Preparation

Humming the Tom Lehrer song in my head

I've got two PuzzleHuntContests coming up next week, and I've been preparing (or not) for weeks.  How about you?

Seattle Night and Day Challenge

Hopefully a magnifying glass is on my checklist

First up this Saturday is the Seattle Night and Day Challenge, an event that gives you a map with 60-odd checkpoints in the city and challenges you to find as many as possible in 90 minutes, 3 hours, 7 hours, or 16 hours (starting at 4pm, so if you choose 7 or 16 hours, you get some Night, some Day).  This will be my 9th Night and Day, so I've got preparing for this down to a science.  In fact, I've got a spreadsheet.

In case you're wondering, I use the same spreadsheet for similar races, and I don't slavishly follow it (for example, I doubt I'll bring along an emergency blanket given the low is forecast to be in the high 50s).  Other than gathering up equipment, the main preparation I need is to get enough sleep and make sure my bike seems to be in good working condition.  Oh, yeah, and going for a few long bike rides.

 Ready Player One Gate #3

Would you buy a DeLorean from this man?

On the opposite end of the spectrum is the final gate for the Ready Player One contest.  For those of you who skipped the last few classes, here's a summary:  Ernie Cline, author of very geeky book Ready Player One, about a contest involving video games and 80s culture, announced a contest of his own, involving video games and 80s culture.  The first person to complete three challenges wins a real DeLorean.  As of the last count, 1200 people have completed the first challenge and over 500 have completed the second.  I expect those numbers to hit around 2000 and 800 before August 1st, when the final challenge opens, and it's a race between these 800 people to solve/finish/master one more game (or combination of games).  Actually, here on the west coast, we get to start at 9pm on July 31, which is sort of an advantage.

I've finished the first two challenges, so I'm one of the 800, and what have I done to prepare?

1. I read Ready Player One (duh).
2. I took August 1st off, in case it looks like I need to pull an all-nighter to win.
3. Some of the challenges in the book involved popular and cult movies from the 1970s and 1980s (e.g., WarGames and Monty Python and the Holy Grail), so I did my best to try to have a copy of these films on hand in case they are useful (thank you, Seattle Public Library).

Otherwise, not much else.  Should I be doing more (practicing my Defender skills, perhaps)?  It's a cost-benefit tradeoff, and I've decided it's unlikely this would help.  If the final challenge involves video game skills (and there are strong indications it might), I think there are a number of people in the 800 competitors who will be much better than I am, no matter how much I practice in the meantime.  But supposing I did think I had a good chance to win, my preparation might look a little more like...

Canlis New Year's Eve Hunt

 

The competition

 On December 31, 2010, I was the captain of one of around 50 teams competing in the final Canlis hunt.  The announced prize was considerably less than a DeLorean:  annual dinner for two at the fancy-schmancy Canlis restaurant for life, but you had to give it away to a deserving person.  In this case, though, I thought I had a chance.  The contest was presumably just going to be a compressed version of the contest Canlis had been conducting for the past few months:  they hid a menu and gave out clues as to where to find it.  They used a variety of clue types, but I thought I was pretty good at solving them.  My experience with Night and Day and other Seattle urban orienteering events meant I probably knew the city better than most of my competitors, and presumably the final event would require us to travel all over the city.  Finally, I was allowed an unlimited number of helpers to research questions at home, and I had a number of smart friends willing to assist.

So in this case, I went all out.  I had weeks to prepare, much of which I spent reading Seattle historical trivia (again, thank you Seattle Public Library) and jotting down interesting facts I thought might be useful.  I wrote up a document to tutor people on solving clues themselves, based on the clues they'd already given.  I wrote a webpage that could 'decode' a message, using the codes they'd already used, plus a couple of other basic ideas.  (Note:  I updated the page for a subsequent contest, so it references some unrelated things).  In short, I spent most of my free time for about four weeks preparing as best I could.  And we won.  Although plenty of luck was involved as well, it would not have happened without good preparation.

So, BE PREPARED.  If you want to win.  Unless you don't feel like it.

Coming up  

You could win this building! (not really)

 

(italics = new since last time)

• Seattle Night and Day Challenge, July 28-29, show up around 2:30 at Road Runner Sports in Green Lake.  See above.  Basically a gigantic Street Scramble that covers most of Seattle and starts at 4pm, with options for 90 minutes, 3 hours, 7 hours, and 16 hours.  16 hours gets you a real 'night and day' experience.  I prefer the 7 hour option, which still gets you some night, but with less of the hangover after you pull an all-nighter.  If you clear the course (I almost did it once; forgot the Locks closed at 9pm, dammit), you'll go around 70-80 miles.  This will be my 9th Night and Day.
• Seafair Treasure Hunt - Thursday, August 2.  Visit a Seafair info booth to find a 'treasure' and win a prize. 
• Ready Player One Easter Egg Hunt - See above.  Final gate opens at 9pm, July 31st (PDT).
• First Thursday Adventure Run - August 2, Road Runner Sports Green Lake.  As always, free, with thousands of dollars in prizes raffled off at the end.  Bonus:  July's run had a Slip and Slide and a bouncy house.
• Gumshoe 5K - August 3-12.  A charity event where you walk around Greenwood and solve a puzzle using clues you find along the way.
• Rabbit Hole Alleycat and Sprint - August 4, Cool Guy Park.  Put on by the organizers of the UW alleycat earlier this year.  Should be fun.
• Choose your own Paddle Adventure - August 5, UW Waterfront Activities Center.  Canoe orientering.  Rent a canoe, or bring your own (kayaks are okay as well).  Don't forget the sunscreen, and watch out for thick lilypad patches and swans (those guys are nasty).  Note that this ends at 12:30, so the registration is open early (9-11am).
• BEAST race #4 - August 7, Issaquah.  Did I ever tell you about the time I was on a BEAST race in Maple Valley and the course got me so confused I ended up going to the other end of the Cedar River Trail before I realized I was heading east instead of west?  Bring a compass.
• Evening Orienteering - Wednesday, August 8, Luther Burbank Park, Mercer Island.  If it's sunny, bring your bathing suit and have a swim afterwards.
• Pirate P"arr"ty - August 8, Ravenna-Eckstein Community Center.  For the kids, includes a treasure hunt.
• Great Urban Race - August 11, starting at Jillian's.  Amazing-race style event.
• Seattle Rep's Theatrical Scavenger Hunt - August 18, noon.   Win Seattle Rep tickets for life!  Instantly become Foursquare's Mayor of the Bagley Wright.
• Bainbridge Street Scramble - August 18.  I assume this will be kind of like the Chilly Hilly, except with more checkpoints, better weather, and fewer people who fall over at the bottom of the hill because their derailleurs rusted out over the winter.
• TRIOBA Sprint Adventure Race - August 18, Ellensburg.  20-30 miles of biking, 5-15 miles on foot, no paddling, 5-10 hours total.  If you're looking for the next step after BEAST races, this would be a good place to start.
• 2012 Geocaching Block Party - August 18, Fremont.  It's International Geocaching Day, so break out your GPS devices and head on down to Fremont, headquarters of Groundspeak, which runs geocaching.com.  Various urban geocaching activities ensue.  Other events take place during the week, including one the next day at Snoqualmie Pass...
• Going APE at the Tunnel of Light - August 19, Hyak.  At the east end of the Snoqualmie Tunnel, on the John Wayne/Iron Horse Trail.  For those who like their geocaching more rural.  Or for those who like going into a 50-degree tunnel on a potentially hot day.  Bring a flashlight.
• Scavenger Hunt - August 21, 3pm, Northeast Branch Library.  Ages 12-18 only.  Heads will roll if they don't visit Top Pot.
• Amazing Ring Race - August 25.   Free entry.  Prizes:  a local jeweler puts up a ring purportedly worth $15,000.  2nd prize is also nothing to sneeze at.  You run around a small area downtown solving clues using a mobile phone application called SCVNGR. 
• Choose Your Own Adventure #3 - August 25, North SeaTac Park.  Orienteering where you find as many checkpoints as you can in 75 minutes.  If you ever lose your bearings just wait for the next plane to come by and remember the airport is due south.

Still going on

• Book Scavenger hunt - Seattle Public Library's Teen Summer Reading Program.

Puzzle cache of the week:  Missing Long Lat.  Find an address in the city that matches its longitude.  There are actually a few of them; the hints narrow it down to a unique answer (or at least a single block).