Q: The onetime country duo "Montgomery Gentry" and the classic song "Go on With the Wedding" have a very unusual wordplay property in common. What is it?Those that have read the Narnia series will have an advantage.
Sunday, May 25, 2025
NPR Sunday Puzzle (May 25, 2025): Unusual Wordplay
NPR Sunday Puzzle (May 25, 2025): Unusual Wordplay
101 comments:
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One of my submissions to Puzzleria! was based on this idea, but my puzzle wasn't as satisfying.
ReplyDeleteRoar!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteSounds like a Wordle stumper.
ReplyDeleteGreat puzzle from Ed Pegg, Jr.! His father would be proud if he just gave a flip.
ReplyDeleteOoooh, I was thinking through a variant of that clue.
DeleteWell, back to the drawing board.
A rather flippant remark.
DeleteAnd probably rather controversial.
DeleteHow many correct answers last week ?
ReplyDeleteOver 1000
DeleteI wish the band had six members.
ReplyDeleteNo clue here, but I think Ed could have and should have picked phrases that are more familiar to more people than the ones he picked. Anyway, this is not too tricky a puzzle if you write it out and just look at it.
ReplyDeleteEd Pegg here. I sent Will a longer list several years ago. Those are the two Will picked from the list.
DeleteRoger that, Ed. No insult intended. I just think it would have made a stronger, more enjoyable puzzle to use more familiar phrases. Anyway, congratulations on having your puzzle be selected.
DeleteI, for one, would be very interested in seeing the entire list. But maybe post it in two weeks or so, because some of it might show up on Puzzleria! first and I wouldn't want spoilers.
DeleteI think I’ve got the answer, but can’t think of a clue that wouldn’t be TMI. So I’m waiting to hear from you guys to help me see if my answer is correct. And I get Blaine’s clue (which is RARE for me!)
ReplyDeleteI'm in the same boat.
DeleteWould that be, The Sloop John B?
DeleteHopefully not the Cuauhtémoc
DeleteI think if you understand Blaine's clue, you're almost certainly correct-toe-mundo. --Margaret G.
DeleteThink of another famous song from the 1950s. Remove the last two letters from the first word. Then remove the letters of the last name of a famous politician. You'll have the same wordplay.
ReplyDeleteI'm stumped.
ReplyDeleteAssuming that isn't a clue, same here.
DeleteScarlett - I had the same thought. I was also wondering if this was a clue. What did the tree say to the lumberjack? I'm stumped...
DeleteSorry, I didn't mean to mislead anyone. I am stumped, as in clueless.
DeleteNot a problem Musinglink. It's all in the game. But I think you'll agree that Curtis told acorn-y joke.
DeleteIf Blaine came up with his clue on the spur of the moment, I'm very impressed. Or did you know that phrase had that property?
ReplyDeleteThere's a way of taking it a step further.
DeleteC. S. Lewis was, of course, a lay theologian besides being an author. An atheist as a young man, he became a trinitarian Anglican later in life.
What if he had another revelation and rejected the conventional church doctrine? If he had embraced the Latter Day Saints, or the Unitarians?
This takes, like, guts!
ReplyDeleteAnd it shouldn't be a total loss for this pro sports team ...
DeleteAnyone for ballet?
ReplyDeleteI almost swallowed my gum when I got it.
ReplyDeleteIf I got the right answer, I wouldn't refer to it as "very unusual" but as bizarre!
ReplyDeleteThe cycle of life?
ReplyDeleteSome numbers can have a similar property. However, there is only one prime number under 100000 with this property.
ReplyDeleteUse commas.
DeleteSpeaking of numbers, today, 5/25/25, is one of a bunch of consecutive palindromic dates.
DeleteAre you a backward thinker?
DeleteAre Michael and Sarah going on palindromic dates?
DeleteFor a number to have each digit twice, it must have an even number of digits. All of the 2-digit numbers with 2 of the same digit are obviously divisible by 11, so 11 is the only prime. 4-digit numbers of the form aabb or abba are divisible by 11. Numbers of the form abab are divisible by 101. Therefore, 11 is the only prime under 100000 with 2 of each digit.
DeleteMarty's worst?
ReplyDeleteMusical Clue: King Crimson Indiscipline
ReplyDeleteGood clue. Good clue.
DeleteCould Will's choice of this puzzle have something to do with Memorial Day?
ReplyDeleteThis puzzle has a connection with me, but it would be TMI to say what it is now.
ReplyDeleteWhat is the difference between a dangerous animal strolling through the streets of an Alaskan town, and two appropriately, and traditionally, attired British businessmen strolling across the Tower Bridge in London?
ReplyDeletePolar bear vs bowler pair.
DeleteThat was quick! I knew it would not be difficult, but I tried to obscure the animal wording as much as I could.
DeleteBears have a keen olfactory sense, but I can smell a Spoonerism of yours a mile away.
DeleteUrsine that outta pride I would assume.
DeleteI'm not going to panda to bamboozling like that.
DeleteBut you koala to pieces over my cheap shoot.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteGot it! Although, I honestly don't know the name for this particular type of Wordplay, even after looking over the Grammarly page for "16 Types of Wordplay." Perhaps if I looked over it again…?
ReplyDeleteLet's save that for Thursday.
DeleteThat's okay; Claude was able to provide me with that name. (Its ability to do so was contingent on me having solved this puzzle, though.)
DeleteThat's a good page. Vielen Dank.
DeleteI remember I sent this puzzle to Will when I visited Florence, California.
ReplyDeleteHow amazing!
DeleteThis puzzle is a duplicate.
ReplyDeleteThere is a connection to the last puzzle.
ReplyDeleteIf we ever get 50 Pope Leos, then the 50th Pope Leo will be Pope Leo L, which has 2 of each letter.
DeleteLet NPR run a puzzle AI did too?
ReplyDeleteMy post was my hint...I had to add another A to make AI so that I would have two of each letter.
DeleteI think I'm beginning to solve this puzzle. I think I'm beginning to solve this puzzle.
ReplyDeleteHow about those NY Knicks? Somehow overcoming that tenacious Indiana D on the road to finally take a game and make this a series. [oh yeah, fun puzzle this week]
ReplyDeleteIt may be revealing too much but a former NY Mets prospect comes to mind. Sometimes they do well, tip of the cap to the team, not Pittsburgh, that got this other guy from the Mets.
DeleteI really miss those BOGO sales at Ollies.
DeleteTimely piano man?
ReplyDeleteLawmaker taking it all in?
DeleteTrickle down economics?
DeleteProtections for skeptics?
DeleteOPPORTUNE TUNER / ABSORBENT SENATOR / QUID PRO QUO DRIP / AGNOSTIC COATINGS
DeleteAs of yesterday, I had found what appeared to me to be the answer to the puzzle. I had commented that I was not able to think of a clue that was not TMI. Now that I have had the opportunity to review more comments, I'm thinking I have an alternate answer to the puzzle. Nothing commented so far matches with the property I found.
ReplyDeleteRewatched Mamma Mia last night. Still humming all those ABBA tunes. Dancing Queen!
ReplyDeleteWithout drifting into TMI land, it took a bit of extra effort to state the puzzle answer concisely enough to fit the "short answer" space provided on the puzzle submission form. It'll be interesting to see the way everyone worded his/her answer Thursday.
ReplyDeleteAll I can say is, growing up we had four cryptograms appearing in the Sunday Birmingham News every weekend. They had sort of the same wordplay as in this puzzle. Some times a little more, but never less. Hopefully this doesn't seem like TMI to anyone, but you never can tell.
ReplyDeletepjbEventuallyGotGoodEnoughToSolveAllFourEveryWeek!
I figured it out at noon.
ReplyDelete"Noon." Nice!
DeleteIf I have the right answer, here are clues for a couple of other things with the same property: (1) eaves in summer but not always in winter; (2) what a man's friend said to someone else about why the man couldn't find a place to put cut flowers.
ReplyDeleteTake yet another famous song title from the 1950s. Remove from it a British term for a man, and what remains follows the same wordplay principle.
ReplyDeleteHere's the Tiraspol railway station.
ReplyDeleteI submitted an answer. I’m 90 - 95% sure it’s the right answer. I’m not sure I’d call it “wordplay.” Maybe there’s a term that describes phrases like "Montgomery Gentry" and "Go on With the Wedding"
ReplyDeleteThey're both PAIR ISOGRAMS; each letter appears exactly twice.
ReplyDelete> I don't have the guts to be a farrier.
INTESTINES and HORSESHOER are also PAIR ISOGRAMS.
> Speaking of numbers, today, 5/25/25, is one of a bunch of consecutive palindromic dates.
Any palindrome with an even number of characters is a PAIR ISOGRAM, of course.
> I'm reminded of a favorite quote from an American aerospace manager when announcing that his company (Boeing, maybe?) was abandoning efforts to build a variable-geometry commercial supersonic transport.
He said something like, "If God intended Man to fly swing-wing planes, He would have given us SWING WINGS." (Another PAIR ISOGRAM.)
>> . . . I honestly don't know the name for this particular type of Wordplay. . .
> Let's save that for Thursday.
PAIR ISOGRAM anagrams to "rispargiamo", Italian for "Let's save".
> Here's the Tiraspol railway station.
It's where you can catch TRAINS in TRANSNISTRIA, a PAIR ISOGRAM formed from the scrambled doubled letters of TRAINS.
Each letter in each phrase is used twice and only twice.
ReplyDeleteLast Sunday I said, “No clue here, but I think the phrases should have been more familiar to more people than the ones picked. Anyway, this is not too tricky a puzzle if you write it out and just look at it.”
The two phrases have exactly 2 copies of each letter.
ReplyDeleteA bit of a yawn for me.
"Rewatched Mamma Mia last night. Still humming all those ABBA tunes." ABBA shares the double letter quality.
Both are second-order isograms; i.e., each letter appears exactly twice.
ReplyDeleteMy Puzzleria! Puzzle:
Name a famous lyricist. Between the letters of the first and last names, each letter appears exactly twice. Now remove each duplicate and rearrange the letters to produce two common words. One of the words is relevant to one of the lyricist’s works.
Who is the lyricist? What are the words?
ALAN (JAY) LERNER; LEARN, RENAL
My other hint:
Think of another famous song from the 1950s. Remove the last two letters from the first word. Then remove the letters of the last name of a famous politician. You'll have the same wordplay.
Tennessee Waltz - ee - (Tim) Walz = two Ts, two Es, two Ns, two Ss.
Wanted to make it another Patti Page song. Not a difficult type of puzzle to create if you can add and subtract letters! 😂
TortieWhoIsGoingToBePostingSomeRiffsOfTheseOnceTheNewPuzzleria!IsPostedIncludingOneThatIThinkIsQuiteInteresting!
I wrote, “Sounds like a Wordle stumper.” A few years ago, the word PARER destroyed the streaks of around 60% of Wordle players. “Parer” sounds like “pairer,” and if you are a pairer of the letters in the names, you pair them all up.
ReplyDeleteBoth are isogrammatic phrases (or simply isograms). More specifically, they are bigrams (or double isograms) because each letter appears exactly twice.
ReplyDeleteI didn't know those names at first, but I did post a hint in my comment: "Perhaps if I looked over it again…," which would mean I would have looked it over exactly twice.
PS: Nice "Narnia series" clue, Blaine! :)
DeleteGood extracurricular research. Now the puzzle seems a bit less miscellaneous and more catagorisable.
DeleteWhen I saw the Trasipol railway station in Transnistria, I knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that I got mine right. In this week's puzzle, the two phrases had double sets of letters, 8 pairs of 2, in Montgomery Gentry and 9 pairs of two in the second phtase. I think it would be neat to just give the pairs of letters and then figure out the phrase.
ReplyDeleteI wrote "Marty's worst?", a reference to Martin Scorsese's movie "New York, New York," which has gotten some of the worst reviews of any of his films. (Disclaimer: I have not seen it but I am told that Liza Minnelli and Robert DeNiro had the type of screen chemistry that is outlawed by the Geneva Convention.)
ReplyDeleteI commented that Ed Pegg, Jr.'s father would be proud if he just gave a flip. If you flip the P in Ed Pegg (by rotating, not reflecting), his name becomes a pair isogram.
ReplyDeleteEach letter that appears occurs exactly twice.
ReplyDeleteReady for some "Puzzle Fun?" Then Bobby Jacobs is your man! And Puzzleria! is your blog!
ReplyDeleteWe will be uploading "Bobby Jacobs Puzzle Fun" this very afternoon – indeed, very soon this very afternoon! Bobby's two-puzzle Critters & Capitals Appetizer is titled “The Turtle and the Bunny race through the Country”. (Our friend Tortitude may have an unfair advantage!) Your knowledge capital cities, as well as of critters, may come in handy.
Also our our menu this week:
* a Schpuzzle of the Week titled, "Two chains, two missing links,"
* a Folk-Heroic Hors d’Oeuvre titled “Copy-Cattle?”
* a Unique & Extraordinary Slice titled "???? – one r = (π+e+s) = pies!"
* An Oasis in a Dessert(?) titled “Doth ‘heavenly’ do thy body justice?,” and
* 10 riffs (six by Nodd) of this week's NPR puzzle titled “We got Ed Pegged as a Puzzle Wiz!” (but first he's gotta flip either the "d" or the "p" in his name 180-along that pesky Z-axis (which is constantly projecting from our screen/page and jabbing us in the face!).
So, please join us for some "Puzzle Fun," courtesy of Mr. Jacobs, "Master of discomBOBBYlation."
LegoAFanOfBobby's"PuzzleFun"
Narnia Series is another pair—I believe they are actually the Narnia Chronicles, but series works for the isograms.
ReplyDeleteIt was Blaine’s clue that helped me solve the puzzle.
ReplyDeleteI asked, What if C. S, Lewis had another revelation and rejected the conventional church doctrine? If he had embraced the Latter Day Saints, or the Unitarians?
ReplyDeleteThen he could have been an ANTITRINITARIAN. That's a triple-isogram!
Oh, and I also wished the band had six members, so it would be a SESTET.
ReplyDeleteI wrote "If I have the right answer, here are clues for a couple of other things with the same property: (1) eaves in summer but not always in winter; (2) what a man's friend said to someone else about why the man couldn't find a place to put cut flowers."
ReplyDeleteEvidently I did have the right answer, and my two definitions referred respectively to "icicleless" (OK, maybe that's merely a constructed word that's not in the dictionary and that would benefit from having a hyphen in between "icicle" and "less", but it works) and "I have his vase", both of which also have each letter occurring exactly twice.