MEOW #186 Home Bound

[DrTom]

Nudges:

As with many of my puzzles the Title tells you a LOT!

You can be HOME BOUND, meaning heading for home, of course or you may be bound to your home!

If Nudge 2 is true, what might you look to do to other words in the meta?

When you are doing what you should be doing you can look in symmetric places.

Then, if you do what Nudge 3 suggests, what is the usual next step when you make a new word?

You are looking for a 5 letter SINGLE word

If you still need more after these PM me!

[MatthewL]

Cat has finally been loosed, but is pretty grumpy about me taking so long. Thanks for the puzzle, Dr. Tom (and the extra nudges)!

[benchen71]

Cat is free, but it was definitely a struggle!

[KayW]

Cat nudged out of the bag. Fun one Tom - thanks!

[DrTom]

It appears nudges helped, 6 more solvers:

17 andeux
18 DCBilly 
19 MatthewL
20 Pair O Ducks 
21 benchen71
22 KayW

[DrTom]

OK, then, if they help, how about some more!

What if this had been named EARTH BOUND and there were words in the Grid like WORM, QUAKE and DAY, what would you do?

Now imagine there were clues for other words like April event = EASTER or Natural Disaster = TORNADO. What would you do now?

[DrTom]

Saturday Solves:

23 LindaPRmaven
24 mardel
25 LarsCaine

Three more found their way home to release the cat

[DrTom]

Sunday Solves (well solve)

26 JM

[markhr]

Cat is released, but is wondering why it took so long.

[DrTom]

Whoo Hoo - two more:

27 SJ
28 markhr

[DrTom]

One more!

29 kurtalert

[DrTom]

Alrighty then! Total of 29 solvers, 8 submitters who tried once and missed it and another 17 incorrect answers.

The low solve rate and large number of incorrect submissions are NOT the fault of the solvers but more mine. The "alternates" were a stretch sometimes, and I can see how many people came up with different answers: Tag-up (very popular), SMILE (most of the letters, probably a poorly defined alternate), STEAL (also most of the letters and baseball oriented) and others. I apologize for making what was meant to be a relatively easy puzzle very difficult. They say you should not try to emulate your heroes but I tried to do a Cap’N Rick type of meta and, let’s face it, there are few better than he at those and I am CERTAINLY not one of them.

For those of you who got the “early” version and still solved, my hat is off to you. My alternates were sooo bad on two of the “HOMES” that I am amazed anyone got it. It shows you the value of reviewing a puzzle before you post it, especially if it has been months since being tested. Testers get used to a constructor’s style and therefore can sometimes overlook “crunchy” bits just like a constructor can (confirmation bias). Luckily these are for fun and no rotational force of the Earth was harmed in the solving. Thanks to those who did solve, and I promise to try to do better – not more serious, just better.

The INTENDED route home was this:

So, as Miss Scarlett said "..tomorrow is another day" (I'm SURE she meant MEOW day)

[DrTom]

Finding yourself with little to do at the moment, want to see what happens when you get caught in a ping pong of versions of your puzzle during testing...if so, follow this link:
viewtopic.php?t=2971

[Al Sisti]

I did eventually find SLIDE, but didn't submit it because I didn't think it fit the prompt ("something you may need to do when leaving for home"). I said to myself "If I slide when I'm *leaving for* home (at best, from third base), I'd be tagged some 80 feet from home and red with embarrassment. Now if the prompt said something like "...something you may need to do to get home safely," I would've known I found the right answer. Shoulda submitted anyway, I guess.

[DrTom]

I did eventually find SLIDE, but didn't submit it because I didn't think it fit the prompt ("something you may need to do when leaving for home"). I said to myself "If I slide when I'm *leaving for* home (at best, from third base), I'd be tagged some 80 feet from home and red with embarrassment. Now if the prompt said something like "...something you may need to do to get home safely," I would've known I found the right answer. Shoulda submitted anyway, I guess.

My thinking was that when you are leaving for home you may have to SLIDE depending on circumstances since it might come down to s close play...but of course that would have made a clunky prompt. It unfortunately was one more flaw in this puzzle.

T