Anybody got a hint for the hot dog puzzle?

I haven't solved it yet (spatially challenged me can't get the hot dogs on the grill...also, I'm a vegetarian so must have a mental block!) but I think I see the final objective - just hope you penciled lightly to get the clue, and noticed the size of the grills looks familiar...

The puzzle is actually multi-dimensional!

I know it's not too early but 'multi-dimensional'? That just went right over my head.

Have you ever seen a 3D tic tac toe board? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3-D_Tic-Tac-Toe

Cool, colin, you've just validated my guess....now to grill up these dogs and solve the thing!

Funny enough we just had hot dogs for lunch! :-)

Thanks for the hints - I solved the puzzles and was still stumped 'til I read your posts!!

I am still stumped, but its logistics, do I put the grids on top of each other to place the dogs? Jeez louise, this one is hard, lol, but fun anyway. I dont think I have the phrase correct yet though, I have tried a dozen variations and one of them have worked? Can anyone tell me how many words it is? I have been using 5 and 6 words and neither of my combinations is working. ARRRGGGGHHHH! LOL

I just cannot get these dogs to go on these grills. You have to place them so they are not touching any other dog, right? And the numbers on the ends say how many spots are filled in that row. If there is no number does that mean no spaces? I have been going back to this since this morning and cannot figure it out. I guess my mind doesn't work that way.

Yup! I'm with you cmchristina, THAT is why I don't ever play these kinds of games - lol, chess, battleship, it's strategy and I stink at it! I am going to try again, (sigh) and again, until 8! I will probably be sunk!! LOL

We figured it out by process of elimination. (Finally). You have to look at the lowest # first. There are some where you see three columns : 1,6,1 for example. So you know that the hotdogs can only go one way. And then it's just a matter of placing the dogs carefully.
I hope that helps. We're on our way to do the Center City Coffee Crawl.

Good luck.

Oh well, I am sunk (lol) anyway, I think I lost a hotdog somehere, (hey is that like the meatball song, only hotdogs?) omg, I am getting loopy over this stuff! I accicentally dropped one of the grids and those impossibly small pieces went flyin! I was not going to figure it out anyway, on to other things!

Thanks Forgies for the hints!

Got it eventually and then it was a beautiful day for scavenging.

Anybody still struggling with the hot dogs, if you are stuck where I was, with everything solved but not getting the connection, I'd give this clue... not 3, but 4

The Forge is catching up today ...go us!

Try using checkers with a few extra checker rows, or even a grid in Excel - I tried using the dogs but every time I let out a sigh my work was lost!

Sequence boards work, too.

The word search gives a clue for the final step after all of the grills have been solved. Use this clue to find the key word and enter it on the "submission page".

ok, that was a crazy hard puzzle! I got the word find and the first too hot dog placing grill thingies, but the third one was really bad. but after looking at this discussion and realizing it was food and drink week I figured it out. I still feel smart, even though I never got that third puzzle. what a way to exercise my brain!!! good luck forgers!!!

I finally finished it! The word search was easy enough but the grills were killer. Left it alone for awhile and came back to it.

What's sad is I got the hot dog puzzle done in about an hour and then took 5.5 hours to do the crossword. I guess I'm better at strategy games than word games. Then again I always have enjoyed logic and math puzzles more than word games.

Hang in there Micci, even the PTI staff admit this is a really tough puzzle. The hint of 3D tic-tac-toe is the best.

Micci, did you get the phrase in the word search grid? Remember when identifying where a hot dog goes don't forget to put a ring of empty spaces around it.

XXXXX
XoooX
XXXXX

I'm sorry team, but I am so mixed up in my mind now from all the clues I could not figure out, that I have to stop, I worked on that thing for seven hours! It took me 30 minutes to do the crossword. I just have to admit that I am not smarter than that 5th grade math/science whiz and wait for tomorrows webgames and all the rest, would liked to have gotten that 250 points and more for the team though.

to jfilion:

Crossword puzzle help at dictionary.com

Go the Internet. Go Forge.

It seems like it should be a number, given the clue in word search. Is it a number or a word?

It is a word.

This puzzle is driving me crazy, been working on it all day and nothing.... Any other hints? I can't get the last puzzle.

This puzzle should have a dummies book with it, I spent more than half the time trying to put numbers in there, like the other codes! Then the other half, trying different word combos, even WITH the phrase, I did not get it, so, I will do my best on the others, but I will not be doing ANY of this kind of puzzle again, I wasted most of my day inside on this when I should have taken a walk outside in the great weather! LOL

To start the 3rd puzzle, start with the middle columns labelled "1 6 0". Black in the column under the 0. No hot dogs will cross that column. Only 1 hotdog will cross the column labelled "1", so what hot dog combination will work in the column labelled "6"? That is the kind of logic you need to solve it. Good luck.

The way the numbers are setup it's almost like a 3 layer sudoku puzzle
exepet the layers don't interact with each other, they just outline the spots on the board/word cross-off! Sorry If that last part didn't make much sense. :-)

Angel, maybe the Forge should have a weekly Puzzle meeting to go over the Newspaper puzzles and help each other out? Maybe something where people meet in a spot most convenient for all, maybe work on the puzzles for a bit, maybe meet up with others to do some scavenging if others still have Hunts to do?

Anyone game?

Inspired Idea, if everyone has FB, we could do it there, on the chat board, we just have to set a time, been doing it one on one already today! But we all would have to be friends with each other on there, so some setup would be required, friend me and I will start the ball rolling! Micci

or were you talking physical meeting, whew, I am really techied out! LOL I forget that we can actually SEE people face to face! That is doable too, but may take more setup because of where everyone is. I live 10 min from ParkPoint at RIT if that is a good meetup spot, the Lovin Cup is there as well as a TC Rileys and other things

Is that part of the coffee scavenger hunt, we could combine things if it is! Just a thought

Sure, I'm game. I do well on the logic problems, but go blank on crosswords.

well, more things to do! But we are good at it arent we?

Actually, the Lovin' Cup near RIT works fine for me on Sundays...I'm in Greece, so that's a straight shot up 390.

Just sent my Friend request. :)

Got your friend request and we can post that meeting for next weeks Sun Crossword, but what about Sat, should we do an online meet at FB for everyone on Sat and the face to face meet on Sun afternoon? If that sounds agreeable, to any that want this, just send word to either shilfiell or myself and we will set times as is convenient to most. Micci

Sounds good - around 1pm either day usually works best for me, later on Saturday preferred, but still want to allow plenty of time before the 8PM cutoff!

The more I'm thinking about it, the more sense it makes to meet F2F on Saturday for the more physical puzzles that really require seeing what others are seeing, and the online meet on Crossword day since that is more online-friendly. Either way is fine with me but I want to get both days done by the cutoff, and I'm confident in my crossword skills and ability to help while online!

Okay, 2 pm on Saturday at Lovin Cup for the Sat puzzle and 2 pm online on Sun for the crossword? Sound good, if so, I can post it on my FB and Twitter pages and anyone who wants to spread the word can do the same.