The Thinks I Think

Day 19: VISIT

Thu, 21 May 2026 06:46:03 GMT

Aunt Hildegarde Visits My Cousins

Aunt Hildegarde loves visiting relatives. Indeed, a few years ago, I visited her and her sisters and came away with some pretty strong preferences.

Last week a got a text from her saying she'd just met a celebrity and it changed all her preferences. (The celebrity part was unusual; the rest was not.) I braced myself for a visit, but it turns out she went to my cousins' instead--the three of them share a house, and apparently our dear aunt has been expressing all kinds of opinions to them, left, right, and center. So many, in fact, that I lost track of which ones told me which things in our group chat:

We were talking about castles and she said she likes BALFOUR but not WINDSOR.
Off to the liquor store since she suddenly prefers BEEFEATER to HENDRICK'S.
I guess she likes DEEP BLUE and not WATSON now?
She wants to visit DISTILLERIES but avoid WINERIES.
I found her playing my DUKE ELLINGTON records and trying to sell my MILES DAVIS records on eBay.
Now she's reading ELLERY QUEEN instead of STEPHEN KING.
How can she even prefer FREIGHT over CARGO? What's the difference?
Somehow she prefers HRADEC KRÁLOVÉ to PARDUBICE when it comes to Czech regions. What's that about?
Out of nowhere she declared a preference for JAYWALKING over LITTERING.
Help! She says she wants a KITTEN and won't accept a PUPPY.
She just expressed a preference for STRYCHNINE over CYANIDE. Should I be worried?
Apparently this Christmas we have to go WASSAILING instead of CAROLING.

I don't envy them. But...who did Aunt Hildegarde meet?

Her sister Aunt Hortense prefers using an answer checker to never knowing if she's right. But that's not a quirk; that's just common sense.

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Enigmarch 2026, Day 18: CLASSIC

Sat, 16 May 2026 22:35:26 GMT

This seemed like a good idea when I started. At least I learned a lot?

NOTE: several errors have been corrected.

One Battle After Another

"Classic" makes me think of Coca-Cola Classic, introduced at what may have been the height of the cola wars. But...how do you even fight cola wars?

Note: this puzzle is best read in the solemn intonations of Morgan Freeman, Sam Waterston, et al, with "Ashokan Farewell" playing in the background. That won't help you solve the puzzle, but it sets a mood.

My dearest Bunny,

We have been marching through this valley for what seems like days, with no signs of shade. Our commanding officer tells us that we are out of sight of anyone looking, so we don't know why our enemy has clear-cut the entire region; not one tuft remaining. The distant hills are quite scenic, though we're told the general never really takes in the view and only invaded for the articles. I think of nothing but returning to you in our penthouse once the war ends.

My sweet Vi,

It is hard to concentrate on this letter in the midst of battle, with the bangs of our cannons ringing out. We thought we had the enemy pinned down, but once again they were able to escape, as they always seem to do. Complex combinations seem the key to their strategy, whether we are in attack mode or defense mode. It feels as if this war has gone on forever, with no end in sight, and though I signed up for this battle five years ago, I am wondering if the time has come to lay down my weapons and open an office.

My darling Václav,

I had hoped our battle might end soon, but again my hopes were dashed. I should have thought that a single line between our nations would bring about peace, but those on the other side insist on having no line at all, even though our capitals suffer. So once again the night is punctuated by gunfire, and during the day we try to close the gap between us and them. We are nearing three years of battle and the only resolution I can imagine is for both sides to resolve to go their separate ways.

My beloved Isambard,

Here on the ground, the tumult continues. The breadth of our dispute is notable, and whenever we encounter the enemy, confusion reigns. Our supply lines cannot survive this chaos much longer, yet it pains me to see so many rally to our enemy's standard. Their narrow views will break us all, each and every one, and I am not sure our side, though it be in the right, can last much longer; retreat to the southwest may be our last chance.

My cherished Isaac,

I swore I would never desert my allies nor my compatriots, but I am reaching my limit. I know victory is integral to our nation's pride, and yet everything seems to converge on this conclusion: that the war is unwinnable, that neither side shall retreat, that we might each get closer and closer to victory but that we shall never bridge that final, infinitesimal gap. I can no longer differentiate good from evil, and five years away from you is too much time apart.

My charming Othniel,

For three days we have camped next to this field, with our enemy on the far side. The air is filled with the sounds of hammer against anvil, which stir up fear within each of us. We are chilled to the marrow, shivers running down our spines; nothing in our situation is humorous. We are all too aware that tomorrow we take the field, and the majority of us will remain where we fall, to be picked apart by scavengers until all that remains of us bleaches white in the sun.

My loving Veronica,

When our navigator first brought us to this beach, we thought we had earned a reprieve from the war. It took but a brief search to find sites for encampments, and for five days we had little to do but surf and make mosaics from shells and driftwood. Today, however, we sighted an explorer from the opposing army, giving us a window into their movements. Conquest has found us, and the time has come to man the communicators and announce our surrender. Soon I shall return to you, and we may live out our days far from the edge of the enemy's territory and resume, perhaps, our excursions to the opera.

My dearest Abigail: I have been shot in the answer checker and fear I shall need it amputated.

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Enigmarch 2026, Day 17: AIR

Tue, 05 May 2026 06:37:19 GMT

Every puzzle writer reaches a point where they must decide: do I not use "Helena, Hussy of Horror" because it is too obscure? Or can I not possibly not use "Helena, Hussy of Horror" because it is too awesome?

I think it's clear how I answered. Sorry this took forever to post; I had the idea and then had to keep tweaking it until I got something that worked. I think there's a lot to say about elegance of design and where it can or can't get compromised, but I'll just leave this here.

We Regret the Airer

We here at Rerun Television have updated our nightly schedules for our eleven channels. We've even updated our midnight block of "Re-Reruns", where each channel reruns a show from a different channel, though we might have lost track of that somewhere.

Channel	8pm-9pm	9pm-10pm	10pm-11pm	11pm-midnight
RTV-①	EastEnders	iCarly	SpongeBob SquarePants	TekWar
RTV-②	The Bletchley Circle	Between the Lines	Pawn Stars	Square Pegs
RTV-③	Castle	Forever Knight	The Joey Bishop Show	The King of Queens
RTV-④	9-1-1: Nashville	Austin City Limits	Helena, Hussy of Horror	Percy Jackson and the Olympians
RTV-⑤	Boston Legal	$#*! My Dad Says	Star Trek	T. J. Hooker
RTV-⑥	Below Decks	Green Acres	Perry Mason	Third Watch
RTV-⑦	Being Human	Kindred: the Embraced	Port Charles	True Blood
RTV-⑧	Grey's Anatomy	Orphan Black	The Real Housewives of Orange County	Red Dwarf
RTV-⑨	Dead Like Me	Frasier	iZombie	Reaper
RTV-⑩	Big Brother Brazil	Diners, Drive-ins and Dives	Monuments, Memorials, & Museums	Wow! Wow! Wubbzy!
RTV-⑪	Georgie & Mandy's First Marriage	Jon & Kate Plus 8	Law & Order: SVU	Love & Hip Hop

Worried that we have half-hour shows in hour blocks? It's fine; we just added more commercials so that everything can start on the hour. That should make it easier to cycle through the channels looking for your favorite show. There's an obvious way to cycle, of course, but here's what our resident critic had to say about the Re-Rerun block:

Reed M. Innordar, TV critic: Once you've found the right way to cycle through the channels, you'll want to switch back to the first channel in the cycle, which obviously is RTV-4. Then flip through the channels in this order: 4th in the cycle (which again is obviously RTV-2), then 3rd, 6th, 8th, 10th, 2nd, 5th, 7th, 11th, and 9th.

It's all a bit confusing, we realize, and we really hope we didn't misread what Reed was telling us. If so, we regret the error.

Curb Your Enthusiasm? Press Your Luck? Check Your Answer?

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Enigmarch 2026, Day 16: OUT

Sun, 19 Apr 2026 20:52:27 GMT

I spent a while trying to do something with "outgunned, outmanned, outnumbered, outplanned" and "outwit, outplay, outlast". That never happened, obviously.

Coming Out

Sometimes, something needs to come out.

Computer language developed in the early 80s → Around a 78, if there's not a grading curve
Islamic mendicant → When tripled, an even-handed, mediocre exposition
Enbies reject its binary nature → Titular pre-teen mass murderer of aliens
Descriptor for a soul or a Highlander → Descriptor for a tarnished soul or a third of the things Alexander Woollcott likes to do
Someone compassionate and charming, like everyone else born from September 22 to October 22, apparently → Something you can still spend in Turkey but no longer in Italy
Surface for holding food or recorded music → The contents of "The Major-General's Song" or "Ya Got Trouble", say
What's left after something is taken out → String around a finger, perhaps
Like pilots, soldiers, and many schoolchildren → Early enough in development to not have a definite shape

31353341

"We gotta make an all out stand; ayo I'm gonna need an answer checker!"

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Enigmarch 2026, Day 15: DOG

Tue, 14 Apr 2026 06:30:21 GMT

Some Pantheons Are Better Than Others

Hey, did you hear the one about the insomniac agnostic dyslexic?

Pantheon 1

A Greek statue of an anvil
A Greek statue of a grapevine
A Greek statue of a trident
A Greek statue of a hearth
A Greek statue of a peacock
A Greek statue of a poppy
A Greek statue of a staff with snakes
A Greek statue of a bee
A Greek statue of a bow and arrow

Pantheon 2

Dnuub, whose realm is domesticity
Ekiak, whose realm is travel
Ijneab, whose realm is moon
Kcabegir, whose realm is love
Nekuhsk, whose realm is wine
Nuorettew, whose realm is fire
Uniabih, whose realm is sea
Whc, whose realm is marriage
Zthihs, whose realm is agriculture

You ain't nothin' but an answer checker, cryin' all the time.

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Enigmarch 2026, Day 14: PLACE

Thu, 09 Apr 2026 07:42:26 GMT

Why is "win, place, show" where my mind went with PLACE? No idea. But I've been a fan of Sandy Weisz's "Raddle" for a while now, and I wanted to see what it would be like to write one. Or three. If you're not familiar with them, it wouldn't hurt to play through one or two of his, so you can see what they look like when they're good. Also when there's not three of them mixed together.

WIN to ?, PLACE to ?, SHOW to ?

WIN	PLACE	SHOW
(1)	(5)	(4)
(3)	(3)	(6)
(4)	(5)	(6)
(7)	(5)	(8)
(9)	(6)	(8)
_______	_______	_______

Add an "A" to X and anagram to get something positive? → Y
Add two letters before the last letter of X to get a drink → Y
Add two letters to the start of X to get a spot
Change a letter in X to get a weather phenomenon → Y
Change one letter in X to get a job → Y
Change one letter in X to get a period of calm → Y
Change one letter in X to get a site → Y
Remove an "I" from X and anagram to get a venue
Remove the first and last letters of X to get a pronoun → Y
The colorful part of X → Y
Time of year associated with X → Y
Two before X, or two after X → Y
What X was an ancient deity of → Y
X sounds like this part of the body → Y
X Y, a civil rights group
X Y, a long hiatus
Y and X, a famous novel
Y X, a common mixer

You know what else Sandy Weisz's organization, Mystery League, provides? This answer checking website.

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Enigmarch 2026, Day 13: KITCHEN

Wed, 08 Apr 2026 05:59:53 GMT

If I'm learning anything from this experience, it's that it's much easier to throw together a puzzle if you don't terribly care to make sure it's solvable. Here's hoping.

KITCHEN Counter

The thing about cooking is that you throw in whatever you've got, and measuring is for chumps. Whereas in baking, if you don't measure things really, really exactly, your oven will explode and your cats will abandon you. Anyway, this recipe involves baking, I guess.

Gramma Jaqua's Oozy Goo
2 c cocoa, dutch processed
1 c chocolate chips
1 tsp baking powder
3 eggs, lightly whipped
4 tbsp oil, divided
2 c skim milk, simmered
dash artificial vanilla
1/2 c light maple syrup
1 c creme de cacao
1 tub chocolate icing

Mix in a bowl. Garnish. Avoid (so gross).

Preheat answer checker to 350°. While waiting, reconsider the life choices that led you to try to make this.

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Enigmarch 2026, Day 12: CONCRETE

Tue, 07 Apr 2026 06:05:41 GMT

Have I done cryptolists? I feel like I haven't done cryptolists. Not that I swear this is a good idea.

Mixins

Honestly, I can never remember if concrete is the base substance, or if there's something you have to mix together to get concrete.

AIUIGZ	BCMYCWFC	BJWNTY	BPSMX	BSYSGI
DUCPRKL	EMUCFCUV	FJHJAN	FLDUO	GSWXW
JAZAFI	JGXFTQ	JUUO	KLQQR	KMTW
KUZASLTU	LSMB	MAMAL	MAML-MAKL	MAVVUU
MGKGZO	MOFOIZ	NKOON	NLQTWOP	PAZAHO
RQO	RSTW	RTDK	SCZTF	SMOMJW
UPSMT	USPT	UYCFLGF	VMUEWSTT	XMPO
XUUWCF	YVJVGF	YZJZAO	ZGZZ	ZRKN
	13 +	________	= 13
	8 +	________	= 6

And a real, solid, concrete answer checker.

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Enigmarch 2026, Day 11: PAST

Sun, 05 Apr 2026 01:57:29 GMT

OK, I'm back. Things get hard sometimes. (In this case, I had a mental block that I just had to get....)

Over

"Commencing first training mission of the newly-formed NATO Defense Time Travel Unit. Everyone sound off in turn with an item from your provided lists. Indicate comprehension with a simple 'Yankee' for yes and 'November' for no."

"Yoke!"	"Yorker!"	"Yokohama!"	"Young!"
A Rent character	A Fortune 500 company	A European country	A Gashlycrumb girl
A woodwind	A baking ingredient	A member of the Coppola family	A state capital
A Commodores single	A British relative	A winner of the Academy Award for Best Picture	An acting nominee at the 97th Academy Awards

"Uh, squadron leader, detecting an answer checker on your six."

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Enigmarch 2026, Day 10: BAND

Tue, 17 Mar 2026 05:35:06 GMT

I'm With the Band

OK, but what are you?

A Toyota Prius (6 6)
Exhibitionism (3 6)
Thorondor (3 5)
Liv Moore (3 6)
Ruth Bader Ginsburg (5 4)
Alfalfa (4 6)
Moe (4 3)
Jiminy (5 7)
Walking on water (4 7)
James Deane (7 6)
Rumpelstiltskin (4 7)
Yerba mate (6 4)
Fruit of the tree of knowledge (6 7)
Steel Vengeance (5 3)

I'm a picker, I'm a grinner, I'm a lover, and I'm an answer checker.

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Enigmarch 2026, Day 9: WATER

Sun, 15 Mar 2026 19:10:24 GMT

Not my best clue phrase (and honestly there was a better choice available for the prompt), but here we are.

Arroyos

The answer is four letters.

Pierre is so rich, it seems like he owns a houvery city in France. (1)
Niasony often helps out at her church when the deaes on vacation. (3)
Ekaterin keeps bees that polte the flowers she grows. (2)
Paulo declared his home a "No Dre" after one too many screaming fights. (1)
Sarah is such a prude that when she saw Michelangelo's David, she tried to cover hidness. (4)
Marlon hates how the oil srs everywhere when he fries chicken. (6)
Marie likes to be frank, but finds people often take hesty as rudeness. (1)
Rajesh hopes to disrupt the music try with his self-playing guitar. (5)
Whenever Jean-Claude travels to Dublin, he murmurs "Helland" when the plane lands. (4)
Francesca bought a tramline to see if she could do backflips. (2)
Ahmed invested in NFTs and was left penss when the bubble burst. (3)
Nigel arrived at Parliament wisage from the King. (5)

An earlier version of this puzzle misspelled "Helland". The error has been corrected.

Take me to the answer checker, dip me in the water, washing me down, washing me down

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Enigmarch 2026, Day 8: MYSTERY

Sat, 14 Mar 2026 17:03:55 GMT

Mysteries of the Ancients

What better time than '26 to look back?

Episode 1, "Ancient Murder": Crime is as old as civilization. We examine a murder among our distant ancestors and what, if anything, they would have done to catch the killer.
Episode 2, "Ancient Board Games": How did our distant ancestors entertain themselves? We take the surviving elements of a board game they played and try to reconstruct its rules.
Episode 3, "Ancient Celebrations": Long before we set dates on calendars to honor people and memorialize events, our distant ancestors created their own recurring observances.
Episode 4, "Ancient Entertainment": It wasn't just stories around the fire! Evidence suggests our distant ancestors gathered in locations designed for amusement.
Episode 5, "Ancient Mariner": All too often we think about our distant ancestors as "hunters and gatherers", but coastal civilizations would rely on the ocean as well. We look into not just their boats but their primitive scuba gear.
Episode 6, "Ancient Emotions": Did our distant ancestors experience feelings the way we do? We consider some defining events in their lives that made them who they were.
Episode 7, "Ancient Aliens": Were our distant ancestors visited by spacecraft? If the captain and crew of one of them were trapped here, what could we learn about them?
Episode 8, "Ancient Computers": Recent discoveries suggest our distant ancestors developed computational devices. Do none survive because of a war between man and machine?
Episode 9, "Ancient Horrors": Did our distant ancestors worship elder gods? Did they believe in monsters? What were their fears? We look through ancient stories to find out.
Episode 10, "Ancient Theater": What did our distant ancestors do for entertainment? We examine surviving scripts, some of which may be pieced together from two different sources.

Did you know our distant ancestors also had answer checkers? BUILT BY ALIENS?

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Enigmarch 2026, Day 7: WILD

Fri, 13 Mar 2026 06:58:15 GMT

Getting slightly ahead of the every-two-days pace, here's...it seemed like a good idea when I started, and by the eighth or ninth clue I started really, really hating it. Here's hoping it's better than I think.

The Call Sign of the Wild

It seemed like for the entire first half of my cross-country drive, I couldn't get anything on the radio except very staticky station identification. At least I got some recommendations for the second half?

"You're listening to...you're tuned in, you must think everyone should tune in! And if you're ever in Indiana, listen to our sister sta...at 101.1: music you crave, music you desire, musi..."
"...top of the hour here a...the hits you want to hold onto! Whole lot more upbeat than my last j...ern Ohio...100.3, Sad Songs All Day. Real tearj..."
"You're bringing it up a notch here on...rom the West Coast, while in Missouri, wh..."The Candle", 97.2, lighting up your ni..."
"...your friendly DJ playing the gentle music you lo...mething gentle for your friends in Rhode Island on 97.2 "The Breeze"..."
"Let's get a big ol' moooooo for your friends here in the stu...nnsylvania, where th...101.2, "The Vineyard", whic..."
"Reignin' supreme here on...adio, just like our friends flying high at 89.3, Maine's favo..."
"...keepin' it weird here o...ton's home for whatever you're into. And let's shout ou...100.1 in West Virginia, who're keeping one eye open at all times, if you know what I mean...."
"When you're liste...s, you're as dear to us as our own kin! And spea...riends at 103.3...accompanying Illinois folks on their drive home, right by their sid..."
"You know us, sly as little foxes here a...just like those funny g...101.3 in New Jersey, your station for 24-hour comed..."
"....love 70s funk, which is why I'm thrilled to join The Gang here o...back home in Connecticut, where I...106.1, "like a warm blanket of music," we'd ca..."

We're giving away tickets to the first five callers, so get your answers ready and call 'em in!

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Enigmarch 2026, Day 6: SOUND

Wed, 11 Mar 2026 21:40:31 GMT

I thought it would be much easier to make a crossword grid in HTML than it turned out to be. Maybe if I had access to CSS files instead of having to jam "background-color:black" into every "td" tag? Well, whatever.

You can also use the grid from 7xwords on September 16 but it'll think you got all the answers wrong.

In a Manner of Speaking

ACROSS

He offered a nude eel
You'll be sad if it's mist
Sell occupants
Start of a whole
They're often raced off Rhodes
"Born" organization
Which action

DOWN

Cars currently running it
Pear
Tony-award winning musical with rap
Earth's second largest is the choral
Prepare metal for Prince, perhaps
"Say la ___"
Coltrane's was usually a tenner

Sounds like you want to check your answer here.

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Enigmarch 2026, Day 5: PATH

Wed, 11 Mar 2026 00:57:36 GMT

Yup, averaging about a puzzle every two days. Sounds right.

Janitorial Path

Welcome, new hire! We're starting you out with an easy little cleanup job. Building's over there--just gather up the letters at the start, feel free to drop anything in the recycling bin before you enter, and just go through and clean up all of the stray letters in the rooms There's a bin in each one, where you can drop any letter you don't need, and it'll get upcycled into a brand-new letter.

Of course, you'll want to make sure when you enter a room that the word you're carrying fits that room's category. So don't try just running straight through and shoving everything into bins willy-nilly; you'll need to plot out a path.

I'll see you when you come out in the southeast corner, where you can drop whatever word you've got onto the blanks there. And keep it friendly; no room for negative emotions in this company.

(Click through for a larger image. Full text description: a grid of rooms, 5 across by 3 down, with openings connecting all adjacent rooms, and openings in the outer walls in the northwest and southeast. Outside the northeast room is the word START and a blank recycling bin; outside the southeast room are four blanks. In each room is a recycling bin with a number; a large letter; and a smaller word or phrase. Reading from left to right, top to bottom, they are in order: +1/C/Dessert; -5/K/Skill; -8/J/Fastener; +7/T/Hair; +11/A/Salt Source; -6/I/Security; +5/L/Athlete; +13/O/Card; -2/M/Chess Term; +12/E/Dynasty; -11/N/Salt Source; -7/K/Connector; +10/G/Quirk; +6/P/Drink; +0/H/Appetizer.)

When you're done with your answer, be sure to drop it in the answer checker for proper disposal.

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Enigmarch 2026, Day 4: HINT

Fri, 06 Mar 2026 20:06:09 GMT

Invisiclues

Invisiclues were just the best hint system ever. You could reveal them one at a time to avoid spoiling too much, and they got progressively more helpful. Plus there was always something thrown in that wasn't even part of the game.

I don't believe this puzzle idea is any good any more.
How do I improve the writing before I run out of time?
I can't get any work done with the police siren going off!
I need to typeset the puzzle's grid.
It's 3am and I can't unlock my computer!
I have a hunch my computer's running out of power.
How can I give my puzzle more character?
The hype around Enigmarch is too much to take.

(Hint 1/3) Are you    re it's plugged in?
(Hint 1/3) Certain words are a    lbreaker for lively writing.
(Hint 1/3) Have you    ed looking for a password?
(Hint 1/3) The her    tea wasn't enough to calm your nerves.
(Hint 1/3) Including a sla   r-film antagonist was too threatening.
(Hint 1/3) What you have now is better than your   itial work.
(Hint 1/3) You could    ase your entire head in something sound dampening.
(Hint 1/3) You'll need to handcraft some black and white pixel squares first.

(Hint 2/3) But     ks to the aquarium between you and the window, you don't need to.
(Hint 2/3) Getting out a    re power cord might help.
(Hint 2/3) Make sure you have a ruler and compass for alignment.
(Hint 2/3) Maybe you should mark them for    etion?
(Hint 2/3) Perhaps a singer would be ha   ess enough?
(Hint 2/3) You need to    ure out a way to stop it from distracting you.
(Hint 2/3) You sim    need something stronger.
(Hint 2/3) You wrote it on the ma   a envelope on your desk.

(Hint 3/3) >    ETE FIRST DRAFT
(Hint 3/3) >   PE "XYZZY" INTO BOX
(Hint 3/3) > ADD R   STAR TO CLUES
(Hint 3/3) > CONN    LAPTOP TO POWER SOURCE
(Hint 3/3) > POUR WA    IN TANK
(Hint 3/3) > S   T HEROIN
(Hint 3/3) > UNDERL    EVERY ADVERB
(Hint 3/3) There is no grid in this puzzle. Stop reading all the hints.

Erratum: an earlier draft of this puzzle was missing the "e" in "etion" in the fourth 2/3 clue. The error has been fixed.

Highlight here to reveal the answer checker.

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Enigmarch 2026, Day 3: CENTER

Wed, 04 Mar 2026 07:59:41 GMT

I wanted to avoid just having lots of lists of clues. Need to get out of my comfort zone, right? Well, not today.

Things Fall Apart

The center cannot hold. Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world. How can we fix it?

Springtime joint

Taxi sheep

Policeman twitch

Pro sawbuck

Inmate dined

Updated apiece

Average lady

Specific mineral

Some centers: alternatives, container, drink, judge, orientation, saw, spring, support

Turning and turning in the widening gyre, the answer cannot hear the answer checker.

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Enigmarch 2026, Day 2: COLOR

Tue, 03 Mar 2026 06:22:01 GMT

Today's puzzle brought to by "just put something out there, it doesn't have to be good".

How very colorful!

And as always, an answer checker.

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Enigmarch 2026, Day 1: SEASON

Sun, 01 Mar 2026 22:00:22 GMT

Oh god it's March again! You know what that means!

We're starting with "list of clues", because I haven't the energy for anything fancier.

Spice Bland

The ten dishes at the top didn't come out very well and need seasoning. I'd recommend sprinkling something on them, which will get you the much better dishes at the bottom.

A serious enthusiast, sometimes verging on extremist [1]

Digestive liquid (or humour) found in the gallbladder [6]

D&D spellcaster, though only in the second edition [1]

Online invitation website [3]

Trig function used to measure vector similarity [2]

Apiece [7]

Sulked [6]

Structural part of a boat [3]

Hills of sand [8]

TV series with Billy Porter as an emcee in the New York ball culture [4]

Arabic-derived name for Ptolemy's "Mathematical Treatise" (8)

Assumed something to be true as a starting point (10)

Band whose lead singer, Dan Smith, was born on July 14 (8)

"Canvas" for a fresco (7)

Colombia has two, separated by Panama (in contrast to Ecuador's one and Bolivia's zero) (10)

Group in which Matthias replaced a missing member in the fifth book (8)

Hovers without means of support (9)

Like literature with elves and magic (or, per Jacques, like a musician's melancholy) (11)

Showing no fear, like a Divergent faction (9)

With nothing but bones remaining (8)

And of course the traditional answer checker.

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A 52nd Birthday Puzzle: Poke 'er Hands?

Thu, 08 Jan 2026 05:20:25 GMT

Almost a year ago, I wrote a puzzle for a 52nd birthday party. I'm well past my own birthday but I'm still 52 for a few more months, so there's still time to reasonably share it:

Poke 'er Hands?

The instructions are in that document, and you'll want this helpfully shuffled deck of cards as well (click for a larger version):

Feel free to print it on cardstock, cut it out, and shuffle the cards around. Or play poker with them! At any rate, you can check your answer here.

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Enigmarch 2025, Day 31: PUZZLE

Thu, 01 May 2025 01:50:02 GMT

Behold: Enigmarch done, before May!

Grid and Bear It

"Puzzle" is such a broad prompt, but for a lot of people it means the Nikoli-style logic puzzle found on this site and its sibling sites. Unfortunately, I'm terrible at writing these. Fortunately, I'm excellent at solving them, and you've put up with a lot from me, so in order to end things on an easy note, I've picked eight puzzles and solved them for you. If you want, you can use the provided links to solve them yourself, but why bother?

(Note: most of them will default to the right puzzle type, but for Mosaic and Renzoku, make sure you choose the right type, because the sites for those default to something else. I was going to link to them directly, but while you can request a specific puzzle, you can't link to them. Grr. The numbers are otherwise meaningless; I just picked the first puzzle it gave me.)

Mosaic 7,325,142 (Go here to solve online)

Hitori 3,536,106 (Go here to solve online)

Slant 1,602,243 (Go here to solve online)

Tapa 4,338,385 (Go here to solve online)

Kakurasu 3,004,550 (Go here to solve online)

Shakashaka 9,033,544 (Go here to solve online)

Heyawake 10,045,921 (Go here to solve online)

Renzoku 8,381,330 (Go here to solve online)

As always, click on the images for larger versions.

Like I said, everything's already solved for you, but since I always include an answer checker anyway, here you go.

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Enigmarch 2025, Day 30: ROUTE

Sun, 27 Apr 2025 06:25:34 GMT

Looks like this feller's got another one of them conundra for ya.

Crossroads

Welcome to Crossroads! We don't get many visitors here, least not many as actually stops. 'course, you can see from the town map that there ain't much here, so that pretty much makes sense:

Mostly we're just a town folks pass through on their way from one place to another, what with ten towns around us. Ain't even sure "X" is the real name of that town, by the way, but they're real secretive and maybe they're just not telling us the rest of the letters.

Anyway, let me give ya some sense of what I mean when I say folks pass through here. Couple three days ago, seven different cars came through town, and not one of 'em stopped to look around. Now, that might could be on account of the storm fixin' to come through, but it's kinda par for the course. Let's see if I can remember right: we saw...

an Audi, that came from Raleigh and left towards Toledo;

a Buick, that came from Upton and left towards York;

a Chrysler, that came from Villaville and left towards Raleigh;

a Chevrolet, that came from York and left towards Toledo;

a Dodge, that came from Zilla and left towards Quincy;

an Esemka--don't see a lot of those, gather they're from Indonesia, but that don't really matter--that came from Raleigh and left towards Quincy;

and a Ford, that came from Wessex and left towards Springfield.

A'course, one reason people don't stop here much is probably 'cause they don't like our road signs. There's all the "no left turns" ones you must've seen on your way in, and then there's that stack over there that all got blown over during that storm. Four identical signs per intersection, each one givin' the rule for that intersection about whether you gotta go straight or turn right. Little hard to read when they're all stacked up, but here, I got 'em all written down:

If the first letter of the make of car you're driving is repeated later in the name, go straight; otherwise, turn right.

If the make of car you're driving can form a new word if a J is added, go straight; otherwise, turn right.

If the make of car you're driving ends with a consonant, go straight; otherwise, turn right.

If the make of car you're driving is five letters long, turn right; otherwise, go straight.

If there's more than one consonant in the make of car you're driving, go straight; otherwise, turn right.

If you can form a common American English word by changing the first letter of the make of car you're driving to a letter in the second half of the alphabet, turn right; otherwise, go straight.

Main source of income 'round here is farming and traffic tickets. Seen a lotta people standin' in front of the judge, arguin' over what words are common and whether Y's a consonant, which it ain't, not 'round these parts. (Also a weirdly high number of people tryin' to read our intersections as Braille just 'cause there's a 2x3 grid of 'em, even though the judge keeps telling 'em that if you're reading Braille, you shouldn't be driving, so cut it out.) Honestly, it was kinda unusual to get seven law-abidin' drivers that day before the storm.

Anyway, thanks for comin' to Crossroads. If you're lookin' to make some cash, we could sure use help getting all those signs back up.

Don't take a map to find the answer checker though.

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Enigmarch 2025, Day 29: COMPASS

Sat, 26 Apr 2025 01:35:10 GMT

god I am so close

Think of a Compass

The compass happens to be the symbol of the travelers, a kind of fraternal society at Otherworld. Every year, eleven of them come to the village of World's Edge, where a number already live. (We go through a lot of compass-shaped temporary tattoos.) Anyway, in their honor, here's a chance to think like a traveler.

Think of a bird, eight letters long. If you add a letter you get a word meaning "unexpected"; if instead you remove a letter, you get a word that might describe someone reacting to something unexpected. What is the bird?
Think of a colonial-era American author, enumeration (4 7). Add a space to his first name and you could read the resulting three words a spider might use to explain that he's not from Boston. (Look, they can't all be gems.) Who is the author?
Think of a compass with eight points. Number them clockwise from the top, and then use the numbers as indexes. What is the word?
Think of a movie of the last twenty years that was nominated for Best Picture (and won three other Oscars), eight letters long. If you remove the first letter and add a space, you get two words for two different body parts. What is the movie?
Think of a number, spelled out. Remove two palindromic sequences from the start and you'll be left with a letter. What number is it?
Think of a piece of jewelry, enumeration (4 7). The first word can be anagrammed to make something that might be an annoyance, and the second can be anagrammed to make a word meaning "more annoyed". What is the jewelry?
Think of a piece of sporting equipment, enumeration (4 5). Move the space to get two sequences of letters. If you swap the first and last letters of the first sequence, you get a word naming some magical items; the second sequence is the second word in the name of a village you might find those items. What is the sporting equipment?
Think of a region that many people call home, enumeration (4 4). Ignoring the space, remove a word meaning "region"; you'll be left with a word meaning "home". What is the region?
Think of a word meaning "component". Remove every component that's a vowel, and add new vowels in every other position to get a new word meaning "remove". What is the original word?

Need a pointer to the answer checker?

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Enigmarch 2025, Day 28: DRAW

Sun, 20 Apr 2025 07:19:02 GMT

Well, it's what the prompt said to do...

Draw Eight

I had two rules: no text, and no references. I had to bend the latter for #5, because what I drew the first time was so wrong that it wasn't a puzzle, it was a tragedy.

The answer to this puzzle is not "Is that what you think that looks like!?", no matter how many times you say it while solving.

(Click for larger versions.)

Look! I drew you an answer checker!

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Enigmarch 2025, Day 27: LOOP

Sat, 19 Apr 2025 22:26:19 GMT

Imperfect, needless to say, but done, darnit.

A Strange Loop

Start with...

...a word that's also a concept in mathematics.
Add a comparative suffix (even though it's not a comparative adjective) to get a time-loop movie.
Take the second half and add an E to the end to get a French word.
Translate that word into English. (Make a note of the third letter.)
Take the second half of this word, and put the word's second letter after it, to get a female figure from Greek mythology.
Write down their male counterpart.
Think of a bird that rhymes with him. (This is not your final anser.)
This bird was the nickname of a MLB pitcher who started his career with the Chicago White Sox. Take his first (given) name. (Make a note of the second letter.)
That name is also the first name in the possessive in the title of a BBC show (i.e., the first name in "[1] [2]'s ..."). Take the second word in the name.
Pick three letters from that name, rearranging them as necessary, to get a word that follows "tin" in a compound word.
Add a letter to that name to get a prominent feature of a great cat....
...and take the name of that cat. (Starts with an L, but note its second and fourth letters.)
Take the collective noun for that cat. (Note the second letter, which will appear at the start of the final answer.)
Change a sound in that noun to get...

...and then anagram the given letters into a single word.

When you're done clicking here, click on the answer checker.

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