A Puzzly Story for the Whole Family!

Happy Thanksgiving, fellow puzzlers and PuzzleNationers!

In honor of a day dedicated to family and giving thanks for the many blessings in our lives, I’ve got a puzzly story to share with you.

Let’s start with a brain teaser: Samuel was born first, but his twin brother Ronan is older. How is that possible?

[Image courtesy of Cape Cod Healthcare’s Facebook page.]

The answer? When Daylight Savings Time gets involved.

In the early hours of Sunday, November 6, Emily Peterson was at the hospital with her husband Seth, delivering twin boys. But after the birth of her son Samuel, the time change got involved and made the blessed event a tiny bit stranger.

From an article on Fox News, passed along to me by friend of the blog Gina Kanter:

Emily Peterson gave birth to the first baby, Samuel, at 1:39 a.m., before clocks turned back at 2 a.m. […] Then, 31 minutes later, she delivered Ronan. Because Ronan’s birth came after the time change, his official birth time was 1:10 a.m., not 2:10 a.m.

And although one of the nurses said she’s never seen something like this in 40 years of work as a nurse, the father wasn’t surprised. “I said earlier that night that they were either going to be born on two different days or the time change was going to come into play.”

Of course, we know which child is actually older, but when you look at the delivery times and then ask who is older, it makes for a great story. It’s not every child that inspires a brain teaser on his day of birth, so kudos to Ronan and Samuel for creating a wonderful little puzzly gem.

Have a marvelous holiday!


And don’t forget, our Penny Dell Sudoku app contest ends at midnight tonight! Click here for the full details!


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It’s Follow-Up Friday: Playing With Our Food edition!

Welcome to Follow-Up Friday!

By this time, you know the drill. Follow-Up Friday is a chance for us to revisit the subjects of previous posts and bring the PuzzleNation audience up to speed on all things puzzly.

And today, I’m posting the results of our #PennyDellPuzzlyFoods hashtag game!

[Image courtesy of Dreamstime.com.]

You may be familiar with the board game Schmovie, hashtag games on Twitter, or @midnight’s Hashtag Wars segment on Comedy Central.

For over a year now, we’ve been collaborating on puzzle-themed hashtag games with our pals at Penny Dell Puzzles, and this month’s hook was #PennyDellPuzzlyFoods, mashing up Penny Dell puzzles and anything and everything having to do with breakfast, lunch, dinner, dessert, snacks, drinks, candy, and more!

Examples include Lucky Eggs Clover Easy, Cheese Three, and Tiramisudoku.

So, without further ado, check out what the puzzlers at PuzzleNation and Penny Dell Puzzles came up with!


Abacustard

Petit Four Square

Chex Mixed Bag

Sausage Link-words

At 7 and 7

Pear Off

Pears in Rhyme

Picture Pears

Little Twizzler

Tidbits and Pieces

A-Maize-ing Quote

Batterships

Brick by Brickle

Brick by Brick Oven Pizza

Double Turkish Delight

Double Trouble Bubble Gum

Almond Four One

All Flours

Flour Power / Sour Power Patch Kids / Flower Powerbars

Quotagraham Crackers / Cryptograham crackers / Diagraham Crackers / S’more Cryptograham Crackers, Please?

Scrambled Eggs Up

SpinachWheel

Make the Baconnection

Piggyback bacon

Syrups and Downs / Ketchups and Downs

Stew at a Time / Roux at a Time

Stew-Step / Roux-Step

Stewdoku / Beef stewdoku

Cake-kuro

Roll of the Spice

Trail Mix and Match / Word Trails Mix / Trail Mixed Bag of Trix

Bits & Reese’s Pieces

Berried Treasure

Circles in the Lemon Square

Cheese & Crackerjacks

Gumdrop-Outs

Half-and-Halftime

Pizza by Piece

Eye of Rounders

Truffle Shuffle

Banana Split Personalities

Starburst Words

Cookieword / Kiwiword / Whiskeyword / Sukiyakiword

Cake a Letter

Sunraisin

ShadowLox

Beet the Clock

Right of Whey

Roulettuce

Wonton and Only

Build-A-Burger Quote

Anagram Magic Square bars

Tossed and Turnip Salad

Topsy-Turvy “Fill-in the Blank” Alcoholic Drinks!

Spinwheel Spaghetti and Meatballs

Analog Nog

Rhyme Thyme

Rye-Angles / Trifle-Angles

Lemon Drop-Outs / Lemon Drop-Ins

Flan Words

Grand Torte

Pickle and Choose

Ghee’s Company

InCiders

Colabyrinth

Hot Crossed bun Pairs / Hot Cross Sum Buns / Hot Crostics Buns

Pixie Cros-Stix

AnaCheese Sticks

7 Match-Up

Match-Up-Side-Down Cake

Pine Scone

Stepping Scones

Dim Sum Triangles / Dim Sum Totals

Onion Ringmaster / Onion Ringers

Macaroni & Places, Please

Beer & There

Missing Domino’s Pizza

Alphabreadics

Gravy-Words Word Seek

Grocery Missing Word List

Mystery Meat Person

Gizzard Words

Wheel of Fortune Cookies

Cookie Sha-dough

Campbell’s Chunky Alphabet Soup

TV Appe-Teaser

Penny’s Finest Chinese Takeouts

Pass the Scrambled Eggs Across the Table

Balancing (the diet) Act

Tossing and Turning the pancakes

A Perfect Ten-course meal

Three’s Company, but four’s coming to dinner

Countdown to Thanksgiving

What’s Leftovers?


There was a submission that deserves its own introduction. One of our intrepid puzzlers tackled the classic Tootsie Pop conundrum in proper puzzly fashion:

How many Lick By Licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Roll of the Dice

That’s a Square Deal. Take it Piece by Piece then Crack’er open.


Have you come up with any Penny Dell Puzzly Foods entries of your own? Let us know! We’d love to see them!

Thanks for visiting PuzzleNation Blog today! Be sure to sign up for our newsletter to stay up-to-date on everything PuzzleNation!

You can also share your pictures with us on Instagram, friend us on Facebook, check us out on TwitterPinterest, and Tumblr, and explore the always-expanding library of PuzzleNation apps and games on our website!

It’s Follow-Up Friday: Funding and Fright edition!

Welcome to Follow-Up Friday!

By this time, you know the drill. Follow-Up Friday is a chance for us to revisit the subjects of previous posts and bring the PuzzleNation audience up to speed on all things puzzly.

And today, I’ve got some updates and answers for you!

First off, I want to say congratulations to Patrick Blindauer, whose Piece of Cake Crosswords Kickstarter campaign was funded by solvers hungry for quality puzzles without the obscurities and crosswordese!

It was down to the wire, but the campaign raised the final $10,000 in just seven days to pass the funding goal and ensure that 52 terrific puzzles will be wending their way to solvers all over the world!

In fact, the first one has already arrived in solvers’ inboxes! I can’t wait to see what Patrick has up his sleeve for the next 51 weeks!


And now, on to the answers!

On Monday, I posted a video by musician, comedian, and pun-enthusiast Ali Spagnola where she assembled twenty Halloween themed (or just generally spooky) songs and challenged you to name them all.

How did you do?

1. “Thriller” — Michael Jackson
2. Ghostbusters theme — Ray Parker Jr.
3. “Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)” — Eurythmics
4. “Time Warp” — The Rocky Horror Picture Show
5. “The Monster” — Eminem ft. Rihanna
6. “Monster Mash” — Bobby “Boris” Pickett and the Crypt-Kickers
7. “The Phantom of the Opera” — Andrew Lloyd Webber
8. The Addams Family theme
9. “This Is Halloween” — The Nightmare Before Christmas
10. The Twilight Zone theme
11. Little Shop of Horrors theme
12. “Crazy Train” — Ozzy Osbourne
13. Scooby Doo, Where Are You? theme
14. “Everybody (Backstreet’s Back)” — Backstreet Boys
15. “Enter Sandman” — Metallica
16. “Somebody’s Watching Me” — Rockwell
17. “Disturbia” — Rihanna
18. “Heads Will Roll” — Yeah Yeah Yeahs
19. “Hungry Like the Wolf” — Duran Duran
20. “The Devil Went Down to Georgia” — The Charlie Daniels Band

Admittedly, I didn’t get all of them — the Ghostbusters theme eluded me, and I don’t think I’d ever heard Rihanna’s “Disturbia” — but I got all of the others! Not too shabby!


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You can also share your pictures with us on Instagram, friend us on Facebook, check us out on TwitterPinterest, and Tumblr, and explore the always-expanding library of PuzzleNation apps and games on our website!

Halloween Hallowhimsy!

Hello there, fellow puzzlers and PuzzleNationers!

It’s Halloween, that spookiest of holidays, and I’ve got two puzzly videos loaded with today’s traditional tricks and treats!

The first video comes from musician and comedian Ali Spagnola, who has created a masterful mashup of 20 tunes loaded with Halloween spirit! Can you name all 20 songs?

I’m a little disappointed that Warren Zevon’s “Werewolves of London” didn’t make the cut, but otherwise, this is awesome.

The second video comes from domino artist and friend of the Blog Hevesh5, who has created a new domino chain to celebrate All Hallow’s Eve in eerie, energetic fashion!

Whether it’s ghosts or goblins, ditties or dominoes, we hope you have a marvelous Halloween!


Thanks for visiting PuzzleNation Blog today! Be sure to sign up for our newsletter to stay up-to-date on everything PuzzleNation!

You can also share your pictures with us on Instagram, friend us on Facebook, check us out on TwitterPinterest, and Tumblr, and explore the always-expanding library of PuzzleNation apps and games on our website!

It’s Follow-Up Friday: This Illusion’s Got Legs edition!

Welcome to Follow-Up Friday!

By this time, you know the drill. Follow-Up Friday is a chance for us to revisit the subjects of previous posts and bring the PuzzleNation audience up to speed on all things puzzly.

And today, I’d like to return to the subject of viral optical illusions.

Last year, we had The Dress. Then, in March of this year, we had The Jacket. And in May, we asked the question How Many Girls?

Whether we’re spotting iPhones or looking for cats in woodpiles, we can’t seem to get enough of optical illusions.

And there’s a new one making the rounds recently:

[Image courtesy of TheChive.com.]

A woman named Bree tweeted this image of a pair of bare legs that look incredibly shiny. Are they false legs? Are they lotioned or wrapped in Saran wrap? What’s going on here?

I’ll give you a few moments to ponder the image before revealing the secret behind it. Because, as Bree said, “Once you see it, you can’t unsee it.”

Ready? Okay, here we go.

Like most optical illusions, the answer is startlingly simple.

[Image courtesy of TheChive.com.]

The illusion of shininess is actually the result of strategically placed streaks of white paint or toothpaste or something similar.

Pretty impressive once you really look at it, isn’t it?

This image has truly gone viral. As I write this, it’s been retweeted over 16,000 times, and liked over 20,000 times. Bree herself seems baffled by the attention the post has received.

Amazing what you can do with a bit of white paint.


Thanks for visiting PuzzleNation Blog today! Be sure to sign up for our newsletter to stay up-to-date on everything PuzzleNation!

You can also share your pictures with us on Instagram, friend us on Facebook, check us out on TwitterPinterest, and Tumblr, and explore the always-expanding library of PuzzleNation apps and games on our website!

It’s Follow-Up Friday: Spooky Puzzling edition!

Welcome to Follow-Up Friday!

By this time, you know the drill. Follow-Up Friday is a chance for us to revisit the subjects of previous posts and bring the PuzzleNation audience up to speed on all things puzzly.

And today, I’m posting the results of our #PennyDellSpookyPuzzles hashtag game!

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You may be familiar with the board game Schmovie, hashtag games on Twitter, or @midnight’s Hashtag Wars segment on Comedy Central.

For over a year now, we’ve been collaborating on puzzle-themed hashtag games with our pals at Penny Dell Puzzles, and this month’s hook was #PennyDellSpookyPuzzles, mashing up Penny Dell puzzles and anything and everything having to do with Halloween, horror movies and TV, costumes, Octobers, anything spooky!

Examples include Trick by Brick, Halloweaver Words, & Stepping Tombstones.

So, without further ado, check out what the puzzlers at PuzzleNation and Penny Dell Puzzles came up with!


Spooky Puzzles!

Boodoku

Zombie ZigZags

Anagram Magic Scare

Creepy Crawler Crosswords

Wicked Witch Word Seeks

Fang-Tastic Fill-Ins

Scaremaster

Sprite of Way

Four-Ghost

Crypto-Zoo-mbies

Exchange Ouija Boards

Skull-a-crostics

Tombworms

Pumpkins, Please

Guess Boo!

Witch Way Words

Missing Howls

Jigsaw Scares

Word Shriek

Heads & Tails & Arms & Teeth & Feet & Brains & Ears & . . .

Four Coroners

Gore-Master / Grand Gore / Lucky Gore

Jeepers Creepers Word Seekers

Who’s Lurking in the Shadows

Skull and Crossbone Word Game Puzzles

Frameworked for Murder

Missing Body Vowels

Tortured Soulocrostics

Sunday Bloody Sunday Crosswords

Wherewolf Are They Now?

Mummystery Word

Crazy for Ghosts

Double Trouble, toil and trouble

Crackerjack-o’-lantern

Black Cat-egories


Spooky Movie and TV Puzzles!

Tales from the Cryptograms / Tales from the Crypto-Zoo

The Nightmare Before-’n’-Aft Christmas

Frankenstein’s Mon-Star Words

Frankenine of Diamonds

Frame-kenstein

Cujo-ku / SudoCujo

Salem’s Lottery / Salem’s Lotto

Carrie-Overs

Pet Sum-etary

Dash-IT / Zip IT

Criss-Crosstine

The Texas Changaword Massacre / The Texas Chain Words Massacre

An Anagram Werewolf in London / An Anagram Here & There-wolf in London

The Rocky Horror Picture This Show / The Rocky Horror Picture Sleuth

“Let’s do the Timed Framework again.”

Ghostpuzzlers

Alfred Hitchcock’s…..The Bird Words

“Mirror Mirror on the wall, who’s the best Extreme Sudoku player of them all?”

Scream Talk

Eight Heads and Tails in a Duffle Bag

Heads and Tails-Less Horseman

Polterguess Who?

“They’re Here and There.”

Countdown Dracula

Hotel Transyllacrostic

The Addams Family Ties

Elvira: Missing List of the Dark

Crackerjacks Skellington

Zombie ApocalBlips

“I saw a werewolf drinking a Pine Cone Colada at Trade-Off Vic’s. His hair was Perfect Fit.”

Chips, the Friendly Ghost

The Legend of Spellbound Hollow

The All Mixed Up Family

“It’s the Guess Who Pumpkin, Charlie Brown!”

Halloween III: Season of the Witch Way Words

Anagram-ville Horror / Amityville Scorewords

Rows Garden’s Baby

Pumpkinheads & Tails

“Let’s play a Word Game!”

It’s just a framework…framework night…it’ll get you so Tangled…you won’t know What’s Left when the Shadows come to fright…

“Ooooo who knows other than Vincent Price will turn back the clock… “Tick Tock” “Tick Tock” time to Wordseek, before the wicked Queen Ellery strikes…


Have you come up with any Penny Dell Spooky Puzzles entries of your own? Let us know! We’d love to see them!

Thanks for visiting PuzzleNation Blog today! Be sure to sign up for our newsletter to stay up-to-date on everything PuzzleNation!

You can also share your pictures with us on Instagram, friend us on Facebook, check us out on TwitterPinterest, and Tumblr, and explore the always-expanding library of PuzzleNation apps and games on our website!