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Sandy Wood
Brain Game: Go West … or Not
by Sandy Wood - September 3, 2008 - 6:30 AM

bloghead_braingames.jpg

Stacy’s 10 winning words post has SCRABBLE on my brain. Further back into the archives, don’t miss David’s history of the game and a lunchtime quiz that yours truly (and wife Kara) wrote about six months ago.

To mix things up, I’ve occasionally played the game with one important rule change: allowing proper nouns to be played on the board. It adds an interesting (and often tricky) element to the game, perhaps because the distribution of letters are different in proper nouns compared to common nouns and other words.

While we’re on that subject…

The names of what two U.S. states
become “regular words” when
you remove their final letter?

HERE is the answer.

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Comments (16)

  1. correct me if I am wrong, but both florid and main are adjectives.

    posted by Brad on 9-3-2008 at 7:25 am

  2. You’re right, Brad — I rephrased the question to make it more accurate.

    posted by Sandy on 9-3-2008 at 7:27 am

  3. I was convinced that Vermont was a valid answer, but alas, it is “vermin” and not “vermon”.

    posted by Hodge on 9-3-2008 at 7:57 am

  4. Montana becomes montan which is “a hard brittle mineral wax obtained usually from lignites by extraction and used especially in polishes, carbon paper, and insulating compositions”

    posted by Michelle on 9-3-2008 at 8:29 am

  5. I made Hodge’s mistake with Vermont..but I got Maine

    posted by Caitlin on 9-3-2008 at 8:45 am

  6. Utah also works – uta is “any of a genus of large lizards” according to the Scrabble dictionary.

    posted by HeyBeckyJ on 9-3-2008 at 10:12 am

  7. I guessed Indiana and Florida- but gimme a break, I’m from Indiana!

    posted by Zach on 9-3-2008 at 10:51 am

  8. What about virgina it becomes virgin which is also a word.

    posted by Sabrina on 9-3-2008 at 10:53 am

  9. Oops just realized my mistake. Apparently I failed my spelling test today

    posted by sabrina on 9-3-2008 at 10:55 am

  10. Ooh! I got this one! I must have passed third grade and learned my states! = )

    posted by Andrea on 9-3-2008 at 12:15 pm

  11. What about Washington? It becomes “washing” and “to”.

    posted by Alicia on 9-3-2008 at 12:26 pm

  12. Washington and Montana are pushing the boundaries of “regular words” (Montan isn’t exactly a word I throw around daily, and “washing” “to” is both too many words and not a phrase), but there are three, not two, very good answers: florid, main, and indian.

    posted by Southern Buddhist on 9-3-2008 at 1:31 pm

  13. What about Ohio?

    If you take away this States Final letter (Being “o”); you are left with “hi”.

    posted by curious on 9-3-2008 at 2:26 pm

  14. Got Maine right away. Took me a while to get Indian and Florid.

    If you removed the last 2 letters you could use Alas(ka) and Virgin(ia).

    posted by Nerak on 9-3-2008 at 3:13 pm

  15. i think virgin is valid?

    posted by shawn on 9-3-2008 at 10:10 pm

  16. And without removing anything: New Jersey – a recently purchased sweater :-)

    posted by robin on 9-4-2008 at 5:04 am

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