Kary Haddad author page
1 puzzle by Kary Haddad
with Constructor comments
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I'm excited to be making my Times debut today. I hope you enjoyed solving what I know was a bit of a quirky puzzle.
A little about myself: I'm a music teacher and grad student in the dissertation phase of a doctorate in music education — which means learning how to construct crosswords was essentially an elaborate method of procrastination. It's very common to see teachers working together on the Times puzzle over lunch in the faculty room and eventually I wanted to see if I could put together a puzzle of my own.
My only other published puzzle was for BuzzFeed, where I learned a lot from the patient and helpful editing of Caleb Madison. This puzzle, in fact, was originally written for BuzzFeed, but was sadly orphaned when they shut down their crossword to contributors earlier this year. Happily, Will and Joel found it amusing enough to give it a second life and, consequently, my Times debut!
Unsurprisingly, a number of my clues were changed, although not as many as I expected, to my satisfaction. Will and Joel also changed a single letter in my submitted grid, changing AGE/EGO to ACE/ECO, I imagine to avoid the near-dupe with the neighboring HBOGO. I'm happy they left my clue for 67-A (STUNT) though, even if I'm the only one that thinks it's funny! Thanks for solving!