XWord Muggles Forum

MikeyG wrote: ↑Thu Dec 28, 2023 4:24 pm My goal before 2024 is to catch-up on year-end metas, even those past the deadlines. (@benchen71, you might get a video of my solving three or four of yours in a row, haha).

I can't wait to see that video!!!

Solved with a couple of nudges. A mistake in a grid answer messed me up. Thanks, Mikey. Great meta - as usual!

Guess what I forgot to do? Send out the e-mail (eep!). If you're on it, that's fine - you may have already solved! But I always do that, and it got away from me somehow (must've been the eggnog).

As a result, I'm extending this deadline until Thursday, January 4 at 1 pm ET, with meta #78 dropping two days later (first of the new year!).

Back I go to the new MGWCC (looks like a doozy) - see you soon!

Mikey G

MikeyG wrote: ↑Tue Dec 26, 2023 11:22 pm Yeah, I probably underestimated this one as well, haha (hence the Week 1/2 rule coming for next year!).

Nudge time!

1. There are five "desserts" hiding in the grid...

2. ...and those desserts are of the pie variety!

3. If you don't already have all five, find them! When you do, look at the center entry, which I did say is relevant to the meta.

4. Hmmm, how would five words be multiplied together? Maybe it's not the words themselves...

5. ...but the...well, I'll leave that up to you! What do you think we need to times to get the final 6-character answer?

I was a little coy at the end, but hopefully, that'll be enough to get you where you need to go! Several had an interesting epiphany with this one or kind of "stumbled" upon the solution. It's fun when those moments happen!

Mikey G

You may not have underestimated. With the holidays many like me may not have seen it until the email yesterday.

finally got a chance to look at the nudges and complete the meta...needed the first 4 to solve...wow! thanks Mikey!

Puzzle #77 answer: 123123

Correct entries: 42



Five clues are coded not as the entry themselves but as the PIE connected to them (also per 38-D): HUMBLE, POT, TACO, OREO, and MAG. Some, like TACO and OREO, actually make some sense, but some are far more tenuous (HUMBLE and POT) and one is nonsensical (a MAG is not a chatterbox...but a MAGPIE is!).

Per the central entry TIMES, take the clue numbers of these five pies and multiply them together: 3 x 7 x 11 x 13 x 41 = 123123, the 6-character answer to the meta. Note this reinforces the other "Easy as..." phrase ("Easy as 123") and, as a bonus for our American friends, we can parse this as 12/31/23, which was the final day of 2023!

See you in '24, which is already here, of course!

Mikey G