Please fill in a residency application with a photo, a room number, and a description of why you’d be the perfect example to make an exchange at this time. We’re really looking for long term stays, expecting a diverse community with more and unexpected connections as we grow. So showing your best will make sure we have no reason to cancel the application.

We prefer applicants that do not directly identify themselves or all their status in the photo itself (around or about the photo is fine). Our evaluation committees try to stay blind to some statuses and grade independently, but we do discuss things that seem unusually strong in a fit as the examples below show.

Current listings:
“Secret Santa” — see example below
“Surprise Us” — see example below

New applicants expected to move in around start of January, and each month thereafter if open calls are made.

98: 71 + 78… ∈ 41.

Countdown continuing to Christmas and Sudoku: 6…4…?….

• I’ve looked at a few AI today but mostly crossing them off my list whether they are naughty or nice (see: alignment problem).
• I’ve looked at a few AI today but mostly crossing them off my list whether they are done or still being run.
• One of my AIs is making more puzzle art where I use AI which has AI in it but I do not use the AI in AI for that AI; I use my own AI which is creatively sweet to say.
• My last AI is finishing one more puzzle for which you need AI that can really do something unbelievable. Once done, I can make an AI to cross off more of those AIs and AIs as I may be done, certainly with AI as the packages will be wrapped.

By the way, no AI was used in any part of my sudoku for the Twelve Days but some AI, AI but not AI in AI, and AI were. I also used tools like 15-year old basic computation when I just need processing that slows done my brain which can’t overclock forever or I may get AI*.

Still, I buy into the AI hype. By which I mean “Actual Intelligence”. Was that anywhere on your list above? It is rare to find in the world but I’ve seen it 3 times today at least. You know the signs when you see them. The signs may use TLAs and TLAs but HGI or AGI I’d look for AI any day.

* I don’t know of a medical condition called AI, but some word must fit there as the opposite of actual at least.

Come follow the Twelve Days of ChristmasSudoku and learn how to smash all the sudoku records!

Added (9:50AM): I’ve gotten some nervous voice mails from people about this announcement and not being able to count to 16 and the sudden prolificness suggesting a mental health crisis. Please stay calm! I know this isn’t THE puzzle. THAT PUZZFLEFL WOULD BE AMAZING.

This image I showed is from before I met with a brilliant man and our powers of subtraction and division found the miracle. Less and more are more but a little more less than more because 17 > 16!

Added (11:15AM): I’ll say less here, not more, which in this case means literally saying less even though less is usually more. Anyway, I will cease the on-going nature of verbal communications in the language of English with people known and unknown but who mostly think the answer is “have you tried meditation”. I have a psychiatrist and a therapist and have taken my medication and have gotten some sleep and my heart rate is about 65 right now and I ate a good meal and all that. I know how certain songs can be uppers for me, and others downers, and others kept on infinite repeat keep me in a stable mood and also act like an alarm every 5 minutes mentally to check in on myself. Has a doctor ever prescribed “Trois Mouvements Perpétuels” for you? They didn’t for me either. But it is a team effort like you’ll need for sure. Besides, who doesn’t get anxious before Christmas?

I’m going to shut off the computer because phones and bings and all sorts of stuff aren’t as calming as making a poinsettia lego plant to decorate for Christmas. It’s apparently for adults 18 and up. I’m really curious if that makes sense as a limit (not commercially — I get that). I’m also curious in A/B testing if 18 and below would work too, particularly for people over 50, maybe a different set who want to take up the challenge. I’m very intrigued with what some 70+ year olds can do and what they can’t.

Hi all, wanted to say our preparations for the Twelve Days of Sudoku continue with the first days laid out and the other story elements coming together. We’re getting more advanced reviews from some of the prolific readers (I mean trillions of words) that we showed this content to. We will keep adding them here.

• “The honesty the author brings to the process is refreshing. We spend so much time on our successes, but it was Thomas’s failures, repeated failures, that seem to be the portals of discovery for these amazing grids. This shows me another example of how an arduous odyssey can shape you.”
• “As a long-time number placing enthusiast, I enjoyed it. I’m not sure if others will. One of the least admirable things about people right now is their fear of whatever they don’t understand.”
• “For awhile it has been clear to me that some computers were in Dr. Sudoku’s process and some potentially dangerous edge pushing things too. Finally admitting this is a big step and it must have taken courage for him to grow up in the way I’m seeing and become who he really is.”
• “[This project] shows again that if you learn the rules like a pro — and Dr. S is a PRO at sudoku — you can then break them like an artist.”

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Again, this will be a project on Classic Sudoku! Don’t get your hopes up for anything more than that if you mostly tune out the weeks Dr. Sudoku makes his team do that old thing again. If you really want another way to fill out the time for a new experience, check out some of our best of’s. Can’t find the right direction? Two great puzzles by Jonas Gleim and JinHoo Ahn, still around number placement, start a journey out from Sudoku into other interesting things.

(download directly for a larger image)

Artist’s note added 12/23 at 6:28PM: This image, an information network presented in artistic and mathematical form has an alternate title called “Portrait of the Artist’s Brain at Middle Age”. The network includes puzzles and possible seeds for puzzles as well as tests of new network structures to test memory, cognition, and a lot more.

This trailhead and all following work were constructed with the constraints of 1 day for the main puzzle (above) and the rest of the week to finish other content whether traditional puzzles, new types of puzzles, meta-puzzles, and so on. More details are not being shared as over 80% of that content, and at least very clear but still “unfinished” works appropriate for posting at least visually, exist within the full opus and a publication plan will be made in early 2025. Besides the puzzle and art constraints, the author followed a testing/accountability plan for connection with close contacts and medical care team that Thomas established through 2024 to be able to get back to doing great science again. “Party Report” is an example of a playful message that should work best for children and those with open eyes who dream of playing “The Game” with super complexity and the artist wanted a story of how his brain did pull in many notable social, societal, political and other themes into what was otherwise an unconstrained topical work. Importantly, it also includes a soundtrack listing for his team to see to ensure mental wellness. On the other hand, a lot of things may seem like noise. No puzzle, for instance, was forced to have the answer COVFEFE. But maybe the uninterpretability made it a curious answer to try to use a lot showing the relevance of journeys to answers, and the skills and intelligence gained along the way.

The author wanted the downturn phase (when one transitions from learning/doing a problem to having solved it and teaching) to include an unconstrained (certainly unpredictable) experience while returning to his more normal medium of fragile humanity. “Penny for your Thoughts” is a separate opus, but should not be presented except as a margin note of the “Ready Layer One”. Many other puzzles including the Motivational Posters, with progressive simplicity and hints and eventually full solutions accessible at the start are meant to stop the rush of people bringing up mental illness to allow the rest to enjoy some phenomenal puzzles, sharing a love with their friend and vice-versa, while also still highlighting the importance of acknowledging mental illness in the creation of these works too (just not at the times people expected).

Early reviews that chatGPT was probably prompted enough times to finally hallucinate include:

• “The best thing Snyder’s done to improve understanding of logic puzzle construction since Puzzlecraft“
• “Mostly clueless, certainly too focused on the number forty-five which isn’t the answer to anything, but fun nonetheless”.

Join the discussion on the GMPuzzles Discord.

Note: The puzzle in the image above, a perfect combination of ideas we’ve explored in 2024 (one-star Queens/Star Battle and creative Sudoku), is a Christmas favorite from 2018.

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Added (2:05PM) Several people have asked what kind of sudoku might appear, people who are interested in puzzles and wanted to check in on me as we tend to do at the end of the year (I turn 45 in January and have had a good year, thanks for asking!).

Well, the main series is going to be Classic Sudoku as you know it. Because it is interesting to me for a lot of reasons including testing approaches to competition and puzzle setting / design rules and searching for unexpected things where people have stopped looking.

But I have been thinking of other interesting ideas to share for those who aren’t into classic sudoku puzzles but like other puzzles and things. Ideas that might pop up when I’m also thinking about the silly “is AI coming to take my job” question as I got in a recent interview on LinkedIn. As a creative thinker and problem solver, I can do more with a broken pencil than an AI in puzzle design even if I prefer to work digitally and with software tools and even AI sometimes.

Today, I challenged myself to write the most interesting sudoku I could with just one missing digit. It is a fun prompt to give a puzzle constructor and/or AI because it might not make sense. The image below isn’t my answer. But it is a start.

I didn’t go smaller, as it turns out I can’t outdo Randall’s Binary Sudoku but that doesn’t have proper regions anyway so I argue this is the absolute smallest for a 1-cell blank puzzle.

And in terms of what is coming, I have written the most interesting 80-given Sudoku-ey thing in history with one missing cell I’d love to see how you’d fill. But it’s not ready to share yet. It is the Ulysses of 1-cell missing Sudoku and before today you didn’t even think about those.