Spoiler alert: that's a puzzle from Zaphod's portion of Infocom presents Douglas Adams' Hitchhikers' Guide to the Galaxy by Steve Meretzky.
Damnit! I even played that game! I totally forgot about that puzzle... but rest assured, in context it will be very different. It's more or less an introduction to Willow's personal brand of "thinking odd", and resembles the children's peek-aboo game more than fiddling around with your ever-so-useful towel

edit:
No, I'm positive that the ideas really are different. Hitchhiker is about consulting the guide to learn about a weakness that is unique to the beast and then exploiting it. I remember not even reading up about the creature in-game, because I knew the source material well enough to figure out what to do. So, yes, similar for sure, but not a direct copy.
Frodo, Dactylopus & everyone-
It was hard to make that post. Even with the hidey brackets. But now that it's out there I feel relief. As I said, what held me back for so long was the (perceived) fact that the net is full of these "Oh I am so sad" posts and the reaction would just be eye-rolling and snark. It took me ages to accept the fact that yes, there's this illness inside you, you are not quite right in the head, you do need help. Still not quite there; openly talking about it, well, still feels odd and risky. But as I said, AGS is an old place and I have trust in it.
Thanks for your kind posts: They are an incredible support.