CISRA Puzzle Competition 2008 - Solutions

This is the archive of the 2008 Puzzle Competition. Please visit the current competition site for information about the latest Puzzle Competition.

B.4 Miss a Beat Poetry

The puzzle has two parts: a poem, and a series of letter sets. There are 16 lines of poetry, and 16 letter sets. Each line of poetry identifies a characteristic of letters of the alphabet shared by all of the letters in one of the letter sets. In each case, there's an additional letter with that characteristic which is missing from the set.

  1. Who's the fairest of them all?: This refers to the fairy tale Snow White, in which the wicked queen asks "Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is fairest of them all?" The letter set which are left-right mirror images are AHIMOTUVXY. "W" is missing.
  2. Raelian Symbols heed this call: There are two versions of the Raelian symbol. Both have rotational symmetry. The letter set with rotational symmetry is INOSXZ. "H" is missing.
  3. Who's the fairest of them oof?: This line is similar to line 1, with the "oof" indicating that the mirror has fallen on the ground. The letter set with top-bottom symmetry is BCDHIKOX. "E" is missing.
  4. Leonhard's bridges fail this Proof: The mathematician Leonhard Euler is famous for many things, including a graph theoretic proof concerning the Seven Bridges of Königsberg problem, which involves tracing a path crossing each edge only once. The letter set containing only letters which can be written while keeping your pen on the paper without repeating any strokes is BCDGIJLMNOPQSUVWZ. "R" is missing.
  5. Eau Rouge or Loews not welcome here: Eau Rouge and Loews are curves on Formula One racing tracks. The letter set with no curves is AFHIKLMNTVWXYZ. "E" is missing.
  6. Unused protractors shed a tear: Protractors measure angles, but since they are unused, we are looking for the letter set with no sharp angles: CJOU. "S" is missing.
  7. Hold those notes my little friend: When children (little friends) sing the alphabet song, some letters are held longer than others, including PSVXZ. "G" is missing.
  8. Thumbs ache before it's time to send: When sending an SMS message on a mobile phone, certain letters take longer to press because they are the last of the list of letters on each button. These final letters include CFILSVZ. "O" is missing.
  9. The counting gladiator roams: This refers to Roman numerals, which include CDILMX. "V" is missing.
  10. "Dear Watson" said by Sherlock Holmes: Sherlock Holmes is famous for saying "Elementary" when describing to Watson how he reached a conclusion. Chemical element symbols which are a single letter include BCFHKNOPSUVWY. "I" is missing.
  11. Black star shines on pink not red: This clue refers to a Scrabble board, whose "start" square is a black star on pink. In Scrabble, the letters in the set AEILNORTU are each worth one point. "S" is missing.
  12. Dear Henry could use these instead: There's a Hole in My Bucket is a song which features the phrase "Dear Henry". The letters which Henry could successfully pour an imaginary 2-dimensional liquid into include HJKMNVWXY. "U" is missing.
  13. Ivan nods at all of these: Ivan is a stereotypical Slavic name. In Slavic nations, the Cyrillic alphabet is used. The letter set which includes letters that resemble ones in the Cyrillic alphabet is ABCEHOPTX. "M" is missing.
  14. Uncle Sam says "add one please": Unlike inhabitants of Commonwealth nations who pronounce Z as "zed", Americans pronounce it as "zee", and would therefore want to add Z to the set of letters that rhyme with "bee". This set includes CDEGPTV. "B" is missing.
  15. Pre Diet Coke to curly square: Before there was Diet Coke, there was Tab, the name of a soft drink and also of a key on the standard US keyboard used by many computer manufacturers. In between the Tab key and the keys for curly and square brackets is a row of letters, including IOPQRTUWY. "E" is missing.
  16. My fill's not working everywhere: Flood fill is a computer algorithm used in drawing programs to fill a contiguous area bounded by another colour. If it's not working everywhere when applied to a letter, then a region within the letter is completely enclosed by the lines of the letter. Letters for which this is true include ABDOPQ. "R" is missing.

Arranging the missing letters by poem order produces a question:

 1. AHIMOTUVXY         W
 2. INOSXZ             H
 3. BCDHIKOX           E
 4. BCDGIJLMNOPQSUVWZ  R
 5. AFHIKLMNTVWXYZ     E
 6. CJOU               S
 7. PSVXZ              G
 8. CFILSVZ            O
 9. CDILMX             V
10. BCFHKNOPSUVWY      I
11. AEILNORTU          S
12. HJKMNVWXY          U
13. ABCEHOPTX          M
14. CDEGPTV            B
15. IOPQRTUWY          E
16. ABDOPQ             R

Where's Govisumber? It's a province in MONGOLIA, the solution.