New York Times, Monday, April 11, 2016

RON:

Though not a great solver, I've been a puzzle enthusiast for a long time. Early in 2009 I discovered C.C.'s Crossword Corner blog, and by the end of the year I was a contributing blogger. I now post there two Wednesdays per month. A couple of years ago she invited me to work on a puzzle with her, and we've done a few collaborations since. She's been an inspiring and generous mentor to me and several other partners in puzzle construction.

I'm a retired Materials Engineering manager from a major car company. My lovely wife Gloria and I have 11 wonderful, talented grandchildren, and following their various activities help keep us busy.

I love word play of all kinds and occasionally amuse myself by writing haiku and limericks. My other love is music. I'm an active amateur musician, playing trombone in two local jazz bands, a concert band and a symphony orchestra. The jazz bands have been willing to play some music I wrote and arranged.

C.C.:

Will & Joel asked us to remove NLE (15A) from our original grid. They also felt that PHO/OTRA (24A/36D) crossing might be hard for a Monday grid. The puzzle was officially accepted on May 6, 2015. I had fun fiddling this grid with Ron. He's incredibly patient and creative.

Congrats to Ron on his NYT debut! I used to play trombone in various jazz bands, so it was fun to chat.

Neat to see C.C. work with so many folks — and she was recently honored by being chosen to write a puzzle for the ACPT! Quite an honor. Today, she and Ron give us "things with POCKETS," from CARGO / PANTS to a POOL TABLE to PITA BREAD and … a BOWLING LANE? I like to bowl every once in a while (I purposefully aim for the gutters, and I'm sticking to that story), but I had to look up what a bowling pocket was. It's that gap between adjacent pins, most notably between the one pin and the three pin, where many bowlers aim in order to increase their chances of a strike. Interesting!

I like the aesthetic of mirror layouts, and it's been neat to see C.C. use it quite often. It's a puzzle-saver in this case, because the themers don't fit within a usual pattern of symmetry: lengths of 10 / 10 / 10 and … 11 = constructor screech. It's great that CARGO PANTS splits into CARGO / PANTS 5/5, which makes mirror symmetry a real solution.

I also like how they put CARGO / PANTS in a prime location, helping it to stand out — I think it's so elegant if theme answers stand out on their own, rather than needing to be starred. In today's grid, ENCHILADAS and SOUR GRAPES are beautiful pieces of long fill, but they sure make the starring of the clues necessary. As much as I like those two entries, it might have been better to jigger the grid to shorten them, so the themers pop more.

I especially wanted that since C.C. tends to be so good with her mid-length fill. GO POOF, REAL ALE, SKI BAGS — that's really nice.

It would have been to get more diversity of "things with pockets," but all I could think of was my poor periodontal health, and gum pockets are kind of gross. So, given all the nice bonus fill along with STOA the only really fusty entry, a fun solve.