New York Times, Saturday, February 1, 2014

I wrote this puzzle a long time ago, and looking back, there are some things I don't like about it — all the you-know-it-or-you-don't proper names in the bottom left and the roll-your-own EX-MET — but there's still a lot of stuff I'm happy with, especially the top and bottom stacks. I'm hoping that the puzzle will introduce some solvers to the works of Emil Nolde (who makes an appearance sometimes as a clue for EMIL). I especially like his woodcut The Prophet.

This puzzle by Canadian Will Nediger has a lot of fine vocabulary. My favorite entries, besides BARBARA BUSH at 1A, are YOUR MAJESTY, OLIVE GARDEN, HAM OMELET, ERICA KANE, ALARM BELL, BETAMAX, FLEX-TIMER, L.A. LAKER, ERIK SATIE, and WE DID IT. And hardly anything undesirable. That's expert puzzle-making!

Fun workout today. And written BY A CANADIAN!

*ducking from hockey stick thrown by Jeffrey Krasnick*

No need to get rough, eh? Nice change of pace today, more loaded on the proper names and trivia than a typical Saturday. These types of puzzles tend to either hit or miss depending on the solver's knowledge base, and it was a tale of two halves for me. The right half flew by because I've forced myself to learn ERIK SATIE through crossword construction (look at all those common letters with vowel-consonant alternation!), and the straightforward clue for the devil-spawn LA LAKERs made it easy to plunk down. But for non-crossword constructors / fanatical haters of the purple and gold menace to humanity's very foundation, it was a really good thing that all the crossing answers don't depend on such specific knowledge.

Trivia is so subjective. I'm sure many solvers will grumble at EQUIVALENCE and AQABA, complaining that these are esoteric bits that no one should have to know. But as a former mechanical engineer, the watts and volt-amperes EQUIVALENCE made me smile, as did remembering the amazing scene of AQABA in "Lawrence of Arabia." High thumbs-up for me, but I can understand how others will disagree.

The left half was much tougher for me, not knowing ERIKA KANE, MARLENE, EMIL NOLDE, or MADONNA with its tough Parmagianino-related clue. It does strike me as a fair area, given that the names are all drawn from disparate disciplines (not having multiple clues requiring concentrated knowledge about Dungeons and Dragons +1 Swords of Justice or something), but it certainly highlighted several deficiencies in my knowledge base. My personal perfect storm? Perhaps.

In general, I prefer more of a mixing of many different types of clue/answer pairs, proper names and trivia being diluted with a good array of wordplay type clues/answers. For example, it would have been great to have more of the "Sky boxes?" / KITES type clue/answer pairs in that left section. I learned a lot today, looking up quite a few entries after I finished.