So Who Wants Answers

What seems like a lifetime ago I mentioned that my brother had given me a copy of the Penguin published "GCHQ Puzzle Book" for Christmas.

Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) is the British equivalent of the US' National Security Agency (NSA). It's job is to encode government communications and to steal and decode other people's communications.

It has its roots in the World War Two Bletchley Park codebreakers lead by Alan Turing who broke the famous "Enigma" code. You may have heard of them - they were subject of the 2015 Oscar nominated movie; "The Imitation Game."

In that movie Kiera Knightley's character was recruited after solving a really complex crossword that had been placed in a national newspaper. The thinking being that anyone skilled enough to solve the crossword would have the skills needed to be a codebreaker. That actually happened.

In the 1990's GCHQ resurrected the idea for charity placing an extremely complex crossword in the Daily Telegraph newspaper every year at Christmas. This year's book is just an extension of that idea. It comes alongside a TV program which debuted last night on Channel 4 called simply; "Spies." Somewhere between a documentary and a gameshow this supposedly takes normal members of the public and puts them through basic espionage training.

Both the book and the TV show seem to be part of a big publicity campaign to support a recruitment drive by the British intelligence services. GCHQ in particular are recruiting because of a growing understanding of the increasing threat from computer hacking and cyberwarfare.

Regardless of your feelings about outgoing US President Obama's theatrics over Russian hacking as technology and the Internet play an ever more important role in all our lives the importance of cyberwarfare is only going to grow. Just back in October 2016 large parts of the Internet went offline after hackers used Internet enabled devices like webcams, doorbells, fridges etc to take down one of the main Domain Name Servers (DNS).

Rather than being the work of a government or being for any political purposes this was the work of some amateur hackers. They did it simply to solve the puzzle of if you could do it.

To give you an idea of what the GCHQ Puzzle Book is like I showed you a sample question;

"42° 15'N, 72° 15'W, 53° 52'N, 44° 50'E, 37° 49'N, 85° 29'W, 39° 37'N, 75° 56'W, 49° 57'N 40° 17E, 51° 54'N, 02° 04'W."

Those are obviously all GPS locations. They correlate to specific towns;

"Ware. Issa. Bardstown and north-east of Cheltenham."

Therefore the question becomes;

"Where is Bard's town north-east of Cheltenham?" 

With the Bard often referring to William Shakespeare the answer is obviously;

Stratford-upon-Avon (51*12'N 1*41'W).

That example is actually from the book's introduction. It's used as an example to show you how some of the real questions work.

Also I feel the need to point out that while I was visiting my mothers I brought a hand luggage sized black holdall.

This is something I've needed to do for a while. The overnight bag I've had for years has always been just a little bit too small. Plus although that bag has travelled with me for many miles across many timezones when faced with my mothers' dog it lasted for about all of two minutes.

It does though look a bit like I'd got so many Christmas presents I had to buy a new bag to carry them in. So I should probably tell you what I got from my mothers.

I got a new apron. As I've spent 90 minutes cooking today and will spend another 30 before I eat you can see why that was appreciated. I also got some warm, winter pyjamas which have already come into their own. My main gift though was an electric toothbrush. Although I'm assured it wasn't one of those 'suggestion' presents I've not even attempted to figure out how to use it yet.

In terms of what I gave my non-biological mother and I have something of a standing tradition whereby I by her beer. This started out when we didn't really know each other and didn't know how long she'd be around for. However over the years it's sort of developed. After all you may be familiar with Fullers London Pride Ale which is available in every supermarket in the UK. However you may be less familiar with a Coconut Porter made by a microbrewery in Colorado, US.

Obviously travelling on the train I didn't want to buy lots of heavy bottles and then carry them down with me. So I hit on this idea of buying them on the Internet and having them delivered to my mothers. This suddenly turned into the most complicated thing ever. I eventually gave up and brought a giftcard so she could chose her own. Except now the giftcard hasn't turned up I think I might have been defrauded in an Internet scam. For me that is of course highly embarrassing.

Mind you the British Parliament seem to be making cyber-crime and cyber-fraud their big priority for 2017. So the former government lawyer may actually appreciate the puzzle. Particularly if the prize is beer.

In terms of my biological mother it is often said that it is the thought behind the gift rather than the gift itself that counts. Amid all the thought it took to make the trip I came up completely blank. So although it hardly counts as a gift I got her a copy of "Five on Brexit Island" which is an imagining of the Brexit debate as told through Enid Blyton's Famous Five characters. I thought it would bring some light relief to what, for some, is an intense topic.

The main thing I got for Christmas of course was a cold. With both of my mothers getting over colds and it being cold weather this is hardly a medical mystery. However it has been a bit of a strange one.

Normally you get a couple of days when you can feel a cold coming on. Then you get a couple of days when you've got a cold. Finally you have a few days where you're getting over a cold. This one seems to have been stuck in pre-cold for about a week.

For example buying this bag was really meant to be an excuse to spend a few hours wandering around the town centre, stopping off for coffee and generally being sociable. Then in the evening we'd go out for dinner. This rapidly turned into; "I've got the damn bag. We're going home to sit on the sofa and order take-out."

Then the following day I was fine and we went for a long walk in the country and I made my way home. On the Saturday (31/12/16) I was back to feeling a bit groggy but was fine on Sunday. Then on Monday I was back to feeling groggy but fine of Tuesday (3/1/17).

So on Tuesday night I decided to break the cold and it did not break my way. Basically since then I've been in bed. However now it seems to have broken it's good thing.

After all I can cope with a sore throat and a cough. What I can't cope with though is my brain not working.

18:25 on 6/1/17 (UK date).