And-Uh The Answer to Yesterday's Puzzler

(Blog title = another Car Talk reference, for those who don't know. I always feel the need to explain these things so you don't think I'm totally nuts.)

In yesterday's post, I gave you a lexical puzzle for the ages.

Recap: Complete the following series...
bugles, unrest, grotto, letter, esteem, _______.

The first thing I noticed (and truth be told, only thing I noticed before the guys at Car Talk explained it on their show), was that each word is six letters long. So the next one has to be six letters, right? Not necessarily, as it turns out, and it's far deeper than just word length.

The pattern: The letters in the first word correspond to the first letter in each of the words. Bugles begins with "b", unrest with "u", grotto with "g", letter with "l", esteem with "e". Which itself spells "bugle". Likewise, letters in the second word correspond to the second letter in each word. Letter #2 in bugles is "u", unrest is "n", grotto is "r", etc. And so on and so on. So to complete this pattern, the sixth word has to consist of the last letter in each word: bugleS, unresT, grottO, letteR, esteeM. So the first five letters of the answer are STORM.

"STORM" by itself works, technically, but I think it makes more sense if the final word has six letters, too. "STORMY" and "STORMS" both work.

If you're having trouble following, it's easier to see the answer if you arrange them in a grid like so:

B U G L E S
U N R E S T
G R O T T O
L E T T E R
E S T E E M
S T O R M Y

Each word reads left to right, and up and down. Cool, huh?

I wonder if there's any other case where this works. I think it's worth a little research...if I ever find one, I'll let ya'll know.

Kudos to Benzo. Check's in the mail. Although I dated it July 29, 2174, so you won't be getting that cool million for a while. Too bad.

Word Play and Auto Repair

I don’t know how many of you listen to National Public Radio. But if you do happen to flip on the ol’ Philco at 10am on Saturday morning, and it happens to be set to NPR, you’ll hear two of the three smartest people in the universe (the third being my old Latin teacher).

Tom and Ray Magliozzi from the radio show CarTalk know more about 1969 Fiat Dino 2.4 Coupés, 1988 Ford Festivas, and probably any other automotive amalgamation you can think of than anyone else knows about anything. After razzing callers by making them mimic the sounds their poor incapacitated cars are making, they always seem to come up with solutions that sound halfway believable. Not only are they believable to ignorant chumps like me, they seem to be right about 80% of the time. (Not bad for over-the-phone diagnoses.)

Yep, since 1977, these guys and their thick Bostonian accents have been the Gregory Houses of automotive talk shows, only without the cane and caustic sarcasm. But the most entertaining part of their show has nothing to do with cars.

Consider this, their weekly puzzler from a few weeks ago...

What's the next word in the following series: bugles, unrest, grotto, letter, esteem.

First person to get it right gets a million bucks.

And while you're pondering that... another thing they like to do is fabricate fake credits. You know, names that play on an occupation? (Saying it out loud helps.) Examples:

Personal Hygiene Advisor from the Tokyo Office - Oh Takashawa
Russian Chauffeur - Pikov N. Droppov
Personal Make-up Artist - Bud Tuggli
Statistician - Marge N. Overa
Customer Care Representative - Heywood Jabuzzov
Personal Psychiatrist - Manny Lus Cruz
Second Shift Meteorologist - Claudio ver Knight
Memory Coach - Hugh Sherlock Famigliar
Janis Joplin Biographer - Ian Bobby McGee

I think I just heard your eyes roll. OK, so reading it doesn't have the same effect... which is why you should listen to it.

JoshCast #9 - Let Me Go On

Friday at the office. Yahoo.

Good thing I have Pandora to keep my sanity from drifting away like a helium balloon. Just heard this catchy little bit from Seabird about a band on the verge of disbanding. "Just let me go on / Just give me one more song / If it sucks we all go home / If not we sing along..."

Let Me Go On - Seabird

Why Brains Are As Good As Brawn

A strong, 20-year-old worker at a construction site was bragging that he could out-do anyone in a feat of strength. He made a special case of making fun of one of the older workmen.

After several minutes, the older worker had enough. "Why don't you put your money where your mouth is," he said. "I'll bet a week's wages that I can haul something in a wheelbarrow over to that building that you won't be able to wheel back."

"You're on, old man," the braggart replied.

The old man reached out and grabbed the wheelbarrow by the handles. Then, nodding to the young man, he said, "All right, dumbass, get in."

JoshCast #8 - Hot Cookin'

Considering the high temp in Dallas today is 104 degrees, maybe this single from G. Love & Special Sauce's Lemonade can help cool you down. (What the hell? I sound like a cheezy editorial writer from Amazon or something.) Also, I'm a sucker for the acoustic double bass (See also: The John Butler Trio), which is featured in "Hot Cookin'".

Also, BOO to imeem for not letting me embed entire songs on my blog anymore. They're always just 30-second snippets! Hence, YouTube will have to do for now, even though I never was one for music videos. C'est la vie.

AFFLE HOUSE - Or Why I Realized A Little Piece Of Josh Had Died

(No, that's not a typo in the title. Keep reading, I'll explain.)

I had a FANTASTIC idea. I thought.

One recent hot, steamy June morning, I dreaded heading to the office because I could foresee some really crappy things happening at work that day. So I had a great idea for a way to positively tackle the day's challenges: "I know, I'll get up at 6:30am and go grab a big, hearty breakfast! That's all I'll need to make it through the day!" So far so good, but whoa whoa whoa, I wasn't done: "I'll just go to that Denny's across the freeway from my office!"

Therein lies the problem. Denny's. Because once I got there, I had ANOTHER brilliant idea: "I know! I'll get the Grand Slam, with two scrambled eggs, two pancakes with seven sticks of butter on it, AND two strips of bacon!"

Perhaps I ought to mention here that I don't always shout these epiphanies to the world. Exclamation marks are added for embellishment and comic relief. On the other hand, I was shouting things later that morning, like "Damn you, Grand Slam breakfast!!" while I struggled to fight through the lethargy caused by eating about 1600 calories for breakfast as I TRIED to complete the tasks of the workday.

But then two things occurred to me: (1) I'm getting older and (2) the "countrified" part of me is slowly dying. The days when I could eat ANYTHING -- a glazed donut, a Whataburger with cheese (no onions) and fries, or fried pies -- without consequence are drawing to a close. Any of these forbidden items now results in a headache or other unwanted conditions that interfere with anything aside from two-hour naps. Argh, I want those days back!

But alas, from now on, it's back to a bowl of Wheaties and yogurt in the morning for me.

On another cheap-breakfast-joint-related note, Jim Gaffigan rags on the Waffle House:

We Love Us

Pre-blog sidebar: You are reading my 100th post. Excuse me while I heartily pat myself on the back. Although it’s you, the reader, who deserves all of the credit for sticking with me through over 14 months of purely non-sensical and unequivocally meaningless drivel. Here here.

Maybe after my little summer sabbatical (notice I’ve spared you from any blogging since June 12...your respite is hereby over), you’ll see some readable material here. Though not likely.

--

Last Christmas, I received a subscription to D magazine, the official narcissistic publication of my current home base, Dallas, Texas. Various Dallasites (that would be the official Dallas denomym) contributed to a neutral, objective evaluation of the city in a truly fair, balanced, and unbiased article, 119 Reasons Why We Love Dallas. See my thoughts on a few chosen items:

#1: Because We Have Manners. Ha. So this is why Dallas is better than the likes of New York City, Chicago, Austin, and San Francisco. I suppose cultural diversity, storied histories, and extraordinary local color serve as modest criteria for evaluating the overall quality of the city, but clearly, they all pale into comparison to manners, which CLEARLY is at the top of that list. Still, this is an interesting point. I will never forget when I was at a journalism camp back in high school (this was in Kilgore, a small town in East Texas, by the way...not Dallas) covering a traveling band of Shakespearean thespians. All of them commented on what a pleasure it was just to be in Texas, as EVERYONE is extraordinarily polite. I suppose there is an attractive quality to Texan manners: it’s not overly formal like, say, Great Britain. It’s a much more friendly and laid-back type of politeness. Please, pardon me for being so rude earlier.

#7: Because We Know a Guy Who Lost $44,000 in One Night in a Weekly Poker Game. (Wasn’t me.) Now this is pretty impressive. Dallas has one of the top underground poker networks in the country. If only I was good at it.

#50: Because You Can Wear Cowboy Boots With Your Suit. 'Nuff said.

#51: Because We Invented the Perfect Summer Drink, The Frozen Margarita. Apparently restauranteur Mariano Martinez invented the frozen marg in 1972 as a way to keep his business afloat. Thirty-seven years later, here we are. As I found out this past March, you can even get these things served to you in a big glass boot in New York. In fact, the original frozen margarita machine is now sitting in the Smithsonian. Think I’ll go have one right now...be back to finish my column in a bit.

OK, I’m back. Now where were we?

#68: Because We Yell “Stars!” During the National Anthem. (Referring to the practice of Stars fans at American Airlines Center.) I recently went to my first Stars game, and the national anthem was quite possibly the best part because of that.

#69-90: Because We’re the Hollywood of Reality TV. The DFW region has produced champions of a number of reality TV shows in the last several years, including Last Comic Standing, Nashville Star, American Gladiators, and Survivor. Even I’ve won So You Think You Can Dance. (Really. I was as surprised as you. See article.)

#99: Because We’re Such a Demanding Sports Town That We Don’t Fully Appreciate the Fact that We Are All Nowtiznesses. You’ve heard me talk about this again and again. We Mavericks fans haven’t climbed to the NBA apex just yet (although we would have if not for Dwyane Wade and those dirty thieves, er, referees in 2006), but we have been blessed with Dirk Nowitzki, one hell of an MVP-winning, three-pointer-raining, heart-of-a-champion basketball player. As Zac Crain writes in the D column: “Those fans – and there are many out there – fail to see the singular player we’ve been gifted with. A model of German efficiency who is boring only because he is so consistently phenomenal. But I see you, big German. I see you.”

Amen.

#115: Because We Embrace Home-Grown Restaurants. Er, we do? Have you been to Plano? True, you can find local fare if you know where to look. But I haven’t seen any “Keep Dallas Weird” t-shirts, either. (See: Keep Austin Weird)

#117: Because We Can Rock Big Hair. Haha!

And finally, #119: