Wednesday, December 17, 2025

Can you solve this week's puzzler?

Folkloric, historic and occasionally sophomoric
Folkloric, historic and occasionally sophomoric
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This Week's Puzzler

Greetings from Car Talk Plaza!

Hello friends! The Puzzler is taking a short break (for real!), but we'll be back in with more historic, folkloric, and occasionally sophomoric puzzlers!
Now, without further ado, the most recent puzzler!

Another Matchstick Puzzler

Puzzler time!

This one came in from a dear friend who also listened to the show for many years. 

Here it is.

This is another matchstick puzzler. So gather up whatever you used the first few times. 

Using matchsticks, write the following Arabic numbers. 

One, and then with two matchsticks make a plus sign, plus one plus eleven. 

So 1 + 1 + 11.

No equals sign. Just 1 + 1 + 11.

Now the puzzler is this. 

By moving only one matchstick, make this equal 130. 

Good luck!

Answer here »
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Friday, December 5, 2025

Can you solve this week's puzzler?

Folkloric, historic and occasionally sophomoric
Folkloric, historic and occasionally sophomoric
View in browser »
This Week's Puzzler

Greetings from Car Talk Plaza!

Hello friends! The Puzzler is taking a short break, but we'll be back in with more historic, folkloric, and occasionally sophomoric puzzlers!
Now, without further ado, the answer to the most recent puzzler!

Two Meanings


This one is an age old puzzler. And there is more than one answer, so just be aware of that. There may be many answers, actually.

Here we go.

As you all probably know, there are words that are opposites, and they're called antonyms. For example, hot and cold, up and down, Click and Clack... 

So the puzzler is, can you think of two words that are their own antonyms? 

I'm gonna give you two as an example, because I know there are more. 

The first one is cleave. I'll give you a sentence. You cleave things apart with a meat cleaver, or your lug nuts may cleave to your studs, making them impossible to remove without a very hot torch. In this case, cleave means to pull apart, and to stay together. 

The other example is the word sanction. And here's a sentence as an example. NASCAR sanctions stock car races, but a driver that runs another into a wall may be sanctioned by NASCAR. In this case, the word means to allow, and then to not allow. 

It's clear that in these two instances, cleave has two meanings which are diametrically opposed, and so does sanction.

The question, very simply is, are there other words like this? And if there are, what are they?
Find out here »
Congratulations to this week's
puzzler winner:

  drweideman

Congratulations! This correct answer was chosen at random by our Web Lackeys.

Facebook Twitter Instagram website@cartalk.com
Cartalk.com Community
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Care of WBUR, 890 Commonwealth Avenue, Boston, MA 02215
Contents © 2025, Dewey, Cheatham, and Howe.
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