WoW: Eucatastrophe
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]
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
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
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
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]
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
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
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
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]
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
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!
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
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
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]
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
Rupert's Recipe
Earlier this week, Rupert went wild with a recipe, cooking up a clue for the latest WoW in ENCHIRIDION. His formula was a fusion of alternation and anagram - plus deletion if you want to be pedantic, but let's skip that element.
To remind you, here was Rupert's clue for ENCHIRIDION:
Handbook omits direction regularly - screwdriver is neither in nor out
The explanation, which many of us needed, revealed the devilry: Anagram of even letters of "screwdriver is neither in nor" - E.
What a marvel - a cocktail of alternation and anagram. Can we meet the challenge, dabblers? And just to give the folly one more degree of difficulty, let's focus on dogs, in honour of the impounded Pistol & Boo, those headline-hogging dogs of Johnny Depp. To kick off:
Oddly called in owls to ruffle dog (COLLIE)
Tarantula name (Indian) regularly mistaken for dog (DALMATIAN)
These aren't easy - but to master one is massive. Try it.
Budget 2015 Brainstorm
A storm with a fiscal twist this week, in honour of Joe's Budget. Instead of the usual clue-fest, the challenge is more about manipulation and imagination. Pick a word or name that contains a T, then budge that T to create a new entity.
Don't think CARTE > CARET, or TRAP > RAPT, but more along the lines of TAIPAN > AIPANT (excellent slacks), or PETER SINGER > PEER STINGER (tightwad ethicist).
Here's my opening BUDGE-T Brigade:
ERRAPINT = bungled bar order
MASER PLANT = microwave factory
SAND BY MET = bus-stop beach strategy
DOLLY PATRON = girly-girl
WoW: Enchiridion
ENCHIRIDION (en-ky-RID-ee-uhn) - manual or handbook (From Greek, en-cheir (in-hand) + the diminutive suffix of -idion). IKEA chattels comes complete with their own cryptic echiridions.
Movie Excerpts [BB508]
If ROTOR hides in Raiders of the Lost Ark, selecting a letter per word, can you find the word, as clued in brackets, hiding in these other longer titles?
And can you add to the cineplex roster, with more hidden words from left to right within movie titles?
DA1 - Letters from Iwo Jima (space)
DA2 - How to Train Your Dragon (store)
DA3 - There Will Be Blood (even)
DA4 - Where the Wild Things Are (moan)
DA5 - Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (belts)
DA6 - The Day After Tomorrow (greenie?)
DA7 - Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (rose)
DA8 -The Passion of the Christ (handles)
SOLUTION NEXT WEEK
BB507 SOLUTION: Boost Freedom, Guess My Size, Boost Freedom, Jigsaw Borders, Seduce Diva, Target Flight Centre, Cue House, Country Road Dangerfield, Fossil Gap
CABBAGE Clues
A, B, C, D, E, F, G
We know the notes by heart. We see them in clues, and hear them over the airwaves. So let's get a little more note-devoted and compose clues for words only using those same seven letters.
EGG? GAGA? DEFACED?
You choose whatever arrangement you desire, with names and repeats part of the fun - just note well: no non-notes are to appear in your answers.
I'll begin the beguine:
ABBA - Graduate reflected on cult band
GAFFE - Tape short slip?
BEG - CADGE to collect other notes?
Feel free to offer several clues for the one answer, just to give other players the chance to BAG their own ACE versions. Tune in.
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