March 17, 2008
The solving of the green
Happy St. Patrick's Day! I trust you'll be celebrating in the traditional way -- by solving a holiday-themed crossword. Lucky for you, I wrote one! (Download Across Lite to solve.)
I ended up writing this because the last puzzle I wrote (you remember, with the Lucky Charms theme) seemed perfect for a St. Patrick's Day crossword -- but that was a really difficult puzzle, and St. Patrick's fell on a Monday this year. So in lieu of waiting until 2011, when it falls on a Thursday, Peter just ran it on a different date. But, he said, he still needed a puzzle for March 17 if I wanted to write one. So I did. The theme is pretty basic, so, to make it interesting for myself, I kept the word count low. (74 words; for comparison, the maximum is 78, and the maximum for a themeless is 72. I usually aim for 76 and go up to 78 if I get stuck.) A lower word count is also good for me because I tend to write clues that are kind of wordy.
Oh, and Peter wanted to run my byline for this puzzle as "Francis O'Heaney". I talked him out of it, pointing out that "Heaney" is already an Irish name and thus does not need to be made joke-Irish.
Posted by Francis at 11:12 AMNice job! While solving, I thought that 38-Across would tie into the holiday theme in some tangential way. Then I figured out the true theme, and assumed 38-Across was just an accident.
Posted by: Todd at March 17, 2008 01:16 PMYep, just a coincidence -- which I didn't notice until you pointed it out. What a missed opportunity! I should have clued it as "Like the Emerald Isle, before St. Patrick was done with it" instead.
Posted by: Francis at March 17, 2008 01:50 PMOh, but making an Irish name joke-Irish with the O is about ten million times funnier than O-ing a random last name. Extra points if the Irish last name already has an O at the beginning!
Things are *always* funnier when you make them over the top.
Posted by: Amy at March 31, 2008 09:09 AM