LAST WEEK’S RESULTS:

Title: “Ghostwriter” by Terry Fridman
Prompt: This week’s contest answer is a seven-letter word you might say when you get the meta.
Answer: SUCCESS
Correct entries: 272 overall, of which 207 were solo solves

A ghostwritten meta last week! Eerie. Normal solve, but then two clues stuck out as highly hinty:

54-D: [Like the byline “by Terry Fridman”…but who is the ghostwriter?] = FAKE
95-A: [Number of clues in this puzzle that share a commonality] = SEVEN

First insight: scanning the clues led solvers to notice that seven two-word clues shared the initials T.F.:

6-A: [Tended foods] = CROPS. As in, farmers tend their crops.
61-A: [Take foals] = RUSTLE
64-A: [Tanager’s fear] = CAT. Birds justifiably fear cats, but why “tanager” specifically here? Suspicious!
5-D: [Teal fetters] = DUCK TRAP. Another odd one.
13-D: [Tall fang] = INCISOR. And another. Why “tall” instead of the more natural “long”?
33-D: [Tight five] = FIST
69-A: [Taster’s fame] = PALATE

This must be the right path, since there are SEVEN T.F. clues and some of them feela little off. But now what?

Second insight: T.F. is also the initials of one “Terry Fridman,” our puzzle author. Things that make you go “Hmmm…”!

What now? Well if T.F. are fake initials, what might be the real initials of the author? Well, let’s substitute the initials of me, your humble meta writer, for this mysterious interloper “Terry Fridman” and see what happens:

Tended Foods –> Mended Goods. Hey, that’s a reasonable clue for USED CLOTHING at 19-Across! And off we go, using another grid entry to satisfy the new clue:

Take foals –> Make goals = SCORE
Tanager’s fear = Manager’s gear = CLIPBOARD
Teal fetters –> Meal getters = EATERS
Tall fang –> Mall gang = SHOPPERS
Tight five –> Might give = SAGS
Taster’s fame = Master’s game = CHESS

Taken in grid order, the first letters of those spell contest answer SUCCESS, which you may or may not have shouted when you got the answer.

Cameron274 exults:

A Truly Fitting answer for my first Week 4 solve!

BarbaraK says:

Tighty food!

Raygirl has a request:

I want the time I spent trying to anagram by Terry Fridman back.

And who was that mysterious “Terry Fridman”? Apply the trick one last time to get “Merry Gridman,” a.k.a. me, your humble crossword constructor.

TWO PETER GORDON PROJECTS:

The great Peter Gordon has two projects you can back:

1) a new Kickstarter up for the 2022 season of his outstanding Fireball Newsflash Crosswords. 20 current events-themed puzzles e-mailed right to your electronic front door once a fortnight.

2) The legendary Fireball Crosswords, known both for their outstanding quality and also for their fiendish difficulty level. As shown by Peter’s explanation: “The puzzles are hard. How hard? If you have to ask, too hard for you.”

Both very highly recommended.

MGWCC 3-MONTH GIFT SUBSCRIPTIONS:

Thanks to the generosity of a MGWCC solver who wishes to remain anonymous, I have ten 3-month gift subscriptions to give out to potential subscribers. They will start today and cover the months of December, January, and February. If you know of someone who might enjoy these, please e-mail me at crosswordcontest@gmail.com with “3-MONTH SUBSCRIPTION” in the subject line. Please include their name and e-mail address in the note.

THIS WEEK’S INSTRUCTIONS:

This week’s contest answer is an NFL team.

Solve well, and be not led astray by words intended to deceive.