New York Times, Thursday, May 19, 2016

When I retired from McGill University, where I had held academic and administrative positions for almost 40 years, I set myself a goal of having a crossword puzzle published in the Sunday NYT. I had never constructed a puzzle before, so as you might expect, my first two efforts at Sunday puzzles didn't make the grade. But crossword construction was as engaging as I had anticipated, and, although I switched to weekday puzzles, I didn't let multiple rejections otherwise deter me. My lucky 13th submission got the nod from Will, as did my 14th, which is the one appearing today.

As a solver, I like the gradual reveal of humorous crossword quips and the change they offer from standard puzzles. I came up with the idea for today's quip while reading a list of cooking metaphors. It took quite a while to get the language right, but I knew I had it when I laughed out loud at my own joke. Unfortunately, the 67-character quip seriously constrained the fill, so compromises led to more names in the puzzle than I would have preferred.

I have to thank Will and Joel for their enormous help and seemingly endless patience. Although they enjoyed my humor, my initial submission was far from acceptable. Many entries fell short, and the middle line of the quip was off-center, a departure from crossword-theme symmetry that was a show stopper. I revised both the grid and the entries — twice. Finally, I submitted two alternatives and, with changes suggested by Joel, we settled on a grid, which I then clued. Given other constructors' comments, I wasn't surprised that quite a number of my clues were changed, in several cases making them more contemporary, but I was pleased that some of them survived and I'm delighted to see my first puzzle in the NYT — my first puzzle published anywhere.

This whole process has convinced me that retirement is a great stage in life for starting something new. It affords the time to develop and hone novel skills, so I'm still hopeful that I will eventually see one of my puzzles in the Sunday NYT.

Debut! Morton gives a punny quip, playing on the word PRIME. Nice to tie together a few bits of police slang, the suspect knowing he was COOKED (had been found out) after getting GRILLED (questioned). The link between PRIME SUSPECT and prime rib is a bit tenuous for my taste, but as a whole, it works all right.

I'm really impressed by Morton's execution. Working with four grid-spanners (15-letter entries) is tough enough, causing many places where you have to deal with two or more themers. When you throw in a fifth themer, it gets even harder.

Usually I would expect most any constructor to have trouble at the ends of grid-spanners, for example where you have to fill around the beginnings and endings of THE PRIME SUSPECT / KNEW HE WAS COOKED. Today's grid is so tough in those spots — you have to fill three adjacent 7-letter slots, all running vertically through those themers.

I had to do a double-take, amazed that Morton was able to skate by with just minor stuff in the four corners. Only STET, PEE, LAN = very impressive. And the fill is not just passable or neutral, either. There's some nice DOTTED I, HEAVE TO, ACT LIKE, AVENGER entries. Well done.

Quip puzzles have to make me laugh out loud or really think in order to make up for their raw difficulty — so tough when you're basically solving a puzzle with only the down clues — but I was impressed with Morton's construction. Extremely impressive for a first time out of the gate.