Will Shortz, crossword editor of the New York Times and puzzlemaster on NPR’s “Weekend Edition Sunday,” shares a quiz about a whole menagerie of animals with names that are portmanteaus. For example, if you could cross a chipmunk and a monkey, you might get a chipmunky and a cockatoo crossed with a toucan would be a cockatoocan. What overlapping animal name might you get if you crossed an Australian hopping animal and a male barnyard bird? This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Will Shortz and His Fantastical, Quizzical Creatures”
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 we’re joined by a special guest. It’s Will Shorts, crossword editor of the New York Times and puzzle master of NPR’s Weekend Edition Sunday.
Hi, Will.
Hey there, Grant. Nice to talk to you and Martha again.
What have you got for us, Will?
Well, I understand you have an animal-related show, so I have brought an animal-related puzzle.
If somehow you could cross a chipmunk and a monkey, an offspring could be called by the portmanteau chipmunk.
Right.
And similarly, if you crossed a cockatoo with a toucan, you’d get a cockatoo can.
A cockatoo can.
Okay.
So I’m going to describe some other animals whose names overlap phonetically. You tell me what their offspring should be called.
Okay.
We’re going way beyond labradoodles here. Here’s your first one.
An Australian animal that hops and a male chicken.
A kangarooster.
You got it.
Number two, a great ape of Africa and a wild horse with black and white stripes.
White stripes?
I think they just have white stripes, don’t they?
Oh, okay.
I think I have it.
Go.
Chimpanzebra?
Chimpanzebras, right?
How about a heavy African animal that spends a lot of time in the water and a bivalve mollusk?
Hippopotamus.
You got it.
How about a relative of a kangaroo crossed with an animal that builds dams?
A wall of beaver.
Now that’s what I want to see. I want to see all of these.
A small desert rodent that can walk on two legs crossed with a large snake that coils around its prey.
And that’s a two-word thing.
That would be a Jeroboam constrictor.
A Jeroboam constrictor is right.
How about a one-humped camel crossed with a farm animal that gives milk?
That’s two words.
A tramadary cow.
You got it.
I guess they both could give milk.
And your last one, an Australian animal with a duck bill crossed with an affectionate term for a feline pet.
Platt a pussy.
Oh, a platt a pussycat is right.
Platt a pussycat.
Yeah, that’s one of the villains, I think, from a Bond film.
Yes.
Okay.
Congratulations.
Well, thank you, Will. I love this. These are adorable. I can’t wait to go to that zoo.
We appreciate you coming out today and doing an animal-themed quiz with us. It was a lot of fun.
Anytime.
