Iowa Girl recognizes the names of the towns

[ljscool1]

I'm wondering if the puzzle writers are from western Iowa. Several of the puzzles have towns from western Iowa like Dunlap, Quimby, Kenwood, Fort Dodge, and Ida Grove. I'm wondering if they randomly pick the names of the towns or if they choose Iowa towns frequently. Does anyone else recognize the names of the towns used in the puzzles like I do?

[LGramlich]

As a current resident of New Orleans, I've recognized Cajun style food. As a former resident of Toronto, I've recognized it's tourist attractions.

[fromalabama]

Iowa towns do seem to be well represented in the puzzle, which I didn't realize until I went to Iowa City for a year. I'm out in California now and there are several puzzles which feature California towns as well, like the trains puzzles and the one about crossing the ocean or whatever and farm crops getting sprayed (Hesperia, Cayucos, Pismo Beach, Indio, Tecopa, Big Bear). And I think the one about sports arenas and honey and a few others may be in Maine or New Hampshire (Fryeburg, Upton, West Gardiner, Lewiston, Peru, Eustis, Corinth). Of course, some of those towns may well exist in more than one state.
I never read the back story so maybe they lay that all out, but overall they do seem to be deliberate in picking a general area and selecting some towns there.

[uigrad]

For the lat/lon puzzles, it puts you in Central Illinois, IIRC, and that coincides with "Urbana" that you see in one of the puzzles (although Ohio also has an Urbana county). Barnstable and Essex counties matches up with Massachusetts, and I believe the oyster puzzle contains the names of places in Connecticut and Rhode Island.

I'm pretty sure the intention was to include lots of places that are obscure enough that only a few people would recognize them, and to spread them out instead of concentrating on one area, but I agree that there seems to be more connection to New England, the midwest, and CA than other parts of the country.

[ella]

The Scandinavian towns - anyone know which country they're from?

[LGramlich]

There are also puzzles that use familiar names & birthdays, like my bro (Randy, Aug. 22,) & mom (Irene, Sept. 22,) and my birthday's Oct. 13.

[fromalabama]

The Scandinavian towns - anyone know which country they're from?

Are you talking about the windmills puzzle? Hoekmoelen and Moekerpelle and Schiedam and whatnot? They sound Dutch to me.

[101944]

Being a Dutch member: yep, they are Dutch

[Alethea]

I recognize the sports arenas as referencing Maine towns, and the wildlife parks reference counties in Alabama. I like that the authors put in that extra bit of effort to make the puzzles that much more entertaining!

[fromalabama]

I recognize the sports arenas as referencing Maine towns, and the wildlife parks reference counties in Alabama. I like that the authors put in that extra bit of effort to make the puzzles that much more entertaining!

Quite right about the Alabama counties, if I may say, although some of the species choices strike me as kind of absurd. Alabama does not need any pythons, thank you, box or otherwise, we have plenty of native snakes that are hard enough to get people to tolerate.

[Alethea]

You are so right about that, fromalabama!

[elemenop]

The one about colleges sometimes mentions my very tiny alma mater (Bennington).

[leokeo]

i live about 15 miles from one of the Iowa towns, so western and central Iowa is being represented

[fransansisco]

The eating contest one has Chicago suburbs including the one I grew up in.

[pcuser]

From the looks of it, fromalabama you will have pythons soon enough. They are currently migrating through northern Florida at least.