JiveBlog

Here’s some statistical and structural info about this weekend’s themeless crossword. First, it has 124 words, which is now the lowest number of answers I’ve had in a 21x21 themeless puzzle. It is also, with one exception, the first time one of my Post puzzles had an average word length of 6 letters or longer (the exception was this Something Different puzzle, where the whole point is to feature long, made-up phrases throughout). It’s also the first time that I’ve used a left-right symmetrical pattern in a themeless puzzle. There wasn’t any special reason for that other than I just wanted to try it and see what I could create.

It may also be the first time I didn’t start out with any specific seed entries — answers that I started building the grid around. Normally I’d take the longest answers and begin filling the grid there, and technically, the 21-letter IT’LL BE OUR LITTLE SECRET was one of the first answers I placed in the grid. But it just sort of popped up as a possibility when I was looking up 21-letter phrases that could cross the two long 18-letter answers at 6D and 14D; it wasn’t a phrase that I specifically intended to use in a puzzle. That pair of 18-letter phrases, by the way, was the only structural element of the puzzle that I insisted on keeping; it was a little wink to the fact that it’s my 18th themeless Post crossword. And neither ALTERNATE UNIVERSES nor UP CLOSE AND PERSONAL was a seed entry; they helped facilitate filling in the rest of the grid with their common letters, but I didn’t start the grid with them in mind either.

Some specific answers and clues:

ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7uK3SoaCnn6Sku7G70q1lnKedZLqis8CzoKedX2d9c32OamloaWlkwLC41K2gqKZdmsOiuoyboKummKS5u7%2BMnZycZWFuerG70q1kppmXlsequsRmmquno6jEsL7DZquhnZ2auaa%2F0malqGVhbXw%3D