Robert Ryan author page
3 puzzles by Robert Ryan
with Constructor comments
Robert Ryan, of London, is an economist for the U.K.'s Competition and Markets Authority. He grew up in Ireland, where he used to sit on his father's knee and "help" him solve the cryptic crossword in the back of a television guide.
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| M | E | R | N | O | H | I | T | B | L | A | N | K | C | D | S | |||||
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| C | H | E | C | K | I | N | D | E | S | K | D | R | Y | G | I | N | ||||
| F | O | S | T | E | R | D | A | D | H | U | E | E | N | C | A | M | P | |||
| L | O | T | A | T | O | N | A | S | S | E | T | S | G | I | J | O | E | |||
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| S | P | E | N | D | E | R | N | O | P | E | W | A | N | T | ||||||
| T | O | N | K | A | T | S | U | A | C | C | R | A | E | R | E | |||||
| E | L | N | I | N | O | B | A | C | K | I | N | B | U | S | I | N | E | S | S | |
| P | O | U | N | C | E | E | G | R | E | T | I | N | A | S | T | A | T | E | ||
| S | I | D | E | D | R | E | E | D | S | T | O | T | H | E | M | A | X |
This puzzle started with JACKIN' THE BOX (a pun on robbing theatergoers with the best seats in the house), and I set off looking for "X-in-the-Y" phrases, where X was a noun that could be reinterpreted as a verb to produce a punny result. The other finds were equally clunky, but switching to "X-in-Y" phrases produced better options. The theme was still restricted in some ways: it would have felt inconsistent to use verbs losing an E in their gerund form (e.g. CASIN' POINT) or gerunds taking a double consonant (e.g., MANNIN' THE MOON).
Several of my proposed "?" clues were kept, including some for shorter words (LIRA, MER, AHA, and NAN). My favorite was SIESTA for being a double play on both "Spell" and "out". My favorite clue from Will was the quote clue for SLEEP — a quote that I'm sure will come to me when I next suffer a dose of insomnia.
The team also suggested a cheater square in the southeast, which enabled a big improvement in the fill (even though you'll have to forgive OPCITS). After trying to eliminate DANAS I eventually succumbed but was still overall happy with some fill I would personally like to uncover as a solver, like RED PANDA, BLANK CDS, RAP DUO, SUNDANCE, FOSTER DAD, DRY GIN, and EUROCRAT.
Thanks to two reviewers — Mark McClain, who gave the theme and fill a thumbs up, and Taylor Evan Johnson, who gave this newbie a lesson on "?" clue etiquette.
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| O | M | A | N | D | A | S | M | E | A | S | L | E | S | M | A | W | S | |||
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| E | L | I | A | S | Z | E | N | K | A | Y | F | R | E | E | L | Y | ||||
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| G | R | O | P | E | B | F | S | M | A | L | E | F | A | C | T | I | O | N | ||
| K | I | D | N | E | Y | B | A | R | E | L | E | A | P | E | D | |||||
| P | L | E | A | I | N | O | R | O | U | T | G | O | B | L | U | B | E | |||
| C | O | N | T | E | X | T | U | A | L | L | Y | O | V | U | M | P | A | R | ||
| C | O | N | O | R | O | L | D | S | B | L | A | M | E | D | ||||||
| A | S | O | N | I | A | I | N | T | E | R | R | E | L | A | T | I | O | N | S | |
| R | E | S | E | E | N | K | E | E | P | M | U | M | R | O | O | M | B | A | ||
| D | R | E | S | S | Y | E | R | R | A | N | T | S | T | O | N | G | A | N |
I don't know Python (yet), so to find words that could potentially be split to invent new two-word phrases, I reverted to Stata, the only coding language I know, thanks to my day job as an economist. It produced quite a lot of potential matches, but most of those had to go in the bin for being uninteresting, clunky, lacking in good symmetrical partners or (in the case of "sacredness") unlikely to pass the ick test no matter how you clue it.
My notes on the puzzle over on Wordplay have a few that were closer to making the submission. My favourite clue that didn't make it was [German for kindergarten, say?] for ETYMOLOGY, but I like the replacement [Word has it!] too. I was glad that [More than just a sec?] survived for BRUT.
One point of trivia that came up in the cluing discussion was whether XANDER was Buffy's best friend. We opted for "friend" out of deference to Willow. But Buffy fans can debate!
A word to the wise — the puzzle actually got accepted in July of 2022, but I was none the wiser for six months, thanks to an overzealous spam filter!