Trickle Down Linguonomics III
K͡Parul K͡Brugmann
This month The SpecGram Puzzle Elves™ are bittersweetly concluding (for now!) our run of this somewhat new puzzle type—Trickle Down Linguonomics—which combines the best elements of English’s nearly arbitrary orthography with the worst ideas from the Dismal Science. This TDL puzzle was originally created by K͡Parul K͡Brugmann, a time-travelling chimeric multi-clone of an American Nobel Prize–winning economist and a German Neogrammarian Indo-Europeanist.
S V O
G L _ _ _
_ I N _ _
P _ _ _ _ _ E
_ _ _ C _ R _
_ H _ L _ _ _ _ Y
_ _ B B _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ A _ _ _ _ T _
_ _ _ _ M _ _ _ _ _ U
_ _ D _ _ _ _ Z _ _ _ _ _
_ _ F _ _ X _ _ _ _ _ _ _
A small batch of TDL puzzles has been dropped off at our offices, and the Elves are publishing each in turn as they are transcoded out of AutoGrammatikon Atemporal Normal Form ΦIV::ʔ¿/42!π (Part B). The third is presented here.
For each word with blanks, use letters from the word or words above to fill in the blanks, repeating as necessary (and it will be oh-so-necessary). For example, blanks on the second line can be filled with any number of O’s, S’s, or V’s. Those on the next line with G’s, L’s, O’s, S’s, or V’s; etc. When multiple words are possible—and with English, there’s always some more- or less-obscure option available—the more linguisticky option is best.
If you think you’ve figured out the answers, submit your solution to the editors of SpecGram by December 15, 2015, and you could win a prize.* Solutions and winners will be announced in the January issue.
Some plausible answers to last month’s query concerning the third batch of L’Ishing du Gwujlang/Phicorthogra mnemonically merged definitions (MMDs) are presented below:
- A sorcerous compound is an alchemic chemical.
- Relatives of squid fluid are ink kin.
- A suitable faucet is an apt tap.
- The anesthetic in that place is ether there.
- To topple an apple pastry is to overturn a turnover.
- A dreadfully serious bird shelterer is an ernest nester.
- To masticate a hot beverage is to eat tea.
- To dispatch a bishop’s headdress is to remit a mitre.
- A set of extracts of lawsuits concerning shelves is a bookcase casebook.
- The entreaty of a hop or a skip is a leap plea.
- Connectors tiptoe when links slink.
- To rescind the awakener is to revoke the evoker.
- Thong-based snares are strap traps.
- The altitude of the last of an octet is the eighth height.
- The curve of a motor vehicle is a car arc.
- Ice cream containers made of biscuits are scone cones.
- The most proficient of the well-balanced work surfaces are the ablest stable tables.
|
Thanks to Siva Kalyan, Vince Wilson, and Keith Slater for their contributions to the decipherment. Each will receive a prize for their help, as eligible.
* Note that SpecGram Anti-Hoarding Guidelines stipulate that puzzle-related prizes cannot be won by anyone who has won a puzzle-related prize in the last three months—though honor, fame, and glory may still be seized on the metaphorical field of puzzle-related battle.
