Explanation: Four symmetrical entries contain an animal: SPIGOTS (PIG), SHARED (HARE), ALIBIS (IBIS), MILLION (LION). Their initial letters spell PHIL and, with the symmetrical entries PUNKS, UHH, TAWNY, suggest our good friend Punxsutawney Phil, our beloved GROUNDHOG who will meteorologically prognosticate for us this weekend! I won't mind six more weeks of winter, to be honest!
Hmmm. Got PHIL and .... could not connect that in any way to an animal unless we included ASP and ERN in which case we get APHILE as in ZOOAPHILE and PEDAPHILE but I didn't think that was where you were going.
So... all I've got is PHIL. Needed a whack from Kay to get that PHIL was enough.
I thought TAWNY as omega may be useful and UHH as central should be useful but obviously is not and PUNKS is weird but so is "Kutcher" so I'll just leave it...... PHIL, PHIL, Phil. As in when Kermit the Frog got amnesia and call himself PHIL ERRUP? Phil, phil.... can't get anything.....
HeadinHome 🤓1:10 · 3 months ago
Just couldn’t find any more animals, and all i had was Phil. Is Phil part of an animal name?? OHHHH - well that explains PUNKS and TAWNY… I knew those had to be significant! This was fun, and a chuckle of an aha moment.
Fun. I had solved and was looking over the 4 animals, PHIL...PHIL? Then while standing over the sheet of paper with light streaming through the window I saw my shadow and, as the guy said who watched the fly ball come closer and closer, then it hit me. Thankfully it wasn't "The answer is a 12 letter name of a town".
I hope this doesn't mean 6 more weeks of winter....I mean Florida winters aren't bad, but anything below 50 degrees and we put on parkas!
Thanks Mikey
MatthewL 🤓7:13 · 3 months ago
Saw PUNKSUHHTAWNY and that was enough. Didn't see the hidden animals. Thanks for the puzzle, Mikey!
rjy 37s · 3 months ago
Had ASP with the other four - pre-nudges - so we simply could not ferret out PHIL from APHIL. But when the nudges dropped it to four - woohoo! What an LOL aha! Pretty great, Mikey!
whimsy 🤓12:04 · 3 months ago
Before nudges, but totally backwards.
Had too much of a mishmash of animals, parts of animals (eew) and their "features" from the grid.
Decided to guess it due to the date, but didn't look at the explanation.
Returned to the grid to backsolve and saw the corners and middle. Should have noticed PHIL in the 4 legit animals; it's the name of someone I know well.
Thanks, Mikey -- and BTW, I tawt I taw a newt in the SE corner.