LAT 8:39
PI 8:29
NYT 7:21
BG 7:05
CS 4:10
What do you write when you want to say just "One More Thing"? Zack Kushner's New York Times crossword adds a P.S. somewhere within a phrase or at the end of it to change the meaning. The hands-down winner, the theme entry that made me laugh out loud, was USE THE FORCEPS, LUKE, clued as [Advice to actor Perry when delivering a baby?]. I just picked up my son from a Star Wars: The Clone Wars-themed birthday party where there was a Yoda hippity-hop ball, so the 90210-ization of Jedi force was welcome. The other theme entries were pretty solid, but they didn't hit the funny bone like 47-Across did:
We've got one of those roll-your-own words here—REGRAB, or [Get a better grip on]. There's a smidgen of blah crosswordese, like EBOLI, or [Where Christ stopped in a Carlo Levi novel] and SISALS, or [Rope fibers]. But there's also lively stuff like a PRETZEL, or [Ballpark snack]. [Steal from, as in Grand Theft Auto] clues CARJACK. There's a comedian's SCHTICK, like ["I don't get no respect," to Rodney Dangerfield]. H.G. WELLS is [The Father of Science Fiction]. Someone's HIT LIST is clued as [It's dangerous to be on this]. There's some pasta etymology: RAVIOLI means [Literally, "little turnips"]. And GEORGE is clued as [Any of boxer Foreman's five sons]; yes, George Foreman likes to name his sons after himself.
Updated:
It took me a while to find the hidden word in Merl Reagle's Philadelphia Inquirer crossword, "See the Secret Word." In Across Lite, the note explaining the theme is appended to the first theme clue, 22-Across. And that note is long. As a Mac user, I can see the full clue only in teeny print with the Across Lite window components resized and stretched fully across a 21" screen (there's no mouse-over pop-up unless you're in Windows)—I don't know why the note wasn't moved to the Across Lite Notepad, where such things usually appear. Annoying. Anyway: The note says that the same six-letter word is hidden nonconsecutively within each theme answer, and it's left to the solver to figure out that the hidden word is...hidden. To wit:
Rich Norris, a.k.a. Gia Christian, constructed today's syndicated Los Angeles Times Sunday crossword (which isn't the puzzle the LA Times happens to run on Sundays). In "HR Derby," an H takes the place of an R in each theme answer:
The most interesting word in the fill is GYNARCHY, or [Government by women]. There is frightfully little of that to be found.
This weekend's old Boston Globe crossword in Across Lite is a savory treat from Henry Hook. In "Versatile Viands," each theme entry contains a word that's also a food. There's a HAM RADIO OPERATOR and KEVIN BACON, a Wisconsin CHEESEHEAD, and assorted veggies, like SERGEANT PEPPER, a MUSHROOM CLOUD, and the ONION NEWS NETWORK. There are two more theme answers stacked together to tie these all together—they are both OMELET FILLINGS and PIZZA TOPPINGS. Between the two-meal elegance of the theme, the stacking of theme entries, the sections of white space (look at the three sections running down the middle of the grid, with all those 6+ letter answers bunched together), and the overall smoothness of the fill, and you've got yourself a beaut of a Sunday puzzle. Really, the only thing I looked a little askance at was CAMIONS, or [Trucks]—it's a legitimate dictionary entry and all, but not a word I'd seen before. I wanted CAMINOS, as in the '70s car/truck blend, El Camino.
Bruce Venzke and Stella Daily's themeless CrosSynergy "Sunday Challenge" has an unusual-looking grid, with stacked pairs of 15-letter answers criss-crossed by single 15's going down. There are plenty of rather arid answers that look like the sort of things solvers will be Googling today:
March 07, 2009
Sunday, 3/8
July 05, 2008
Sunday, 7/6
NYT 10:18
PI 8:58
LAT 8:15
WSJ 8:05
CS 4:45
If you like both crosswords and sudoku, you'll enjoy Patrick Blindauer and Frank Longo's new book, Crosswordoku. Each pair of puzzles includes a crossword and a sudoku—the 13x13 crossword has some shaded squares, and you transfer the letters in those squares into the shaded squares of the sudoku grid. Then you've got a "wordoku" puzzle to contend with—a sudoku logic challenge using nine different letters rather than numbers. The finished wordoku grid will include a nine-letter word in one row, column, or diagonal (and if it's the diagonal, it won't be an anagram of the nine letters used in the grid). I'm still in the "beginner" section at the beginning of the book (hey, I just started the book last night), but both the crosswords and -oku puzzles will get harder as the book progresses.
Brendan Emmett Quigley's latest Sunday New York Times crossword is called "What the H?" Each of the eight theme entries changes a W word into a sound-alike WH word:
Let's turn our attention to the knottiest fill: NATICK is the [Town at the eighth mile of the Boston Marathon], and it sits atop CARROL, [Charlie Chan player J. ___ Naish]. Ouch! 2-Down could have been OOHED AT just as easily as the correct AAHED AT ([Showed delight over]), and ["Treasure Island" illustrator, 1911] N.C. WYETH's initials cross NATICK and CARROL. ARNE is the first name of [Swedish Chemistry Nobelist Tiselius]. The [1887 Chekhov play] IVANOV was eluding me when I'd thoughtlessly entered WHIRLED REPORT instead of RECORD, making THE CAN (the [Stir]) turn into THE PEN and obscuring the sense of [Fully or partially: Abbr.]—that's ADV, or the abbreviation for adverb, which is what "fully" and "partially" are. At least, these were the knottiest spots for me—I'm seeing some longer-than-usual applet solving times, so I suspect people found other hitches too.
Favorite clues and favorite answers, in no particular order:
Updated:
The Saturday Wall Street Journal included Mike Shenk's crossword (published under his Alice Long nom de plume), as the usual publication day, Friday, was the Fourth of July. In the "American Plan" theme, eight phrases adopted the letters USA and radically changed their meanings. Bond traders became BONUS AD TRADERS, or [Ones swapping free TV spots?]. That one feels a little tortured, but presumably the bond traders who like the WSJ crossword appreciated the shout-out. Cal Tech gives us a CAUSAL TECH. There's a SAUSAGE BRUSH, a [Tool for scrubbing a salami?] (sagebrush). [Fizz added to "Every Breath You Take"?] is STING OPUS AERATION (sting operation). Grand Prix yields a GRAND PRIUS AX. There's CHRISTMAS CAROUSAL. Those are all fine, sure, but my favorite theme entries are CLUB MEDUSA, [Advice to Perseus if he had a bat instead of a sword?], and SAY IT AIN'T SOUSA, ["Please don't play another march by that guy!"?].
Merl Reagle's Philadelphia Inquirer puzzle, "The Jack Black Society," assembles 13 people (a few of them fictional) who, like Jack Black, have rhyming names. The least obvious is LEO CARRILLO, [Actor who played Pancho on TV's The Cisco Kid]. Fast food spokesclown RONALD MCDONALD, [Salad inventor] BOB COBB, CHERI OTERI of SNL (111-Down), and several others join the rhyme party. [Operetta pioneer] JACQUES OFFENBACH and an [L.A. center, once] named SHAQUILLE O'NEAL are stacked together with their Q's in close proximity—that's some fancy constructin' there. I love seeing Happy Days' redhead, RALPH MALPH, in the grid. Fun fill overall—MR. BEAN, "OH, CRUD," LINUS from "Peanuts"—lots of pop culture inside and outside the theme.
Updated midday Sunday:
Newcomer Zack Kushner makes a nice debut with his syndicated Los Angeles Times crossword, "Sail Away." The six theme entries have boating puns:
Favorite clues: [Uses a powerful engine] for GOOGLES; ["Just kidding!"] for "PSYCH!"; [Lettuce] for GELT; [Strawberry Shortcake, e.g.] for DOLL; and [Airport in "Home Alone"] for O'HARE.
Bob Klahn's themeless CrosSynergy "Sunday Challenge" has tons of lively fill and tricky clues:
