Speaker 1: Hello, puzzlers, Welcome to the Puzzler Podcast the eleven herbs
Speaker 1: and Spices in your original puzzle recipe. I am your host,
Speaker 1: AJ Jacobs, and I am here with Chief Puzzle Officer
Speaker 1: Greg Pliska. Welcome Greg, Thank.
Speaker 2: You, Aj. I'm glad to be released from the Puzzle
Speaker 2: Lab once.
Speaker 1: Again, just temporarily, but yes, thank you.
Speaker 2: What's the product with the eleven herbs and spices? Is that?
Speaker 1: Like I thought it was KFC?
Speaker 2: Oh here, KFC. You're right, yeah, KFC the secret eleven
Speaker 2: herbs and spices very good.
Speaker 1: But I thought they had figured out at least like
Speaker 1: seven or eight of the secret herbs and spices.
Speaker 2: Now that we've mentioned KFC, do we get a sponsorship?
Speaker 1: Interesting? I always thought I like that it used to
Speaker 1: be Kentucky Fried Chicken, and that I feel they now
Speaker 1: they just.
Speaker 2: They've gone away from Kentucky Fried and Chicken.
Speaker 1: Right. I guess if you switch from Kentucky Fried Chicken
Speaker 1: to KFC, you know, you could start serving donuts. You
Speaker 1: could start serving like my salads.
Speaker 2: In broiled beef instead from Tennessee Toxey. Broiled beef could
Speaker 2: be a thing exact. Well, this puzzle has nothing to
Speaker 2: do with any of that.
Speaker 1: Perfect.
Speaker 2: You've read the entire Encyclopedia, yes, and forgotten it, and
Speaker 2: now you've taken a deep dive into the US Constitution.
Speaker 1: True.
Speaker 2: True, So I figure you're an expert on every fact
Speaker 2: related to the United States.
Speaker 1: Exactly, wrong, exactly, But I will do my best. I yes,
Speaker 1: I have forgotten about ninety nine point eight percent of
Speaker 1: the Encyclopedia, which was my first book and my my
Speaker 1: recent book, The Year of Living Constitutionally, I do still
Speaker 1: remember a lot of constitutional stuff. So if that's it,
Speaker 1: I might be a okay. But if it's not, then
Speaker 1: who knows?
Speaker 2: Well? For better or for worse? This puzzle is completely fictional, okay.
Speaker 2: I so instead of being about the United States, I'm
Speaker 2: calling it the Untied States.
Speaker 1: Oh.
Speaker 2: I like it, okay, because I've made up fake facts
Speaker 2: about each state, and in each fact it ends, the
Speaker 2: fact ends with an anagram of the state name, and
Speaker 2: you have to come up with the state.
Speaker 1: Okay, good, all right, I'm already in my mind. I'm
Speaker 1: trying to get one step ahead of you. I think
Speaker 1: I have one.
Speaker 2: I have one, or you already have a state name
Speaker 2: anagram in your head.
Speaker 1: I do That's it.
Speaker 2: So do you want to give me the example or
Speaker 2: should I give you the example?
Speaker 1: Well, let me try this, Let me try this. This
Speaker 1: would be the fact that there is a special charge
Speaker 1: on all lassos and spurs. In other words, it's a
Speaker 1: some rodeo taxi.
Speaker 2: Yes, very good. And that would be the state of Texas.
Speaker 1: So I got one, you got one.
Speaker 2: Excellent. I like when you give the example for the
Speaker 2: puzzle I'm doing. And in fact, my example was also
Speaker 2: for the state of Texas. Still using this state has
Speaker 2: been under the flag of six different nations, each dedicated
Speaker 2: to chopping down trees using a very specific axe set.
Speaker 1: Oh that's good. Yeah, that's hard.
Speaker 2: All right, So remember the fake fact will always end
Speaker 2: with the anagram of the state name. Gotcha, all right,
Speaker 2: here's your first one. This was the most debaunched of
Speaker 2: the early colonies and was considered a very.
Speaker 1: Lewd area, a lud area. Okay, uh that is? Oh,
Speaker 1: I got it, Okay, I got it. I got it.
Speaker 1: It is And I don't know if this is true.
Speaker 1: I'd be interested to see the statistics. But it was.
Speaker 2: Delaware, Yes, it was Delaware. No, these are all fake.
Speaker 2: In fact, Delaware has laws to prohibit the showing of
Speaker 2: our and X rated movies at drive in movie theaters
Speaker 2: even today, even today, so it's a very not back
Speaker 2: back in colonial days, they also did not show extra
Speaker 2: in movies at drive in theaters.
Speaker 1: Well it's nice because they didn't have them then, and
Speaker 1: they probably don't have drive in theaters now. So right,
Speaker 1: we're out of the danger zone.
Speaker 2: There was that brief window of drive in movies, right,
Speaker 2: all right, here's another one for you. Early Spanish settlers
Speaker 2: in this state learned the history of Seminole celebrations when
Speaker 2: they discovered the remnants of an old fairly.
Speaker 1: Fair, okay, that is, or remnants of an old fair.
Speaker 1: That's interesting, all right, Well, I was thinking, Arizona, that
Speaker 1: doesn't work. Let's say, let's say I am wait, say
Speaker 1: it again. Remnants of an old fair is the end?
Speaker 2: Remnants of an old fair is the nds.
Speaker 1: Oh man, I don't know, Oh I am blanking.
Speaker 2: Mention of the seminoles is of course Native American people
Speaker 2: who lived in this in this territory. They they continue
Speaker 2: to live there today. In fact.
Speaker 1: Interesting, all right, Well give me the first letter that'll
Speaker 1: help that.
Speaker 2: In fact, we'll give it away.
Speaker 1: It starts with an F Uh so, my mind is
Speaker 1: so foggy, I can't remember. I do know, I do
Speaker 1: know that there was a state called Franklin for a while.
Speaker 1: But it's not Franklin. It is.
Speaker 2: It's got the letters of old Fair in it. It
Speaker 2: starts with.
Speaker 1: An F and Florida. I was taking west for some reason.
Speaker 1: Oh my god. All right, Florida, Florida.
Speaker 2: All right, here's another one during the gold.
Speaker 1: But I give myself. No, I'm just saying I should
Speaker 1: get extra credit for the Franklin thing, even though I totally.
Speaker 2: Absolutely see that's the remnants. That's the last point two
Speaker 2: percent of your reading of the encyclopedia is knowing there
Speaker 2: was a state called Franklin, Okay good during the gold Rush.
Speaker 2: This state became known for a different mining industry, and
Speaker 2: the fumes from it filled the land with a noxious
Speaker 2: coal odor. Coal odor. It's impossible to say coal filled
Speaker 2: noxious coal odor.
Speaker 1: All Right, this one I think I do have. I
Speaker 1: think because this one you can do, because you know
Speaker 1: you're only anagrammy couple letters. Colorado Colorado exactly goes to Colorado,
Speaker 1: Okay currently.
Speaker 2: Is eleventh in the US and coal production with eight
Speaker 2: active mines.
Speaker 1: Well, good for this I guess.
Speaker 2: Yeah, hopefully not too much coal odor. All right, there's
Speaker 2: another one. Spanish conquistadors discovered this state by sailing in
Speaker 2: the wrong direction in search of African oil.
Speaker 1: African Okay, I think I got it. Uh No, I don't.
Speaker 1: I thought I had it. I thought it was Louisiana.
Speaker 1: But that's not it.
Speaker 2: That's not going to be an anagram of African oil.
Speaker 1: And I thought as well, I thought it was Florida
Speaker 1: because when I heard the conquistadors it was uh so
Speaker 1: it is not that. Hold on, I am still suffering
Speaker 1: from my cold medicine mind, so I need.
Speaker 2: Well, this is a This is a western state that
Speaker 2: a lot of Spanish settlers came through, both conquistadors and missionaries.
Speaker 1: Wait, California.
Speaker 2: California is in fact an anagram of African oil.
Speaker 1: Oh well, this is interesting. I do not This actually
Speaker 1: is not interesting. But it's interesting to me that I
Speaker 1: wrote oil and my writing was so messy. The L
Speaker 1: looked like a D, so I was like, what state
Speaker 1: has a D in it? No state with these letters.
Speaker 1: So there you go.
Speaker 2: You had african oid.
Speaker 1: African oid. That didn't work.
Speaker 2: All right, Let's do two more of these.
Speaker 1: All right, I can make this.
Speaker 2: This colony developed its own version of the aesop fable
Speaker 2: when it held a popular rabbit and turtle race in
Speaker 2: the seventeenth century, with a prize of a pound of
Speaker 2: marijuana to the winner. The news headline the next day
Speaker 2: was hair Wind's hemp.
Speaker 1: Hair Wind's hemp. I love it, all right, this one
Speaker 1: I feel I got. I don't know how I got it,
Speaker 1: but it's New Hampshire exactly.
Speaker 2: But you just anagrammed hair winds hemp and hair.
Speaker 1: Yeah it works and does How did you look into
Speaker 1: New Hampshire and their and their hemp rules and their
Speaker 1: podet I didn't. I did.
Speaker 2: It's look it's live free or die state. I'm sure
Speaker 2: everyone's getting stoned up there all the time.
Speaker 1: That's what I felt. All right, good? What else?
Speaker 2: You your last one? This midwestern state began as a
Speaker 2: nature preserve, with special attention given to amphibians to care
Speaker 2: for the little creatures. Naturalists would build tiny oak toad huts.
Speaker 1: Oak toad huts, okay ok toad huts. Well, it's interesting
Speaker 1: because I feel oak toad huts is a Dakota, But
Speaker 1: so there's a South or a North Dakota.
Speaker 2: Yes, which one has an essen? It?
Speaker 1: That one? I think I can answer. Give me a second,
Speaker 1: South Dakota, South Dakota.
Speaker 2: South Dakota exactly all right, because today there are there
Speaker 2: are actually five different kinds of toads in South Dakota,
Speaker 2: none of which live in huts.
Speaker 1: That we know of. Well, look at that, say, we
Speaker 1: learned something real, real facts as well. And by the way,
Speaker 1: Associate puzzler Andrea, am I right that Franklin was briefly
Speaker 1: a state? Or was it just an idea for a
Speaker 1: state that never got off the ground. We'll find that out.
Speaker 1: And while she's doing that, do you have one for
Speaker 1: the uh puzzlers at home? Perhaps?
Speaker 2: Yes, I'm gonna turn this around for the folks at home,
Speaker 2: since they've got plenty of time, and assuming they've arrived
Speaker 2: home and have their pencil and paper out, they can
Speaker 2: work this the other way. So I'm going to give
Speaker 2: the name of the state in the clue and they
Speaker 2: have to figure out what the anagram toward anagram is.
Speaker 2: All right here it is. During the colonial era, Massachusetts
Speaker 2: had a grape growing industry they wanted to keep secret
Speaker 2: from the British. This meant that along the coast there
Speaker 2: were many hidden blank blank.
Speaker 1: Uh huh.
Speaker 2: So you take the letters of Massachusetts and anagram to
Speaker 2: finish that sentence that along the coast there were many
Speaker 2: hidden blank blank.
Speaker 1: Got it? Okay? So letters are Massachusetts, rearrange them to
Speaker 1: fill in the blanks. One last note is that the
Speaker 1: fourteenth state was supposed to be Franklin in East Tennessee,
Speaker 1: but it was never recognized, so it was an unrecognized
Speaker 1: proposed state. I recognize, so I feel it's I mean,
Speaker 1: he is my favorite of the founding fathers, so that
Speaker 1: he didn't get his own state to me, is he
Speaker 1: gone out right?
Speaker 2: James seem right.
Speaker 1: Puzzlers, please don't forget to subscribe to the Puzzler podcast
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Speaker 1: we will meet you here tomorrow for more puzzling puzzles
Speaker 1: that will puzzle you puzzlingly.
Speaker 2: Hello puzzlers. Greg Pliska here up from the Puzzle Lab
Speaker 2: with the extra credit answer from our previous show, we
Speaker 2: played Masterpieces with James Altacher, in which each answer is
Speaker 2: a word or phrase that has the name of a
Speaker 2: chess piece inside of it. The extra credit that aj
Speaker 2: gave you was this, what do you call a particularly
Speaker 2: impish chess piece, one that moves only diagonally. The answer,
Speaker 2: of course, is Archbishop. For that and more archword play,
Speaker 2: join us here day on the Puzzler podcast. Thanks for
Speaker 2: playing along with the team here at The Puzzler with
Speaker 2: Aj Jacobs. I'm Greg Pliska, your chief puzzle Officer. Our
Speaker 2: executive producers are Neelie Lohman and Adam Neuhouse of New
Speaker 2: House Ideas and Lindsay Hoffman of iHeart Podcasts. The show
Speaker 2: is produced by Jody Averragan and Brittany Brown of Roulette Productions,
Speaker 2: with production support from Claire Biddegar Curtis. Our associate producer
Speaker 2: is Andrea Schoenberg. The Puzzler with Aj Jacobs is a
Speaker 2: co production with New House Ideas and is distributed by
Speaker 2: Starched patois also known as iHeart Podcasts. If you want
Speaker 2: to know more about puzzling puzzles, please check out the
Speaker 2: book The Puzzler by AJ Jacobs, a history of puzzles
Speaker 2: that The New York Times called fun and funny. It
Speaker 2: features an original puzzle hunt by Yours Truly, and is
Speaker 2: available wherever you get your books and puzzlers for all
Speaker 2: your puzzling needs, go visit the puzzler dot com. See
Speaker 2: you there,