XWord Muggles Forum

Did our usual Sunday evening FaceTime with our kids -- both out on the West Coast.
Came back to the puzzle, saw a slightly different way to consider something I'd been looking at pretty much all along, and there it was.
Maybe I've missed last call but I hope not the last boat because I am headed ASHORE!

If there are folks who are "soooo close" or "sooo frustrated" and want a last minute nudge, let me know. I'll be reading boring meeting minutes for an upcoming Board meeting so will be glad of the diversion.

Heading to shore belatedly, but not TOO late ... and only seconds before I surrendered to a 52D. How it took me three days to notice, I'll never understand!

I needed more than a nudge. Sheesh! I had to be led right to it. I’m on the shore but was so hopelessly lost at sea that I had to be thrown a lifesaver and hauled in while the waves were crashing and I was tumbling in the surf. I have sand in my hair, in my teeth, and in all my articles of clothing! I won’t submit and can’t even hold my head up high enough to join the party. Well, okay, after I get cleaned up I’ll join you all. Is anything left in the tiki bar? I’ll take whatever the cabana boy will deliver.
Good luck to all the muggles!

Ugh! I had knee, bree, and ches written down but couldn’t figure out what they meant! Ugh!

Nope. I did not see this one.

Failed miserably at this. Submitted “coat” because of rain and car and pea in the long answers. Mea culpa.

My hail mary this week was SLACKS (kind of an inside joke at our house).

Congratulations to all who solved it; see you all later in the week!

At least the Dodgers won!

Lots of Knee Breeches in this movie, but really can’t see them in this scene...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qczVJtTmW3M

The math pun and visual plus signs in the grid made me guess PLUS FOURS before starting the grid. When I located the letters for the meta answer, I first parsed them as KEEN BEER...

Yeah, saw the plus signs, the PLUSFOURS of course, and the “SUMMER” in the title, but I thought I had to add some numbers. THREEPEAT didn’t help. Was never going to get this, seems like Shenk and I just don’t see eye to eye.

Did anyone else chase down 4-letter words that could take an S up front? S/KIM, S/EEK, S/EAT, S/OFT - very glad HOE wasn’t in the grid!

I ordered a full investigation of the + black squares, once I spotted the word "HERE" stretching diagonally between them. Clever hint. Celebrating a correct submission in full dress jodhpurs and Pusser's Rum today.

So when I was solving this, the most obvious strategy to me was to add four to every numbered-box letter and presume that some series (1,5,9... or 3,7,11... or whatever) would give an answer. (Maybe it STARTed at 17A?) Anyway, as you can see, if you start at 4, the ultra-specific HANES pops up (making me wonder if they bought a sponsorship and the rest would be TAGLESSTSHIRT), and if you start at 31, the first 4 letters in the sequence are SHOE. Monkeys and typewriters, amirite?

Huh. Can’t believe I missed that...I went round and round the plus signs and never put it together. Especially after I had an extended conversation with my husband the lifelong golfer who had never heard of PLUSFOURS.

I was stuck on adding fours. The START in the upper left threw me for a loop as well. Assumed it was a game and we were moving by fours around the grid.

MikeM000 wrote: ↑Mon Oct 19, 2020 7:17 am So when I was solving this, the most obvious strategy to me was to add four to every numbered-box letter and presume that some series (1,5,9... or 3,7,11... or whatever) would give an answer. (Maybe it STARTed at 17A?) Anyway, as you can see, if you start at 4, the ultra-specific HANES pops up (making me wonder if they bought a sponsorship and the rest would be TAGLESSTSHIRT), and if you start at 31, the first 4 letters in the sequence are SHOE. Monkeys and typewriters, amirite?

breeches.JPG

I spent about an hour doing that until I got tired. (Also found ASSET and ESSEN to be big distractors.)

Then came back and thought, "gee, those plus signs make a neat pattern," resulting in an immediate forehead slap.

For those that missed the reference regarding Saturday's NYT puzzle, here it is. When I downloaded it Friday night, it confirmed to me that Shortz and Shenk get together on these things to play with our heads!

Remained firmly planted onboard the ship this weekend. Got as far as Plus Fours being the key, but was busy chasing mathematical answers (and a brief Donna Summer/MacArthur rabbit).

Hope to be beach bound this week.

-Paul