Aaron M. Rosenberg author page

★ Such creative thinking! Constructors have been playing upon magazine titles for decades, but it's been a long time since I've seen an angle as this fresh. Not just plunking in magazine titles, but coming up with phrases that all mean "no more of that magazine available"? I love the out-of-the-box notion.

OUT OF SHAPE is perfect. Not only is it a fine phrase in everyday use, but it says, "We don't have any more Shape issues available," to a tee. LACKING VARIETY is also strong, although the phrase itself isn't one I would strive to use in a themeless crossword, as it lacks a little spice. Ha!

Why ha?

Because variety is the spice of life?

It's a good thing that Aaron made this one, not me.

MISSING OUT is also strong, but it, unfortunately, duplicates OUT in OUT OF SHAPE. It would have been great to separate these more. Starting and ending with OUT OF SHAPE / MISSING OUT would have helped it not be so noticeable.

That reordering would have made gridding more difficult, though, as Aaron would have had to work around three long themers jammed together in the middle. It's already a troublesome-enough challenge, with the black square in between LACKING / VARIETY forced into place. Solid work in the tricky middle region, Aaron even working in TEA BREAKS / THE BYRDS and BILLY GOAT / STARGATE. Those big NW and SE corners would have been much easier to fill with BILLY GOAT broken at the Y, but the extra effort to inject more bonus material was well worth it.

I enjoy this "reinterpreted phrases" genre, especially when someone comes up with such a novel angle.

★ I'm getting dizzy thinking about how much I loved this puzzle! It had been ages since I saw VERTIGO, but who could forget that vertiginous swirl? I've watched a lot of old 100 greatest movies in various attempts to broaden my knowledge gaps, and too often, I get bored by the slow pace or the lack of tension that might possibly hold my attention span that measures in microseconds.

Not VERTIGO. I rewatched it after doing today's puzzle, and it held me captive in the same way that Casablanca or The Godfather does with every viewing. It's a wonderful life to have a few of these grab me so strongly.

Beautiful use of diagonal symmetry to achieve a spiral pattern. I'd have been impressed simply to have a spiral made of asymmetrical entries, but to have it composed of matching 9s, 7s, and 5s is as dazzling as Jimmy Stewart's performance.

AND to get rare 15-letter bonuses in MONKEYING AROUND and I DEMAND A RECOUNT? They're so juicy that I demanded my annoying analytical self to stop monkeying around, trying to figure out if these muddied the theme.

Maybe one could argue that CRISPR (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats) is a tough way to start a puzzle. As long as the crossings are crisp, though …

Along with evocative fill like APOPLEXY and FIGMENT, it all felt too good to be true. Thankfully, there were only pluses — like the one in the lower right that reminded me of the TOWER!

With two elementary schoolers, we're in the depths of a bathroom humor phase in my household ... who am I kidding? I've been in a bathroom humor phase my entire life. That tamped down over the past five years given the realities of real-life poop issues, but soon, I'll be able to fully laugh out loud at BACKWARD LOO KING without bracing myself for horror movie toilet seat jump scares.

Although longtime solvers may have seen this theme concept many a time, I enjoyed Aaron's execution. CHERRY PIC KING creatively parsed the base phrase, and DOUBLE PAR worked.

PERSONAL BAN KING evoked unpleasant Putin thoughts. Maybe I should shun the last vestiges of news that I do follow.

Will Shortz wants Wednesdays to be harder than Mondays and Tuesdays; and incorporating proper nouns is one way to accomplish that. It's perfectly fine to use KARL BENZ, ANZAC, VICHY, CHIANG, etc., as long as they're fairly crossed, giving solvers every chance to get each square correct.

Another way is to use foreign words. Again, EN BANC, PAPILLON, AMIE are reasonable choices, as long as the crossings are fair.

Avant-garde terms are yet another way. AVANT POP eluded this pop music dunce, but the fact that it's two recognizable words made it easy to piece together.

I prefer difficulty stemming from devilish wordplay in clues, but I did love Ted CHIANG's Exhalation.

Enjoyable way to elevate a common theme type. Just don't tell my kids, or the backward loo maneuver may be looming.

What a shame that there isn't a famous person named JURGEN MAI CHAN. I'm such a fan of genmaicha's toasty notes that I tried to convince Will Shortz that the aforementioned person was a huge baking star in Taiwan.

That almost got us into hot water.

I'm here all week, folks!

Other editors are strict in avoiding long Across fill when all your themers are vertically oriented, so some would call CHEAP SHOT a cheap shot at solvers. Both viewpoints have merit, but in this case, where the circles make the themers stand out, I like having my tea spiced up.

I enjoyed helping Aaron get this one across the finish line. His original submission contained MINT and CHAI, so it was an engaging process of trying to uncover longer options. I TL;DR most everything these days — ironic that the expanded phrase would be so useful.

What did the mad scientist shout after shrinking his nemesis?

Outta sight!

Terrible dad joke, but an apt description of today's theme. I spent a embarrassing amount of time trying to think of other synonyms for "small" that could fit this concept, and I failed miserably. To come up with five — all food-related! — is no small feat.

Given enough brainstorming time, I would have thought of SMALL FRIES and even MERE TRIFLE, given my fanboying over Paul Hollywood and Prue Leith. ATOMIC SUBMARINE is a triumph, though. ATOMIC a synonym I might never have considered, and linking it to a SUBMARINE sandwich is amazing.

To explain Aaron's point further. It's typically better to start with your 10-letter themer — in this case, SMALL FRIES — because that can go in row 3, allowing for much better overall spacing. That ordering would have been just fine for this guy who likes to end the evening with a not-so-MERE TRIFLE of a dessert.

Aaron still made things work, albeit needing the awkward AHUFF LIM in the middle. Not atypical for a squashed set of themers. Exploring alternative possibilities with a 16-wide grid could have been useful.

Excellent SW / NE corners, Aaron squeezing every last drop of color out of his long slots. AFRIKAANS WINTERIZE I CLAUDIUS sure make for some STAR TOURS! When you decide upon an off-beat layout, this is the way to take full advantage of it.

The reader in me enjoyed the story of the mad scientist at a party — neat way to link this set that otherwise would have seemed random. If it had run on a Tuesday or Wednesday, when I'm not expecting something harder and more mind-bending, I might have given it some POW! love.