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The TAM5 Crossword

Brown

Penultimate Amazing
Brown
Joined
Aug 3, 2001
Messages
12,984
Special thanks to Smart_Cookie and Darat for helping make this puzzle available.
 
A few points about the puzzle. First, it's intended to be of the "fairly easy" variety. Many of the solvers won't be regular crossword solvers, and may be intimidated by the puzzle. My hope was that most people would say, "Hey, I can solve this!" It's actually a bit of a challenge to construct a puzzle that a large segment of the population can solve.

Second, I tried to include as many Las Vegas-themed clues as I could. Nearly all of the answers to the Vegas clues are available in any of those free magazines that describe the attractions in the city. Even so, many of the answers can be easily deduced (or correctly guessed) by those who have never been to the city. There are many TAM-based clues as well.

Third, the puzzle's "secret" was originally intended to be a springboard clue to yet another puzzle. I proposed this idea several months ago, but there were insufficient resources at that time to pursue the matter further.

Fourth, every letter in the alphabet is represented in the answers. It's easy to find A's and B's and C's, but can anyone locate Q's?
 
I solved it on one of my flights home. I consider myself expert in solving Swedish crosswords, but this was a good challenge. I do remember at least one z and one x, but I'm not sure about any q. Probably I made some small errors, I had some serious problems with names of American sport's teams and similar. :)
 
A-ha. I found my crossword and in fact there wasn't any sports team, but something else with a Q in it where two american pop culture phenomena
crossed.
 
I haven't finished mine yet either. Which Moe actually started.
But it took me a while to figure out that the little circles outside the grid weren't just markings of which letters to use, but did in fact need to have letters in them as well. Slightly confusing ...
 
Merko said:
A-ha. I found my crossword and in fact there wasn't any sports team, but something else with a Q in it where two american pop culture phenomena
crossed.
Click to expand...
The bit about finding Q's is tricky. If you have given up, here's the answer:
It's a pun/homophone. The answer to 5 Across is "CUES," which is pronounced the same as "Q's."
Edited to add: My hat is off to anyone from whom English is not a first language and who tried to tackle the puzzle.
 
Last edited:
Brown said:
TMy hat is off to anyone from whom English is not a first language and who tried to tackle the puzzle.
Click to expand...

I'll let you know how I get on once I get a chance to look at all the down clues.
I'm thinking on the plane ride home I'll have plenty of time to finish it.
 
Brown said:
The bit about finding Q's is tricky.
Click to expand...

I was rambling, the pop culture crossing I was mentioning had a (second) Z, not a Q, of course. On the plane I guessed that was an N or maybe T, when I checked it up now and found a Z I just assumed it was 'the missing honour' (in Scrabble terms :)).

I noticed no one still posted anything for my Scrabble puzzle btw.. surely it should be something for crossword people. It's not that hard btw. I didn't construct it by hand, but I solved it by hand.
 
Loved the puzzle, Brown! Thanks once again. I think that I solved it during Shermer's talk. :)

--James
 
I love the puzzles every year - it gives all of us something fun to do during "down times" and I find at least part of it really challenging. Keep up the great work!
 
Okay, I did finish the crossword on the plane ride home. Although finishing is saying a lot. I managed to find the quote and its author, but that's about it. There's still some white space leftaround 11 down, 27 across, 54 down and 105 across.

Merko, I have no idea what or where your scrabble puzzle is.
 
exarch said:
There's still some white space leftaround 11 down, 27 across, 54 down and 105 across.
Click to expand...
Some extra hints:

11 down: It is mostly seen as a prefix, but as such it is very common.
27 across: I haven't read my Shaw (shame on me) so I solved this one only by figuring out the other words. That said, you can find the answer easily in Wikipedia.
54 down: You might associate to a certain forum for unrestrained 911 conspiracy theories..
105 across: There are two reasons for this phenomenon, either a show is popular, or the broadcasters don't have enough material to air.

Merko, I have no idea what or where your scrabble puzzle is.
Click to expand...
It is in the puzzle section. ;)
 
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