Rap pioneers, slangily / SAT 2-28-26 / Animals in an early-2000s virtual fad / South Indian lentil stew / Gay nightlife spot with a dress requirement / Innermost moon of Neptune / Principle of improv comedy / Dialect that is responsible for a large majority of Gen Z slang / Weakens, as an overly strong character, in video game lingo / Tolkien ring bearer / Popular role-playing game since 1974, informally / Acting like a sore loser, informally / Affliction treated with a nit comb / Robert Frost's middle name

Constructor: Adam Levav

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium

THEME: none 

Word of the Day: SAMBAR (37D: South Indian lentil stew) —

Sāmbār, or sambhar, is a lentil-based vegetable spiced curry or stew, cooked with pigeon peas and tamarind broth. It originates in South Indian cuisine and is also eaten in other parts of India.

• • •

[48D: Blue-roofed restaurant]

Perhaps unsurprisingly, most of the excitement in this one is coming from the LEATHER BAR (15D: Gay nightlife spot with a dress requirement). That was the one answer that popped for me, the one major "what? oh!" moment in the puzzle. The only other long answer in this one that I actively enjoyed was BEFORE TIMES. I don't normally like answers that remind me of the pandemic, but there's something wistful and melancholy about this term I kind of like. The term has a history extending back to the Middle Ages, but it got popularized during the 2020s as a nostalgic way of referring to the days before COVID and the societal rearrangements that came with it (lockdowns, disinformation, the rise of the anti-vaxx movement, etc.). Nostalgia kills and the BEFORE TIMES (like most earlier times) weren't as great as we imagine, but still, I like this phrase for its currency and its understandable sense of longing for a less ruined world. The other long answers in this puzzle, I only felt neutrally about, except BUTT HURT, which is a phrase I despise. There's something so rancidly online about it—something cruel and sneering and sadistic (taking pleasure in the pain of others). It's rarely used to mean merely "sore loser" and usually used to mock anyone who is upset about anything. It’s a gamer-adjacent phrase that’s big with the “f*** your feelings” MAGA types, but I have friends who use it too. It's just not for me. Extremely not for me. Otherwise, the puzzle seems mostly OK. Solid, occasionally interesting corners. Just a little light on flashiness (and, once again, a little too easy).

["THAT'S ME in the (NW) corner ..."]

Surprised by the total gimme at 1A: Set unambitious goals (AIM LOW). I wrote it in immediately and confirmed it with WOMB and that NW corner was done in pretty short order. Thanks god for the absolute certainty of WOMB, because I would definitely have misspelled SMEAGOL without it (14A: Tolkien ring bearer). Even now, that "O" looks insane. But right is right, and you can't argue with right, and the crosses are all fair, so ... tragedy averted. The one tricky part of the puzzle was getting into the center. I had no luck at first coming out of the NW into the middle, and so hopped over to the NE corner and worked my way into there. AAVE was a gimme (9D: Dialect that is responsible for a large majority of Gen Z slang), and that gave me REVOLTS, and soon that corner was done too. Coming out of that corner was also a little challenging, but ... I forget which happened first, but either I put LEATHER BAR together from LEA- (finally) or LICE / NEMEAN / AVES (which I had as AVIS) got me the BRACES part of CURLY BRACES (36A: Symbols used to group blocks of computer code). Did you know LESBIAN BAR and LEATHER BAR have the same number of letters? I may actually have started to write LESBIAN BAR in before thinking "wait ... 'dress code'? really? what do you have to wear ... lesbian clothes? That sounds ... wrong." Wrote in BAE for 20A: Term of endearment appropriated from [AAVE], which gave me LEA- for the "Gay nightlife spot," but still had a few moments of wondering (brain: "what are those upscale, tony bars called ... fern bars? Fern ... LEA- ... something about leaves? LEAF BAR, is that a thing?"). But then the "T" from TRIS finally got me over the hump: Aha! LEATHER BAR! Like in Cruising! Nice. Original. Surprising. Easily the most exhilarating part of this solve.

[Follow me on Letterboxd!]

Stuff like NERFS (44A: Weakens, as an overly strong character, in video game lingo) and YES, AND (13D: Principle of improv comedy) might've felt fresh even a year or two ago, but now have appeared enough times that the sheen has worn off. Not bad, just not as original-seeming as they once were. I was mad at ERASER PEN for a bit because I was thinking of an ERASABLE PEN, which I would not describe as an [Error correction tool]—it's a writing tool that has an "error correction tool" attached. But then I realized ERASER PEN must be another thing entirely: something pen-shaped that is just ... an eraser. A pen-shaped eraser, is that it? Yes. It has a pen-like shape for precision erasing. There seems to be some conflation of "erasable pen" and "ERASER PEN" online. Some of you pen-heads (or ... eraserheads?) will be able to speak to this better than I. As for INSTANT TAN, I think the term I know is "self-tanner" or "spray-on tan" (26D: Body bronzer). I believe this puzzle that INSTANT TAN is a thing, but those other things feel more like things than INSTANT TAN feels like a thing, hence my lack of excitement. Also, my "body" has never been "bronze" a day in its life—not even close, it just ... doesn't do that—and I've never had any desire or need to fake it, so everything I know about tanning I pick up from ads. I am not a reliable source of info on tanning products, is what I'm saying. The clue on AIRHORN didn't quite resonate with me either (56A: Musical sample added for excitement). I do not think of an AIRHORN as something that "adds excitement" to any occasion. A truly awful sound, but yeah, you can hear it in some dance music, so it must be "exciting" to someone. Yesterday had funky BASS LINES—a much more "exciting" musical phenomenon to my ear. 

[Enjoy the "excitement"!]

Bullets:

• 57A: Animals in an early-2000s virtual fad (NEOPETS) — helps to have had a daughter who was a small child in the early 2000s, though she was more into WEBKINZ than NEOPETS.

• 22A: Part of a Blues Brothers outfit (FEDORA) — dark suit ... sunglasses ... needed crosses for FEDORA.

• 31A: Innermost moon of Neptune (NAIAD) — no idea. Needed virtually every cross. That NAIAD / NEMEAN / AVES bit is maybe the roughest patch in the puzzle.
• 5D: Rap pioneers, slangily (OGS) — "Original Gangsters." From merriam-webster dot com:

Original Gangster

Note: According to an essay by Steve Champion and Anthony Ross, former members of the Crips street gang in Los Angeles, the initialism O.G. was first used by the Crips in the early 1970's; see Champion and Ross, "The Making of an O.G.: Transcending Gang Mentality," written in 2006 and available on the website indybay.org as of 7/12/21. The release of the album O.G. Original Gangster by the rapper Ice-T (Tracy Lauren Morrow) in 1991 likely contributed to the migration of the word from gang culture to more general use.

• 51A: ___ Tung, star of cable TV's "The Summer I Turned Pretty" (LOLA) — again, no idea. Also, LOL at the phrase "cable TV's." What are you talking about? What channel? Where is this alleged program found besides in the vast universe of "cable TV"? Looks like Amazon Prime, which is ... not cable TV. Is it? It's streaming. What is happening here?
• 30D: ___ Story (punny nickname for the "Iliad") (TROY) — first I'm hearing of this, but I like it. Cute. A Toy Story pun. I won't be using it, but I like it.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook and Letterboxd]
=============================
❤️ Support this blog ❤️: 

• Venmo (@MichaelDavidSharp)]

=============================
✏️ Upcoming Crossword Tournaments ✏️

• Boswords Spring Themeless League (online) (starts Mon., Mar. 2, 2026)
• American Crossword Puzzle Tournament (Stamford, CT, Apr. 10-12, 2026) (registration closed!)

=============================
📘 My other blog 📘:

• Pop Sensation (vintage paperbacks)

Read more...

Coinage of the early 2000s? / FRI 2-27-26 / Adjoining, in a way / Illuminating point / Car requirement beginning in 1998 / Pantheon feature / Heroine in the "Fifty Shades of Grey" books / Travel safety grp. at school / Jeans material for a worn-out look

Constructor: Caroline Hand

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: none 

Word of the Day: DEBI Mazar (36D: Actress Mazar) —

Debi Mazar Corcos (/ˈmeɪzɑːr/; born August 13, 1964) is an American actress and television personality. She began her career with supporting roles in Goodfellas (1990), Little Man Tate (1991), Singles (1992), and Batman Forever (1995), followed by lead roles on the legal drama series Civil Wars (1991-1993) and L.A. Law (1993-1994). She portrayed press agent Shauna Roberts on the HBO series Entourage. She starred as Maggie Amato on TV Land's Younger, and alongside her husband Gabriele Corcos in the Cooking Channel series Extra Virgin. [...] 

In the early 1980s, Mazar was part of the downtown club scene in New York City, socializing with artists Jean-Michel Basquiat, Keith Haring, and Kenny Scharf. // While working at Danceteria, Mazar met Madonna, who hired Mazar to do her makeup for her first music video "Everybody" (1982). She appeared in five of Madonna's music videos: "Papa Don't Preach" (1986), "True Blue" (1986), "Justify My Love" (1990), "Deeper and Deeper" (1992) and "Music" (2000). Mazar originated the hair and makeup for the 1988 play Speed-the-Plow. // As a teenager, Mazar was a b-girl in New York City. Her first television appearance was on the pilot for the hip-hop television dance show Graffiti Rock, in 1984. Her first major role was playing a character on Civil Wars in the early 1990s. When that series was cancelled her character was brought over as a recurring role between the 1993 and 1994 seasons of the TV drama L.A. Law. // Mazar has played a number of minor supporting roles in a variety of films, including Sandy, a friend of Henry Hill's mistress in Goodfellas (1990); The Doors (1991); a small role in Spike Lee's Malcolm X (1992); Bullets Over Broadway (1994); and as Spice (of Sugar and Spice, with Drew Barrymore as Sugar) in Batman Forever (1995). (wikipedia)

• • •

[Point of illumination?]

Really liked this one. Stacked 15s aren't always my favorite late-week grid feature—at least part of the stack tends to be weak, and the crosses can be rough. But I like every element in both stacks, and as for the crosses ... I dunno. They hold up OK. I think what I liked most about the puzzle was that it put up a real fight at first. That's because I attack stacks by coming at all the crosses first and then seeing what I can make out of the letters that I pick up. Today, when I attacked the crosses, I whiffed a lot. Like ... I went coast to coast with those Downs up top and by the end had only four, and only two I was sure of (LANKA, REMY). So I felt like I was in trouble. I had better luck with some of the short Acrosses just below the stack (URSA, KEY, TIC, SWAN). But it turned out that LANKA and REMY alone were enough for me to get the DENIM part of DISTRESSED DENIM, and from there I was able to build the back ends of the long Acrosses, which allowed me then to whooooosh back across the grid—once you've got DOLLAR, PALE ALE, and DENIM, their front ends aren't that hard to imagine. But some of those crosses were legitimately tough. EN SUITE! (8D: Adjoining, in a way). APERÇU! (9D: Illuminating point). Yipes! Adjoining (!) French answer. Never would've gotten those with considerable help from crosses. And I thought I was so clever when I read 9D: Illuminating point and, off just the "C," wrote in SCONCE! I was so proud of that answer. "Good clue!" I thought. But no. APERÇU. Not as fun, but accurate enough, I suppose (Def. 2: "An immediate impression / Insight"). I also had some trouble spelling SACAGAWEA (really thought that "G" was a "J") (1A: Coinage of the early 2000s?). Once I finally had that top part nailed into place, I felt like I'd worked for it, which felt satisfying. Also, the stack seemed worth the work.

The puzzle was much easier from then on. Swooped down the east coast, got the back ends of all the long Acrosses down below very easily (helped to have heard of DARIUS, 51A: ___ the Great, king of ancient Persia), and from their back ends, those stack answers are all very easy to pick up. Well, two of them were. I could see I was dealing with KANSAS and thought of MANHATTAN before ever looking at the clue, and while I thought that top long answer was going to be some kind of REFERENCE at first, one look at the clue and RUN INTERFERENCE was easy to see (54A: Create a distraction, so to speak). As for ANASTASIA STEELE, lol, no idea (57A: Heroine in the "Fifty Shades of Grey" books). When I say "lol" I mean I literally laughed out loud. That is such a florid name, such a perfect erotic romance novel heroine name. I've never read the books or seen the movies, but I was weirdly just thinking about 50 Shades earlier this week because I watched Mike Nichols's Working Girl (1988) for my Movie Club on Monday. That movie famously features Melanie Griffith in her breakout starring role. Griffith's mother was Tippi Hedren (of Marnie and The Birds fame), and her daughter is Dakota Johnson, of ... 50 Shades fame (of other fames as well, now, but initially, it was 50 Shades). Anyway, I fell down a bit of Melanie Griffith rabbit hole, which means that I was reading about her relatives, which is how I discovered that Dakota Johnson was the star of the 50 Shades movies (not something I knew before this week). Hey, you know who else was in 50 Shades movies (50 Shades: Darker and 50 Shades: Freed)?: Rita ORA! (29A: Rita on "The Masked Singer"). Fun fact! So I laughed at ANASTASIA STEELE 'cause it's kind of a cheesy name and I laughed at the coincidence of having just read about Dakota Johnson and 50 Shades earlier this week. And so a totally unknown-to-me pop culture name, the kind of thing that could've been irksome, didn't bother me at all. Good fortune.

The puzzle runs a little heavy on partials—fill-in-the-blank stuff, stuff that makes no real sense on its own. MAUNA LANKA CARTA! That's a hell of a partial trio. There's also CUL and RUH (not great) and not one but two Chinese menu fragments (PAO, TSO'S). But this uglier shorter stuff largely stays inconspicuous and holds together some good-to-great medium and longer fill. OLD AS DIRT! (wanted OLD AS THE HILLS or—more likely, since it fit in the space allotted—OLD AS TIME) (11D: Antediluvian). DEAR SANTA ... BASSLINES! (32D: Funk music features). Love a puzzle with a good bass line. BRAISES (41A: Prepares, as coq au vin) and KINDEST (35A: "___ regards ..." (letter sign-off)) and ROTUNDA (27A: Pantheon feature), all solid mid-sized answers through the middle. The puzzle is very sturdy. Thumbs up. 

[funky BASSLINE(S)]

Bullets:

• 1D: Travel safety grp. at school (S.A.D.D.) — "Travel safety" absolutely threw me for a loop in the S.A.D.D. clue, even though it shouldn't have (S.A.D.D. stands for "Students Against Drunk Driving," although that second "D" might also stand for "Distracted" these days ... oh, no, now it's "Students Against Destructive Decisions." So it's not even travel-specific any more. Time to change the cluing!). "Travel safety" just sounded like something to do with remaining safe while traveling ... like, on a bus or plane or whatever. The "Drunk Driving" context never entered my head. This clue isn't much different from other S.A.D.D. clues, so I should've seen right through it. Shrug. Sometimes your (my) brain just glitches.
• 23A: Bird that Zeus disguised himself as in a much-told Greek myth (SWAN) — kind of white-washing the whole gods-raping-mortals context here. So many ways to come at SWAN, not sure this would be my top choice.

• 31A: Car requirement beginning in 1998 (AIR BAG) — do they not require more than one? Feels weird to say that only a single bag is required.
• 39D: Neighborhood in New York City where Zohran Mamdani lived before being elected the city's mayor (ASTORIA)—first Mamdani reference (that I can remember) in the NYTXW. Expect many more once post-election puzzles finally make it through the pipeline. Both ZOHRAN and MAMDANI are gonna appear before year's end, for sure. Maybe we'll get the full name. You don't get unimpeachably famous new names every day, and also it's NYC, so Mamdani references in the NYTXW just make sense. This clue is just the beginning.

That's all for today. See you next time.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook and Letterboxd]
=============================
❤️ Support this blog ❤️: 

• Venmo (@MichaelDavidSharp)]

=============================
✏️ Upcoming Crossword Tournaments ✏️

• Boswords Spring Themeless League (online) (starts Mon., Mar. 2, 2026)
• American Crossword Puzzle Tournament (Stamford, CT, Apr. 10-12, 2026) (registration closed!)

=============================
📘 My other blog 📘:

• Pop Sensation (vintage paperbacks)

Read more...