New York Times, Tuesday, December 3, 2013

This is my second NYT puzzle, but it's been since 2009 since the first. This really simple little puzzle really took a lot of practice to achieve, mostly in favorable grid design, but I've been building word lists and applying theory like maximizing the freshness of my long non-theme entries. TALLINTHESADDLE was actually the seed of this puzzle that didn't persist because, unlike the present set of five, the theme word in the idiom is at the end and it doesn't change meaning from riding gear.

I really wanted to use ALLHOPE instead of AIRHOSE in the triple-crosser central entry. Fancying myself as a bit of classicist, I felt freshness in this entry that has been around for thousands of years. I thought my clue of ("It should be abandoned by "ye who enter here") made it stronger. In retrospect, I agree it's not recognizable or strong enough to warrant a seven-letter partial phrase. My initial grid also had IATRO and PDR in it. As a physician, these seemed to me to be "in the language." My wife tells me "not so much." This has always been a stumbling point for me — recognizing that just because I love it doesn't mean anyone else will.

It was great to be allowed input in the editing process by Will. In a couple of volleys, he expertly nixed the above as well as the foul fill PTL and BCS. BCS allowed HOTCHICKS instead of TOOTHACHE, but so goes the reality of crossword construction.

It's not often that a Tuesday puzzle surprises me, but here's one that did! Because it must be relatively easy, often times a Tuesday theme must be so out in the open or have a straightforward revealer, but not today. I really appreciated having to sit back and figure out what tied the theme together; perfect example of a puzzle that's better off for not having a revealer. Puzzle mogul Henry Hook sometimes calls to oust the tyranny of the revealer, saying that solvers are too smart for such blatant overtness, and thus in some circles, a revealer is also known as a ... (ahem) "Hooker". Today is Henry's day! Henry, I'm buying drinks if I ever have the pleasure of meeting up with you, you delightful curmudgeon*.

What I liked best about this puzzle was that Phil hid the horse-related terms in plain sight. CROP CIRCLES is a great entry in itself, for example, and has nothing to do with a riding crop. Beautiful. The others followed suit well, although I can't speak to SADDLESHOES as my knowledge of fashion couldn't fill a buckminsterfullerene molecule.

I have a feeling we'll get the usual listing of crosswordese in the blogosphere today, and some entries are decidedly inelegant. As much as I love BEBOP**, BSA over OER over PTS is not pretty, for example. But while some will denounce DOBRO, I find it to be an interesting entry. No, I didn't know it even though I was and continue to be an unabashedly proud band geek, but the crosses were fair and I enjoyed looking it up; learning about something I might try playing one day.

I'll point out one more thing I thought Phil did well: he gave us some interesting 6-letter fill in the north and south sections. Often a stack of 6's like this suffers because it's that much harder to cleanly fill stacks of 6's than 5's. IN OIL feels slightly partialish in the north, and the N or Norris makes an unfortunate CTN, but overall, I imagine Phil spent a bit of time smoothing these sections out, polishing them up to where they stand.

Overall, nice hidden theme and some really good long fill; a few compromises along the way.

*If you haven't read Matt Gaffney's book on crosswords, "Gridlock", it needs to go on your To Be Read (TBR) pile. Great overview on crosswords including a nice story about Henry.

**If you haven't read Miles Davis's autobiography, it also has to go on your TBR pile, just as long as you don't mind every other word being the F-bomb and the remaining words being variants of %$#^! and %#$^*%