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I have been working on this mystery hunt on and off for the last couple of evenings. It's great. I have solved a bunch of the basic puzzles and I still have no idea what to do with the answers. They're clearly instructions to perform further wordplay on something-or-other, but my target is uncertain. I wonder if it will become clearer to me if I solve all of the basic puzzles first?
Does Games Magazine need younger talent? I just solved (part of) a puzzle in this month's issue that involves building words that have something in common semantically, though you aren't told what ahead of time. One of the answers was OLIVER, HAIR, and CATS -- aha, all musicals.. But they're really old examples, and I'd argue the pop-culture validity of at least one of them. I feel fairly certain that I'm on the young end of the age group that could solve this with offhand knowledge.
Actually, I'm being kind -- the fouth member of the set was MAME, which I'd never even heard of. According to WP, it was a stage hit from the mid-1960s starring Angela Lansbury, and was later a flop of a film with Lucille Ball. Whatever. The other three alone made the answer obvious to me, but recognizing OLIVER was a stretch... I think I dimly remember lots of TV ads from a 1980-ish revival or something.
Surely they could have worked in RENT or something? Or is that actually less famous than I think it is?
Regardless, it reminds me of hearing someone's description of trying to play the original mid-80s edition of Trivial Pursuit. Back then, he was a little kid, and couldn't play against adults because they'd mop the floor with him, as you'd expect. Today, however, he finds that vindication is denied him, because half of the questions assume you are a baby boomer and ask you things like "Who played Mr. Peepers?" Erm. (Well, I actually know what "Mr. Peepers" is thanks to lileks.com, but that's beside the point. And anyway I don't know who played him.)
Would it be worth my while to join the NPL?![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
cramerica, IIRC, suggested the idea some time ago, after I gleefully announced that I had solved my first cryptic crossword. However, everyone I know who is a member seems to have been a member since forever. I'm a little hesitant to take up something that most people seem to do as adults only coz they started when they were kids, like role-playing games, or smoking. Eh heh heh.
Does Games Magazine need younger talent? I just solved (part of) a puzzle in this month's issue that involves building words that have something in common semantically, though you aren't told what ahead of time. One of the answers was OLIVER, HAIR, and CATS -- aha, all musicals.. But they're really old examples, and I'd argue the pop-culture validity of at least one of them. I feel fairly certain that I'm on the young end of the age group that could solve this with offhand knowledge.
Actually, I'm being kind -- the fouth member of the set was MAME, which I'd never even heard of. According to WP, it was a stage hit from the mid-1960s starring Angela Lansbury, and was later a flop of a film with Lucille Ball. Whatever. The other three alone made the answer obvious to me, but recognizing OLIVER was a stretch... I think I dimly remember lots of TV ads from a 1980-ish revival or something.
Surely they could have worked in RENT or something? Or is that actually less famous than I think it is?
Regardless, it reminds me of hearing someone's description of trying to play the original mid-80s edition of Trivial Pursuit. Back then, he was a little kid, and couldn't play against adults because they'd mop the floor with him, as you'd expect. Today, however, he finds that vindication is denied him, because half of the questions assume you are a baby boomer and ask you things like "Who played Mr. Peepers?" Erm. (Well, I actually know what "Mr. Peepers" is thanks to lileks.com, but that's beside the point. And anyway I don't know who played him.)
Would it be worth my while to join the NPL?
cramerica, IIRC, suggested the idea some time ago, after I gleefully announced that I had solved my first cryptic crossword. However, everyone I know who is a member seems to have been a member since forever. I'm a little hesitant to take up something that most people seem to do as adults only coz they started when they were kids, like role-playing games, or smoking. Eh heh heh.
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It's definitely a reprint, because I haven't written anything for them for, like, five years (except for one Ornery Crossword). "Rent" would almost certainly have been out at the time the puzzle was written; since I don't remember the puzzle I don't remember if I left it out because there was some constraint, or if I simply left it out because I can't stand the score to that frickin' musical.
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Anyway, it's called "Group Therapy", and involves doing one-letter shifts on already-grouped words (though the words are initially stored as great cartoon pictures by Ron Barrett).