"We're In This Together" - August 28, 2020

[jag]

Ashore, after a rough few weeks of being stuck with Issac. Enjoyed the construction of this meta!

[PHOFER]

71A! But good grief, the wheels within wheels needed for this one. One of these days we will have an 18- or 19-step meta. I'm just glad I figured out the [secret number of] steps to do this one! Ashore and amazed. Thanks, Matt!

[wordsmith]

Swimming here! I thought I had steps one and two figured out, but can't make any sense of them and am now beginning to doubt after reading through comments...is the "obvious" path the right one?

The obvious path is right, it's just longer than you expect.

On shore, with encouragement! Fun swim!

[TPS]

71A! But good grief, the wheels within wheels needed for this one. One of these days we will have an 18- or 19-step meta. I'm just glad I figured out the [secret number of] steps to do this one! Ashore and amazed. Thanks, Matt!

It took me X amount of steps to solve this one also. But what I realized after the fact is if you are eagle-eyed like some of our first page solvers - you don’t. I hope to get to that point one day!

[burak]

This was a very quick swim ashore for me. Experienced Gaffney solvers will find this easy, whereas for newbies it'll be a great learning experience.

That being said, I have my very subtle pageant doubts on this one. The mechanism gives you a very clear answer in X steps, but it feels like there should be an X+1th step because of how we got there (although I cannot produce it).

Edit: I'm glad to know that I'm not alone but it looks like the probability of there being a pageant is 0.01 and the cherry on top of the answer is tasty enough.

[rexthree]

still on the boat, hanging out with isaac

[Kris Zacharias]

On shore. The answer came after much fiddling and faddling, and blindness at every step. Was very gratified to get to a solution that seems certain.

[Joe Ross]

My joking comment was meant to imply that you'd be too busy watching the game at noon

I have lost interest in sports for now with all the sequestering and such. No fans, No home games, no pizzaz.

Agree, in large part, Bob, but some televised sports are better, without fans, if the announcers allow viewers access to the players that wasn't possible, before.

[DrTom]

OMG! A fellow Muggle just pointed out the absolute elegance of this META. I had no idea until doing some Mr. G work. It's official, Gaffney is a genius!

I hope you'll share the details post-deadline. I liked this one a lot but there might be some icing on the cake that I missed. (and I like icing!)

Oh, absolutely! I even e-mailed Matt to see if it was by chance or on purpose.

[DrTom]

I have been spending this week finishing writing an OER textbook for a tech math class, but 33D was new to me.

I was about to post that I have a gibberish anagram of a name, but then I realized mid-post that I misidentified one part of the answer, and now I have a name that makes sense. Mid-post enlightenment!

I haven't used 72A, but I'll take another look before going back to the textbook (and, more importantly, before submitting).

Update: it took about 90 seconds to crack the 72A clue.

ON THE BEACH

OH NO, Boston, I cannot Bear to look, you'll be the Bruination of all of us! Guess I'll just have to take a Flyer and maybe watch the Netflix series Ranger Things (the temptation to do a word play with hockey puck is great but caution and good taste prevail - besides I don't want to be censored)

Bold words. Funny, I didn't end my bold text because I couldn't remember whether it was [ /b ] or [ \b ] and I figured "Ah, what does it matter, it's not going to cause any trouble."

OH, I'd have probably bolded the entry anyway, that was the icing on the cake which was my apPARENT goal(IE).

[JRS51]

On shore! Really enjoyed the AHA moment which came surprisingly quickly after completing the grid this afternoon. Fun mechanism.
Look forward to seeing people’s comments Monday morning.

[Gpiggies]

On shore! After I started to see things in the puzzle this afternoon, I had to attend to real life things like cleaning the guinea pig hutch and helping build a Lego car, etc.
After the wee ones went to sleep, I was finally able to piece things together (and I don't mean more legos). It was a pleasant float to shore on on a little raft, propelled by the tide and a nice ocean breeze.

[Lee-Ann]

On shore! It's been a while since I've solved one, but this one fell together pretty easily for me.

[Deb F]

On shore, at long, long last. Miracles never cease! I was 2/3 of the way there--or would it be 3/4? or 5/6? In any event, it finally clicked for me. First time on shore in about 2 months. Nice to see everyone in daylight--not Isaac's neon.

[Tom Shea]

Count me on the ship with Isaac.

Not enough time to pursue further.

Cheers.

[dk letter]

My first time ashore - albeit with a nudge from Bob!

[boharr]

My first time ashore - albeit with a nudge from Bob!

Congratulations!

[Wendy Walker]

My first time ashore - albeit with a nudge from Bob!

Well done and welcome to the group! Hope to see you here on the Forum again!

[LadyBird]

On shore! Really enjoyed the AHA moment which came surprisingly quickly after completing the grid this afternoon. Fun mechanism.
Look forward to seeing people’s comments Monday morning.

Or seeing the comments about 3 minutes after the deadline when Joe posts the solution!

It helps me that I'm on central time so I only have to wait until 11p.

[Jeff S]

On shore. I had gotten through the first step almost immediately after finishing the grid, but was then in limbo until I took another look just now and saw the path forward. I really can't imagine the mental gymnastics needed to construct puzzles like this.