Saturday 20 January 2007

'P' FOR 'PUZZLE'

erhaps you missed it, but the other day Lisa at Brainwash Cafe left a perplexing puzzle among the comments and I’ve been puzzling over it ever since….

Here it is:

"What is the only English word when the first letter changes from lower to upper, BOTH the meaning AND the pronunciation change?”


A plea for an answer only brought this additional clue:

“Hint: the word has 6 letters and begins with letter ‘p’... and YES, one of the words will make you lose weight [this was prompted by my recent blog about pasta], but only if indulged in excessively…”

All solutions welcome. But I have to warn you I can’t give you the answer tomorrow (or in the foreseeable future) because, at the moment, I really don’t know it!!

6 comments:

David Weeks said...

" Draw a line through the maze from the upper case letter to the lower case letter"
Yes. And . . . .?
This is an Educational Worksheet?
That it is genuine I do not doubt. That it is educational is another assertion entirely.
Is it any wonder that the educational system is in the sad mess that it is when things that like this claim to be educational.
This is one of those dreaded worksheets that allows each pupil to work at their own speed.
What pray, is the point of this exercise? What exactly is possibly going to be learnt that is worth learning, by performing this mind numbing activity?
Answers on a postage stamp!

Brian Sibley said...

Well that got a strong response! I only chose the illustration because it gave me the 'P' for 'Perhaps...' and because it was, at the same time, a puzzle --- though not a very good one, I admit...

But what about the WORD puzzle? Do you know the answer to THAT??

Anonymous said...

I have spent 10 whole minutes thinking about this and I give up, I can't imagine what the word is. I sure hope you find out the answer yourself, and when you do, that you post it to put me out of my misery.

Brian Sibley said...

Only TEN MINUTES, Maxine? Some of us have been puzzling over it for days!

None of my very clever friends has cracked it, so I'll have to beg Lisa to put us ALL out of our misery very soon...

As soon as I know, YOU'LL know.

And, if inspiration does suddenly strike, well, drop us a line... :-)

Anonymous said...

EUREKA! I went to Brussels this morning and sat down for a hot chocolate... with pen & paper. Five minutes of doodling later: Polish, polish... Ta da!!!

Brian Sibley said...

BRAVO!! And thank you Suzanne for giving us all back our sanity!!

WELL DONE! :-)