"Start In Fear" October 28, 2022

[arecibo]

Think of the clue as:

" 'Toys' for 'Tots', e.g. "

In a cryptic crossword, the clue would end in a "!" or "?" to call out its pun-ness.

[whimsy]

Did not see it, but I love it!
Just the kind of thing I get such a kick out of.

I was thinking of "Start in Fear" as possibly being the first two letters of Fear = FE = Iron, placed at the Start of the 5 words.
I wanted to make Flat Iron Steak, and was trying to get Iron Foundry out of FONT and Goudy.
I know, way too far-fetched and off-topic, but once I saw that Iron, it kept pulling me back in!

[Jace54]

I think the symmetry in this puzzle is amazing with finding matching lengths in “caressed” and “meringue”. How many other 8-letter words could add “boo” to the start and form another word?

The shorter words are probably more plentiful, such as “stir” could become “booster” with boo added to the start.

[Fogway]

I launched my hail mary from the boat, but it fell way short of the shore line.

Alas, 28A LEGS, 9A BUTT, and 35A TEASE led me to the wrong prefix, i.e., Strip-TEASE. "Pirouette pivot" for 8D TOE didn't help.

After that I couldn't get my mind out of that rabbit hole (or gutter)! BOO on me!

[Richard]

Aa a lifelong Philadelphia sports fan my brain is filled with Phillies in the World Series and undefeated Eagles. Plus I had some family obligations. I spent some time looking at it but found nothing. Glad I did not spend more time as I doubt if I would have gotten it had I spent days on it. Very nice and congrats to the solvers.

[Barney]

Looks like the closest I’ll get to the shore this week would be to rent a boatel, a word I was not previously familiar with.

🛳 🛥

UPDATE. I changed my rental request from boatel to bootel.

Way too scary for me!

[Merry Potter]

Aa a lifelong Philadelphia sports fan my brain is filled with Phillies in the World Series and undefeated Eagles. Plus I had some family obligations. I spent some time looking at it but found nothing. Glad I did not spend more time as I doubt if I would have gotten it had I spent days on it. Very nice and congrats to the solvers.

Not to mention the Philadelphia Union advancing to the MLS final cup by defeating NYC last night!

[VanVeen]

I think the symmetry in this puzzle is amazing with finding matching lengths in “caressed” and “meringue”. How many other 8-letter words could add “boo” to the start and form another word?

The shorter words are probably more plentiful, such as “stir” could become “booster” with boo added to the start.

“Tin ear” could become boutonnière. Maybe a bit of a stretch.

[femullen]

I was, as so often, dazzled by the first shiny object I saw, which was 13A, RAFE, immediately underneath 1A, a theme answer. RAFE is an anagram of FEAR, so what little time I had to spend on this over the weekend was misspent digging every rabbit hole I could think of using grid answers underneath theme answers.

The key, apparently, was to read "Start in Fear" and think "Boo," which I fear I didn't.

[pookie]

RE: #232 Post by zach » Mon Oct 31, 2022 4:18 am
"I got into a rabbit hole that I couldn’t get out of.
I thought “Start in Fear” alluded to the word “fear”..."
I thought the same thing, start in FEAR, the whole word.
There it was, 13A, RAFE! Word ladder?
Then 3D AFAR
19A AFRO
10 D unFOREseen. Wait, that won't count.
32D LEROy (this is not going to work, but I can't stop now)
28D LEARn (now it's getting ugly)
43A RALLy (reality check: this has NOTHING to do with the starred answers)
This wasn't the first attempt, either. I thought,
TEAK rhymes with SHRIEK!
FONT rhymes with HAUNT.
CARESSED ...POSESSED, DRESSED
Aw, never mind.
Big round of applause to all who solved this one!

[Inca]

So now I know....
I'm really mad at myself for missing this one!
SPEAR actually kept niggling at me. BOOMERANG is so much better an answer. HOWever, it *still* didn't trigger the BOO connection or the BOO MERINGUE connection. (It didn't help that in the beginning I was pronouncing the word MER IN GAY as in the dance )

I think it is a great meta; wish I had solved it

[MikeMillerwsj]

The contest answer is MASKS. If you put “boo” before each of the five starred answers and pronounce it, you get another word (TEAK/ BOUTIQUE, MERINGUE/BOOMERANG, TEASE/ BOOTEES, CARESSED/BUCHAREST, FONT/ BOUFFANT) that fits a clue for a different grid answer. The first letters of those answers, in grid order, spell the contest answer.

This one was brilliantly playful and a bit tougher (scarier?) than usual. We had 873 entries, with just about 60% correct, somewhat lower than usual. The request for a five-letter world related to Halloween narrowed the field, so we received lots of answers that fit that bill, starting with TREAT (131) and also including GHOST (39), SCARE (38), TRICK (27), WITCH (20), and many others.

Congrats to this week's winner: Catherine Kerr of Osterville, MA!

[Geezer Weezer]

I no longer think I'm cut out for this. The only puzzles I solve now are the occasional bunnies. I used to solve at least three out of four, now not even one in four. Are these getting harder, or am I just getting worse?

[Flying_Burrito]

I no longer think I'm cut out for this. The only puzzles I solve now are the occasional bunnies. I used to solve at least three out of four, now not even one in four. Are these getting harder, or am I just getting worse?

They got harder in the past couple of months, but that's where the beauty lies. The chase and the hunt are always more fun than the prey. That's why I do not fully comprehend the 8 pm Muggle call on Sunday since the answer is revealed only 4 hrs later. Different blokes, different strokes i guess

[ZooAnimalsOnWheels]

I think the symmetry in this puzzle is amazing with finding matching lengths in “caressed” and “meringue”. How many other 8-letter words could add “boo” to the start and form another word?

The shorter words are probably more plentiful, such as “stir” could become “booster” with boo added to the start.

Yeah, getting two eight-letter words was elegant. I was thinking "Zounds" would be fun, because it could change to "Boo-Zounds = Boozehounds", and there are so many synonyms for "drunks", the clue would not have looked out of place.

Did anyone else look for phobia prefixes after considering the title? I thought I might find "Acra", "Agora", etc somewhere, but nope!

[LadyBird]

I no longer think I'm cut out for this. The only puzzles I solve now are the occasional bunnies. I used to solve at least three out of four, now not even one in four. Are these getting harder, or am I just getting worse?

They got harder in the past couple of months, but that's where the beauty lies. The chase and the hunt are always more fun than the prey. That's why I do not fully comprehend the 8 pm Muggle call on Sunday since the answer is revealed only 4 hrs later. Different blokes, different strokes i guess

Here is my rationale for occasionally attending the Sunday Last Call. For me, the Friday ZooMuggle call is too soon--I haven't really had time to exhaust my resources. Because, if at all possible, I want to solve it on my own. If I haven't figured it out by Sunday night, then I am probably going to need help! The benefit of the call is that I can get at least some of the "AHA" moment, as I work through it based on the hints given. There is no possibility of an AHA if I just read the solution at midnight--or the next morning.

And I do think that they are getting harder--or I am getting dumber. I looked through my Meta spreadsheet on Thursday, just to re-acquaint myself with previous solutions. I noticed that last year, I had a 30+ solving streak. Now I'm lucky to get 4 in a row!

[Flying_Burrito]

Here is my rationale for occasionally attending the Sunday Last Call. For me, the Friday ZooMuggle call is too soon--I haven't really had time to exhaust my resources. Because, if at all possible, I want to solve it on my own. If I haven't figured it out by Sunday night, then I am probably going to need help! The benefit of the call is that I can get at least some of the "AHA" moment, as I work through it based on the hints given. There is no possibility of an AHA if I just read the solution at midnight--or the next morning.

And I do think that they are getting harder--or I am getting dumber. I looked through my Meta spreadsheet on Thursday, just to re-acquaint myself with previous solutions. I noticed that last year, I had a 30+ solving streak. Now I'm lucky to get 4 in a row!

In my book you are still one of the main SMEs on the forum LadyBird. My longest streak in the past 6 months has been 6. And in this one I was all over the map as i thought we had to change the first letters of the 5 clues to indicate fear. So Teak became Shriek (and I mapped that to letter S since there was a Perfect Pitch definition = Strike), Font became Haunt, Tease became Freeze etc. So now you are getting a taste of the level of insanity i free fall once I start creating my logic. And i started tracking hrs spent by meta this year and in 90% of the time that I did not solve in the first hr I was unsuccessful. Sysyphus is a rookie compared to me...

[Susan Goldberg]

I no longer think I'm cut out for this. The only puzzles I solve now are the occasional bunnies. I used to solve at least three out of four, now not even one in four. Are these getting harder, or am I just getting worse?

They got harder in the past couple of months, but that's where the beauty lies. The chase and the hunt are always more fun than the prey. That's why I do not fully comprehend the 8 pm Muggle call on Sunday since the answer is revealed only 4 hrs later. Different blokes, different strokes i guess

Here is my rationale for occasionally attending the Sunday Last Call. For me, the Friday ZooMuggle call is too soon--I haven't really had time to exhaust my resources. Because, if at all possible, I want to solve it on my own. If I haven't figured it out by Sunday night, then I am probably going to need help! The benefit of the call is that I can get at least some of the "AHA" moment, as I work through it based on the hints given. There is no possibility of an AHA if I just read the solution at midnight--or the next morning.

And I do think that they are getting harder--or I am getting dumber. I looked through my Meta spreadsheet on Thursday, just to re-acquaint myself with previous solutions. I noticed that last year, I had a 30+ solving streak. Now I'm lucky to get 4 in a row!

Agree on all counts Lady Bird!

[LadyBird]

They got harder in the past couple of months, but that's where the beauty lies. The chase and the hunt are always more fun than the prey. That's why I do not fully comprehend the 8 pm Muggle call on Sunday since the answer is revealed only 4 hrs later. Different blokes, different strokes i guess

Here is my rationale for occasionally attending the Sunday Last Call. For me, the Friday ZooMuggle call is too soon--I haven't really had time to exhaust my resources. Because, if at all possible, I want to solve it on my own. If I haven't figured it out by Sunday night, then I am probably going to need help! The benefit of the call is that I can get at least some of the "AHA" moment, as I work through it based on the hints given. There is no possibility of an AHA if I just read the solution at midnight--or the next morning.

And I do think that they are getting harder--or I am getting dumber. I looked through my Meta spreadsheet on Thursday, just to re-acquaint myself with previous solutions. I noticed that last year, I had a 30+ solving streak. Now I'm lucky to get 4 in a row!

Agree on all counts Lady Bird!

I hope that you aren't agreeing, though, that I am getting dumber!

[Kas]

Frankly, I just have to say,
That this one left me in dismay.
Oh sure, it said to "Start in Fear,"
but that's the norm for Metas here.
I get the grid, I get my pen,
I sit my butt down in the den...
Then yep: The nerves kick in for sure,
for my puzzle discomfiture.
(Oh well, it's just par for the course--
...my solving stats could not be worse.)

xox,
Kas