"Why Not" September 27, 2024

[chocoholic]

Solved on last call. Would not have got this without a nudge in the right direction. I think I had enough beverages hanging out with Isaac all weekend. Happy to leave the bar.

[Collegetowngirl]

On shore for the first time in over a month!

I’m at 39% over the years and also am very appreciative to whoever has been updating the WSJ Mug Score sheet with answers and data lately!! WSJ Mug Score sheet

[JRS51]

Ashore! I had the right idea but I was taking it in the wrong direction. Fortunately, I took another look and saw what I had been missing. Fun finish!

[Tom Shea]

On the ship again. Busy weekend. Almost finished the roof over the grill. Dry nights ahead (well, not that way ).

Good luck to all who have solved.

[Commodore]

By Neptune, it's a ship fer me this weekend. ("What is a week-end?")

[CV-at-Sea]

So,I have had frustrations similar to @ladybird and @whimsy but they both seem to have made it to shore, while I have not. My only excuse is that I am in Scotland, where the golf is as vexing as the meta.

Oh, I am still floating about at sea! I've been in Northern Michigan with little free time and even less internet connectivity. But I did have this lovely view last night after my shift ended.
20240928_200349.jpg

Afloat with you …and with perfect connectivity everywhere except between brain and meta

[ReB]

To which I must reply: Pas de lieu Rhone que nous.

I had the methodology but could not close the deal until I got nudged out of the rut I was in. Or perhaps it was the trip to the vineyard here in France.

Robert Stevens 24Sep28 7D Mark II 3732-2.jpg

On the shore but sitting on a boat in the Rhone River

[DrTom]

SUBMITTING WHEN NUDGED - SHOULD I OR SHOULDN'T I

I buy a lottery ticket usually each week, I have never won. Why do I still do it, because I might win and besides it is fun thinking what I might do with an official poop-load of money. It is truly one of the cheapest, and safest, fantasies I can have. When I do not win, and someone else does, I am not angry at them for winning; I just think…that could be me! Did they have some insight, did they know what one of the numbers would be for sure, and would that make any difference. Well it would increase their chances of winning but there are still 5 more numbers you have to choose out of the 69 available. That means you have less than a 1 in 10 million chance of winning the lottery even if you know one of the numbers ABSOLUTELY will be chosen.

“The” Mug, though certainly not in the 10,000,000:1 category, is much the same. If winning were dependent on solving the meta and submitting so that your answer could be added to a stack of those who were the best at solving and the mug pick would be from that pool only after sufficient time elapsed so that you had a representation of meta moguls then yes, submitting an answer that you got only with significant help would be somewhat questionable because it would put you in a group you did not deserve to be in.

However, each week your chances are the same, whether you are Jangler or a first time solver. If you submit the right answer AND get chosen out of the plethora of submissions then great, but it still has nothing to do with skill, only luck. Well what about if you do it EVERY week, do your odds go up? Well they are much better than if you did not submit at all but just as playing the same lotto numbers every week doesn’t really increase your chances of winning beyond the fact that you are playing, submitting a correct, whether solo of nudged, answer each week only puts you back in the pool of possible e-mails that can be selected.

Winning the mug doesn’t mean you are a Crossword champion, any more than winning the lottery means you are a smart investor even though both come with their rewards.

So bottom line, if you want to submit after a nudge go ahead. If not doing it gives you some moral serotonin then feel free not to, but please do not feel that those who did are doing anything they should not. If it comes down to euthanizing kittens or burning rain-forests we will judge you, if not, as others have said, you do you.

Of course after all that I am reminded of the words of a great man and powerful hero:

[Jarrod]

Ashore! Last hour re-look helped!

[Brian K]

Ashore! Thank you zoom meeting muggles!

[hcbirker]

[hcbirker]

[Bonnibel]

JUST under the wire with 3 minutes to spare!

So happy the light finally clicked on!

Since I am posting this after the reveal, I should add that I got misdirected with these rabbit holes:

TATUM ONEAL appearing in the down answers - but then couldn't find any links to her or to other actors.

ROD, STAFF, & PREPARE all in the grid at first seemed to lead me to the 23rd Psalm, and a theme of death (which would really prevent anyone from doing anything!) but then I realized this would be quite unlikely and not any fun at all.

At first I did think of WHY = Y, also of NOT = KNOT, especially with 1D being ROPE.

Ah, just glad I made it in time!

I'll have a little warm toddy.

[Brian K]

Warning. There is no rabbit down this hole:

The word "NOT" is in the title. The central grid entry "GRATEON" anagrams to "NEGATOR." So this must be a puzzle concerning opposites.

15A: MATURE is antonym to IMMATURE, yielding I.
19A: LESS is antonym to MORE and we get M.
etc.

Look, it must be right. We are building to a seven-letter reason not to do something, like I'M AT SEA, or I'M CRAZY, or I'M INEPT.

Alas, I could not find seven letters that work. How can it be so right, yet so wrong? I'M A LUZR

[DrTom]

I spun my wheels for a while trying to fit ON ICE for READY, and a lot of time looking for DERRY (was there an Irish reference?) and ROPEY. It finally hit me that there were seven letters needed and at least 5 (it took me forever to find OHMY) had "long answer" alternates. That pushed me to find PREPARE and then look for something to pair with "GOODGOLLY". I finally gave up and used an anagram solver to get EMBARGO and then saw how it was to fit in order.

[hoover]

I did, indeed, solve backwards. I first found the words that would make a new word with a Y added. This includes 22D DERRY, my quibble. Then I found clues that fit the new words, except for DERRY. After not finding a clue to fit DERRY, I belatedly found 62D OHMY.

[Bobj]

A good puzzle for lovers of Dad jokes:

When I went to school, the alphabet only had 25 letters. Nobody knew why.

Also:

At first, I could only find 6 words that needed a Y. Had to google to see if ANTONY (17A) might be another (lesser!) bartender.

[Red Inker]

I figured it had to be something with one letter from each of the 7 long answers... But "ABDOMEN" was sitting right there, and "BAD OMEN" is a much better answer to "reason not to do something" than "EMBARGO".

Sigh.

[whimsy]

At first I was working with only 6 letters (on purpose) because I was sure we'd be adding a Y at the end (or somewhere) just as we did to get to the synonyms in the grid. Especially since I had found 6 quite easily -- it was the OHMY, of course, that got by me in spite of what I eventually saw as the symmetry.

Then I was drawn to the possibility of a third set of synonyms! I saw that I could replace the A in STAFF with a U then once again add a Y. MUSTY = AIRLESS = STUFFY. (3D -- DREI was egging me on; replace the E with a T and add Y = DIRTY = UNCLEAN = GRIMY. Additionally, that 38D GEFILTE was fishy to me; so close to FILT[E/H.] With GEFILTE crossing it, 53A UNCLEAN was nearly literally "Covered with filth.")
Tried mightily for more, but couldn't stretch things far enough.

[femullen]

My 7-letter guess: TOO HARD