Thank you to the LEGENDARY crossword maker and co-parent to our single brain cell crosstina aquafina for the test solve!
SPOILER-Y THINGS:
fullscreen | .puz | .pdf
Hi all! I'm back with a kinda-maybe-themeless. This grid was withering away on my desktop for months so I decided to just finish the damn thing. I hope you enjoy! Thank you to THEE kateschmate for the test solve!
Also: I wanted to take the time to thank y'all for all the incredibly kind feedback on the Tabula Rasa project (and in particular the shoutouts on Daily Crossword Links, Bewilderingly, and Fill Me In). This project truly was a labor of love, and I'm so happy and humbled to hear that it resonated with you all.
Some more xwords links below:
fullscreen | .puz | .pdf
Look, I haven't been on this earth very long, but over the course of my life I've found three things to be categorically true:
1) The health and well-being of ourselves and others should be everyone's number one priority - everything else is dumb, fun bullshit and should be treated as such. This includes puzzles. They are designed to be fun - not stuffy homages to Puccini operas or whatever the fuck that are meant to pacify anyone who needs smelling salts at the first sign of a butt joke. (Ask me how I really feel.)
2) Everyone is secretly a huge freak and they'll eagerly demonstrate that to you if given the opportunity. Yes, this even applies to normies, who are actually probably some of the biggest weirdos on the planet. Imagine repressing your weirdness for all your life and having all that bubble up inside your head forever? No thanks!
3) Fun is more fun when you get more people involved. Take this how you will.
Anyway, these three truths are the guiding principles behind Tabula Rasa. Since getting really into puzzles, one of the things that's been really interesting to me is seeing how different people clue different things. It's a really intimate moment where you get a curated peek inside someone's brain with their permission, and slowly you begin to learn more and more about the people constructing the puzzles. In my opinion, indie puzzles are where most of this magic happens, as the "rules" imposed by larger publications aren't a thing out here in this wild, wild, west. Because of this, I ask that as you solve these, you really take the time to absorb the clues and not just speed through the puzzle. This puzzle was designed for creative purposes, not competitive ones. (Besides, competition frequently stifles creativity in our neoliberal hellscape and the end product is inescapable, thoughtless cookie cutter "art". Anyway!)
Tabula Rasa is a project where I constructed a 15x themeless grid with fun, flexible fill and sent it out to whoever for them to clue however their little freakazoid heart desired. The three rules I did have for this project were this: there needs to be basic grammatical agreement between your clue and the fill (no, I don't really care about spelling or typos), no needless bummers, and any racism/sexism/homophobia/transphobia/Islamophobia/etc. will result in your puzzle being entirely excluded from this project.
It was also important to me that people who've never constructed a puzzle got in on this, even if it's just the cluing portion. Making puzzles can be expensive (between "standard" wordlists and software) and it's ridiculous to think that people have expendable income like that in 2022. A collaborative spreadsheet on Drive works just fine to share clues! And also, honestly, it's also kinda intimidating to build a grid for the first time, so I figured I'd just do the hard part! I wanted this to be a bit of a nudge for people who've been considering getting into making puzzles but have been putting it off for whatever reason, and I think this project was successful in that regard.
Live on this blog is my version of the Tabula Rasa grid, along with grids from constructors who do not currently have their own blogs (but many of them are Twitch streamers, so I've included the links to their channels). If we, as constructors and members of an ever-growing community, are serious about platforming new voices, then we should just, y'know...platform new voices. Not rocket science.
Here is a link to the puzzle pack that includes all 19 submissions as .puz files for your solving pleasure. I've also invited seasoned constructors to post their own clued versions of my Tabula Rasa grid on their blogs over the course of the next few days. I'm so excited for you all to see them (see the list below)! Truly bangers.
One last thing and then I'll let you solve a fucking puzzle: truly, an enormous thank you to everyone who contributed to this. Thank you for taking on an opportunity that may, in many ways, make you a little vulnerable and going with it anyway. There's a lot of power in taking silliness seriously and anyone who says otherwise can go listen to Puccini.
xoxo,
meatdaddy69420
SPOILER-Y THINGS:
What's that sound? Oh, not much, it's just a MEATDADDY69420 AND CROSSTINA AQUAFINA COLLAB!!!!!!!
We genuinely, sincerely hope you hate it.
SPOILER-Y THINGS:
what the fuck are you even talking about
what the fuck are you even talking about, and how do i get in on it (scored dictionary)
This puzzle has been in the works for longer than it needed to be, largely because I can't spell. It turns out that if you misspell something in your acrostic quote, it's not only really embarrassing (in my defense, I copied and pasted the quote) but it also messes up the whole puzzle. Some of you may say "but meatdaddy, don't you have a linguistics degree?" And the answer is yes, but as a Gemini, I contain multitudes, okay? [insert spiel here about medieval monks and the crapshoot that was orthography in Modern English manuscripts]
ANYWAY, a huge thanks to Alex for helping me troubleshoot this puzzle and my spelling errors, and to his acrostic generator for enabling me to make this. Another huge thanks for Norah Sharpe/Shannon Rapp, crossword extraordinaire, for the test solve and for helping me hone my puzzle craft.
Love it? Hate it? Streaming it? Does it make you wanna throw your Macbook in the East River and return to a hunter-gatherer society? @ me!
To all my girls, gays, and theys (and straight men, I guess...): BEHOLD! The collab you have all been waiting for - you know her, you love her, you solve her lovely puzzles - it's a KATESCHMATE (of Crosswords Schmosswords fame) MEATDADDY PRODUCTION!
Firstly, thanks to Kate for reaching out for a collab! I'm always really flattered when people reach out to make a puzzle with me and this was no exception. I really forgot how much I missed making stuff with my friends and crosswords have reminded me what a true joy it is. I also wanna thank Kate for fully enabling (and honestly, showcasing) my chaos - I think we fed off each other's silliness in a really fun way and this is what we wound up with. I think it's perfectly ridiculous in all the right ways and I'm so happy with what we whipped up. Hope you are too!
A word from Kate: "I don't feel like there's much I need to say, since the puzzle quite frankly SPEAKS FOR ITSELF, other than I am so happy meatdaddy was into it when I asked them to collab! This puzzle is dedicated to the wheel. Thank you, wheel."
P.S. - No one test solved this, so any typos are the solver's fault for doubting our ability and intelligence. I can't believe you. Take some accountability, jeez.
P.S.S. - WHEEL! WHEEL! WHEEL! WHEEL!
fullscreen | puz | pdf
Hi! I don't know what this puzzle is. Have it anyway! I tried to experiment with some fun, long fill since I'm usually a bit intimidated by it. I didn't bother having anyone test solve it because I didn't feel like it warrants that, so any typos or whatever are solely on me (as it always is, but like...especially now).
Hm. On second thought: sometimes it's cathartic to just be like, publicly ugly and bad at something to prove to yourself it's not the end of the world? I guess that's what this is. Not everything needs to be polished.
fullscreen | puz | pdf
Look. Many of you know me as a saint. Maybe even a martyr. This is why I have opted to create this puzzle. I must speak my piece, and what a piece it is.
I have been ignored - nay, robbed - snubbed! - for far too long. I have fought the good fight with the best of intentions, only for my words to fall on stubborn, unlistening ears. I have clawed my way up from the trenches, I have fought my inner demons, I have been a passenger aboard Charon's mighty raft through the deepest pits of Tartarus. I have touched the cold and unrelenting hand of God, and I have returned to you all, bruised, raw, but full of affirmations: I am strong. I am powerful. I am deserving.
This puzzle came to me in a dream, much like the benzene ring appeared in the form of an ouroboros to Kekulé. His vision changed the world, and so will my puzzle.
Thank you to the incomparable Norah for all of her help on this puzzle, and for being my ally on this grueling journey.
SPOILER-Y THINGS:
Evidence of my dedication to the cause (1, 2, 3)
fullscreen | .puz | .pdf
There are a multitude of reasons as to why I'm grateful for stumbling into the crossword world, but one of the main ones is that I've met so many incredibly smart people who are willing to lean into (and frankly, enable) my chaos - I firmly believe in the beautiful, masterful execution of insanely dumb ideas and hope to sell you all on it eventually. I also hadn't realized how much I missed making silly stuff with my friends until I started collabing on puzzles.
As always, some thanks are in order: a huge thank you to Alex for reaching out and suggesting we do an acrostic collab (you can make your own here), and a huge thank you to Chris for the test solve! And a quick shoutout to the acrostic generator for producing some nasty fill - I see you, girl. Do your thing.
PS: Go check out the AVCX Kickstarter!
SPOILERS (please watch this video in its entirety I swear it's worth it)
