Q: Name a famous person from America's past who has four letters in his or her first name and five letters in the last. Take a homophone of the last name, move it to the front. The result would be something a woman might write. What is it?"Doh!
A: John Deere --> Dear John
Q: Name the female of a certain animal, add the name of a bird, say these two words out loud one after the other, and phonetically you'll name a country. What country is it?This reminds me of a puzzle from last year, and the weather forecast in Europe.
A: EWE + CRANE = UKRAINE
Q: Think of an adjective that might describe a child before a summer vacation. Change the second letter to the next letter of the alphabet, and you'll name someone you might see in a hospital. Who is it?I'm sorry to dash your hopes, there are no clues in this post today.
A: IMPATIENT and INPATIENT
Q: Name a classic television show in two words with eight letters. Remove one letter from each word. The remaining six letters, in order, will spell the last name of a well-known writer. Who is it?Musical hint: btmiihlsihhwbwr
A: STAR TREK
Remove T from the first word, K from the second word
Jean-Paul SARTRE
Q: Think of a common four-letter adjective. Then take its opposite in French. (It's a French word that everyone knows.) Say the two words out loud, one after the other, and you'll name a famous film director. Who is it?It's déjà vu, all over again.
A: TRUE + FAUX --> François TRUFFAUT
Q: Take the word "ballerina," drop one letter and rearrange the remaining eight letters to name a well-known fictional character. Who is it?My wife asked me, "A hat puzzle, then a helmet puzzle. What's next?"
A: Ballerina (remove 'a') --> Li'l Abner
Q: Think of a former world leader whose first and last names both sound like things you might see in a mine. Who is the leader, and what are the things?Now that this blog has been mentioned on the NPR website, we can expect great things. Here come all the new visitors looking for the answers to last week's hat puzzle. For the rest of us, this week's puzzle shouldn't be too hard.
A: HELMUT KOHL --> HELMET, COAL
Q: A hat room contains a wall with 49 pegs, arranged in a 7-by-7 square. The hat clerk has 20 hats that are to be hung on 20 different pegs. How many lines, containing four hats in a straight line, is it possible to produce? A line can go in any direction: horizontally, vertically or obliquely. To explain your answer, number the pegs in order, from 1 in the upper left corner to 49 in the lower right corner; list which pegs you put the 20 hats on, and give the total number of lines containing four hats in a row.Liane has left, but it also seems like the NPR website editors are gone. Last week they had "goose" as a two word phrase (instead of "roast goose") and this week they misspelled Sam Loyd (as Sam Lloyd). Anyway, back to the puzzle; not counting rotations and reflections, I have 3 ways to get the answer.
A: I found 3 main solutions (not counting reflections and rotations). Click each one to see a larger view with any rotated/reflected variants.
Q: Take the two-word title of a TV series. The first word contains a famous actor's first name in consecutive letters. The second word is a homophone for this actor's last name. Name the series and the actor.My hint: 80% of Ararat in space... figure that one out.
A: American Idol --> Eric Idle
Q: Think of two five-letter words that are exact opposites, in which the first two letters of each word are the same as the first two letters of the other, only reversed. Hint: The fourth letter of each word is A. What two words are these?Déjà vu. Okay, so time for some open discussion. What do you think of Audie being the regular host of NPR: Weekend Edition Sunday? Is she doing a good job? How does she compare to Liane? How is Will with a new puzzle partner? Do you even listen to the puzzle on-air or do you read it online only? What do you think of them repeating a puzzle? Do you have a better puzzle?
A: Same as last week
