Alright, let me tell you about this crossword I tackled today. Saw the title, “unlikely duo crossword,” somewhere and it just stuck with me. Sounded kinda quirky, you know? Like, what pairs are they gonna throw at me? Peanut butter and pickles? Socks and sandals? Had to give it a shot.
So, I printed it out – yeah, I still like doing them on paper – grabbed my trusty pencil, poured a cup of coffee, and sat down. First glance, looked like a standard grid, nothing too wild layout-wise. Started scanning the ‘Across’ clues, looking for the low-hanging fruit. You know, the fill-in-the-blanks or the super obvious ones to get some letters on the board.
Getting Started
Managed to get a few right off the bat. Simple stuff, maybe like “Opposite of black” (WHITE) or a common abbreviation. That always feels good, gets the momentum going. Then I hit one of the themed clues. It was something hinting at a strange pairing, and I just drew a blank. The clue itself wasn’t hard, but the answer it clearly wanted didn’t seem to fit the expected partner.
That’s when I realized the “unlikely duo” thing wasn’t just a funny title, it was the core mechanic. Okay, game on. Had to shift my thinking. Instead of the obvious pair, I needed to think outside the box. What’s a weird partner for, say, salt? Not pepper, maybe… sugar? Or something even odder?
Working Through the Theme
This actually made it more interesting. I started focusing on the clues that seemed like they should be obvious pairs, but deliberately tried to think of the wrong or unusual partner. It took a bit of guessing and checking. I’d pencil in a weird answer based on the theme, then see if the crossing letters worked with the ‘Down’ clues.
- Found a clue about ‘day’. The unlikely partner turned out to be something totally unrelated, not ‘night’.
- Another one hinted at ‘sweet’, but the answer wasn’t ‘sour’, it was something else entirely unexpected that fit the letter count.
It was slow going for a while. Lots of erasing. My coffee got cold. Had to really lean on the crossing words. When a Down clue confirmed a weird letter from an Across themed answer, that was a little victory. “Aha! So ‘chalk’ does go with ‘cheese’ in this crazy puzzle’s world!” (Just making that up, but you get the idea).
Hitting the Wall and Finishing Up
Got stuck properly in the bottom-right corner. Just a mess of blank squares. The theme clues there were particularly tough, and the regular clues weren’t giving me enough letters to make educated guesses. Stepped away for about twenty minutes. Made another coffee, looked out the window. Sometimes you just need to reset your brain.
Came back, looked at one of the stubborn clues again, and the answer just popped into my head. It wasn’t even a themed one, just a regular word I’d been blind to. That gave me the foothold I needed. One letter led to another, and suddenly the weird “unlikely duo” answer for that section made sense. Phew.
The last few squares fell into place pretty quickly after that. Filled in the final letter, sat back, and looked it over. Done. Felt pretty good, gotta say. It wasn’t the hardest crossword ever, but the theme definitely made me work for it.
It was a fun little challenge, messing with expectations like that. Made a change from the usual straightforward stuff. Definitely a good way to spend an hour or so. Keeps the old brain cells firing, right?
