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12:45 AM
@AncientSwordRage yep
1:08 AM
@Jafe I'll let you decide
1:24 AM
ok i'll go
CCCC: PSE user is a sex machine, according to Frank Zappa on the radio (7)
Ah, you made a C4 about me I see
4
@Sciborg Sheeeesh chilllll
Wait but what if it's actually you though xD
I mean, machine, "borg"?
seven letters????
👀👀👀👀
iiiinteresting
Are you a sex machine though?
I mean, DEUSOVI is another candidate solely by letter count
If by "sex" you mean "Strong Enthusiast of Xylophones", then yes
1:33 AM
LOL, you and deus are the only seven-lettered PSE users I can think off the top of my head
I mean, OVI- is a root word for like eggs
Frank Zappa has a song called "The Radio Is Broken", if that helps any
Radio is probably R, or AM/FM
Or "on the radio" is a homophone indicator
SEX might be M/F
@bobble Was just typing that, yup. Could be a homophone
1:36 AM
Hm
SCIBORG sounds a lot like CYBORG if you ask me
What would Frank Zappa be though
I really hope the answer is me so I can tell Sam the Puzzling Stack has officially confirmed I am a catch
Ah, so
SCIBORG
homophone of
sy borg?
Wait, hold on but what about the "sex machine"...? CYBORG?
Or is the entire word
"SEX MACHINE ACCORDING TO FRANK ZAPPA"
Oh wait yeah
1:38 AM
This is the best day of my life
@Jafe SCIBORG homophone of SY BORG
that is correct
Hm, does Gareth technically get it?
I'm texting Sam that my internet buddies called me hot
@Sciborg You are indeed a catch
Though I'm not sure you actually want to be called a sex machine
1:39 AM
I don't know whether I technically get it but I don't particularly want it (it's approaching 3am local time and I need to go to bed) so I suggest that someone else takes it.
Either Sciborg or North.
North gave the full solution including the homophone, so probably North.
Okay. I need to eat, but will work on coming up with a clue
You got this tree buddy
Man, haven't done this in a while
Also, that song is HELLA risque
you can say that again
1:41 AM
And the clue wasn't? :p
but it was the 1970s
@Sciborg Well, not as risque as the music
wOW. if this song was written in the 1970s i am stunned by the lyrics
NSFW
@PrinceNorthLæraðr I'm excited
1:43 AM
Hehe, we'll see
I love how the song starts fairly innocent and typical rap-music material, and then just hits you with a gay baseball bat
Good golly
Do not google, kids
@Sciborg what if I need to know about baby goats?!
Google kids
1:50 AM
Don't look! It's NSFW (new, soft, fluffy, wubbable)!
"Let's eat, grandma" / "Let's eat grandma"
What if I want to google NSFW (Nice Soft Friendly Whales)???
2
i saw whales for the first time last month, that was really cool
ooh! that's really neat, did you do like a whale tour?
yeah
they migrate really close to the coast this time of year
1:55 AM
That's awesome. They're so beautiful
did you get pictures?
not really, pretty hard to get a good one when you have to hold on with one hand and the ship's rocking under you
plus my photography are pretty much limited to point-the-camera-and-hope
Valid. I would also imagine there's a risk of dropping your phone into the ocean
yeah
LITTLE-KNOWN FACT: once upon a time there were things called "cameras" which were not the same as phones, and some of those come with a sort of thing you put around your neck so that even if you let go with your hand it doesn't plummet into the ocean and injure the poor whales.
:o
Impossible
Do you mean to tell me that.... there was a time before camera-integrated phones???
HEATHEN
2:09 AM
never heard of 'em
btw, "do not google, kids" doesn't work. .. try "check it out kids, it's the music grandpa loves!"
which might even be true, depending on the grandpa
This makes me remember that one SNL sketch about the Alexa designed for old people where the old guy yelled "Alexa, play black jazz!" and the Alexa went like "playing, uh... jazz."
I aspire to be the kind of grandpa who yells "Alexa, play gay jazz" regularly in the house
2:47 AM
@Sciborg HAHA IVE SEEN THAT
3:07 AM
hehe
oh and it was pretty funny making up a clue about someone not in the room and them immediately showing up saying "ah, this is about me"
what are the odds
1/10000000000000
never tell me the odds
(han solo)
CCCC: Germany established the start of aggressive tempos in video game music. (7)
3:16 AM
@Jafe My Puzzling spidey sense was tingling
 
2 hours later…
4:57 AM
Hm, the C4 answer should be PASSION, but I can't seem to get the wordplay to work out. :-)
finally closes all the powerpoints and word documents; school is done for today
5:17 AM
@Jafe makes me realize that many of the things I know exist, I have never actually seen in real life. Mind blown slightly
@MOehm ahh
6:14 AM
i have so many things i wanna see, especially wrt marine life
dolphins are the next big thing, i've seen them in captivity several times but it's not the same
they organise sighting tours pretty near here actually, need to get on one of those at some point
6:38 AM
@Jafe "dolphins are the next big thing" takes notes, sends to Vogue editor
this better not lead to a bunch of people showing up on the red carpet wearing dolphin leather
6:51 AM
@PrinceNorthLæraðr DESTATI (video game music) = D (Germany) + EST. (established) + A_ T_ I_
aargh est. for established, of course... i was fixated on SET
@Jafe ditto
 
1 hour later…
8:09 AM
@Stiv I had no hope
There's always hope...
@Stiv not this time 😅
Even if I got the word play exactly, I'm not sure I'd have thought to Google destati
PSE has wrecked any hope of Google successfully pigeonholing me through my search history. If anything, one day I'll surely be flagged up by their algorithm as 'Just plain nuts'...
8:27 AM
@Stiv I'm certain I am getting my searches if "tempo synonyms" autocompleted to "tempo synonyms in hindi" as I'm on crosswords unclued so often now
8:47 AM
One-time VP candidate is plain nuts (5)
She really was...
 
2 hours later…
10:31 AM
haraS
 
2 hours later…
12:24 PM
1
Q: A puzzling stained glass window

AnonOn a recent trip to Europe, I visited a beautiful gothic abbey. Walking up the dark aisle between old wooden pews, the air heavy with the odour of incense, I could only marvel at the beautiful stained glass windows illuminating parts of the massive stone church with their vibrant light, and espec...

12:54 PM
ugh, found a rap lyric that perfectly works as printer's devilry for the word i'm trying to clue
problem is, the 7-word phrase contains one b-bomb, one s-bomb and one word which i'm pretty sure is not referring to tools used for digging soil in the garden
aaand back to the drawing board
1:14 PM
2
Q: A week around Europe

StivI've recently returned from a week of travelling around Europe, visiting a different town or city in a different country on each day, choosing my destinations according to an underlying pattern. I've plotted the first six places I visited on the map below; I need you to tell me: Which UK town or ...

1:32 PM
Ha, just noticed that Anon and I both put out a puzzle within less than an hour of each other using the premise of travelling around Europe! Funny coincidence...
hah yeah, almost sounds like it could be the same person narrating both
1:47 PM
too slow again, should have thought about using the title earlier
Looks like an auto racing complex, but there are no stands
some kind of test track?
"Applus+ IDIADA is an engineering company providing design, testing, engineering and homologation services to the automotive industry. "
alternatively it could be a highway designer's "let's mess with drivers who take a wrong turn here" move
It is a test track - There's a short video on that page.
2:03 PM
0
Q: Fold the plain four times to get the maximum number of cross points

EricYou have a straight line $l$ in an infinite plain. You can fold the plain along any straight line so the line $l$ becomes two rays with a common starting point. In the picture we fold along line $a_1$ to get the shape that is composed of the red ray $AB$ and the blue ray $AE$ You can fold the pl...

1
Q: Themed Boggle Grids

Scratch---CatInspired by this puzzle, I created (or discovered) these grids. Within each Boggle board is a set of words with a common theme. To make a word in Boggle, connect at least three letters horizontally, vertically, or diagonally, without using the same letter twice. Some of these grids contain blanks...

2:34 PM
@Stiv Yup! It’s a really cool music and my school orchestra (well my former middle school, to be exact) is performing that piece on Thursday!
@msh210 I LOVE PASSION ITS SO GOOOOOD
2:46 PM
Very cool
CCCC: School organisation held hostage by infamous murderer call and voice another complaint. Heads up - it's a superhero! (7,7)
@Stiv CA(PTA)IN+(_C+_A+_V+EMAN)<
@Sphinx Frustratingly I had every group except #9 solved within a few minutes, and I still can't spot #9 even now!
@Jafe And yes, this is spot on :)
@Jafe call => name? I wasn't aware of that
'I call him Stiv'
i'm called... = i'm named...
2:58 PM
Like "he's called Fred".
@Jafe hello ...
...i'm dad
4
CCCC: Range of mountainous places running east to west (4)
mountainous is one of those words that looks wrong every time... i looked it up again just to make sure
ALPS
mountainouS PLAces <
that is correct
I'll work on one, but I may be a short while
3:09 PM
@PrinceNorthLæraðr You might say you have a... never mind.
@Jafe &lit
(I know you know. Just pointing it out in case anyone missed it. Good &lits aren't a dime a dozen, y'know.)
yep
CCCC: Dishy strigiform in empty bed? (10)
I had one ready I had forgotten about
0
Q: Consecutive integers which have digital sums that are not relatively prime

Bernardo Recamán SantosWhat are ten smallest natural numbers n, such that n and n+1 have digital sums which are not relatively prime?

@AncientSwordRage behootered? dishy, definition; hooter (strigiform) in e+bed (though it's out of order then)
@msh210 not what I had intended
3:21 PM
oh, good
trying to understand what part of that would be the def... you know what, you don't need to tell me
@AncientSwordRage Can you double check the enumeration?
@ChrisCudmore I can
(it's still 10 letters)
3:27 PM
ok.
(apologies, that wasn't meant to come off as unhelpful/rude)
I'm curious what you thought it could be that would be different letters
Later...
@AncientSwordRage "dishy"
@msh210 gotcha
3:30 PM
Is there a hyphen?
Or should there be?
I'm going with B + OWLSHAPE + _D
That's using Strigiform as an adjective rather than a noun.
3:48 PM
@ChrisCudmore Ack, I walked away, realised that but you've solved it before I could apologies/warn
that is correct though
I think I was subconsciously doing nominalization, which is slighly unfair maybe?
@ChrisCudmore I would write it without, but maybe that's an error on my part?
4:21 PM
CCCC: Hang out in Berlin, Germany(6)
@ChrisCudmore _lin ger_
CCCC: Comic imp did something wrong? On the contrary (6)
@AncientSwordRage it's fair imo
@msh210 phew
 
1 hour later…
5:45 PM
@msh210 IMPROV(comic), IMP+(w)RO(ng)+V(for versus)
What clues the RO container?
not convinced that V means "on the contrary" either.
@AncientSwordRage What @ChrisCudmore and @GarethMcCaughan said. Your solution was not my intention.
@ChrisCudmore something
@AncientSwordRage I think container hints need to be a bit more literal.
5:53 PM
I initially thought "do something wrong"> worsen > opposite would be IMPROVE, but that can't be all that's involved
@ChrisCudmore yeees true, apologies for trying to make my guess fit the word play a little too clumsily
No need to apologize.
I do the same thing often.
It's something I noticed myself do while we were all trying to inch-down in Scotland
And I didn't like how much I did it
Speaking of Scotland - Here's one I rejected because it required M-W "Primarily Scottish"
Deer ate inferior partygoer. (9)
6:32 PM
@ChrisCudmore not sure if if should assume a Scottish deer or a Scottish partygoer
It's actually scottish inferior
6:45 PM
I'm lost on all fronts them I'm afraid
look up Rot13(onhpu) on M-W.
7:00 PM
@ChrisCudmore ahhhhhhhhhh
💡
Got it
Yeah, I thought that though it was technically legal, it was a bit unfair.
Although,
Deer ate inferior Scottish partygoer. (9)
might have been ok.
@ChrisCudmore I would have been fine with that
Don't take my word for it though
7:20 PM
Clearly â„¢ it's BE DEVIL but backwards, LIVE DEB, and a debbie DOWNER is contrary to what you want to be...
BD is short for Bande dessinée which is a kind of comic though
8:19 PM
The wordplay used in the C4 is very well known: it appears on many a short list of examples of a particular sort of wordplay. So I thought this C4 would go quickly.
8:44 PM
Container reversal.
Still doesn't help.
9:11 PM
@msh210 By any chance, is this DENNIS (comic imp) = SINNED<
9:31 PM
1
Q: Cryptic Acrostic 1: Off Balance

juiciferThis is an acrostic puzzle which uses cryptic clues. If you're unfamiliar with either or both of those, click the associated link. A complete answer should give the quote, author and source, as well as solutions and explanations of the cryptic clues. Oh, and in case you're too lazy to solve this ...

0
Q: Most efficient way for people along the edges of a grid to move to the center

Ice TeaI'm considering an $2k\times 2k$ square grid ($k\in\mathbb Z^+$) with $8k$ highly rational people standing along the vertices forming the perimeter. All of these people want to go to the centre of the square. Within unit time, each person can either decide to stay on their vertex or walk to an ad...

@Stiv By chance, it is!
Would you believe it!
Funny, I actually read a Beano to my daughter at bedtime too...!
CCCC: Badly-drawn web-lover creates sci-fi classic? (5,3,5)
@Stiv brave new world*?
@msh210 Yup. Knew it would fall quickly, but bedtime is fast approaching so I didn't want to go too cryptic!
9:46 PM
CCCC: Tormented by speed, inhaling a line at crack of dawn (8)
@Stiv Yeah, I got the mechanism instantly. Just trying to sort out the anagram.
@ChrisCudmore I saw "new" first somehow, and then the rest followed.
I got stuck playing with "the" and "and"
I actually posted the answer before making 100% sure it was an accurate anagram (hence the question mark).
@ChrisCudmore oh, I didn't even see "and". Good thing. Had I, I'd have gotten stuck on it, too.
"The" fell quickly (letters absent) but it's always a consideration on 3-letter words
9:56 PM
Yeah, I'd hoped 'and' might prove tricky tbh!
Well, gameN. This C4 I do not expect to fall quickly. (But I've been wrong before.)
10:23 PM
tumbles in
11:16 PM
@msh210 COKEHEAD
Head of the day/dawn of the day.. the page I linked doesn't back it up.. but I think it flies?
> Tormented by speed, inhaling a line
That's the def
Where does coke come from the wordplay?
@ChrisCudmore crack/coke of dawn/head
11:38 PM
I do not believe COKEHEAD. For one thing, I don't see a matching definition. Maybe someone "tormented by speed" could be a cokehead (though coke and speed are different drugs) but that doesn't mean that "tormented by speed" can rightly clue "cokehead". And I don't see any wordplay that matches.
(I would in fact be quite surprised if any part of the solution has anything to do with drugs. I think that's just a nicely misleading surface.)

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