I am a fan of creative puzzles - but I am a superfan of word and number puzzles! One of my favorite puzzle-dense areas is Metrowest Boston, where JWCorey has placed enough puzzles to keep someone busy for MONTHS. My favorite type of puzzle of his was the RASH puzzle. Since there was none in this area, I thought it might be great to share what fun and quite challenging puzzles they are, considering they are made of just a few odd words.
I have included the instructions from the RASH series as given in JWCorey's puzzles. They do a great job explaining what RASH is all about.
How it Works: The clues are mixtures of components (words or syllables) that, when verbally replaced with appropriate counterparts, will integrate into answers that correspond to the puzzle’s theme.
- Relatives are similar things. Apples and oranges are relatives in the fruit family; Cupid and Blitzen are relatives in Santa’s reindeer; Mars and Jupiter are relatives in the family of planets.
- Antonyms are opposites: black and white, will and won’t, now and then.
- Synonyms are different words with similar meanings: yellow and amber, cold and brisk, trash and rubbish, near and close.
- Homophones/homonyms. Homophones are pronounced the same, have different meanings, and may or may not have the same spelling: merry, marry and Mary. Homonyms have the same spelling and pronunciation but different meanings: bank (edge of a river, carom, or depository).
Tricks of the Trade:
- If you can get a part of a clue, you can usually reason through the twisted combination of “nyms” to get the whole answer.
- Italicized words identify homonyms that are not exact, but close. For example, Modify Stinky-Dairy might translate into Doctor FoulCheese. Doctor FoulCheese would then become Doctor Fauci. Such rough homonyms are denoted in italics to alert the solver.
- Hyphens separate partial word (usually a syllable) clues. For example, Bubble-Seis could translate to Fizz-Six = Physics
Now, time for the twist! Use your list of answers to devise the final coordinates! (Full set) Cache is winter-friendly, but may be tricky to find at GZ. Think outside of the box for possible locations. Feel free to reach out to me for any guidance with the puzzle or the cache. The distance from parking to GZ is about a quarter of a mile and about 200 feet of light bushwhacking. Once you are in the zone, find the head height film canister.
Another thanks to JWCorey for being the inspiration of this puzzle and for producing so many great mysteries!