Jim Quinlan author page
2 puzzles by Jim Quinlan
with Constructor comments
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I can't help but anagram and make wordplay with stop signs when I'm driving. It's annoying. Those big white letters just ask to be messed with. POTS, TOPS, SPOT, OPTS. Am I alone in this? I hope so. Anyway, "Stop Sign" sounds an awful lot like "Stop Sighin'!" ["Quit feeling sorry for yourself!"] " which is where this idea sprouted. Alas, the only other theme-type answer that I found which would work with it was "Finish Lyin'!" ["Quit speaking falsehoods!"]. Nonetheless, the idea kept eating at me.
It doesn't help that I drive a lot.
Rather than pursue the original idea, I decided to try a variation on it by thinking of other words I could elide to create homophones. I eventually found a set in which the vowel sound changed: LYIN' (for "line"), MOOIN' (for "moon"), PLAYIN' (for "plain"), and BEIN' (for "bean").
I am seriously bothered by the fact that I can't find a way to use "Stop Sighin!" as a theme answer. It's like an itch that can't be scratched. Any help?
As a side note, I couldn't care less about yield sign wordplay.
Delighted to have a second puzzle in the New York Times.
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This theme came about while I was on lunch duty (one of the less glamorous aspects of teaching in a middle school). While daydreaming, I decided I wanted to give crossword construction a shot and was determined to create a theme before the lunch period was over. Immediately thereafter, a student playfully accused another of stealing her friend's bag of chips: "Katie did it!" she said. Katie defended herself in the third person: "No! Katie didn't!" Beginner's luck for me. It's proven much more difficult since to devise solid themes.
Nancy Salomon was gracious enough to mentor me through the process of construction. I am so grateful for her sharing her expertise and for the incredible amount of time she has spent communicating with me.