him
It is now 9:25pm on the East Coast and no correction of any kind has been made. The Thursday deadline is just hours away. It now seems clear to me that NPR is not dealing with this in any way other than leaving it completely up to Will Shortz to deal with verbally tomorrow. I would say they are making no effort at all to support him. I see this as a red flag indicating more is going on behind the scenes than we are aware of. Sunday will be Must Hear Radio.
ReplyDeleteI think Will should be made to play his next ping pong match wearing cement galoshes to feel the pain that he inflicted upon those who struggled with the original puzzle.
ReplyDeleteEveryone, almost, makes mistakes. Hardly a tragedy in the grand scope of things. However, one believes they would make at least a minimal effort at correction by editing the NPR site text. That wouldn't reach everyone effectively, of course; but, it would demonstrate audience awareness and concern. Then again, as suggested, maybe there is no "they" in NPR+WS. For want of a proofreader a pretty clever challenge was sidetracked.
ReplyDeleteSome people go ballistic when the postman delivers a wrong address piece of mail to them. I don't know what to call them. "To err is human -to forgive Divine."
DeletePeople take this stuff way too serious.
I don't know if there's a special word for *them*, but the delivered letters are called "ballistic missives".
DeleteThen there were those who went ballistic when their draft notices were delivered to the right address. Everything's relative. My first semester graduate school grades arrived while I was in Basic Training. Ah, those were the days.
DeleteNah...I disagree with this "everybody make mistakes" soft parade. This is a guy that will JUDGE our creative challenges based on originality, syntax, believability, smoothness, etc. Let NPR and WS get THEIR act together. Murphy's Oil Soap using brie eating eiitists.
ReplyDeleteThe irony here (or perhaps the switcheroo) is that they published the wrong wording of the puzzle submitted by someone named “wright”! Anyway all these issues lately would be enough to shake up the puzzle master.
ReplyDeleteSnipper, that is nonsense. Will stated the puzzle incorrectly on the air. You can go to the web site and listen to your heart's content. You cannot blame this one on the interns.
DeleteWhile we are waiting to see what further justification the PM offers, it is worth re-reading a few times what he wrote to Lego above:
ReplyDelete"Will wrote: "I am deeply sorry. The puzzle was submitted to me with incorrect wording, but I didn't catch the error, and I perpetuated it.
It's the FIRST letter of the island that should be shifted six spaces later in alphabet.
Feeling rotten,
Will Shortz"
He received the puzzle in the same form he put out on the air and on the website. Would a proof reader have helped?
It seems he so liked it in that form as to not bother to do what all of us did as many as a hundred times: Take the last letter of the island (which he had in front of him), count six letters forward from the last one (five seconds?), read it or write it backwards (15 seconds?) and find nonsense.
He has told us before that he usually doesn't try to solve submitted puzzles, but not checking the easily found "answer" is ridiculous.
It was not a forgivable mistake, it was careless and cavalier laziness, with no concern for its consequences, which continue.
It could have also worked if the steps were changed. For example, "Reverse the name of a well known island. Move the *last* letter six later in the alphabet and the result is where that island might be located." I'm wondering if it might have been that way and in trying to clean it up, it accidentally got changed to the version that aired.
DeleteThese are good questions. I submit directly to Will by his personal email. Most submit via NPR. We do not know how NPR forwards these submissions to Will. That being said, it is always his responsibility to make certain they work.
DeleteI posted here before that he changes our puzzles without consultation. He also emails a full copy of what will be used on air Fridays. So, I suspect the web site errors are not necessarily made by interns, but by Will himself.
I also posted here once that I received one of these copies on a Friday morning that he was about to record that was using one of my puzzles I had sent him. It had a major error in it made by him. I emailed him as soon as I caught it and he wrote back, flustered, that he had changed it. He has dumbed down the puzzles he has used that I made up, and spoiled all of them. I find it very annoying to send him what I consider a clever puzzle and then to see it spoiled by his editing.
It is now clear to me NPR has told him he made his bed and now has to lay on it. They could easily have commented on air about the glitch, but have chosen not to, for whatever reasons we may never learn.
The only reason we know what the error is is because instead of emailing Will myself, I emailed Lego and then he emailed Will and got the skinny.
sdb: Hows about just posting Willy's email addy here so we can all offer him our thoughts?
ReplyDeleteIf he wanted me to do that he would tell me or do it himself.
DeleteBecause of all of the craziness of the wrong puzzle directions being posted, I will predict that only 35-54 correct answers will be submitted this week.
ReplyDeleteBut what is a correct answer? It cannot be the one originally intended because it does not fit what we were presented with and no correction was made.
DeleteRelax, my good man. This was a late reference to 35 degrees, 54 minutes North, the latitude of the capital of Malta.
DeleteMALTA (which is located in an ATLAS)
ReplyDeleteHint: “At long last…”—remove “long” and the final “t” and you get…
Having solved the puzzle soon after Lego had told us of Will’s correction, I posted the hint without identifying it as such, suggesting that my comment was actually about finally getting the puzzle’s wording right. At first I did consider only the words “At last…” but thought it would almost certainly be TMI and removed by Blaine.
MALTA change the M to S to get ATLAS
ReplyDeleteThis is what the answer would be had the puzzle been presented to us as it should have been, but it wasn't, and therefore it cannot be accepted in my opinion.
EBOLA ISLAND, Sierra Leone. Change the A to G and read backwards and you get GLOBE.
This is the best answer I could come up with for the puzzle as stated. Ebola is certainly well known, and Sierra Leone was an island of Ebola.
MALTA can be located in an ATLAS
ReplyDelete> Sweet!
The ancient Greeks called the island Μελίτη (Melitē) meaning "honey-sweet".
> This island is located a few hundred miles east of the feature named for "where this island is located".
The ATLAS Mountains are a few hundred miles west of MALTA.
First formulation:
ReplyDeleteThe Croatian Island <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pag_(island)”><b><b>PAG</b></b></a>.[Change the <b><b>LAST</b></b> letter G six places later in the alphabet to M & read in reverse] → The island <b><b>PAG</b></b> becomes & is on the <b><b>MAP</b></b>, but I don't know how well-known it is...
Second formulation:
The island of <b><b>MALTA</b></b>,.
If you change the <b><b>FIRST</b></b> letter, M, of the Island six letters later in the alphabet to an S, and then reverse the letters, you have <b><b>ATLAS</b></b>, where Malta can be found...
First formulation:
DeleteThe Croatian Island of PAG yields MAP when you change the LAST letter G six places later in the alphabet to M and read the result in reverse.
Second formulation:
MALTA → ATLAS
Intended answer = MALTA --> ATLAS
ReplyDeleteAlternate answer = JAMAICA --> A CIA MAP
The CIA has long maintained details of every country in their World Factbook so even though it wasn't the intended answer, I still like Jamaica as an alternate.
DeleteDog-gone-it, Blaine! Your late deletion of one of my posts convinced me that your "Alternate answer" was the intended one!
DeleteSorry for leading you astray. I thought JAMAICA --> A CIA MAP was the answer until I found MALTA --> ATLAS. See my post above
DeleteSo that also explains why my comment was deleted (I used the word "map"). You are forgiven. ;-)
DeleteMALTA — ATLAS
ReplyDeleteOne of the above posts put me on the path to the answer.
That was Proud parent of cats's soon-removed reference to The Liberation Trilogy by Rick Atkinson. Thanks to jan's earlier geographic clue, "located a few hundred miles east…," it crossed my mind to take a closer look at the images of maps, which led me to Malta, from which I immediately got Atlas. And what do you know—Malta is indeed located a few hundred miles east of…the Atlas Mountains!
Another post confirmed I had it right.
That was Nodd's post suggesting that moving the third letter four spaces later in the alphabet, and deleting all succeeding letters, would give you "essentially the same answer"—namely, a map (essentially the same as an atlas).
I had entertained another possible "answer" that might make sense…only that it really doesn't make sense.
That was JAMAICA — A CIA MAP. What didn't make sense to me was: First, I was unable to confirm that. And, second: Why this, of all associations?
For what it's worth, Jamaica is located in the atlas as well—although not as close to the Atlas Mountains as Malta!
A big "Thank you!" to all those who were instrumental in finding out how the puzzle should have been worded. What a puzzle week this has been!
Thank you, Blaine, for pointing out in your post how I could have confirmed the CIA had Jamaica on a map…! 😉
DeleteThe intended answer was the first one I considered thanks to my dog Carina who is a Maltese.
ReplyDeleteMALTA - ATLAS or
ReplyDeleteJAMAICA - A CIA MAP (my unsubmitted alternative)
My comments:
"35-54 correct answers" The latitude of the capital of Malta is 35 degrees, 54 minutes North.
"Perhaps WS is holed up somewhere..." Atlas was tasked to hold up the earth.
Malta, Atlas
ReplyDeleteOur Puzzleria! menu this week is "Chuck-full O’ Tricky Sticklers" – namely, four appetizing puzzles prepared by our friend Chuck for his "Conundrumbstruck by Chuck!" feature. They are titled:
ReplyDelete1. “Blinding you with science fiction,”
2. “Monkeys stand for honesty, giraffes are insincere,”
3. “Digging up an ‘underground’ anagram,” and
4. “Talkin’ some ‘snack’ ”
We upload Puzzleria! every early Friday Morning, just after Midnight PDT.
Also on this week's menus are:
* a Schpuzzle of the Week titled, a “A 'double-literectomy' can hurt!”
* a Slice of puzzle titled "He who hesitates doesn’t medal,"
* a Dessert puzzle about a professional person who seems never to have given a subpar performance, and
* Seven riff-offs of this week's NPR puzzle titled: ‘Twas “last” at first, but ‘twas “first” at last!
Come, be Conundrumstruck by Chuck! (He is giving you four strikes, not just three!)
LegoThe"Unenlightninged"
MALTA-->ATLAS. My post had two hints. (1) You can get essentially the same answer by moving the third letter four spaces ahead and deleting the rest. (MAP) (2) I tried to think of a better hint but couldn't come up with "any. Darn." (AYN RAND, author of Atlas Shrugged)
ReplyDeleteMy clue was "Hmph, gotta dash now."
ReplyDeleteHmphrey Bogart, Dashiel Hammett... the Maltese Falcon.
Malta --> atlas
ReplyDeleteLast Sunday I said, “Well, now that we have an actual puzzle to solve, I’ll go do my makeup workout routine that I should have done Sunday morning instead of finding a needle that doesn’t exist in a haystack.” Some of you may be too young to remember, but there was a body builder named Charles Atlas who created popular workouts in “one of the longest-lasting and most memorable ad campaigns of all time.”
JAMAICA - A CIA MAP
ReplyDeleteMy hint was to Swan Island, E of Honduras and SW of the Cayman Islands in the Caribbean. In 1961 the CIA set up a 50 kW "clandestine" station there. It transmitted on 1160 (actually 1165) kHz medium-wave/AM, as Radio Swan and later, Radio Americas using a 2-tower directional array aimed at Cuba. Consequently, it was also readily received up the E coast of the USA. Wikipedia>/b>.
The Swan Islands now belong to Honduras.
Malta, Atlas
ReplyDeleteOne Both my clues focused on Charles Atlas. Specifically, the "Hero of the Beach" comic I saw throughout my childhood.
First, I wrote the puzzle has my "stamp" of approval, as in "I'll gamble a stamp..."
Then, I wrote to the Staten Island thread that the poster should "head away from the Ferry, towards Midland. Bring Comix." Because Midland Staten Island has a nice beach, and if you bring comix...
Delete
Island: Saba; Location: A Bay .....My choice and the correct answer!!!
ReplyDelete