You were presented with a puzzle in the shape of an hourglass. the top bulb contains a cryptic clue, but the bottom bulb contains gibberish. I guess we should start with the top, then! Reading through, we are instructed to "Erode away all the other options" to find the "Grain of Truth", so there must be something more to the top passage than meets the eye.
The "glass" is full of sand, so not much can be eroded that way. letting "gravity" work on each by dropping the contents of the upper half to the lower yields interesting results.
FL
IP
TODE
CODE
OUCROEET
RERLBESF
NGDEEEGPTHIN
ESTELUTEAWOR
ITOTHHDLRTIESG
VUSOURCKHLEAYS
TSEOHTOJBUAIONET
IJDYFTUKSAGOFTAU
ESHITKAMNEPEXNOSCI
GSNYOFRDREVOVLTWLC
ETPREMATODMGOWASAU
EQOAGALHGATETOIOAL
MYAGZADODDREERFLUHMM
ETUNOSSIEALNFACAQOPC
ULAHVJEGAMMOHTITIOAV
WAVOERTDSOTYAMRSRICK
IP
TODE
CODE
OUCROEET
RERLBESF
NGDEEEGPTHIN
ESTELUTEAWOR
ITOTHHDLRTIESG
VUSOURCKHLEAYS
TSEOHTOJBUAIONET
IJDYFTUKSAGOFTAU
ESHITKAMNEPEXNOSCI
GSNYOFRDREVOVLTWLC
ETPREMATODMGOWASAU
EQOAGALHGATETOIOAL
MYAGZADODDREERFLUHMM
ETUNOSSIEALNFACAQOPC
ULAHVJEGAMMOHTITIOAV
WAVOERTDSOTYAMRSRICK
OK, that makes sense. It is an hourglass after all. When we turn over the puzzle and apply the same solution, we get this -
TO
MM
YLAS
ORDA
MANAGEDT
THEDODGE
RSAFTERHISRE
TIREMENTODJV
RACTEVSKDLASOO
ILFOGPBJMAMAZH
IQIOVOAKCURFGANV
OUAWXEULDOAKERGA
COOTLOGHTURTFOYOUA
AHSONIARGEHTHTIPAL
PAWTFELEBLLUOYDNQT
MASNOITPOREHTOEHTY
KLLAYAWAEDORETSUJSEW
VUCESEHTEDOCEDOTSSEU
CCUSROFSEPICERSEVIGE
MITGNITEELFTUOGNITEM
MM
YLAS
ORDA
MANAGEDT
THEDODGE
RSAFTERHISRE
TIREMENTODJV
RACTEVSKDLASOO
ILFOGPBJMAMAZH
IQIOVOAKCURFGANV
OUAWXEULDOAKERGA
COOTLOGHTURTFOYOUA
AHSONIARGEHTHTIPAL
PAWTFELEBLLUOYDNQT
MASNOITPOREHTOEHTY
KLLAYAWAEDORETSUJSEW
VUCESEHTEDOCEDOTSSEU
CCUSROFSEPICERSEVIGE
MITGNITEELFTUOGNITEM
"Tommy Lasorda managed the Dodgers after his retirement." A quick trip to verify with your baseball reference of choice, and you will know that Walter Alston immediately preceded Tommy when he took over the club.
Thanks to all those who participated. Initial standings will be posted shortly.
10 comments:
Thanks to all who played!
The official tally.
1. Josh S.
2. MR. F
3. Golem
4. Jason
5. J. Steve
6. Dusty (in Injury Time)
Ah, so there was an extra T in there (after MANAGED). I found it after I submitted my answer. I thought I had just dropped an extra letter or something.
Great puzzle. I have NO IDEA how you managed to build it so it made sense.
I got how to do it right away, but the mechanics of moving the columns took a long time. I used Word, but I think I would have been better off blowing up the font, printing it out, and using scissors.
Josh,
I built it in a spreadsheet where every letter was in its own cell, then shuffled them around as required.
Josh,
Honestly, I didn't see the extra T until just now! Fortunately it didn't result in any change in meaning.
Can't tell you how long I searched for a deeper meaning of that "T". Speaking of Ts, I found the word "tit" in there and it made me titter to myself.
Given that it took me 10 minutes to figure out the solution _after_ you posted it, I don't think I was going to solve this one. Cool concept, though.
I also noticed that my way of flipping it back over (reordering the lines, bottom to top) was different than yours (literally flipping it over, with the letters staying upright), leading me to get a backwards version of the Tommy clue. I thought that was what you meant by "flip to decode".
Wow very cool puzzle Mr C!
@Josh
Yeah, I wondered if that might happen, but you eventually got the idea. One rotates the puzzle 180 degrees, as you would to an actual hourglass, rather than mirroring it.
If you printed it and turned it over, your letters would have been upside down, but in the correct order.
Thanks, EK!
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