In the age of social media, putting a birth notice in the newspaper is becoming rarer and rarer. And the handful of ads you do see in the births section are now mostly signed from great grandma. But as an excited new father with a regular crossword gig, I knew I had the perfect opportunity to announce my baby’s arrival in the paper, without coughing up for 25 words and an angel icon in the classifieds. By putting it at 1-across in the Sydney Morning Herald cryptic.
Now, before I forge ahead and reveal all the puzzles’ spoilers, here is a link to the puzzle in question.
From a wordplay perspective, the name we chose for our baby isn’t particularly useful. It’s not anagram-friendly, it’s not a palindrome, or reversible like my name. It is six letters long – three of which are Roman numerals – and in Scrabble it would be worth 12 points. It originates from Latin and means “spirit of the wood”, while also being the name of the 8th-largest asteroid in the asteroid belt.
By coincidence, an Australian Ballet production of the very same name was touring in Melbourne and Sydney around the time of the birth, on August 14. It seems her arrival was written in the stars.
The clue for 1-across was:
This girl says love is a regularity (6)
[SaYs LoVe Is A] with regularity = SYLVIA
I couldn’t leave it at just one theme reference, so the rest of the puzzle is littered with other references to baby excitement. See if you can spot the birth celebration references in the solution grid. One thing most people didn’t notice, I’m sure, is that the black part of the grid contains the shapes L and H (for the parents, Liam and Helen!)
I also dropped in this clue for 8-down:
Comprehend first kid at this moment (4)
Sylvia’s first attempt at the cryptic
The last little anecdote about Sylvia’s name comes from when we tried to register her surname. My wife’s surname is Officer, and originally baby Sylvia was intended to take her mum’s last name (hence 4-across solution being OFFICER). However, when we tried to register at Births, Deaths and Marriages we were told Officer was a prohibited surname. Surely this was a mistake. I mean, I know of people with the surnames Sergeant, Constable, King, Judge and Lord! So we called the registry “officer” and he couldn’t help. He told us we had to come into the city to fill out the paperwork in person!
Anyway, that’s the story of how my baby got her lazy dad’s surname and the patrilineage continued for another generation.
Do you think a personalised crossword or clue would be a good gift for the expecting parents in your family? Check out my customised crosswords for special occasions, or send me an email.