Tree of Providence

Most of the email I get is from mailing lists or notifications, so imagine my surprise when I got home tonight and saw I had an email from Hot4Rowan@gmail.com with the subject The Rowan Song. Apparently, I have a fan. Who knew?

Song for Rowan:

I got a robot in my pants
and I’m feeling pretty flirty
don’t wanna just dance
wanna get down and dirty
thinkin’ rowan is for me
but I gotta surpass 011ie
so I’m gonna have a fling
and make Row my little dolly

So Rowaaaaan is my girl, (ya ya ya know it)
and sheeeeeee is my world, (ya gotta show it)
but IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII keep getting compromised
I’m not like other guys you know, you know
oh Rowan I’m hot 4 u

She’s always in the IRC
and she’s solvin the puzzles
but the dream i got for me
is if me and rowwy nuzzle
gotta get me a kilt
and a fancy scottish accent
wanna make my Rowan melt
without it bein’ too taxin’

So Rowaaaaaaaaan is my shoooortay, (ya ya ya know it)
and IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII just wanna paaartay (I’m gonna show it)
but Sheeeeeeee won’t let me in her world
I’m not the one she knows, she knows
oh Rowan I’m hot 4 u

(speaking voice) Rowan, you know I dig you
but if i have to, i’ll speak to your heart in rot 32

So Rowaaaaan is my girl, (ya ya ya know it)
and sheeeeeee is my world, (ya gotta show it)
but IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII keep getting compromised
I’m not like other guys you know, you know
oh Rowan I’m hot 4 u
oh yeah Rowan, I’m hot 4 u

Words escape me at this point in time. So yeah. Thanks, Hot4Rowan. I think.

You guys remember my friends Tim and 011iver, right? Well Tim’s doppelgänger Jim Babb (whom I also consider a friend) is trying to raise money for a new game he is creating: Socks, Inc.

So if you have 6 minutes of free time, check out the adorable video Jim has created to explain the project. If you like it and have a few extra dollars to spend, consider giving it to help fund this effort. And if you can’t financially contribute, just spreading the word will help out – both in terms of helping to find new Kickstarters and players for the game when it launches. No matter how you help, you’ll be doing everyone in the ARG community a great service, not just Jim and Socks, Inc.

I’ve become quite the fan of Meynard Chao. So much so, that I’ve decided to try my hand at designing his new album cover. I think you will agree with me that it conveys the pure awesomeness that his album will become.

While Roses are lovely this time of year, Emeralds are awfully sweet as well. Congrats USC for beating Boston College!

Imagine you’re a part of a soccer team. Your coaches have decided to make your games a little more fun and have set up a series of semi-random bonuses to people who complete the tasks set out each week. Because of the type of player you are, you either don’t have the ability or inclination to complete these tasks (and thus be rewarded for the week). But that’s okay, because, overall, you consider yourself to be a team player and it is more important to you for your team to work together and get a win rather than get an individual reward yourself.

This goes on for several months, and although at times you might be slightly jealous, you never really feel left out because you’re becoming quite the player on the team. Your teammates notice it and your coaches have quietly given you kudos on the work that you’ve done. The fact that you haven’t won an individual prize doesn’t mean much since you never actively tried to win one.

Finally, the season comes to a close and the coaches have announced that they are going to be having a final award ceremony, where more prizes will be given out, including some for the most valuable players. You become pretty excited at this because you know, your teammates know, and your coaches know that you are one of the best players on the team. Although you hadn’t expected any sort of reward at the beginning of the season, you can’t help to feel like now it’s your turn and that you’ll finally get something tangible for your efforts.

The night of the award ceremony comes. The coaches announce a lot of names for rewards. You notice a lot of the people already won one or more of the weekly rewards, but that’s okay because they still played the entire season and deserved a final reward for sticking it out. Then the time comes for the MVP award. You’re so excited because you’ve seen some of the kickass gifts the others have received tonight and you figure you have to be getting something like that. You and three other people are called up to the stage. Your names are announced. The coaches thank you for a job well done. Then they give you a pat on the back and send you back down to your seats empty handed. Thanks for playing and goodnight everyone.

You leave feeling extremely upset and insulted.

Read the rest of “An Open Letter to the IHC” »

Corruption Theory has gone into hiding. His identity has been compromised and he’s trying to protect the life that he has left. Before he left though, he sent Soren Ulfert a link to a puzzle that shows proof that the IHC lottery is a fraud. For some reason, it’s being hosted on Charlie Frost’s website instead of Corruption Theory’s website, but I’ve stopped questioning these odd details.

The puzzle is fairly easy – it’s just a jigsaw puzzle, although as you get more pieces connected, more colors get added into the rest of the pieces, so that helps out a bit. Personally I don’t think it’s the slam dunk proof that Corruption Theory says it is, but what do I know. He does say that he is mailing packages to people that he trusts with additional evidence. After solving all those stupid book ciphers, I had better get a package.

I guess everyone was watching the baseball game last night, because there still is no decode as of this morning. Luckily the encoder must have gotten just as sick as I was about counting out really long numbers as this one was pretty easy to do just by sight. Still too many mistakes though.

Re: Project Naaczaal

Status Briefing, October 27

Negotiations on the site for full-scale construction have completed. More information regarding the site selected will be available on an as-needed basis for teams involved in shipping and construction only.

Complete evacuation instructions will be available to all qualified staff members once our transportation plan is complete. We are assessing how to propagate this information as securely as possible and will report when analysis is complete.

All staff, please note that this overview is Eyes Only and should be deleted after reading.

Good thing Corruption Theory was able to get to Miami or had a better contact in the area than I did, because I’m not sure how else we would have gotten the files otherwise. Whoever encoded this must have had more time to work, because I only count about 8 mistakes this time. Of course, one of those mistakes I can’t quite make out what it’s supposed to be saying, so I guess that’s a negative.

Update: Ha! It turns out there were a lot more than 8 mistakes in this message. The code we got from Corruption Theory was missing a whole sentence fragment. Sorta wonder how he managed to solve the code with a huge chunk missing from it. I’ve added the missing bit in italics (and fixed that earlier typo I couldn’t figure out).

Re: Project Naaczaal

Status Briefing, October 25

We are sending out a new geological report that underlines the urgency of the project and confirms the necessity of our ambitious timeline for construction. This new data indicates there is no room for the project timeline for to slip. Team leads that do not meet scheduled milestones may face severe consequences, up to and including loss of red [sic] passes.

All staff, please note that this overview is Eyes Only and should be deleted after reading.