After a stretch of number puzzles, it’s time to try a words one. This one requires a little bit of work rather than relying on a “gotcha” moment, so take your time.
My first idea was to ask solvers to create a sentence using only one of each consonant and two of each vowel. Then I checked online and found that there’s been a surprising amount of previous thought on “pangrams,” or sentences containing at least one of each letter. It didn’t seem like my previous query would be solvable, so I’m changing the game.
What’s the shortest pangram you can create featuring the phrase “A WIZARD”? I’m sure we’re not going to get to the theoretical minimum length here, so have a little fun with it.
How do we pick a winner this time? Simple. Post your solution as a response in the comments. If you post a valid sentence shorter than any previously shared, then you are the leader. If you remain the uncontested leader for a full seven day period, then you are the winner. If someone else beats your mark within that time frame, they are the new leader and the clock starts anew.
I’ll begin with an easy-to-beat opening entry.
“A wizard told me ‘a quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.'”
46 characters there. Go ahead and beat that mark and take your spot on the leaderboard. Good luck!
NOTE: I retain the right to disqualify bad sentences like “A wizard said ‘bcefghjklmnop…'”
“A wizard judge: my quarry,” a black sphinx of the zoo vows.