The Puzzler with A.J. JacobsHello, Puzzlers! Puzzling with us today: our very own Chief Puzzle Officer, Greg Pliska.
Join host A.J. Jacobs and his guests as they puzzle–and laugh–their way through new spins on old favorites, like anagrams and palindromes, as well as quirky originals such as “Ask Chat GPT” and audio rebuses.
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"The Puzzler with A.J. Jacobs" is distributed by iHeartPodcasts and is a co-production with Neuhaus Ideas.
Our executive producers are Neely Lohmann and Adam Neuhaus of Neuhaus Ideas, and Lindsay Hoffman of iHeart Podcasts.
The show is produced by Jody Avirgan and Brittani Brown of Roulette Productions.
Our Chief Puzzle Officer is Greg Pliska. Our associate producer is Andrea Schoenberg.
Hello, puzzlers, Welcome to the Puzzler Podcast, the therapeutic hot cold Pack for your puzzle pain relief. I am your host, A J. Jacobs, and I am here with Chief Puzzle Officer Greg Pliska. Welcome Greg, Thank you, AJ.
I am thrilled to be here. I'm glad we get to do another one of these, and I have nothing to banter about.
All right, let's make us a banter free introduction.
We're gonna dive right into the puzzles.
No more paces.
These are puzzles about language, but not real languages, made up ones. Okay, every answer is a word ending in Ish, Ease or Ian, like English, Chinese or Italian. Oh okay, except these aren't actually languages.
I love it. Do you have an example?
Of course I do. I could be I could give you the clue. It's garbage, or it's a language spoken in massage parlors.
Oh well, I thought it was trash. Oh rubbish, rob.
Rubbish exactly, it's garbage, is rubbish, or if it were a language, it's the language of rubbing.
It's rubbish, got it, So it's Ish? What were the three?
Well, I'll you know what I'm going to do. These in groups. So the first are all Ish words.
Is there any o like Esperanto?
Oh, very fancy.
No, I didn't do any Oh you know there, I could have done esque.
Like monagasque, the language of Monaco.
I didn't know about that. I will tell you. I looked up puzzle, the word puzzle in Esperanto, and it's enigmo, enigmo, enigmo. I think that Esperanto sansy just add and o to every word.
Enigmo sounds like the name of the machine we have in the puzzle lab. Fire up the enigmo and get us more languages.
All right, Well, what did the enigma have for me? Now?
All right? So these are some Ish words.
Okay, it's an object believed to have magical powers, or it's a language spoken at a festival or lavish outdoor entertainment.
Okay, all right, well I'm drawing a blank. I've got some theories. Uh, outdoor entertainment. And there's picnic that doesn't end an ish.
Well, keep in mind that this is that would be picnic ish you were looking for. Right, So the first half of the clue and object believed to have magical powers? Oh, I say, is the word ending with ish.
Oh, I see, I see that It.
Could also be used to to refer to somebody's sexual predilection, like you have a foot blank.
Oh okay, I got it, I got it. I got a fat ish fat ish exactly exactly. You went with the more g rated, Yeah.
I did, but then I gave it away with the foot fish.
And there we are that that help I need the more yeah, the more low route clues. So there you go.
All the all the parents driving in the cars with their children are like, honey, I'll explain this to you later and not explaining any All.
Right, here's here's the second one.
It's what magicians do to their audiences. Or it's the language of James Bond's car.
Interesting, see now, I I was thinking that it was like Vanish uh, and that it would be about vans, but it's actually astonished.
Yes, yes, very nice.
Vanish would be the you know, the vehicle in which James Bond is abducted.
Or when he retires and has kids and.
Drive it around in the van. Right, all right, here's another one.
It means to give sustenance to, or it's the language spoken only by the Queen.
Of Jordan's.
Okay, I think I got this one. I think that it is nourishish exactly.
So Queen Queen Noor of Jordan, of course.
So is that a homophone homophone or does she spell her name n O?
I believe she well, I believe her name is probably spelled in Arabic originally, right, but she's we we transliterated to n O o.
R Newish nourish.
All right, let's look this up.
Yeah, there is an Arabic spelling of Noor al Hussein. She was actually born Lisa Najeeb Halabbi. Interesting, but she is known as Newr.
Now, all right, there you go. It's infotainment. You're getting your entertainment and your info.
That's what we're here for. Okay, let's go to Let's switch over to.
Some es words.
Okay, ease, all right.
It's the element with the symbol m n or. It's a language spoken by yellow, red pear shaped tropical fruit.
Oh my goodness, well, I thought for a second, I'm getting I'm getting Mangoese, magnoese, Mangoese.
What is that element magnese medium, No, it's but you're very close to saying it it just if you don't know the element you'll probably never guess.
But all right, well, I'm just gonna say that those sounds in a sort of slurring way, and you can give me credit. So it's mangan.
Yes, you got it, Manganese.
Manganese exactly, Manganese. All right, Manganese. Oh so that really that's an element, is manganese.
It might be the only element that ends esse. I don't think there's the new ones. Don't have any of those.
Interesting. I just listened to the Tom Lair song where he lists all the elements. So I did hear it, like a few days.
It should have been easy for you.
Yeah, all right, I feel okay.
Mangan here's another e See it's the territorial jurisdiction of a bishop, or it's a language spoken by gaming cubes.
Well, I thought that it was archdiocese. Oh, I said, you take out the arch it's just the arch Maybe that's the cardinals the archdiocese or the archbishop.
Really, the archbishop runs the archdiocese, bishop.
Runs God the diocese. All right, diocese, diocese.
Right, I've got two more.
These are words that end with.
I A n okay, I'm ready.
It's a person responsible for the cleaning and care of a building, or it's a language of swear words spoken by amphibians.
Okay, I think I got it. I think I got it because I did. I basically was. I got it from the clue of the janitorial.
So which is building caretaker.
Custodian, and then toad is the amphibian, and so custoactly than.
You imagine all the toads just cursing at us all night long.
It's a very popular language, absolutely, I'm sure.
And finally, it's a word for an uncivilized person, or it's a language spoken by naked people in pubs.
Okay, all right, And I'd like.
To be clear that naked people in pubs are not by default uncivilized people.
True, that is true. And as we've discussed on this show, there is a large nudist following for escape rooms exactly, so we are puzzlers have nothing against the naturalist movement.
And when they successfully complete the escape room, they go off to the.
Pub exactly where they speak Barbarian.
Exactly, Barbarian perfect.
You got it, well done, Greg, You definitely got me on a couple But I had a good time. Nonetheless, and do you have an extra credit for the puzzlers at home.
I do.
This is a condiment or it's a language spoken by people who think equines are cool.
Okay, Oh I like that. Okay, all right, So if you get it, that's wonderful. And if you don't, you should come back tomorrow because we will give you the answer. And in addition to that, you might want to just subscribe or tell your friends or whatever you want to do and join us here tomorrow for more puzzling puzzles that will puzzle you puzzlingly.
Hello, puzzlers, this is your chief puzzle Officer, Greg Pliska, here to give you the extra credit answer from the previous episode. Jeremy Hopson joined us once again and we played the middle with him. We took four letter words, inserted a letter in the middle to get a new five letter word.
I gave you this extra credit.
I've collected kitchenware belonging to Robert Frost, Emily Dickinson, and Amanda Gorman because I love the blank of blank?
What do I love?
I love the pots of poets of course. Thank you so much for listening, and we'll catch you here next time. Thanks for playing along with the team here at the Puzzler with Aj Jacobs. I'm Greg Pliska, your Chief Puzzle Officer. Our executive producers are Neelie Lohman and Adam Neuhouse of New House Ideas and Lindsay Hoffman of iHeart Podcasts. The show is produced by Jody Averragan and Brittany Brown of Roulette Productions, with production support from Claire Bidegar Curtis. Our associate producer is Andrea Schoenberg. The Puzzler with Aj Jacobs is a co production with New House Ideas Is and is distributed by Ostracized Path The Path Nobody Wanted to Take Now I'm kidding. It's distributed by iHeart Podcasts The Path Everyone Wants to Take. If you want to know more about puzzling puzzles, please check out the book The Puzzler by AJ Jacobs, a history of puzzles that The New York Times called fun and funny. It features an original puzzle hunt by Yours Truly, and is available wherever you get your books and puzzlers. For all your puzzling needs, go visit the Puzzler dot com.
See you there,
