Look Both Ways

This was a lot easier after I stopped trying to do something with those 10 words. Thanks, Pair O.

I think it takes a significant leap to go from the metanism to the meta answer... but a dumdum like me got there so what do I know... Anyway thanks for the very fun puzzle

^^^ agree with the wizardwitch. Great to have two challenging steps in a meta. Thanks!

Took me enough tries! I need to bone up on social media. Thanks for the puzzle.

I've never heard of this expression, but Google helped. I tried pair of eyes, side glance, eye contact, eye surgery... lol

Man I was so sure it would be a case where I had to find the new word (IMAGE, ICON, COATI, DASHI, etc.). Threw me for a loop. I also tried: PAIR OF EYES, A SET OF EYES. Got there in the end though - thanks for the puzzle.

Oof, it took so long for this to occur to me as a 10-letter phrase. @boharr had to tell me I had already solved it lol. I thought of SIDE EYE right away but figured that couldn't be right. You might consider removing "10-letter" from the prompt and accepting SIDE EYE without the article as a valid answer as well. "10-letter" and "five rows" also brings about the (maybe intentional?) red herring that two letters in the answer will come from each row, which isn't what's happening. Love this phrase as an answer though! And great puzzle!

So many great clues in here too! My favorite has to be the reference at 46A. What a fantastic book.

Similar to others - had the metanism and the sense of the answer but couldn't stick the landing without a nudge. Tried PAIR OF EYES, DOUBLE EYES, and even thought of SIDE EYES but could not stretch that to 10 letters without a nudge. Good concept and fun challenge!

(BTW, your settings for the puzzle did not include a delay for the "Give Up" to be active, so it took all my willpower to not peek once I was narrowing in!)

I thought my answer was going to be incorrect and that the answer would be some term relating to stereoscopic vision.. Imagine my surprise and delight.

Two of the ones on the right side made me kinda hungry! Fun puzzle; thanks!

Good one!

I had the answer for most of the day. I just wasn’t 100% sure. Thanks for the puzzle!

Took me an age to get the first step, and then got it stuck in my head that the answer was a 10-letter word! Tried all sorts of “-ION” words, thought DEPOSIT-I-ON fitted quite nicely lol!

Thanks, Schmidzy! Gotta admit this meme is a new one to me. My age is showin’!

Finally got it without hints but not before making a couple of wild guesses yesterday and not before making what I thought was a really clever guess of "eyes peeled" before getting the actual answer

oooooooh. THE SIDE EYE. Gotcha. My bad. :)

Feel like I've cheated because my version was only 8 letters. :) :) Got the I's right away, and then thought PAIR OF EYES was definitely it. Threw in a couple of related things as well, but never got SIDE EYE to go anywhere. After some folks mentioned on the Zoom tonight that it was a younger phrase I decided that maybe SIDE EYES might work after all. But confess I still don't see the 10 letter version, so I should only get half credit. :) :)

Should have posted my comment in the main trunk instead of as a reply to someone else’s comment: I join the ranks of PAIR OF EYES flunkies, and the not-hip-to-the-jargon crowd. Still, a really clever puzzle!

Needed the nudges! Great puzzle!

First submitted "The Eye Test". Thought that felt very familiar. Oh, 39D. Thanks Schmidzy!

Had the mechanism but needed the nudges to help me find the right expression. Thanks for the meta!

Nice one, Schmidzy! Very original concept and execution.