"Earbuses" w/ Katie Grogg

Hello, Puzzlers! Puzzling with us today: the actor-singer behind the popular TikTok account, @coffeeandcrosswords, Katie Grogg!

Join host A.J. Jacobs and his guests as they puzzle–and laugh–their way through new spins on old favorites, like anagrams and palindromes, as well as quirky originals such as “Ask Chat GPT” and audio rebuses.

Subscribe to The Puzzler podcast wherever you get your podcasts! 

"The Puzzler with A.J. Jacobs" is distributed by iHeartPodcasts and is a co-production with Neuhaus Ideas. 

Our executive producers are Neely Lohmann and Adam Neuhaus of Neuhaus Ideas, and Lindsay Hoffman of iHeart Podcasts.

The show is produced by Jody Avirgan and Brittani Brown of Roulette Productions. 

Our Chief Puzzle Officer is Greg Pliska. Our associate producer is Andrea Schoenberg.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hello, puzzlers, Welcome to the Puzzler Podcast. Lee pickled pearl
onion in your puzzle Gibson Cocktail. I'm your host, Ajy Jacobs,
and I am here with today's guest, the wonderful Katie Grog,
host of the popular TikTok channel coffee and crosswords, where

(00:26):
she solves every day the New York Times crossword puzzle
in front of her one hundred and seventy thousand subscribers.
Hello Katie, Hello Katie. As a puzzle expert, you might
know about ribus'es. This is when a word is printed
in a particular way as a clue. So if the

(00:46):
word grass is printed in green typeface, that would be
green grass. That's the Are you a Ribus fan? Are you?

Speaker 2 (00:54):
I am a fan? I would say my audience is
divided on that. Ribs isn't.

Speaker 3 (00:59):
Cross Words tend to show up as like multiple letters
in a box. And then sometimes and then the clue
will be like the revealer clue would be, for example,
like Jack in the box, So you'll have a bunch
of boxes that have Jack in them or something like that.

Speaker 2 (01:14):
I get such a kick out of them. I love them.

Speaker 3 (01:17):
I think it is such a fun, little breakaway from
the norm.

Speaker 2 (01:22):
But some people disagree, and that's okay. Everyone can have
their own opinions.

Speaker 1 (01:28):
That is interesting, Yeah, because some I guess some people
don't like you and I like the wordplay, but I
guess some people they do not signed it amusing. Well, well,
I hope they're not listening, because this one is all
about wordplay. This is We can't do written ribses on
our podcast, but we do try to do audio rebuses

(01:49):
or eribuses trademark bending. So I'm gonna say a word
or a series of words in a certain way, or
a certain tone of voice, or a certain tenor accent,
and if you combine the words with the manner of speaking,
then it will reveal the answer. So, for instance, if
I said tied, then that is.

Speaker 2 (02:11):
Rising rising tide.

Speaker 1 (02:14):
Right you thought high tide?

Speaker 2 (02:16):
Yeah, but the rising tide makes much more sense.

Speaker 1 (02:20):
Got it? Well, I would accept either. All right, So
here we go. We'll start with this one bloody harder.

Speaker 2 (02:29):
Oh, this would be screaming bloody murder.

Speaker 1 (02:32):
That's exactly what it is, all right. What about actually
sort of in the same same ball park? Old?

Speaker 2 (02:44):
Oh, is this old yeller?

Speaker 1 (02:48):
It is old Yeller? Nicely done killing it.

Speaker 2 (02:51):
You're so good.

Speaker 1 (02:53):
What do you mean you're the selling up?

Speaker 2 (02:54):
But thank you you're acting though I'm really feeling.

Speaker 1 (02:57):
Oh I see, thank you. Yes, I'm hoping you get
a a Webby nomination. All right, what about this one?
The men the boys, the men the boys?

Speaker 2 (03:10):
Is it just separating the men from the boys.

Speaker 1 (03:13):
That's exactly what it is.

Speaker 2 (03:15):
Okay, okay, okay.

Speaker 1 (03:17):
He thought it was something trickier.

Speaker 3 (03:19):
I was thinking maybe boys two men, because the two.

Speaker 2 (03:23):
Is in Roman numerals and in music, if it's like.

Speaker 3 (03:28):
We call they can they this is too much? But
sometimes they're called a railroad tracks, which indicates a grand pause,
and so I thought maybe we were going a little.

Speaker 2 (03:40):
Bit uh interesting down that road.

Speaker 1 (03:44):
Well, yeah, I'm not that smart. You give me way
too much credit. All right, you're ready for another? Here
is this one? T oh r I, t oh are I,
And I'll give you one hint. It's a person. It's
a person's name.

Speaker 2 (04:03):
Oh okay, that was a great hint. I think it
is tory spelling.

Speaker 1 (04:08):
It's exactly what it is, Tory spelling. All right, here's
another one, and I'm gonna do the whole thing because
I'm an actor. Candle candle, candle, candle, candle, can of candle, candle, candle,
can of candle, candle, candle, candle, cand of candle.

Speaker 3 (04:24):
Okay, I did count, and so I think so I
think it is sixteen candles.

Speaker 1 (04:31):
That is exactly what it is. Sixteen candles. Nailed it,
all right, We got just a couple more. Uh, all right,
this one really does stretch my acting skills. But I
looked at YouTube tritorial, so we'll see how it goes.
Chocolate cake.

Speaker 2 (04:48):
Okay, I got it. You did so good. This is
this would be German chocolate cake.

Speaker 1 (04:55):
Excellent job. I'll thank you for the dice, for the
overly kind compliment. But by the way I look this up,
this is actually not an accurate earbus because it's German.
It's named after a guy, a chocolate maker named German,
and not after the country. So it was originally German's

(05:16):
chocolate cake.

Speaker 2 (05:17):
Oh wow, Yeah, that could be really confusing.

Speaker 1 (05:21):
Very confusing. All right, just two more ancher aker.

Speaker 3 (05:31):
Okay, if this is what I think it is, shout
out Vanderbilt anchor down.

Speaker 1 (05:36):
Yes, well I was thinking dropping anchor, but wait, what
is anchored down? Is that the Vanderbilt like catchphrase, Yeah.

Speaker 3 (05:44):
It's whatever, Vanderbilt s Hays, which I didn't even go
to Vanderbilt, but I did go to the school across
the street from them, and I had a lot of
friends there.

Speaker 1 (05:50):
So and what does that mean? Anchor down like this?

Speaker 2 (05:54):
Oh, I have no idea. I know no, actually, I
have no idea.

Speaker 1 (05:59):
We won't even know it. All right, well we'll find
out maybe we'll we'll reveal it later. But all right,
last one, you ready again? I watched some YouTube for
this acting gig. But here we go. Clean. Try it again?
Clean clean? Could you hear what the word was? That's

(06:25):
the first question? Clean clean, C L E A N exactly.
So this is an adjective before the word clean clean
because it's said in a certain type of voice. And
the person I watched was I believe going through puberty clean.

Speaker 2 (06:50):
I'm like, it's like crack clean.

Speaker 1 (06:54):
Yeah, that's it. That's sort of. It's more think uh,
I think rodent, think mouse, think squeak weekly weeky clean.
You got it nicely done. Well, thank you, Katie. You
have been a delightful guest. We love to have you

(07:14):
back and and good luck with your three hundred and
sixty six streak before you we'll be watching.

Speaker 2 (07:23):
This is so fun.

Speaker 1 (07:24):
Thanks for having me our pleasure. And before we wrap up,
for all the puzzlers at home, an extra credit. This
one is Young, Young, Young.

Speaker 2 (07:40):
A bit.

Speaker 1 (07:40):
It's a baseball it's a baseball theme, so there's a
little hint. Thank you, And please check out our Instagram
feed at Hello Puzzlers, because we post original puzzles and
other fun nuggets every day and we will meet you
here tomorrow for more puzzling puzzles that will puzzle you puzzlingly.

Speaker 2 (08:04):
Hello Puzzlers. Greg Pliska here with the extra credit answer
from our previous show. We had Katie grogon for a
game we called random Talk, which is all about different
versions of TikTok with a different word in the front.
Your extra credit clue. This community is for fans of
microscopic organisms and miniatures and other teensy tiny.

Speaker 1 (08:26):
Things, and that of course is small talk. Get it
small talk.

Speaker 2 (08:32):
I hope you enjoyed playing, and I hope you're back
with us next time.