#709 - “Permutation Situation”

[rjy]

One curious rabbit-hole I went down (before discovering the nearly full set of OTIS permutations) was that there were 9 instances of near-permutations, just one letter away, and thought that was a "situation" of failed permutations. If only there were an EAST DOLAN university I'd have been higher up on the leaderboard

[Bird Lives]

Submitted and awaiting the update. (Yay! 209.) Thanks to someone who sent me a clever trick for finding the one square I had wrong (hate it when I misspell Swedish women's names!).

Me too. I knew that SATIRED for the clue "Beat" was off, but I didn't figure out that it was wrong till I went through the permutations and saw that I was missing SOTI.

[Guffman]

Every week there's a handful of solvers who seem to be able to decode Matt's metas in very short order. Still, it's more fascinating to follow the comments of the larger group that soldiers along with the process - some successful, some not. This was a much easier week #5 for me than usual. Chalk it up to a college degree that required lots of math. The word "Permutation" almost immediately sent me hunting for words repeated but mixed in the grid. Once I found the four critical letters I instinctively expected 23 of 24 combinations to appear. (That's just the way math students think.) It was a pleasant surprise for me, but I sympathize with those who struggled. If it's any consolation, I'm sure Matt will soon dream up another mechanism that will completely baffle me. That's the thing that makes his puzzles so maddening - and satisfying to solve.

[Bird Lives]

In the Comments, I congratulated Matt on his prescience. How could he have known that OSU -- oops, I mean THE OSU -- would dominate the media (or at least the sports media) that weekend? (Full disclosure: I did not see the game.) Now I'm guessing that he started this puzzle a month ago when the teams were first announced. After all, OSU was the favorite, and besides, wasn't there already a puzzle where Utah was the meta or at least part of it?

[BarbaraK]

Damn.

[image redacted - causes Trojan Horse virus warning in malware protection]

When I found that, I understood why Matt had had to specify an American university.

[patpatchica]

I didn’t have much trouble getting to the IOST. I did notice a lot of the same letters in the grid, but the kicker for me was OTIS and ITOS in the grid. That could not be a coincidence! Following the title, I listed all the permutations of those letters and found them all within grid words - except the IOST permutation.

[Laura M]

Full disclosure, I couldn't get this one until after I read the comments on this forum on Monday. I don't know why this works--it's not like there are any overt spoilers--but somehow. sometimes, it jars my brain loose from the wrong track to read what others have to say. So, thanks for the (sort of) group solve!

[JennyByrd]

I didn’t get week 3 or week 4, but found this one in relatively short order. Although with family and friends from DesMoines and various small towns in Iowa, my first inclination was IOwaSTate, and i spent way too long trying to make that work. I eventually gave up and remembered “The” Ohio State university. I thought the puzzle was magnificent.

[MajordomoTom]

To quote Dr. Claw:

"Next time Gadget, next time!

[Joe Ross]