Wordwise Wandering Trivia Quiz

Answer: Code Red

Explanation: Judging by all the ones and zeroes, this is binary code. And the text is, of course, in red. That gives the term CODE RED. Hospitals often use color-coded alerts (e.g., Code Red, Code Blue, Code Black) so that doctors and other staff know precisely what type of situation is ongoing. It has other uses, of course, but like the similar term "red alert," whenever a Code Red is announced, it means emergency!

By the way, the binary code in the image isn't just random -- there's a little message hidden in it. Can you make out what it says?

Answer: Border crossing

When you reach a BORDER CROSSING -- or a checkpoint, as it's sometimes called -- a passport is definitely needed. Some people seem to think the regulations are too strict -- they think, "What's the big deal; I'm just passing through" -- but most folks understand the concerns about legality and safety that necessitate the strictness.

Okay -- the hint "for the shape, think of a steeple" was meant to be a bit of a help to try to orient people's thoughts in the right general direction. What do you usually see atop a church steeple? Sure, a cross. And "BORDER" is both literally and figuratively "crossing" -- i.e., the letters are both intersecting and forming the shape of a cross. Hence BORDER CROSSING. Admittedly, I wasn't able to make this cross-shape's proportions quite perfect, hence the hint.

Answer: Reverse the charges

Well, it's probably cliche by now, but to use the saying again, this is a classic case-in-point example of "say what you see" -- "segrahC ehT" isn't a phrase, but if you reverse direction and read it starting from the right, it says "The Charges." So that's exactly what you see, and also what you do -- REVERSE THE CHARGES.

Some people are perhaps more familiar with this phrase than others, if only because it's not so common anymore -- a somewhat-more-common term is a "collect call." When you call collect -- or when you tell the operator to "reverse the charges" -- it simply means the person receiving the call pays instead of the person making the call.

I suppose another use of "reverse the charges" would be what you might ask the bank to do if you discover that someone else used your credit card without permission. In this case, the bank would investigate and hopefully return the money to your account.

Answer: King Kong

This one is actually a pretty straightforward explanation. When letters are placed in an unusual position, you try to figure out how their position might describe, or at least point you toward, the intended answer. In this case, the K is in the G -- more simply, "K in G" -- KING. And then the K is on top of the G -- "K on G" -- KONG. And there you have it: KING KONG.

This famous last line from the 1933 movie of the same name is often truncated (and a word erroneously changed) to simply, "'Twas beauty killed the beast." I suppose the latter has a somewhat more-poetic ring to it, so it's not all that surprising that this is often misquoted. The first sentence, however, really does help the context. I've seen an occasional "analysis" that tries to suggest the film actually has some sort of a deeper meaning -- like about race or gender -- but that's really just reading something into it that isn't there.

Had I decided to be accurate to the classic film, perhaps I might have found a way for the second G to be tiny like the Empire State Building, and the K on top to be gigantic like the monster. Oh, sure, it may sound like a sort-of-clever idea -- but I am not nearly creative enough to think of a way to actually execute the idea. Oh well!

Answer: Helen Reddy

This is one of just three color-themed "questions", and as with "reverse the charges," the name probably resonates more with some folks than others. The blue is just to provide a strong contrast -- against the most-important letters. Just take the name you see -- HELEN -- and then describe it -- "red E" -- REDDY. And there's HELEN REDDY!

Helen passed away in 2020, and for those who haven't heard her sing, take a few minutes and give one of her songs a listen; she's got a really lovely, distinctive voice. Arguably her most-famous song was "I Am Woman," from the '70s. Not surprisingly, she was a strong advocate for women's rights.

Answer: Lucille Ball

When words are written in shapes, they can look a bit unusual! There were only seven letters, so you kind of had to start counterclockwise and go to the letter L at about the 9 o'clock position on a clock. Anyway, you can see it spells LUCILLE. But just to make it a little more clear what shape I was aiming for, I drew an outline of the shape -- a circle, or more accurately for our purposes, a BALL. And with that another famous lady graces our quiz -- LUCILLE BALL.

There's really not very much at all that needs saying about her, is there? I honestly don't think I've met a single person who hasn't at least heard of "I Love Lucy"! Between her character (Lucy Ricardo) and the comedienne who played her (Lucille Ball), she was unquestionably one of the true pioneers in television, and her delightful comedy really has endured.

Answer: Life insurance

I've looked at many books and websites, and there's still no agreed-upon origin of how "buy the farm" came to mean "die." Similarly, it's not entirely understood just where we got such a vague-sounding idiom as "buy it" -- which means the same thing, of course -- but for the purposes of this Wordwise, the first "buy it" is referring to the answer. The use of quotation marks around the second use of "buy it" is in quotation marks to point out that this is a different usage of the same phrase. That is, if you elongate the sentence, It means "Buy life insurance before you die."

Well, this is yet again fairly self-explanatory -- it's a very common practice to use or imply the word "in" by having one word sandwiched in another. That said, I tend to find it a little hard to make out when everything is written in the same font size -- just consider "SURLIFEANCE" like that -- so it's easier to "pop" the one word by making it bigger. So you see that "LIFE" is IN (the word) "SURANCE" -- LIFE INSURANCE. (And did you know? It's an archaic term now, but "surance" actually is a word -- an obsolete one that means the same thing as "assurance."

All right, I'll admit it: I didn't trust my own handwriting enough to whip out a pen and paper to do these, so I deferred to my computer. When I was making each of these, I thought "a little pop of color would be nice for variety", though I ended up deciding to keep mostly to black-and-white so people wouldn't get misled. Hence why in this instance I pointed out that the "color is irrelevant" in the hint.

I'll dedicate this one to my paternal grandfather George, who was a life-insurance salesman -- for about 35 or 40 years -- and a wonderful prankster -- for all 93 of his years!

Answer: Seafood

Well, this one was sort of a double shot, if you will. The answer, of course, is SEAFOOD. But there are two different hints going on -- both of which involve something in common. Perhaps the more-obvious is that these are all seafoods (which is why that plural was also an acceptable spelling). But the more-playful thing -- yet again, a case of "say what you see" -- is these are all foods that begin with the letter C. Said more directly, they're all "C foods" -- hence SEAFOOD (or, as noted, SEAFOODS).

I'll resist the urge to make any puns about the fact that "carp" means both a fish and "to complain" -- we've got enough word silliness already!

Answer: Together at last

This is one of those phrases that when I think about it, I realize I've heard it many times throughout my life (and used it a few times myself), albeit in somewhat-different contexts. Sometimes it means that two people who were meant for each other finally met ... or fell in love ... or "found" each other after a long time apart. The phrase has a real feel of finality to it, because the strong connotation is that romantically, two people are either united or reunited -- or that any number of people, relationally, have finally gotten to meet or be together. Take, for example, a family reunion. Many folks often find that a relative they've heard of but never met before is there, or they feel like the family is whole -- brought together after a long time, for once not separated by geographic distance.

And you can tell fairly simply how to arrive at this one: "gether" (which is more of a word fragment -- though it sounds like "gather", doesn't it) -- and not one "gether" but TWO -- and converging in the same place, AT the word "LAST." Thus you can simply read it just as it appears -- TOGETHER AT LAST.

Answer: Lemon drops

Sorry to disappoint if you might have been inclined to think the last puzzle in the set would end things on a challenging and/or clever note. On reflection, though, I didn't think anyone would particularly mind a fairly straightforward ending, especially after some of the other Wordwises. All right, let's parse this out. The letters LEM are used in several acronyms -- in fact, some people even pronounce it as "lem", when referring to the Lunar Excursion Model, the original name of the Apollo Lunar Module -- but I digress.

Below the LEM is the word "drop" -- and as it's there twice rather than once, that's the clear indication of a plural. So one of the words is DROPS. But going back up to the second floor, look at what you see and simply describe the letters' position: "LEM is ON the DROPs." Simplify it and there's your answer: LEMON DROPS.

The clue in question, as you quite likely figured out, tells you that this phrase refers to something edible, but more to the point, it's playing on the two different meanings of the same basic action. Usually when someone "puckers up", it means they're going to give a kiss -- but this similar lip-squeezing also can happen as an involuntary reaction to a very sour or zesty flavor. Ever try biting into a lemon?

Anyway, lemon drops are a popular candy -- one of the more well-known confectioners is Brach's, though there are many different ones. They're basically just what they sound like -- bright-yellow, usually lemon-shaped (imagine that) little candies with a thin coating of sugar. Generally they're soft and chewy, so you can just pop one in and bite down. It's an acquired taste, I suppose; I never found those sweet-and-sour snacks appealing.

There are also a couple other things also known as "lemon drops." One is a martini or cocktail (I'll avoid enumerating all the ingredients). The other one you've likely seen now and then when looking at throat lozenges -- "honey lemon cough drops." When your throat hurts, lemon helps, but you don't want the to worsen things, so honey is great both because it's sweet and is sort of a sore-throat salve -- forsooth, it's for soothing!