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7/21/2024
They daily review is going on hiatus.
I'm taking a little break from the daily crossword solve + commentary combo, it's taking a little too much time out of my day that I'd rather reserve for other projects. I'll still be posting crossword-adjacent topics over at my newsletter (like the Adventure Awaits constructor notes), but I won't be writing new reviews anytime soon.
A big thank you to anyone who's been following along so far, it's been a fun experiment!
7/21/2024 - DNF - actually impossible - puzzmo
Oh no dude, it's the revenge of the HUNDOP. Do people actually say
this? Please don't tell me people actually say this. This word needs
to be eliminated from every constructor's word list, ASAP.
This is not a crossword for mortals. I'm scratching my head trying to figure out what kind of person can solve this thing without hints, is it someone who knows the trivia by heart? Or someone who can improv an 11-spanning wordplay misdirection? Either way, I fit neither of these descriptions.
I spent ten minutes or so futzing around before I gave up and hinted the long acrosses. Even with 6 hints I was getting nowhere. After another 10 minutes of circling the grid I simply gave up and revealed the rest of the squares. Since I effectively DNF'd this grid I don't think it's necessarily fair for me to comment on it, so I'll keep it short.
I'm a little disappointed by "#bada55 or #defec8, e.g." My answer was
RGB since each 2-number hex component corresponds to one of red,
green, blue, in that order. Once that was revealed to be wrong
(TUSHIES at the cross) I slotted HEX. Nope. Instead the answer is
the boring HUE. What can you do?
My feeling with this single clue was rather emblematic for the whole grid, hence the DNF.
7/20/2024 - 18m 55s w/ hints - impossible - puzzmo
Sometimes you just have to throw in the towel. I don't think I had an answer for a single piece of trivia in this grid, and while that's normally not a requirement for solving a puzzle, this grid felt particularly nasty without it.
I count this grid as a themeless even though it clearly has a
recurring motif. The editor notes MOVEALONG, GETONTHEBUS,
WALKAWAY, and LOVETRAIN as "song titles that can be related to
travel". Meh? Honestly the fill in this crossword is rough, and I'm
not just saying that because I had to use at least 5 hints.
My first mistake was slotting DONTASKME as the "Response when
someone should know the answer to their own question". IMO it's just
as solid a fit for that clue as YOUTELLME, the actual answer that
didn't occur to me until I had hinted 20A and 27A. It doesn't help
that the Y and U are only revealed via a Ted Lasso reference and a
Greek letter. Look, I understand that I'm missing the boat by not
having watched Ted Lasso like every other sport-loving American, but
throw me a bone!
After ten minutes of floundering, hinting, and arriving at YOUTELLME
I'm finally starting to make progress on the grid. Unfortunately my
next mistake was slotting LATETRAIN instead of LOVETRAIN, where
the O and V are revealed by an All-American rejects song (which I had
as NOTELLING) and some name from a cartoon from the early 2000s.
Man, it took me long enough to figure out GETONTHEBUS (by the way,
not to be confused with GETINTHEBUS) that at this point I've just
given up and am hinting anything with the slightest level of friction.
I don't remember the last time I've been so wholly wrong during a crossword solve but this feels like a special moment.
7/19/2024 - 12m 26s - medium - puzzmo
Another day, another themeless. I had a great time with about 90% of
this puzzle, with that final 10% leaving me a little frustrated.
There's one corner in particular that I think needed an extra edit
pass (LAO-SAO, anyone?). I appreciate the longitudinal shape of
today's grid, but it does come at the expense of some bad fill.
The more crosswords I solve, the more I appreciate my ability to guess
random trivia. For example, take "City where you say 'takk' in
thanks". I don't know any Norwegian (though I have been to Norway, so
maybe there's a subconscious element here) but seeing that the answer
occupies 4 squares, the language "sounds" Scandinavian, and knowing
that OSLO is exceedingly common fill, I slotted it straight away.
Half of the game of solving harder crosswords is recognizing common
words so you're nearly immune to clue variations.
Then again, I floundered on TLC so have I really learned anything?
"'Waterfalls' trio" was giving me no hints, so in my desperation I
looked at the TL_ and assumed the C. That C proved critical since
MEATSAUCE followed, then USUALSUSPECTS, and now we're cooking with
gasoline.
I found nearly every corner in this grid to be fairly easy, at least
compared to some of the longer acrosses like PHOTOOP and MIDDLEC.
One corner in particular absolutely kicked my butt, with the
LAO-SAO combo in the middle-right. I started off with HUTS, grew
into MIDDLEH (I don't know notes, sounds plausible?), and got stuck
on "Squares on diamonds". And boy, it took me a loooong time to
finally fill BASES. Maybe part of my problem is that "diamonds" is
plural for seemingly no reason. Is it weird that the clue isn't
"Squares on a diamond" or is it just me?
Overall the clues in this grid are interesting and unique, even if
they don't always agree with my taste. There are a lot of clever
misdirects and interesting compositions (e.g. "Occasion for a round of
shots?" PHOTOOP) that are super solid.
7/18/2024 - 5m 18s - easy - puzzmo
No theme today, but solid fill and a fun solve. I am immensely proud
of some of my plonks today, with AMOEBA, CARETS, and ONSIDE.
Something about the cluing jived with me, what can I say.
As far as themelesses go, this is one of the better ones. Maybe I'm biased since I solved this together with my partner and we make the greatest crossword tag-team duo known to humankind. Maybe the fill is simply great. One of these is probably true.
I found that this puzzle split the difference between easily plonkable and entertaining in just the right way. A lot of the gimmes sat on the tip of my tongue for a few seconds before I could jot them down. There's something inherently satisfying about the space created after reading a clue, where mental gears are churning and the debate as to whether you can slot it reaches its peak.
The top half of the grid went down easy, each across plonked without
considering its downs. I did mistake CHAD for "British bloke", but
it was close enough to the intended answer CHAP that I can't count
it as a loss. The bottom half was a bit harder, with some more
esoteric trivia like TOOTLE for "Play the flue" which stumped even
my flautist partner. We were thinking TOOTED, TOOTS but couldn't
find the right extension for the act of TOOTING to finish it out.
I caught on to CLASSACTION surprisingly quickly, slotting it after
only the CLA was revealed. EDITORSNOTE took a little longer, where
EDITOR was obvious (especially so thanks to the puzzle title) but
the back half a little less so. A couple of solid spanners.
Maybe could've done with a few more wordplay clues, but I do love the
inclusion of the dad joke "Lawyer's underwear of choice?" as
BRIEFS.