# Family moves into a puzzle - amazing story **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [June 13, 2008, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/family-moves-into-a-puzzle-amazing-story/452820 "2008-06-13T16:16:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![commasense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/commasense/32/3017_2.png) [@commasense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/commasense)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2008, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/family-moves-into-a-puzzle-amazing-story/452820/21 "2008-06-14T23:07:49Z")
Did anyone else decipher the poem on the radiator cover? There are a few errors in the ciphering, and I’m wondering if they’re intentional or not. ---
**Author:** ![Wile\_E](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c37758/32.png) [@Wile\_E](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wile_E)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2008, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/family-moves-into-a-puzzle-amazing-story/452820/22 "2008-06-14T23:17:09Z")
The designer’s name is Clough. Is that pronounced “Clue” because that would be cool. ---
**Author:** ![commasense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/commasense/32/3017_2.png) [@commasense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/commasense)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2008, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/family-moves-into-a-puzzle-amazing-story/452820/23 "2008-06-14T23:21:03Z")
I would expect it to be pronounced “cluff.” ---
**Author:** ![Bosstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/22d042/32.png) [@Bosstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosstone)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2008, 11:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/family-moves-into-a-puzzle-amazing-story/452820/24 "2008-06-14T23:40:10Z")
[QUOTE=commasense] I would expect it to be pronounced “cluff.” [/QUOTE] Ah, but is it Clough like through or Clough like tough? Or Clough like dough? -ough is one of the meanest letter clusters in English writing. ---
**Author:** ![commasense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/commasense/32/3017_2.png) [@commasense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/commasense)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2008, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/family-moves-into-a-puzzle-amazing-story/452820/25 "2008-06-15T01:20:35Z")
[QUOTE=commasense] Did anyone else decipher the poem on the radiator cover? There are a few errors in the ciphering, and I’m wondering if they’re intentional or not. [/QUOTE] Never mind. It was intentional, and I figured it out. ---
**Author:** ![Ducktail](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/43a26b/32.png) [@Ducktail](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ducktail)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2008, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/family-moves-into-a-puzzle-amazing-story/452820/26 "2008-06-15T04:08:16Z")
Whoa…this is awesome… I hope I someday have the opportunity to live in some rambling apartment or house. All mine so far have been pretty uninteresting in that regard, although my folks apparently were once tempted by this giant four-level house with hallways that ran in circles. They got lost in it trying to tour it. I’d have loved to grow up in a house like that. ---
**Author:** ![commasense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/commasense/32/3017_2.png) [@commasense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/commasense)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2008, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/family-moves-into-a-puzzle-amazing-story/452820/27 "2008-06-15T18:09:57Z")
[QUOTE=Bosstone] Ah, but is it Clough like through or Clough like tough? Or Clough like dough? -ough is one of the meanest letter clusters in English writing. [/QUOTE] In an interesting coincidence, a spiritual, if not literal, ancestor of Eric Clough is [Sir Clough Williams-Ellis](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clough_Williams-Ellis), the designer and builder of [Portmeirion](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portmeirion), a resort in Wales that is best known as “The Village” in Patrick McGoohan’s 1967 TV series, [_The Prisoner_](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Prisoner). Sir Clough pronounced it “cluff.” ---
**Author:** ![Rysto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ecccb3/32.png) [@Rysto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rysto)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2008, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/family-moves-into-a-puzzle-amazing-story/452820/28 "2008-06-15T18:34:26Z")
[QUOTE=anu-la1979] Completely irrelevant but is it commonplace to use the word “bemused” to mean “amused” now? Because I always thought that word meant puzzled or confused but those meanings don’t make sense in the context in which it’s used at the end (since they solved the puzzle, after all). [/QUOTE] Quite common. I didn’t learn the real definition of the word until a couple years tell. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/family-moves-into-a-puzzle-amazing-story/452820.md?page=1)