Saturday 26:45 (no Google, but see below)
When bored online, generally late at night, I bounce around my bookmarks aimlessly, hoping to get inspired enough to stay in one place for a spell. One of them is Rex Parker's popular crossword blog. Right at the top of each article is the latest puzzle's completed grid. These usually go up around 9-midnight the night before the paper release or early the day of, since the puzzle is available earlier online, and I usually do them early as well.
Except on Friday. I tend to get home later because of Friday Night Magic. Sometimes I bring home beer on Friday, print out and solve the Wall Street Journal Saturday variety puzzle, watch Real Time, whatever. I might get to the Saturday puzzle, but I sometimes leave it for the morning. But before getting to it tonight, I was bouncing around and hit upon Rex Parker. Seeing it was Saturday''s solution, I quickly closed it, but not before seeing the answer for 1-Across. It was a difficult clue, "Junk dealers?" for SPAMBOTS. It's hard to unring that bell.
Did I cheat? The time wouldn't suggest so. I didn't just enter 1-Across; I tried to solve it "fair" from crosses, but it's hard to not see what you know. It turned out to be the trickiest area of the puzzle, so any cheating doesn't even help much (I used the P to solve Nebula winner Frederick POHL, but I could have Googled it), and I think 1-Across ended up as my last entry. Seeing "Settlers of Catan" as a grid-spanning answer made me smile, as well as JANK, a formation which Rex Parker was unfamiliar with ("janky" is the more common parlance but the internet shortens everything). The benefits of Magic-playing. Not the first time it's come up, like the word SCRY.
Saturday, July 20, 2019
Saturday, July 13, 2019
Saturday 22:41 (1 Google)
Oh my stars, New York Times! Maui Wowie as an answer in your crossword puzzle? Think of the children! I have noticed that the last time they used a marijuana strain (the more general KUSH) was also on a Saturday. That's also an awkward enough collection of letters that you really had to really want it in the grid. Yet really good fill, nothing felt forced. Almost no proper nouns either.
Oh my stars, New York Times! Maui Wowie as an answer in your crossword puzzle? Think of the children! I have noticed that the last time they used a marijuana strain (the more general KUSH) was also on a Saturday. That's also an awkward enough collection of letters that you really had to really want it in the grid. Yet really good fill, nothing felt forced. Almost no proper nouns either.
Friday, July 12, 2019
Friday 21:29 (1 Google)
1-Across: Means of interstellar travel, 9 letters. Easy WARP DRIVE, right? Nothing clicked in that corner right away from those crosses, so I moved on and didn't get back to it until the end. I finally looking up the RCA Dome when warp drive wasn't working. The answer was star ships. Eh, sure, I guess. Technically, warp drive is a Star Trek-specific thing, and it would have to be clued as such. There was also an Ad ___ clue, where anyone would put HOC. Luckily, I discovered HOC was wrong right away, but hadn't really ever heard of the right answer REM. Geez, that's some Saturday-level stuff. There are friendlier ways to clue REM than that and still keep it challenging.
I've been having moderate success with Izzet Phoenix on MTG Arena. Magic 2020 rotated in, but all I did was swap some sideboard cards into Fry. But I don't see Teferi everywhere anymore; it seems like everyone is playing Elementals. Rising Reef, Nissa, Krasis. I've seen uncommon Chandra, Living Twister. Some play Growth Spiral, some don't. There are many options. But Phoenix is actually pretty well-positioned against it. You have ample removal for early Elves or Reefs, and you can hopefully pressure Nissa with Phoenix or Drake and burn so things don't get out of hand. If they can't land a huge Krasis, they can't deal with your fliers any other way. Post-board, you get Entrancing Melody for Krasis, or sometimes an animated land. I bring in 2 Kefnet as well, and they really have trouble with that.
Yet I found a new toy. You can read about it here. I've only played a few rounds, but this deck is fun as heck, and I wanna play it. I just got to Gold, and I'm going to a least try and get to Diamond this season. It's heartbreaking that Teferi is not the place to be (actually, 3-mana Teferi is kind of a beating vs. Simic), but I like this style of never tapping out. An opponent had used Narset to find Negate while I was pressuring with a couple of guys including a Cutthroat. He drew out a Sinister Sabotage with a Vraska's Contempt. then the next turn, confidently played Ritual of Soot with Negate up...right into Frilled Mystic. There is no way to express a smirk online, but I bet he could feel it all the same.
1-Across: Means of interstellar travel, 9 letters. Easy WARP DRIVE, right? Nothing clicked in that corner right away from those crosses, so I moved on and didn't get back to it until the end. I finally looking up the RCA Dome when warp drive wasn't working. The answer was star ships. Eh, sure, I guess. Technically, warp drive is a Star Trek-specific thing, and it would have to be clued as such. There was also an Ad ___ clue, where anyone would put HOC. Luckily, I discovered HOC was wrong right away, but hadn't really ever heard of the right answer REM. Geez, that's some Saturday-level stuff. There are friendlier ways to clue REM than that and still keep it challenging.
I've been having moderate success with Izzet Phoenix on MTG Arena. Magic 2020 rotated in, but all I did was swap some sideboard cards into Fry. But I don't see Teferi everywhere anymore; it seems like everyone is playing Elementals. Rising Reef, Nissa, Krasis. I've seen uncommon Chandra, Living Twister. Some play Growth Spiral, some don't. There are many options. But Phoenix is actually pretty well-positioned against it. You have ample removal for early Elves or Reefs, and you can hopefully pressure Nissa with Phoenix or Drake and burn so things don't get out of hand. If they can't land a huge Krasis, they can't deal with your fliers any other way. Post-board, you get Entrancing Melody for Krasis, or sometimes an animated land. I bring in 2 Kefnet as well, and they really have trouble with that.
Yet I found a new toy. You can read about it here. I've only played a few rounds, but this deck is fun as heck, and I wanna play it. I just got to Gold, and I'm going to a least try and get to Diamond this season. It's heartbreaking that Teferi is not the place to be (actually, 3-mana Teferi is kind of a beating vs. Simic), but I like this style of never tapping out. An opponent had used Narset to find Negate while I was pressuring with a couple of guys including a Cutthroat. He drew out a Sinister Sabotage with a Vraska's Contempt. then the next turn, confidently played Ritual of Soot with Negate up...right into Frilled Mystic. There is no way to express a smirk online, but I bet he could feel it all the same.
Friday, July 5, 2019
Saturday 35:14 (3 Google)
No records here. Pablo Casals? Ina Claire? Yikes. (The third Google was Dane Cook who was clued via an album I know nothing of.) Some things you learn by doing enough puzzles, such as bygone opera diva Maria CALLAS, "Family Ties" mom ELYSE, song "Goodnight, IRENE," Supreme Court justice ELENA Kagan, both names of ALAN ALDA. A mine opening? ADIT. Indigo dye source? ANIL. If you want to go real deep into the archives, you'll learn AMAH (Asian nursemaid) and ESNE (Anglo-Saxon slave), although Will Shortz hates that kind of crosswordese (if it ever really can't be avoided (and the rest of the puzzle had better be worth it), ESNE is often derisively clued as "slave to crosswords"). Unfortunately, while something as useful as INA is the sort of name you might expect to pick up from experience, I've never seen it clued as a name. It's always "___ flash!" or something. It ought to be, if it can, of course. Crosswords need to be careful balancing such things. Sure, a computer will figure out a cellist and a 1939 film actress no problem, but solving other clues take a human touch, too. And you don't always need to know everything. I got all 11 letters in DARLENE LOVE entirely from crosses.
No records here. Pablo Casals? Ina Claire? Yikes. (The third Google was Dane Cook who was clued via an album I know nothing of.) Some things you learn by doing enough puzzles, such as bygone opera diva Maria CALLAS, "Family Ties" mom ELYSE, song "Goodnight, IRENE," Supreme Court justice ELENA Kagan, both names of ALAN ALDA. A mine opening? ADIT. Indigo dye source? ANIL. If you want to go real deep into the archives, you'll learn AMAH (Asian nursemaid) and ESNE (Anglo-Saxon slave), although Will Shortz hates that kind of crosswordese (if it ever really can't be avoided (and the rest of the puzzle had better be worth it), ESNE is often derisively clued as "slave to crosswords"). Unfortunately, while something as useful as INA is the sort of name you might expect to pick up from experience, I've never seen it clued as a name. It's always "___ flash!" or something. It ought to be, if it can, of course. Crosswords need to be careful balancing such things. Sure, a computer will figure out a cellist and a 1939 film actress no problem, but solving other clues take a human touch, too. And you don't always need to know everything. I got all 11 letters in DARLENE LOVE entirely from crosses.
Saturday, June 29, 2019
Thursday 17:44
Friday 19:38
Saturday 12:30
I think that's a personal best for Saturday, at least without outside assistance, and compare the times for Thursday-Friday. I couldn't really tell if this was a hard puzzle or not but 1-Across was a nice long gimme ("Woman who spends money on a younger lover, in modern slang" SUGARMAMA. (Is there old-timey slang for this? "Sugar Daddy" wouldn't be considered modern, would it?)). Saturday usually has fewer straightforward things, but there was nothing too terribly misdirecting, which I would rather see, even if it takes longer. Clever clues for regular words make me smile, Will Shortz has said the best puzzles could be Monday OR Saturday, differing only in clues. But clearly, that's not actually a standard they use. Friday-Saturday are always lower word count (remember, lower word count means longer answers and more white space, so harder) than earlier days.
Friday 19:38
Saturday 12:30
I think that's a personal best for Saturday, at least without outside assistance, and compare the times for Thursday-Friday. I couldn't really tell if this was a hard puzzle or not but 1-Across was a nice long gimme ("Woman who spends money on a younger lover, in modern slang" SUGARMAMA. (Is there old-timey slang for this? "Sugar Daddy" wouldn't be considered modern, would it?)). Saturday usually has fewer straightforward things, but there was nothing too terribly misdirecting, which I would rather see, even if it takes longer. Clever clues for regular words make me smile, Will Shortz has said the best puzzles could be Monday OR Saturday, differing only in clues. But clearly, that's not actually a standard they use. Friday-Saturday are always lower word count (remember, lower word count means longer answers and more white space, so harder) than earlier days.
Saturday, June 15, 2019
Sunday 42:53 (themeless)
A themeless Sunday. Why do you do this? If it weren't for the diagramless (which was ok, but a little easy despite the asymmetry and the theme was sparse), the puzzle weekend would be wasted. Friday and Saturday are your times for themeless things, don't waste your premier day on this. It's not a horrible puzzle (although SERENE and SELENE in the same grid is unattractive), just not fun for the time it took. No aha! moments, yet not hard enough to feel accomplished for finishing it. It was just work.
A themeless Sunday. Why do you do this? If it weren't for the diagramless (which was ok, but a little easy despite the asymmetry and the theme was sparse), the puzzle weekend would be wasted. Friday and Saturday are your times for themeless things, don't waste your premier day on this. It's not a horrible puzzle (although SERENE and SELENE in the same grid is unattractive), just not fun for the time it took. No aha! moments, yet not hard enough to feel accomplished for finishing it. It was just work.
Friday, June 14, 2019
Friday 20:57 (2 Google)
Toughie.
So the last professional Magic event was won by Jeskai control, a deck I very much wanted to play. It was a large player shortly after Guilds of Ravnica was released, and I built it, but it had fallen out of favor with the new tools in Allegiances, and the deck was supplanted by Esper Control, or its sister Esper Hero. With War of the Spark, some people looked back to Jeskai, and built a planeswalker-heavy deck. Sarkhan, Saheeli, T3feri, T5feri, Narset, and more. But I like to counter spells. I want Absorb. I got lucky early in War of the Spark, and opened several copies of Teferi. I actually spent almost $40 and a lot of store credit to get the last cards I needed, and I felt like Thanos acquiring the last Infinity Stones. This deck seemed like just what I wanted - tight control with a combo finish (Ral, Storm Conduit and 2x Expansion/Explosion. It seems like that's unlikely to happen, but it does. If not, copying Banefire, or just burning them out with other spells and Ral's static ability, going ultimate with Teferi usually prompts concession). You know what other deck played like that? Zevatog, possibly my favorite deck ever.
I've played the deck in a few events since. I can't win. Or at least, I'm not winning enough. And I'm losing to completely unlikely situations, or I'm losing to my own mistakes, and losing to the very people I cannot stand losing to, at least one of whom made the same mistake multiple times. I know the deck can win. It has horrible game against mono-blue, but nobody plays that anymore, right? No, some guy won't give it up. My Gruul deck owns the fuck out of that, but can't really hang with the rest of the metagame anymore. There are new Gruul decks, and maybe I should just find one of those, but I really worked hard to make Jeskai, and I want it to do well. I don't know how to sideboard correctly, although I at least mostly know what I want in
I should play the deck more on Arena, but man it is a pain in the ass to play there. There is no way to make this any good in best of 1, since the sideboard is transformational based on match-up, so you have to play bo3, and matches take forever. Plus, I'm not entirely sure how to execute the combo correctly with full control active. They say you should never make a pet deck, but this isn't a pet deck. The meta has shifted a little but, but this is still well-positioned against most of the field. Maybe I just need Niv-Mizzet main. I board it in every single match, and it really is curtains a lot of the time.
Toughie.
So the last professional Magic event was won by Jeskai control, a deck I very much wanted to play. It was a large player shortly after Guilds of Ravnica was released, and I built it, but it had fallen out of favor with the new tools in Allegiances, and the deck was supplanted by Esper Control, or its sister Esper Hero. With War of the Spark, some people looked back to Jeskai, and built a planeswalker-heavy deck. Sarkhan, Saheeli, T3feri, T5feri, Narset, and more. But I like to counter spells. I want Absorb. I got lucky early in War of the Spark, and opened several copies of Teferi. I actually spent almost $40 and a lot of store credit to get the last cards I needed, and I felt like Thanos acquiring the last Infinity Stones. This deck seemed like just what I wanted - tight control with a combo finish (Ral, Storm Conduit and 2x Expansion/Explosion. It seems like that's unlikely to happen, but it does. If not, copying Banefire, or just burning them out with other spells and Ral's static ability, going ultimate with Teferi usually prompts concession). You know what other deck played like that? Zevatog, possibly my favorite deck ever.
I've played the deck in a few events since. I can't win. Or at least, I'm not winning enough. And I'm losing to completely unlikely situations, or I'm losing to my own mistakes, and losing to the very people I cannot stand losing to, at least one of whom made the same mistake multiple times. I know the deck can win. It has horrible game against mono-blue, but nobody plays that anymore, right? No, some guy won't give it up. My Gruul deck owns the fuck out of that, but can't really hang with the rest of the metagame anymore. There are new Gruul decks, and maybe I should just find one of those, but I really worked hard to make Jeskai, and I want it to do well. I don't know how to sideboard correctly, although I at least mostly know what I want in
I should play the deck more on Arena, but man it is a pain in the ass to play there. There is no way to make this any good in best of 1, since the sideboard is transformational based on match-up, so you have to play bo3, and matches take forever. Plus, I'm not entirely sure how to execute the combo correctly with full control active. They say you should never make a pet deck, but this isn't a pet deck. The meta has shifted a little but, but this is still well-positioned against most of the field. Maybe I just need Niv-Mizzet main. I board it in every single match, and it really is curtains a lot of the time.
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