New York Times, Wednesday, February 14, 2018

This puzzle was originally submitted in December 2016 as a 17x diagramless submission. Will surprised me writing:

"Oddly enough, I think this would work better for the regular paper than as a diagramless. As a diagramless the grid is too chunky — too difficult, I think. As a 69-word regular crossword, this could work as a daily.

However, to run as a daily, the puzzle would have to meet themeless standards, and this grid has a lot of unappealing vocabulary. ...

This doesn't look like an easy grid to fill. But if somehow you can improve the vocabulary, I'd be happy to take another look."

After many go-rounds on a very slow, old laptop I managed to come up with a more cleanly filled grid that Will was pleased with except for the upper right corner. A big thank you to Frank Longo who smoothed out the top of the grid and to Will for his patience.

I hope you enjoyed the puzzle. From my heart to yours.

ML got in touch with me last year, asking if I'd help redo this grid, but the concept didn't resonate. Maybe I just don't appreciate VDay? Or the themers felt too overt, not playful? Or I couldn't get past the asymmetry?

I counterproposed a mini-theme that would run as a (mirror symmetry) themeless the Friday before VDay, with something like BOXING GLOVES / GARLIC CLOVES / THE ARTS. But Will felt that was too subtle.

What about a heart-shaped grid with LOVE TRUMPS HATE down the middle? Too political. Good point!

So, it just wasn't for me, and I passed. But I can see how VDay fanatics could dig what's going on, HEARTSTRINGS / CUPIDS ARROWS / SAINT VALENTINE forming a loose VDay theme. I would have preferred something tighter for a themed puzzle though; a stronger connection between the three themers. Not just "stuff related to VDay."

Mostly solid gridwork though, snappy entries in GO ON A SPREE, STATE SENATORS, ROTISSERIE, NEVERLAND, even BOATYARD, SO AND SOS and MARION ROSS (hands up for a childhood crush on Mrs. C?).

I don't mind a bit of EEO and TAS — I used to see EEO all the time when I was hiring for our startup way back when, and I had plenty of TAS even further back.

TIRO and TWPS are much, much more egregious to me, though. Not just TYRO, but a variant of it? Yikes! And TWPS is … twerps? TW Power Services of Australia? It's "townships"?

Huh.

And DINGE. Dingy, sure. But DINGE sticks out like some dinge on the puzzle.

I think the compromises to get the themeless-like feel to the puzzle were okay overall, but oof, did those three bits jar me out of my solve.

I still have a lot of trouble getting past the lack of symmetry inside the puzzle. The annoyingly OCD constructor inside me wants some reason for it, like Joe Krozel's clever BROKEN HEART concept. But I can appreciate the novelty of the puzzle, as well as the heartfelt sentiment from ML.