ACROSS LITE PUZZLE: [ TAKE THAT, MATT!]
PROGRAM: [Across Lite]
PROGRAM: [Java]
PRINTOUT PUZZLE: [ TAKE THAT, MATT!]
PROGRAM: [Adobe Acrobat]
Also, I forgot to post my Visual Thesaurus on Wednesday, but better late than never, right? Click here and do it up!
So the Matt I’m referring to in the title is Matt Jones, probably the defacto alt.weekly puzzle maker du jour. A couple of us have small little alt.weekly empires (me, Ben Tausig, David Levinson Wilk), but our numbers are dwarfed by the Jonesin’ syndicate. I know he does good stuff too as I used to give his puzzle a quick look after thumbing through the Boston Phoenix. (Matt, you weren’t in the issue this week, so if that’s a mistake, you might wanna bust a couple skulls.)
So any way, while I was begging for some kind of a penalty on Monday, Matt very quietly dropped the gauntlet to try and duplicate his Jonesin’ puzzle this week. Well, just take a look at this baby and it’s no surprise that I was all-in for the challenge. (No time to do it? Read Amy’s blog about it instead.) It’s a beautiful construction, four cheaters in the corners aside. Basically, any chunky swathe of white sqaures looks impressive. And Matt’s insane-o 8×6 centerpiece, hoo-boy. Calling it an 8×6 is a misnomer as, really, almost all the entries are 7-10 long. I’d say this is showing off, and let’s face it, with puzzles like that, it is, but the vocabulary represented in the puzzle is fresh. Bravo.
So let’s call this a game of H-O-R-S-E, and let me tell you, I couldn’t come up with anything worth a hill of spit. For me, that middle was too fugging difficult to pull off. Even with all the cheaters, Matt wins. So, Matt, I’ve got a letter.
Now, what I’ve posted above was the best that I came up with while attempting the Jonesin’ puzzle: I kept the non-traditional 16×16 grid, went with a more manageable 6×6 center (manageable for me at least), lost as many of the cheaters as I could, and then went to town. Started with 64-Across, where I start almost all of my themeless puzzles, and used that entry mainly because they were on iTunes when I started making it. In one of my puzzles last week, I almost pulled off 60-Across, so that was a pleasant surprise to get it to work this week.
The middle turned out to be a little friendlier than I’d hoped. 46-Across was a nice base, and 16-Down offered some flexibility for the future; essentially I could have started with two different compass points. (For any up-and-coming constructors: plan ahead! Give yourself a couple two three outs especially into hairy corners.) You’ll be happy to notice I didn’t follow my own advice with 24-Down (I thought about talking myself into AND SO THEN for a minute).
The _ _ _ _ _ E I ending of 5-Down seriously limited that corner, so I was pleasantly surprised that I managed 4 snappy entries up there. It should be noted at this point, it’s basically inevitable that for every colorful entry you manage to pull off, especially in super-wide-open stuff like this, there will be at least one garbage entry, in this case: 6-, 7-, and 8-Down in this corner (3-Down to a lesser extent as I think at least the quote’s funny).
The inevitable flaw with themeless puzzles is that, at the end of the day, they tend to feel like a couple two threee (or in this case five) mini puzzles. There’s really nothing linking anything among these entries other than the fact that I wrote them. In many ways, a really, really well designed themeless puzzle is way more satisfying than yet another hackneyed themed puzzle. But that design flaw of the compartmentalized corners seems unbreakable. For a while the New York Sun was running “mini-themed” themelesses (always running on Thursdays). Sometimes the theme was obvious (NASCAR MOMS and SOCCER DADS as two different entries, say), other times it might be more subtle, perhaps hinted in the clues. It didn’t matter if you didn’t notice it (hell I never noticed them in the handful of times my own puzzles run on Thursday), but perhaps something like that might make the solving experience sweeter.
Okay, enjoy this one. New one on Monday.
terrific puzzle man! Lots of good stuff, although the SE corner was a bear for me given me lack of musical knowledge. Great fill… only two quibbles: the stepsisters aren’t exactly “extras” in Cinderella, are they? Supporting characters, yes, extras, no. And He or I, e.g., is a great clue but is the “e.g.” enough to indicate the answer’s abbreviated? But this is minor stuff–the NW corner across answers make an awesome stack, and 3-, 6- and 8-down are more than worth it for the acrosses. Nice baseball trivia at 19-A that I didn’t know, too.
I think that the Phoenix decided to drop their xwords a few months ago. I enjoyed those Jonesin’s, what a shame.
Good stuff, Brendan. Maybe you couldn’t pull off Matt’s 8×6 center, but your fill is more solid. (Of course it is—you didn’t have to contend with a fearsome 8×6 center.) Looking forward to seeing future rounds in this game of H-O-R-S-E!
I love themelesses, so I’m not one to complain about a grid that’s nearly split into multiple chunks. Unless the constructor’s being an SOB, there’s usually some way to break into a section even if only one entry reaches into it from next door.
Were you hoping to find something starting with an X for 47D?
Ethan, the He and I are abbreviations of a sort.
Was pretty happy with that NW corner, and while I’m here, that piece of trivia about Cal Ripken.
Strange… They’re running Matt Gaffney’s Psycho Sudoku tho. Oh well.
Quibble: The 12-Downs in “Cinderella” are not like the passel of nuns in “Sister Act,” say. It’s not like there’s lots of them, just the two. So “extras” is not an accurate description.
Well, seeing as I started with the SE, the W at 47-Down was already in place.
I’m always down for more games of H-O-R-S-E. I guess, this the second round of H-O-R-S-E, with David Levinson Wilk’s crazymaking triple stack crossing the other triple stack I tried to do here: http://tinyurl.com/cbbt62
Okay…. point taken. Clue changed as well. (Hey, everybody, Jon Delfin joined the discussion!)
That may be the first time a grid and title alone have made me crack up! SW stack is my favorite even though it was where I got slowed up the most.
How can we encourage more constructor battles?
Also, on 12D, the entry is singular, while the cluing is plural.
I’ve heard rumors that another blog that posts free puzzles is doing another battle-esque puzzle, stay tuned!
And while we’re nitpicking, the link to Matt’s puzzle is wrong (should be jz090430.puz).
I bet Frank Longo could fill Matt’s original grid, but I sure wasn’t able to. Yikes.
Corrected that link… Sheesh.. this is the last time I post before drinking coffee.
Frank, you out there? Can you refill Matt’s grid?
Love, love, LOVE the clue at 54A. Before noticing the number of letters I was instinctively typing in IPOD.
Enjoyed it!
of a sort… I have to confess I’m not up on this whole issue (and it’s a massive issue according to the copyeditors I know) of abbreviations vs initialisms vs who knows what else. But an abbreviation sensu stricto must take a period, right? Which Elem. does and He and I do not.
Great puzzle. The South was hardest for me.
Also, I think the clue for 1D should be singular, unless I’m reading it wrong.
Okay, two things…
A – I forgot to thank you for the STEREOLAB reference. Filled that in first.
B- I don’t know what kind of turbo-brains your readership has, but it boggles me that believe anyone was able to do this puzzle in under. I just re-filled it on a lark, knowing all the answers, and it took me 6 minutes! Should I keep this kind of thing secret?
Gotta say thanks for 36A, a gimme for me since I grew up there. With Television at th e top of the thread it may not be off topic entirely to point out that Darien was kinid of a hotbed of indie rockers. Clint Conley of Mission of Burma was from there (Moby covered one of his songs a few years back), as is (more obscurely to be sure) Jeff Connolly (aka MonoMan) of the Lyres and DMZ. We were all buddies together in high school, excepting Mr Melville who was of course much younger.
The clue is correct, Andy. Multiple Tetris pieces make one stack. Unless, of course, you start building on the sides of an empty bottom row.
Loved the Television reference. I haven’t heard that album in years and it took me a couple of crossings to remember the opening track.
A VERY satisfying puzzle. Loved the fill!
Hmm. My comment seems to have been eaten by the ether so I’ll try again.
The clue is correct, Andy. Multiple Tetris pieces make a single stack. Unless, of course, you build on the sides of an empty bottom row.
(Perhaps the reply feature isn’t working this morning. I’ll post again here.)
The clue for 1-Down is correct, Andy. Multiple Tetris pieces make one stack. Unless, of course, you build on the sides of an empty bottom row.
And, of course, all of my previous comments finally show up for no other reason than to make me look like a fool.
whatever…
Rarely am I an expert on anything… but I do have a masters in Chemistry (6 months from a PhD). He and I are symbols. Not technically abbreviations. So personally I think the e.g. is kosher. At least that would be my two cents to the copyeditors.
What amazes me about your puzzles is that there is always a bunch of stuff I don’t know and yet they are doable. Didn’t have a clue about 62 & 64a as well as 36a & 26d but still finished with no errors. That said, it took a while.
I gotta tell you, this was a really good puzzle. I took about a week and a half to work on my grid, but you seemed to get yours done in about 2-3 days, with really clean fill, as well as the 5×5 corners and the 6×6 in the middle. STEREOLAB was a great entry (one of my faves too).
So…I’m up for the O round if you suggest the challenge. Bring it!
Thanks, that was the intended vagueness.
A: you’re welcome. More inevitable obscure music references to come.
B: Isn’t it insane? I don’t get it either. Take it from my point of view: it most certainly did not take me six minutes to make this thing. Humbling!
As for me, Mission of Burma got better when they reformed. “Onoffon” is a stunning record. Shit, they blew the Pixies off the stage when I saw both of them.
And what can one say about the Lyres that hasn’t been said already? The last time I saw them MonoMan hadn’t even bothered to show up to the club (or tell any of his bandmates about the tardiness) until literally ten seconds before the set began. Amazing display of rock stardom.
People seem to love the themeless, should we have at least one a week now?
Thanks, and I really mean that. I don’t want to make these puzzles unsolvable so I’m doing my best to balance the nonsense that I know is for a specific audience as well the stuff for everybody. Glad you’re enjoying it.
Consider the gauntlet dropped. It’s my job to get you to get an “H” first!
51D: You want either “Montreal suburb” or “Quebec university”
Truly the man has a gift. Probably my closest friend growing up. Guy was a piano prodigy–used to quote whole passages Brew on his Wurlitzer electric piano in 7th grade. We used to do Soft Machine and Zappa covers back in our high school garage band. Also known for playing “Dance of the Sugarplumb Fairies” on his glockenspiel during moments of high tension on the football field. Perhaps it was that more than anything that presaged his surprising conversion to punk after heading to B.U. for college.
“….from Bitches Brew.” Blog software ate part of my post, honest.
Great puzzle, BEQ! It took about twice as long to solve than the Matt Jones puzzle that inspired it.
I’ll add a very minor nit: The claim that the “Star Trek” featured the first televised interracial kiss is often disputed, mainly because of ambiguities over the inclusion of certain television events and the definition of “interracial” (e.g., would a kiss between Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz be interracial?) You would probably do better rewording the clue, or taking a different approach for SHATNER.
That’s a good point re: SHATNER. I got the clue off Wikipedia, so the moral, as always is, if it’s on the Internet, it’s not necessarily 100% true.