Thread: Patterns in the stolen item locations

This is probably meaningless, but certainly interesting. Here is a listing of the stolen items that were found by floor, with the floor they were "stolen" from in parantheses.

12 Victrola (5)
11 Burpy bear lunchbox (

10 Lead Bars (12)
9 Statue (3)

8 Green galoshes (9)
7 Unicycle (6)

6 Bubbleshoes (7)
5 toothbrush (2)

4 hunting rifle (10)
3 magnifying glass (1)

2 Metronome (4)
1 Zuchinni (11) (This is inferred. I can't point to any specific thing that looks like a zucchini, but in several cases, you only see partial glimpses of what is there. Perhaps the fact that we have identified everything else means we don't actually have to see it to know it is there).

There are 3 interesting things here:
1. When you create pairs of items by floor, you always have one item from one of the top floors and one item from one of the bottom floors.
2. With the top and bottom pairs, the item on the higher of the two floors originated from the lowest of the floors. The opposite is true with the rest of the floors.
3. Each pair consistently has a pair of stolen items that were originally separated by an odd number of floors.

If we needed to somehow "pair floors" together to get a solution, this would provide an interesting way to do it.

Wondering the ordering of when each floor was visited.

For instance - but not necessarily in order.

12 took the lead bars to 10
10 took the hunting rifle to 4
4 took the metronome to 2
2 took the toothbrush to 5
5 took the victrola to 12


11 took the zucchini to 1
1 took the magnifying glass to 3
3 took the statue to 9
9 took the green galoshes 8
8 took the burpy bear lunchbox to 11

7 took the bubbleshoes to 6
6 took the unicycle to 7

If the numbers from the floors are actually buried in the location of where they were taken to then Ohio's 6 is in Pennsylvania IF in fact floor 7's clue leads us to PA and in this case vice versa?

And now I have totally confused myself. But my confusion could provide food for thought for someone more level headed?

If the numbers from the floors are actually buried in the location of where they were taken to then Ohio's 6 is in Pennsylvania IF in fact floor 7's clue leads us to PA and in this case vice versa?

this is what my cuz was referring to also

excerpted from jbell:
12 took the lead bars to 10
10 took the hunting rifle to 4
4 took the metronome to 2
2 took the toothbrush to 5
5 took the victrola to 12


11 took the zucchini to 1
1 took the magnifying glass to 3
3 took the statue to 9
9 took the green galoshes 8
8 took the burpy bear lunchbox to 11

7 took the bubbleshoes to 6
6 took the unicycle to 7

...or to look at it another way, if above results were displayed as a clock face it would look like this:

(crude picture didn't work well) in a nut shell, take all the numbers off a clock-face and put the 5 where the 12 was, 11 where the 1 was, etc.





Not having a copy of the book yet makes it difficult to proceed from this point, but I suspect that the times displayed on the clocks on the floor the items were found were set by the thief, as a reminder to the location that that particular number was buried. This is probably only part of the location though, maybe in conjunction with the Spoonerisms and other clues it yields the precise dig-site.

Originally Posted by Snickers

Here is a listing of the stolen items that were found by floor....

There are 3 interesting things here:
1. When you create pairs of items by floor, you always have one item from one of the top floors and one item from one of the bottom floors.
2. With the top and bottom pairs, the item on the higher of the two floors originated from the lowest of the floors. The opposite is true with the rest of the floors.
3. Each pair consistently has a pair of stolen items that were originally separated by an odd number of floors.

If we needed to somehow "pair floors" together to get a solution, this would provide an interesting way to do it.

Snickers, this is intriguing. Could you clarify a couple of your points?

2. With the top and bottom pairs, the item on the higher of the two floors originated from the lowest of the floors. The opposite is true with the rest of the floors.

Are you saying that you're dividing the building into top and bottom, with 7 thru 12 being top, and 1 thru 6 being bottom? If there is a "highest of the low and lowest of the high" pattern, starting in the middle, wouldn't that make the pairs 6/7, 8/5, 9/4, 10/3, 11/2 and 12/1? Sorry to be so dense. Numbers just aren't my strong suit.

3. Each pair consistently has a pair of stolen items that were originally separated by an odd number of floors.

I think there's actually a mix of even and odd differences between floors isn't there? If you go from missing to found, it would be ooeeooooeeee (o=odd, e=even):

From 5 to 12 is seven floors. (Victrola)
From 8 to 11 is three floors. (Burpy Bear lunchbox)
From 12 to 10 is two floors. (Lead bars)
From 3 to 9 is six floors. (Winged snake w/ multi heads)
From 9 to 8 is one floor. (green galoshes)
From 6 to 7 is one floor. (unicycle)
From 7 to 6 is one floor. (lavender bubble shoes)
From 2 to 5 is three floors. (toothbrush)
From 10 to 4 is six floors. (hunting rifle)
From 1 to 3 is two floors. (magnifying glass)
From 4 to 2 is two floors. (metronome)
From 11 to 1 is ten floors. (zucchini)

Or, working from the other direction - :

From 10 to 12 is two floors.
From 8 to 11 is three floors.
From 4 to 10 is six floors.
From 3 to 9 is six floors.
From 9 to 8 is one floors.
From 6 to 7 is one floor.
From 7 to 6 is one floor.
From 12 to 5 is seven floors.
From 2 to 4 is two floors.
From 1 to 3 is two floors.
From 5 to 2 is three floors.
From 11 to 1 is ten floors.

(I may have messed this up - keep confusing lost/found lists.)

I really like that you thought of a new way to look at this. There has to be some significance in the displaced/found pattern, and this could be the approach we needed!

From 5 to 12 is seven floors. (Victrola)
From 8 to 11 is three floors. (Burpy Bear lunchbox)
From 12 to 10 is two floors. (Lead bars)
From 3 to 9 is six floors. (Winged snake w/ multi heads)
From 9 to 8 is one floor. (green galoshes) 1 instead of 8?
From 6 to 7 is one floor. (unicycle)
From 7 to 6 is one floor. (lavender bubble shoes)
From 2 to 5 is three floors. (toothbrush) maybe 4? I don't see it on 5
From 10 to 4 is six floors. (hunting rifle)
From 1 to 3 is two floors. (magnifying glass) 3 or 11?
From 4 to 2 is two floors. (metronome)
From 11 to 1 is ten floors. (zucchini) 4?

I'm still not certain about the location of some of the objects. Here's why:
The anti-grav boots apparently look more like the boots on 1 (on the iPhone app).
There are 2 toothbrushes in Sigfried's glass in the bathroom, and one looks more like a Pink Pony to me than either of the ones on floor 5 do.
Ida also has a magnifying glass on top of her 3.99 toaster oven/microwave.
I see the zucchini on the upper left corner of Sigfried/Montecore's kitchen table.

To clarify what I meant by the odd spacing between the floors.....

From the top down, I am dividing the floors into pairs.
12-11
10-9
8-7

6-5
4-3
2-1

When you pair the floors like this, each pair contains 2 "stolen" items. In each pairing, it struck me that pairing contains 1 stolen item from the top half of floors (12-7) and 1 from the bottom half (6-1) and that the floors from which the items originated were odd numbers apart. For example:

Floors 12 and 11 have the Victrola and the Burpy Bear lunchbox, which were "stolen" from floors 5(bottom half) and 8(top half), which are 3 floors apart

Floors 10 and 9 contain the lead bars and the statue, which were "stolen" from floors 12(top half) and 3(bottom half). Floors 12 and 3 are 9 floors apart.

As you work your way down, you find that pattern stays consistent. 1 item from the top floors, 1 item from the bottom floors, odd floors apart. On floors 12-11 and floors 2-1, the item from the top half of the building is found on the lower of the two floors. On every other floor pairing, the item from the top half of the building is on the higher floor. That is likely completely irrelevant, but it is a pattern nonetheless.

I don't have the book in front of me to explain specifically why I believe each item is where I think it is. Most of them are obvious. In the context of the story, you aren't looking for anti-gravity boots, you are looking for green galoshes. That dude is crazy. He had a microwave as a robot head. The pink toothbrush is on a counter on the left side of the page on floor 5. That is the only pink toothbrush I saw. The zucchini is the only tricky one in my opinion. The other thing to factor in was that zucchini was from 1983, so who know what that would look like. I doubt it would still be green. Perhaps this thread can change into a discussion to collectively agree to where we think those items are.

Hi folks, been a while, never did post my 48 hour attempt to find myself a beat L.

Could it be the green things (zucchini plural) poking out of the open drawer on the right-side wall of the 12th floor? Or is it the big yellow belt-squash-ed thing above the converter? For story purposes I'm thinking Quello had used the smaller green zucchs to work the machine but ended up changing small things into other small things, but recently discovered that by strapping on a larger zucchini makes it possible now for the machine to change small things (small t-cups) into large things (big T-shirts).

-eric is here

I vote for the yellow belted thing.
http://blogs.davenportlibrary.com/re...8/zucchini.jpg

I haven't actually spent time on searching for the zucchini, and since the others were so much easier to locate, and I respect the observational skills of everyone on the forums, there's only one logical conclusion:

It's truly missing.

The question becomes, 'Why?'

You don't know it's missing unless you've found all the others. To me, it's shouting, 'A clue lies here.'

Zucchini
ZOO + KEY + NEE

Turn the 'Z' on its side, and you have KEY ONE ONE. Not sure what it implies, but wasn't the zucchini stolen from Floor 'One One' and supposed to be found on Floor 'One'?

I don't know what this implies as yet, but I'm thinking the stolen items are a discrete puzzle for one of the numerals.

Doc