====== Hot ======


[[http://www.picciotto.org/hot/|{{krewe:noms:its-hot.gif}}]] 



===== Recruitment =====

Howard Bergerson's //Palindromes and Anagrams// ---> Hot

//First Issue//: Dec 1985 

===== Recruits =====

[[Alice]], Amalgam, [[Banterweight]], [[Cat]], [[Dandr]], 
[[Daz]], [[Elfman]], [[Grams]], [[Iolanthe]], [[Kool]], 
[[Plaid]], [[thefoole|The Foole]], [[Tilegod]], [[Trazom]],
[[wildknight|Wild (K)night]].

===== Nom =====

I joined and recruited [[Grams]] (Greg Williams, who only stayed 
in the League for a few years) at the same time. Originally, I was planning on 
being "Rip" (end of my first name and beginning of my last name). We thought "Rip Grams" 
made a nice sounding combinom. However, in the end I didn't like the brutal and 
Anglo-Saxon sound of "Rip", and decided to connect the H of Henri with the last two
letters of Picciotto in reverse order, to get Hot, which is more in keeping with my 
Mediterranean temperament. At my first con (a sweltering weekend in [[cons:1986:photos|Cambridge]]), 
I introduced myself by saying "I'm Hot" and dozens of Krewe responded "so are we!".

My main combinom is Harth, with [[Arachne]]. [[Arachne]] suggested the combinom, which was
inspired by a character in Ursula K. LeGuin's novel //The Left Hand of Darkness//. 
Harth, like the other inhabitants of Winter (a planet somewhere in the Milky Way), is 
sometimes male and sometimes female. His/her name includes letters from both Hot and [[Arachne]]. Our
combi-city, of course, is Winter, MW. Another character in the same book is named Ai -- quite
appropriate since our first co-solving effort was a wonderful puzzle of [[Ai]]'s at the 
Charlottesville con. At first, only [[Sibyl]] knew who Harth was. We revealed our identity at 
the [[cons:1989:photos|Cleveland con]], in a cryptic crossword-cryptogram competition (there's an adapted version of that puzzle [[puzzles:cryptic:conventional_wisdom|here]]).


==== Combinoms ====

  * Harth: Hot/[[Arachne]]
  * Height: Hot/[[Banterweight]]
  * Honny: Hot/[[Uncanny]]
  * Hooker:Hot/[[Joker]]
  * Hot Ice:Hot/[[Alice]]
  * Hozom or Hot-to-Trazom:Hot/[[Trazom]]
  * Hopi (Hot/[[loquacious|Okapi]])
  * Ho-Hum (Hot/[[Ucaoimhu]])
  * Hot Tin Roof -- with [[Tinhorn]]




===== Offices =====

  * 2nd Vice President (1989)
  * Cryptic crosswords coeditor (1995 - present)  
  * Picture puzzle editor (1999 - 2002)
  * Coeditor of //National Puzzlers’ League Cryptic Crosswords// (2005)