We have new update (or random vague comments) from Sally, or as I like to call her Creepy McCreepo:

Well, I want to thank you all for your questions about Jeff and the name of the baby.

And it’s all going GREAT!

Jeff¹ sometimes writes to me… He likes oldfashionedsnailmail… And I have this wall of letters. I take the letters he writes and tape them up on the wall.²

So far one wall is done.³

Because of the people who were trying to kill Jeff, I really can’t tell you anything about where he is. Even I’M hiding from those people! They’re CRAZY!

But Jeff’s going to write music that’s going to make them even madder. And this time, they won’t be able to stop him, because he’s only going to work with people he trusts. Like me.

I think I’m going to name the baby Sarah. And not ’cause someone here suggested it! LOL! That’s my mama’s name.⁴

HaymSolomon: By the way, I’m making a list of things that happened with Poor Richard. I wasn’t there the night you saw them at CBGB. But I was wondering — pretty please — if you could tell me what Madison Rose and Adam were wearing. It’s like this scrap book thing I’m making, and it would really help! Thanks!

And if you see any of the band members, make sure to let me know. You don’t have to go talk to them or anything. Just let me know what they’re up to and stuff.

I miss them. I hope they’re all okay.

~Sally

Tibdits to note: Jeff is off writing, Sally is in hiding, she’s lining the walls with Jeff’s letters,⁵ her mother is Sarah, she’s interested in what Madison Rose and Adam were wearing at a concert, and she wants to know what the rest of the band is up to.

The WHSC will be adding this to their canonical record of Reasons To Hate Sally, particularly the creepy Wall of Letters idea. Rings a bit like a fatal attraction to me.

1. JEFF! [↩]
2. Not at all unhealthy or stalkerish [↩]
3. Anyone else thinking she should be lining her wall with padding instead? [↩]
4. Speculation abounds as to why Sally’s grandparents would choose to name their daughter LOL.  Perhaps this could explain certain aspects of Sally’s personality. [↩]
5. Or with the many blank pieces of paper she’s stuck in envelopes addressed to herself.  Whichever. [↩]

1 Year, 10 Months Before the Death of Poor Richard

Ahhh the joys of a house party: Kegs of beer, plastic cups, and hot people everywhere.

Only, at this party, they have cans of Budweiser, Caffeine Free Diet Coke, and Sam with extremely sweaty armpits. Woo. Sign me up for this riot of the century. I’ll have my can of pissoir beer and hype myself up on some caffeine-less, sugar-less cola beverage, and then huggle up next to sweat boy to nuzzle my nose in his flowery armpit fumes.

Ok, so maybe Poor Richard struggles to host a party, but they do know how to host a fracas! In from the cold, Arnold and Sam stumble in stoned out of their brains. Arnold, looking suave in his Union Jack shirt¹, pulls a gun out of his pants and introduces everyone to his favorite friend. No, not THAT gun, a real gun with bullets, not gooballs, shooting out of it. Nevertheless, the girls scream at the profundity and enormous size of Arnold’s piece.
He waves it around, talking about how great it is to be free from the paaaaaaaaaain, and prattles on like a depressed housewife on a bottle of Chardonnay. Adam stiffens his upper lip and goes to lecture Arnold on the bounty of living and the newness of life, all while staring down the barrel of Arnold’s crotch. Gun. I mean, gun.

Anyhoo, the stern fatherly lecture appeases Arnold for the moment, as he re-zips his pants and hides his double-barreled pump-action pistol, which gives Lyn a moment to reflect on the corpses left in their wake (2, she says) and how Arnold never got to use his friend for real. He just kept touching it with his hand, petting it, polishing it…

1. Oooo foreshadowing of his inevitable traitor-y deeds. [↩]

Following the community solve for the mp3 file Lyn posted on Hang Separately, she decided to sling another brain bender our way. (bitch!)

Having tested our aural pleasure, Lyn’s decided to test our cunning linguals with a testy, culled word puzzle, complete with guillotine to lop off any extra heads.

Discussion is underway at the UnFiction forums in a new puzzle thread, and everyone is invited to help with the solve!

UPDATE: 4 Hours Later

Ok, so that was decidedly less painful than the last mp3 puzzle. The Guide’s own SHADOW pulled this one off with ease, trouncing everyone else, having picked the correct words. (I’m so not jealous, or anything ¹ )

The puzzle is clued with the Guillotine² and suggests an old round of “Queen’s Game,” where taking the first letter off of a word (its “head” if you will) results in a new word. For instance, in this puzzle, “APATHETICALLY” turns into “PATHETICALLY.”

Following this pattern, you get the following words for the blanks:

• Brightness -> Rightness
• Frightfulness -> Rightfulness
• Hairbrush -> Airbrush
• Islander -> Slander
• Junction -> Unction (This is where SHADOW wins. We were all stuck with “Jangling -> Angling”)
• Knightly -> Nightly

The red circles of the words provide the following letters: PESIASNL which, when anagrammed, form a new word and unlock a new video: PAINLESS³

1. Hey!  Did I complain when you and Caspian pulled off that brilliant solve of RHYTHM METHOD?  I did not! [↩]
2. Which, coincidentally, in random history, was invented by Guillotin, a member of the French Academy of Sciences as well as a Masonic Lodge - both memberships shared with Benjamin Franklin. [↩]
3. Also of random oh aren’t they snappy? festiveness, the guillotine was the highly touted painless method of execution. Ba dum dum ching. Ohhh Lynny, you’re a witty one. [↩]

With a little help from Lyn, the solve for Flying Colors was achieved, though a few eyes were crossed in the process.

The shirt itself, pictured at the left, is comprised of a series of butterflies circling the waist. Inside, the hem code of “Nothing To Hide” is written as a series of dots, from a single dot, to dots composed of three rings to form a mega dot. As simple as it sounded, putting these dots to the front of the shirt proved a greater challenge than expected. ¹

After a few days of eye crossing, Lyn came to everyone’s rescue on Hang Separately and posted what appeared to be a correct phrase², and lo, it was solved, revealing the phrase “Sweet Cheat” and unlocking a video of the same name.

1. Perhaps because the shirt was mis-printed. You know, not that I’m complaining about EDOC selling an incorrect, misprinted shirt for full price [↩]
2. Reports from other customers have indicated that what Lyn posted was a sticker found on some Flying Colors tees, though not the two purchased by UnFiction forum members. [↩]

Aliendial from UnFiction scored the Kissing Swallows tee the other day, and kindly provided photos and a solve for the shirt. The bottle of wine shown in the photo was not shared, but I had some of my own, so it’s all good.
Tucked inside the inner hem was a code similar to that found on the men’s Druggy tee, as shown below.

The code was used to translate a nest of birds’ eggs found inside the upper chest pocket, and after a few attemps, the word LYRICS came to light, unlocking another video clip.

Cheers to Aliendial for the photos and the solve!

Kali from UnFiction posted her latest email from EDOC (yes, I know, it was a while ago, but I’m catching up )

From: Lyn Folger
Sent: Saturday, April 19, 2003, 9:27 PM
To: Amanda Folger, Carl Folger

Hi Mom and Dad,
Really busy. Just wanted to drop a note: Remember when I said I wanted to find something that mattered? This band I’m working with: this is it. I cannot tell you how much I love working with these guys. It’s everything I’ve ever wanted. Troubles, yes. But what revolution doesn’t have troubles? And more than that: it’s worth it.

We’re making something here that will be remembered. I don’t think I’ve ever felt like this before. Giving something back to the world that matters. Love you both. Got to get back to work.

LYN

P.S. No, Mom. I’m still not dating anyone. 

Yes, Lyn, “you’re worth it.”  Way to spout a L’oreal commercial to your parents.

When Lyn first saw Sally flopping wildly over the guardrail, screaming for Jeff, she thought Sally was his little sister. Watching her, Lyn got the oogies: Sally was obsessive. All Bad Love.
“You can’t forget me, Jeff! I’ll never forget you!” Bouncing her 15 year old boobies up and down with each jump for attention, Sally waves photos at Jeff. He lets her through and sifts through the stack of lovey-dovey gag-a-riffic polaroids of himself and Sally. Lyn finds one later and compares it to a Paris Hilton mish-mash.
Jeff had been a good guy a second ago, but now? Now he’s Ukkyman-hump-young-girl San.

Make sure to check the story page for updates and other summaries!

Lyn starts posting puzzles to the Hang Separately forums. The first one is a doozie of an mp3. See this post for the solve.