"Fresh Start" - November 6, 2020

A place to discuss the weekly Wall Street Journal Crossword Puzzle Contest, starting every Thursday around 4:00 p.m. Eastern time. Please do not post any answers or hints before the contest deadline which is midnight Sunday Eastern time.
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LittleGood
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#301

Post by LittleGood »

Ok yep, there are a lot of Fs in the theme answers. Completely missed that.

Did anybody else get hung up on LOTION/LAOTIAN?
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Joe Ross
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#302

Post by Joe Ross »

DrTom wrote: โ†‘Mon Nov 09, 2020 8:43 am (oh, and the fact that because I did not pay attention to my grill last night I managed to reduce $40 worth of ribs to charcoal while entertaining friends - thank God for late open supermarkets!)
I am more than proficient at monitoring grills and preventing rib reduction, no matter how many Guinness Draughts you force upon me. I'll wait, here, for my invitation. :idea:
Whole blood, platelets, or plasma: Donate 4 in 2024

PLATELET ๐—ฑ๐—ผ๐—ป๐—ผ๐—ฟ๐˜€ ๐—ฎ๐—ฟ๐—ฒ ๐—ฟ๐—ฎ๐—ฟ๐—ฒ.
๐—ง๐—ต๐—ฒ ๐—ป๐—ฒ๐—ฒ๐—ฑ ๐—ถ๐˜€ ENORMOUS ๐—ณ๐—ผ๐—ฟ ๐—ฐ๐—ฎ๐—ฟ๐—ฒ:
๐Ÿฐ๐Ÿฌ% ๐—ฝ๐—ฒ๐—ฑ๐—ถ๐—ฎ๐˜๐—ฟ๐—ถ๐—ฐ,
๐Ÿฏ๐Ÿฌ% ๐—ฒ๐—ฎ๐—ฐ๐—ต, ๐˜๐—ต๐—ฒ ๐˜๐—ฎ๐—ฐ๐˜๐—ถ๐—ฐ,
๐—ณ๐—ผ๐—ฟ ๐—ฐ๐—ฎ๐—ป๐—ฐ๐—ฒ๐—ฟ & ๐˜๐—ฟ๐—ฎ๐˜‚๐—บ๐—ฎ. ๐—ฃ๐—Ÿ๐—˜๐—”๐—ฆ๐—˜ ๐—ฆ๐—›๐—”๐—ฅ๐—˜!
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DrTom
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#303

Post by DrTom »

BethA wrote: โ†‘Mon Nov 09, 2020 9:05 am I might have gotten it if the title were PHRESH START.

โ€œMy mind is going. I can feel it.โ€
Listen while your mind is out there will you have it look for mine?
NUDGES!I am always willing to give nudges where needed; metas should be about fun, not frustration. Send me what you have done so far because often you are closer than you think!
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Wendy Walker
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#304

Post by Wendy Walker »

BethA wrote: โ†‘Mon Nov 09, 2020 9:05 am

โ€œMy mind is going. I can feel it.โ€
I was just thinking of that movie last night! We were setting up an "old" (ca.2015) computer in the garage so I can keep it there for my Zoom exercise classes. We tested the Zoom connection and it was grainy and slow -- reminded me immediately of the astronaut's video call back to Earth from the space station!
Good luck, fellow Muggles!
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DrTom
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#305

Post by DrTom »

mpmanning wrote: โ†‘Mon Nov 09, 2020 9:14 am First things first, Happy Marine Corps Birthday to all the Leathernecks aboard!

But, now, Arrgh! Where did I get this headache? Where did that solution come from? That was not the beach I saw as I said I believed I was ashore! Where is the medical dispensary?

I'll be back after I relieve myself at the rail.
So, what ship is that sitting in the harbor? Looks vaguely familiar?
NUDGES!I am always willing to give nudges where needed; metas should be about fun, not frustration. Send me what you have done so far because often you are closer than you think!
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DrTom
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#306

Post by DrTom »

For those of you who are wondering just how badly I burnt the ribs I mentioned....
Ribcoal.jpg
I may not get a "Good Job!" but I should get a "Well Done!"
NUDGES!I am always willing to give nudges where needed; metas should be about fun, not frustration. Send me what you have done so far because often you are closer than you think!
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John77
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#307

Post by John77 »

Dplass wrote: โ†‘Mon Nov 09, 2020 6:57 amPhlox? Really?
It certainly isn't popular with me. Whenever I've planted it, it never survived longer than about three weeks.
Wir sind zu frรผh alt und zu spรคt schlau.
ADS
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#308

Post by ADS »

I agree that the numbers were not necessary. But, they did help me confirm that I was on the right track. The first one I spotted was Faze-Phase-Stage, and I paused because the number seemed coincidental. But when I then moved to Farrow-Pharaoh-Ramses and it had 6 letters, I was encouraged to keep going. And then it was just too coincidental that Few-Phew-Finally had the 7 work again.

Looking back, it almost seems like Matt was attempting to make it just a bit easier by including the numbers in the clues and also telling us that the answer was "six" letters. But I agree that it opened the door to a lot of potential rabbit holes, especially coming only two weeks after a parenthetical numbers puzzle that had a completely different mechanism. So perhaps it was actually Matt's attempt to make it just a bit harder. Either way, I liked this puzzle a lot.

Mister Squawk wrote: โ†‘Mon Nov 09, 2020 5:43 am So this puzzle, which I solved, has two features that I found ... interesting.

First, the FILL -> PHIL -> ADAM connection was bogus, as Phil Hartman and Adam Sandler did not overlap as SNL cast members. Like many others, I deduced "FRAYS" from "FR?YS" and that was that.

Second, there is the matter of the red herring parenthesized numerals (7-6-4-5-5). A recent previous puzzle using the same mechanism ("Where's the Rest", September 11) did not include the numerals (the first gimmick was a set of answers that should have been, but were not, plural forms). In the case of the current puzzle, the numbers were completely gratuitous. They were not required to solve the puzzle, and for some of us, an ENORMOUS time-waster.

But I'm very happy to have solved this one after blowing the last two...
Nlobb
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#309

Post by Nlobb »

I got this one right but almost didn't submit it because I can't see any connection between phrase and fresh start. Clarification??
BTW I must be one of the few people who likes doing homophones too as a retired reading teacher!!
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Bob cruise director
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#310

Post by Bob cruise director »

Nlobb wrote: โ†‘Mon Nov 09, 2020 9:55 am I got this one right but almost didn't submit it because I can't see any connection between phrase and fresh start. Clarification??
BTW I must be one of the few people who likes doing homophones too as a retired reading teacher!!
Fresh start told me to change the letter F at the beginning of the theme words to something that sounded the same.

As an engineer, I was wondering if the homophone came out just before the cell phone?
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Joepickett
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#311

Post by Joepickett »

Dplass wrote: โ†‘Mon Nov 09, 2020 6:57 amPhlox? Really?
Phlox was not obvious to me. But soon as I recited them out loud, my wife picked up on it and said "Like the plant?"
Also with FARROW. I was so focused on the original word, I couldn't think of the very obvious PHAROAH.
It helps to have a teammate.
EVJ
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#312

Post by EVJ »

DrTom wrote: โ†‘Mon Nov 09, 2020 9:35 am For those of you who are wondering just how badly I burnt the ribs I mentioned....

Ribcoal.jpg

I may not get a "Good Job!" but I should get a "Well Done!"
๐Ÿ˜‚Thatโ€™s bad!
Iโ€™m glad you were just watching ribs and not children!!
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hcbirker
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#313

Post by hcbirker »

Well I ended up on the wrong shore. Won't say how I got there because it's too stupid. Let's just say that "fill a void" had me looking at filling in black squares and I came up with an answer I liked.
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Kris Zacharias
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#314

Post by Kris Zacharias »

My experience in solving this puzzle included some of the rabbit holes that others went down, such as trying "phewton" (="futon"). But "phewton" is not a word, unlike all the other homophones generated in the puzzle. The numbers in parentheses did help there, as the puzzle contained only a few answers with 7 letters. Finally I saw "finally" as a synonym for "phew" and got "FRAYS." PHRASE came to mind immediately, but then I started to second-guess myself. Previous puzzles have had little instructions in the answers, and right in the middle of the grid was "fill a void." Should I fill a void in "frays" and get "forays?" A foray is, after all, a kind of start that begins with "f." One thing I have learned is that metas almost always have a uniformity in the steps to the solution. So if "forays" is the answer, I figured, the theme should be "fresh starts." Moreover, "fill" was already used as a homophone for "Phil," and I cannot remember a clue/answer having two different functions in a puzzle. And finally, again, "fresh start" is a phrase. So I submitted PHRASE. Phew and whew!
JeanneC
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#315

Post by JeanneC »

Phlox, huh? Thatโ€™s also the name of a character on a subsequent Star Trek show. Maybe Matt is a Star Trek Enterprise fan...๐Ÿ––. Anyway, I give myself credit for at least seeing the โ€œFarrowโ€ and โ€œRamsesโ€ connection.

Hey, if they were all easy, what would we do with our Saturdays and Sundays?๐Ÿ˜‰
โ€œI cannot and will not cut my conscience to fit this yearโ€™s fashionsโ€. Lillian Hellman
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Cosmo
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#316

Post by Cosmo »

Funny enough, I think I would have had an easier time solving this one if the parenthetical numbers weren't included! I noticed all of the F's right away, but unfortunately the numbers led me astray. Still a great meta, though!
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Kas
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#317

Post by Kas »

Great puzzle. I was circling in the right area with the "F's," but without making that mental switch to "PH," I couldn't cross the...uh..."Phinish Line."
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ky-mike
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#318

Post by ky-mike »

I've been mugged!

With 1 of only about 520 or so entries this week, I won the mug lottery!

I guess the time is coming for a new avatar. Maybe the mug with Rabbit Hole bourbon in it ;)
Last edited by ky-mike on Mon Nov 09, 2020 10:14 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Joepickett
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#319

Post by Joepickett »

hcbirker wrote: โ†‘Mon Nov 09, 2020 10:34 am Well I ended up on the wrong shore. Won't say how I got there because it's too stupid. Let's just say that "fill a void" had me looking at filling in black squares and I came up with an answer I liked.
Yes I was trying the same thing for awhile!
Gaffney did that or someone did with BROKEN BOTTLES many puzzles back.
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mpmanning
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#320

Post by mpmanning »

DrTom wrote: โ†‘Mon Nov 09, 2020 9:32 am
mpmanning wrote: โ†‘Mon Nov 09, 2020 9:14 am First things first, Happy Marine Corps Birthday to all the Leathernecks aboard!

But, now, Arrgh! Where did I get this headache? Where did that solution come from? That was not the beach I saw as I said I believed I was ashore! Where is the medical dispensary?

I'll be back after I relieve myself at the rail.
So, what ship is that sitting in the harbor? Looks vaguely familiar?
That is my former cruise ship - a Navy guided missile light cruiser, the USS Little Rock (CLG4) moored on a buoy in her homeport of Gaeta Italy. The photo is a navy file photo. She is currently decommissioned and serving an emeritus role as a museum ship on Lake Erie in the Buffalo NY Naval and Military Heritage Park. Her namesake, the current USS Little Rock (LCS9), is a lighter, faster, more stealthy, more high tech deadly cruise ship homeported in Mayport, not far from you.
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