So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish

Thanks for comin out, folks, to the final installment of the first Cross Nerd series. Sincere gratitude and big ups are in order for all of you solvers out there that were kind enough to give my puzzles a try, offer insightful feedback, and generally be awesome and interesting people to meet.

I'll be taking a bit of time off from puzzle making for what's shaping up to be a busy December full of festive season parties, musical engagements, and settling into new digs. Cross Nerd will be back up in the new year, albeit with a different format. Until then, amuse yourselves with the fine indie puzzle sites in the sidebar, or dig into the older puzzles here if you missed 'em. I particularly liked this one, this one, this one, and this one.

As for next year, I'll be posting aperiodically and less frequently. Keeping to a weekly schedule accomplished exactly what it was supposed to: I was motivated to keep up with constructing, I became efficient at turning vague ideas into finished work, and I was forced to make firm decisions about fill and theme entries rather than hemming and hawing indefinitely. However, I have found that making the weekly puzzles takes up just about all of the time in a week that I can/would be willing to devote to construction, and sometimes more. I want to be able to work at a more leisurely pace (which also means I'll be able to tackle some more adventurous constructions), and have a little extra time to spend on some of my other hobbies that I've been neglecting. Also, it will be nice to start submitting some puzzles for publication, now that I kind of feel like I know what I'm doing. Lastly, I'd like to focus some time and energy on doing puzzle-related work rather than solely making puzzles. Aside from the weekly puzzles, my intention with this blog (which I really didn't think out for very long before it launched) was to offer reviews and analysis of interesting puzzles, discuss the nuts and bolts of constructing, and produce and share software tools for constructors and other interested parties (notice the "For Nerds" page? Notice that's it's never been updated?). So, basically, stay tuned for interesting stuff in the new year. Either check back periodically, or join the Google group to stay in the know.

I struggled a bit with finding the right kind of puzzle to write to conclude the series. Was thinking an extra large themeless at first, but I did a themeless for the penultimate puzzle and also I had a busy work week and then moved into a new pad all weekend. Being short on time, I also knew it would be risky to try and pull anything too adventurous (I want to focus on weirder stuff once I'm free of the weekly commitment). No, the best bet was a straightforward daily-sized number with a tight and fitting theme. The theme came right away, thankfully. I would be surprised if it hadn't been before (kind Chronicle of Higher Education-y, I think), but I can't actually remember having seen it. Tried to make it nice and breezy; perhaps I'm feeling a bit sentimental.

More words, crossed and otherwise, coming soon...

Puzzle: Famous Last Words
Rating: XW-PG13
Difficulty: Gentle
Downloads:
PUZ
PDF

Move It On Over

Yikes, only one puzzle left after today!  I'm of course hoping to make it extra special, but then I don't really have any good ideas as to how I'm going to do that yet.  Plus, I'll be moving into my new apartment next weekend, so time will be tight.  Super stoked on that; I've been living in houses with roommates for the last 4+ years, so it will be nice to have my own space for a change.

Just another freestyle this week.  Quite tough, if you ask me.

Parting words, crossed and otherwise, next Tuesday.


Puzzle: Freestyle #23
Rating: XW-PG
Difficulty: Quite tough
Downloads:
PUZ
PDF

Fortnight nightie-night

Just a pair of weekly puzzles left after this week!  Don't worry, puzzles will continue, though at a slower and less regular rate.  However, there will also be more puzzle-related stuff (ramblings and half-baked ideas, mostly) posted periodically, so I do hope you'll stick around.

But for now:

Every time I write a themed puzzle, I'm convinced that I've used up the last of my cruciverbal creativity and that I'll never be able to think up another theme.  And every time, just when I need a new one the most, one materializes out of thin air (you may have noticed that I pretty much post whatever kinds of puzzles I feel like posting; however, I hate to go too long without a themed puzzle, and every few weeks a new one seems necessary).  Such was the case this week.  I was recording a new album with my band Ink Road, and didn't think I'd have to time to crank out a solid full-sized puzzle, so I figured a 13x13 would have to do.  The challenge was coming up with a theme that felt complete using little grid real estate. Jeffrey Harris said once that "if I solve a puzzle with three theme entries, I want that to be not because there was no room for a fourth entry, but because there is no fourth entry."  Good advice to constructors, I think, and I wanted to heed it.  Miraculously, just this afternoon while running errands and fretting about still having to write a puzzle and get some shut-eye for work in the morning, a theme idea came to me for which I could think of only 3 short entries plus a revealer.  The rest was just the proverbial 10% perspiration (I believe the original quote referred to "genius"; I don't think this puzzle is ingenious, for the record).  Actually, even the third theme entry doesn't quite belong, in a way, but I think it gets the job done.

On a related note, my backup idea was a freestyle with a mini-theme, the gist of which I'll present to you in the form of a puzzle:

I'm thinking of a pair of 2-word terms, both of which have the enumerations (5, 5) (i.e. 2 5-letter words each).  They can both be clued as follows: [It might be listened to as a sleeping aid].  The first words of each can be paired to form a new term clued as [Metaphor-heavy sea beast of literature].  The last two words of each original term can also be paired to form a term clued as [Avant-garde genre for Sonic Youth, at times].  What are the terms?  I have no idea if this is difficult or not, but they were going to be the seed entries because I thought it was neat.

Answer: WHITE NOISE and WHALE MUSIC, which can be repaired as WHITE WHALE and NOISE MUSIC.  (highlight to view)

A more elegant puzzle would have the pair rearranged to form terms related to the originals (the holy grail would be all four terms sharing a single clue), but I couldn't think of any.

More words, crossed and otherwise, next Tuesday.

ps That link to my band above is hilariously dated, as is most of our web presence.  Only 2 of 5 current members were on the last album, and some pictures out there have like 4 extra people in them.

Puzzle: Sack Attack
Rating: XW-PG13
Difficulty: Mild
Downloads:
PUZ
PDF