Puzzlebrains

Katsmom has registered on behalf of those who may be interested in taking part in Mums Hunt 2009 (Melbourne Uni). I have the Team name and password, but right now can't find anywhere to log in. I'm awaiting her link. She was afraid of stepping on toes. Anything like this we have no problems with- go right ahead and post on the forum yourselves.

Any interested peoples PM me. Up to 10 members per team. We can split into several teams if response is good.

Later on we wil be asking for volunteers for CISRA 2009. If you want to express interest now you can also PM me. Teams will be split fairly. We have to beat team YOPE- you know who you are. I wont give it away

Gill

Who or what is this all about?

Working on Cenwulf's theory thats Giraffe signed up Fell for it- I knew I'd get you

Think of it as basically an issue of Puzzlebrains that you have to solve in a week.
But you don't get the puzzles all at once - a few are published each day.

............ And its teamwork.

So far:

Katsmom
Gill216
Scurra
Maisie Ladybird

& Giraffe if she wants too join in. No pressure.

Do we know dates as to when this is happening?

interested but wondering when

The MUMS Hunt starts a week on Monday (30th March)
The CISRA Hunt usually happens at the end of April, but they haven't announced the official dates yet.

Both of them usually run for about five days altogether.

How long do they go on for?

5 days Kathlyn.

Update:

Katsmom
Gill
Scurra
Maisie Ladybird
LAT ( limited time)
Looby (limited time)
Giraffe
Laura- who has the whole week off

Be honest about how much time you have available please. That way if we have more than 10 we can split into 2 teams fairly- there doesn't have to be 10 per team- the rules are up to 10 per team.

can you explain more of what is involved?

Best bet is to have a look here: http://www.ms.unimelb.edu.au/~mums/puzzlehunt/ and review the previous years' hunts.
CiSRA is going to be a bit later this year, at the end of April or beginning of May apparently - see http://puzzle.cisra.com.au/ for a bit more info.

You may have heard of the MIT Hunt, sometimes mentioned by Scurra and myself (the 2009 MIT event was held in January). It's along those lines, although MUMS and CiSRA hunts are generally somewhat less intense - tending to be a timed release of puzzles over 5 days rather than about 100 - 150 puzzles over a single weekend, so don't be frightened off by thoughts of it being quite like MIT as described.

CiSRA is open to teams of four registered people, but allowed to have unlimited "unofficial helpers" - the official restriction is only for legal reasons because it's a commercial organisation offering a prize, but as only Australian students are eligible to win any prizes, it's pretty irrelevant to PBers.

I just had a look at a puzzle and was completely baffled. I wasn't even sure if it was a puzzle, or just a bit of intro waffle I think I would be completely useless, but I don't mind making up the numbers if you are short.

The "intro waffle" is commonly called "flavour text" and sometimes contains a few oblique hints or pointers as to the direction of the puzzle, but they are pretty much self-contained. MUMS generally has a linking theme/backstory which has little to do with any puzzling, but tries to at least link the puzzles, if not always terribly plausibly.
Once you get into it, you'll find it's not really much different in principle to (say) a bunch of PBers round a table with the PB magazine open at the middle section and working out the set between you.

When I looked at the answer the intro waffle turned out to be the puzzle.

Well - mostly the puzzles are independent of flavour waffle then!

That's hardly an unknown technique. As both of you know perfectly well

No, and that's really the point, I was trying to say that although it seems baffling to be told about it like this, it's really as familiar as PB is to everyone here now, and certainly nothing to be afraid of.

I won't embarass anyone by joining in and then not contributing - but good luck to all who are playing.

Besides which - I'm not a Mum, so I couldn't go on the Mum's Hunt..... Errr Scurra???

Well, you might notice that both SparkOut and I referred to it as the MUMS hunt. Only Gill (who clearly qualifies) called it Mums...

(For completeness, and to save people looking it up, it's the Melbourne University Maths Society that runs it.)