"Interior Design" January 13, 2023

[Joe Ross]

[mlvilv]

well I was sort of close. I was looking for something either bw the first two letters (C, G) or bw the last and first letter (K, G) in each clue. But I was looking for a clue answer having those. Even if I had figured out that it was the alphabet letters I certainly wouldn't have known Stu/Ringo or KLM/TWA so I was ultimately doomed. Onto next week!

[chriscross]

Even if I had figured out that it was the alphabet letters I certainly wouldn't have known Stu/Ringo or KLM/TWA so I was ultimately doomed. Onto next week!

Wait - I had to google KLM and STU to identify the clues they belonged with. Does etiquette dictate I shouldn't have submitted? I am used to puzzle hunt type puzzles where creators often expect you to use the internet to search trivia, but I can see how in a crossword setting that same expectation wouldn't apply.

[MajordomoTom]

DNF, hung over in the ship's bar ... at least, it looks like a ship's bar

[JRS51]

Never in a million years! Kaz 5 all the way.

I got deeply stuck in the mire after seeing "ELS" in the center of the grid, sure that it was a hint. "Look at the Ls!" it seemed to scream.

I tried all manner of manipulating the Ls - letters above and below and beside, boggle-style L shapes, other instances of EL in the grid, replacing Ls, and on and on. All to no avail.

Ah wELl.

It was the same for me, highlighting the Ls, looking for a pattern with them, etc. Also there seemed to be a lot of patterns with diagonal and adjacent groups of vowels. Probably true of most crosswords but I was hopeful one of these patterns would be the interior”design.”

[sharkicicles]

Even if I had figured out that it was the alphabet letters I certainly wouldn't have known Stu/Ringo or KLM/TWA so I was ultimately doomed. Onto next week!

Wait - I had to google KLM and STU to identify the clues they belonged with. Does etiquette dictate I shouldn't have submitted? I am used to puzzle hunt type puzzles where creators often expect you to use the internet to search trivia, but I can see how in a crossword setting that same expectation wouldn't apply.

Googling is not only a good idea... it's the law. Or at least standard procedure for metas.

[mattythewsjpuzzler]

Even if I had figured out that it was the alphabet letters I certainly wouldn't have known Stu/Ringo or KLM/TWA so I was ultimately doomed. Onto next week!

Wait - I had to google KLM and STU to identify the clues they belonged with. Does etiquette dictate I shouldn't have submitted? I am used to puzzle hunt type puzzles where creators often expect you to use the internet to search trivia, but I can see how in a crossword setting that same expectation wouldn't apply.

Googling is not only a good idea... it's the law. Or at least standard procedure for metas.

We call him Mr. G

[sharkicicles]

For you on the Sunday night call, for the record STU was one of the easier ones for me. KLM was harder. But I don’t fly much. 44 years old and I know a lot of folks my age are big Beatles fans.

[TMart]

For all you Beatles fans, here’s a blast from the past:

https://www.xword-muggles.com/viewtopic.php?t=537

[woozy]

I assume nobody noticed the opera TOSCA was in the clue "'It happened one nighT' OSCAr winner"? That inspired me to create a puzzle. It says something that I found it easier to create a new puzzle than to solve this puzzle.

[BarbaraK]

That was one of my 'five theme answers, five different metanisms' theory

CLARKGABLE - clue hides "Tosca" - note tie in to 47D OPERA and 49D ARIA
GLASSJAR - OK, I didn't really have anything good for this one
JAWAHARLALNEHRU - contains grid entry HALAL with an extra R
MARCOPOLO - last word of clue "Pool" is an anagram of the last word of the entry
RIFTVALLEY - alternate letters are ITALY - another call back to the La Scala opera clues

[JJD]

Never in a million years! Kaz 5 all the way.

I got deeply stuck in the mire after seeing "ELS" in the center of the grid, sure that it was a hint. "Look at the Ls!" it seemed to scream.

I tried all manner of manipulating the Ls - letters above and below and beside, boggle-style L shapes, other instances of EL in the grid, replacing Ls, and on and on. All to no avail.

Ah wELl.

Yes, and an ELL is often a grid entry related to architecture/design!

[M and M]

I got deeply stuck in the mire after seeing "ELS" in the center of the grid, sure that it was a hint. "Look at the Ls!" it seemed to scream.

I tried all manner of manipulating the Ls - letters above and below and beside, boggle-style L shapes, other instances of EL in the grid, replacing Ls, and on and on. All to no avail.

Ah wELl. ;0



Yup, the L thing is my rabbit hole. (I went down a lot of them but the ELS across the middle of the puzzle was my favorite). I took one step not mentioned so far - I actually drew lines between all the Ls, starting with the answer labeled 1 and proceeding in order (moving sideways when there were two Ls in the grid answer.) This produced an ARROW (five letters) and it was a nice design in the interior of the puzzle but... the more I looked at the arrow, the more I thought, "That's not an arrow. That's just an indescibable hieroglyphic." I tilted my head every which way but the more I looked, the less of an arrow it was, so I finally gave up and went off after some other rabbit. I'm glad to meet my fellow L team members. We may have been wrong, but we were ELegant.

[Scott M]

I too fell into the ELS rabbit hole. Counted the L's in each theme answer, looked for words in the shape of L's, looked at the letters surrounding the L's, looked at words containing EL's - NOBEL, ANGEL, KTEL, ELY, ELSA, BELA. Too many to be a coincidence, right?

I also spent a lot of time looking at the clues for something related to the theme answers. Found "Casual greeting"/CLARK GABLE and "Miami paper"/MARCO POLO, but the trail dried up from there. .

[Kas]

A Kas 5, for sure,
Without even a doubt.
Not even with a clue,
(and surely not without).
I never had a shot,
Yep, was wholly out to sea.
So this week, the ship's cantina
Features both Isaac and me!

[mheberlingx100]

I seemed to recall a past puzzle where finding the meta was dependent on the letters between the first letters of two word answers. Doubt I would have seen it if I hadn’t remembered that from an earlier puzzle.

Anyone recall the earlier puzzle?

[Cbburns]

I’d like to know the stats on this one! How many successful solves and how many submitted? As for me, I was totally blown away!

[BarbaraK]

I’d like to know the stats on this one! How many successful solves and how many submitted? As for me, I was totally blown away!

Stay tuned. Mike Miller (of WSJ) will be here later today or tomorrow with that info.

[Ergcat]

I seemed to recall a past puzzle where finding the meta was dependent on the letters between the first letters of two word answers. Doubt I would have seen it if I hadn’t remembered that from an earlier puzzle.

Anyone recall the earlier puzzle?

There was “Inner Turmoil” April 8, 2022

[MikeMillerwsj]

The contest answer is HEART. The letters alphabetically separating the initials of the five theme answers (CDEFG for CLARK GABLE; GHIJ for GLASS JARS; JKLMN for JAWAHARLAL NEHRU; MNOP for MARCO POLO; RSTUV for RIFT VALLEY) give an alternate answer for another answer’s clue: DEF for ETYM; HI for AHOY; KLM for TWA; NO for HARDLY; and STU for RINGO. The first letters of those answers, taken in order of the parenthetical numbers in the theme clues, spell the contest answer.

This was a very tough one! We got part-way down the black-diamond path at puzzle HQ but not all the way. We had just 425 entries, quite a bit lower than usual, with about 70% correct. Other guesses included DECOR (41), STYLE (9), MASON (2), THEME (2), and a handful of others.

Still waiting to confirm our winner so stay tuned...