Calliope posted pictures of her Rock Angel tank over at UnFiction this weekend, asking for help in solving the puzzle. The inner seam (shown in picture above) reads: What do I have if I have no secrets? Turning this into the key phrase “Nothing to Hide” requires twisting the phrase into a riddle question - if you have no secrets, then you have nothing to hide. Ta da! Key to solving the front, which is a fairy tale riddle:

Once upon a time, two suitors vied for the hand of a beautiful princess whose cunning father did not
wish her to wed. He called for a race between them from Florence to Rome with the curious stipulation that whichever suitor’s horse should arrive last would be victorious. When the suitors realized they should
both grow old and grey trying to win this peculiar contest, they complained to the princess, who whispered two words to solve their problem and give herself away.

This story, as I understand it, is an old Chinese riddle. As whoever arrives at the destination first loses, the race as it is set by the father, isn’t really a race. Neither one of them wants to show up first - so the princess suggests something to make the race once again fair.

What does she suggest? That the two Trade Horses.

Thanks go out to Calliope for posting the information to UnFiction (her pictures I also posted to the EDOC Laundry Flickr site - here’s hoping she doesn’t mind ), and to EGo for spotting the answer to the riddle.

An ingenius solve to the riddle on the women’s Season 1 shirt, Rock Angel.

2 Years and 10 Months before PRB dies:

When Lyn thinks about the beginning of the band, George always comes to mind.  He always seemed to be the boss that they were looking for, but now, she wonders if George might have started all of the problems.

Back when the band was looking for a manager, Lyn meets George at a bar.  He breaks it down for her, asking what happens when Arnold’s trust fund, which the band is dependent on, disappears.  Lyn says that they’ll switch horses, find new knights, whatever they have to do.

George thinks that sounds like a nice dream and gets up to leave, but Lyn stops him and makes him listen to the recording of the band. “It is a dream,” he says, smiling.

While Lyn leaves, she notices George take a note out of his breast pocket, crumple it up, and stuff it into his empty liquor glass.

Lyn, having magic uber-stealing fingers, swipes the note:

Sorry Beth and Greg - 

Couldn’t do anything worthwhile after all.  Sorry I failed you all.

George

Hmmm.

Random Historical Question: Who are Beth and Greg?  Elizabeth? Why would Georgieboy be writing to these two?

Solve from the men’s Season 1 shirt, Bad Boy.

3 Months before PRB dies:

Lyn stops by Adam and Abigail’s apartment to drop off some recordings for the band’s third album. She’s stopped outside of their door, however, by the sound of a loud ARGument.

Inside, Adam and Abigail are having quite the ARGument about whoever it is that Abigail has been hanging out with (not Mr. Eyeliner). Makeup Maven wants Abigail to stop seeing this guy, but Abigail sees no harm in it, and points out that the guy is also Adam’s friend.

Adam still wants it to stop.

Abigail storms out of the apartment, passing Lyn.

Adam, standing in the midst of a pile of notes, glares at Lyn and asks her if she would please, next time, just knock instead of doing her usual Lurk ‘N’ Listen.

Lyn takes this information in, but proceeds to snag a good look at the notes on the floor at Adam’s feet: Letters between Abigail and Jeff (dun dun DUUUNNNN). Abigail’s letter says how Jeff’s words always comfort her, and that he is the rhythm to their journey and it’s his words and dreams that give them all something to play. Jeff’s letter to Abigail says how she’s like fine, fine chamber music.

No wonder Adam is unhappy.

Random analysis and historical factualization by moi: Early in the development of the nation, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson (here, Jeff) were good buddies and shared a lot of philosophical letter writing and collaborated in the writing of the Declaration of Independence, though Jefferson, ultimately, penned the document.

Adams’s presidency, however, split the two friends almost irreparably. Jefferson had teamed up with James Madison to undermine Adams’s efforts at passing laws and governing as he believed was outlined in the spirit of the Revolution, and in the process, managed to get a few items published that hinted at Adams being a bit of an unstable nutter. Eventually, the two former friends ran against each other in the 3rd presidential election, and with Madison’s assistance with the “Adams is a nutter” campaign, Jefferson won. Adams and Jefferson entered a period of total silence in their friendship.

Beyond this slight on his person that Adams felt Jefferson had done (besides being totally unsupportive of a friend during his presidency), Adams was beginning to resent the fame that Jefferson and Washington were getting because of their involvement with the development of the nation. Adams was a bit jealous, seeing that Jefferson had merely penned a document that was brought about by Adams’s philosophy and goals. Adams felt like a bit of a wet rag, being passed over by the memories of history for being neither an author of brilliant prose, nor a warrior for a nation.
At some point during this period, Abigail and Jefferson struck up a friendship. Their letter writing continued and their friendship grew, despite the animosity between Jefferson and Adams. Abigail’s writing, despite being a friendly pursuit, was also to try to bring the two old friends back together. This pursuit ultimately won out, and Jefferson and Adams, late in their lives, picked up their pens once again and treated each other to lively debate.

The two eventually died within hours of each other on July 4, 1826.¹

1. Yes, that was the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, for those of you who keep count of that sort of thing.  From our “G-d is an iron” file:  Adams, who had vowed to survive until that 50th anniversary, supposedly died with the words “Thomas Jefferson still survives” on his lips.  If so, he was wrong:  Jefferson had died earlier that day. [↩]

Solve from the men’s Season 1 shirt, Cock. This video is a source of discussion - post a comment to weigh in!

2 years and 6 months before PRB dies:

The band is celebrating after another awesome performance. Toasts are being thrust, drinks are being downed, and Adam isn’t there.

Abigail says that he’s making notes about the show as usual, and Lyn volunteers to go and get him to join in the revelry.

Walking over, she sees Adam surrounded by chickee-doos - flirting, laughing, having girls hang all over his eyeliner-ed rock star person¹. Lyn remembers Adam saying one time that “The cock tells you when it’s time to wake up.” She thought it was just some weird sex joke at the time. There’s only one person his cock knows and Adam (apparently) will only wake up for her²: Abigail³.

*does the little finger motion of up and down. Vooop! Vroooomp. VROOOOOP! vrrooomp. This is also the part in the summary where I start making “cheetoh” references and doing the dancing pinky*

So, the questions: Why does Abby stay with Adam? ⁴ What is up with Adam checking out random ass? What does he mean by the whole “Cock waking up thing?” What was the point of this video? Is Adam a big ginormous walking penile implant? Is that hair on his head or a bad foreskin? WHAT IS WITH THE RED DEVIL EYES?!

Adam = teh suk.

Abby = teh dum.

1. There is some debate as to what’s happening here. I think it was mostly innocent dirty flirting. EGo thinks Adam was getting “serviced” in the backroom by the ladies… I’m going to get all Bill O’Reilly on y’all and say.. “YOU DECIDE!” [↩]
2. Ok, so at the end, we’ve got cheezoid smiling Abigail hugging on a shrugging Adam with red devil eyes, who has already watched the two girls in the closet with him walk away (watched their asses, I mean to say) - Is Adam shrugging at the other blonde girl walking away? And is the blonde girl MOCKING Abigail? What is WITH THIS VIDEO?! [↩]
3. Again, this has some debate. The phrase of Adam’s “The cock knows when…” sounds playerish, which would lead to the closet being less than innocent. But then at the end is Abigail a moron or just in denial? Is Adam for real or just a poopyheaded man? GAH SO HARD! Not Adam. Well, okay, he probably is, hence the whole idea of the video, but that’s not what I meant. Interpretation. Yes. That’s hard, too. [↩]
4. My thought: He’s bigger than a bread-basket. [↩]

Wojcik from UnFiction tuned in today to post two more solves for the men’s shirts Bad Boy and Cock.

The solve for Bad Boy involves using the arrows on the front of the shirt to grab letters printed on the inside of the shirt, forming the phrase “Lovers Quarrel.”

For Cock, the inside of the shirt has the word “Cock” inside of a large word balloon, which is composed of morse code. The morse decoded leads to the phrase “The Cock Tells You When Its Time To Wake Up.”

Both solves unlock videos of the same name, which I have yet to watch, so summaries of those will be coming soon.

And now, we shall wait and see how long it takes for Google to put this guide in with a bunch of porn sites for gamers ¹

1. Six minutes, 32 seconds. [↩]

Encoded in a modified pig-pen cipher, the men’s polo shirt Checker encodes the passphrase The Singer or the Song, which unlocks a video of the same name. The solve credit goes to HaymSolomon from the EDOC Wiki.

The video clip starts at 2 years and 6 months before PRB dies. Madison Rose asked Lyn for an extra long mic cord before one of their concerts. Having received it, Madison uses it to jump into the crowd during the middle of one of the songs, yelling “You’re Fantastic!” at the heaving mass. Lyn thought it was awesome, the kind of stuff that gets you loved and noticed by people. Jeff wasn’t so keen on Madison’s crowd-surfing love.

Jeff (who totally was not jealous AT ALL oh no) describes the event to Lyn as an “anointing,” mentioning how it was as if Madison had gone out there to bless everyone in the crowd. Lyn mentions that some people kind of enjoy that and don’t really see it as an idolatry event, but Jeff, of course, disagrees. Echoing the Revolutionary past, he says how the people don’t need to be blessed by anyone to achieve, as the people have the authority in themselves.

As Jeff mopes at the bar, Madison is bopping around the room like a happy hooker, dancing and drooling over everyone, male and female. Lyn wonders why, if Jeff is the King of Himself, why he’s holding back from doing what he wants - being with Madison Rose.

EDOC Uberlaunches.  Two new websites and more story to unravel.  Also, Jeff is a really gross dirty old man.

An email in my box today alerted me to a change on Edoclaundry.com today.  It said

Changes made to http://www.edoclaundry.com: You need to upgrade your Flash Player
Download Flash Player from Macromedia site

You need to upgrade your Flash Player
Download Flash Player from Macromedia site

Hmmm.  Interesting.

So I go to investigate, and lo and behold!  EPIPHANY!  The online retail store has launched!  Every item, every thing, all on sale, right from edoclaundry.com.  Hallelujah!

And then I look closer.
At the bottom of the Men’s, Women’s, and Accessories catalog pages on the site, the little drop down menu… HOT BUTTERED BUTT RUM! There’s a new option:  “Preview Season“.  That’s right, kids, we get to see, ahead of purchase, the next laundry season of Edoc.  And wow, is there some good stuff (If anyone wants to send me a Face Plant shirt in XL, I’d love them forever).¹

Wandering over to the hidden pages of “Nothing to Hide” brings up a slight difference (the page is named nothingtohide5.asp).  Instead of going straight into the trailer as before, the code entering page appears along with some new text from Lyn, asking us to give her a hand in deciphering the truth.  This page also links to two websites now, the original, and now “Official Hanover” site, Poor Richard Band (which has undergone a more official, less Sally stance (YES!) ), and a new “unofficial fan” site, Poor Richard Rocks. (Oh crap, it’s Sally again. Just when I thought she was gone.)
Prior to this, the page named nothingtohide1.asp used to be the page that loaded the videos.  Going to this page now brings up a further text tidbit from Lyn, mentioning that we’ve now seen part of the story and need to talk about it. This page links to another new website, Hang Separately.

Hang Separately² appears on first glance to be Lyn’s main hangout and the point of organization for her videos. The opening page lists all the videos we’ve unlocked so far along with question marks for those we haven’t, organized by the Edoc Symbol and the corresponding character they belong to (For instance, Madison Rose is the Rose Edoc symbol).  Counting these up, we find that there are 8 total videos that do not belong to any laundry item (one of these, Toothpaste In Brazil, having already been discovered), and must be coming from some other interaction in the game (YEY!).  Lyn also has her own set of forums linked from the main page, and also links to the awful Sally and her Poor Richard Rocks site.

And that, I believe, is all the news that’s currently fit to print.  More to come as we discover and uncover more good stuff!

1. Ok, though, really, I have just a minor complaint.  I am blonde and pasty - Nordic in color, if you will.  For the love of fashion, the colors “Butter,” “Ecru,” and “Grey” DO NOT LOOK GOOD ON ME. Please, may I have a Rose, Red, or Navy? [↩]
2. “Hang Separately” is also part of a famous quote by Benjamin Franklin made during the ratification of the Declaration of Independence.  When discussion the importance of unanimously approving the document, Franklin was quoted as saying “We must all hang together, or most assuredly we will all hang separately.” [↩]

We reported yesterday that Yellow Rat Bastard/YRB was selling EDOC T-shirts online.

WanderingAngela dropped us a line pointing out that not only are they being sold, but they are ON SALE! BIG TIME!

$20 for a men’s shirt

$10 for a ladies’ shirt

Shipping starts around $7 (at least to California).

So don’t just walk to your nearest web-browser… RUN! Holy crap! $10!

Link to YRB Store

Of the ones available at YRB, we are missing solves for Checker (men’s polo) and Rock Angel (women’s tank)

Randomly trying to entertain myself today on the internet, I wandered over to YRB (www.yellowratbastard.com) to see if the May/June issue of YRB Magazine is out yet (Come on, EDOC Laundry ad…), as we’re rabidly waiting for it to hit the newsstands.

While there, I checked out their retail section and found that they are selling 12 men’s and women’s EDOC tees online (and presumably in their stores).