ACROSS LITE PUZZLE: [ FOLLOWING DIRECTIONS]
PROGRAM: [Across Lite]
PROGRAM: [Java]
PRINTOUT PUZZLE: [ FOLLOWING DIRECTIONS]
PROGRAM: [Adobe Acrobat]
UPDATE: I have the 2/26/09 New York Times puzzle which you can get here. The Visual Thesaurus posted my puzzle as well here.
I’ve been giving Will Shortz a hand these past couple weeks leading up to the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament. And like most assistant jobs in the “entertainment industry,” it’s sometimes not all that it’s cracked up to be.
Pick up Will’s dry cleaning? Check.
Run errands to Staples? Check.
Find spare parts for Will’s General Electric stove on eBay? Check.
Open up Will’s mail? Check.
By the way, you simply cannot comprehend the volume of submissions Will gets for the Times. Maybe ten or fifteen years ago he estimated he got 75 or so manuscripts a week. My conservative estimate nearly doubles that figure. It’s a boggling amount of paper, overwhelming even.
While I’ve been watching the slush pile grow, it kind of reminded me of the old anecdote of the late great BBC Radio 1 DJ John Peel and the mountains of unlistened-to demo tapes aspiring bands sent him that slowly took over his studio. An assistant (probably his wife) was going to throw them out one day, when he protested saying that the next Elvis might be in there. In that sense, Will is exactly like John Peel, because, yes, somewhere in that Mount Rushmore sized pile of manuscripts, there might be the next Patrick Berry and therefore he really must look at every single submission.
Anyway, that’s not to say this assistantship isn’t all opening mail and running errands. It does have its perks now and then. I have had the opportunity to test solve and do some fact checking for almost all the puzzles that will be used in this weekend’s Tournament, and let me tell you, you’re in for a treat; there’s some great work in there. Also it seems that the ACPT is recession-proof, we’re seeing pretty much the same numbers from last year. So if you’re even thinking about coming down, it’s a blast. Signup link is above.
Okay, new puzzle on Friday.
Great puzzle … I was about to give up a couple of times but kept plodding away and eventually got it. Getting the circled squares helped.
I think the answer for 17A is a typo. The phrase is getting an A not an E. Maybe you could switch the clue out with: Johnny Crocket’s “______ Electro”
Have fun this weekend!
Hey, Brendan, be sure to bring a few hundred copies of your Friday blog puzzle to the tournament so you can watch the masses doing your puzzle.
Great puzzle, especially the diagonal. 23 minutes, but I was standing in a freezing parking garage waiting for my car. Keep it up.
I liked this one, though I must admit I did swear at you at 11D. Not in a bad way of course!
Well done, buddy-boy. Diagonals are a beach.
See you tomorrow.
-P
Very awesome puzzle!! I liked your monogram right in the middle, and the fill was top-notch.
Because of this puzzle, I will buy a t-shirt!
Brilliant-ine. Ouch. I would have gone Halogen’s suffix. But then again I am a chemist…
Oddly enough, I just finished watching a Tivo-delayed episode of “Chuck” where 5-Down figured in the close. Or maybe you watched the episode, and cranked out a puzzle featuring it not 2 days later?
Your NYT puzzle really kicked me around the block. Even once I got the theme, it still stuck it to me. 25-Down refused to resolve, as did the area in the center. Had 3 different answers for 38-Across before it came together.
A little unnerving, right before the competition, but good fun throughout…