![]() ![]() It’s such an evocative phrase, and I love the way HEART breaks across three words. My favorite of the four theme entries is at 48A: HEAD FO R THE HILLS (“Flee to remote safety”). When I saw that the shaded squares contained a word that could be broken, I guessed that the same word would be split in the other three sets of shaded squares, and I was not disappointed!Īs predicted, the HEART at the heart of T HE ART OF WAR is broken across the words in each of the other three theme entries. This is the benefit of visual elements in the grid like shaded or circled squares - solvers can assume that they are the key to the theme. I only needed this first theme entry to guess the theme, which is revealed at 60A: HEARTBROKEN (“Despondent … as progressively suggested by 17-, 24-, 38- and 48-Across?”). The shaded squares start out all together in the first theme entry, T HE ART OF WAR, but are separated in the other four. ![]() This puzzle contains four theme entries and a revealer, and each of the theme entries has a series of five shaded squares. “Trompe L’OEIL” is French for “deceive the eye,” and refers to optical illusions. The wordplay clue “Musical combos?” refers not to jazz combos but to CHORDS, which are combinations of musical notes.ĥ4D. This puzzle, created by a married couple, most certainly qualifies as a Public Display of Affection.Ĥ7D. “Show of love, for short?” clues PDA, which is short for Public Display of Affection. Is this written down somewhere, or is this just common knowledge?Ĥ5D. Today I Learned: “Fashion dictates that its width be the same as that of one’s lapels” is the clue for TIE. ![]() “Communication at Gallaudet Univ.” still uses “communication” instead of “language” because of the prohibition on clues using the word that a letter in the entry represents, but I much prefer this clue for ASL to yesterday’s jokey clue.ģ5D. This isn’t too tricky of a clue, but I wanted to point it out because I noted yesterday’s clue for ASL (American Sign Language), and thought this one offered a good point of comparison. But no, this is a golf clue, and the place where a slice might go is the ROUGH.ģ4D. I know very little about golf, so I saw the clue “Where a slice might go” and immediately thought of where a slice of pizza might go (“belly,” maybe?). “‘Really?,’ in textspeak” is the clue for SRSLY, which is short for “Seriously?” on the internet (or in texts).ġ2D. I really wanted “diary” for “Book that comes with a set of keys,” but in fact the clue referred to an ATLAS, which comes with map keys that explain the various symbols in the ATLAS’s maps.Ħ9A. An example of an IN APP purchase might be buying extra lives in a game app.ĥ6A. I was a little flummoxed by the clue “Like some online purchases” but ultimately uncovered the entry IN APP, as in IN APP purchases that one can make within a phone app. I definitely entered “pants” by accident when trying to type PASTS for the clue “Some people have checkered ones,” and then giggled to myself because some people do, indeed, have checkered pants.ġ5A. More on the theme below, but for now I’ll just say that new solvers should always be on the lookout for visual clues like shading or circles, which can provide extra hints to the solve. Shaded square themes always tend to go a little faster for me because I am (usually) able to use those squares to uncover the theme early, which I did right away today. We’ve seen a lot of debuts over the past couple of years and quite a few collaborations as well, but I think this is the first married-couple puzzle I can remember solving.Īfter noting today’s byline with delight, I took a look at the grid: We’ve got some shaded gray squares making their way through the long Across entries (three of which are 15 letters long, spanning the whole grid!). Zetzman makes her debut! I love their notes, below, which describe how this puzzle was created while they prepared for the birth of their first child. Vu makes his second New York Times Crossword appearance and Ms. TUESDAY PUZZLE - Congratulations to the married couple Hoang-Kim Vu and Jessica Zetzman, as Mr. ![]()
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