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Dr. Shapiro's Puzzle of the Day

Today's Puzzle

Tuesday, April 27

   


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Yesterday's Puzzle + Solution

I recently saw the object at left on someone's desk (with some of the letters lit up). What is it, and what letters are covered by the yellow rectangle?

Solution This object is a clock… and the letters are CLOCK. Here's what it looks like in use:

I noticed the clock on a desk inside a car dealership as I walked by. My attempts to photograph it eventually attracted a guard's attention! I didn't get a good photo, but luckily I was able to find the product photo online by searching for ITLISASTHPMA. Turns out "word clock" would also have done the trick; the image search results show an awesome variety of different takes on this idea, including some you can build yourself.

Thanks to some random-looking filler letters, this clock can also display TENSE O'CLOCK (⏰😬⏰), or perhaps it can tell you who it belongs to (PASTOR FOUR? No, IT LISA'S!). Let me know if you see any other funny messages in the grid…

Congratulations to yesterday's solvers Alex Z., Anna J., Charlie, Ena, Jacob C., Lucia, Peter M., Peter V., Graham, Kate, Zachary S., and the Greggs. Thanks to everybody who made a guess!

About This Site

Though he now teaches mathematics, Dr. (né Mr.) Shapiro's first job in a K–12 school was as a lunch monitor in Davis, CA. It was there that he originated the Puzzle of the Day, even rewarding correct answers with tickets in denominations like "15 points" (though without a clear idea of how he'd ultimately redeem these). Dr. Shapiro's favorite puzzle from this pre-professional era was "Tell me the location of the beehive on this campus."

Ten years later, Dr. Shapiro revived Puzzle of the Day at Proof School, writing each day's puzzle on a name tag. After 600 puzzles or so, he was just starting to feel normal about students reading his chest all the time when campus closed and the puzzle, like the rest of our lives, moved online. New puzzles are posted daily on school days.

Want to catch up on old PotDs? There's an archive currently containing puzzles from March 2020 to March 2021.