Report Cards and Crosswords

On one year of Extra Credit (and, as promised, a crossword)

One year and two days ago, the first issue of Extra Credit went live. The subscriber list, seven names strong, was made up entirely of college editorial staff, and while we were committed to at least a year-long run for experiment’s sake, there was no guarantee that list would grow. Not that we needed to hit a certain number — one of the joys of being institutional communicators is that we’ll never monetize this Substack and aren’t under the typical pressures to justify our projects with constant, exponential growth — but it’s sure nice to know that the work you put out into the world is finding some kind of audience.

Now, 12 months into our newsletter run, we know we have. Extra Credit has hundreds of readers and has published some 26 newsletters without ever missing a pub date. Along the way we’ve run Q&As with COLA faculty (on monkeys, the Maya, family reunions, and life after militarism), reading lists and essays on translation, a column or two, podcast interviews, and more. Most importantly, it’s been fun. It’s felt meaningful. People have told us how much they enjoy it. And we have more up our sleeves.

Still, it’s important to take breaks, pat ourselves (and you) on the back for sticking with it this long, and — as we promised a year ago — distribute some Extra Credit extra credit. So consider the following a kind of gold star, and, as always, we’ll be back in your inbox in two weeks.

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For the upcoming 1984 issue of Life & Letters, our sister magazine, we reached out to crossword-writer extraordinaire (and assistant professor of linguistics at UT Austin) Kyle Mahowald with a request for a themed puzzle. The result is below in myriad forms so that you can play along no matter how you like to work out your crosswords.

A pencil-and-paper person? No judgement: here’s a printable.

Want to play online? The interactive version of the puzzle (and its solution) lives on the L&L website here.

Want a preview of the puzzle and its clues? Read on.

1984 - Is anybody watching?

By Kyle Mahowald

Across

1 One from 1984 might include the USSR

6 Hair accessory

10 Pool units

14 Miami Dolphins coach in 1984

15 ___ Runner (1980's computer game)

16 Wheel part

17 *Michael (b. 1949, musician and music faculty member at Lehman College)

19 No-goodnik

20 George Michael Bluth player, in "Arrested Development"

21 Against

22 *Jackie (b. 1951), Tito (b. 1953), Jermaine (b. 1954), Marlon (b. 1957)

28 Make like Anthony, in a Billy Joel song

29 Turn about a fixed point

30 Aloud

31 Spend a semester far from the Forty Acres

35 Persona ___ grata

36 *Anthony Cicconne (b. 1956)

39 Major happening of the 1910's, briefly

40 1997 movie, named after a type of snake and nominated for 6 Razzie awards

42 "Did you get the ___?" (classic "Office Space" line)

43 Little bit

44 Michigan State athlete

47 *Gary Garland (b. 1957, former Denver Nuggets basketball player)

51 Having lots of windows, perhaps

52 Messes up

53 Focus in CNS or Cockrell

54 1984-relevant phrase that also describes the relationship between the starred clues and their respective 1984-relevant celebrity answers

60 "Do you like ___ coladas...?"

61 Austin's Treaty Oak, for one

62 Star of the 1984 movie "The Bostonians" [who is more famous for playing a superhero]

63 ___ count (statistic tracked in many health apps)

64 First name in classic animation

65 Got under control

Down

1 Query

2 ___ Terminator (hit movie of 1984)

3 I ___ Austin (t-shirt slogan)

4 Legendary boxer who endorsed Reagan in 1984

5 ___ Panza, Don Quijote sidekick

6 Bordeaux wine, to a Brit

7 Not too far from the 40 Acres, say

8 Wedding statement

9 Notetaking need, before laptops were widely used in the classroom

10 Kareem Abdul-Jabbar or Magic Johnson, in 1984

11 Neuron parts

12 Planet in 1984...but not now

13 Solidify

18 Emilio Estevez to Demi Moore, in 1984

22 Dummy

23 Donald's wife in 1984

24 Cartoonist's block

25 Widely used data storage format that is pronounced similarly to the the leader of the Argonauts

26 Actor Alda who starred in one of the most watched TV events of the 1980's

27 Country that refused to participate in the 1984 Olympics

28 ___ Lisa

31 India's smallest state

32 Scanlon's "What We ___ Each Other" (classic philosophical work that plays a crucial role in "The Good Place")

33 "Jeez Louise!"

34 Singer who released the album Mélanie in 1984, which topped the charts in Quebec for 10 weeks [but who wouldn't enter the English language market for another few years]

36 It goes through phases

37 Poker stake

38 Subject of the film "The Longest Day"

41 PDF available on the Visit Austin web site

42 Star of the 1984 motivational video "Be Somebody... or Be Somebody's Fool!"

44 Icy treat

45 Kitty's satisfied sound

46 Mix

47 Stingers under the eave

48 "And begin!"

49 1984 Grammy Award winner ___ Cara

50 "Phenomenology of Spirit" writer

54 "And another thing", in text speak

55 Glass you might hear while you're driving?

56 Earl Grey, for one

57 Clothes line

58 Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' ___

59 Texas's election map color, in recent history