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crossword 9:33
meta 15 min
good day and welcome to episode #743 of matt gaffney’s weekly crossword contest, “Butterfly Effect”. this week 4 puzzle, a visitor providing from paolo pasco, challenges us to seek out a time period utilized in historical past. all proper, what are the theme solutions? there are seven lengthy(ish) throughout solutions within the grid, every of which has each an actual and a hypothetical clue:
- {What if the clue was… “1999 Grammy nominee for Best Female R&B Performance” as an alternative of “1980 Grammy winner for Record of the Year?” (August 2014)} I GET LONELY.
- {…”Architectural marvel in Bay Lake” as an alternative of “Architectural marvel in Paris”? (September 2021)} SPACESHIP EARTH.
- {…”Some K9 unit animals” as an alternative of “Excellent source of Vitamin B12”? (June 2011)} ROTTWEILERS.
- {…”Surname in a basic nursery rhyme” as an alternative of “Chocolate company known for ovoid products”? (June 2016)} HUBBARD.
- {…”Emphatic refusal” as an alternative of “Primal feelings”? (July 2021)} HELL TO THE NO.
- {…”Hides information from” as an alternative of “Trayed fare?”? (November 2019)} KEEPS IN THE DARK.
- {…”Milwaukee staff, informally” as an alternative of “Author of the bestselling memoirs ‘Hourglass’ and ‘Slow Motion’”? (December 2018)} THE BREWERS.
in every case, the “what if the clue was” clues the entry that truly goes within the grid. so what’s the “instead of” clue all about? and the parenthetical month and 12 months? it seems that these have been all theme clues in earlier mgwcc metas from the given months, so we’re trying an alternate historical past of mgwcc itself. what an incredible and bonkers thought! let’s take a better look:
- {1980 Grammy winner for Record of the Year (August 2014)} was from mgwcc #323. the reply was SAILING, by christopher cross. on this meta, the theme solutions have been all musical works by individuals with double initials, and people initials spelled out the meta reply, which was CELLO. in paolo’s alternate historical past, we’re changing SAILING with I GET LONELY by janet jackson. on this meta, this might change the C from christopher cross with J to provide the brand new meta reply, JELLO.
- {Architectural marvel in Paris (September 2021)}, was from mgwcc #693, a 12 months in the past. the reply was EIFFEL TOWER, and the meta used the shapes of those architectural landmarks to spell out the reply, MATH. EIFFEL TOWER’s iconic A form gave the A, so changing it with the spherical SPACESHIP EARTH (from epcot middle) would change the meta reply to MOTH.
- {Excellent supply of Vitamin B12 (June 2011)} was from mgwcc #160, considered one of my favourite metas of all the sequence. (additionally, this puzzle ran when paolo was, what, 10 years previous? how does he learn about this stuff? it’s not like mgwcc reruns are continuously on television land or regardless of the youngsters are watching as of late.) anyway, the reply was LIVER, however the important thing to the meta was that there have been six clues containing an alphanumeric designation of one of many areas in a recreation of battleship, and if you happen to map the crossword grid to the battleship board, the reply itself used the corresponding sq.. so sq. B12 within the grid picked out the I of LIVER, and the reply to the meta was SIMILE. (you’ll be able to see the rows labeled A-O and columns 1-15 within the grid picture on that hyperlink.) within the alternate historical past, we’d be sq. K9 as an alternative. that may take away the primary I of SIMILE and add an R to the top, altering the meta reply to SMILER.
- {Chocolate firm identified for ovoid merchandise (June 2016)} was from mgwcc #421, a visitor meta by chris king. the reply was CADBURY, and on this puzzle, all of the theme solutions have been seven letters lengthy, and associated to a vacation noticed on the identical day of the week yearly. so CADBURY makes easter eggs, and easter is at all times on a sunday, and sunday is the primary day of the week, so it picks out the primary letter of CADBURY. within the alternate historical past, HUBBARD of nursery rhymes is previous mom HUBBARD, suggesting mom’s day, which can be a sunday. so we’d be selecting out the H and as an alternative of CANDLES, the meta reply could be HANDLES.
- {“Primal emotions (July 2021)} was from one other visitor meta, mgwcc #684 by malaika handa. the reply was INSTINCTS, and on this puzzle, the theme solutions have been every of wierd size and comprised precisely two of every letter they contained, apart from one odd letter out. so INSTINCTS has I, N, S, and T twice every, plus one C. taking the odd letters out spells out the meta reply, which was TWICE. if we change INSTINCTS with HELL TO THE NO, the odd letter out could be N (with E, H, L, O, and T showing twice every), altering the meta reply to TWINE.
- {Trayed fare? (November 2019)} was from one more visitor meta, mgwcc #598 by dave sullivan. the reply was PIGS IN A BLANKET, and the theme solutions all contained a shortened type of one of many six trig features (sin, cos, tan, csc, sec, cot). selecting out the letter instantly earlier than the trig operate spelled out the reply, which was TRIG itself. changing PIGS IN A BLANKET with KEEPS IN THE DARK would change TRIG to TRIP.
- {Author of the bestselling memoirs ‘Hourglass’ and ‘Slow Motion’ (December 2018)} was from mgwcc #550, and the reply was DANI SHAPIRO. every of the theme solutions contained a hidden language, so this one was DANISH. the primary letters of the languages spelled out the reply, which was one more language, DUTCH. changing DANI SHAPIRO with THE BREWERS would change DANISH to HEBREW and provides us the alternate meta reply HUTCH.
phew. in order that was a visit down reminiscence lane! however what’s our new meta reply? nicely, on this outsized (21×21) grid, there have been seven entries whose clues might fulfill one of many alternate historical past meta solutions:
- {Mold-y dessert?} FLAN is also the clue for JELLO.
- {Destructive insect} LOCUST might additionally clue MOTH.
- {One in an image, say} ACTOR might additionally clue SMILER, if we’re speaking a few {photograph} as an alternative of a movement image.
- {Some vodka purchases} PINTS might additionally clue HANDLES. i didn’t know this sense of HANDLES, and needed to backsolve it, but it surely’s a factor.
- {Package retailer provide} PEANUTS might additionally clue TWINE. i believed this was an odd option to clue PEANUTS within the first place (neither the meals nor the caricature), however this explains it.
- {Make a misstep} ERR, an uber-common crossword reply, however this might additionally clue TRIP.
- {Bunny’s hangout} RABBIT HOLE, but additionally HUTCH.
taking the primary letters of these seven solutions within the corresponding theme order spells out FLAPPER, a historic time period (from the Twenties) that additionally cleverly refers again to the titular butterfly, flapping its wings and inflicting these small adjustments to ripple by the material of historical past.
this was an absolute tour de drive, and i used to be additionally delighted to be reminded of a few of the intelligent metas of the previous. that mentioned, i need to admit that i believe i had a leg up on this meta, having blogged all of those puzzles within the first place. i believe there have been loads of methods in anyway, particularly with considered googling of the “instead of” clues, however i’m undoubtedly to listen to about your experiences. what did you all assume?
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