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Rows Garden #110

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ROWS GARDEN 110 — HARDER

ROWS GARDEN 110 — EASIER

Rows Garden 110 Harder — Solution

Rows Garden 110 Easier — Solution

Ugh…tough weekend for me. I discovered one incorrect letter in a bloom halfway through cluing this week’s puzzle. That one letter eventually led to parts of five Rows and ten Blooms needing to be changed, including the seed entry of the puzzle. That’s OK, because yesterday I saw that I was scooped by the veritable Brendan Emmett Quigley (I won’t say which entry, but you can probably make a reasonable guess) on that said entry. Hours later, I gave up. Even the final version includes a yucky partial, so I apologize for the somewhat lowered standard I used in this one. I like a lot of the Rows, however, so it still should be fun. Still, this was by far the biggest edit I’ve had to make, and the most time-consuming.

It’s currently -12 degrees (-24 windchill) here. You want to know the funny part? This weekend I’m taking a vacation…to Grand Forks, North Dakota, where it’s even colder! And I can’t wait for it. My beloved St. Cloud State Husky hockey team is playing its in-conference rival, the North Dakota used-to-be-until-the-state-legislature-shut-it-down-Fighting-Sioux. It’s a huge series, with first place in the WCHA on the line, so it should be a very entertaining weekend of hockey.

Stay warm!

2 Comments

Andrew J. Ries, January 22nd 2013 | Tags: , , ,
Posted in Puzzles, Rows Garden

Rows Garden #97, and a Crossword Book Giveaway

ROWS GARDEN 97 — HARDER

ROWS GARDEN 97 — EASIER

It’s about time I started giving away crossword stuff on the site, so why don’t we get right to it? The landmark centennial of Arthur Wynne’s first crossword puzzle in 1913 is closing approaching, and the estimable Peter Gordon edited a collection of 100 crosswords that celebrate the history since that first puzzle, titled “100 Years, 100 Crosswords.” I constructed two of the puzzles in the collection, but the book is chock full of contributions by constructors more accomplished than I: Patrick Blindauer, Francis Heaney, Brendan Emmett Quigley, and Mike Selinker, just to name a few.

The book officially releases November 6th, but I will be giving away a couple free copies here, and all you need to do is solve this week’s Rows Garden and do some brief extra-curricular activity after solving. Here are your instructions: Both entries in Row B share the same clue, as you’ll see, and they both ask for a “Triple Crown component.” I want you to e-mail me a Triple Crown component NOT mentioned in this puzzle’s grid. I will award a free copy of “100 Years, 100 Puzzles” to three randomly selected entrants among those who correctly identify a missing Triple Crown component. Email me at aries.puzzles@gmail.com and put your answer in the subject heading of the email. The contest will close at 10 PM central time next Monday, October 22nd, so get your answers in before then! Since it’s a contest, I’m not posting the solution until next week, so you can’t peek! And no spoilers in the comments, please.

10/16/12 EDIT: Typo in the Row E book title. It should read The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, not “Windfell” as I had. Thanks to Phoebe M. and Ray H. for bringing this to the attention of the staff.

2 Comments

Andrew J. Ries, October 16th 2012 | Tags: , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Puzzles, Rows Garden

Rows Garden #65

ROWS GARDEN 65 — HARDER

ROWS GARDEN 65 — EASIER

Rows Garden 65 Harder — Solution

Rows Garden 65 Easier — Solution

This puzzle’s subtitle: Beat to the punch by BEQ. You’ll quickly find out why. And admittedly, the master vastly outclued me in this case. But I’m certainly not the only constructor one-upped by Brendan, and we even swapped Facebook messages regarding who was going to be the first to debut the phrase in question. Ultimately a spirit of friendliness prevailed and we decided to both go for it. Have fun with that one.

Did you all watch the Oscars on Sunday? Pretty boring ceremony, if you ask me, but I did like seeing Meryl Streep winning again (albeit for probably her 13th best performance in her career). It slew me to see Woody Allen winning for his Midnight in Paris screenplay. The guy openly despises the Academy, has never collected one of the Oscars he’s won, been to exactly one ceremony, and stated in Stardust Memories (the finest of his films, in my humble opinion) that he’d trade his Oscars for “one more second of life.” And yet the Academy consistently nominates his work and has awarded him four awards. Too funny.

3 Comments

Andrew J. Ries, February 28th 2012 | Tags: , ,
Posted in Puzzles, Rows Garden
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