Katherine Baicker author page
3 puzzles by Katherine Baicker
with Constructor comments
| S | C | O | O | T | P | R | O | D | H | T | T | P | ||
| C | R | U | D | E | L | O | F | I | O | H | I | O | ||
| H | O | T | E | L | S | U | I | T | E | S | W | E | E | T |
| L | A | R | S | I | R | S | T | U | T | S | I | |||
| E | T | A | B | R | A | S | P | R | O | U | T | S | ||
| P | I | G | T | A | I | L | T | A | L | E | N | U | T | |
| A | E | O | N | O | R | A | E | S | P | Y | ||||
| A | D | H | O | M | I | N | E | M | ||||||
| N | E | R | D | A | G | E | M | I | S | S | ||||
| A | Y | E | M | R | R | I | G | H | T | R | I | T | E | |
| B | E | D | S | I | D | E | I | O | S | L | A | V | ||
| T | U | T | E | E | B | A | H | M | E | T | E | |||
| S | E | C | O | N | D | T | O | N | O | N | E | N | U | N |
| U | S | E | R | G | I | L | T | E | N | T | R | E | ||
| I | T | S | Y | E | A | T | S | T | U | B | E | D |
| A | B | S | S | O | C | I | A | L | S | B | I | B | ||
| P | O | E | O | P | E | N | N | E | T | E | C | O | ||
| N | O | N | C | H | A | L | A | N | C | E | H | A | Y | |
| E | Y | E | R | O | L | L | T | E | T | O | N | S | ||
| W | A | C | O | I | N | D | O | L | E | N | T | |||
| S | H | A | P | E | D | O | R | R | S | E | L | F | ||
| T | I | A | N | A | E | L | S | I | E | |||||
| D | I | S | C | O | M | B | O | B | U | L | A | T | E | D |
| A | C | O | R | N | R | I | S | E | S | |||||
| M | E | N | U | P | A | S | Y | E | N | T | A | S | ||
| M | I | S | N | O | M | E | R | S | H | U | E | |||
| N | A | C | H | O | S | A | C | T | F | A | S | T | ||
| A | K | A | U | N | B | E | K | N | O | W | N | S | T | |
| P | E | R | S | E | A | W | E | E | D | O | I | L | ||
| A | R | E | E | R | N | E | S | T | O | S | E | E |
KATE: I reached out cold to Adam, whose puzzles I love, to see if he'd be interested in collaborating. He asked if I had any theme ideas, and I had the barest germ. I love words like these and learned that they're called lonely negatives (15 letters!!). I'd compiled a long list, but didn't know where to go from there. Adam came up with this brilliant construct. We aimed for different prefixes for each themer, and originally had LONELY NEGATIVES as the revealer. The editing team suggested cutting it, which let us add DISCOMBOBULATED — so much better! This was my first NYT acceptance, though it's the second to appear.
ADAM: I normally expect theme collab brainstorms to take weeks. Not so with Kate! She lobbed "Lonely Negatives" in her very first email! I suggested deploying blocks to clue themers self-referentially, and we were off.
I also normally expect to give fill guidance to newer constructors. Again... not so with Kate! She filled circles (squares?) around me. I mean look at that BE HONEST / I CANT LIE stack … that is truly awesome.
Lastly, one neat constructing quirk: bumping INDOLENT and MISNOMER in one block from the edges is the reason the whole grid works, because it makes the block over the D in DOLENT symmetric with the block over the B in BEKNOWNST, reducing two pairs of constraints down to one and allowing much more flexibility with the fill.
All in all, we hope this puzzle left you feeling gruntled!
| L | E | M | O | N | D | I | A | L | S | A | P | |||
| A | D | I | D | A | S | A | C | M | E | P | R | O | ||
| S | I | L | E | N | T | T | R | E | A | T | M | E | N | T |
| S | T | E | T | R | O | T | C | S | E | E | I | T | ||
| O | M | I | T | U | P | S | I | D | E | S | ||||
| E | M | O | J | I | K | E | Y | B | O | A | R | D | ||
| D | E | N | O | T | E | E | E | L | Y | A | T | O | ||
| A | R | T | Y | G | A | S | S | T | O | P | ||||
| M | E | H | G | O | O | S | I | M | H | E | R | E | ||
| E | L | E | V | A | T | O | R | M | U | S | I | C | ||
| C | A | S | I | T | A | S | M | O | A | T | ||||
| O | S | C | A | R | T | H | E | N | S | O | I | L | ||
| T | H | E | R | E | A | R | E | N | O | W | O | R | D | S |
| T | E | N | A | L | A | N | N | A | U | S | E | A | ||
| A | N | T | L | A | Y | S | S | T | O | A | T |
KATE: Woo hoo! I took up constructing during the pandemic and am eternally grateful to the welcoming, generous crossworld community for helping out a clueless newbie. I'm ecstatic to have my NYT debut with Scott, whose skill is matched only by his kindness. This was my 22nd submission — I finally wore them down!
This theme was Scott's idea, and we had fun going back and forth on themers (Can you read body language over Zoom? Does a silent movie have words? What's your favorite obscene gesture?). I'm so grateful to inimitable, hilarious mentor Ross Trudeau. I reached out cold to constructors I admired who were foolish enough to list contact information — thank you to collaborators Ross, Scott, Jeff, Adam, Matt, and Laura. In conclusion, woo hoo!
SCOTT: Kate has been a fantastic collaborator. I tend to construct freestyle [i.e., themeless] puzzles, so noodling on theme ideas with a creative partner like her has been a delight. This puzzle went through several revisions to make it more Monday-friendly — including a last one by the editors, thereby losing the fantastic CORI Bush — and being able to debate the merits of many, many fill options with Kate made the process much more enjoyable!