Sunday, January 21, 2018

PUZZLE #25: Propositional Phrases

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SOLUTION to the last puzzle

Welcome back, solvers!

A quick puzzle recap: over the off weekend, the Mystery Hunt happened. This was my first year actually participating (as a remote solver for team Palindrome), and it was an experience. I'm still tired after the three-day straight puzzle deluge, so I won't write a lot about it. Main points: the theme (Pixar's "Inside Out") was incredible, and the puzzles themselves were so much fun to work on. I'm hoping to be able to head down to next year's Hunt in person, just to get the full experience. For more specificities, you can check out this article about the hunt.

Onto today's puzzle: definitely a modern one, but hopefully there's something for everyone to enjoy. Also, the theme's much less elaborate than a Mystery Hunt puzzle, so it's got that going for it as well.

Hope you enjoy!
-Paolo



Wednesday, January 10, 2018

PUZZLE #24: Personal Space

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SOLUTION to the last puzzle

Surprise, it's an off-week, non-Sunday puzzle! Today's puzzle is about a subject near and dear to my heart, and I hope you enjoy it. Fair warning: if you don't get the theme when you're done, it might take some Googling. Or, to cut the hassle, just click here (SPOILERS for the puzzle, of course).

Also, check out this link, which talks about part of an initiative by Erik Agard and Will Nediger, among others, to reduce the (horrific, IMO) gender imbalance in crosswords and puzzles in general. Check out the linked Facebook group for more information, especially if you're a female-identifying/otherwise underrepresented individual who wants to construct puzzles. My line's always open as well-- email me at the address in the sidebar if you're interested in collaborating.

As always, enjoy the puzzle!
-Paolo


Sunday, January 7, 2018

PUZZLE #23: Themeless 7 (and an announcement)

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LAST PUZZLE'S solution

It's been a while, solvers! First, apologies for the unannounced Christmas/New Year's break; school happened, then I had to play catchup for a little. So you don't get burned again, but I can still stay sane, I'm going to ease up on the schedule a little: as of today, Grids These Days will be publishing every other week. This is hopefully going to be a temporary measure-- going biweekly would let me build a puzzle backlog up again.

In other news, shoutout to the American Values Club crossword for allowing me to trick them into joining the team. You'll be seeing some of my puzzles there in the future; if you like the pop culture deal of this blog, smash that subscribe button. You won't be disappointed.

Onto today's puzzle: another themeless, with a very clear seed entry. After you're done solving, click here (SPOILERS) to see the origins of that entry, and its usage since then.

Also, a non-spoiler thing that's still very cool, that test-solver/very good constructor Chris Adams pointed out: Pyeongchang, the site of the 2018 Winter Games, is adopting the internally-capitalized name PyeongChang. The reason: to avoid confusion with Pyongyang. It's factoids like these that make the blurbs on this site worthwhile.

Enjoy the puzzle!

Best,
Paolo