I laughed hard at [Question in a lot of cars?]. Not only is WHERE DID I PARK an A+ marquee entry, but the use of "a lot" to hide the ...
read moreI laughed hard at [Question in a lot of cars?]. Not only is WHERE DID I PARK an A+ marquee entry, but the use of "a lot" to hide the parking lot meaning removes any question that this is a model pairing.
Get it, model?
As in car model?
Cleverness score: Grant = a lot, Jeff = 0.
Some ingenious grid wizardry, Grant nearing mastery over his 64-word creation. I've mentioned previously that "pyramid blocks" (of six black "cheater" squares each) make gridwork easier by maybe a factor of two each. If you use them sparingly — AND create a pretty, curving aesthetic that approximates a giant letter S as a bonus! — it can be a fantastic way to achieve grid sizzle without any semblance of cheating.
Amazing amount of juice squeezed out of the long slots, considering the amount of interlock. It's one thing to work in WHERE DID I PARK over THE SANDS OF TIME, but when you can run DOLLAR SIGN through them, that's big money right there.
It wasn't all dollar signs, though. I enjoy THE ___ phrases, because of the emphasis the THE places. It's not just A ___, eh? (With apologies to XWI's resident Canadian, Jim Horne.) The repetitiveness of THE RAM, THE SANDS OF TIME, and THE TANGO wasn't quite WHAT THE … ?! territory, but it wasn't great, either.
Where Grant was absolute money, though: the sheer quantity of clever clues. Repurposing "the Land Down Under" to literally describe ATLANTIS is fantastic— which so aptly described DOLLAR SIGN. A handful of these makes a themeless sing, and half a dozen today kick it up near Champions-level.