A Puzzle for Your Coffee Break

[Maria]

"Hi, my name's Maria and I'm a Girls Own Paper-aholic."

Trust me to open this at this time of night! (11pm). Now I won't get many winks of sleep thinking about it.
Maria

[Ann]

(Just so we don't have to keep switching pages.)





Indigestion

I could not sleep a wink last night,
The world to me seemed upside down.
My head upon the pillows white,
Starts????????change hue white to brown
And life so far as I could gauge,
Seemed like this heiroglyphic page.
My heart gave violent ????? knocks
As through the dark I clearly traced
A wrong lived life and prison docks.
Must as I thought full soon be faced,
I creased back the pillows around,
And shook the leaden feathers bound.
And as the flight of morn stole in,
They found me lying wide awake.
And pointed with aglittering grin,
To an empty box of cake.
How odd/strange that our worst woes by far,
Are those which self inflicted are.[/color]#nosmileys#nosmileys#nosmileys#nosmileys#nosmileys#nosmileys#nosmileys#nosmileys#nosmileys#nosmileys#nosmileys#nosmileys#nosmileys#nosmileys#nosmileys#nosmileys#nosmileys#nosmileys#nosmileys#nosmileys#nosmileys

[boheme]

Ann -- did you see my earlier suggestion about the start of line 4? (Is that, perhaps, a tart?)

[Ann]

Kaye,

No, I didn't. We must have been writing replies simultaneously and yours just beat mine , so I missed it. I'm coming to the conclusion that perhaps it isn't an animal's head after all, but nothing else is coming to mind, so it could be a tart, albeit a misshapen one. Starts certainly fits the context, although we're still a couple of syllables short and there's a "t", plus the significance of the low "c" to work out.

[Ann]

Or is it starts? Now I've typed it in and reread it, it sounds like it's her head that's changing colour!!

[boheme]

Ann said:

Or is it starts? Now I've typed it in and reread it, it sounds like it's her head that's changing colour!!

"starts" was my thought (and if that IS a tart, it looks like something that would come out of my oven, given my poor baking skills .....)

"Starts to change hue white to brown" ? ? ?

Makes no sense, tho' .....

(And that backwards "K" has me completely stumped.....)

[Ann]

I know! I hate to give in, but I've looked and looked at the bits that are left and I'm stuck. I think it'll soon be time to look up the answer.

[boheme]

Well, I'm off to class in a few minutes, and won't be home until 8:00PM (three hours from now) -- so you're on your own for the rest of the evening .....

[Ann]

OK, Click here to see the solution and the Examiner's Report. Don't be put off by the length, the writer has quite a dry sense of humour and it's an entertaining read.

It's a bit daunting to realise that, even with 3 of us working on it, we wouldn't have come close to getting even a Highly Commended Second Class!

[boheme]

Ann said:

It's a bit daunting to realise that, even with 3 of us working on it, we wouldn't have come close to getting even a Highly Commended Second Class!

Well, that's all right -- considering that we're rank beginners, I think we did a darn good job on it!!!

Now, when do you post the NEXT one ? ? ?

[Ann]

It's already up. I posted it at the same time as the solution to this one!

[PAWS]

Last blast before cribbing the answer. Is the line 4 thing lumber or lump? Thus: Slumps or Slumbers before tea..?


No, not even close there. But I don't think we did too badly, all things considered. Hey ho, on to the next.

[Ann]

'Fraid not Graham. When I looked it up I doubted that any of us would have worked it out in a million years, which was why I decided it was time to post the solution.