ACROSS LITE PUZZLE: [ WORD PROCESSING]
PROGRAM: [Across Lite]
PROGRAM: [Java]
PRINTOUT PUZZLE: [ WORD PROCESSING]
PROGRAM: [Adobe Acrobat]
I am staring at a dustbunny the size of a small farm animal. It’s simultaneously amazing and disgusting at the same time. Yay the joys of moving! I can’t wait to get my life back to normal.
So, you all know by now that I typically start with the lower entries first while I’m making themeleses. This one is no different and went with AIDS QUILT. I liked it not only because I thought it’d make for a nice entry, but also because of the Q, the U, and the two Is would make for a challenging fill. It’s always feels a copout with the edge words like EDENS (62-Across). Perfectly good words, I guess, but those are the easier letters to work with. I guess STAYS AT and PUERILE aren’t all that much better than EDENS. So, since the science of the fill typically calls for those kinds of entries heavy on the Es, Ds, and Ss, that’s why I like to start with a wild entry on the edge somewhere.
I thought this one might have a few too many proper names, but when I went back over it it seemed to have a normal amount. My brain is too addled with pop culture so it’s probably inevitable that stuff like Marty McFly’s mom is the puzzle.
An earlier version of this puzzle had in the lower SW corner EL CAJON crossing JAI HO. The test solvers were split as to the fairness of that crossing. But the thing that killed it was LHO, the monogram of JFK’s supposed assassin. A constructor always weighs the crap with the good. Inevitably some junk is going to have to go into a puzzle to hold all the good stuff together. Is a corner worth it to have all these winning entries and the Inuit word for watermelon? Or should we just play it safe and keep it all clean?
Okay, hope you enjoyed the puzzle. New one on Monday.
(Oh, you were expecting some sort of X-Rated puzzle since this is puzzle #69? Get your minds out of the gutter, sickos! What kind of a crossword constructor do you think I am?)
UPDATE: So, one of my test solvers, Joon Pahk, kindly reminded me why I had put LHO in the first place. Typically a constructor isn’t going to put in an entry that they’re not 100% sure about. I knew I’d seen LHO before, but couldn’t remember why. Anyway, I’ve kept the LHO-free grid above, and posted the alternate corner here: ACROSS LITE, PDF, and JAVA APP. You be the judge.
this one was awesome. SPINAL TAP at 1a was a great start, with a really fun clue. “intravenous de milo” … so brilliant.
Does “WORD PROCESSING — Here’s your entry form” have any significance?
Immediate gimmes at 1, 15, and 17 across (I love Spinal Tap, Madeleine L’Engle, and the Aeneid), but I still didn’t break 4 minutes.
Pretty much the best rock movie ever.
No other significance than it’s the title and the blurb.
Let me tell you it’s hard to come up with titles for these themelesses. Any suggestions?
Still, a 4:00 mile! Cuckoo bananas fast.
Interesting puzzle, just not on my wavelength. Got totaly bumfussled with the Avengers clue. Just did the LAT which had that godawful movie Mrs Peel clue for UMA.
PEASE COD is not “awesome.” What the hell is it? STRONG TEA??? er … um …
The rest is pretty great.
rp
That show does seem to come up an awful lot in crosswords. That, “M*A*S*H” and “Roots.” Never seen any of them, although I’ve read “Roots.” On my honeymoon of all places. Nothing says “love” like a book about slavery.
I never said PEASE COD or STRONG TEA were awesome. Take that back! That hurts!
Good stuff! Except those entries Rex mentions… fortunately OOLONG TEA didn’t stay in my grid very long. (Neither did MRSTEED, but that’s a good trap.) Your new SW is better, but I wouldn’t hate LHO if it were clued as the assassin rather than… uh, left hand… opponent?
Just call all the themelesses OLLA PODRIDA.
Like I said, not every entry is gonna be a winner.
Amy suggested with putting “themeless” in the blurb section, which I like the best so far.
Another great themeless, BEQ! I liked FRENCH DOORS and ROSES ARE RED a lot….I’m a huge SPINAL TAP fan (it was my first VHS tape!), but I blanked for a second and almost put THE MENTORS!
I also had PILSNER at 2d for way too long….and I parsed PEASE COD as PEA SECOD, never heard of either.
I usually read your blog first to get a little background on the puzzle…can you please put a spoiler alert when you give away answers? You ruined my AIDS QUILT! =)
usually when he does that, the blog post title is something like “thoughts on the puzzle” or “the making of…” so that you know to stay away until after solving. me, i always solve them before reading anyway, even when i’m delinquent on my test-solving responsibilities, like i was this time.
Any puzzle featuring Spinal Tap and pale ale is a winner in my books !
ahhh, gotcha…thanks!
Although I have gotten used to seeing the clue “chemist’s compound”, I think we should start cluing ENOL as “A ketone isomer”. At least that is relatively specific. I also had to look up 47D once I was done. I learned a new word today, so good work there. 1A just made me think “what’s wrong with bein’ sexy?” Fantastic movie.
Pretty much the best movie ever, period, I think. Fantastic way to clue it, too — and it’s always great to see a shout out to one of England’s loudest rock bands. Also, not only is ROSES ARE RED great fill you worked “billet doux” into the clue. + a lot for that!
Sexist! Sharp Elbows! Sex-Ist!
I LOVE PEASECOD. It’s so Renaissance Faire-ish. It’s what Renaissance guys wore to ‘fill out’ their tights, and ballerinos do it too nowadays. Mmmm! Great old word.
Googling PEASECOD gets me a lot of definition pages. Googling PEASE COD pulls up several pages about Cape Cod. Is it supposed to have a space or no? And I’d really love to have a puzzle with the phrase Chia Pet now.
But why peasecod? Why not say a cucumber in some aluminum foil?
I can try and make that happen.
hey, that’s a great way to monetize the blog… take bids for entries people want to see!
Brendan, What would the aluminum foil be for?
I’d never heard of PEASECOD (“pea secod? what?”) or seen SACHA Baron Cohen, so I missed that crossing and finished a letter short. I thought SMALL AD was weak and STRONG TEA mildly annoying (I had OOLONG at first).
But AIDS QUILT and SPINAL TAP made up for all those 🙂
Good point, Nancy. Foil tends to wreak havoc with airport metal detectors…
Aw, I thought this was fun with a capital F. Sure there were moments when I said WTF? But I have such a blast doing these that I don’t care if I have to change oolong to STRONG TEA. In the scheme of things, it’s easy to forgive.
I guess I’d like to know more about how you decide on the cluing. So much is so original – either you’re a walking encyclopedia or you sit for hours in front of wikipedia. Which is it? 😉
As for the beer discussion of the other day – I’m behind on doing the puzzles – I echo the recommendation to have anything from Bell’s Brewery in Kalamazoo if you ever have the opportunity. As a craft brewer, they don’t distribute far and wide, I guess, but I buy it here in Cleveland/Akron, Ohio, and I had it in Bloomington, Ind. a few weeks ago. So just keep your eye out for it in case the typewriter orchestra goes on tour in the midwest or something. I fell in love with Bell’s when I happened to buy a six-pack of their Hell Hath No Fury Belgian ale after I sent my then-paramour packing for bad behavior. Almost made the whole fiasco worth it!
It is from “This is Spinal Tap”. And it made me laugh out loud at work looking like an idiot. Nothing new there of course.
I haven’t a clue where the clues come from. No, seriously. I dunno. Internet + bad taste + drugs. I have great test solvers who bang my stuff into shape. Thank them.
Another Kalamazoo beer reference. Might have to make a trip to Michigan. Hmm…
Enjoyed the puzzle, but for me it was by far one of your hardest. Had PILSNER in the place of pale ale, which pretty much made that corner impossible. Also had OOLONG for a very OOLONG time. 15A and 17A were definitely NOT gimmes. I really think this woulda made a helluva Saturday NYT.
Looking forward to Monday’s puzzle.
My sister found your twitter and this website and was shocked to see the name of our uncle who was also a Brendan Quigley. And my dad spent his whole life doing the crosswords. Crosswords must be in the old Quigley genes from Ireland!!!
Those genes very well could be in all the Quigleys. Thank your sister for spreading the word for me.