KAARP = PARKA

KLFEU = FLUKE

CLORSL = SCROLL

TAPDUE = UPDATE

CARTOON ANSWER:

THE BIRD THAT ACCIDENTALLY FLEW INSIDE THE HOUSE – – –

PAAFESCLUDA = CAUSED A FLAP

Good Tuesday morning, Jumble fanatics, and happy first day of spring! At 12:15 pm Eastern time, the sun will be directly in line with the equator giving us the vernal equinox where both the Northern and Southern Hemispheres will have the same amount of daylight. To our friends in the Southern Hemisphere, happy first day of autumn!

Excellent clue word choices today with PARKA and SCROLL being the two that gave me the most trouble. SCROLL took the longest to figure out so it’s my pick for the most difficult anagram of the day. The U’s in FLUKE and UPDATE were a big help and allowed the words to instantly come into view.

The setting for today’s cartoon is in a living room where a chaotic situation is taking place. There’s a bird loose in the house and he definitely doesn’t appear to be leaving anytime soon. From our bird’s-eye view perspective we see four different characters with each one having a different facial expression and body language. Mom appears to be in shock with one hand behind her head and the other one near her mouth. Junior appears to be in awe with a huge one-toothed smile and an extended arm reaching out to his new “friend”. Dad is clearly angry at the feathered intruder for not only interrupting his coffee time but also violating his personal space. As dad swats at the bird, which has a look of confusion on its face, we get a glimpse of the best detail in today’s panel that is on dad’s rolled up newspaper. There’s a tiny Jumble puzzle on the paper as well as a Family Circus comic! You’d probably miss it if you didn’t look hard enough so I’ve included an enlarged photo of it below.

The final solve will no doubt be the reason that most people will arrive at this website today. The letter layout was wonderfully cryptic and didn’t give anything away. The only help we get with this puzzle was the one letter A in the solution. I struggled quite a bit with this one and had to do quite a few self-jumbles before FLAP came into view. CAUSED wasn’t difficult to figure out once the other two words were solved. This puzzle was definitely on the more challenging side and it definitely left me feeling like a birdbrain! Have a terrific Tuesday and I’ll see you tomorrow!