Leslie Young author page

Congrats to Leslie, who got married a month ago!

Leslie and Acme have puzzle-making DOWN TO A SCIENCE! I loved their last collaboration, and this one was almost as fun. This person of science enjoyed how PHYSICAL, SOCIAL, and EARTH were well-hidden at the ends of phrases. Orienting the themers vertically was perfect, too, placing those thematic words DOWN low in the grid.

Such beautiful phrases! Perhaps ANNUAL PHYSICAL isn't snazzy, but ever since I turned 50 this year, I've changed my mindset about dreading my annual. I have such little control over so many aspects of my life, that I'm eager to see how more exercise than ever (what else has there been to do?), will affect my bloodwork.

That said, I'll look forward to returning to retro ICE CREAM SOCIALs some post-pandemic day (instead of gorging frozen treats after my kids go to bed, then blaming Santa for the thievery).

If only psychiatric science had been included today, for my kids' sake.

Some A+ cluing work. It can be difficult to write fresh clues for humdrum words like LIAR and EDIT — especially for a Monday, when puzzles need to be newb-accessible. "Make-up specialist" might go over some folks' heads, but I won't make up excuses for this bit of brilliance. And the telltale question mark does its job well in [One way to reduce one's sentence?] — as in shortening something verbose.

(Jim Horne, who's already flagged my post as too long, is playing Oscars walk-off music.)

It's tough for me to POW! any puzzle that has a whiff of a "words that can precede X" theme, but this one came close. With so few oopsy MESSUPS in gridwork, this could have won out in many other weeks.

★ Five factors make this not just an easy POW! pick, but a paragon of Monday perfection.

Interesting theme. I had to go back nearly a decade to think of a Monday puzzle that had a similar feel. Not only are the theme phrases colorful, but they point perfectly to their "symbolic" clues. Q.U.E.U.E.S. as a DOTTED LINE makes me smile.

Consistency. Each themer is in the form of (adjective)(noun). Each clue contains six letters. Elegant! Consistency by itself cannot make a boring theme interesting, but it can make a great theme that much better.

Amazing bonus fill. Six long Downs spread out in alternating fashion, up down up down up down. Six long Downs, not an iffy one among them. No CUSS WORDs from me, just a giddyup, ALL ABOARD!

Short fill so smooth that it's unnoticeable. A mark of true grit. Most constructors would settle on six long Downs that worked(ish), and then they'd look the other way to get a final corner glooped together. Not a single dab of crossword glue for Leslie, showing iteration striving for perfection.

Fresh cluing. GELS has been in the NYT crossword 50 times. This is the first time it's been clued using "nail polish." Tying together two consecutive entries in BROOD and HEN was a nice touch, too.

Top-notch puzzle to hook newbs, as well as to remind ennui-ridden veterans that even early-weekers can spark joy.

My kids will eat anything if it's covered with sprinkles — broccoli surprise, anyone? Why didn't anyone tell me about FUNFETTI? It's not the most clever portmanteau — as I expected, it's fun + confetti — but it's a marketing home run. I baked my daughter's last birthday cake, and for her next one, I fully expect her to pick FUNFETTI. With sprinkles on top, of course.

Standout clue for DRAG RACERS. Already a great entry, making it fresh with a Zoom reference elevates it even further.

Editors often don't give check marks for single-word entries, since ones like ENDEAVOR and INSTANT can be more neutral than assets. When you give AVIATION a zinger of a clue like [The Wright stuff?], though, that can help it stand out.

A few entries/clues that could confuse people:

• I thought I knew what RUBRIC meant: a classification, as in "under the RUBRIC of ___." I forgot, it can also mean "a general concept that marks divisions or coordinations in a conceptual scheme," which would be helpful in assessing grades.
• MOS is short for months. I went straight to modi operandi, especially since those Greek gods of mythology often played fast and loose with the rules.
• [Circular] is a great misdirect, not pointing to roundness, but a piece of paper that circulates; a FLYER.
• I snarfed a laugh when Jim Horne asked what it meant when chickens got cornfed (pronounced in one syllable, akin to "snarfed").

A lot of great wordplay today and immaculate gridwork. The 72-word themeless has an extremely high (and continually rising) bar, but a few years ago, I would have picked this one as a POW!

I don't mind Seattle winters, but they drive my wife to despair. Even though DARKNESS AT ONE PM would be an exaggeration, I think it's what my wife perceives. Thank goodness we're SPRINGing FORWARD soon!

I liked Leslie's plays on two familiar figures of speech, FIVE (to SIX) O'CLOCK SHADOW and BURN THE MIDNIGHT (to ONE A.M.) OIL. Clever use of mirror symmetry, too, making possible a theme set of 15 15 15 13 (note that they're all odd in length; that's the critical element).

My lack of familiarity with DARKNESS AT NOON was probably yet another hole in my knowledge base. I asked two highly well-read people, Jim Horne and my wife, if they recognized it. Both of them said something to the effect of "… yeahhh …" Maybe throw in a few more h's. Made me wonder, why not use another colloquial NOON phrase?

Blew my mind that after 30 minutes of searching, the best I could do was HIGH NOON or SHANGHAI NOON. I'm a big fan of the "Rush Hour" pairing of Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker, but him and Owen Wilson ... yeahhhhh.

Some delightful clues. I was stuck in the northwest corner, [Signs of something moving?] befuddling me. Ah, TEARS show that someone's been moved! Crossing that with [Crow native to the Midwest] is diabolical. I ran through all the types of blackbirds I knew (two) and thought it had to be a Native American reference. Ah, SHERYL Crow was born in Missouri!

I should explain two entries. DESI confused me because I'm used to cluing it as DESI Arnaz, but it's also a term for some peoples of the Indian subcontinent. And SINE of pi is zero, when expressed in radians, which is … yeahhh, you don't care.

I found the overall concept too straightFORWARD and easy to figure out, but I enjoyed the apt use of the two colorful base phrases. I might have had a stronger impression if Leslie had gone with HIGH ONE AM (nine letters is also possible in this mirror symmetry layout) and clued it as the phrase (not the movie) to make all three themers more consistent.

★ Second puzzle, second POW! for Leslie! Her first one was at one end of the constructing spectrum — an easy-peasy, smooth Monday — and this themeless is at the other. It's a rare individual who has the potential to hit for the cycle, given that a Monday and a Friday puzzle require different skill sets. Check back here in five years; my money says that Leslie will be on the list.

At first glance, this grid doesn't look that much different from a standard 72-word themeless. Take the SE corner for example — triple-stacked 9s are a staple of Friday puzzles. The one big difference is the grid-spanner in the middle, the vivid POLAR BEAR PLUNGE. That has the potential to ice up every corner of the grid.

Leslie wisely used her black squares to separate POLAR BEAR PLUNGE from the NW and SE corners, while still allowing for decent solving flow. However, it's impossible for the ends of POLAR BEAR PLUNGE to not affect the SW and NE corners. I like her decision to break up the outside slots (SPELL / DUE and FAD / AIDES). Many constructors would keep those as 9-letter slots, giving themselves a huge problem. It's easy to construct 9-letter triple stacks when you have few other constraints, but when you fix three letters into place, it becomes much more difficult.

I love how careful Leslie was with her short fill. I'm always picking out some nit in a themeless, but not today. Top-notch work. It's not rocket science — you can get yourself a solid word list and work with the minimum score fixed at a high level — but so many constructors get fed up with the sheer quantity of iterations they must iterate through to get a clean, colorful product like this.

This wanna-be surf bum enjoyed kicking off the puzzle with RASHGUARD (try surfing without one for a day, see what happens), but Jim Horne commented that he'd never ENCOUNTERed it before. So although I see it as a great entry, something like FIRST STEP or ROSE PETAL or SKI SEASON is a safer headliner, given their more universal recognition.

Nearly faultless execution, with both quality and quantity of feature entries. Can't wait until Leslie's next outing!

★ I love playing the "can I guess the theme" game on Mondays. A perfect early-week theme is obfuscated until the very end, where a revealer gives me a delightful a-ha moment. My observations through my solve today, along with timestamps:

1:24 — NIGHT-NIGHT. Theme is doubled words? Hmm, that'd be boring.

2:05 — WHITE WEDDING!

(singing) It's a nice day to … START AGAIN!

Oops, gotta get back to it.

2:16 — NIGHT / WHITE … rhymers with different spellings?

2:58 — MUSHROOM BALL? Let's put the theme game aside and figure out WTF a MUSHROOM BALL is.

(down the internet rabbit hole) Wow, those look delicious!

3:31 — Scratching my head. How could these three themers possibly be related?

4:24 — Hit the revealer, CAP AND GOWN.

4:26 — Wha ... ?

4:32 — Uh ... buh?

4:37 — More head scratching.

4:46 — Re-read the clue for the fourth time. Still nonsensical.

5:05 — Jeff is getting angry!

5:31 — AHA! Happy dance! NIGHT cap, WHITE cap, MUSHROOM cap. NIGHT gown, WEDDING gown, BALL GOWN!

Great twist on the "both words can precede X" theme type. Fortuitous findings — I wouldn't have believed it possible. Huge kudos.

And great gridwork too. Enough bonuses in SUNSCREEN, OBNOXIOUS, COPYCAT, DATASET. Not much crossword glue in ETH MATA SNO. This is the way to execute on a Monday grid, folks. Don't be afraid to go up to the max of 78 words. Don't try for anything flashy. Focus on a clean, smooth grid, and work in a couple of strong bonuses. Pro stuff right here.

POW! Congrats on joining the club, Leslie, and looking forward to more from both of you!