It is March and the lovely EnigMarch people have challenged puzzle designers to write a puzzle inspired by today's word: "play".
Oh no! The USA clown President Trump and his buffoonish adviser Elon Musk don't understand gender and they throw tantrums when trans women play women's sports. These clowns say they're worried that men will pretend to be trans to peep in the women's changing room. As if the problem there is trans women—anyone who only claims to want to participate in some activity just to peek in the changing room is a menace, no matter what their gender, even if everyone agrees on what that gender is. For example, Trump bought some beauty pageants. For years, he barged into dressing pageant dressing rooms. His gender wasn't the problem, just the creepiness.
Can you figure out what these words are supposed to be? Some clown has stuck 🄼 and 🄵 labels on them, getting it wrong every time. For example, they saw someone playing and said they were flaming. You might worry that it's ambiguous: How did we know it was playing and not blazing or glaring or clawing or… Don't worry, we have clues for the words. You can see we already crossed out the clue for playing. OK, you can worry a little: the clues aren't in order; you'll have to think to figure out which goes with which word.
When you're done, the circled letters will spell a word for a better way to celebrate our country's might than chasing some women out of sports.
| 🄵la🄼ing | ⓅlaⓎing |
| 🄵ather | ◯ather |
| ri🄵t | ri◯t |
| sta🄵🄵 | sta◯◯ |
| du🄼🄼y | du◯◯y |
| 🄵ine | ◯ine |
| 🄵ran | ◯ran |
| 🄵a🄼e | ◯a◯e |
Clues:
- By choice
- Day 20
- Less ruly than a rally as protests go
- Maybe bigger than an earldom. (Definitely more fun to say.)
- Nation home to the Natanz Nuclear Facility
- One of 50 in the USA
-
Participating in a sport, perhaps - Square
Hints, rot-13'd:
- Ol pubvpr tbrf jvgu sngure. Yrff ehyl tbrf jvgu evsg.
- Fdhner tbrf jvgu svar. Angvba tbrf jvgu Sena.
- Qhpul vf sha gb fnl orpnhfr vg fbhaqf yvxr "qbbxvr" v.r., cbbc
Solution, rot-13'd:
cl / synzvat / CynLvat / Cnegvpvcngvat va n fcbeg, creuncf e / sngure / Engure / Ol pubvpr b / evsg / evBg / Yrff ehyl guna n enyyl nf cebgrfgf tb gr / fgnss / fgnGR / Bar bs 50 va gur HFN pu / qhzzl / qhPUl / Znlor ovttre guna na rneyqbz. a / svar / Avar / Fdhner v / sena / Vena / Angvba ubzr gb gur Angnam Ahpyrne Snpvyvgl pf / snzr / PnFr / Qnl 20
