Today's Puzzle
Thursday, April 29
Today's puzzle combines geography and linguistics!
Seen at left is a Russian map of the Bay Area. The place names are written using the Cyrillic alphabet, while preserving the sound of the English name as much as possible. I have circled five cities. Can you identify them?
Tip: Use the places you recognize to figure out the sounds of the letters. But beware:
- Some letters look like Roman (English) letters. They may or may not sound the same.
- If you use the italics, know that some Cyrillic letters look different in italic.
Yesterday's Puzzle + Solution
What single 8-letter adjective can describe all of the following?
- certain home telephones available since the early 1980s
- most window blinds currently on the market, thanks to safety regulations
- all human beings, except extremely new ones
Hint
Also in this category: certain drills and vacuum cleaners.
Solution
The answer, as styled by Graham:
c~o~r~d~l~e~s~s
Congratulations to yesterday's solvers Yana, Connor, Peter V., Ena, Charlie, Anna J., Atticus, Kate, Graham, Dr. Yetman, and Mr. Gregg. 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.