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The other day I was listening to one of my favorite podcasts, A Way With Words. For those not familiar with it (most of you, I'm sure), it's a call-in radio show where listeners ask questions about language and get answers from the hosts, Grant Barrett and Martha Barnette.
One of the weekly segments on the show is a visit from the puzzle guy John Chaneski (or sometimes it's Greg Pliska or another guy whose name escapes me at the moment) had a puzzle that he said was based on a driving game.
The game is very simple: While you're driving, pick a non-vanity license plate from a passing (or being passed) car. It should have a sequence of letters and numbers. Most of them will contain a three-letter clump of letters. Everyone in the car tries to come up with the shortest word using those three letters in order. Shortest word wins. Of course, if the letters already make up a valid, three-letter word (SKI, CRY, URL, etc.) then you move on to another plate.
That's pretty much it. Of course, the on-air puzzle was that Chaneski gave Martha and Grant several three-letter combinations and they had to try to come up with the shorter word, then Chaneski gave really long ones, usually involving some medical or chemical term.
I have become obsessed with this. I have no idea why, but while I'm driving and listening to podcasts, this seems to occupy my mind even further. On the way in to work this morning, I saw a plate with "BMU" and it is still bothering me that I couldn't come up with a word using those three letters. (Heh! As I was typing this, it finally hit me: BerMUda! I can stop obsessing over it!)
Some of them are fairly easy. I had ACN on the way into work, and it became ACNe. AUM became AlUM. BTC became BiTCh. Etc. Some of them are way less obvious because the shortest word using those letters may involve adding something to the beginning. My personal blind spot is trying to start the word with the first letter of the trio. So if I see ARY, for instance, I would think of AngRY or ARmY before wARY.
Can you tell I have spent far too much time thinking about this? :)
My own tag contains the letters RFE. RiFE, of course. (Or perhaps polytetRaFluoroEthylene or stRaightRorwardnEss.) For the one in the Creative Commons picture above: cHeRVil, perhaps?
I may need an intervention. On the other hand, maybe it's a great exercise to keep myself mentally alert. Or aLeRT, as the case may be.
The world needs more lerts.
One of the weekly segments on the show is a visit from the puzzle guy John Chaneski (or sometimes it's Greg Pliska or another guy whose name escapes me at the moment) had a puzzle that he said was based on a driving game.
The game is very simple: While you're driving, pick a non-vanity license plate from a passing (or being passed) car. It should have a sequence of letters and numbers. Most of them will contain a three-letter clump of letters. Everyone in the car tries to come up with the shortest word using those three letters in order. Shortest word wins. Of course, if the letters already make up a valid, three-letter word (SKI, CRY, URL, etc.) then you move on to another plate.
That's pretty much it. Of course, the on-air puzzle was that Chaneski gave Martha and Grant several three-letter combinations and they had to try to come up with the shorter word, then Chaneski gave really long ones, usually involving some medical or chemical term.
I have become obsessed with this. I have no idea why, but while I'm driving and listening to podcasts, this seems to occupy my mind even further. On the way in to work this morning, I saw a plate with "BMU" and it is still bothering me that I couldn't come up with a word using those three letters. (Heh! As I was typing this, it finally hit me: BerMUda! I can stop obsessing over it!)
Some of them are fairly easy. I had ACN on the way into work, and it became ACNe. AUM became AlUM. BTC became BiTCh. Etc. Some of them are way less obvious because the shortest word using those letters may involve adding something to the beginning. My personal blind spot is trying to start the word with the first letter of the trio. So if I see ARY, for instance, I would think of AngRY or ARmY before wARY.
Can you tell I have spent far too much time thinking about this? :)
My own tag contains the letters RFE. RiFE, of course. (Or perhaps polytetRaFluoroEthylene or stRaightRorwardnEss.) For the one in the Creative Commons picture above: cHeRVil, perhaps?
I may need an intervention. On the other hand, maybe it's a great exercise to keep myself mentally alert. Or aLeRT, as the case may be.
The world needs more lerts.
