New York Times, Saturday, January 18, 2014

I was inspired to build this Saturday puzzle after reading so many blog comments complaining that my puzzles were too easy. NO JIVE ... not! My true inspiration for constructing this puzzle back in April 2012 was that I had a bunch of 11-letter seed entries I wanted to put into a crossword grid, which included BANANAGRAMS, ADOBE READER, and TIJUANA TAXI. I also had a sizable number of 8-letter entries that seemed fresh, my favorites of which were UGG BOOTS and MEGAN FOX.

My original submission contained the entry TINIE TEMPAH (a British rapper) at 60-Across, which Will felt wouldn't be familiar to the majority of solvers. So I reworked the lower half of my puzzle and ended up with a stack I felt was superior to the original. I particularly loved EJECTOR SEAT and SASHA FIERCE, though I also really liked I LOVE LA, FACEPALM, and IF I DID IT.

The long entries did necessitate the duplication of I in the lower left and a few "meh" entries — I found SRIS, ITES, and SAV particularly irksome — though I was (and still am) happy with how the fill turned out. My favorite clue/entry pair is "Professional organizers?" for TAXONOMISTS, though I also love Will's new clue for TAVERNS ("Round houses?"). I hope you enjoy my puzzle!

David continues his NYT crossword tear today. I'll set the over/under for how many he has in 2014 at... 14.5. Let the betting begin!

Slightly unusual today is David's use of triple-stacks of 11-letter entries. Typically most themeless constructors shy away from this approach, choosing to use triple-stacks of 8-10 letter entries, because 1.) it creates more three-letter words in the puzzle (USM / GEE / GAG in the NE, for example) and 2.) makes for that many more crossings to deal with. Eight parallel downs through a triple-stack is hard to work with, and 11 can be very hard to do cleanly. We see traces of that difficulty in ARNEL at the top and ITES / AJA at the bottom, but otherwise they're clean.

It's particularly interesting to me that while David's 11-letter stacks are nice and sparkly, I wasn't as big a fan of his stacks of 8s (in the NE and SW). After all, neither LAVATORY nor SEA ROUTE seem terribly exciting. And seeing IVAR / the stilted IT IS I / TYS ... what's going on, I wondered? It should be easier to fill that SW corner than one of the big NW or SE corners, shouldn't it?

I believe it has to do with where a constructor spends his/her black squares. With a maximum of 72 words allowed, the black squares must be used sparingly, and David does a great job of applying them so that the NW and SE are easier to cleanly fill. But that doesn't leave as many to facilitate filling the SW and NE corners. I wonder if the fact that both a 7-letter and a 8-letter answer (I LOVE LA / FACEPALM) cross the SW stack has something to do with the relative roughness. That's a lot of white space in one area.

Finally, I loved the clue for TAVERNS ("Round houses?") and TAXONOMISTS ("Professional organizers?") and would have liked a few more of those in my Saturday puzzle. Many of the entries today are great in the own right, but they're difficult to clue in a playful way (MEGAN FOX and BANANAGRAMS for example, you either know or you don't so the cluing must be made straightforward). It's a tough trade-off constructors must weigh: lean more on entries snappy in their own right but must have a straightforward clue, or ones that make for clever cluing? Anyway, a fun puzzle with some very nice entries.