Emily Rourke author page
2 puzzles by Emily Rourke
with Jeff Chen comments
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| T | A | T | E | F | I | S | T | S | O | L | E | S |
Well, HELLO KITTY! How meta to use a cartoon character to tie together four others of the same ilk. All five are so gentle, too. I doubt I'd say HELLO KITTY to Aslan, Rajah, or Bagheera. Even less so for the Black Panther.
Is it strange to have ANTEATER as an Across bonus in a feline puzzle? Maybe, but I laughed at the New Yorker article Jim Horne linked to (below), and I watched a lot of the ANTEATER from the PINK PANTHER show as a kid.
Placing HELLO KITTY in the middle of the grid makes for a tough construction, given that all of Emily's other themers are long. There are so many Down entries that have to weave through two themers. Great work making the solve purr with MOP TOPS / IDIOTIC / MONSTER — that all deserves a treat!
The north and south sections are wider than usual since this is a 16x15 grid, and that extra column makes things tough. A TRAIN is usually fine, and A TASTE might even SCRAPE BY editors. Toss in A TREE, though, and it makes it all stick out.
Similar story for the old-timey PETARD, defunct IPHOTO, and ENOLA, clued as the WWII plane. A fresh clue related to Enola Holmes 2 would have helped.
I loved the YOYO clue. My daughter has lost everything from her HELLO KITTY lunchbox to her HELLO KITTY Tamagotchi. (O, the HELL I'm in.) Imagine losing a $2.5M cello! Great way to freshen up a clue for an average word. Same goes for MONSTER. Tess recently read Coraline. Thanks a lot for the sleepless nights, Neil frickin' Gaiman!
Companionable Tuesday puzzle. So unlike my wife's old cat, who once rubbed her butt on me as I slept.
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| P | T | S | T | O | E | D | M | S | U | |||||
| Y | O | U | V | E | G | O | T | M | A | I | L | |||
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| A | W | O | L | E | D | A | M | R | E | N | E | W | ||
| P | E | E | L | R | E | F | S | T | R | E | A | D |
Two years ago, I moved our mailbox because the carrier would always leave it ajar, thus soaking everything in even light rain. Seemed like a no-brainer.
Unfortunately, he decreed that he would no longer deliver our mail. I spent over ten hours on the phone attempting to sort things out. I learned that 1.) moving a mailbox is a complicated procedure that requires multiple approvals, and 2.) it was ultimately up to the mail carrier, who smugly passed our house every day. I finally gave him five giant chocolate bars plus an apology for my libertarian behavior, and he relented.
YOU'VE GOT NO MAIL is not a romcom.
Neat that Emily found a tightish set, things that (most) mail carriers deliver. I couldn't think of any other major categories, only things like coupons and political flyers. Hard to hide those in common phrases.
Great job disguising the mail meanings of BILL, LETTER, PACKAGE. I wasn't familiar with LETTERPRESS so I would have loved something like LETTER OF THE LAW or LETTER GRADE, but it turns out that Seattle has a letterpress community. Also, crossword symmetry isn't always the kindest, so LETTER OF THE LAW would create alternate trade-offs.
YOU'VE GOT MAIL's length already makes construction awkward, too. Twelve-letter revealers have to go in row 12 instead of 13, thus compressing the themers together. As much fun as is it get OLIGARCHY and SAFE SPACE, it's not ideal that they come with big corners filled with "this is a word?" entries like SORORAL and AREAR.
Overall, though, fun debut delivery!