The Globe and Mail crosswords: Breaking down the Weekender’s ‘Get a Word in Edgewise,’ cryptic clues and more

Welcome back to Puzzle Pieces, an insider’s look at our Weekender and Weekender Cryptic crosswords. Spoilers abound, so read no further until you’ve solved the puzzles!

By convention, I put clues in [square brackets] and grid entries in CAPS.

Favourite moments in the Nov. 14 Weekender

I constructed Get a Word in Edgewise, with guest editing by Will Nediger.

I hope you giggled rather than eye-rolled at 114A: [“I’m too young to ___!” (122-Down about going prematurely grey)]. At 122D we find PUN, so of course, the answer here is DYE. You’re welcome.

We have one of our test solvers to thank for noting that Canadian judges don’t bang GAVELs, which is why the 117A clue specifies: [Banger heard at an American courthouse]. I admit, most of my trial knowledge comes from U.S.-based movies and TV, so I had no idea. You learn something new every day.

I included a little personal nostalgia at 56D, with the clue [First gaming console for many Gen Xers]. I know we have solvers for whom an ATARI is an ancient historical artifact, so I’m here to tell you that some of us remember it well! I spent hours and hours turning that little wheel to perfect my Super Breakout skills.

Callbacks to my childhood are one of my favourite types of clues, actually. This puzzle also includes 21A [___ Bedelia (character who takes things too literally)], 15D [How “the cheese stands” at the end of The Farmer in the Dell], and 39D [Something done “sitting in a tree,” in a song]. That’s AMELIA, ALONE, and K-I-S-S-I-N-G.

Breaking down the theme

I had the revealer entry for this puzzle, OFF TO ONE SIDE, in a list of random ideas for a while, unsure what I’d do with it. Should there be entries that bleed off the sides of the grid? Should theme entries only run down the sides? When I hit on the idea I eventually went with, all kinds of possibilities opened up.

It’s clued at 118A: [Out of the way for now … and what can be found in this puzzle’s theme entries?]. The idea was to tack the word OFF onto either the front or back of recognizable terms or phrases, in a way that would change their meaning entirely.

I started by making a list of words that start or end with OFF and that become a completely different word when you remove it, such as face(off), spin(off), (off)hand and (off)shoot.

Then, I looked for common expressions using those resultant words and finally, I thought about which ones would lend themselves to totally different and funny definitions with the OFF reinstated. I wanted to alternate sides, which helped narrow down the possibilities a little.

Here’s where I landed. I think it turned out nicely:

• 24A: [Like a really big loan?] – HELL TO PAY OFF
• 32A: [Unplugged for a beach day?] – OFFLINE IN THE SAND
• 55A: [Discarded bit of internet slop?] – WEB CASTOFF
• 63A: [Kids slowly starting to make up after a fight?] – OFFSPRING THAW
• 76A: [“Really can’t proceed until this is approved”?] – I NEED A SIGN-OFF
• 87A: [Police officer who’s a bit of a goofball?] – OFFBEAT COP
• 106A: [“That second-round vote went pretty well for us”?] – WE HAD A GOOD RUNOFF

Cryptic clue of the week

Let’s examine 26D in the Nov. 14 Weekender Cryptic. The clue is [For recital, must give boyfriend a woodwind (4)].

At first glance, this clue seems to have an awful lot of parts to give just a four-letter answer. But we press on.

When it’s a short answer, my brain tends to try to find the definition first to see if I can back-solve the clue. I really can’t think of a four-letter anything that might mean “for recital,” or any other combination of the words at the start of the clue. So I’m pretty confident that the definition is at the end, and that we’re looking for a woodwind.

Because I’m a crossworder, OBOE immediately springs to mind (just as OREO would spring to mind if the clue said “cookie”).

(Because I also solve cryptics, my brain assumes there must be obscure four-letter woodwinds I’ve never heard of, and I immediately start resenting this puzzle for choosing words I don’t know.)

From cryptic experience, I also know that “for recital” can indicate a homophone, suggesting we want something that sounds the same but has a different spelling. Think of it as “when the following is recited.” So what might be another way to say “must give boyfriend” that sounds like the name of a woodwind?

My very first idea holds the key: “must give boyfriend” can be “owe beau.” When recited, that sounds just like OBOE. I knew it all along.

For a deeper intro to cryptic solving, check out Fraser Simpson’s article How to solve The Globe’s cryptic crossword.