A mystery...

An unknown agent appears to be testing The Secret Laboratory. This morning a package arrived from an anonymous sender. The address was written in block capitals, so no handwriting clues. No return address on the package, no note inside and the package was franked with a "Royal Mail postage paid" label, so no postmark. Who could it be from?

Inside: two mugs of Welsh origin, each bearing a conspicuous dragon emblem; a small jug of Scottish origin; a brown paisley scarf of English origin; a newspaper clipping from The Wirral News reporting upon the activities of a certain rock band with whom I once had some association.

Sifting analytically through my portfolio of friends, I could see tenuous links to many among their number but no single friend satisfied all of the criteria. Those with a Wirral connection might know of my Welsh connection but not necessarily of the band in question. Those with the band connection might know of my Welsh connection but nothing of the Wirral. Those with the Welsh connection would know nothing of my Wirral or band connections. Those who might have judged that the scarf would work well with my tweed jacket and moleskin trousers might have known of the band and my Welsh connection but what were they doing in the Wirral? As for the Scottish jug, well, was this just a Red Herring? Or a Kilmarnock even - that's a plaice in Scotland.

I confess to being utterly stumped.

Band, Scarf, Scotland, Wales, Wirral; that's five factors. I should try drawing a Venn diagram to narrow the range of suspects but, on paper, Venns only work with three factors. Looks like I'm going to have to fire-up the multidimensionaliser tomorrow. It's been in the shed all winter - I hope it still works. Now, where did I put the 2-stroke oil?