This cache is not at the posted coordinates.
Introduction
This is the ninth in my series of caches meant to teach people some ways to solve puzzle caches. Please read the information above the line in Puzzlers Lesson 1: Alphabets.
The posted coordinates are one of the locations used to access this section of the West Haven trail system. This trail is also part of the Golden Spoke Trail Network, as noted by a sign embedded in access locations along the trail. This access location is near a neighborhood so please take that into account when looking for this cache. Dogs should be on a leash, and you should pick up after your pets. No motorized vehicles are allowed.
Ordered Items
In the first of these lessons I covered how to convert letters to numbers. There is nothing inherent correspondance between letters and the numbers that I showed you in that lesson. However, there is an inherent order of our alphabet and other alphabets. The history of this is too much to go into at this time and is left as an exercise to the reader.
You can also think of the numbers as another ordered list. Corresponding elements are lined up and this is how we get the relationship of A=1, B=2, C=3, etc. Or we can start with 0 (zero) and we get A=0, B=1, C=3, etc.
Television
A similar correspondence can also be established between any two ordered lists. So, for instance, we can establish a correspondence between numbers and the characters in "Gilligan's Island", according to the opening credits song from second season onward. Gilligan = 1, Skipper = 2, the millionaire (Thurston Howell III) = 3, and his wife ("Lovey" Wentworth-Howell) = 4, the movie star (Ginger Grant) = 5, the professor (Roy Hinkley) = 6 and Mary Ann (Summers) = 7. Like in the previous lesson we can use the actors' names as substitutions as well. If we include the made for television movies there are three actresses who played Ginger Grant. And, just like the previous lesson, any other character/actor who appeared in the series can be used to represent 0 (zero).
If we move over to "The Brady Bunch", another series by Sherwood Schwartz, the order is Lovely Lady = 1, "three very lovely girls" = 2 - 4 (probably oldest to youngest, but could be the other way), a man named Brady = 5, "three boys of his own" = 6 - 8, and Alice (shown but not mentioned in the song) would be 9. Also notice that videos of them are put in a 3 by 3 grid, just like a telephone or calculator keypad giving another way to get the numbers 1 - 9.
The order that actors are given in the opening credits may also be used. However, for long running series actors often change so which season to use would need to be specified, greately complicating things. A single season series will make this much easier.
There have also been a few made-for-television movies in the original Brady continuity and two movies in a new Brady continuity. This means that many actors/actresses have played the characters.
Key Phrases
Here is another example of an ordered list of items, something that you may not think of as such. The following phrase is what is called a pangram, a sentence that contains all of the letters in the language, in this case it is in English.
The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog
In the above phrase only the first occurence of each letter is bolded. This is what is commonly done in making an encryption phrase for ciphers which we will be using in a later lesson. The correspondance for the above phrase would be T=1, h=2, e=3, q=4, etc.
If the word or phrase does not contain all of the letters of the alphabet then the remaining ones are placed at the end jkquvxyz. So, i=1, f=2, t=3, etc. In a secret phrase that is sent in the open then the remaining letters at the end would be understood to be there when making the key phrase.
Key Words
A phrase may be made by any list of things on the cache page, even if the list used isn't obvious. For instance, if you have a cache named "My Favorite Things" the list may be made up of the list of nouns from the song from "The Sound of Music":
- Raindrops
- Roses
- Whiskers
- Kittens
- Kettles
- Mittens
- Packages
- String
- Things
This is the list from just the first verse of the song.
A unique word from each line of lyrics could also be used. For instance, from the first line raindrops, roses, whiskers or kittens could be used to indicate 1.
Longer texts can also be used, but I will get into that later when I cover book ciphers.
Other Lists
Like in the previous lesson there is an infinite number of ordered lists that can be made. Again, if you find a puzzle that looks like it may be made up from words that have no correspondance that you can see, try searching for the list of items. Remember that something that does not belong could be used to indicate 0 (zero).
- Geocache attributes: This can be used but may change in the future as it has in the past
- Book series:
- Order of publication
- Chronological order
- Number of books in a given series
- Movie series:
- Order of production
- Chronological order
- Number of movies in a series
- Music:
- Words in song lyrics
- Album release order
- US States (may include territories in some lists):
- Alphabetical order
- Full name
- Postal abbreviation
- By length then one of the above for ties
- Date admitted as a state
- Size, usually largest to smallest
- Number of counties or equivalent
- Geographic location
- Geographic center of state
- By north, east, south, west, NE, SE, SW or NW extent
- Countries:
- Many of the same orderings listed for US States above
- The same could be done for any particular political subdivision of another country
- People:
- Year of birth
- Year of death
- Some other characteristic
- Buildings:
- Height, probably tallest to shortest
- Year built
- Flowers, by number of petal
Since this is a necessarily incomplete list, an infinite number of other ordered lists exist. Anything that may change (like number of movies in a series) would be as of the date that the cache was published. However, a cache owner may keep the puzzle up to date and update it when a new movie in the series is released.
Puzzle
Now, on to the puzzle:
troubles yesterday though so oh looks in now seemed all
You can validate your puzzle solution with certitude.
Congratulations to Oreoshakers and grumpywombat for being first to find.