MEOW #217 Along For The Ride / Two's Company

[MatthewL]

Cat has been re-released (with much less effort). Thanks for the bonus puzzle, Ben!

[KayW]

No apologies necessary, Ben. But I'll never turn up my nose at another puzzle...
Cat is out again!

Thanks for twice the fun!

[Dave C]

The cat is out of the bag in the apology meta. I like the format of these puzzles.

[woozy]

working on the bonus. Whoa! Thanks. Should point out for the purpose of the first puzzle: If you are solving on line at the link Ben gave you can enter rebuses (rebi?) by using the ESC key. I had a lot of trouble with that on the first puzzle.

Done with the bonus. Awesome. Love it.

[HeadinHome]

Grid about as hard as the last one (though at least I knew what was up) — but figuring out where that other thing was happening was easier, and the meta - though it took a second - was satisfying. Thanks for this make-up gift; you really didn’t have to! ( :

[benchen71]

Here's the first batch of those who successfully solved the bonus apology meta:

Berto
hoover
edestlin
LarsCaine
MatthewL
KayW
Dave C
markhr
Cinny
HeadinHome
woozy
CPJohnson

We start with 12! There's less time for this one: I'll do the answer reveal around the time this week's MOAT comes out...

[ELSavage]

I didn't get a chance at the first one, but I accepted the apology challenge and let that cat out of the bag.
Thanks for an interesting variation.

[ajk]

Got this one too, and even almost completed the grid. Thanks for the bonus.

[benchen71]

Four more solvers for the apology meta:

Serafin
whimsy
ELSavage
ajk

That's a total of 16. And now for the answer...

[benchen71]

Here's the solution to the apology meta "Two's Company":

While it was not planned this way, the end result of this double MEOW meta came out really cool! Essentially, just like the two characters in "The Odd Couple", the first meta ("Along For The Ride") had an extremely messy meta mechanism. It was solvable, but it was still a bit of a nightmare. By contrast, the second meta ("Two's Company") had a beautifully neat meta mechanism. Together, these two metas really were THE ODD COUPLE!

[DrTom]

Wow, although I finally got the answer (logic and what I did manage to find) I never got to the end the right way. I had LIVE_ _ ADD which I SHOULD have seen could be LIVENUP and a double D (for some inexplicable reason PUN never came to me, guess I must have used them all up?). It was really a neat mechanism, though I have ot say I go a little swirly trying to keep the rows/bands straight.

Thanks for the puzzle(s) Ben

[DrTom]

Oh, and us "seasoned" people do NOT see THAT Odd Couple when we think of the Odd Couple we see either this:

or this:

[whimsy]

I quit the first puzzle when I found out that the cats in the bag were rather mean and nasty.
Good thing! -- If I had let them out they might have gone straight for the Coo Coo Pigeon Sisters!

Thanks for all the puzzles you come up with, Ben!