"Unfinished Business" September 29, 2023

[Bonnibel]

Ack!

I figured out that the longer grid answers, that are usually considered themers, were not central to the solution.

I also figured that the center crossed entries, BESTFIT and LEFTOFF were going to be the key.

I played around with LEFT as a directional clue, but just never saw LEFT OF F.

So simple yet it eluded my brain this time around!

Congrats to solvers!

[Joe Ross]

I don't know what's going on at WSJ (maybe something to do with the Murdoch "succession" process?) but the crossword editor there has got Mike Shenk's genius puzzle all wrong!

------

So don't let the WSJ crossword editor fool you with his (admittedly simpler) explanation. Mike Shenk deserves all credit for putting together this masterful meta! (And I deserve another nomination by the XWord Rabbit! )

Yeah! What he said!

Wait...

[benchen71]

I don't know what's going on at WSJ (maybe something to do with the Murdoch "succession" process?) but the crossword editor there has got Mike Shenk's genius puzzle all wrong!

------

So don't let the WSJ crossword editor fool you with his (admittedly simpler) explanation. Mike Shenk deserves all credit for putting together this masterful meta! (And I deserve another nomination by the XWord Rabbit! )

Yeah! What he said!

...

Wait...

[FloridaMan81]

I was stuck on the boat here.

I stared at LEFT OFF all weekend but couldn’t make out what to do with it. Also 56A, combined with most of the apparent themers having “IN” plus various other entries starting with or having “IN” in them also kept me busy. 34A, which had a clue that used “verb” tying back to the meta answer, was INF(IN)itive. Just seemed to be too coincidental. Oh well, on to next week.

[mattythewsjpuzzler]

Never got it. Not sure how to programatically solve this except if there were a way to determine letter frequency in the completed grid. Is there any such tool that folks are aware of?

[BarbaraK]

Never got it. Not sure how to programatically solve this except if there were a way to determine letter frequency in the completed grid. Is there any such tool that folks are aware of?

There is indeed:

https://boisvert42.github.io/mechapuzzle/

[Joe Ross]

Never got it. Not sure how to programatically solve this except if there were a way to determine letter frequency in the completed grid. Is there any such tool that folks are aware of?

Mechapuzzle

You'll need the PUZ file.

I could add letter counts to the spreadsheet. I'm overhauling the spreadsheets & will consider adding this feature.

[mbryant]

Nope. Too clever for me. I will blame it on a distraction: we are preparing for a three week trip to France, leaving today. Congrats to all solvers!

[pjc]

Nope. Never got it. I just kept trying to lop off the left side of the longer answers in various ways and trying to make some kind of connection with what was remaining.

Onward!

[LadyBird]

One small rabbit hole (before I descended into utter cluelessness)....The answer to 66A was EWAN. Removing the left-most letter leaves WAN, which appears in the clue as Obi-wan. Spent a bit of time trying to find other instances (which weren't there). And, in retrospect, a past-tense verb ending in E or W would be pretty unlikely.

[C=64]

a past-tense verb ending in E or W would be pretty unlikely.

FLEW

[Katiedid]

Darn. This is so cool. I'm really sorry I didn't get it. I lacked time to focus on it this week.

[DavyGravy]

Not a fan. The title is the problem imo

[HunterX]

Never saw the rabbit hole Benchen71 fell into. (Darn it!) But did "find" many irrelevant ways to interpret LEFT OFF. Including, but not limited to:
- Leaving off the left side of the 5 "themers," (not knowing yet that there were none) whether 1 letter or all-but-1 letter, so see if some new word or phrase could be created.
- Putting the word "Off" to the left of parts of the themers.
- Putting OFF before other grid answers.
- Trying to complete one of the words in each themer in order to make either a business, or an alternate answer to one of the other clues. FAST plus ENER could be another pocket watch part, for example?
- Trying to add "Left" to grid answers, such as LEFT OUT, MANY LEFT, A FEW LEFT.

I also spent too much time thinking that OUT was somehow key. I noted that it veered off to the (wait for it...) LEFT (if viewed in the direction you are headed while reading) from the word LEFT, at the O that starts OFF. OUT can then be added to parts of the themers as in OUT THINK and OUTFIT. Plus, LISTEN IN ON contains the opposites of both OFF and OUT. That MUST have meant something!

I had tried looking to see if "Business" referred to companies. There are various ways for this, but again, I was looking to add something. Best BUY, or maybe ListeRINE. Even using THINK as the slogan for IBM, or adding "Different" to make it the slogan of Apple. Or taking off the AD on the left of AD FEE and making McAFee.

Then I added AD to RIFT and found I was definitely adrift.

EDSEL and SEDAN caught my eye as being symmetrically placed and both being car references. NAPA could be one too, actually.

SAC FLY could be a "Successful catch." And ERA could be read as a baseball reference too.

Once I was told to try something different, which is always very good advice when you've been stuck going over the same stuff, I looked at the INF, which is inside CHINFEST. That's when I noticed that there were 12 F's, which seemed a little high. And lots of pairs, whether OF's, DF's, etc. That then clicked with the nudge to essentially rethink OFF. Forehead slap.

[JeanneC]

One brilliant puzzle!
Got lost in all those baseball references. Then kept trying to add letters to the front (left) of words like “rift”, “out” and “epee”.
Kudos to those who solved!

[BethA]

I was just unable to see this one! Here’s what I sent in anyway —-

That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for a Beth!

naSa - from NAPA
lIftoff - from LEFTOFF
spaceX - from SPACER

The changed letters SIX, plus the puzzle title UNFINISHED BUSINESS, and the contest hint “a past-tense verb” suggest my contest answer — DEEP-SIXED

[femullen]

As many times before, I admire the glaring simplicity of this meta and am embarrassed by my failure to see it at once.

I think, though, that I'm going to start printing these out and doing them by hand. The inability to see all the clues at a glance on my pocket-sized phone I think is an impediment.

[MatthewL]

Thought this was one was fair, if slightly deceptive. Had to get a little guidance to get there, so I didn't submit. But -- I'm irritated at myself because I've seen this type of thing in dozens of regular (non-meta) crosswords over the years as the revealer. Except in regular crosswords, they just tell you to parse the phrase or word differently in order to interpret the themers properly. Should've seen it. Oh well, I'll just add it to the list of things to try in the future (which list I will promptly forget by next week).

[MikeyG]

What a weird weekend.

I think I ended up filling out the grid five times: three times in the .puz, once in a PDF, and once on my phone as well. Here's what I came up, which is not relevant at all:

1. Unfinished Business. Past-tense verb.

THINKSFAST
RURALAREA
BESTFIT
CHINFESTS
LISTENINON

2. The clue going down is "LEFT OFF." Do we take the left part of each entry off?

THINKRUBESTFCLI

Nothing there at all. Obviously, the left part of something is left off, though.

3. TF, RA, BF, CF, LIO. Maybe?

4. One of these two things is almost certainly happening: No, it isn't, Mikey...

a) We're taking the left part of the themers off.

b) The left of the themers has been taken off.

5. Not sure if it's relevant, but the themers are clued a bit clumsily:

THINKS FAST (Makes a successful catch, maybe) (baseball with SACFLY, perhaps?)

RURAL AREA (Grange setting) (had to look this up)

BEST FIT (Optimal choice for one's purposes) (I would've used the line in math, but I'm a math nerd)

CHIN FESTS (Confabs) (Okay, fine)

LISTEN IN ON (Bug, say) (Okay, clever - but maybe there are other bugs?)

HINKSAST
URALREA
ESTIT
HINESTS
ISTENNN

6. What if these entries are just guiding us elsewhere?

1. (catch)
2. FARM
3. IDEAL
4. CHATS
5. (bug)

7. Epiphany that might be a rabbit hole: I thought about INC and not finishing that. Maybe fit these letters in somewhere?

8. What is up with a lot of these letters:

IN/ST
??? (RURAL AREA, come on now)
ST
IN/ST
ST/IN

Nothing yet.

9. It seems like there'd be something else going on in the puzzle - 10/9/7/9/10 wouldn't be enough, would it? Does each of these point to something?

10. NAPA is bizarrely clued: Valley between the Vaca and Mayacamas mountains. Why mention KLUM's other judges?

11. Fill That's Making Me Go Hmmm...

ASSYR
EASYAS
INF
REFI
SACFLY
YELLOWY

12. Do I need to stop short on some entries?

THIN
RUR (Nothing's coming out of this!)
BES
CHI
LIST

13. INF is very out of place and clued as a verb (not songs) - maybe we need to check the entries for an infinitive verb that is not quite complete?

WAIT.

RURALAREA = ARE
BESTFIT = BE
LISTENINON = IS

But...no, I don't know. I'm kind of meh on that.

14. Some similar letters, but that might just be fill:

NES
INF
IFS
SINS

15. Man alive, am I lost. I don't think we need a "cheater" square, so that makes me thinks SINS might be significant. Why couldn't that have been a five-letter entry? Seems like the fill would be okay.

16. I'm at sea. I'm still lost and nearing 8 hours. What in the absolute world is escaping me, so obvious (but also lateral) that it apparently will cause me to groan and slap my head.

---

At that point, I asked for guidance, and someone simply said, "None of that's relevant" with a note that the themers aren't really themers.

"Okay," I mused. "That doesn't really help, though."

And I took one more look at the down.

LEFTOFF

LEFT OF F

And I was like, "You've got to be kidding me."

I still don't know why I saw that immediately, but perhaps there was a seed of freedom in knowing absolutely nothing I tried was useful in the slightest. Puzzles like this also help to puncture my hubris, much needed, because I kept saying as the hours crept upward, "There's no way I would slap my head when I see this."

And, of course, I did.

Definitely a memorable weekend, for sure!

[Bird Lives]

I don't know what's going on at WSJ
<snip -- very big snip>
So don't let the WSJ crossword editor fool you with his (admittedly simpler) explanation.

benchen71 goes full theoretical.
Journal eds. ask: genius or heretical?
For that long exegesis
Will they cry, “Thank you, Jesus,”
Or suggest that his problem is medical?

(With enough time, I might have been able to wedge in parse rhymed Aussie style with arse.)