Around the Town

by Aussie Meyer
Solving Tips

Story


Scene: the Drones smoking room.

"I say, what climbed up Pongo Twistleton's pants leg? I was getting some lads together to go see the monkey house at the zoo, and he nearly bit my head off when I asked him!" inquired the Bean.

An Egg inquired, "He has been touchy lately. What exactly did you say to him?"

"Why, I asked him if he was up for a pleasant and instructive afternoon, and he turned on me and shot me a look that froze me to the marrow!"

"I can explain," said a nearby Crumpet. "Last week Pongo's Aunt Jane went to Baden-Baden to take the waters, and he had to play host to his Uncle Fred, a notoriously adventurous old git. The words 'pleasant and instructive afternoon' bring the horror of it back to life."

"What, Lord Ickenham? But he's such a pleasant geezer, how could he bring anything but joy?" said the Bean.

"Pongo told me all about it. It seems that he had Uncle Fred for 5 days in a row, Monday through Friday, and on each day he'd tag along after the old boy and find him posing as some new character, raising havoc in a different location each day. The old boy thinks big - he passed himself off as a police detective, a diplomat, a nerve doctor, an adagio dancer, and a judge, and he preferred very grandiose first names: Alphonse, Cornelius, Maximillian, Octavio, and Wilberforce. The last names he chose were fairly odd as well: Greenbuck, Philpot, O'Sullivan, Troutman, and Winkle. In any case, he wound up perpetrating these farces all over town, at Covent Garden, Regent Street, Hyde Park, Picadilly Circus, and down at Wembley - a new venue every day. Why, the whole week so upset poor Pongo, that he was unable to recall just who Uncle Fred pretended to be in which place, on what day. All that came to him were a dozen scraps of recovered memory from the trauma. Indeed, his own nerve doctor says it might help if he could reconstruct the events fully, in order to look them in the eye and diminish the impact. Until he does that, he may remain skittish as a rabbit."

Can you, with the 12 clues below, help Pongo recall what names Uncle Fred took, what he pretended to be, and where he did it, for the five days he was on the loose?


./Labels/h_First.png ./Labels/h_Last.png ./Labels/h_Character.png ./Labels/h_Venue.png
./Labels/v_Alphonse.png ./Labels/v_Cornelius.png ./Labels/v_Maximillian.png ./Labels/v_Octavio.png ./Labels/v_Wilberforce.png ./Labels/v_Greenbuck.png ./Labels/v_Philpot.png ./Labels/v_O_Sullivan.png ./Labels/v_Troutman.png ./Labels/v_Winkle.png ./Labels/v_Police_detective.png ./Labels/v_Diplomat.png ./Labels/v_Nerve_doctor.png ./Labels/v_Adagio_dancer.png ./Labels/v_Judge.png ./Labels/v_Covent_Garden.png ./Labels/v_Regent_Street.png ./Labels/v_Hyde_Park.png ./Labels/v_Picadilly_Circus.png ./Labels/v_Wembley.png
./Labels/v_Day.png ./Labels/h_Monday.png Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark
./Labels/h_Tuesday.png Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark
./Labels/h_Wednesday.png Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark
./Labels/h_Thursday.png Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark
./Labels/h_Friday.png Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark
./Labels/v_Venue.png ./Labels/h_Covent_Garden.png Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark
./Labels/h_Regent_Street.png Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark
./Labels/h_Hyde_Park.png Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark
./Labels/h_Picadilly_Circus.png Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark
./Labels/h_Wembley.png Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark
./Labels/v_Character.png ./Labels/h_Police_detective.png Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark
./Labels/h_Diplomat.png Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark
./Labels/h_Nerve_doctor.png Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark
./Labels/h_Adagio_dancer.png Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark
./Labels/h_Judge.png Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark
./Labels/v_Last.png ./Labels/h_Greenbuck.png Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark
./Labels/h_Philpot.png Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark
./Labels/h_O_Sullivan.png Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark
./Labels/h_Troutman.png Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark
./Labels/h_Winkle.png Mark Mark Mark Mark Mark
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JavaScript Grid by Scott Noyes

Clues

  1. Four of the five impostures were as follows (in no special order): the one at Covent Garden, the one at Regent Street, the one where he called himself Alphonse, and the one where his last name was O'Sullivan.
  2. He did not call himself O'Sullivan at Hyde Park.
  3. Four of the five days included the adventure at Picadilly Circus, the one involving the name Cornelius, the one where he went by the surname Greenbuck, and the one where he passed himself off as a Judge.
  4. Uncle Fred did not pretend to be a Nerve Doctor the day after he posed as an Adagio Dancer.
  5. He did not introduce himself as Alphonse on Tuesday.
  6. The name he used with the last name Winkle was neither Wilberforce nor Octavio.
  7. His adventure in Covent Garden was at least two days before his name was Troutman.
  8. He claimed to be a Police Detective at Wembley.
  9. Uncle Fred called himself Wilberforce at least two days before impersonating one character (not the diplomat).
  10. The character named Winkle was not the Adagio Dancer.
  11. Four of the five outings were the one to Hyde Park, the one in which he was Maximillian, the one involving the name Philpot, and one in which he acted the part of a Judge.
  12. The day he was Octavio and the day he went to Regent Street were, in some order, Thursday and the day after he was Greenbuck.



Solving Tips


Use an X when you are sure that two fields do not match. Use a dot when you are sure that two fields do match. Click once to place an X. Click a second time to place a dot. Click a third time to clear the box.

Select marker color by clicking the colored radio buttons. You can use colored marks to indicate which clue provided a value, or to indicate a guess that might not be correct, or just because you like solving puzzles in teal.

Use the "Save" button to save a puzzle in progress. Use the "Load" button to reload the puzzle. This feature uses cookies - fear not, we aren't tracking you or stealing credit card numbers (we couldn't, even if we wanted to.) At the moment, only one puzzle may be saved at a time on each computer (unless using different browsers or accounts). There is no warning if you save over another puzzle, and no undo!

Use the "Current Solution Window" button to parse the grid for your solution. This feature simply looks for dots in the top set of rows and creates a list that you can copy and paste into your email for submission.

If you want to clear the grid and start over, just refresh the page. Note that there is a bug in IE6 (and possibly other browsers), so that if a color other than the default is selected, that color may appear to be selected after the reload, but the actual color used will be the default.

Feature Requests
What would you like to see added to the JavaScript grid? Send me your requests and ideas.

Bug Reports
If you encounter something strange, or a JavaScript error, or some other oddity, let me know!

Scott
snoyes@gmail.com