"Leader of the Pack-age" w/ A.J. & Greg

Hello, Puzzlers! Puzzling with us today: our very own Chief Puzzle Officer, Greg Pliska.

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 (00:04):
Hello, puzzlers, Welcome to the Puzzler Podcast, home of your
daily puzzle or DearS. I'm your host, Adie Jacobs, and
I am here with Chief puzzle Officer Greg Pliska.

Speaker 2 (00:22):
Hello, Greg, Hi a Jay.

Speaker 3 (00:24):
Are you You're gonna do a different thing every time,
aren't you? Or derv A moose Bush. It's gonna be
a little French, a little Latin, a little Italian. Yes.

Speaker 1 (00:32):
Please send in suggestions, you know, whether it's tagalog or whatever.
I need all the help.

Speaker 2 (00:38):
I can go a little tagalog puzzle.

Speaker 3 (00:40):
I actually did a puzzle once that was words that
gott into English from Tagalog.

Speaker 2 (00:44):
We'll play with that sometimes.

Speaker 3 (00:46):
Boondocks, I think is one of the most famous ones.

Speaker 1 (00:49):
Look at that you got for trivia, right up front,
right up front, all right, Greg, I hear you have
cooked something up for us.

Speaker 2 (00:55):
My puzzle lab.

Speaker 3 (00:56):
Indeed, this is puzzle is called Leader of the Package,
and it's a puzzle where we mash up world leaders
and well known products.

Speaker 1 (01:05):
World leader and now were these current world leaders or
these from all of history?

Speaker 2 (01:11):
They could be from all of history, all.

Speaker 1 (01:13):
Right, because that yeah, I'm a little weak on like
I don't know who the prime Minister of Albania is
right now.

Speaker 2 (01:18):
Oh, don't worry.

Speaker 3 (01:19):
This is more of a historical Prime Minister of Albania. Quiz,
it's all Prime Minister of Albania from you know, nineteen
seventy forward.

Speaker 1 (01:27):
You'll be fine, I will be fine. All right, I'm
ready to try this now.

Speaker 3 (01:32):
This is just like your favorite game, Gorillas in the
Mystic Pizza. Accept Instead of mashing up movies, we're mashing
up a world leader and a brand, always in that order. Okay,
And it's only a matter of time before politicians and
products turn into the same thing. Anyway, there, you might
as well do it here on the puzzler first. So
I'll give you a slogan or a description of the

(01:54):
combined product and leader, and you tell me the blended name. So,
for example, I might say, like its father, this Irish
whiskey became President of the United States.

Speaker 1 (02:05):
Oh my god, I am drawing a total blank. All right, Well, oh,
so well there's Jack Daniel. It's the Irish whiskey.

Speaker 2 (02:12):
Irish whiskey.

Speaker 3 (02:15):
Or to President's father son pair of President Adams, No,
a more recent pair, some embarrassing all right, Bush, Yeah,
So do you know Irish whiskey that starts with bush.
Don't drink enough, you don't drink Pattens, you don't drink
Irish whiskey. Looking for George W. Bush Mills, Bush Mills Irish.

Speaker 1 (02:42):
Wow, I am gonna wish this one big time. That
was if that was the simple example.

Speaker 2 (02:48):
That was the example. Well, you know, if you don't
know Irish whiskey, then it's a you know.

Speaker 1 (02:52):
All right, well I'm modeling that. It's okay not to
know the answer that it is.

Speaker 3 (02:58):
You know, it's the next one isn't a example?

Speaker 2 (03:01):
Okay, good, let's go there you go.

Speaker 3 (03:03):
This is the frozen orange juice concentrate that fought for
Vietnamese independence.

Speaker 1 (03:09):
The frozen all right, so that is uh uh oh right.
So it is the frozen orange juice juice concentrate.

Speaker 3 (03:22):
The company is known for making frozen orange juice.

Speaker 1 (03:26):
Well, there's min it made, and there's.

Speaker 2 (03:28):
That's the one.

Speaker 3 (03:28):
That's the one minute made in front of that. You
want a Vietnamese leader, someone who fought in Vietnam War.

Speaker 1 (03:35):
My goodness, I'm not sure I know.

Speaker 2 (03:37):
Oh see, this is too this is too deep. It's
not Albanian. That's the problem.

Speaker 3 (03:41):
We're looking for ho Chi minute, that coach and minute made.

Speaker 1 (03:47):
I'm embarrassed. All right, we're going to retape that so
that I get it because I don't want Okay, good,
ho Chi minute made perfect, exactly right, excellent, well done.
All right, I'm I'm getting I don't know. I'm having
a little trouble conceptualizing, but I'm going to do it now.
I'm on board.

Speaker 2 (04:06):
All right, good, here you go. Here's this.

Speaker 3 (04:07):
This is more recent world leader. This UK Prime minister,
the second woman to hold the job, helped manage the
country's exit from America's largest department store.

Speaker 1 (04:22):
Okay, yes, all right, so it is. It's not Margaret Thatcher.
It is May and Macy's. And what is her first name?

Speaker 2 (04:31):
Her first name starts with t oh.

Speaker 1 (04:34):
Teresa Maysa's Macy's.

Speaker 2 (04:36):
Teresa Macy's is the answer.

Speaker 3 (04:38):
There you go.

Speaker 1 (04:39):
Well, I got a role now, very small role. Okay,
keep going.

Speaker 3 (04:43):
Give you another one. This is back into the past.
This supersonic jet airliner can get you from London to
New York in half the time and conquer most of
Central Asia and China while doing it.

Speaker 1 (04:55):
All right, I feel I feel much better now now
you're getting into the one like, you know, the the
Middle Ages and before I feel better. So that would
be Genghis Concord.

Speaker 3 (05:07):
Genghis Concord exactly, Genghis Khan, the Mongol leader who conquered
most of Central Asia. And of course the Concord, the
now defunct supersonic jet airliner.

Speaker 1 (05:19):
But they're bringing one back apparently.

Speaker 2 (05:21):
Yeah, yeah, coming soon.

Speaker 3 (05:23):
Let me give you one more, also historical. The eleventh
president of the United States. He oversaw the largest expansion
of territory in the nation's history thanks to his alliance
with Pikachu, Charizard and Jigglypuff.

Speaker 1 (05:39):
All Right, well, first of all, I'm thrown because the
largest expansion in I thought that was the Louisiana purchase.

Speaker 3 (05:48):
He acquired through the Mexican American territory some territory from Britain.

Speaker 1 (05:55):
Well, by the way, that was a good hint, thank you.
So that was James K.

Speaker 2 (05:59):
Polk. I'm on, James K. Pokemon exactly. I would buy
that Charizard.

Speaker 3 (06:05):
And jiggly Pop or Famous Pokemon.

Speaker 2 (06:08):
Great.

Speaker 3 (06:08):
Well, let's let's leave one for our listeners a little bonus.

Speaker 1 (06:12):
I love it.

Speaker 3 (06:16):
This one is a fast food chain founded by a
recently deceased Supreme Court Justice.

Speaker 1 (06:23):
Okay, fast food chain founded by recently deceased Supreme Court Justice.
I'm not even going to try, because that way I
can retain the delusion that I would get it immediately
if I did try. So I am going to leave
listeners with that. But please, puzzlers, don't forget to subscribe
to the Puzzler podcast and I'll meet you here tomorrow

(06:46):
for more puzzling puzzles that will puzzle you puzzlingly.

Speaker 3 (06:55):
Hello puzzlers, Greg Pliska hear from the Puzzle Lab with
the extra credit answer from our our previous episode, we
played with Joel Stein and we were giving clues to
magazine names that were taken too literally. We'd give you
an example of an article from that magazine and you
have to tell us what the magazine is. The clue
we gave you was short and sweet. Why five minutes

(07:18):
of quiet is the best way to discipline children? That,
of course would be from the well known magazine Time Out.
Of course, that's not what timeout's really about, but in
our fanciful world, that's what it is. Thanks for playing along,
and I look forward to puzzling with you again soon.

(07:41):
Thanks for playing along with the team. Here at The Puzzler,
I'm Greg Pliska, your chief puzzle Officer. Our executive producers
are Neelie Lohman and Adam Neuhause of New House Ideas
and Lindsay Hoffman of iHeart Podcasts. The show is produced
by Jody Abergan and Brittany Brown of Roulette Productions. Associate
producer is Andrea Schoenberg. The Puzzler with Ajjacobs is a

(08:06):
co production with New House Ideas and is distributed by
Ethics Adapters Adapting your ethics to match your situation. No wait,
rearrange that it's distributed by iHeart podcast If you want
to know more about puzzling puzzles, please check out the
book The Puzzler by AJ Jacobs, a history of puzzles

(08:26):
that The New York Times called fun and funny. It
features an original puzzle hunt by yours Truly and is
available wherever you get your books and puzzlers. For all
your puzzling needs, go visit the Puzzler dot com.

Speaker 2 (08:43):
See you there,