ACROSS LITE PUZZLE: [ THEMELESS MONDAY]
PROGRAM: [Across Lite]
PROGRAM: [Java]
PRINTOUT PUZZLE: [ THEMELESS MONDAY]
PROGRAM: [Adobe Acrobat]
Puzzle genius Merl Reagle threw out this gem of a riddle that kind of needs to be shared. Only problem, it involves a key answer in today’s puzzle. So, if you’re so inclined to see it, just highlight the following text:
Wimbledon record-breakers ISNER & MAHUT can be rearranged to form what two synonyms?
Pretty brilliant, no?
I am pretty much in awe of anybody who can anagram words like that. And Merl’s got the kind of brain that can do this on command. You’d think that since playing with words is part of my job description, I’d be a monster at scrambling words. Not really. I mean, when I have to anagram words (like say that blue moon day I’m solving a cryptic) I write the letters out in a circle and hope I see the new pattern. Plug ugly and certainly a rank-amateur move.
Now, we know my non-skills at Scrabble have become a recurring meme on this site. And certainly the ugly fact I cannot place the tiles in a circle means I cannot anagram and therefore eliminates any possibility of bingoing. So, the moral is, if you really want me to play that dumb board game with you, we have to forgo the racks and allow some 3-D tile juggling.
Having said all that, it bears repeating that Nancy Salomon discovered BRENDAN E. QUIGLEY anagrams into DRAG QUEEN BY-LINE. Do with that information/discovery what you will.
A small reminder, I have some small costs to keep this site running smoothly, and if you found this month’s puzzles enjoyable, a small tip of $5, $10, or $20 would make all the difference in the world. One randomly selected donor who gives this week will receive their choice of anything they care for from the ole’ BEQ gift shoppe. Thanks again for the support.
Share the puzzle. New one on Thursday.
UPDATE: The Visual Thesaurus contest puzzle went live on Friday. Do it here.
when i am stuck on an anagram in a cryptic, i often have to resort to typing the letters out on the computer and then moving them around that way, like:
BRENAN E. QILE
D_ _G _ U _ _ _ _ Y _ _ _
it’s a little demoralizing; you’d like to think you don’t need any paraphernalia to get the job done.
this weekend i played a game called bananagrams (google it) that is sort of like scrabble except there’s no board, you don’t score points (you simply win hands), and (perhaps best of all for you, brendan) you put your tiles face up and can arrange them however the f* you want. we came up with a few crosswordy variations, too: phrasal bananagrams, vowelless bananagrams, vowelless phrasal bananagrams, etc. good fun.
Another Monday breath of fresh air. Might have been on the MARD side for me…nothing too un-gettable from crosses. AVES? As in they are usually long? Meh. But, that’s a mere 58D.
MARD – If I can do it, there’s no H needed. Only wrong letters were ISHAR instead of ISNER. I did know the Merl Reagle solution, but I couldn’t remember either of the source names so I couldn’t reverse-engineer the solution (and the crossings were no help).
I liked JIVE ASS, WEBINAR, PIE JESU (domine … THUNK! … dona eis requiem … THUNK!), CARFAX, NAVARRE, J STROKE … all good stuff.
Another anagram, somewhat descriptive of their match, is “humans tire.”
A pretty nifty anagram from a HIRSUTE MAN such as Merl.
Mmmm, Jesu Pie.
MEIOSIS slowed me down. DUMBASS too. “U” in PIE JESU was last thing I did. Top half WAY harder than bottom, which I got w/ nearly no effort. IDLE CHAT was remarkably hard to see. Good work.
rp
Enjoyed this one a lot, was defintiely hard for me with a bunch of googles needed to complete. Great to see Fiery Furnaces ELEANOR and Duncan SHEIK.
One of those crazy “how much stuff can I cram in a grid themelesses” – in other words I liked it even though I was cussing at the time… 2 Mistakes were because had no clue about PIEJESU or that Japanese chef dude so I just put in an “A” and related to that get dioramas and diatramas mixed up, it’s a lot easier to do than you think! (Ok the extinct bird is DIATRYMA – I’m even more mixed up than I thought!)
Yeah, I missed the Piu Jesu/Japanese chef crossing too(I thought the E looked good, like Kobe). But not that bad for a beq themeless.
Awesome puzzle, and a Hard one that I could solve! Mostly. Couldn’t get the crossing of 21D and 44A without looking it up, despite hearing about the remarkable match at Wimbledon a few times recently. That’s what I get for not gluing myself to the TV like is my duty….
Also, having grown up in Provo, I’m glad to see that 23A is listed as its suburb — that is, as its inferior. We always suspected as much!
I just discovered Fiery Furnaces over the weekend and downloaded their 2004 album “Blueberry Boat” from eMusic. What are the odds that I would see them referenced in a crossword two days later?
Well, they also anagram to ‘manure shit’. what’s the actual solution i should be looking for?
what do you mean, “also”? that’s the answer.
Dude: “Widow City” is their high water mark.