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Your boss wants you to head up a new part of the company that will analyze business statistics. She wants an official name for it like "The Organization for Business Statistics" or "The Business Statistics Council".

She asks you to write a list of 26 words that start with each letter of the alphabet that are loosely synonymous to "organization" or "council". She agrees that there are no such words starting with h, k, n, q, v, x, or y, so really she only wants 19 words.

You write this list, choosing words that would not seem out of place in the phrase

I'm a member of The ________ of/for Business Statistics.

or perhaps

I have to go to a meeting with the Business Statistics ________.

Sadly, you've lost the list, and only have vague memories about what the words were. You jot down these recollections, knowing they must relate to the words:

a: starts with an end
b: holds clothes
c: three sets of double letters
d: math operation
e: more proper to use for music
f: Sam was in one
g: sounds like wine fruit
h: n/a
i: reasearch ___, ___ for technology
j: angry men
k: n/a
l: the red-headed one was fake
m: of magic
n: n/a
o: relates to neatness and tidiness
p: relates to windows
q: n/a
r: Sam was in this too, in a way
s: sounds like Stampy's best friend's name
t: almost a meeting going in the wrong direction
u: one
v: n/a
w: powerful, compound
x: n/a
y: n/a
z: only if it's monkey business

You already realize that o must be for organization because being organized relates to being neat and tidy. Can you figure out the other 18 words? (c is not necessarily for council. The words only contain letters.)

To verify your answer, take the 19 words in order, all in lowercase, and separate them with spaces. e.g.

aword bword cword dword eword fword gword iword jword lword mword oword pword rword sword tword uword wword zword

The resulting MD5 hash is 6a871238db24d9b1a91fc87f34721963.

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2 Answers 2

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Hash:

association bureau committee division ensemble fellowship group institute jury league ministry organization panel ring squad team unit workforce zoo

A is for

ASSOCIATION (starts with "ass")

B is for

BUREAU

C is for

COMMITTEE (there weren't many possibilities!)

D is for

DIVISION

E is for

ENSEMBLE - thanks again to Reticality.

F is for

FELLOWSHIP (Lord of the Rings reference)

G is for

GROUP (sounds like "grape")

I is for

INSTITUTE ("research institute", "institute for technology")

J is for

JURY

L is for

LEAGUE (a lovely reference to the Sherlock Holmes story "The Red-headed League"!)

M is for

MINISTRY (Harry Potter reference) Thanks to Reticality for this one, since I've now looked at his answer.

O is for

ORGANISATION (already mentioned in the OP)

P is for

PANEL (as in window panel)

R is for

RING (well, Sam's finger was in it at least!)

S is for

SQUAD (Reticality told me it should sound like "squid".)

T is for

TEAM (almost "meet" backwards)

U is for

UNIT

W is for

WORKFORCE - thanks one final time to Reticality.

Z is for

ZOO

Great puzzle by the way!

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  • $\begingroup$ I'm pretty new to puzzling.se so I'm not sure if I should tell you which ones you got correct now or if I should wait for more edits/answers. Advice?. $\endgroup$ Mar 15, 2015 at 21:50
  • $\begingroup$ @Calvin'sHobbies Telling me which ones I got correct is fine. I've spoilertagged them all, so other people can choose whether or not to use that info. (By the way, congrats on getting your other riddle into a nicer form so that it could be answered by someone without enough rep to see deleted answers!) $\endgroup$ Mar 15, 2015 at 21:51
  • $\begingroup$ Currently your incorrect ones are a, i, and u (not to mention the 9 you haven't done). $\endgroup$ Mar 15, 2015 at 22:00
  • $\begingroup$ @Calvin'sHobbies Now I have something for everything! Can you tell me which ones are wrong? $\endgroup$ Mar 15, 2015 at 22:35
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    $\begingroup$ @Calvin'sHobbies I think I've got both S and U now! Yes - the hash is right. I thought it was wrong, but that was because I used ORGANISATION not ORGANIZATION :-p $\endgroup$ Mar 15, 2015 at 23:21
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Here is my answer.

a: starts with an end

Association (Starts with "ass", an end)

b: holds clothes - wrong

Body (Actual answer: "Bureau" (of change? as in changing clothes.) By Rand al'thor)

c: three sets of double letters

Committee (Doubles: "m", "t" and "e"

d: math operation

Division? Like the division of defence or something? Can't think of anything else.

e: more proper to use for music

Ensemble. As in group (of musicians)

f: Sam was in one

Fellowship. I think he was Frodo's best friend in tLoTR

g: sounds like wine fruit

Group, as in Grape (which ferments to wine) Rand al'thor got this.

i: research _, _ for technology

Institute. I found many research institutes, and some institute[s] for technology (and management)

j: angry men

Jury, the 12 angry men. (Movie)

l: the red-headed one was fake

League. Used Google's synonyms, so no explanation.

m: of magic

Ministry (of magic. From Harry Potter I believe)

o: relates to neatness and tidiness

Organisation. Neat people have this.

p: relates to windows

Panel

r: Sam was in this too, in a way

The ring!

s: sounds like Stampy's best friend's name - Incorrect

syndicate? (Squad. Again by Rand al'thor)

t: almost a meeting going in the wrong direction

gniteem -> teem -> team (Riddles make the word backwards always implicitly imply reverse.)

u: one - wrong but close

Union. As in the union of probability / set theory into 1.
(Actually unit. By Rand al'thor)

w: powerful, compound

Workforce? A compound word, who are powerful?

z: only if it's monkey business

The thesaurus suggests zoo. And, coincidentally, that's what the other answer says.

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  • $\begingroup$ B is not what I was thinking but it actually fits quite well. The shorter J answer is correct (it fits the sample phrases better). For S you have the right Stampy but are way off otherwise. U is wrong (but close). All others are correct. $\endgroup$ Mar 15, 2015 at 22:47
  • $\begingroup$ I've taken a few of your solutions into my answer, crediting you for each one. I hope you don't mind! I can remove them if you like. Now we just have S and U left to get... $\endgroup$ Mar 15, 2015 at 22:54
  • $\begingroup$ @Reticality Wait, you're giving away all the answers in your hash string! You don't need to include the string, juct check for yourself if the MD5 hash value is identical to the one I provided. If it is then you know you have the answers exactly right. $\endgroup$ Mar 15, 2015 at 22:59
  • $\begingroup$ I finally managed to complete it. Thanks for your help! :-) I got E, M, W, and help with S from you. $\endgroup$ Mar 15, 2015 at 23:26
  • $\begingroup$ @Len It could just be removed. There's really no point in having it unless it's the correct one (which this isn't). $\endgroup$ Mar 16, 2015 at 2:23

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