It’s a lovely Sunday afternoon here on my balcony, and it’s time for another “episode” of Enigma Emporium’s Wish You Were Here Series II - Blowback. My puzzling partner and I are on the 4th card, which I am very carefully describing without solving while my puzzling partner picks up his dinner from the delivery - I feel very smug, on my second glass of wine, having walked down to the little crepe place on the corner, now reopened, and happily fed. While COVID-19 remains a threat, I am glad that small shops that don’t have interior space - the crepe place is a kiosk with only an ordering window - are able to reopen. Unsurprisingly, I digress.
Describing without solving, I can say only that the front of the card has a close of up the moon, with lines of easily-recognized (I’m a nerd) Moon Writing on the top and bottom. There is also a phrase in Italian (?) with letters of three (at least) sizes. On the reverse, we have a series of blanks and numbers under the word SOLE, two stamps - a pear and hand brooms, and a message from our pen pal, who regrets that he hasn’t met us as he moves towards what he sees as his ultimate goal.
And that is as far as I’m going until my puzzling partner gets his food. I can be patient. It hurts, but I can do it. Especially as I have a copy of Moon Writing on an app on my phone - it’s called Sidekick, and is incredibly handy for when you want to decode something on the fly. Not that it ever has, but I have to admit that I’ve been in enough boring meetings that I considered taking notes in Pigpen for the heck of it. Fountain pens and ridiculous excessive penwomanship have to suffice. For now.
FINALLY my puzzling companion is done with his meal and we can dig in to the real meal - PUZZLES!
We start with what I assume is Italian, unfortunately neither of speak it so we have to go through Google Translate. We get the following quote, which is much cooler as an image :)
My friend, meanwhile, translates ‘pear’ and ‘broom’ and gets “pera scopa” or PERISCOPE.
We think the height of the letters of the quote may mean something, but we have to figure out what. He works on that while I work on the moon writing.
THE OUROBOROUS HAS A MOLE IN THE CIA. HE GOES BY THE CODENAME MANTICORE
That leaves us with the weird heights of the letters, and the spaces on the back (under the Italian word for SUN). We lack a name, and a location. We go to work with the ruler.
Describing without solving, I can say only that the front of the card has a close of up the moon, with lines of easily-recognized (I’m a nerd) Moon Writing on the top and bottom. There is also a phrase in Italian (?) with letters of three (at least) sizes. On the reverse, we have a series of blanks and numbers under the word SOLE, two stamps - a pear and hand brooms, and a message from our pen pal, who regrets that he hasn’t met us as he moves towards what he sees as his ultimate goal.
And that is as far as I’m going until my puzzling partner gets his food. I can be patient. It hurts, but I can do it. Especially as I have a copy of Moon Writing on an app on my phone - it’s called Sidekick, and is incredibly handy for when you want to decode something on the fly. Not that it ever has, but I have to admit that I’ve been in enough boring meetings that I considered taking notes in Pigpen for the heck of it. Fountain pens and ridiculous excessive penwomanship have to suffice. For now.
FINALLY my puzzling companion is done with his meal and we can dig in to the real meal - PUZZLES!
We start with what I assume is Italian, unfortunately neither of speak it so we have to go through Google Translate. We get the following quote, which is much cooler as an image :)
My friend, meanwhile, translates ‘pear’ and ‘broom’ and gets “pera scopa” or PERISCOPE.
We think the height of the letters of the quote may mean something, but we have to figure out what. He works on that while I work on the moon writing.
THE OUROBOROUS HAS A MOLE IN THE CIA. HE GOES BY THE CODENAME MANTICORE
That leaves us with the weird heights of the letters, and the spaces on the back (under the Italian word for SUN). We lack a name, and a location. We go to work with the ruler.
- M is 0.7 cm
- A, E, L are 0.6
- R, C, U, D, are 0.5
- S, R, E are 0.4
- Everything else is 0.2 cm
Mars?
Meanwhile, I realize that the spaces under the “SUN” are the length of planet names - in Italian. Because of course. Poor Pluto gets ignored.
- Mercurio
- Venere
- Terra
- Marte
- Giove
- Saturno
- Urano
- Nettuno
In height order, we get: MARCUS ELDER. We bang our heads. My wine is now gone. Sono fuori vino.
So, our pen pal is in Austin, going by the name of Marcus Elder. There’s a mole in the CIA, and he’s thinking about a periscope, another nautical reference to go with broadside, but how does it go with shipment and chateau? Per my puzzling companion: a houseboat?
And that, my friends, is postcard #4 of Enigma Emporium’s Wish You Were Here Series II - Blowback.
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