The Sphinx's Lair

Sid

18:00

Agreed. Let me put that up on comments on his answer.

Gareth McCaughan

OK. I was going to answer here but I'll do so there instead.

Rubio

"Comments are not for extended discussion" - the election chat room is probably better, @sid

Techidiot

What is this answer :-/ I don't get a bit of it

Gareth McCaughan

There's a children's rhyme that begins "Heads and shoulders, knees and toes".

Accompanied by appropriate actions.

Mostly used with extremely young children.

The idea is that the child here has misheard (or is being misheard by the parent).

Rubio

That was my first thought, but the entire middle of the child's "poem" is in no way a match for that rhyme

Gareth McCaughan

18:02

I think it fits OK.

Techidiot

Oh. I've never heard about it. Thanks.

Rubio

unless there's some big chunk of the rhyme I've never heard, which is admittedly possible

Gareth McCaughan

"Eyes and ears / and mouth and nose"

(one acquaintance of mine used to sing a slightly modified version, which goes "Zombie shoulders, knees and toes / Zombie shoulders, knees and toes / Eyes and ears and mouth and BRAAAAAIIIINNNNSSSSSSS ...")

Rubio

lol

oh well. my first instinct was right then.

Techidiot

I am not able to connect it somehow..

Peas on toast
Fleas on rose

Rubio

18:05

actually now that I look at it again what threw me off was the parenthetical. which shouldn't have. alas.

Techidiot

With what are these two lines related?

Gareth McCaughan

Peas on toast & fleas on rose both = knees and toes

I have to say I don't think much of the puzzle. Children's mishearings don't usually end up much like that.

Techidiot

How?

Gareth McCaughan

And I don't think schools are in the habit of teaching children of any age "Heads and shoulders, knees and toes".

@Techidiot Well, the vowel sounds are more or less the same

and I think the (not very plausible) principle behind the question is that the child has remembered the vowels and some of the consonants and then guessed in a rather implausible fashion at the words.

Sconibulus

@GarethMcCaughan I'm pretty sure I learned that in school... in French

Gareth McCaughan

18:07

Interesting! Were you at school in France, or do you mean you were learning French and they used this as a teaching tool?

Techidiot

Hmm.. Quite difficult to understand even after knowing the answer. And impossible without knowing how the rhyme is sung :)

Sconibulus

I was learning French, we learned a few children's songs as teaching tools

Gareth McCaughan

I expect that if you go to YouTube and type in "heads and shoulders knees and toes" you'll find how it's sung.

Sconibulus

so plausibly a child in another country might learn English this way

Gareth McCaughan

@Sconibulus So, does it work in French? I'd have thought all the syllable counts would be wrong.

Though right now my brain is failing me and I am unable to think what most of the words would be in French.

Sconibulus

18:08

I think knees doesn't work well

Gareth McCaughan

genoux, right?

Sconibulus

tete, epaule, something, pieds (feet, rather than toes)

yeah, that sounds right

Gareth McCaughan

you can lose some of the "ands" and have it work, kinda, maybe

Sconibulus

it's been a while, sorry, I'm very rusty

Gareth McCaughan

tetes, epaules, genoux et pieds ...

(apologies to any francophones who are doubtless cringing at the absence of accents)

of course the echo in the next line then has to go "-noux et pieds", which is a bit weird

Rubio

18:11

francly, my dear, ...

Sconibulus

~il s'a deservé, il s'a deservé, seulment lui blamer, si tu etait la, et tu as vu sa, je pense la meme chose que tu il fait~

sorry, that's the song I remember best for some reason :)

Mithrandir

🎵

Sconibulus

I wonder if anybody can guess the English version

Gareth McCaughan

It seems like it ought to have lines ending "else to blame" and "done the same", but googling for those doesn't turn up any children's songs.

Sconibulus

it wasn't exactly a children's song

or even a little bit a children's song

Gareth McCaughan

18:18

doesn't turn up any non-children's songs either, I think

Beastly Gerbil

18:29

ah i see gareth and rubio nominated themselves.

Both on 30/40 interestingly

I have a feeling they are clear favourites

M Oehm

Pre-election polls haven't been too reliable lately, though.

n_palum

Wasn't Macron projected to win though?

Beastly Gerbil

Well they have the highest score, so...

If people come to the site to vote, but don't know much about it they usually vote based on scores

Sconibulus

@n_palum The polls were still off by 8 points

n_palum

Meh

Sconibulus

18:31

He was just projected to win by like 20, and won by almost 30 instead

n_palum

Well it's better than Clinton projected to win and losing

Gareth McCaughan

yeah, the polls were really wrong on Macron / Le Pen, it's just no one notices because they didn't get the winner wrong

n_palum

It wasn't just fully wrong

M Oehm

Yes, the margin was greater than predicted. But participation in the polls was rather low.

Sconibulus

@n_palum She was projected to win by 3 I think, and won by 2 instead

n_palum

18:32

Didn't like 80% vote?

Sid

Clinton and Trump and Brexit polls had it wrong because the projections were within error limits.

n_palum

Better than the American turnout

Sconibulus

American polls predicted the popular vote pretty well

ffao

the polls were also 10% wrong in the recent Brazilian presidential election

Sid

@ffao erred on the side of the winner?

M Oehm

18:35

About 75% voted, which is the worst participation for more than 40 years.

n_palum

Better than US

Sid

For example in 2014, in India's prime ministerial elections, predictions were that there would be a coalition Government. Ultimately, the favourite won by a landslide.

Beastly Gerbil

Is there a poll for puzzling?

ffao

in the first vote they erred on the side of the winner, in the second for the loser

Sconibulus

fivethirtyeight.com/features/…

ffao

18:36

but the winner was predicted correctly in both cases, so people didn't make such a fuss about it

Mithrandir

There's the primary, where the top 10 go on ahead

ffao

So our conclusion is that polls are globally getting elections terribly wrong

Sid

I would say one of the reasons is because of bias towards a certain personality or party.

Mithrandir

Anyway, /me should be getting off now as I have to get up at around 5 in the morning :/

But feel free to ping me with any questions or stuff, I'll try to wiggle in some time tomorrow to respond.

dcfyj

@Mithrandir It's only 3 pm, you've got plenty of time :P

Mithrandir

18:44

*mutters* Timezones...

dcfyj

hehe :P

Beastly Gerbil

This query is very helpful to find the top scores on site

although it is slightly inaccurate...

Sconibulus

oooh, I'm a top-25 mod, apparently :)

so as soon as we get to 15-20, I'll self-nominate :)

Beastly Gerbil

rubio is getting 27/40 in all queries instead of 30/40. Maybe the need to update

n_palum

Yeah if that were to happen

Beastly Gerbil

18:49

I'm very surprisingly fourth

Sid

I have a rather ominous 13.

Mithrandir

I dropped back in to say that I'm in 39th place, my favorite number :D

> The query processor ran out of internal resources and could not produce a query plan. This is a rare event and only expected for extremely complex queries or queries that reference a very large number of tables or partitions. Please simplify the query. If you believe you have received this message in error, contact Customer Support Services for more information.

O_o

On SFF?

Sconibulus

19:05

39 happens to be my Jersey#

n_palum

I usually have #11 :P

Rubio

19:37

@BeastlyGerbil My last 3 points were acquired in the last 24 hours (or fewer) of my nomination.

Beastly Gerbil

ah ok then

Just a bit behind

Mithrandir

It's updated every Sunday

Bleh, I should be asleep

But is this a valid CC? 'Fish heads are cold and really putrid (4)'

Deusovi

I don't think so - "heads" is separated from what it acts on

Beastly Gerbil

carp

but it reads acarp

Mithrandir

:/

I'll keep thinking

Beastly Gerbil

19:45

you could have 'Are fish heads cold and really putrid'

Because then 'are fish' is def

(would that be good @deus ?)

Deusovi

No, "are fish" isn't a definition

"fish" is, but "are fish" is not

incesterror21

Maybe "a fisher"

Mithrandir

Fish - heads cold and really putrid.

Deusovi

That's fine.

Mithrandir

I'll keep thinking, trying to figure these CCs out :P

incesterror21

19:48

You have a weird taste @Deusovi if you think that kind of food is fine

Mithrandir

incesterror21

This room is fine?

Sphinx

20:04

0

Q: Don't give me that line

Note: This puzzle cannot be solved on the computer. Draw it out on paper and then solve... --------X---------------x------- | | | X X X | | | -----X------X------X------X----- | | | | X ...

GentlePurpleRain

21:00

It must be coincidence, but the 3rd-last letters of "oPen lorrIes unmanNed wrecKed countlEss rust-laDen" spell out PINKED. I can't see any possible way that PINKED means "tragic", or how that would be clued.

n_palum

21:49

@GentlePurpleRain It can mean pierce or something similar

But I assume Western is how you deduced the 3rds

Sconibulus

22:06

that's a very interesting observation

n_palum

ERMEUS is taking the 3rd instead of the 3rd last XD

Rubio

western Start Trucks Autonomous/automated Gutted Endless Decrepit → STAGED (tragic). that's the best I got so far.

n_palum

Oh that's nice

Rubio

22:21

it feels like that's the right idea, though I'm not at all happy with that actual word - unfortunately after a lot of digging I've not found a better fit that can be pulled out of those words. And it would be soooooo open ended if that's the construction that happening on the right solution is going to take a ton of plodding determination or utter serendipity, methihks, so I actually hope this is not at all right.

Anyway I'll leave that there and see what @Sconibulus has to say about it :)

n_palum

I think Western is the way we should be getting the letters

Sconibulus

That's actually a pretty good word, so I'll throw a hint

'Countless Rust' is an... atom for lack of a better word, it joins together to make one thing, which may or may not be operated on by other things

n_palum

Well how was anyone supposed ta know thaat

ffao

I feel like every time I get a hint I'm even more confused

Sconibulus

I mean, I imagine it would have been tried at some point, the hint should just narrow the possibility space a little

n_palum

22:41

I'm confused now..

The punctuation looks deliberate but it confuses me more

Rubio

step one, ignore punctuation and capitalization. (except when you shouldn't.) ;)

Sconibulus

The punctuation is to make it read like scene directions

or at least, that's what I was going for

Rubio

I can see "rust" giving Fe₂O₃ and thus "countless rust" being FEO. "wrecked" may anagram it. but I can't find any useful word for either Tragic or Laden that has (FEO)* in it.

and if "Western" isn't an indicator then either "Open" is a (probably sketchy) one, or there's entirely too much here to reduce to 6 letters in any way I can see.

n_palum

^ like certain stuff is capitalized but not others

Sphinx

22:59

0

Q: Skeleton sudoku, the second

I've already set one skeleton Sudoku. Here's a rather harder one. (Nonetheless, it should be within the realms of what can be done by hand; I solved it manually myself to verify that there was only one solution. Actually, I got pretty good at solving these, because it took me something like 5 or ...

sudoku dissection grid-deduction

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