Quiz Guy John Chaneski’s puzzle is a take-off — literally. The challenge is to take off the letter I or J from the beginning of one word, leaving another word entirely. For example, find the two words clued by this sentence: My factory makes statues of the saints, and we employ men only recently out of prison. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Take off a Jot or Iota Quiz”
You’re listening to A Way with Words, the show about language and how we use it.
I’m Martha Barnette.
And I’m Grant Barrett.
And, well, I guess he’s been rescuing cats from trees.
He’s certainly tall enough.
It’s our quiz guy, John Chaneski.
Hi, John.
Hi, Grant.
Hi, Martha.
I’m always happy to help getting a cat out of a tree, so please give me a call.
Now, this week, the quiz is one of our staples, the takeoff.
It’s a variation on a National Puzzlers League puzzle type, but it’s very simple.
You take a word, you take its first letter off, and a new word is left behind.
I’ll read a sentence that contains clues to both the original word and the resultant word.
You tell me both of them.
Now, this week we’re taking off the letter I from the beginning of the word or the letter J from the beginning of all these words because there’s just about enough I’s and J words to make up a quiz.
Okay?
Plus, I and J, they’re very similar.
Well, here’s the example.
If I say, my factory makes statues of the saints, and we employ men only recently out of prison, the two words that are clued are?
Icon and con.
Right, icons and cons, right, or icon, right.
Okay, here’s the others.
The catcher avoided the sliding runner with a nimble leap, but he landed on the official anyway.
The catcher avoided the runner with a sliding leap, but he landed on the official anyway.
As opposed to a jump.
Yeah.
Landing on the ump.
Exactly.
Jump and ump.
Taking off the J from jump, you get ump.
When the judge announced the winner of the tilt, the guards took it as a sign to topple the king.
Joust and oust.
Yes, joust.
To tilt on horses is a joust, and toppling the king is to oust them.
It would be absolutely perfect if you could get me a really good rate on that rental car.
Oh, ideal and deal.
Yes, very nice.
Good work.
Well done.
My mother suddenly packed us into the car for a quick trip to visit her sister.
Her sister.
So it’s your aunt and it’s a jaunt.
Yes, a jaunt to visit our aunt or aunt.
Yeah.
A jaunt.
Here’s the last one.
I took a tour of the detention center and now I don’t feel so good.
Jail and ale.
Jail and ale.
Yes.
Very good.
Oh, thank you so much, John.
Appreciate it. Talk to you later, dude.
Talk to you next week. Bye.
So if you want to talk to us, all you have to do is give us a call, 877-929-9673, or send your thoughts about language to words@waywordradio.org.
