PUZZLE #5 & two for Wednesday

ACROSS LITE PUZZLE: [ AYO] 
PROGRAM: [Across Lite]

PROGRAM: [Java]

PRINTOUT PUZZLE: [ AYO]

PROGRAM: [Adobe Acrobat]

I also have today’s puzzle in The A.V. Club section of The Onion. They won’t let me embed the file on this blog, but I can link to them here: Across Lite and PDF.

In today’s two-fer, we’ve got some word mangling going on. Over at “The Onion,” it was the crosword editor Ben Tausig’s idea to do a series of farwell puzzles to our lame duck President. So there’s my contribution to that one. And in the puzzle I’ve embedded in the blog, you’ll have to butcher the English language yourself in order to get the theme.

I got a confession to make here. I’m a terrible word mangler myself.

Mispronounciations? Check.

Malapropisms? Check.

Coining neologisms based on words that I think should logically exist? Check.

Maybe it’s the part of my brain that is the puzzlemaker. The one that is constantly playing with words. Playing with their meanings, spellings, ambiguities. I really can’t shut it off at times.

So with my job being the crossword puzzlemaker and the fact that I’m always fooling around with words and what not, you’d think that I’d love Scrabble, right? Well, let me tell you, that couldn’t be further than the truth.

In fact, I detest Scrabble. Let me count the ways:

1. When constructing a crossword, I’m not limited to using only seven specific letters at a time.

2. I can use proper names in a puzzle.

3. I can use multiple word phrases in a puzzle.

4. Unlike most other puzzlemakers, I can’t anagram seven or eight letter words like it’s no such thing.

5. Since I do this for a living, I feel I have to beat the holy crap out of my opponents. And because of the aforementioned negatives, I am forced then to play a defensive game, wherein I attemtp to cut off my opponents from using most of the board.

6. Despite the fact that there are numerous dictonaries in my apartment, my wife will only allow us to use her Abridged British English dictionary as a reference. She also doesn’t think “yo” is a word.

Okay, enough spieling.

For the stalkers out there: I will be performing with my new band, The Boston Typewriter Orchestra, tomorrow (12/18) at Johnny D’s in Somerville, MA. All the proceeds go toward the homeless. Hope to see you there.