Grid: 15 minutes; Meta: 5 more
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Mike Shenk’s Wall Street Journal contest crossword, “Spell Casting” — Conrad’s writeup.
This week we’re looking for what’s missing from this puzzle that we hope you find by solving it. I noted DELTA, CHARLIE, etc., in the long theme entries, and then spotted NATO, clued as Grp. with a phonetic alphabet. Here are the long entries containing code words from the Nato phonetic alphabet:
- 17a: (DELTA)BURKE: [Emmy nominee for “Designing Women”]
- 28a: (CHARLIE)RICH: [Country music’s “Silver Fox”]
- 45a: (MIKE)NICHOLS: [“The Graduate” director]
- 60a: (VICTOR)HUGO: [“The Hunchback of Notre-Dame” author]
WSJ Contest – 03.28.2025
There were four other grid entries comprised of Nato code words:
- 3a: KILO
- 37: ECHO
- 47: SIERRA
- 56: ZULU
That’s eight of the 26 code words in the Nato phonetic alphabet. I spotted a bunch of clues containing fifteen additional code words, here they are:
- 7a: CAR: Alfa Romeo, for one
- 10d: STANDREWS: Home of Golf
- 12d: ARIE: Grammy winner India. ___
- 13d: BEDS: Hotel offerings
- 21a: DANCES: Tango or foxtrot, e.g.
- 26a: HAITI: Papa Doc’s nation
- 32d: CHEER: Bravo! or Ole!
- 46d: NON: Quebec rejection
- 55d: STAR: Feature of an Astros uniform
- 63a: VOTE: November urging
- 64a: ISLA: ___ San Lorenzo (body near Lima)
- 58d: DOSE: That of an X-ray is measured in rads
- 67a: SOUR: Whiskey cocktail
That’s 23 of the 26 letters in the Nato alphabet. Here are the missing three in alphabetical order:
- Juliette
- Oscar
- Yankee
The first letters of those entries spell our contest solution JOY. Solvers: please share your thoughts.
I absolutely loved this puzzle. I initially thought the answer would be one missing letter so I was confused when there were three unused letters. I recognized the three missing letters were Juliett, Oscar, Yankee, and reread the solution prompt, and chuckled out loud at how perfect this solution was. Yes, Mike, I found JOY in solving this. Thanks for an exceptional puzzle. Loved it!
We also loved it. Liked the work involved.
Same process for me.
I very much liked this puzzle.
I started down the phonetic alphabet path, but quickly abandoned it with ‘Mike’ — when I was in the Signal Corp back in the 60’s, ‘M’ was ‘mountain’. I should have paid more attention to the ‘NATO’ hint, and checked the current version of the it.
I don’t think M was ever “mountain”. Always been Mike in my experience. I did some research on the history, and it appears “Mike” is M.
Per Google: No, the NATO phonetic alphabet never used “Mountain” for the letter “M”. The correct word for “M” in the NATO phonetic alphabet is “Mike”.
It was just a few weeks ago that I thought I uncovered a secret NATO code in one of the meta puzzles, only to find out I was on the wrong trail. lol. But here is one with a perfect conclusion. BRAVO, Mike.
Agreed! BRAVO Mike!!
+2
Great meta. Very clever and imaginative and fun
Sadly and absurdly, what may be missing from NATO soon will be the letters U, S and A.
I tried a number of things before setting the puzzle aside to work on the Fireball grid (another meta puzzle last week whose answer was due by 3PM Pacific time, Sunday)
I got back to it Sunday. This time, I scrutinized the corners, starting in the NE, working clockwise. When I got to the NW, it hit me that KILO was crossing DELTA, so I immediately looked at the clue for NATO (just seen in the SW before arriving in the NW and clued as [Grp. with a phonetic alphabet]) and I was off, looking afresh at the grid! After getting the eight in the grid, I remembered that NATO hadn’t meant anything to me until I looked at its clue, so I started reviewing the clues.
The game was afoot! So exciting!
Got down to missing only J, O, R, and Y because I didn’t catch ROMEO the first time through the clues, and had myself convinced that the answer would be ROMEO and JULIETT, so spent at least 20 minutes searching and re-searching for OSCAR and YANKEE. Had both an “Aha!” and a “D’oh!” moment when I finally spotted ROMEO.
Similarly, I missed Uniform so was left with J-O-U-Y. Then I remembered the hated Astros was in a clue and there it was. “Feature of an Astros uniform” – I wanted the answer to be dirt, but didnt fit in this instance. Very kind of Mike.
Thanks for posting the movie about Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. One of many great Wilco albums.
Thanks! A song from Yankee Hotel Foxtrot was my clear choice for this writeup. Unfortunately: there aren’t really videos from that album, due to Wilco getting dropped by their label, picked up by another, etc. So I went for that clip from I Am Trying to Break Your Heart. The Jay Bennett scenes make me uncomfortable, but the whole documentary is worth a watch.
I remember listening to the bootleg MP3s in the summer of 2001, before the band streamed YHF in September 2001. I was spooked when 9/11 happened (for a lot of reasons), including that Jesus, Etc. seemed to be written about 9/11, even though it was recorded and leaked long before that. Great song.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=USMsgVbf8Us
I was interested to note that clues contained Romeo, but not Juliet(t); Emmy and Grammy, but not Oscar; and Phillie, but not Yankee. I’m choosing to view these as extra clues rather than coincidences.
An early clue for me was Tango & Foxtrot together in a clue, both ballroom dances and members of the phonetic alphabet. It didn’t take long to spot the rest!
So wait–was it within the “rules” to look up the NATO alphabet online then? I always treat it as cheating to look up a regular clue, but does that not apply to WSJ puzzle contests? I picked up on the alphabet bit with Delta and Charlie, but that’s a tough puzzle if you essentially had to serve in the military or be a ham operator to know all 26 letters with that kind of confidence?
You make your own rules. If you want to restrict yourself like that, then stay true to your rules. If not, then pull up the alphabet list. No one except yourself is going to make you pull back your solve or return the mug. Play it your way. Looking it up may help you remember the ones you didn’t know next time.
I vaguely remember reading something by one of the top-notch meta puzzle constructors like Matt Gaffney, Pete Muller or Evan Birnholz expressly stating that it was OK to use outside resources to help you with the meta. I’d link to that document if I could find it.
I’ve certainly looked up things similar to the NATO alphabet in my attempts to solve metas. And I’m perfectly fine with that.
Thanks, that makes sense. The meta is only really fun to have solved if I feel like I’m following the rules the creator had in mind, that’s why I ask.