Matt Gaffney’s Wall Street Journal contest crossword, “Measure Twice, Solve Once — Conrad’s writeup.
This week we’re looking for a five-letter adjective. There were five long theme entries, each fifteen letters long:
- BEHINDTHESCENES: [Away from public view]
- ROYLICHTENSTEIN: [Noted pop artist]
- CATCHMEIFYOUCAN: [DiCaprio/Hanks movie]
- THANKSGIVINGDAY: [Time to talk turkey]
- PERSONIFICATION: [Very essence]
Matt was riffing on a “measure twice, cut once” theme. Keeping measure in mind: I bounced around the grid looking for a signal, and I found none. I measured the lengths of the themers: each was 15 letters long, with varying word lengths. For example: BEHIND THE SCENES (6,3,6).
WSJ Contest – 12.15.2024
I found zero signal in the grid, so I check the clues. LSD’s stood out: Big hallucinogen. Why big? Same as AROAR’s clue: Making cat noises. Two very odd clues.
My meta solving experience has taught me to note oddly worded clues. Meaning: stop when you see one and write it in your notes. It’s easy to rush right past them. I now had two and noticed that both were 15 letters long. And Making cat noises (6,3,6) followed the same word pattern as BEHIND THE SCENES (6,3,6). Measure twice.
I had the rabbit: there were five 15-letter clues, with words matching the lengths of the theme entry words. Here they are in theme entry order:
- AROAR: Making cat noises (6,3,6) -> BEHIND THE SCENES
- LSD: Big Hallucinogen (3,12) -> ROY LICHTENSTEIN
- IVAN: Lendl up at the net (5,2,2,3,3) -> CATCH ME IF YOU CAN
- KNAVE: Unscrupulous man (12,3) -> THANKSGIVING DAY
- ERGO: Consequentially (15) -> PERSONIFICATION
The first letters of the mapped grid entries spell our contest solution ALIKE. Solvers: please share your thoughts. I’ll end with a non-thematic Christmas song I heard in London last week.
Very clever. Didn’t solve it. I felt like Clue 14A was mocking me.🙄
I’m still new at this,so I thought 14a:How did it take me so long to see that & 2d:Italy’s longest river in full made me think long = lanky. Seeing AHHH was odd and led me astray. Out of 6 puzzles I’ve gotten only 1 correct. Still fun trying.
What a great meta. If I could have spent the rest of my life, I might have gotten it, i.e., if I live to be 100. I at least considered that the clues might be relevant. Congratulations to those who solved it, and to the constructor as well.