We have a big puzzle on our hands this weekend (23×23 squares, 182 answers) and it has meta. The instructions say we’re looking for a Grammy-winning song. The first thing to do is look at the longest entries as they are probably topical answers:
- 23A: [Some luau tops] is ALOHA SHIRTS.
- 25A: [The Ganges flows into it] is GULF OF BENGAL.
- 40A: [Insects also known as Florida woods cockroaches] is PALMETTO BUGS.
- 45A: [Diamond shapers, for instance] is GEM CUTTERS.
- 67A: [Extortion scheme involving humans, not weasel family animals as the name suggests] is Badger Game.
- 72A: [Policemen in shorts] is KEYSTONE KOPS.
- 83A: [Opening book of Tamora Pierce’s “Protector of the Small” series] is “FIRST TEST.”
- 99A: [Top 10 title for Peter Frampton and Styx] is “SHOW ME THE WAY.” They’re different songs with different lyrics, but here’s the Peter Frampton song, and here’s it for Styx.
- 102A: [What Meriwether Lewis called a “barking squirrel”] is PRAIRIE DOG.
- 127A: [Rodents’ river structures] is BEAVER DAMS.
- 131A: [Fruity diner dessert] is PEACH PIE.
- 148A: [Subject of the beauty blog Afrobella] is NATURAL HAIR.
- 152A: [Baking apparatus that resembles an insect nest] is HIVE OVEN.
There’s also a meta-related hint at 162A: [Like the third letters of three-letter answers (many of which you’ll need to solve the meta)] Which one is LAST (appropriately the last Across entry in the grid). So we’ll have to find relevant three-letter answers, but let’s focus on the longer answers first.
These 13 thematic responses above have something in common, although it may not be obvious at first glance. The title gives a key clue: they are linked to the states. Topic responses begin with keywords from US state nicknames. You might have to google them to confirm if you don’t know them by heart (I certainly don’t), but here they are:
- ALOHA SHIRTS → Aloha State → Hawaii
- GULF OF BENGAL → Bay State → Massachusetts
- PALMETTO BUGS → Palmetto State → Caroline from the south
- GEM CUTTERS → gem state → Idaho
- Badger Game → badger state → Wisconsin
- KEYSTONE KOPS → keystone state → Pennsylvania
- FIRST TEST → First State → Delaware
- SHOW ME THE WAY → show me status → Missouri
- PRAIRIE DOG → Prairie State → Illinois
- BEAVER DAMS → beaver state → Oregon
- PEACH PIE → fishing state → Georgia
- NATURAL HAIR → natural state → Arkansas
- HIVE OVEN → hive condition → Utah
This is where the second step comes in. Whenever you are taken to US states in a meta-puzzle, one of the first things to list is their two-letter postal abbreviations. You’ll find them all in the grid at different three-letter answers, where the first two letters are the abbreviation and the third is an additional meta-letter:
- Hawaii → HELLO → HELLOJ at 151D: [Thwack]
- Massachusetts → MY → MAH at 4D: [___-jongg]
- Caroline from the south → CS → CSI at 47D: [Ecol., e.g.]
- Idaho → IDENTIFIER → identifierS at 104D: [DOB bearers, often]
- Wisconsin → WI → WII at 100D: [“Metroid Prime 3: Corruption” system]
- Pennsylvania → Pennsylvania → PAS at 124A: [Faux ___ (slip-up)]
- Delaware → OF → FROMA at 106A: [Org. in the film “Traffic”]
- Missouri → MOM → monthM at 27A: [Blythe, to Gwyneth]
- Illinois → HE → ITE at 120A: [Land in l’Adriatique, e.g.]
- Oregon → WHERE → ORR at 119D: [Bassist Benjamin]
- Georgia → Georgia → GAI at 58A: [Moo goo ___ pan]
- Arkansas → AR → ARVS at 41D: [Hammer throw path]
- Utah → Utah → YOUA at 5 p.m.: [Acting teacher Hagen]
Take these 13 extra letters in thematic order and you spell the 2018 Childish Gambino Grammy Award winning song.”THIS IS AMERICA.” If you’ve never heard of it, you can watch the video clip here.
This meta idea was a holdover from my files from last year. I remember toying with the phrase “country music” and wanted to allude to “This Is America” for July 4, 2021 using different song titles that hit the Billboard charts, but instead, I I put that aside for a Declaration of Independence themed puzzle and used the musical meta mechanism for the “Places, Please” puzzle the following month. For today’s puzzle, I originally wanted to use the original 13 US states and their nicknames, as that would match the number of letters in THIS IS AMERICA. The problem was that Virginia’s nickname (The Old Dominion) was spoiling it. There are only a handful of sentences that begin with OLD DOMINION (like OLD DOMINION UNIVERSITY and its sports teams, the OLD DOMINION MONARCHS), and those were way too long for so much thematic material I needed . In any case, it was not necessary to confine ourselves to the only states admitted into the Union at the end of the 18th century.
Hope you enjoy the rest of your 4th of July weekend. What did you think?
