Usually, a word meld requires changing one common English word into another, using steps that change any single letter and yield another common word.

In this word meld, your task is to change the word "PASSER" into the word "SPARSE." However, for this problem, each step consists of switching the position of any two adjacent letters (without regard, obviously, for whether they form a word or not).

P A S S E R
. . . . . .
. . . . . .
. . . . . .
. . . . . .
S P A R S E

How can you do this in five moves?

(Not less than five)

OK, I got this one in about 2 seconds after simply moving them and doing it in 4,then realizing you had to switch the 2 S's. However, the directions say something about doing something to form "another common word." Thing is that word another can throw you off here. Looked at it for about 10 more minutes, then looked at your solution. This one was vague. Yeah, I'm that guy from your class who complained about the one question he got wrong on the test because of poor wording -- hahaha. Let it go, man, let it go. hahaha

Posted by Lawrence on 2003-08-24 08:05:00