Category: News

LollapuzZOOMa: A Zoom hangout for Lollapuzzoola 2022

WhatZoom Hangout for Lollapuzzoola
WhenSat Aug 27, 2022
Hangout starts at 11:00 am
Tournament starts at 12:00 pm
(All times US-Eastern)
Meeting ID890 5524 0078
(no passcode, must be registered)
Meeting LinkClick here to join us now on Zoom

If you’re an online solver attending the Lollapuzzoola crossword puzzle tournament and you’re looking for a group to socialize with during the tournament, come join me and other fans of the tournament and the Fill Me In podcast. It’s a great way to experience the social aspect of the tournament if you can’t attend in person.

Everyone is welcome (whether you’re live at the event or virtually in the cloud), so please share the link. Feel free to join, leave, and come back whenever you like … the meeting will be up starting at 11:00 am and will last until after the final puzzle is over.

Sadly, I won’t be at the live event, but I will be spending the day online in the Zoom hangout.

Spoiler Alert (sorta): Please don’t spoil any of the puzzle content in the Zoom hangout before the puzzle timer has expired. You might want to mute your speaker (as well as your microphone) while solving to keep the conversation from disturbing you while you finish a puzzle.

If you need help getting connected, send me email to eric@puzzlehead.org or tweet at me at @ePeterso2.

Meeting Invitation

Join Zoom Meeting
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Meeting ID: 890 5524 0078
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OMG SECRET MESSAGE

If you’ve been reading my posts over the past week in the Puzzlehead Facebook group, you’ve probably been wondering what the noise has been all about. If you haven’t been reading my posts over the past week in the Puzzlehead Facebook group (and, really, why haven’t you?), here’s what you missed:

  1. BOOTLEG SNOB (6 5)
  2. HAIR DILEMMA (5 6)
  3. DROP EVENTS (6 4)
  4. INTERNAL NOODLES (7 8)
  5. WINTERY SMOKE (3 4 5)
  6. GLOSSIEST ENAMEL (3 7 5)
  7. HOT CEREBRAL VOTERS (9 8)
  8. HAPPIER LIQUID INHALER (12 8)
  9. MAIM PETTY SAAB (5 3 5)
  10. IN BIZARRE CUPOLA (7 8)
  11. SCHOOL THE UNICORN (7 9)
  12. WASTING PHOTONS (10 4)
  13. WALLING RANDOMNESS (6 7 4)
  14. ETCHING CARIBOU (7 7)
  15. CASES WORSEN JURYMEN (3 4 7 4)
  16. REAWAKEN UNSENT MILLIJOULE (9 7 8)
  17. SWOLLEN AVERSIVE JAGUAR (3 5 6-7)
  18. URGENT SENIOR CATEGORY (6 6 8)
  19. LUNATIC JANITOR ANNULS TATTOO (7 7-12)
  20. ETERNAL TILTING TELESCOPES (7 4-13)
  21. VARIOUS TRUANTS HOLLERED (8 4-10)

(Shout out to the various folks that spotted my errors during the week … thanks for being my impromptu puzzle testers!)

Today, I’d like to deliver two messages to you, and they are as follows:

SECRET MESSAGE #1
7, 7, 8, 6, 4, 3, 12, 7, 8, 3, 4, 9, 10, 14, 14, 8, 7, 2, 9, 6, 14

SECRET MESSAGE #2
(15,11), (12,4), (4,9), (18,7), (16,7), (21,2), (11,3), (19,2), (1,4), (7,2), (6,7), (10,12), (3,2), (14,13), (20,22), (2,6), (9,11), (13,2), (8,18), (5,7), (17,3)

Announcing the Geodyssey Puzzlehunt

Geodyssey is a collection of puzzles with a bit of a geocaching twist, although you don’t have to be a geocacher to solve them.

There are three parts to Geodyssey:

The puzzles are completely free: there’s no cost to access the site, and there are no banner ads on it.

As part of the rollout, I’m also running a contest through the end of March 2016. Everyone who completes one of the three Geodyssey challenges by then will be entered into a drawing to win their own copy of the book Puzzlecraft. Details are available on the Contest page.

I drew upon two sources of inspiration to create Geodyssey. First, I wanted to create a sequel to the Puzzle Solving 101 series of geocaches that I created back in 2007. Second, I wanted to try my hand at creating some of the puzzles in the book Puzzlecraft: The Ultimate Guide on How to Construct Every Kind of Puzzle by Mike Selinker and Thomas Snyder, especially ones I’d never constructed before. The grand prize in the contest for each challenge is a copy of that book.

I started designing Geodyssey in the summer of 2015, and I’m really interested to know what you think of it. If you’ve got an opinion, suggestion, or question about Geodyssey (good or bad), please get in touch with me. You can reply to this message or use the Contact form on the web site.

I’ll be sending news updates about Geodyssey on this list as well as posting them on my blog at puzzlehead.org.

Enjoy the puzzles, and good luck to the contestants!

Alice, Bob, and the Puzzlehead Mailing List

My new puzzlehunt is just about ready to roll out. Launch date is National Puzzle Day – Fri Jan 29. You’ll see an announcement here, on my Facebook page, my Twitter feed, and elsewhere.

But if you join my Puzzlehead email list, you’ll get announcements about the release delivered straight to your inbox. I’ll bring the info you need straight to you, absolutely free!

Visit this link to sign up, or use the signup box on this page. I use Mailchimp, which makes it easy for you to manage your messaging preferences.

In the meantime, here’s a simple logic puzzle about the mail, which I found on the wonderful puzzle site MindCipher:

Alice and Bob live very far apart. Alice wants to exchange mail via the postal service with Bob, but they both know their mail carrier is corrupt and opens their letters.

Alice has a box that can be secured with one or more padlocks, and the mail carrier cannot open the box when it is locked. Alice and Bob each have a keyed padlock that can secure the box, but Alice’s key cannot open Bob’s padlock, and Bob’s key cannot open Alice’s padlock.

How can Alice send a letter to Bob without it being read by the mail carrier?

[su_spoiler title=”Solution 1″]Alice puts her letter in the box, locks the box with her padlock, and mails the box to Bob. Bob puts his padlock on the box and mails the box with both locks on it back to Alice. Alice unlocks her padlock and mails the box back to Bob. Bob unlocks his padlock, opens the box, and reads the letter. [/su_spoiler]

[su_spoiler title=”Solution 2″]Bob sends his unlocked padlock to Alice. Alice puts the letter and her unlocked padlock in the box, locks the box with Bob’s padlock, and sends the box to Bob. Bob unlocks his padlock, opens the box, and reads the letter.

He can now send a reply to Alice by putting his letter and his open padlock in the box, then locking the box with Alice’s padlock.[/su_spoiler]

A new puzzlehunt is coming soon! (Jan 29)

I’m putting the finishing touches on a brand new puzzlehunt which I plan to release to the world on National Puzzle Day – January 29. If you liked my Puzzle Solving 101 Series, I think you’re gonna like this new one.

It’s not going to be a new series of geocaches, but it’s got a fair bit of geocaching elements to it. But you don’t have to be a geocacher to enjoy it – it’s designed for the cachers and muggles alike.  Although there will be a local aspect to it for people who can get to South Florida, there will be something in it for you no matter where you live.

In the meantime, please enjoy this throwback to my 2 minutes and 50 seconds of C-list internet fame, thanks to the producers at Groundspeak:

Rebuilding the Site

The old version of this site had been hacked and flooded with spam several years ago, and my attempts to thoroughly clean up the results of that hack were unsuccessful.

As a result, I’ve moved the old version of this site to old.puzzlehead.org. All of the URLs that used to point to this site should work on that site if you change “www” to “old” in the URL. All comments and registrations on the old site have been disabled, and I’ve patched the system as best I can, so hopefully that will slow down the nonsense.

I’ll be slowly rebuilding the new site out of the pieces of the old. Stay tuned!