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Totally off topic but ... this! (My nephew just committed to the Villanova Wildcats!)
I thought the same thing. Would this meta have been more palatable if the prompt was "A cartoon duo that could be the fifth theme entry"? Or would it still be criticized by most for having too obscure an answer?
I have a nephew who started there this year. So you and I are practically related nowWendy Walker wrote: ↑Mon Dec 09, 2019 11:53 am Totally off topic but ... this! (My nephew just committed to the Villanova Wildcats!)
I'm an old Boomer (1954) and my kids were born in the '80s, so I had never heard of this cartoon before. I spent some time googling cartoon characters with “win” or “won” in their names. I thought of Winnie the Pooh and Willy Wonka, but neither has a suitable sidekick. Then I stepped away from the puzzle to take a shower, and it occurred to me that “Twins” would work and could be the name of a duo. Since I would then need a first word with “won,” I wondered whether there were cartoon characters called the Wonder Twins. Back to Google, and there they were!Bob cruise director wrote: ↑Mon Dec 09, 2019 8:44 am For muggles who are baby boomers who solved this by googling something, could you tell me what you googled that stumbled on Wonder Twins. I spent half the weekend googling and came up with nothing of value.
After you get to a page, you don't have to wade through it or proofread it. All you need to do is search for WIN or WON on the page; let the browser do the work for you.
I went on Google to search for cartoon duos and included WON or WIN or both in the search terms and went nowhere. I finally just searched for cartoon duos and up came the wikipedia page that others reported and WONDER TWINS was there. I suppose the lesson learned is that more things in the search term doesn't mean better results.Bob cruise director wrote: ↑Mon Dec 09, 2019 8:44 am For muggles who are baby boomers who solved this by googling something, could you tell me what you googled that stumbled on Wonder Twins. I spent half the weekend googling and came up with nothing of value.
I'm too lazy to decipher the Hollerith card. What does it say?Commodore wrote: ↑Mon Dec 09, 2019 9:27 am Anchors Away!
1. The old Commodore currently keel-hauling himself. Grump, grump, grump.
2. Boolean Schmoolean, I need a masterclass from Mr. G.
3. Gave up on Won & Win. And One & Win. Juan & Win. And…etc.
4. Snip & Snails was my Hail Mary. Nip? Nail? Rhyme with Prevail? Uggh.
5. Will our 80% be graded on a curve?
6. My Wonder Twins are Jim Beam & Bud Wiser.
7. “Gotta play better. Coach better. All 3 phases. We’re on to Cincinnati.”64 80 col.jpg
Congratulations to all solvers. You X rascals, tho' - Get off my lawn!
Thanks for the link. I had something like this back when I was composing the occasional crossword, but I lost it probably in some computer change-over when I forgot to copy my bookmarks. Things were much harder for crossword constructors in the pre-Internet era, which is when I started.anjhinz wrote: ↑Mon Dec 09, 2019 9:02 am A great tool for metas like this (where you're searching for letter patterns instead of actual words, which Google is terrible at) is https://www.onelook.com/
I used the "*" wildcard to search "*WON*WIN*" and the answer came up very quickly as 3 of about 35 results, even though I've never heard of them.
You started your meta career facing a Nolan Ryan 100 mph fastball. Next week will probably be easier as this was one of the toughest ones that we have had.CruciLexiPhobia wrote: ↑Mon Dec 09, 2019 12:49 pm I think I may have chosen the wrong week to sign up. I got the grid on Thursday but then couldn't do anything with the clues to find the meta answer. Maybe next week.
A few translationsBarbaraK wrote: ↑Mon Dec 09, 2019 12:43 pmI'm too lazy to decipher the Hollerith card. What does it say?Commodore wrote: ↑Mon Dec 09, 2019 9:27 am Anchors Away!
1. The old Commodore currently keel-hauling himself. Grump, grump, grump.
2. Boolean Schmoolean, I need a masterclass from Mr. G.
3. Gave up on Won & Win. And One & Win. Juan & Win. And…etc.
4. Snip & Snails was my Hail Mary. Nip? Nail? Rhyme with Prevail? Uggh.
5. Will our 80% be graded on a curve?
6. My Wonder Twins are Jim Beam & Bud Wiser.
7. “Gotta play better. Coach better. All 3 phases. We’re on to Cincinnati.”64 80 col.jpg
Congratulations to all solvers. You X rascals, tho' - Get off my lawn!
Congrats - great school! My wife went undergrad there and my son got his MBA there last year. And they have a pretty good basketball team!Wendy Walker wrote: ↑Mon Dec 09, 2019 11:53 am
Totally off topic but ... this! (My nephew just committed to the Villanova Wildcats!)
Oops - probably true. I missed that.
Googling the phrase “cartoon duo” returned nine pages of results, but not that wikipedia page. Searching for the phrase “animated duo” returns that page as the number one result.FrankH wrote: ↑Mon Dec 09, 2019 12:37 pmI went on Google to search for cartoon duos and included WON or WIN or both in the search terms and went nowhere. I finally just searched for cartoon duos and up came the wikipedia page that others reported and WONDER TWINS was there. I suppose the lesson learned is that more things in the search term doesn't mean better results.Bob cruise director wrote: ↑Mon Dec 09, 2019 8:44 am For muggles who are baby boomers who solved this by googling something, could you tell me what you googled that stumbled on Wonder Twins. I spent half the weekend googling and came up with nothing of value.
Since Matt deems Google as a valid meta-solving tool, I am WONdering if he meant for us to put in "cartoon duo" as the search term.
I know. And I too, was too lazy to figure out what was on the punch card.Bob cruise director wrote: ↑Mon Dec 09, 2019 1:22 pmOops - probably true. I missed that.
I wonder how many people on this list knew what a punch cards were and had ever used them. And how many had dropped their deck
When I'm googling for a meta, I often use a private/incognito window so that any initial bad paths will not contaminate my later results.Inca wrote: ↑Mon Dec 09, 2019 11:50 am Actually, google works in mysterious ways....and depending on what other searches you did before trying that, you may or may not get what someone else got on their initial search with the same parameters. Clear as mud....yeah about as clear as the crazy, very secretive google algorithms
Well that is pretty slick and I will bookmark that page for future use, though I sincerely hope I do not have to use it again anytime in the near future.anjhinz wrote: ↑Mon Dec 09, 2019 9:02 am A great tool for metas like this (where you're searching for letter patterns instead of actual words, which Google is terrible at) is https://www.onelook.com/
I used the "*" wildcard to search "*WON*WIN*" and the answer came up very quickly as 3 of about 35 results, even though I've never heard of them.