MEOW #210 Do I Hear Water

[Qmark]

Cat's out...thanks DrTom!

[woozy]

DELIGHTFUL! We have a mini-Tsunami of solvers:

1 markhr 

....
12 woozy
....

Still waiting for others to get their feet wet!

Day 1:

....
23 woozy 
...

Twenty-eight solvers let the cat out so it could find the source fo that water. Thanks to all!

Cool! I'm on the leaderboard twice!

[Serafin]

Only just got around to the meta. Great puzzle Tom! Cat is out of the bag.

[DrTom]

Cool! I'm on the leaderboard twice!

Whoops! Well maybe you should be, you have the most posts!

Actually this comes from me seeing your original post where you said the cat was still IN the bag and misreading it, then doing my usual Crosshare "sweep" later on.

So my solve number drops by one.

[DrTom]

OK,posting the updated solvers list (and removing duplicates):

28 Dave C 
29 Dickie Dunn 
30 ChrisKochmanski
31 phenomist 
32 Qmark 
33 Schmeel 
34 mateo
35 Serafin

That's a pretty respectable number, but I'm going to try to bump it with some nudges!

[DrTom]

NUDGES:


Everyone tires of hearing this, but look to the Title. Obviously there is going to be some tie-in to water in the meta.

Although at times I cannot manage, in general I always try to be symmetrical with my theme answers.

39A is a rather obvious "nudge" clue - what might you add, or might have been added, if it is a crossword puzzle that contains a meta and you are looking to make an answer?

Constructors often try to make the first clue be meta related. Given 39A can you see how it might be?

Similarly, we often try to make the LAST clue meta, though in this case it might not be as familiar as 1A.

The meta answer is six letters long.

[hoover]

Cat was nudged out of the bag!
@HeadinHome , @woozy I left some comments for you on Crosshare.

[DrTom]

Well we are down to a trickle...but I can still hear it!

36 hoover 
37 Avlan 
38 andeux 
39 Pair O Ducks 

OK, maybe one more BIG nudge will help...

I toyed with the idea of making the meta answer FLOWER just because I have been tricked so many times by that (i.e. French flower = Seine) but I had a heck of a time trying to find a body of water I could add an O to to change it to a different word

[DrTom]

No new solvers to report, the WSJ seems to have a lot of people trying to swim to shore so maybe some more tomorrow.

[DrTom]

Son of a gun, one new solver:

40 TEngstrom

I like even numbers, 40 is a great response.

[ELSavage]

No cat left behind - not this week anyway.
Finally had a chance to go back and get the poor cat out of that wet paper bag.

[DrTom]

The cat said you were soak kind, course he has never been accused of dry humor.

T

[DrTom]

One last solver seeps through:

41 ELSavage

Thanks to all!

[DrTom]

THE REVEAL:

There was some concern that the bodies of water were not very common. Of course all that depends on your familiarity with other bodies of water. I personally have heard of a WASH (or WADI) and a LICK. I had not heard of a SEEP, but the symmetry should have led you to that one even if you never heard of it. I had included "water" or some reference to water (soaked in 17A) in ALL clues that had to do with the mechanism, including 39A. I knew no other way to get that "nudge" across without referencing adding "something" to water. If that confused people and gave anyone a FAULCET answer, I apologize. People said a BEND was a body of water, like Great Bend or River Bend, but I checked and it is not listed as a body of water, a feature of a river perhaps but not a body of water. Therefore FAULCET could not have been right.

It seemed to be a well received puzzle, garnering 41 solvers and some really nice comments. Thanks to all who gave it a try.

[DrTom]

Well son of a gun somebody else gave it a whirl late this evening:

42 Susan

Thank you Susan, I am moist happy you made it under the wire.

[ajk]

Continuing my trip back in time, since I can't get past step 1 of this week's MEOW. Needed the push on this one, but got there eventually. Thanks.