I am an obsessive dorklet
It started when
Boing Boing mentioned
this crypto puzzle. It's exactly the kind of frustrating/interesting/ultimately-pointless thing that calls to me. And I'm
not alone. Some kind soul even created
a place for us newly-minted cryptographers to trade ideas.
Nobody's solved it yet. I got all excited last weekend when one of my guesses for the top cipher yielded something statistically improbable enough to be half the solution, but it was just random noise. (Gawd, I almost skipped a movie-date with Rob when I thought I'd almost solved it. Rob who is all practically housebound with the broken leg and the not-doing-well-on-crutches. I'm a bad, bad friend.)
So yeah,
W is right. I'm a leeetle bit obsessed. Although [ahem] for the record: I definitely sigh, but I do
not grunt.
Whenever I'm switching between projects — or just procrastinating — I go back to the puzzle. I can't put it down. I've learned a metric fuckload about cryptography this week, and re-learned some stuff from school in a hands-on way. And whenever I think I'm ready to give up,
more clues appear.
I even talked W through the basics of
ADXGVF encryption last night, and had him apply his writers' brain to guessing potential solutions.
All these hours, and here's what I've learned:
- Hearing your friend/gf/whoever talk about crypto is an excellent recipe for sleep, for the non-nerdy. (Shades of the Kamgod Project. Le sigh. Sometimes I think I should just rent myself out to insomniacs.)
- The dudes who solved cyphers like ADXGVF and Playfair by hand were gods among geeks. I am in awe. We're all trying to solve this fucker with the entire web, stacks of books, and all kinds of software, and we're stumped.
- Wil Wheaton is a funny guy. Who knew? He's also a sweetheart for keeping the game going, even though he has plenty going on, what with the being on tee vee and the sick kitties and all.
- Not really learned, but confirmed: Wikipedia is astounding. It may well be the single greatest thing to emerge from the web. Ever.
- Numbers Stations are spooooky. You still awake? Give a listen.
Bor-ing
All I've been doing is home repair, code repair, and hard-drive repair. (Walter's drive — with all his recent writings — crashed this week. But we got the data back.) Also helping Rob get around, a little, since he broke his ankle in St. Pete's (Russia, not Florida). That doesn't count as repair, I spose, since his leg is healing itself. Still, I feel like I should be wearing gray coveralls with a name-tag patch. Utilitarian Liz.
Tonight I'm gonna head to
Mynxie's burlesque show, then to
SBI's birthday party. If I have time, I'm gonna dye my hair burgundy. w00t!