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Fun at the puzzle tournament

Notes from the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament, held Feb. 27 to March 1 in Brooklyn....

FRIDAY NIGHT

Registration time. Last year when I walked up to the table, a seemingly nice gentleman named David J. Kahn gave me my registration materials. But the next day it turned out that Mr. Kahn was the author of that year's Puzzle #5, which is commonly called, with more than sufficient reason, "the bastard puzzle."

This year I don't see Mr. Kahn at the registration table. Instead, I am waited on by Patrick Merrell, who I happen to remember is also a crossword puzzle designer. A very affable young man, Mr. Merrell is.

The Friday night program consists of a panel discussion and a competition that won't affect the weekend's scores. The panel consists of people who blog about crosswords, including Rex Parker, whom I've corresponded with a number of times, though we've never met, and our paths don't get around to crossing this weekend, either. (It's hard to spot someone in a crowd of more than 650 puzzle solvers.) The discussion seems pleasant enough, though the audio could be better.

The competition, called "Pick Your Poison," is in two rounds. The first consists of KenKen puzzles, KenKen being the latest rage for those who love Sudoku. The inventor of KenKen, Tetsuya Miyamoto, is a special guest at the tournament and speaks to us for a few minutes. Mr. Miyamoto is charmingly exuberant, and it soon becomes clear that no one will have any trouble getting him to come out of his shell any time soon.

Although I've done some Sudoku puzzles, I've never done KenKen. Turns out I have a choice between four 4-by-4 puzzles and two 6-by-6 puzzles. I figure doing the four smaller puzzles will be easier. We have 20 minutes, and with maybe four minutes left I've finished the first three and am thinking myself quite the KenKen whiz. But the last one stumps me, and I am forced to realize that the only competition I might win within the next few minutes will be one that awards a trophy for the most erasures. When it comes to KenKen competitions, I am a WashoutWashout.

Next we have 20 minutes to do one of three puzzles: Cryptic Crosswords, Split Decisions or Diagramless. I've never been able to do a Diagramless and I've never heard of Split Decisions (and when I look at a sample I know I'd be dead in the water before I ever left the beach). So by default I try a cryptic puzzle. I've done them before. They're like British crosswords; the clues involve puns and anagrams and almost never mean what they seem to mean.

Although I've done cryptic crosswords, it usually takes me a while to do each one, and my brain has to be in the proper gear for it. Because it's been a while since I've done a cryptic, I'm pleasantly surprised when I get a lot of it done, but there's no way I'm going to beat the 20-minute time limit.

So I don't need to stay for that night's awards ceremony.

SATURDAY

A big day -- six puzzles.

Right off the bat I forget a lesson I learned last year: Get in the competition room early so you can get a seat at one of the long tables. Despite my forgetfulness, I manage to find a seat before things get so bad that they have to send out for extra chairs.

Two seats down from me is Ellen Ripstein, a competition winner who was among those featured in "Wordplay," a documentary made about the tournament a few years ago. Next to me is a young man (way younger than I) who designs puzzles; one he constructed with someone else was published earlier in the month in The New York Times.

No reason for me to be intimidated sitting at the same table with these folks, no sirree.

Puzzle #1 is by Byron Walden. Mr. Walden is a double threat: Not only does he compose diabolical puzzles, but I often see his name on the Times' crosswords Web page, listed among the top 10 solvers of the puzzle of the day.

But Puzzle #1 is supposed to be easy, and Mr. Walden complies. I'm relieved but maybe a little disappointed; seeing a puzzle by Byron Walden that turns out to be easy is a little like being James Bond and being taken to Dr. No's torture chamber and finding out that the only weapon the good doctor has on hand is his collection of favorite knock-knock jokes. But I complete the puzzle perfectly (150 bonus points) and a few minutes early (25 bonus points for each point).

Puzzle #2 is by someone even scarier than Byron Walden: Brendan Emmett Quigley. Seeing his name on a crossword puzzle usually makes me want to buzz my secretary and have her clear all appointments for the next three days -- no matter that I a) have no secretary and b) have few appointments these days. The puzzle is titled "Allow Me to Introduce Myself." The theme answers are familiar phrases with i's stuck in them, so that, for example, the answer to "Put some complete morons it touch with each other?" is CONNECT THE IDIOTS instead of CONNECT THE DOTS.

Luckily I figure out the theme soon enough, but some other answers (what crossword buffs call the "fill") prove troublesome. Most troublesome are two intersecting words, the clues for which are "Having gems arranged side by side, e.g." and "Fifth-century Chinese dynasty." For the first I have T_OROW; the second, _EI. I can't figure it out and return to it after I've resolved all the other trouble spots. Finally, with less than a minute, I decide that maybe China at one time had a FEI dynasty. And less than 20 seconds after the proctor takes my paper, I realize the correct answers are WEI and TWOROW (TWO ROW).

The next puzzle is by Merl Reagle It takes a while, but I finish it perfectly with a few minutes to spare. Luckily for me, Mr. Reagle is a lot closer to my age than those whippersnappers Walden and Quigley and is apparently an old-show-biz buff, so I have an apparent advantage over the young man to my left: I know immediately that "Constance or Norma of the silents" is TALMADGE and the vaudeville star who is famous for appearing in "Hellzapoppin'" is OLE OLSEN.

Even so, Ms. Ripstein has finished the puzzle (112 words) within a few minutes and has left the room, having had the decency not to get in my face and yell "Nyah-hah-hah!" before departing.

After lunch, Puzzle #4, by Andrea Carla Michaels and Myles Callum, provides me with another perfect finish.

But then comes The Bastard Puzzle.

And it's by -- you guessed it -- Patrick Merrell, that affable enough young man referred to above. How could you, Patrick? Then again, I am able to figure out the theme, which wasn't the case with Mr. Kahn's puzzle: each theme answer in Mr. Merrell's puzzle has two words, each of which could be preceded by "sub" (HUMAN SPECIES / SUBHUMAN, SUBSPECIES). But the fill is way too tough, and most of the people in the room (including me) run out of time.

The final puzzle of the day is by longtime puzzle-maker Maura Jacobson, who I believe has had a puzzle in the competition since the beginning, more than 30 years ago, and who once again wins a warm round of applause from the audience. The theme clues are spoonerisms -- NERD'S BEST SOUP for BIRD'S NEST SOUP is one -- and it's a charming way to end the day, especially since I finish it perfectly and ahead of time.

After dinner, it's Game Show Night, with word and trivia games. One of the team members is a puzzle-maker named Tony Orbach, but there's no puzzle about his parentage: It's plainly obvious from his looks that he's the son of one of my favorite actors, the late Jerry Orbach.

SUNDAY

A lot of suspense -- not just the end of the competition, but the imminent end of relatively mild winter weather in Brooklyn: A big storm is scheduled to hit the area that night, and I decide to head out for the airport after the competition, skipping the dinner, which this year is to be prepared by a Food Network chef who, as part of the program "Dinner: Impossible," was taken to the hotel Sunday morning with the assignment to prepare the dinner from scratch. Matter of fact, The Food Network has been taping the tournament both Saturday and Sunday. A big sign near the entry to the competition room tells us all that we've pretty much given up our right to privacy by being in the tournament. (This is a particularly bad break for tournament contestants who are also entered in the witness protection program.)

The last puzzle for everyone, by Mike Shenk, isn't too bad, but going into it I know that that WEI has led my score way astray, so I try to be accurate and very fast, and I succeed.

The tournament ends with the section finals, and the last round, the Section A final, is particularly suspenseful; Trip Payne and Francis Heaney finish the puzzle (by Patrick Berry) early but have made the same error, while Tyler Hinman, who has won four times in a row, seems to be stuck and the clock is running ... running ...

Did he finish in time? Find out here.

The scores are posted on the tournament Web site. At first I'm 245th, but during the week the scores are adjusted, and on Friday I learn I'm 250th out of 674, up from last year's finish, 262nd out of 699. Were it not for that Puzzle #2 blunder, I apparently would have been 228th.

And did I get out of New York City in time to beat the snow? I'm afraid I don't have video on that, so you'll have to take my word for it that my plane took off before the snow took over, and I said WEI! WEI! WEI! WEI! all the way home.

Across and down to Brooklyn, again

Tomorrow I'll be traveling to Brooklyn to compete in the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament for the second year in a row.

Last year I finished 262nd out of 699 competitors.

And met a lot of nice people.

And for the second year in a row, I'll be reporting on my adventures.

If you want to know more about the tournament, look here.

John Carradine, Sylvia Sidney and me

Not long ago I wrote about the summer stock productions that used to be staged at the high school up the street from where I grew up.

One of the things I didn't get around to mentioning is that my sister Mary once worked as an apprentice for these productions. The show-biz bug had bitten her hard, and the experience was invaluable, which was a very good thing because the pay was zilch. But Mary did get to be Shirley Booth's dresser in a production of "Desk Set," and the gracious Ms. Booth, as I recall, gave Mary a nice trinket at the end of the weeklong run.

Mary also worked on a production of "Play It Again, Sam," starring George Gobel, and I recall her rather sadly telling us about all the bottles of booze in his dressing room. Gobel played the Woody Allen part and, after each show, did one of his famous monologues about Uncle Elmo or whomever. I only know this because Mary told me -- I didn't have the brains to walk up the street and see this master comedian at work.

(Please excuse me for a few minutes while I beat myself senseless.)

Now ... where were we?

Oh, yes. Mary went on to pursue an acting career herself and is now an accomplished storyteller.

After apprenticing up the street, Mary spent a summer doing much the same thing at a playhouse in the Poconos. The following summer, she was back in town but not working at the local playhouse. However, a friend of hers from the Pocono days was now the stage manager for the local playhouse, which this particular week was offering "Arsenic and Old Lace" with John Carradine and Sylvia Sidney.

The stage manager invited Mary over to see the show and to bring a guest, which turned out to be me.

I still remember wandering backstage, trying not to trip on all the cables, while Mary magically glided through the backstage area as if they weren't there.

I got a close-up view of the play's set, which, like most sets seen that way, was tacky. I could also see the two stars' dressing rooms, though I didn't exactly see the two stars. My memory, which is about as reliable as a geyser with kidney stones, tells me that I saw Ms. Sidney's hands knitting something. I'm pretty sure I saw Mr. Carradine's arthritic hand holding a smoking cigarette. Ah, show biz!

Mary and I went out into the audience for the first act and returned backstage during intermission.

"What kind of a house is it tonight?" the stage manager asked. She was thinking about cutting the intermission short.

It was a Wednesday night. A pretty light house, Mary said, I think a short intermission would be fine.

I remember the stage manager going to the stars' dressing rooms to ask their permission; I remember Mr. Carradine grunting his assent and Ms. Sidney saying something like "Fine, dear."

So Mary and I returned to our seats.

Then disaster struck.

The stage manager was supposed to coordinate the intermission with the head usher, who (I think) would flash the lights to get people to return to their seats.

Problem is, the head usher was a woman whom no poet would ever compare to a Ginsu knife. Indeed, during a previous season, she had caused a few uneasy moments of ad libbing for some cast members of a show called "The Happy Time" when she failed to recognize that the strange man in the lobby who was in costume as French Canadian photographer and who was trying to enter the theater after the curtain went up and whom she was now trying to restrain was actually the star, Ray Bolger, who was supposed to make his entrance that way.

So on this night, the stage manager and the head usher got their signals crossed, and the play started again while a lot of people were still in the lobby.

I should explain that the side entrance to the auditorium led to a ramp that wasn't all that far away from the stage. So as John Carradine, seated at a table, tried to go on with the play, a number of returning theatergoers were only a few feet from being in the play themselves.

And I don't think it was a small number of returning theatergoers, either.

Mary and I slid down in our seats.

"We're not going backstage afterward," she said, at least somewhat redundantly.

I would like to think that John Carradine, veteran trouper that he was, took this all in stride.

But for years part of me has feared that John Carradine, veteran horror movie actor that he was, removed the stage manager's head and kept it in a jar.

Ah, show biz!

Mark Rothman

Chances are you've seen this guy's name if you've watched any TV at all over the last few decades.

He wrote for "Happy Days" and "The Odd Couple" and co-created "Laverne and Shirley."

Yes, that Mark Rothman.

And now he has a very funny blog that you can find here.

One warning: Don't start catching up with his blog late at night or you'll be too laughing so much that you won't make it to bed until well into the next morning.

James Whitmore and the Rolls-Royce Lady

The recent death of actor James Whitmore brought back some memories...

For many summers in my town, a local impresario and his wife brought in touring companies for a season of plays -- what used to be called "summer stock" or (don't ask me why) "straw hat theater."

These plays usually starred accomplished, respected performers who weren't exactly on the A List anymore. (Then again, they didn't have A lists back then. Or B, C, D ... well, you get the picture.)

For a few summers, these performances were staged at the high school that was (and still us) up the street from the house where I grew up. I can remember some of the headliners (some of whom you might not remember unless, like me, you're over 50): Shirley Booth, Van Johnson, Durward Kirby, Hal March, George Gobel, Hans Conried, Dody Goodman, Ray Bolger, Mickey Rooney...

And James Whitmore.

I can't remember what Whitmore appeared in; matter of fact, the only one of these summer plays I ever saw was "Don't Drink the Water," starring Conried and Goodman.

But my parents saw Mr. Whitmore's play.

And they went backstage afterward.

And my mother, um, touched Mr. Whitmore's hair and told him how she'd always wanted curly hair like his.

And he was gracious.

And I'm cringing now, remembering it, even though I was at home that night.

But I remember another occasion where I was all too present.

That week, the playhouse was featuring an Agatha Christie play. The star was a very famous actress who is still, even now, very much alive and well and, as far as I know, very much litigious.

I don't know where this lady was staying during the play's weeklong run, but I do know that she drove a Rolls-Royce to the theater every day. I can still remember it passing by our house on our little two-block street. Why do I remember it as being grape-colored? It probably wasn't, but I can just about swear that it wasn't black.

One evening after dinner, my mother decided it would be fun to hide behind the school, near where the celebs parked, and see if we could catch a glimpse of the Rolls-Royce Lady in person.

Keep in mind that we weren't exactly dressed for this event on this summer night. And by "we" I mean my parents, me and two or three of my six siblings.

We got to the parking lot and stood around like a bunch of hicks until the Rolls-Royce Lady rolled in.

And got out of her car.

And looked for the stage door.

And couldn't find it.

At which point we all emerged from our hiding place and descended on her.

She looked us kids over (her nose wasn't big, but it had more than enough cartilage to enable her to look down it without breaking a sweat), and she said, "All these all yours?"

Her tone implied that up until that point she'd been completely unaware that the lower classes were being allowed to repopulate themselves with such abandon.

My mother said that yes, those were all her kids. I seem to recall her stiffening as she said it.

My father, who I suspect was oblivious to the imaginary daggers my mother was mentally hurling in the direction of the equally oblivious Rolls-Royce Lady, gamely showed the star the way to the door.

From that day on, my mother hated the Rolls-Royce Lady's guts.

And I'm still cringing.

I thinky not

At a local mall, a fast-food chain is advertising a new taste sensation. which it says is:

MEATY, CHEESY,
CONVENIENTY