1. If you wear a tail out in public you may get a lot of STARES.
2. Mechanical aptitude is one of the TRAITS covered by the test.
3. Between the winter snowstorms they had to RATS my street.
4. This painting doesn’t appeal even though I normally like the RATS.
5. To reach the mezzanine you go around the corner and use the STAIRS.
6. I’ve always wanted to see the STRAIT of Gibraltar.
7. I got drinks at the drivethru but forgot the STRAWS.
8. I’m sure Demento fans remember the Ray Stevens novelty song, “The RATS”.
9. The running cheetah would RATS after its prey.
10. I planted marigolds, zinnias, and RATS.


I couldn't figure them all out, but I tried!

Between you, that's 1, 2, 5, 6, 7, and 8 answered. Unsolved: 3, 4, 9, and 10.

Also note that there is a different clue for 9. I posted a wrong edit of the list. :P

Very good... And I just noticed I made a mistake! Clue 9 was supposed to be replaced:

9. Pet rats love yogurt RATS.

Treats

And after I'd hustled to try and find an answer to the first one!

Bonus points? :)

1. Stares
2. Traits
3. Resalt
4. Artist
5. Stairs
6. Straits
7. Straws
8. Streak
9. Thrash
10. Asters

Bravo! And with alternate #9 too. CongRATSulations! :D

Edited at 2012-03-22 03:42 am (UTC)

Yay!
*does the Gilmore-Dance*

There's a Gilmore Dance?

Vid plz!

;)

NOO!! No living eyes must ever view the white lion dancing! It is too much for mortal souls! You would die from sheer laughter!

1) STARes
2) TRAitS
4) ARTiSt
5) STAiRs
6) STRAit
7) STRAws
9) TReAtS
10) ASTeRs

Couldn't get 3 or 8, to my chagrin.

If you like this stuff, have you considered doing DASH in Seattle next month? http://www.playdash.org/DASH4/

Ooh, had never heard of it. Looks intriguing. Are you participating, then?

1) stares
2) traits
3)
4) artist
5) stairs
6) strait
7) straws
8) streak
9) treats
10

8 of 10? erk...

Yogurt drops aren't actually that good for rats.

That may be, but I stand by the puzzle's statement that rats love 'em. :)

I got most of these, I'm pleased to say, but a lot of them worked just fine as they are. Rats are so versatile!

Edited at 2012-03-22 11:39 am (UTC)

No one seems to have mentioned the other answer to number 1: haters. I suppose we all hope to get stares instead, though ;)

For some reason (possibly efficiency) my first move in response to a puzzle like this isn't to just stare at it and hope the answer comes to me, but to grep the wordlist on my computer to get a list of words that fit the criteria, then look through them to spot suitable answers. I expect this is "cheating", but... I don't care, really! :>

2: traits, 3: recast? starch? :p 4: artist (or master?) 5: stairs 6: strait 7: straws, probably (pastry/repast/taster/afters/roasts) 8: streak 9: ? 10: asters

Oh, cool, I didn't spot that alternate answer! Very good.

You can solve this puzzle however you choose. Though I doubt you'd find the intended answer for #3, resalt, as it doesn't show in most word lists (but I'd argue it's a word).

Indeed, "resalt" is in the large "web2" wordlist (235k words, derived from an old edition of Webster's, I believe) but not the standard "words" list (98k words) on my computer.

Just FYI, LJ now has a "Spoilers" tag that allows you to hide answers (or longer amounts of text) until it is clicked on (without reloading the page like a cut).

Cool. I didn't know about that feature. Thanks!