them's crossing words

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Numbers Game

by chandi

Look, when I said I was contemplating adding "time since Beyoncé" to my "time since Taylor Swift" counter yesterday, I didn't think I'd have to reset the counter as soon as the next day. I'm starting to think it's a bad idea to include both, the counter would never exceed a couple of days.

This puzzle has some cute clues. "One might be a strong snuggler whose bedfellow's breath smells of Fancy Feast" is funny enough that I'll forgive the shade. "Shape of a resting feline, often" as LOAF is also pretty great. Maybe I just like all of the cat clues? CATPERSON, indeed.

I really dig this crossword's shape. Something about it resembles a sprite from an 8-bit video game, or maybe Block Dude on the TI-84[1]. Puzzmo has done a good job shipping interesting grids these past couple of weeks, particularly the asymmetrical ones on Saturday and Sunday.

As for what I don't like about this grid: the music references. Surprise, surprise. I just don't like fill-in-the-blank lyrics as clues. I get that with fill like THEIR and FOR a constructor can pick anything as the clue. But really, the constructor could pick anything that's not an Avril Lavigne song[2]. How about that?

  1. Everyone's favorite block-pushing puzzle game in calculus class. ↩︎

  2. The constructor clues "Sk8tr Boi" as a "tragiclassic love song". Is "tragiclassic" some newfangled Zoomer lingo or am I out of the loop? ↩︎

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