WoW: Phedinkus

15 June, 2015

PHEDINKUS [ferr-DINK-us] - nonsense, malarkey [Nonce word coined by US writer Damon Runyan, adding the pseudo-Greek prefix of ph onto dinkus, a gadget] Due to its vague roots and meaning, phedinkus can also substitute for whatsit or thingummyjig.

Skeleton Keg [BB513]

14 June, 2015

Each answer below has been given a grand finale. Halloween beer barrel, is SKELETON KEG, where the orthodox phrase ‘skeleton key’ has gained a grand (or G) finish. 

How many can you snag? And can you compose your own comical variations for us to 'thing' about?

DA1 - Sweaty, cranky insect (3,5,3)

DA2 - How a genie smokes dope? (8)

DA3 - Symphonic sow (9,3)

DA4 - Global thunderclap (5,4)

DA5 - Morbid online journal (5,4)

DA6 - Alpine jewellery (4,5)

DA7 - Bipartisan battleaxe? (7,3)

DA8 - Candid eccentric (4,3)

SOLUTION NEXT WEEK

BB512 SOLUTION: Dover Heights, Marsfield (or Marsden Park), Picnic Point (and arguably Yowie Bay); Bickley Vale, Drummoyne, Kenthurst (Other suburbs are possible.)

Conundrum Cluster

12 June, 2015

Rather than a Friday folly this week, here are five tough questions to wrestle. You may need to rely upon the wisdom of crowds, as none of these will yield their answers easily. So feel free to theorise, or offer inklings, as one person's input may lead to another's outcome.

Conundrum 1 (from the Salon): What brand-word began as a French portmanteau, and is know a common noun?

Conundrum 2: ABIDE (or ABODE) owns four letters in their corresponding slots in the alphabet. So what familiar 12-letter word can boast five?

Condundrum 3: What common 10-letter word opens with a consonant pair, followed by a vowel pair, then 2 consonants, 2 vowels and lastly 2 consonants?

Condundrum 4: What links mondegreen, fashionista, bodyline, factoid, flying saucer & metrosexual?

Condundrum 5: What seven-letter word can see its initial C relocate to the tail in order to create a loose definition of the original word?

PS: If you live in or near Melbourne, there are some excellent tickets for the Williamstown Lit Fest to be snaffled. All you need to do is solve a few simple DA puzzles here.

Happy brainstorming.

Scrabble Threes

9 June, 2015

Often the hardest words to clue can be the shortest. So let's put that truism to the test, dreaming up clues for this unilkely brigade of midgets culled from the Scrabble dictionary. (There are so many rarities, I only needed to raid the first half of the alphabet.)

If you wish to see the loco lot in toto, try here.

Anyhow, we need both definition and wordplay here. Good luck, as some of these defintions seem as cryptic as the recipes you may apply. May be the FAB BEY (a Turkish sovereign) rule supreme.

ARD - primitive plough

BEZ - second tine of a deer's horn

CLY - to seize or steal

FAP - inebriated

FON - to compel

GAW - imperfect rainbow

JOW - to strike a bell

KED - wingless fly that infests sheep

KOW - bunch of twigs

KYU - judo novice

Cly the moment, I fon you.

Hooray for Riddledom

8 June, 2015

Q: What's black, white, red with a yellow chicken?

A: Riddledom - 101 Riddles and their Stories.

I'm mighty proud of the new book's scope, plus its many folkloric scoops, finding the most outrageous and intriguing riddles from around the globe, and across time, roaming Zanzibar and Myanmar.

Still a few months before copies hit the shelves, but bookshops have been ordering up. Go here to pre-grab, or take a further peek of the Riddledom blurb and details.

This is one major mystery tour for anyone into language as much as culture and the human brain. The official launch is slated to be part of the Melbourne Writers Fest in late August. So why not come along and crack some enigmas? Details to be available soon.

And while you're pondering that invitation, some other scattergun news:

+ a new poll [at last] has just been posted on site, regarding Scrabble's text invasion;

+ chatting this Wednesday on the Conversation Hour about Russian Jews in Australia, and The Secret River's adaption to TV. Should be worth a podslurp;

+ on Sunday, as part of the Williamstown Lit Fest, I'll be giving a world-first Cluetopia lecture, complete with slides of many of these rare and dangerous puzzles.

Now a Word Question: What brand-word began as French portmanteau, and is know a common noun?

And for those still doing UK puzzles, there have been some treasures in the G and Times lately. You know you can always share the ahas and grrs here. Cheers, and have a wordy week.

WoW: Eucatastrophe

8 June, 2015

EUCATASTROPHE [YEW-cah-TAS-truh-fee] - sudden and favourable turn of events [Coinage of JRR Tolkien, from Greek eu - beautiful + kata - down + strophe - turning] Heroes in fairy tales often evade doom by dint of eucatastrophe.

Suburban Mayhem [BB512]

7 June, 2015

A smaller-scale Birdbrain this week, which has all sort of potential for extra challenges, drawing on suburbs in either Sydney, or Melbourne - or possibly elsewhere.

DA1 - What three Sydney suburbs open with well-known chocolate bars?

DA 2 - While what suburbs open with three different brands familiar to smokers? (Hint: only one brand is a cigarette.)

SOLUTION NEXT WEEK

BB511 SOLUTION: Great universe (Daewoo), High view (Alta Vista), Swift creature (Yahoo!), Leave luck to heaven (Nintendo), Moby Dick sailor (Starbucks), Pleiades constellation (Subaru), Sunrise (Hitachi), Three-rhombus (Mitsubishi), Three stars (Samsung), Danish king (Bluetooth)

Huh 49

5 June, 2015

A few head-scratchers from recent Brit puzzles. Enough to recruit a few more heads, so that we can scratch together. Or maybe you'll perceive the logic at first glance, and tell me what I'm missing. 

Then again, if you'd rather pass on the parsing, feel free to create clues for the same batch of answers. See who can't out-Brit the Brits in surface sheen.

1. Mostly put out about risen and not forbidden double-dealing = DUPLICITOUS

2. Maybe greeting King, recklessly firing secret rounds = GRIEF-STRICKEN

3. Spooner's plan to attract mods to Bordeaux store, perhaps = WINE CELLAR

4. Intimate chat of a lord with a good track record reportedly = COZY

5. English paper’s redhead dropped? No latitude there = EQUATOR

6. Incomplete permission to enter for Felipe, the king = ELVIS

7. Rescuers on the way to see rescue ship find one of first pair listed for saving?  = LANDMARK

Thanks for any insights, and delights.

Take A Jump, Benjamin

2 June, 2015

Currently enjoying the punctuation porn known as Between You & Me - Confessions of a Comma Queen - by Mary Norris. Recommended.

Not just for the grammar yarns, the 'tense' standoffs, but also the curious flashbacks to spelling reformers such as Noah Webster and Benjamin Franklin. In fact, Franklin lobbied hard for C, J, W and Y to be removed from the alphabet, making powwow and John Wayne all the more problematic.

This week's Storm would be tricky too, given that your answers must contain 3 of these letters at least. Hence such solutions as wacky and juicy are OK, Woy Woy and coccyx, yacht club and cowboy. My openers:

JOCKEY - Funny saddles cruel start for rider

[JOKEY around C]

CYCLONE - Candy replica a major blow

WHICH WAY - Outspoken spelling champ to assess Quo Vadis

Gentle Ben beginning. What else can we conjure?

WoW: Shadchan

1 June, 2015

SHADCHAN [SHART-uh-ken] - a matchmaker or marriage-broker. [From Yiddish, shadkhan, from Hebrew] Shadchanim - the plural form - are the altar egos of the synagogue. 

Logology [BB511]

31 May, 2015

You’ll need more than your Nikes (named after the Greek goddess of victory) or Reeboks (antelopes) to figure out the major brands that own the derivations below.

Products can stem from the supermarket, the showroom, the strip mall.... (And what other brands own curious backgrounds? See if you can stump us here.)

DA1 - Great universe (Korean)

DA2 - High view (Spanish)

DA3 - Jonathon Swift creature         

DA4 - Leave luck to heaven (Jap)

DA5 - Moby Dick sailor

DA6 - Pleiades constellation (Jap)

DA7 - Sunrise (Jap)

DA8 - Three-rhombus (Jap)

DA9 - Three stars (Korean)

DA10 - Danish king

SOLUTION NEXT WEEK 

BB510 SOLUTION: Research, diagnose, warmth, obeyed, friskiness, sacrilege, machinist, chandelier, thankless, vermouth, delivery, orchestra

Avid Ones

29 May, 2015

Wheel out the guillotine as we prepare for a spate of beheadings. Two words, or names, need to be involved, turning David Jones (say) into avid ones. Or Greek Easter into reek aster, shopping mall into hopping all.

No mixing is necessary. Just two clean chops to create your new phrase. To turn the game into a puzzle, please provide clues, plus your initials and number. For example, to get the truncated heads rolling...

DA1 - Pips' leader?/Hen party

DA2 - Book's prelim phase/Lane shelter?

DA3 - Phone phase?/Limerick?

DA4 - Scientific satellite/Gown going places? 

DA5 - Obstacle/Salon sight?

DA6 - Adhesive/Nosy goon?

Compounds are kosher (screwdriver > crew river). Though we may need to use word lengths if the solving proves too tough. Let's see how the cookie rumbles.

Scrabble Newbs

26 May, 2015

This week's Wordplay column (in the SMH's Spectrum) tackles that ticklish problem of new Scrabble words. Should OBVS and LOLZ qualify? Is there a home for LOTSA and THANX?

While that debate simmers, let's celebrate the more inspiring imports on the extension list, by cooking up clues (both definition & wordplay) for any of the following:

COQUI - Puerto Rican tree frog

QUINZHEE - temporary snow shelter; impromptu igloo

PACZKI - enclosed, jam-filled doughnut of Poland

HACKTIVIST - one who tampers with an IT system for political reasons

PODIUMED - finished among a contest's top three

WOJUS (Irish) - of poor quality

QAMUTIK - sled with wooden runners

ZEDA - grandfather

Yes, ZEDA is a jumble of DAZE, but why not bedazzle with some more daring constructions? Or skew the clue in such a way that your story is seamless.? Come on down - the sandbox is yours.

WoW: Materteral

25 May, 2015

MATERTERAL [mah-TURR-tur-uhl] - relating to an aunt [From Latin matertera, maiden aunt] Materteral is the seldom aired feminine flipside of avuncular.

Operation: Brainstorm [BB510]

24 May, 2015

No puzzle for the squeamish today. Each word has lost its body part, meaning PUNISHING, which holds SHIN, appears as PUNIG (4). Can you perform the vital surgery under pressure?

Please note, the last FOUR examples all require a body part of five letters.

DA1 - RESCH

DA2 - DIAG

DA3 - WTH

DA4 - OBD

DA5 - FRIESS

DA6 - SACRIE

DA7 - MAIST

DA8 - CELIER

DA9 - THSS

DA10 - VER

DA11 - DEY

DA12 - ORRA

SOLUTION NEXT WEEK

BB509 SOLUTION: Jinx, Jimi Hendrix, Ajax, jack-in-the-box, banjax, bijoux, Julius Marx, Mexican jumping bean, sex object, juxtapose, jambeaux, John Knox

H Honours

22 May, 2015

Holy hell, how hard and harrowing was our H hoedown this week? Not too hectic, but we did haul in some highly handsome handiwork. 

To cut to the chase, and hoick those H-words, I will offer a handful of musings, and then declare the book-winning pair.

Firstly, a warning from Rupert I enjoyed:

IRIS - Inside stir isn't the place to eye muscle

Then the devilry of jpr's CAMBER/well, clued as Rush home. That makes my Friday skulduggery seem like Cluedo.

Further credit to Rupert for his Arepo reference for SOWER - a meta-allusion for all genuine crossword geeks, as well as his lingerie comedy:

THONGS - Nothing's tangled in discarded underwear

I thrilled to SK's innovation, using 'quick' in the sense of essence:

Crossword (Quick) appear in Sunday Express initally = SORE

Genius idea, and an Anaxesque execution. Equally good was the CS double - with two smile-triggering clues, both original in their approach:

FARTHING - Coin 'black stump', say?

FARTING - Some of art in Guggenheim causing a stink

Very close to seizing the prize, but for sheer outrage and originality, I could not ignore Jon's deja-vu two that used without in contrary ways to present the epitome of ambiguity:

SAVING - Cutting excess without hard scraping

SHAVING - Cutting excess without hard scraping

Stunning deception, and a classy response to a dual clue challenge. Congratz to that hero, and hail all hands who had a whirl. (Jon, if you can let me know your best snail, I will send H Factor your way.) Thanks everyone for the hoot.

Hs Away!

19 May, 2015

Time for a contest, with a tangible and readable prize. The book up for grabs is called The (H)Aitch Factor by Macquarie Dictionary's own Susan Butler. The title alone should help you guess where this showdown is going...

That's right - H hoicking. But not just in Cockney style (turning hair into air), but anywhere the H is hiding. That means HERRING and ERRING is a legit pair, despite the sound variance, just as much as BATH and BAT can be a couple. (Ditto for HEATH and HEAT - or EAT - where you banish whichever H/s you choose.)

Once you devise your duo - ditching the H from any word or name to make another - can you cook up two classy clues?

Let's not worry about aliases, as in the past. (Not sure if DisQus is all that keen about the ploy anyhow.) The winner will likely emerge amid a hubbub of consensus, otherwise I'll play Lord High Honcho to decree the stand-out double. My starters:

HAILING - Poor weather flagging

AILING - Harbour pursuit to remove sulphur, going green

LATHER - Prepare to shave woodworker?

LATER - Old opener lost face by and by

Have a helluva hoot, and I'll announce the best duo on Friday.

Salon 54 - Unphonetic Alphabet

18 May, 2015

Received a brain-buzzing email from Chris Woods over the weekend, a bloke who's busy building his own non-phonetic alphabet. 

We all know about the ham-radio kind, where A is Alpha, and P is Papa etc, but Chris has sought out words that sound as though they should start with the nominated letter, but don't. To warm you up:

A as in Hair

E as in Aesthetic

F as in Photo

G as in Jet

The harder ones to harvest - so far - have been D (bdellium), I (yttrium), J (djibbah - long Muslim coat), K (qiviut - a musk ox's underwool!) and Q (kwacha - Zambia's currency, 100 ngwee in fact). 

As you can see, this alphabet enters some obscure waters, but perhaps it will be creativity as much as vocabulary that will finalise Chris's task. In a drastic bid to seal the deal, Chris is still on the hunt for words that match up with B, C, M, U and V. 

For C, I could suggest and hard-k opener (kitchen, kettle), but that denies the soft-c option as well, as mimicked in soft and sun. Either way, the ideas are worth sharing to finish the folly that Chris gamely began. All out-there words and whims welcome.

WoW: Kakemono

18 May, 2015

KAKEMONO [kak-uh-MO-no] - Japanese scroll or calligraphy, usually edged with silk, often seen as a wall hanging [From Japanese, literally 'hanging thing'] Sushi houses create an authentic feel with ample kakemono on the walls.

J-Xs [BB509]

17 May, 2015

All twelve answers, including some names and phrases, hold both an X and J, such as extrajudicial or Jewish Orthodox.

(And is there any candidate we overlooked?)

1. Hoodoo

2. Purple Rain legend

3. Greek warrior

4. Spring toy

5. Ruin – UK slang

6. Small jewels  

7. Groucho

8. Latino moth pod

9. Person as beddable thing?           

10. Neighbour 

11. Leg armours

12. Presbyterian pioneer   

SOLUTION NEXT WEEK

BB508 SOLUTION: Room, hoard, tied, whine, snots, tyro, rioted, hafts