"It's De-Lightful, It's De-Lovely" w/ A.J. & Greg

Published Feb 9, 2024, 7:00 AM

Hello, 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.

Subscribe to The Puzzler podcast wherever you get your podcasts! 

"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, home of your daily puzzle, single shot Espresso. I am your host, AJ Jacobs, and I am here with Chief puzzle Officer Greg Pliska.

Hello Greg, Hello Aj. There is nothing I love more than a single shot espresso.

I was going to go with a single shot mocha latte, but I couldn't think of the right words.

So that's, you know, and that's inherring contradiction, and mocha latte is never a single shot. It's a big cup of deliciousness.

Okay, So, Greg, I hear you have cooked something up in your puzzler laboratory for us today.

Indeed, I have. I have a puzzle today called It's delightful. It's lovely because it's definitely time for a deceptive game using the prefixde.

So all the dee is one of them. Defenestration because that's my favorite word.

I'm sorry to disappoint you, but defenestration does not appear in this puzzle, and in fact, no one was thrown out of a window in the making of this puzzle.

Okay, I guess I feel better. Well, all right, sounds delightful or devilish? Or devious or whatever it is.

But I'm ready all of the above, absolutely well. You know, normally the de prefix is used to indicate the reversal or doing the opposite of something, So one person might encode a message and then the other person would decode it, right, or in the case of your your favorite word, it's more used to throw something out of to defenestrate. But in this case we're using it to mean the opposite of something.

Got it, okay, okay, And.

What I will do is give you a clue that includes both a direct definition of a de word as well as a more fanciful one, and then you give me the word.

So like the cryptics, the cryptic crosswords and the British.

Unlike a cryptic, where there is a direct definition and then a more punny kind of definition. All right, I'm right exactly. So I might say, to erase a piece of music you wrote and then rode away after.

Death, Okay, I think I got it decompose.

To decompose, correct exactly, which means, you know, to rote away, to decompose, and then, in the more punny sense, to erase the piece of music I composed it, and then I decomposed it.

It's a little macab but I like it.

Yeah. Well, look, you were throwing people out of the window at the top of the episode, so one point, once they hit the ground, they they're going to decompose.

It all works together, okay.

All right, here's your first one. To remove the odor from someone while climbing down a mountain.

Oh my, all right, well, oh all right, I got it. I got it. It took me a second, but yes, to remove the odor from someone while climbing down a mountain is descending or descenting?

Did I guess descent? Descent? Yes, exactly. Need you can't do descend because then you have se n d which isn't in English word, but scent is the key upon there.

Right, So do I get? Do I get partial credit or full?

You get? You get full credit?

You're too easy, you're too nice, I'm.

Very you got the idea, it's a It's all good.

All right, love it.

Next the next one, to put an egg back inside a hen after finding out the train is going to be late.

All right, that's a disturbing image, but I think I got it because what does a hen do to an egg? What does it do to an egg lays an egg. Yeap doesn't lie an egg, so it's dlay delay.

Exactly, to put the egg back inside a hand is to delay it. And of course the train that is late is delayed.

Excellent. I love that, and I I feel I deserve full credit for that one.

Absolutely, absolutely two eggs for you so far. All right, I've got to These next two are kind of related. I'll give you the first one. To return the wrinkles to your dry cleaning, which makes you sad.

Oh oh oh yeah, okay, I got it. I got it. Took me a second. That one is all right. So I went with the sad part because the.

Iron that's a good way to get in. Yep.

Even though our producer Jody was ironing a shirt during the last so it all somehow ties together.

It all has meanings.

He was not depressing, I hope he was.

Exactly to be sad is to be depressed, or to be made sad is to depress. And then to remove the wrinkles. To return the wrinkles to something is to depress it, exactly God. And that leads to the next one, which is to change your mind and iron the close again so that you lessen your sadness?

Uh oh, now that. Oh I'm stumped. I'm stumped. Andrea is smiling like she knows what it is.

So you want to you want to lessen something?

Wait, say say the clue again.

Sure to change your mind and iron the clothes again. So you lessen your sadness.

So you lessen your sadness, So you become less sad you become How.

Do you when you lessen something? You do? What to it? Looking for a d word? Is it?

Is it a pharmaceutic? Is it like an SSRI?

No? No, no, no, you're trying to sadness is a red herring here? That just connects it to the previous clue. In this case, if you want to get more of something, you do it. You do this, But if you want to get less of it, you do the opposition.

I see you. D oh my god, it's on the tip of my tongue. You decline it. But it's not cline.

And you want to get rid of the so you want to d.

Wrinkle it.

You would also be if you had a folded piece of paper and you wanted to decrease, decrease.

There a little brain fire.

Okay, make it lasses to decrease it or to remove the creases from it. Iron it back out, very Let me give you one more and then we'll do the bonus.

Okay, love it.

Uh, this is a this is a tricky one, all right. This is uh to fire the director of Avatar from the Collection of Novellas by Giovanni Boccaccio.

Oh my goodness, that is very good. Oh my god. Okay, James Cameron is the director of.

Avatar, right, but you're going to fire him, so.

We're going to Oh my all right, and wait, what was the second one?

The Collection of Novellas by Giovanni Boccaccio.

Oh, I feel so illiterate.

This is a deep this is a deep cut. This is not you know, English one. Oh one.

This is all right, but I blew the last one. So I was having to end strong and I am.

Well, you build it, build it from from the director.

Okay, So D well, I mean it's not D James or D Cameron, is it? Oh?

Yes, it is. It's one of those two.

Well, then I'm going with D. Cameron.

Cameron. Yes, that's the collection of novellas. There were ten of them, so that that's where it has the deca prefix meaning ten, but in our fanciful way, we've turned it into removing James Cameron Cameron something.

That is that's a little pretentious. I have to say, I love you well.

You know I'm down in the lab a lot.

You know.

That's a little heady down there sometimes.

So wait, it is deca Maroon is the name.

Of the Cameron. No, it's spelled like Cameron, James Cameron in front of me.

All right, love it, all.

Right, let me give you the bonus for our for our listeners, fantastic undue. A measurement of three point two eight feet for the goddess of the harvest.

Okay, I love it, so do one more time, just so we got it to undo.

A measurement of three point two eight feet for the goddess of the harvest.

Excellent.

I have to say I got this one from my son Nikki, who is fascinating with fascinated with Greek mythology right now, so you can ask exactly call Nikki for a hint.

Wonderful, delightful, awesome, all of that. Puzzlers, please don't forget to subscribe to the Puzzler podcast and I'll meet you here tomorrow for more puzzling puzzles that will puzzle you puzzlingly.

Hi again, puzzlers, this is Greg Pliska here with the extra credit answer from our previous show. We played Faith, Hope, and Love with Faith Saley, in which each answer is a common group of three. The clue we gave you for extra credit was pots, cool, kool, and silent, and that's all we gave you, but a lot of you figured it out. I'm sure these are all anagrams and the anagram to the three words stop, look and listen. So thanks for stopping by, looking at your phone and listening to the Puzzler podcast.

It's great to have you here. Thanks for playing along with the team here at the Puzzler. I'm Greg Pliska, your chief puzzle Officer. Our executive producers are Neelie Lohman and Adam Neuhaus of New House Ideas and Lindsay Hoffman of iHeart Podcasts. The show is produced by Jody Abergan and Brittany Brown of Roulette Productions. Our associate producer is Andrea Schoenberg.

The Puzzler with Ajjacobs is a co production with New House Ideas and is distributed by ethics adapters, adapting your ethics to match your situation. No wait, rearrange that. It's distributed by iHeart Podcasts. If you want to know more about puzzling puzzles, please check out the book The Puzzler by Ajjacobs, 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,

The Puzzler with A.J. Jacobs

Finally, your daily puzzle fix—in audio form! Every day, New York Times bestselling author A.J. Jaco 
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