The title of the puzzle is based on an accompanying crossword puzzle that the customer designed to go along with the puzzle. The solution provides a phonetic pronunciation, which with a bit of puzzlement, can be translated to "Babe Au Lit, Vienna Virgina". In case one gets lost, the solution is printed in the lower left hand corner of the puzzle.

The puzzle is the first one I've made using a new "light jet" photographic printing machine process I discovered at a local service bureau, thanks to a previous customer who supplied an image printed with this technology. The print quality is superb and I will be using this technology for selected large print puzzles in the future.

The customer wrote in early July:

"The puzzle got here about 20 minutes ago, and it is absolutely gorgeous. Over and above the extremely tasteful and careful packaging, the crossword puzzle is exactly as I had wanted it in the cover, and the puzzle itself (or, at least, the various pieces I looked at) are so way cool I can't stand it. I had anticipated leaving the box on the puzzle table tomorrow morning without fanfare, but I expect that I won't have the self-control to keep a lid on it overnight, and will instead spill the beans in some manner tonight. Oh well. Thanks again for all your patience and cooperation. It's been a very pleasant experience."

As it happened (from my Journal archives)

June 26, 2002

10:30 pm - Initial cut for #286 done, still planning to do major cutting tomorrow going into Friday.

June 27, 2002

11:37 am - Figural design for #286 done; leaving now to work on puzzle. Figurals: Frog, Gavel, Baseball Bat, Airedale Dog, Gibson Les Paul Guitar, Parakeet.

10:30 pm - Cut 320 +/- 2 pieces of #286. As the puzzle has to have "exactly" 706 pieces or I don't get paid, I'm keeping fairly methodical track of what I'm doing. I'm going to get to an early start tomorrow as I'd like to get down to a final section of the board of the size of about 20 pieces before calling it a day. I'd do a formal count on Saturday and cut the required remaining pieces. The photo-print is cutting very well, and I'll likely use this technology for one or two of the puzzles to be made for the September show.

June 28, 2002

5:35 pm - Just got back from the shop after another long day of puzzle cutting. I've completed #286 except for a small section. I'm hoping to cut that section into 24 pieces tomorrow, if I have the rest of the puzzle counted correctly. I will count the pieces later this evening. If I'm off by more than 4 or 5 pieces the puzzle will have problems, hopefully I didn't make any math errors during the course of cutting, I'm a bit nervous in that I think I should have been more formal in my counting along the way.

June 29, 2002

9:11 pm - Completed #286 with 706 pieces, an excellent puzzle.