It is a truth universally acknowledged that after a Tuesday puzzle that plays like a Wednesday, you get a Wednesday that plays like a Tuesday (apologies to Ms. Austen). It's not clear to me the criteria that push an early week puzzle into one day over another. I assume there's some "playtesting" that goes on?
In any case, today we get metaphors that can be used for life and/or relationship advice, but which more literally can be applied to solving a jigsaw puzzle. The sayings are placed in order to make sense reading from top to bottom as steps necessary to finish your puzzle, starting with LAYITALLOUTTHERE and finishing with SEETHEBIGPICTURE. Nice sequence. But shouldn't there have been something about starting with the edge pieces? Everybody knows that's how you get started...
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| SADE Adu |
Perhaps the difference between Tuesday and Wednesday is that the clues are more PLAYFUL ("Like a frisky puppy"). Some good ones today:
4D: By no means basic (ACIDIC). Indeed.
54A: Eat dirt? (ERODE)
72A: Run into a hitch? (ELOPE) - this is a great QMC, IMO.
64A: Mae who said "To err is human, but it feels divine" (WEST) - not so much clever as witty.
A nice shoutout to THEWIRE, still my favorite television series of all time.
I like that the puzzle ends with the quotation "The REST is silence."
I was looking for something EDGY too, Colum, but still this is a very sweet puzzle. And brought back lovely memories. Our Aunt Priscilla was the jigsaw puzzle queen at the Susan Bailis House on Mass Ave. People would actually buy her finished creations and she would dutifully and cheerfully give the money to the residence.
ReplyDeleteFWIW, I was a couple minutes slower on this one than on yesterday's. And we love a puzzle around here. Frannie just finished one yesterday!
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