Apr 11, 2005
RAY: This puzzler comes from someone named Paul Zemlin. I had to change things around and obfuscate it just a little bit.
It's semi-automotive. Here it is:
"My car was being vandalized by some kids I had flunked from my English class. Each night they would remove the first and last letter from its model name emblem. For example, 'Camry' is the model name of a certain Toyota.
"They continued to do this until all the letters were gone except for one. The curious thing that I noticed was that each morning the remaining letters of the model name still spelled a word in the English language.
"I'll give you an example. If the car were a Chevy Blazer, you'd take off the first and last letters and you'd have laze, which is a real word that I know something about.
"If you did it again, you'd wind up with the letters A and Z, az - like you don't know your az from a hole in the ground. Of course, that doesn't work.
"But there is one model name for which it does work. And the question is, what is that model?"
It's semi-automotive. Here it is:
"My car was being vandalized by some kids I had flunked from my English class. Each night they would remove the first and last letter from its model name emblem. For example, 'Camry' is the model name of a certain Toyota.
"They continued to do this until all the letters were gone except for one. The curious thing that I noticed was that each morning the remaining letters of the model name still spelled a word in the English language.
"I'll give you an example. If the car were a Chevy Blazer, you'd take off the first and last letters and you'd have laze, which is a real word that I know something about.
"If you did it again, you'd wind up with the letters A and Z, az - like you don't know your az from a hole in the ground. Of course, that doesn't work.
"But there is one model name for which it does work. And the question is, what is that model?"
Answer:
RAY: The model is the Mitsubishi Eclipse.
TOM: I take off the E and the E and I get "clips" left.
RAY: Which is certainly an English word.
TOM: And I take off the C and the S, and I get "lip." And I take off the L and the P and I get "I". All of which are words.
RAY: Do we have a winner?
TOM: The winner this week is Gary Ingersoll from Bloomington, Indiana. And for having his correct answer selected at random, from all the correct answers that we got, Gary is going to get from us a 26-dollar gift certificate to the Shameless Commerce Division at cartalk.com. With this 26-dollar gift certificate, he can get his mother, are you ready for this, a Mother's Day gift. Like for instance, a copy of our mother's CD called Maternal Combustion.
TOM: I take off the E and the E and I get "clips" left.
RAY: Which is certainly an English word.
TOM: And I take off the C and the S, and I get "lip." And I take off the L and the P and I get "I". All of which are words.
RAY: Do we have a winner?
TOM: The winner this week is Gary Ingersoll from Bloomington, Indiana. And for having his correct answer selected at random, from all the correct answers that we got, Gary is going to get from us a 26-dollar gift certificate to the Shameless Commerce Division at cartalk.com. With this 26-dollar gift certificate, he can get his mother, are you ready for this, a Mother's Day gift. Like for instance, a copy of our mother's CD called Maternal Combustion.
