For this week’s puzzle, Quiz Guy John Chaneski asks you to move the final letter of one word to the beginning to get a new word. For example, in the case of the word earth, the H circles around to become heart. Given those parameters, try figuring out what two words are suggested by the clue “It wasn’t hard to get enough votes to pass the bill.” This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Wordplay Letter Rearrangement”
You’re listening to A Way with Words, the show about language and how we use it.
I’m Grant Barrett.
And I’m Martha Barnette, and Glad handing his way around the room, kissing babies all around.
It’s our quiz guy, John Chaneski.
Hey, how are you doing?
How are you?
How are you?
Good to see you.
How what’s up?
How are you doing?
Nice.
This is great.
Thank you for coming, everybody.
This is just great.
Look, you guys, I’ve talked about cryptic crosswords before, which I consider the gold standard of grid puzzles.
And now there are about a dozen different cryptic clue types, and this one that we’re going to talk about today is kind of rare.
I don’t see it very often, but I think it’s pretty fun.
I call it the cycle.
All right.
You take a word and you cycle the letters by moving the final letter to the beginning and you get a new word.
And you won’t see this very often, but sometimes and sometimes this will be used as part of a bigger clue.
For example, the word earth, if you cycle the H to the beginning, you get heart.
Heart.
Yes, very good.
It’s not simple.
You’re just moving basically, this is the simple cycle.
You’re just moving the last letter to the beginning.
Okay?
Unfortunately, I do have to put a level of difficulty above that.
I’ll give you a sentence that clues two words.
You take one of those words and move its last letter to the beginning, and you get another clued word in that clue.
Got it?
Okay.
All right.
Here we go.
It wasn’t hard to get enough votes to pass the bill.
I’m thinking about enough votes.
I’m thinking about eyes or yeses.
Oh, oh.
What about easy and yes?
Yes.
Very good though.
Yeah, easy enough.
Yay, it was easy enough for Martha.
Easy and Yes.
The underworld king is attended by a spirit.
So he’s a mob boss or a Don or a well No what do you think, Martha?
Hades?
Yeah.
Is what?
Hades.
Shade.
Oh, shade.
Yeah.
Hades is attended by a shade, a spirit or shade.
Good teamwork.
Yeah.
I’m thinking of Tammany Hall.
Right.
Riley’s emotions ran the gamut from rage to joy.
No boy.
This is gonna be a core memory.
I know it.
Riley’s rage to joy, so her range and her anger.
Yes, very good.
Anger and rage.
Take anger, move the R to the beginning, you get range.
I wagered on two, four, six, and eight.
And well, it was almost eight.
So it was seven.
Or seven and a half.
Seven and three quarters.
Seven and even.
Yes, I waged it on the evens and well, it ended up being seven, which is not one of the evens.
N Nice.
Well that’s there’s something really pleasant, pleasing about that one.
Very good.
Here’s the last one.
They say her potatoes with a lightly browned cheesy crust earned her those two Michelin stars.
I love the sentences.
Thanks.
Lightly brown cheesy crust.
Are we talking about a French name?
Mm—
Oh.
Yeah.
Oh, Grotten.
Gratin.
And then that becomes rating.
Rating.
The two Michelin stars is her rating.
Yes, very good.
Gratin and rating.
Well done.
John, give our best to the family.
Thanks again for coming out and doing this really hard quiz with us.
You two guys.
Cheers to you and yours.
I’ll see you next time.
All right.
Thanks, John.
John’s not the only one who can talk to us.
We’ve got a toll-free line available in the United States and Canada.
