Please allow me to lead you on a merry dance through the following original puzzle (for which you will need to work out exactly which way to proceed).
The question is: What type of dance is it? The answer is 8 letters long.
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3$\begingroup$ Well, I do get the title, so that's a start. $\endgroup$– JLeeSep 20, 2022 at 18:40
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1 Answer
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5
The dance is a
NEWS REEL!
First we notice that
we have a compass rose with clues at the eight points. The clues are dashes, digits, and stars. All stars are red, some numbers are red.
To the right are four squares.
Each square tells us something about the clues around the rose.
The first square
keys that the digits represent the initials of the compass points. 1=N, 2=NE, 3=E, etc...
The second square
has a symbol for each of the categories. For example, at North is music, to the Northeast is Old World Geography and to the West is New World Geography.
The third square
Who knows, maybe we don't need it.
The fourth square
indicates how the clues are ordered: chronologically, alphabetically, by size, or (alphabetically by last name).
For the clues at the compass points
we first replace each digit by its one- or two-letter abbreviation. We can notice patterns, find some answers, deduce the category and even fill in the answers with no clues where they form a complete set. Then the letters represented by red symbols can be anagrammed to get the name of a letter of the NATO phonetic alphabet.
North
These are Nirvana albums in chronological order
BLEACH
NEVERMIND
IN UTERO
CHARLIE
Northeast
These are New England states
RHODE ISLAND
CONNECTICUT
NEW HAMPSHIRE
VERMONT
MASSACHUSETTS
MAINE
INDIA
East
These are members of rock band The Eagles
GLENN FREY
DON HENLEY
BERNIE LEADON
RANDY MEISNER
ALFA
Southeast
These are Stack Exchange sites listed in chronological order
STACK OVERFLOW
SERVER FAULT
META STACK EXCHANGE
SUPER USER
MATHOVERFLOW
STACK APPS
WEB APPLICATIONS
ARQADE
WEBMASTERS
SEASONED ADVICE
...
MIKE
South
The five senses
HEARING
SIGHT
SMELL
TASTE
TOUCH
ECHO
Southwest
Locations of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World
ALEXANDRIA
BABYLON
EPHESUS
GIZA
HALICARNASSUS
OLYMPIA
RHODES
LIMA
West
Counties of Wales
CLWYD
DYFED
GWENT
GWYNEDD
MID GLAMORGAN
POWYS
SOUTH GLAMORGAN
WEST GLAMORGAN
ALFA
Northwest
Nations with nuclear weapons (one assumed)
UNITED STATES
RUSSIA
UNITED KINGDOM
FRANCE
CHINA
INDIA
PAKISTAN
NORTH KOREA
(ISRAEL)
DELTA
Now we have our 8 letters
CHARLIE (C), INDIA (I), ALPHA (A), MIKE (M), ECHO (E), LIMA (L), ALFA (A), DELTA (D)
And we didn't even need to understand that third box! All we need to do now is
take the letters in the order indicated by the red arrows
and we get our answer
IAALCEMD!
Hmm, that doesn't seem quite right...
The way to proceed on this merry dance is to notice that
the third box actually indicates the total number of letters in each of the intended category names!
We can figure them out as follows
NIRVANA (7)
NEW ENGLAND (10)
EAGLES (5)
STACK EXCHANGE (13)
SENSES (6)
SEVEN WONDERS (12)
WALES (5)
NUCLEAR WEAPONS (14)
As confirmation, each category name's initials are the initials of that cardinal point, ie (North = Nirvana, North East = New England, East = Eagles etc...)
Finally,
we index into each category name by the corresponding NATO letter to get another eight letters:
R N E E E S W L. Taking them in the order indicated by the red arrows gives us our dance, the NEWS REEL, which is appropriate because NEWS spells the cardinal points and the rose is round like a reel.
The title
looks like a cryptic clue, but as @No Name and @JLee point out, it is merely a rephrasing of "Never Eat Shredded Wheat", a mnemonic for the points of the compass going clockwise.
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2$\begingroup$ Can you include the answer to the cryptic clue on the title as well? $\endgroup$– justhalfSep 21, 2022 at 3:57
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$\begingroup$ All looking good @cap :) You can probably skip over the 'red herring' part - it wasn't intended to be one and may be a tad confusing for readers; I think your narrative works fine without it (I really like the 'Hmm' train of thought!). The only thing one might describe as a red herring here is the fact that each group contains a distinct total number of items, which may suggest an ordering to some solvers - however, this was more a construction challenge on my part, rather than any kind of solving suggestion. Re the title, think 'mnemonic', and then you've got it all! $\endgroup$– StivSep 21, 2022 at 7:23
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6$\begingroup$ It's not enough to avoid consuming broken cereal. One must also avoid consuming wet breakfast pastries! $\endgroup$– No NameSep 21, 2022 at 9:59