PCC#36 "Chasing Rainbows"

Big ___ (Whopper competitor)

Across

1A
Big ___ (Whopper competitor)
4A
Campground wheels, for short
7A
Crossword legend Gorski known for her amazing and innovative designs (check out her site at Crossword Nation
10A
Its map typically features AK and HI as insets
11A
True statement
13A
Princess in "Frozen" who sings "Let It Go"
14A
Pig enclosure
15A
Reverses something that occurred (this isn't physically possible unless you have a time machine handy)
17A
Hors d'oeuvre spread
19A
Letter that appears twice in the German word for over-fertilization "Überdüngung" (Hyph.)
20A
___ sword (sheathe)
22A
See 21-Down
24A
President William Howard ___
28A
Former White House Chief of Staff John spelled with three U's
29A
Troublemaker Dennis of comics or The Phantom in a "Star Wars" title
31A
"SportsCenter" channel
32A
Once-common childhood malady
33A
"Solfeggietto" composer Carl Philipp ___ Bach
35A
What Tom Cruise's character stumbles upon in "Eyes Wide Shut"
38A
Letters associated with a rainbow flag
40A
They're hard to believe
42A
Home of the Burj Khalifa: Abbr.
43A
Aliases, for short
44A
Villain Uriah in Dickens's "David Copperfield"
45A
Fabric store purchase quantity: Abbr.
46A
Peaceful kind of garden
47A
Airport screening org.
48A
Complete group, like the colors of the rainbow

Down

1D
Jim Henson characters which include Kermit who sang "Rainbow Connection"
2D
On the ocean
3D
Small shops on military bases
4D
Private med school in Chicago named for a female scientist whose research led to the discovery of the structure of DNA
5D
Pacific island nation that was the setting for the ninth season of "Survivor"
6D
Fast skiing maneuver
7D
Welsh god whose name is missing from "H A _ _ _ L _ J A H"
8D
"This ___ what it looks like!"
9D
___ in "zebra"
12D
Not wild
13D
Pollution monitoring org.
16D
Flat, elevated landform
18D
Eventually become
21D
Put two and two together, with 22-Across
23D
One of seven in a rainbow
25D
Wilderness photographer Adams
26D
Easy scapegoats or a popular online battle royale obstacle course game
27D
Abbr. for trichloroethylene
29D
Students with personal guides
30D
It uses Zener cards to evaluate your psychic ability (and anagram of "septets")
32D
It's used for whacking moles in Whac-A-Mole
34D
Sound of a kiss
35D
Drink at a sushi bar
36D
Distinctive flair
37D
Big shirt sizes, briefly
39D
Expressed, as a farewell
40D
Whirling Looney Tunes "devil," for short
41D
Luxury hotel amenity

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Philip Chow constructor · 10 months ago

Answer explanation: There is only one instance of the letters R O Y G B I V in the grid... These letters represent the colors of the rainbow and connecting these letters in order gives you the outline of the state of NEVADA

Constructor Notes: I made this puzzle about a year ago just never wrote the clues for it or figured out a good time to publish it. For PCC#36, we have the 36th state that joined the union. Happy pride month and shout-out to Nevada for being the first state to constitutionally protect same sex marriage

I was a little bit sad about this puzzle because I found out afterwards that Mike Shenk already made a Rainbow Connections puzzle (this was before I did or knew about the WSJ metas) and of course his version is much better in terms of a cleaner grid, no unchecked squares, and no cheater squares too!

Pair O Ducks 🤓7:56 · 10 months ago

Fun! I initially thought all the U's were upside-down rainbows -- and that the limited I's and O's were a product of needing so many U's. It was a fun aha realizing it was actually the other way around. Happy pride!

Hector 2s · 10 months ago
Same! I didn't realize that about Nevada (or more likely forgot). Happy Pride from Fran San Frisco, where if I recall we've had some small part in all that as well.

Meg 2s · 10 months ago

I got side-tracked by all those U's. There are also a bunch of U's in the clues. Nice aha!

HeadinHome 🤓1:52 · 10 months ago

This was so much fun! My wrong theories included highlighting first letters of clues with rainbows, then noticing the U’s I though maybe those were upside down rainbows and the letters following those were “chasing” them, then I did the same thing (next letters) for all the letters in LGBT, then the same for all the rainbow letters ROYGBIV… finally tried just connecting them since they seemed oddly spaced, and voila! (THEN I noticed the “connect the dots” hint… duh!). Super cute; thanks for the fun.

(BTW - did not need any nudges)

Qmark 2s · 10 months ago

Thanks Phil! Great construction to have only one of each of those 7 letters in your grid! (no nudges needed)

kurtalert 🤓2:50 · 10 months ago

Yay! No-nudge solve here. I got lucky and first searched for all the Os in the grid- after the "connect the dots" clues- but when there was only one, it was a quick jump from there to finding all of the ROYGBIV spots. Fortunately it was also a very recognizable state shape!

Philip Chow constructor · 10 months ago
When I was conceptualizing the puzzle I checked the map for states that can be drawn using 7 connected dots… Nevada and Utah stood out and went with Nevada since I think it had a more interesting shape (sorry Utah!)

Darth 🤓10:24 · 10 months ago

All those U's definitely scream for attention in the grid. My first thought was that the answer should be Utah... but then I couldn't see a way to make that work. ;) ROYGBIV is a great way to make it happen. I think it's funny that we've been seeing so many "visual" metas lately. Thanks, Phillip. Happy Pride!

PCC#36 "Chasing Rainbows"

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