Welcome to Phil's Crossword Corner (PCC)! Philip Chow (aka Phil) is an auditor at NYC Dept of Parks and Recreation who makes crossword puzzles for fun in his free time. A new meta puzzle posts every other Saturday weekend on Crosshare.
Phil’s metas will usually include immediate nudges, a great tool for new solvers. You can reach him at pchow13@gmail.com
Finally getting around to posting my old puzzles here on this forum.
Please see below for PCC#7 - "Jibber-Jabber" originally posted on Crosshare 09/09/23
[Level 1.5] Meta prompt: The answer to the meta is a fashion accessory (that rhymes with sounds from a frog)
Note: the level is the intended difficulty I had in mind when I designed the puzzle, but may play differently since every solver has their own area of expertise... what one person may find easy, another may find difficult.
Have fun and keep in mind if you're ever lost at sea, google is your best friend (actually, I don't know if you'd get internet service in the middle of the ocean)
-Phil
Hint #3: I originally assigned this meta level 1 but bumped it up to 1.5 because the solution is a not-so-familiar term... so if you've never heard of the term before you probably uncovered this hint: 41-Across (as footwear) is meta-related
Hint #4: The fashion accessory in question is what you call the charms that you put on Crocs (easter egg alert: there are six clues that reference "charm")
Solution below - SPOILER ALERT:
Answer explanation: Vowel progression puzzle: Jabberwock, Jebediah, Job offer, Jubjub bird... JAB, JEB, JOB, JUB... we are missing JIB... and a fashion accessory that starts with JIB (and rhymes with the frog sounds "ribbits") is JIBBITZ
Fun fact: Everyone wears Crocs in the 2006 movie "Idiocracy" because the costume designer had a limited shoe budget, and thought the cheap plastic shoes made by the then startup company were futuristic yet too stupid-looking to ever become popular in real life
