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.
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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 Essential Vitamins and Minerals as part of a Complete Puzzle Breakfast. I am your host, A J. Jacobs, and I am here with Chief Puzzle Officer Greg Plisko.
Welcome Greg, Well, thank you Aj, and Happy Pie Day.
Happy Pie Day to you. March fourteenth, three point one four. So yes, it's very exciting. And Albert Einstein's birthday, which I didn't know until this year, but it.
Kind of works out right, kind of fitting that he is birthday would be on Hi Friday.
I think you would like pie as a constant. I looked into this just before the show because Pie Day, I feel, is a great nerdy holiday. But there are two others that are just slightly nerdier, which is Pie Approximation Day, which is the twenty second of July because twenty two over seven is the fraction that approximates pie. So that's pretty nerdy like.
That, that's even nerdier. Yeah, and let me give you.
One last one before we get to the puzzle, which is Mole Day. And Mole is some crazy big number related to Avigrado's number. I don't even understand how they're related, but it occurs on October twenty third at six oh two am. Because that's ten twenty three, six oh two and and avocado's number is six point zero two times ten to the twenty third. So that's hardcore.
There you go. And that's that's not avocado's number, that's avogadro's number.
Right, right, did I say avocado's number?
You did say it could be the number of avocados you have in your house too.
Well, I feel that like you make pies on pie day, so you would make avocado dip or guacamole on avocado agudros.
It could be molay a day and then you would make it nice.
Oh, I like it, Molly and avocado. That's great.
Every day is about food or irrational numbers. Well, I wish I had a puzzle that was about pie the food. But today it's about pie the number. It's about adding pie helped to various things.
All right, I'm getting out my calculator.
Don't worry, there's no math involved, just the two letters pi.
Excellent. Thank god, you had me scared for a moment.
Okay, don't be scared this. I'm going to give you clues to two words where you stick pie inside the first word to get the second word.
Oh, I love it. Do you have an example?
I do have an example. Start with a part of your face, insert pie inside of it, and you end up with a two word term meaning to contribute your share of the cost of something.
Uh okay, I was going no pies for nose, but now I got chip in for chin. You add the pi and it goes chip in.
You got it exactly, all right.
It was my second It was the second part of my face that I thought of. So there you go. I thought of.
The next week, we'll do part of the face day and it'll be ready. All right, here's your first one. Start with a satirical news site and end up with the kind of column often appearing on a newspaper's editorial page.
Oh my goodness, all right, I'm already lost. Oh wait wait wait, no, no, okay, Well I know that opinion pages often and.
Oh that's it.
I got it. I work backwards, yes opinion, yes, onion is yep, the onion sasterical news. And you put a pie right in between two of the letters, which my brain is too foggy to figure out which, and you got opinion.
You got it, You got it very good.
All right. I've got a little bit of a cold, so I'm not working on all eight cylinders. Or is it eight cylinders or six? See, I'm it depends on you.
You know. If you've got a twelve cylinder brain, then it's twelve cylinders. If you've got a Mazda, you've got kind of a rotary brain that just spins around in it.
Right now, I feel I'm working with the Mazda brain.
Okay, you're doing great, you're doing great. All right. Start with a term for a guy with a lot of braun. Okay, end up with a term for a guy with not much brains. Oh wow, Okay, a guy with a lot of braun. So I'm thinking, I guess someone not a bully, a at list.
No, that wouldn't work.
That's a four letter word.
He's a real, he's a real. All right. Let me try going the other way.
Okay, what's an adjective meaning not having much brain?
And it's got to have the letters pie in it. So, oh man, I am not smart but dumb dumb?
Yeah, another word for dumb. You know.
I am living out the second part of this. I am the person with not many brains.
But you're looking very brownish.
Yeah, okay, I blame the cold mitigation. All right, So someone who is not wait he said, as someone who's not smart is or not slow? Yeah, stupid, stupid? Ah, a stud and stupid, all right, exactly feel.
Brawnny guy is a stud. The guy with not much brain power is stupid.
I am certainly the second, right now, feeling the second. Let's let me try to get back to the first. Let me try to get back to studley.
Back to Studley and the puzzle. Realm sure, all right? Start with red, yellow or black. End up with the color of an old photograph.
Oh thank god, I feel okay about this one. All right, so yes, I work backwards because the answer I'll just start with the answer is c se A and Sepia. But it was the Sepia that got it for me because I happen to know Sepia is like that brown colored photograph. And then I really, oh black sea, yellow sea.
Yeah, that's exactly very tricky there, Well done. Now you say Sepia, I say cepia.
Interesting. Maybe it's a British American thing like era and era could be Probably I'm just mister.
One of us is clearly Andrea, you.
Our puzzle associate. Puzzler has to weigh in and tell us, so let.
Us know who's right. But let's continue with puzzles while she does that. Start with a gunman who shoots from a rooftop and end up with an adjective meaning more short tempered.
Oh. Interesting, Well I thought I had it because I thought the gunman from the rooftop. Oh, I think I do have it. I think I do have it. Okay, show yes, So the gunman from a rooftop is sniper, and then you add a PI to sniper, and you've got snippier, snippier.
All right, I should we should have done it. The other wise it's just the snipier sniper, the snippier sniper.
They're all pretty snippy. I don't I don't think you can have like a zen come. I mean they seem that maybe not, maybe that that's the whole thing. You want to be zen in calm. If you're a sniper who.
You're truly zen, you're not going to be shooting things from a roof I hope. All right, let's let's get away from the violence and go for this one. Start with a word for your stockholdings, and end up with the types of markers used in space. Wow.
Wow, okay, Well, the things that come to me immediately are not working out at all. One is anti gravity.
Pen that yeah, that has no pi in it?
I mean portfolio was the part that I as you. It's where you keep your stock holdings? Is what you said?
No, a word for your stockholdings. You have a bunch of blank of stock. You have a you're gonna buy some stock blank stock.
Uh, you're gonna come back to being the non stud. Uh. Uh, You're gonna buy a stock portfolio. You're gonna buy some stock picks. You're gonna buy some stock.
How many blank of apple stock do you own? How many?
Oh?
Share?
Ye? There you go? All right? And then what was the clue?
And the marker? It's a type of marker that happens to be used in space because it can write in zero gravity.
Oh goode.
Popular for signing autographs.
Yes, I have used sharpies, So yes, sharpies. Very well done?
Right, let's do two more?
All right? You want to humiliate me? Two more done?
Sure? One start with the nose of a pig and end up with a possible result of losing control of your car.
All right, well, I thought I had it. I thought the nose of a pig was a snout. It is okay, good, So then, oh, okay, I see the p I goes earlier in the word than I thought. So you do spout snout to spin out snack exactly, exactly, exactly, okay.
And our last one start with the kinds of boats you might row down a river and end up with the kinds of shelters you might erect alongside your house to protect you from the sun.
Oh okay, now that is good. I mean, I it's funny. I actually do feel my neurons firing at a lower rate because there's a word that I know, that I know, and it is not coming to me. Okay, but wait, word, it's a ship you would row by the river, A boat, I'm sorry, A boat? Which would be it could be a canoe, It could be a kayak, could be a It wouldn't be a rower.
You named canoe?
Canoes?
Canoes?
All right?
So, and then kinds of shelters that protect you from the sun.
Oh okay, canopies, canes, the canopy very good? Well, I don't know about the very I'd say.
You got them all. It's pie Day, you got them all. How many digits of pie can you name?
Oh? Man, I think I can go for like five and that's it. And I give up three point one four one five. He is nine two seven. Hey, I surprised myself. I think that that's pretty good. What do you got?
I got three point one four one five nine two? So you're a.
You are a sud you're trying to be nice? All right? Well that was fantastic, Greg, Do you have a uh an extra credit for the folks at home?
I do?
I do.
I picked a tough one. You start with a six letter term used in science fiction for inhabitants of or for an inhabitant of Earth, okay, and end up with the species of small turtle that is the mascot for the University of Maryland. Oh I love it.
Okay. I did happen to get that one reverse engineering it because I have a friend who's a big fan. Well that was fantastic. Happy pie Day. Everyone, go eat some pie, or go calculate some irrational numbers, and don't forget to come back tomorrow for the answer and subscribe and write a review. By the way, breaking news. I sort of got pie right and I sort of got it wrong, So full disclosure three point one four one five nine two six five. But if you round that up, it's three point one four one five nine two seven. So yes, I will take the W even though I got the y L. Thank you and right in. If you're still angry, all right, that was fun. Tell your friends if you want, we're here. We'd love to keep puzzling you, and we will. We will meet you here tomorrow for more puzzling puzzles. I will puzzle you puzzlingly.
Hello puzzlers. Greg Pliska here up from the Puzzle Lab with the answers to the extra credit from our previous episode, we played sports sounds with Charlotte Wilder, where we gave her a number of different sounds that she had to identify what sport they came from. For the extra credit, we played you this sound. Ras up what many of you probably recognize that as the sound of curling, But did you know that's the Swedish women's curling team and it's the final match at the Vancouver twenty ten Olympics. And bonus credit if you could name the player. He's Anna LaMonte, Catherine Lindahl, Ava Lunde and Annette Norberg and they won gold, and your gold to us for listening to the Puzzler every day. We'll catch you next time.