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After a long day, you head to your local bar for a couple of drinks. Halfway through your second beer, a pretty girl walks up to you and points to the empty chair next to you. "Is this seat taken?" she asks sweetly.

"No, not at all," you reply.

She sits down, and after a brief chat, the two of you quickly bond over a mutual love of puzzles. Before long, you work up the courage to ask for her phone number. The girl takes out a piece of paper and a pen and starts writing something down, but when she passes the paper to you, instead of a phone number, there is the following:

enter image description here
"You seem like a smart guy," she says. "You should be able to work this out in five minutes." She gives you a flirty wink, then gets up and walks away, leaving you equal parts enamored and baffled. You're certain her number is of the standard American format, (xxx)-xxx-xxxx, but she doesn't seem to have given you much else to go on.

Determined to figure it out, you down the rest of your beer, pull out a pen and paper of your own, and set to work trying to crack the puzzle...

What is the woman's phone number? BONUS QUESTION: Which state is she from?

Hint:

Play close attention to the lady's parting remark: "You should be able to work this out in five minutes." There's an important hint in there somewhere.

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  • $\begingroup$ By looking at R/B it seems R =Cipher Text and B=Plain Text according to red/black concept of cryptography. Not sure though. $\endgroup$
    – Techidiot
    Jan 28, 2017 at 16:46
  • $\begingroup$ Does this need the rebus tag? $\endgroup$
    – boboquack
    Jan 29, 2017 at 0:29
  • $\begingroup$ No, I don't think so. I'll add a clue that should hopefully point people in the right direction. $\endgroup$
    – F1Krazy
    Jan 29, 2017 at 9:34
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    $\begingroup$ Well, that first value certainly looks like a base '5' number. $\endgroup$
    – Doug.McFarlane
    Jan 30, 2017 at 20:22
  • 5
    $\begingroup$ It was true love from the moment I spider. $\endgroup$
    – Hugh Meyers
    Jan 30, 2017 at 21:20

1 Answer 1

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Converting 1330132242112124 from base 5 to base 35 gives SKYBLUE(35) which interpreted as color name in RGB is (R=135,G=206,B=235). So multiplying R*2 and B*20 and writing it as phone number gives: (270)-206-4700. And if I'm right the state is Kentucky

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  • $\begingroup$ Correct! It's just missing one tiny thing: where does the spider web fit into the equation? $\endgroup$
    – F1Krazy
    Jan 31, 2017 at 14:55
  • $\begingroup$ @F1Krazy The only thing that pops in my mind is the web browser (wich is somehow related to a spider web) that can by used to interpret color name to actual RGB values. $\endgroup$
    – kamenf
    Jan 31, 2017 at 15:18
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    $\begingroup$ Well, skyblue is a web colour. And I guess that the five minutes were meant as a hint that the number is in base 5? $\endgroup$
    – M Oehm
    Jan 31, 2017 at 15:26
  • $\begingroup$ @MOehm Yes and yes. I'll go ahead and mark this as accepted. $\endgroup$
    – F1Krazy
    Jan 31, 2017 at 16:12

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