contest

Tis a Puzzlement!

64 Arts

Yul Brenner as the King of Siam… awesome movie. I’ve got the Rex Harrison version playing behind me via Netflix, but it’s just not the same.

At any rate, it’s time for our next art!

28 Conundrums

Presented as a game or as a subject for discussion.

Oh, let’s go with a game, shall we?!

I don’t know about you, but so far this year has been full of ups and downs and I could use a little light-hearted fun, perhaps even in the shape of a pun.

Because that’s all a conundrum boils down to:

A conundrum is a riddle in the form of a question, the answer to which involves a pun. Originally the term was applied to any quaint expression. It is thus, in its modern form, a union of the elaborate riddle and the impromptu pun.

from The Handbook of Conundrums by Edith B Ordway

Here are a couple of examples that tickled my funny bone:

What herb is there that cures all diseases? Thyme.

What evidence have we that Adam used sugar? Because he raised Cain.

Those are pretty simple because it’s not much of a stretch between thyme and time, Cain and cane (as in sugar cane).

Others might be more of a stretch, requiring you to even say the answer out loud before it “clicks.” For instance,

The name of what character in history would a person mention in asking the servant to put coal on the fire? Phillip the Great.

Takes a moment to kick in but when you say Phillip the Great it can sound like “fill up the grate,” which is, of course, the point!

So I have a challenge for you:

I’ve pulled together 10 conundrums, below, all with the punny answer missing. It’s a handy-dandy web form (make sure to click over to the post if you can’t see it via RSS) and I encourage you to fill them out with your best guesses. I’ll leave the form up for a week before posting the answers and announcing a winner.

The winner will be the one with the most correct answers or, if there is a tie, I’ll draw one of the names out of a hat.

Ready? Set? Puzzle!

What will the winner get? I’m still deciding, but probably one of my hand-bound journals.

I do hope you’ll play along!

What’s In Your Purse?

64 Arts

For the last several years almost all of my purses have been big and red and from Liz Claiborne. Not that I pay department store prices, or even retail! I find them at places like Marshalls, TJ Maxx or Bealls Outlet and pay half (or less) of the usual price. There’s just something about a show-stopper red purse that can carry whatever I need and look fabulous doing it. Plus, it matches pretty much everything by needing to match absolutely nothing!

As promised, here’s what was inside my purse as of Monday evening:

What's in My Purse?

What's in My Purse?

Clockwise from the upper left corner:

  1. Tome of Runes (my first illustration credit–it came in last week and I’ve been carrying it around because I’m just so tickled it’s done!)
  2. Monthly planner (stuffed with store coupons in case I feel like shopping) and postage stamps (yes, I mail things–not bills, though, that’s what online banking is for!)
  3. My Red Notebook (everything from budgets to project notes to podcast playlists–it’s my life and I go through one a year, always red)
  4. Travel Amulet
  5. iPod (in red case… are we sensing a theme, here?), charger and ear buds
  6. Calculator and 6 pens (I highly suspect at least one is dead or broken)
  7. Prescription sunglasses
  8. A sash from the skirt I wore 2 weeks ago
  9. Ginger pills and Lactaid tablets
  10. Wallet, smaller card case, coin purse and passport
  11. Umbrella holding down a stack of store receipts
  12. Keys and a separate ring of those store scanner tabs
  13. Nail file, tweezers, compact, 5 lip glosses (3 tinted, 2 clear) and 3 hair clips (that’s where they all went!)

The only thing not pictured is my cell phone–when I’m home it’s usually on my computer desk or on it’s charger.

Now, who else played along?

*crickets*

Sigh…

Whoever thought it’d be so difficult to give stuff away!

But, hey, it’s my giveaway and I’m going to give it another try. That’s right, I’m extending the deadline.

You have until Sunday, October 24, 2010, at 8pm Eastern do the following:

  1. Dump everything out of your purse (arranging it nicely is optional)
  2. Take a picture of it
  3. Upload the picture to some public place (your blog, Facebook, Flickr, etc.) and leave me the link in the comments OR email it to me at randomactscomics@gmail.com

See, it really is that simple. And I’ll pick one purse photo at random of those submitted and the owner of that purse will win a prize that I will mail to you. It will be purse-themed. It will be a mix of store-bought and hand-crafted items. You will either love it or decide it would make the perfect regift for the neighbor/teacher/co-worker at some point in the upcoming holidays, thus saving you a shopping trip–that parts up to you.

Now, go find that camera!