Saturday, March 21, 2009

No-Google Friday

So, after the excitement of the ACPT, after re-solving all the tourney puzzles, after taking a stab at KenKen and not finding the joy in it, after taking a longish vacation from puzzling in general, I decided to jump back in with a NYTimes puzzle on, of course, the second-toughest day of the week, Friday.

So I opened the Times to a David Lawrence Wilk challenge featuring 10 -- count 'em! -- 10 15-letter entries, a feat I just had to sit back and admire (honestly, I don't know how constructors manage to find 15-letter phrases that will stack & cross like this!) before diving in. With a pen. Because I hadn't brought a pencil with me on my ride to work. So I tried to fill in the blanks *lightly* while despairing of ever filling in trivia type entries like "Carol Kane's role on 'Taxi'". Oh, I watched "Taxi" religiously back in the day ... but ... yanno, I'm gettin' old and forgetful. Heh.

True to my usual Friday experience, I managed a few entries before having to get to actual paying work. When I returned to the puzzle, I was excited to fill in one of the 15-letter entries ... then the 2nd one fell ... and I was off and running, even in spite of some misdirected wrong entries: I'd filled in "kin," for instance, for the "Fathers and sons" clue. Wrong! All right, then it must be "men," right? Wrong! (If you must know -- turn your head if you don't want to see -- it's "hes" which is, IMHO, hardly a legitimate plural, but it's only a minor groan for the crossing 3-stacker payoff.)

The upshot is that I *almost* -- I came this||close -- finished the puzzle with nary a tour to Google. Where I stumbled is in the lower left where I know nothing about a "Royal from the planet Alderaan" nor who was the Oscar nominee for "Stand and Deliver" in 1988.

Still ... I'm pleased. And off now to pick up the Saturday Times (in spite of my online subscription to the puzzles, I still prefer the old-school pen[cil]-and-paper experience) to see what challenge awaits within ...

1 comment:

  1. Puzzles not my cuppa tea.

    Will get the Rubik's Cube or play sudoku instead.

    But yes Google friday is now- on top of my to-do list and guess what? Today is FRIDAY. No time to waste.

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