The Big Payback

By Sandy Wood

Can you solve the Word Ladder in today's mentalfloss.com Brain Game Wednesday Wordplay challenge in five steps or fewer? Let's find out:
By changing one letter in each step to form English words, and leaving all other letters in their original positions, convert LEND into CASH in the fewest possible steps.
L E N D_ _ _ __ _ _ __ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ C A S H
Here is a 5-step SOLUTION.
A 5-STEP SOLUTION:
L E N D
L A N D
L A N E
C A N E
C A S E
C A S H
Did you come up with a different sequence of words (shorter, longer, or the same length)? Please share it with us in the comments below. Thanks for playing!