This rabbit popped up down near the corner of Hardie and Burton Streets, Darlinghurst, this week.

It’s a cute bunny, but it’s a bit early for Easter decorations, right?

Moments after that last post, I received news from my co-blogger that he was closing in on the mystery chalker.

Hours later, two emails popped up in my inbox from readers, Shawn and Fred, saying they had (independently) captured the chalker’s latest stunt, on the Hardie Street wall of the Darlo Bar: “L is for Libation.”

Reemski commented about “K is for Kleptomania,” too, but didn’t get a snap.

Following a couple of leads, I found the chalker.

He thought it seemed a shame to ruin a good mystery. I agree, but we reckon we owe it to you guys.

The This Is For That series/chalk alphabet is just a celebration of great words, or at least favourite words. They’re not, as a rule, linked to the location or what’s going on in the world, just words that are excellent for some reason.

The first one was “a is for atom” on a toilet door, then “b is for brain” on the footbridge, then “c is for cephalopod,” which was the first one to get photo’d, and is of course another word for a squid.

Other words are really normal, but when put out there on their own they get weird, like “igloo.”

Some are great sounding like “wobble,” or kind of moving like “heartache” or “fiasco.”

Some are beautiful words and things like “filament” and some are excellent concepts like “entropy.”

Then others are interesting concepts that need a bit of research, like “azimuth” (which someone modified by adding “z is for zenith”, which is a word describing a similar thing, but starting with z… brilliant).

Other great modifications include someone taking letters out of “g is for gyroscope” and making “g is for goop.”

I’m up to my second alphabet now. Currently up to, um, “m”… not sure what that’s for yet.

The z is for zipper is the z from the last alphabet.

So, the mystery is solved!

Hmm, turns out that had we the nous to type “a is for azimuth” into a search engine, the mystery may have been solved long ago. But where is the fun in that?

Incidentally, the letter m, it’s for meddling.

Is that “meddling” directed at us?

This chalk alphabet riddle is puzzling, but we have eyes on the street. Step by step, we’re getting closer to the answer.

One of our regular contributors, Blake, doesn’t think it’s a riddle/code. But he’s been keeping his eyes open for new examples. He found a copycat today, right next to E is for “entropy” on Liverpool Street, Darlinghurst.

And Blake seems to have caught the (original) alphabetic graffitiist in the act:

Lex and I came across this copycat graff this afternoon right next to E is for Entropy and started chatting to another couple who were admiring the work. One of them had seen the culprit in the act! He was described as male, with a beard, carrying a shoulder bag-satchel type thing and an English Staffordshire Terrier by his side.

We’ve had another eyewitness account in the comments, from Nathan:

On Wednesday evening, a surreptitious man was seen on the corner of Hardie and Liverpool Streets, before producing a large piece of chalk from his pocket and wielding it in front of an innocent group of bricks. His accomplice was an unleashed wolf on lookout. The man left the scene and may or may not have a fake beard.

Copycat graffiti! Eyewitness accounts! We’re getting close.

OK, so this is a bit late. I blame good food and summer.

Several months ago, we blogged about the interesting case of a missing spider in the area. It’s back.

Nathan, pointed this out in the comments in mid-November, but it’s taken us a while to get over and check it out.

It even has a morsel of some kind.

When you see a stencil on the wall it’s usually pretty direct. Words, characters (human or otherwise), streetscapes. The meaning might be ambiguous, but the picture’s usually fairly clear.

I saw this one on Hardie Street in Darlinghurst this afternoon. I’m not sure if it’s a stenciller gone abstract or just a slip of the spray can.

Either way, I like it.

We noticed this unusual new publication on Liverpool Street this morning. The Darlinghurst Times. Seems like a one-issue rag.

We came across the scene of the crime around the corner on Hardie Street.

“Spider + web, THEFTED!
on Thursday…
bloody well return it!!”

There’s no contact information, so if you’re responsible for this crime (or know who is), probably best to head over to Hardie Street.