« SWEET SIXTEEN: East & West Regions | Main | ELITE EIGHT: East & West Regions »
SWEET SIXTEEN: North & South Regions
NORTH:
Game E:
H: 4I24E11 O3E1I12 3O4E 13O1E A34IE4E2 I1 1OU11A3E11 31A4 1E11 1U3 O4 I11 1I1E 4A1UE1 2U1I12 2A3E 4O1 44I34 3O83I3 4A1 O44I3IA1 4U3O1 3A2A10I1E
L: X = the product of the coordinates of the circumcenter of the triangle whose vertices are A) the population rank of State N on the x-axis, B) the rank according to entry in the union of State N on the y-axis, and C) at the point ( half the number of the letters in State N’s name , number of state owned universities in State N ) ; where State N is the state with the longest name that doesn’t have the same initial letter as another state.
Game F:
H: Number most prominently displayed on the large colourful object to the left (as we face them) of the large colourful object on the right on the stamp issued 48 years after song A made it to #1 on the Billboard charts in the US and whose singer's original last name, when doubled and joined by the first name of a children's song writer (mentioned later), evokes the large colourful object on the right of the stamp, and whose name (song A's) is mentioned as a world location in the lyrics of song B, written by the children's song writer mentioned previously and released 23 years after song A, which (song B) lists over 60 world locations, all of which are actual world locations except for song A's title, according to the Times World Atlas, and whose lyrics (song B's) includes another location that was involved in a milestone (or first) involving a Locomobile Steamer 100 years before the issue of the stamp.
L: gekubeerde la raíz cuadrada de la racine carrée de duecento cinquanta sei
SOUTH:
Game E:
H: By taking the most direct route via state highways between two towns whose names are synonymous with a clothing storage device and a large group of trees in the state that produces the most cranberries, the sum of your route.
L: All fifth powers end in the same digit as the root. What is the smallest two-digit number for which neither digit appears in its square, cube, or fourth power?
Game F:
H: Value of Bob's initials, quotient in this substitution problem:
B L
----------
B O B / L O D G E
E Z E Z
-------
H E H E
H E H E
L: Number that is shared by highways that go through Waco, Lincoln and Charlotte.
Comments
JmSR,
Just a quick read through these puzzles leads me to think that the higher seed's puzzle in South - Game E is incomplete (at least it appears to be an incomplete sentence leading into a much longer phrase or paragraph). Please confirm that something is missing.
Posted by: Sean F | Mar 24, 2006 9:47:32 AM
Things were going great until Round Two N-S, and I couldn't make a dent, then things picked up again with the Sweet Sixteen. But that's useless unless you finish everything before, right?
Posted by: Ross | Mar 24, 2006 12:29:25 PM
Hi,
I have a question regarding -->
L: gekubeerde la raíz cuadrada de la racine carrée de duecento cirquanta sei
Should CIRQUANTA be CINQUANTA instead?...
Posted by: Jim from Minnesota | Mar 24, 2006 1:29:42 PM
The constructor has informed me that Jim is correct. Expect corrections soon.
Posted by: JmSR | Mar 24, 2006 4:31:00 PM
I know that the deadline is April 15 but judging by the sheer deviousness of the questions I was wondering if the deadline could be postponed?...
Christmas sounds nice...
I should be done by then....
Posted by: Jim from Minnesota | Mar 24, 2006 6:07:22 PM
JmSR, I see you revised South Game E, but I'm still wondering if the 2nd occurrence of "between two towns whose names" is not only redundant, but also unintended:
Game E:
H: By taking the most direct route via state highways between two towns whose names are synonymous with a clothing storage device and a large group of trees in the state that produces the most cranberries between two towns whose names, [find] the sum of your route.
Posted by: Sean F | Mar 25, 2006 6:35:43 AM
Does "via state highways" mean you are not allowed to use Federal Interstates or U.S. highways? My atlas shows shield shapes for numbers of U.S. highways, ovals for state highways, and rectangles for both secondary state roads and county roads. Figuring the most direct route looks very challenging, especially if I am not sure if some roads are secondary state or county, and one is allowed and one isn't. Please clarify.
Posted by: Bob Lodge | Mar 25, 2006 6:34:24 PM
Hi,
I have a question regarding -->
L: Number that is shared by highways that go through Waco, Lincoln and Charlotte.
What is the definition of "highways" here?...
Do you include "interstates" as "highways"?...
Thanks...
Posted by: Jim from Minnesota | Mar 27, 2006 10:37:23 PM
I just had one of those weird moments that only people on this site will appreciate. As I was searching for children's songs for the Children's Song/Billboard #1, I tried a particularly obscure search string, and the first page that popped up on Google had the headline "What children's song is also known as William Trimmytoes?" FLASHBACK! I gotta get out more often!
Posted by: Michael | Mar 28, 2006 2:05:35 PM
In Game North, High Seed, are there a couple of misprints or do those characters (which seem out of character) actually belong to the string? (I don't want to be more specific, in case I accidentally let a herring out of the bag {so to speak}).
Posted by: DonV | Mar 29, 2006 1:08:33 AM
A change has been made to correct the error that Don detected.
Posted by: JmSR | Mar 29, 2006 8:15:28 AM
Hi,
I have a question about --->
Game F:
H: Number most prominently displayed on the large colourful object to the left (as we face them) of the large colourful object on the right on the stamp issued 48 years...
Is it a US stamp?...
Thanks...
Posted by: Jim from Minnesota | Mar 30, 2006 7:07:07 PM
I want to confirm the wording for a question. Sweet 16 North F High: The #1 song in question: the title IS a place named in the children's song, right...not the title CONTAINS a place name? For example, could the great 50s standard "I left my heart in Keokuk" apply since there is a place named Keokuk; or is it disqualified, because there is no place called "I left my Heart in Keokuk"?
Posted by: Michael | Mar 31, 2006 9:05:00 AM
There seem to be a few unanswered questions and requests for clarification in this section. Are all of these intended to be solved from the current level of uncertainty, or are some of these legitimate questions that would be prudent to answer?
Posted by: Bob Lodge | Apr 1, 2006 9:17:18 PM
According to my atlas, a highway includes interstate, US, state, provincial, county, secondary state, county trunk, Trans-Canadian, Mexican and Central American roads.
Posted by: DonV | Apr 2, 2006 1:00:43 AM
I will answer all unanswered questions on Monday.
Posted by: JmSR | Apr 2, 2006 2:03:10 PM
Both of my atlases use a different color for the road to distinguish between highways and county or secondary roads. Don't forget that the answer is numerical.
Posted by: Paula | Apr 2, 2006 6:00:25 PM
On NORTH Game F High Seed:
The stamp need not be from the United States and a place name need not be in the title of song A's title appears in the lyrics to song B as a place name.
Posted by: JmSR | Apr 3, 2006 7:38:56 AM
OK, with three days to go, HAS ANYBODY FOUND THE STAMP?? Surprise, folks, I am NOT the contributor of this one, and despite a fair familiarity with worldwide stamps and the catalogs, I still have not. Early on I thought I had it in a US stamp, but later it was announced it MIGHT be any country and further work with #1 hits and Locomobile history convinced me it was the wrong year, so I am still looking. The Scott catalog has SEVEN THOUSAND PAGES of listings, and even knowing the year, each of hundreds of countries must be checked separately for this unknown design. After a while I'm rummy and realize I'm forgetting to look for two colorful objects with numbers on them! (I did find a lot of neat stamps I didn't know about that I need for my collections, though!) If some of you have located it, then we should leave it as it is, but if NOBODY has found it yet, I would suggest a hint would now be appropriate, perhaps a narrowing of the issuing country by continent or alphebet, for instance? What say you?
Posted by: Bob Lodge | Apr 27, 2006 6:04:53 PM
Unfortunately Bob, I have received two final entries already. I don't think a hint can be given, sorry.
Posted by: JmSR | Apr 28, 2006 7:05:35 AM
NORTH
Game E:
H: Duchess 97 W
L: Two Lane 35
H: Using SCRABBLE letter tile values (1=L, N, R, S or T; 2 = D or G; 3 = B, C, M or P; 4 = F, H, V, W or Y; 5 = K; 8 = J or X; 10 = Q or Z), the encrypted sentence can be translated to:
HIGHEST OPENING MOVE SCORE ACHIEVED IN TOURNAMENT PLAY LESS SUM OF ITS TILE VALUES IN GAME FOR WHICH MOXBIB WAS OFFICIAL HUMOR MAGAZINE.
The highest opening move recorded in Scrabble tournament play has happened twice, and is BEZIQUE, scoring 124 points. The sum of the tile values of BEZIQUE (3+1+10+1+10+1+1) is 27. 124 less 27 is 97. Jay Winter, writer.
L: State N = Pennsylvania Triangle vertices: (6,0) , (0,2) , (6,14) Circumcenter: (5,7). Paula Stevens, writer.
Game F:
H: Home Shopping University 68 W
L: Coast Guard 64
H: Pikes Peak in the states first reached by car (Steamer) in 1901.
Pikes Peak is mentioned in Red Grammer's "Places in the World" from Teaching Peace, 1986.
I could not find another "pikes peak" in children's song lyrics, hopefully this is a reasonably specific step.
The same song refers to Dominique as a place, which is not listed in any Atlas I looked in. It may be a local name, but hopefully this is reasonable too.
Dominique was sung by Soeur Sourire in 1963, whose real last name is Decker. Decker doubled (double-decker) hopefully is reasonable to evoke the red London buses one of which appears on a British stamp issued in 2001. Next to it is another British bus with the route number 68 on it.
Answer: 68. John Daly, writer.
L: ANSWER: 64 – cube (Dutch) of the square root of (Spanish) the square root of (French) 256 (Italian). Paula Stevens, writer.
SOUTH
Game E:
H: Electoral College 99 W
L: Gipf University 53
H: Answer: 99. Dresser to Forest, Wisconsin 35 + 64. Paula Stevens, writer.
L: Of 90 2-digit numbers (10-99), all ending in 0, 1, 5, or 6 have squares ending in the same digit, and the cubes of those ending in 4 or 9 end in the same digit, so immediately there are only 36 possibilities, those
ending in 2, 3, 7, or 8. Other digit matches in the squares or cubes eliminate all but five: 22, 47, 53, 77, and 92, and the fourth power screen leaves only 53 and 77. ANS: 53. Bob Lodge, writer.
Game F:
H: University of North Dakota - Ellendale 87 W
L: Auntie Em I T 77
H: Solution:
8 7
----------
8 0 8 / 7 0 2 9 6
6 4 6 4
-------
5 6 5 6
5 6 5 6
-------
87. Bob Lodge, writer.
L: 77. Don Vance, writer.
Posted by: JmSR | May 1, 2006 8:43:45 AM
Did anybody actually solve the stamp problem? Despite hours of searching, I was only able to find two song's with "Pike's Peak" in the lyrics. But neither listed more than two other "locations". This one was a STUMPER!
Posted by: Paula | May 1, 2006 7:00:13 PM
Did anybody actually solve the stamp problem? Despite hours of searching, I was only able to find two song's with "Pike's Peak" in the lyrics. But neither listed more than two other "locations". This one was a STUMPER!
Posted by: Paula | May 1, 2006 7:00:16 PM
Hi...
There is a MAJOR error in the stamp question...
No wonder I couldn't solve it...
If you take 1963 & add 48 you get 2011 which hasn't occured yet!...
That's why I never found the US Billboard #1 hit song...
Posted by: Jim from Minnesota | May 1, 2006 8:03:20 PM
Very early on I found THIS US stamp from 2000, and spent much time trying to fit other facts to it. Hope the html link works. If not, the stamp shows two football players with a big "80" on the uniform of the left one. That would put the song in 1953 but the only place name I could find was Moulin Rouge--more time trying to find that in a children's song. Wow, this one was a hair puller!
Posted by: Bob Lodge | May 1, 2006 8:03:56 PM
Technically, I think the longest state name, which happens to also have a unique initial among states, is RHODE ISLAND AND PROVIDENCE PLANTATIONS, but I'll let it slide. :-)
Long forgotten by now, but some of you may have wondered earlier at my dumb questions regarding the drive from Dresser WI. I managed to find three sources that did not show Forest (actually one did, but a mistake in the index had me looking 200 miles away!) I did, however, easily locate CEDAR GROVE, in Sheboygan Co on Lake Michigan, clear across WI from Dresser! So I was trying to wend my way across hundreds of miles, wondering how one could be sure which way was most direct and which roads were acceptable. Look at Dresser to Forest on the map, then Dresser to Cedar Grove, and you'll see why I was so befuddled!
Posted by: Bob Lodge | May 1, 2006 8:24:27 PM
I never found the Locomobile song or stamp, either. Given that the Locomobile Steamer was invented in 1898 or 99 or so, and it's now 2006, the possible range for song A to hit #1 was 1950 - 1958, with 1953 very probable because of the Pike's Peak event. None of the #1 songs I found during this window panned out. I never got as far as looking up stamps.
For the Dresser, WI question, I found Dresser quickly using google maps, but "Forest, WI" draws a blank from Google maps! I finally settled on either Woodland, Birchwood, or Elmwood, WI and went with Birchwood because there's a reasonably direct route using state highways 35 and 48.
Posted by: Dan H | May 1, 2006 8:43:17 PM
Post a comment
Commenters please note: do NOT discuss ANY contest information for a currently active contest outside of what is printed in GAMES magazine.