I'm reading "Will Shortz’s Life in Crosswords/The veteran Times puzzle editor discusses his favorite clues, debates in the crossword community, and unexpectedly finding his first serious romance" (The New Yorker).
The "breakfast test" imagines people doing the crossword at breakfast and therefore not wanting to feel like puking.
About that first serious romance:
I’m struck by the wonderfulness of finding love at seventy.... I never expected to find love at my age, never expected to have a relationship like this. This guy is the perfect person for me, the only person in the world I think I would be partners with. We match in so many unusual ways. I don’t really believe in fate, but our connection feels like fate.
Asked why it happened only so late in life, Shortz says:
I’ve never come out publicly. I’ve told lots of friends, but I’ve never been public about my sexuality. I’ve known that I’ve been interested in guys my whole life, but it wasn’t a life I wanted to lead.
First of all, I was in denial for years, and I fought my inclinations. By the time I was in my thirties, I accepted the way I was. But I didn’t want to have a gay life style, if that’s how you put it. I have a wonderful career. I have a wonderful life. I have great friends. This wasn’t something I needed.
It just dropped in my lap when I was sixty-nine and I thought, Wow, this is amazing. We’ve moved in together, we own a house together, and our intention is to get married, maybe this year.
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15 comments:
I suppose this clue is out
The Solar Anus is a short surrealist text by the French writer Georges Bataille, written in 1927 and published with drawings by André Masson in 1931. Albeit elliptically, its aphorisms refer to decay, death, vegetation, natural disasters, impotence, frustration, ennui and excrement. Wikipedia
Four letters beginning and ending with "D" describing Will Weng
Imus's announcement that Weng had died.
The most recent Sunday puzzle was an elaborate depiction of an asshole. A black square in the center and around it on all sides was a word that meant "ass" — "ass," "butt," "can," and "rear." The words weren't clued to mean "ass," so you were supposed to feel delight when you saw the scheme, which was tipped off by another clue in the puzzle that was answered "making ends meet." "Ends" = asses. What got me was the black square right in the center, obviously, the asshole.
Isn't every male writer at the NYT's Jewish, Black, or Gay (or in the closet)? I think that's what they hire for. That certainly seems to be true of PBS/NPR.
Of course he's gay. Of course.
Four down, sixteen letters: we don't need to know.
I own every Sunday NYTimes compilation of crosswords published up until the latest. Weng's puzzles are tough- very tough. Maleska's puzzles are bit easier, while Shortz are easiest of the three. Part of it is probably that Weng and Maleska were choosing cultural material that is slightly stale for me, or just predates me in the case Weng; and a great deal of it is that Shortz' selections are almost exclusively themed, which helps if you can figure out the theme early on. Shortz is the superior editor of the three. His stringent enforcement of clue protocol is a great contrast to his predecessors.
“Eat breakfast yourself, share lunch with a friend, and give dinner away to your enemy.”
How apropos that "crass" rhymes with "ass!"
Ann Althouse said...
The most recent Sunday puzzle was an elaborate depiction of an asshole. A black square in the center and around it on all sides was a word that meant "ass" — "ass," "butt," "can," and "rear." The words weren't clued to mean "ass," so you were supposed to feel delight when you saw the scheme, which was tipped off by another clue in the puzzle that was answered "making ends meet." "Ends" = asses. What got me was the black square right in the center, obviously, the asshole.
*********************
So...what are you suppsed to do when you "solve" this puzzle?
Snigger?
Get aroused?
Or register disgust at how far into the cultural cesspool Gay depravity has pushed us?
Of course he's gay. Of course.
Semantic drift? He sounds a bit circumspect, even sullen.
Remember “gay people are just like straight people”?
Yeah, the worst of straight people.
As I’ve said before, the Closet IS the compromise.
Wha? A black square? That's a tough one. Now, if it were a picture of Chuck Schumer then it would be a solid lock!
"Lose your breakfast." Another blast from my past, an expression of my dad's.
Were it an asshole, Rex Parker must've loved it.
Given his history at the NYT, I shouldn't be, but I find myself surprised that Shortz is 70. I've seen him, albeit from afar, at a number of recent ACPTs. He never seemed remotely that old. More like late 40s or 50s.
I can also relate to some extent to his description of his life. I'm now 69 and not expecting anything like love or partnership to "drop into my lap" any time soon (or ever). More power to him that it did for him.
--gpm
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