The Petals Around The Rose

[nemorathwald]

The Petals Around The Rose is a mind-teaser puzzle. Roll five dice. How many petals are around the rose? You say a number, and the person who knows the solution to the puzzle tells you the real answer. Then you roll again and again until you either figure out what "the rose" is or become insane. I am currently taking the latter option.

This is tormenting me. People say that the smarter you are the more difficult it is. I've been at it for three days. Obviously the expanse of my intelligence is a void no universe could ever fill. "Don't overthink it," they say. I've been concentrating very hard on trying to be stupid but I don't know how!

It must be a pre-planned series of answers like the Fibbonacci sequence. The dice are a red herring! But no! I ask two strangers the answer to a set of dice and they give me the same answer!

Why are there five dice? Is it a reference to the Holy Hand Grenade? Where did the dice come from? Why have they come? WHAT DO THEY WANT??? "We're allowed to tell you this: think about the name," they say. I ALWAYS THINK ABOUT THE NAME. DAY AND NIGHT. I THINK OF NOTHING ELSE BUT THE NAME. "The"? "Petals"? "Around"? "The"? "Rose"? The rose is watching me... it's out to get me... Can't sleep, roses will eat me...

Comments

[matt-arnold.livejournal.com]

I tried the true solution to the game on Wednesday. I was using a different Java based web page to play, and perhaps it was defective. It told me it was wrong. For the past few days I've been trying umpteen-dozen variations on the actual solution, in increasing artistic elaboration, even trying to see a stem and thorns going from one die to the next. It was almost like Nash in A Beautiful Mind. Finally my paranoia reached such a level that I saw the following:

As you can see, evil paranoia demons are obviously l33t hax0rs and care nothing for spelling.

[wormquartet.livejournal.com]

AMUSEMENT! :)

-=ShoEboX=-