Fourth quarter report: #TreasureOrTorture 2016

And then, all at once, it was over. The John H. Watson Society's annual Treasure Hunt. Not with a bang, but a . . .

"Did we send our answers in?"

Well, if we didn't, I'd look for a sudden influx of Canadian currency into the economy of St. Louis, Missouri. (Canadian dollars are up, worth .76 American dollars at the moment, possibly an effect of the Trump campaign and potential migration patterns, so it's a good time for bribes from the North.)

But I am confident in the trusted founder of our team and his answer-sending abilities, having had all of a year's experience going into this round. How did we do? Well, I think. Our team's valkyrie of the bookshelves did a final ride or two that put a bow on the hundred question examination for us, but it's all up to the judges now, dotted "i"s and crossed "t"s and similarities of thought patterns.

Unlike last years Hunt, we weren't beating our brows down to the last week, this time, as the absence of a "Third quarter report" in these posts might hint . . . we were so comfortably done by then that I completely forgot I was doing quarterly reports on it this month. We even had our team name by then: "And Experience of Canon Which Extends Over Four Players and Three Separate States."

Some rejected or interim names, just for the record were: "The Sign of the Four," "Holmes's Four Exterminated Eggs," "The Selenaside Squad," and "The Team Who Would Not Be Named."

But now that it's done, before the results are in, I'd like to heartily and sincerely thanks Rob Nunn, Beth Gallego, and Ron Lies for coming together from a goodly distance and getting this tremendous task done in a comfortably short time -- quite a difference from the experience with last year's two-and-a-half-member team.

Will we do this again next year? Well, we shall see next year. Even Watson deserted Holmes for a wife now and then . . .