LAST WEEK’S RESULTS:

Title: “Way to Go”
Prompt: This puzzle’s contest answer is a city often seen in crossword grids.
Answer: ERIE, Pennsylvania, found by 421 solvers, 394 of which were solo solves

Four theme entries in a pinwheel pattern last week — and with an oddly-sized 16×15 grid, which was necessitated by a subtle reason. Our themers, moving clockwise:

3-D: [Can’t do it alone] = SEEKS OUT HELP

26-D: [Irritations] = MINOR THREATS

64-A: [Opening line of the Journey hit “Separate Ways (Worlds Apart)”] = HERE WE STAND

Scanning those four, solvers noticed that each concealed one of the cardinal points on the compass:

SEEKS OUT HELP
KOREA STRAIT
MINOR THREATS
HERE WE STAND

Now what? Well, notice that NORTH and SOUTH are vertical entries, and that EAST and WEST are horizontal, so maybe that’s important….and it was! Go one step from the proscribed direction and in the proscribed direction and see what happens:

South from the S in SOUTH = E
East from the E in EAST = R
North from the N in NORTH = I
WEST from the W in WEST = E

Those spell contest answer ERIE, every crossword writer’s favorite Great Lakes city (with TOLEDO and Sault STE Marie also in the running).

Meta – World Peace says:

Able was I ere I saw Erie…

Jason T quips:

That was NEWS to me!

Golem wondered:

Was there a way to determine the ordering? Or were we just supposed to get the answer by ruling out EEIR, EERI, EIER, EREI, EIRE, IERE, REIE, IEER, REEI, IREE, and RIEE?

Several solvers thought the ordering was weird, even though it was well within the normal zone (clockwise, starting in the upper-left). I think that long 3-D entry made the usual pinwheel pattern look a bit odd.

And finally, Tyler Hinman says:

Hopefully someone solving without a prompt doesn’t submit EIRE.

One person did! Might’ve been a typo…

GUEST CONSTRUCTOR PUZZLE:

Today’s meta is by MGWCC veteran Peter Gwinn. Peter (on the left in photo below) is a comedian who lives in Chicago and writes for NPR’s “Wait, Wait Don’t Tell Me!” In his free time he writes trivia puzzles for AVCX and articles about doing escape rooms with your kids for Room Escape Artist. He met Kermit the Frog when he used to write for “The Colbert Report”.

Let’s see what Peter has in store for us…

THIS WEEK’S INSTRUCTIONS:

This puzzle’s contest answer is something you can use to solve it.

Good luck!

–Matt