Make it a Double Quiz

You’re listening to A Way with Words. I’m Grant Barrett.

And I’m Martha Barnette. And we’re joined now by the one, the only, the unique, and the always safe for work, John Chaneski.

Safe for work.

Aren’t you safe for work?

I’ve never been described as safe for work before.

But I guess it applies. Hello, Grant. Hi, Martha.

And he can be operated well under the influence of alcohol.

That’s true. That’s true. That’s true.

What’s going on, John?

Something happened to me recently I thought you guys might be interested in.

And I went to Max’s school, my son Max.

I went to his kindergarten class for all the kids that had written these little books with pictures.

And Max had written a story about going to the store with me.

And I bought him this toy that he likes.

And he wrote in a little word bubble because we read a lot of comics.

He wrote in a little word bubble, we go to the store.

And he wrote we WII.

Nice.

Yeah.

It totally got by my wife until I said, you know why you’re out there, don’t you?

And do you have a game?

Speaking of games, do you have one for us?

I do have a game.

And speaking of I-I and double letters, it has something to do with double letters.

Oh.

I call it Make It a Double.

It’s a simple puzzle.

I’ll give you the definitions for two words.

Both words are spelled the same with the exception that a single letter in one of the words is doubled in the other.

Okay.

For example, skeletal, pleasing to the eye, suggests what two words?

Skeletal, pleasing to the eye?

Pleasing to the eye.

Wait, skeletal means…

Skinny, pretty…

How about this?

How about skeletal pleasing to the…

Oh, bony and bonnie.

Right, right.

Bony and bonnie.

I was going to say skeletal pleasing to the Irish eye.

How’s that?

That’s good.

Bony and bonnie.

B-O-N-Y?

Okay, gotcha.

B-O-N-N-Y.

Good.

This is pretty easy.

So to spice it up, I’ve made the clues read sort of like a sentence.

There may be a superfluous preposition or two.

It won’t trip you up.

Also, the definition to the single-letter word could come first or second.

It’s changed up.

All right?

Okay.

Play it by ear.

Here we go.

Here’s the first.

Zeus or Hera, for example, is not bad.

God and good.

God and good.

Yeah, should have started with that one.

That was good.

That was God.

I mean, that was good.

Here’s the next.

Took unlawfully, yet wearing a king’s clothes.

Took unlawfully.

I was going to say stolen, but that doesn’t work.

Robbed and robed.

Robbed and robed.

Robbed and robed.

Very good.

Good, good.

Here’s the next.

Wagered on a root vegetable.

Rutabaga and no.

Bet on a beet.

Bet on a beet.

Bet and beet.

Very good.

Rutabaga.

Here’s another.

Moving an aircraft not easily born.

Born as in B-O-R-N or B-O-R-N-E.

Breachcraft and Beechcraft?

No.

Usually you fly an aircraft, but when you drive an aircraft…

Taxi and…

What was the other one?

Let’s do the gerund.

Oh, taxing and taxiing?

That’s it.

Taxing and taxiing.

Oh, my goodness.

What a stranger a double I is in an English word.

I know.

It’s really weird.

You got to get up to some hijinks to find something like that.

Well, that’s a triple dotted, but not double I.

Anyway.

Here’s the next one.

More narrow, like a green Ghostbusters phantom.

He was slimmer and slimer.

Slimmer and slimer.

Oh, good.

Good, Grant.

Do-do-do-do-do-do.

Do-do-do-do-do.

A little earworm for you.

Thank you.

Who are you going to call?

Wordbusters.

That’s us, baby.

Here’s the next one.

Float up and down.

Like some kind of jerk.

Float up and down like some kind of jerk.

I was going to say bob and boob, but that’s it.

That’s perfect.

Oh, that kind.

Yes.

Float up and down is bob, and some kind of jerk is a boob.

So boob and bob.

Or bob and boob.

Either way.

Oh, man.

Okay.

Here’s the next.

Without rhythm, like the helter-skelter guys.

Beetle and beatless.

That’s it.

Beatles and Beatless.

Oh, good.

I was thinking Charles Manson.

The Beatles were hardly Beatless.

We take a little puzzle license there.

Gotcha.

Okay.

Here’s the last one.

The shredded remnants of spuds.

Taters?

Mm—

Taters and tatters.

Taters and tatters.

Well done.

Man, why hasn’t somebody marketed that?

Mom, can we have taters and tatters tonight?

Tater-tatters. French fries are sort of tater-tatters if you shred them really well.

Julianne potatoes are tater-tatters.

All right. So that was a hard one.

I think that was pretty difficult, right?

A couple of those were easy, but some of those, ooh-wee.

I could have sat here for an hour without Martha.

You guys did fantastic.

I prefer challenging to hard.

And you guys, you were challenged and you rose to the challenge.

You met it.

Thanks, John. That was indeed a lot of fun.

Thank you. We’ll see you again next time.

All right. Bye-bye.

Sounds good.

And if you’d like to talk about grammar or slang or punctuation or letters or words and how we use them, give us a call, 1-877-929-9673.

That’s 1-877-WAYWORD, W-A-Y-W-O-R-D.

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