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Inspired by Avi's Vowelburger™ Riddle

Last week, after English class at school, a few friends and I went to the local Vowelburger™ to get some lunch. Feeling hungry, we decided to order 13 burgers among the 4 of us. However, when our burgers were delivered to the table, John decided to make a burger tower out of them and they all fell over.

Afterwards, we were wondering what would have been in them if we had actually tried them. Can you figure out what we would have had?

Patty Vowelburger
? FAN
? GATE
? INK
? LOUSE
? MILLIARD
? MOROCCO
? NICOTINISM
? RACKET
? SHAKESPEARE
? SWEETIE
? TAXI
? WAIT
? 1024^4

Hint:

In English class we've been studying Love's Labours Lost, which was one of the reasons we chose the SHAKESPEARE burger...

Hint 2:

This Vowelburger riddle doesn't exactly follow the pattern of many of the previous riddles. You might be better off imagining this as a completely unrelated puzzle, if it helps.

Hint 3:

In a Puzzling sense, what do POPULARIZED, CORONAVIRUS and REHABILITATED have in common?

TakingNotes
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  • Will the choice of buns be consistent in these Vowelburgers and will some burgers appear more than once? – hexomino Mar 09 '21 at 19:24
  • We ordered our burgers from all over the menu, so it's likely that the buns will all be mixed up between burgers. We did however notice quite a few turkish bread buns... – TakingNotes Mar 09 '21 at 20:30
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    I know you've added a bounty to draw attention but one thing that I'm finding difficult here is figuring out how the 13 burgers are tied together. If there are lots of buns to play with then, in theory, we could be looking at any three-letter word for each answer and none informs any of the others. Am I missing something here? – hexomino Apr 22 '21 at 11:40
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    @hexomino I've been having the same problem. To my mind, the suggestion that they 'make a burger tower' suggests that we end up with a chain where the bottom bun of one burger is the top bun of the next, etc. I also don't get the importance of the hint at this stage - a hint more pertinent to the solving mechanism might be more useful? – Stiv Apr 22 '21 at 15:06

2 Answers2

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With the new hint I think I understand the overlying theme:

The hints refer to alternating consonants and vowels, like a burger tower (where the buns overlap with each other). Considering this, the word would have to be 27 letters long, which is awfully lengthy. There is a word that fits this length and has alternating consonants and vowels: honorificabilitudinitatibus. The burger is just a little out of order :)

This also explains Hint 1:

Love's Labours Lost contains the word honorificabilitudinitatibus

HON - Sweetie

NOR - Gate (thinking of this as a logic gate)

RIF - Morocco (the Rif in Morocco is a geographical location)

FIC - Fan (put it together - fanfic, or fanfiction)

CAB - Taxi

BIL - Milliard

TUD - Nicotinism (tobacco use disorder)

LIT - Shakespeare (short for literature)

DIN - Racket (in terms of sound, making a 'racket)

NIT - Louse (the eggs)

TAT - Ink (to get inked is to get tattoo'd)

TIB - 1024^4 (a tebibyte, as noted by @Amoz and @trolley813

BUS - wait (buses always come with waiting for it to come)

Elpharya
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    The 1024^4 can be rot13(GVO, n flzoby sbe grovolgr (ovanel irefvba bs grenolgr)). – trolley813 Apr 23 '21 at 16:09
  • Some of these solutions are correct, but there is a larger overarching theme that connects all the words together that you need to identify first. – TakingNotes Apr 24 '21 at 22:19
  • This is so very nearly the correct solution, but two of your definitions have been swapped... – TakingNotes Apr 28 '21 at 06:22
  • @takingNotes I think ive found them :) – Elpharya Apr 29 '21 at 01:50
  • There you go, enjoy your tick mark! Few petty notes:
    1. Your LIT and TUD solutions are the wrong way round...
    2. My intended solution for BUS was to bus a table at a restaurant is the same as waiting it.
    3. The words I gave as examples in Hint 3 were all previous solutions to Vowelburger riddles similar to this one, but on a much smaller scale...
    4. Congrats on figuring it out only 30 minutes before the bounty expired...
     – TakingNotes Apr 29 '21 at 01:58
  • Haha thanks! I recognized the rehabilitated one from another puzzle so it was a very useful hint. Awesome puzzle:) – Elpharya Apr 29 '21 at 02:27
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Maybe going a completely wrong direction, but with the hints

Love's Labours Lost and Turkish Bread

One thing comes to mind, which is that perhaps they were tired of normal burgers and decided to instead have:

BLT's, with BLT as bread and various vowels mixed in.

We can kind of get there, although it seems forced in a few parts, or maybe I missed a better alternative...

FAN = BELT (A fan belt)
GATE = BOLT (Both can mean to secure well)
INK = BLOT
LOUSE = BOOT (a synonym)
MILLIARD = BIL (a billion)
MOROCCO = No idea, but BOTOLA is a top sports team from there
NICOTINISM = TOB? (tobacco)
RACKET = BAT (in sports?) or BATTLE (a synonym)
SHAKESPEARE = BILL? (maybe a pun on William)
SWEETIE = BEAUT or maybe Beau/beauty
TAXI = BOAT (a synonym, to carry/pull over water)
WAIT = BIT (e.g. just a short wait vs. just a short bit)
1024^4 = TIB (tebibyte)

Oh also, this matches 'TaBLe' if it's a clue in the text, but the fact that these words don't 'stack' suggests there is probably a more elegant solution....

Amoz
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  • Nicotinism could be rot13("gno", fynat sbe n pvtnerggr). Based on the 13 burgers, 4 friends, and John, I thought it might be rot13(Ubzrfghpx eryngrq naq gevrq hfvat gur pbafbanagf sebz gur punenpgre'f hfreanzrf: "TGPO"), but your interpretation works a lot better – samm82 Apr 24 '21 at 19:55
  • Sadly this solution is mostly wrong. Sorry to burst your bubble! – TakingNotes Apr 24 '21 at 22:20