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BEST CAT EVER.

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This entire meta, from incipiency to grid to clues, took about 4.5 to 5 hours, all in a less than within a 16-hour period that included some semblance of sleep. I'll explain later what went on, haha.

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72. Of Course!

The answer to the meta is an 18-letter phrase.

Later deadline is Sunday, October 22 at 1 pm ET.

Good luck, and may all your solves be beautiful!

Mikey G

Is that cat's name Ada?

oldjudge wrote: ↑Sat Oct 14, 2023 1:06 pm Is that cat's name Ada?

No, but today, she Ada salmon treat (or three).

Also: note the larger grid necessitated attachments to the full-page PDF with a larger puzzle and clues. This is just for your convenience and is not meta-related.

Solved! Thank you, I enjoyed it! Not in my wheelhouse but I seemed to go in the right directions on this one.

Solved. Thanks, Mikey. In retrospect, the steps were quite logical, even though I got totally stuck halfway through.

Got it. Thanks Mikey.

Solved!

SamKat9 wrote: ↑Sat Oct 14, 2023 8:04 pm Solved! Thank you, I enjoyed it! Not in my wheelhouse but I seemed to go in the right directions on this one.

This was also not in my wheelhouse and I made the puzzle, haha.

Didn't mention earlier, but this will be somewhere in the neighborhood of Level 2.5 - 3.5. Your mileage may vary!

Mikey G

Solved - that was fun!

Of course I loved it! (Also not my wheelhouse, but still very gettable.)

Back from visiting grandkids and luckily I saw the path pretty quickly. Really a fun puzzle---thanks Mikey!

GGGGGot it! That’s GGGGG as in GGGGGraczyk. Much fun, Thanks, Mikey!

ChrisKochmanski wrote: ↑Sun Oct 15, 2023 2:26 pm GGGGGot it! That’s GGGGG as in GGGGGraczyk. Much fun, Thanks, Mikey!

Though it's on my byline every time, it's still surreal to see my name on the screen like that! (It rhymes with "basic" for all wondering, haha.)

Got it! Nice aha moment. Thanks, Mikey!

Solved! A great puzzle!

One of your best puzzles so far, @MikeyG! Loved it!

Darth wrote: ↑Sun Oct 15, 2023 10:08 pm One of your best puzzles so far, @MikeyG! Loved it!

I knew staying up until 4 am was a good idea!

20 solves so far, so a good start! A nice, solid Level 3, I'm projecting.

So, in case everyone's wondering, "What in the world went on with this puzzle?," here's a journey inside the process. (Obviously, no spoilers, since this puzzle is still live!)

A meta completely different than this was slated for #72. The general idea for a meta is made a few months in advance, though I don't think I have nearly as much of a backlog as @benchen71! I have a few ideas here and there that ping-pong back and forth in my mind, and I have a spreadsheet to keep track of some of my random thoughts.

Anyway, I was up at 1 am late Friday (early Saturday), ready to make the finalizing touches on my edits. And then something hit me, and here it is.

The prompt for the meta originally slated involved the word "mathematics."

At first, you might be like, "So?" or you might wonder if I wanted to be a kind creator and not have you wade into my mathematical mind (no, someday you will), but that wasn't the issue. Though unrelated, though a complete coincidence, the somewhat challenging WSJ whose deadline just passed (why I had to wait to share) had an answer of MATHEMATICS.

Now, this is a much smaller endeavor, I get that - but I felt to do that with a somewhat challenging conundrum still in play was a bit unfair. It might have not - probably would have not - mattered in the end, but I didn't want to take that chance.

So, at 1:15 am Saturday, I realized, "I have no meta ready to go." There are some in the till slated in the future, but I didn't want to disrupt my schedule and didn't want to bring one out yet without ruminating on it, so what would be better than...creating an entire meta from scratch in a short amount of time.

Believe it or not, I thought I might have a chance to pull this off by noon central (that's my time zone, but I slate things in ET). Here's a non-spoilery journey of what went down (after all, this meta is still in process!!).

1:15 am. Uh-oh, thought activated.

1:30 am. Surprisingly, I had an idea pretty quickly! Not sure how it came, but it did (and it's the one that eventually went live). Start working on metanism.

2:15 am. Metanism basically finished for the most part - time for the grid!

2:45 am. About halfway through the grid, definitely making some concessions: I would've liked to make this grid slightly smaller, and we're clocking in at a very less-than-ideal 21% black square rate (I like that 18% at the max).

3:45 am. I think the grid was finished right around this time. Sleep was calling - there was no way I could clue anything. To bed I go.

4:15 am. Finally got to sleep. Visions of crosswords danced in his head.

10:15 am. Wake up - definitely feel that I only got six hours or so. The goal would be to clue a puzzle (a bigger-than-usual one, mind you) and get all the technical things squared away, which usually takes 45 minutes.

11:00 am. I was absolutely blitzing over the past 45 minutes, especially with my jazz music in the background. I got through all the across entries and about half of the downs (leading to a more casual cluing, which perhaps made some of the solving easier). But I would still need to complete the downs, edit the clues, go over the meta-nism, and get all the technical stuff done. Alas, it was not to be.

12:00 pm. With no warning at all (whoops), I posted the delay. This delay could have just been an hour or two; however...

1:00 pm. Small family get-together, previously scheduled. I anticipated it ending around 4 pm or so (I was correct), so...

4:30 pm. Rapid-fire: clue the rest of the downs! (This made me realize that had I had about 30 extra minutes earlier, I may have been able to get this in at the original deadline).

5:00 pm. Cluing finished - just one hour to go!

6:00 pm. All technical edits finalized and the puzzle (with its dad jokes) was sent out to the world!

In retrospect, all things considered, the puzzle turned out better than I would have hoped for! A little chaos is good at times, I suppose.

Keep on solving all the puzzles you can get your hands on!

Mikey G

That really interesting, Mikey. Thanks for the look behind the curtain.

Solved! What a great puzzle (once you see the metanism)! Thanks for the adventure, Mikey.