NOPER = PRONE

LICDH = CHILD

GLIMEN = MINGLE

RFAOLL = FLORAL

CARTOON ANSWER:

HE WROTE A LETTER TO HIS OLD FISHING BUDDY BECAUSE HE WANTED TO – – –

 

 

PNE HID MI ORL = DROP HIM A LINE

 

 

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Happy Monday everyone! Today’s answer didn’t leave me drowning in laughter, but I thought it was just stinky enough to start off the last week of January. All of the clue words, as well as the final solve, came into view instantly which allowed me to finish this one up in a jiffy. If you came in search of help this morning, my bet is that you got tangled up in the double L’s of FLORAL. I’m sure that the final solve was an instant read for most people so backing into it should have been reely easy. CHILD is coming up as a new clue word while the other three have been previously played last year. NOPER is the only anagram that we’ve definitely encountered before and I had to drift all the way back to 4/8/08 in order to find it.

The first cartoon of the week featured two Jumble characters and a boatload of extra details. The good news is that a quick read of the sentence and dialogue should have revealed just enough to allow you to arrive at the answer. The only bad news was that seasoned players may have found the given “A” in the answer layout a bit off-putting. If you think about it though, an instant solve meant you were free to dive into all of those extra goodies and I think that’s something we all look forward to!

The first thing that caught my eye was the unique logo on the gentleman’s shirt. It appeared to resemble a fishing lure and it had the name “Richard Powel” just below it. A quick search of the name revealed that the artist is Richard Powell with two L’s. I’m not sure why Jeff omitted the extra letter but it didn’t impact the solvability of the puzzle in any way. The lure is called the Pink-Bearded Buzz Bomber and you can check out how it was created by clicking on the link.

With all of that out of the way, we were left with a few small surprises hanging on the wall. A couple of trophy fish are mounted on plaques and just below them is a picture of our main character and his friend, Dennis. The last detail really blew my socks off and it was very difficult to decipher. If you look at the letter that he’s writing, you may have noticed some scribbles on the paper. When magnified it reads “Hi, Flip! It’s been too long!”. I’m sure Flip is the nickname of a mutual acquaintance of the cartoonists or perhaps it’s an inside joke between them.

The final solve was an anagram consisting of 11-letters. The answer was well hidden in the layout but the idiom flowed quite easily from the abundance of visual clues. It wasn’t overly sofishticated but it was clever nonetheless. Have a great start to your week and I’ll see you right back here tomorrow!