Jun
18th
Thu
18th
by Steven Bevacqua
A glimpse into what's going on in my brain, RIGHT NOW!
May
31st
Sun
31st
PRIZES
—A lot of you have asked what swag I scored after the New York Times article mentioned that JJ Abrams would be sending a few things my way for being the first to solve his puzzles. Well, a couple of packages showed up at my doorstep this afternoon. First off was a copy if the May issue of Wired signed by JJ. Also, a few items he rated in his “Playlist” article: a copy of “Catcher in the Rye”, a copy of Kenny Shopsin’s “Eat Me”, Thomas Dolby’s “The Golden Age of Wireless” on CD, and most awesomely—the complete 156-episode, 28-DVD box set of The Twilight Zone. One of my favorite TV shows… as a kid I used to religiously watch WPIX’s annual marathons and tape as many episodes as I could so I could watch them again. Now they’re finally all mine! But it didn’t end there, the second package was a tube—containing two “Star Trek” movie posters signed by JJ as well. Some of you know I collect autographed movie posters, so these will get some prime real estate on my walls!
May
22nd
Fri
22nd
THAT OTHER WIRED PUZZLE
—Jon at Good Times has finally cracked the second page of the “LOST” numbers puzzle. I’m not a “LOST” viewer, so I missed the WIRED magazine that appeared in the season finale. Apparently, running the numbers against the time travel article in that issue (an article I actually do remember reading!) will give the solution: “The four toed statue is Taweret”. So there you go.
May
14th
Thu
14th
WIRED PUZZLE ANSWERS
—D’oh! I was looking pretty hard for the hidden word “expostulate” and had actually looked at the staff member names a few times and compared a couple of them to old issues, but didn’t compare the right ones! Oh well, at least I wasn’t the only one who missed it!
Apr
26th
Sun
26th
This Bevacqua guy must be a maniac. He solved the thing in a couple days and he’s already taking on the biggest mystery— madamimadam, on the unfiction ARG forums.
To be honest, I just get a little obsessive over unsolved puzzles. I’m nowhere the caliber of anyone who can tackle a Sunday New York Times crossword. But it has been fun googling my name the last week or so!
To be honest, I just get a little obsessive over unsolved puzzles. I’m nowhere the caliber of anyone who can tackle a Sunday New York Times crossword. But it has been fun googling my name the last week or so!
Apr
23rd
Thu
23rd
MORE WIRED PUZZLES
—Still trying to answer some of the leftover questions in the WIRED issue. Based on an idea from Nick Tierce on the Brad!cal blog, I converted the code on the “LOST numbers” page to letters based on a repeating cycle, where “A” could be encoded as 1, 27, 53, or “B” could be 2, 28, 54, etc. Anyway, once the numbers were converted to letters, I tried a Vigenere cipher (inspired by the Kryptos article) and took random guesses at code keys. Sure enough, by my sixth or seventh guess, I decoded the message:
“USE LETTERS BACKWARDS FROM END”
from the first page of numbers. Now I have to figure out what the second page is all about.
Apr
21st
Tue
21st
I FORGOT MOST OF MY HIGH SCHOOL FRENCH
—So I can’t read much of this article from Paris. Except, of course, my name.
IFC BLOG
—I got a blurb in one of the Independent Film Channel blogs as well. Cool!
Apr
20th
Mon
20th
TOMORROW'S NEW YORK TIMES
—I’ve got 14 of the 15 mini-puzzles fully solved, and the answer (but not the question, how Jeopardy!) to the 15th, which is driving me crazy. But you can read all about it in tomorrow’s New York Times, page C3.
Rumor has it that it took about an extra 70 hours for the next person to solve the metapuzzle. Didn’t realize I was that fast!
But there are plenty more puzzles I need to solve. Like: what’s up with Chris Anderson’s signature in the editor’s note? Why are the words “here’s the illusions” on the Contents-Features page different from the article copy? What’s the significance of 16 and 27546.824125 in the “Pi Chart” (I figured out what 0138704 referred to at least!)? Where can I buy an old Violet Sedan Chairs album anyway? Is Jengai the plural of the game Jenga? What’s up with the Lost lotto ticket? Or the tiny numbers squiggled into the “American Stonehenge” article’s title graphic?
Oh, and, wouldn’t ‘Steampunk Bullwhip’ be a great name for a band?
Apr
19th
Sun
19th
