I didn't have to wait long to be able to use my new word. Today's Tuesday puzzle by Nancy Salomon (answers) has a quarfoot right at 1 Across — "What a gal has that a gent doesn't." It's too bad the rest of the puzzle wasn't more quarfotic. Ok, ok, I just wanted to use the adjective form, don't mind me. As a bonus, the clue was what passes for mildly naughty in Crosswordland. I initially penciled in BOOBS but it didn't work. Come to think of it, I'm not sure telling a gal she has a hard G is any better.
This was the Monday puzzle we didn't get yesterday in terms of degree of difficulty. ARA is the altar in the sky, last seen through the telescope less than a month ago. HAAS has been clued more than half the time as "Lukas of Witness." Someone should tell the Haas family that there's a huge opportunity for crossword fame if some kin can just do something noteworthy and take the pressure off future clue writers.
I want to know more about Ms. Salomon. She's the Queen of Collaborators. Besides the 66 crosswords she constructed solo, she's co-written with Harvey Estes (43 times), Lee Glickstein, Sherry Blackard, Bill Zais, Bob Peoples, Bob Frank, Marjorie Berg, Kendall Twigg, Gail Grabowski, Karen Riekert, Norma Johnson, Courtenay Crocker, Deb Amlen, Earl Reed, Elayne Cantor, Holden Baker, Joe Bower, John Minarcik, Levi Denham, Bob Klahn, Kyle Mahowald, Louis Hildebrand, Nancy Shack, Marjorie Richter, Kelly Clark, Richard Leva, and Nick Grivas. I don't know who most of those people are either but that's a very long list.
If I can't get any real info, I'll resort to another "mini-biography of people I don't know anything about" but Ms. Salomon seems interesting enough that her real story ought to be told.
Update: Ellen provided this link in the comments and it's such a great article I wanted to add it here. Nancy Salomon is even more amazing than I suspected!
Update2: There is some discussion about this puzzle from the constructor at the bottom of this post.