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FRIDAY, Jul. 25, 2008 -- John Farmer (Five-time Horse of the Year, 1960-64 / Turkey's wattle / Baseball's Belinsky and Jackson)
Friday, July 25, 2008
Relative difficulty: Easy
THEME: None
Those of you who were around last night know that Rex sent up a smoke signal asking for one of us benchwarmers to get in the game. Okay, it was a little more high-tech than a smoke signal, but apparently not by much. After I responded to the plea for help, I checked in with Wade who said his power had gone out during the last episode of "The Sopranos" and was writing to me from his Blackberry. So he's no help. No idea where Seth is. He's young, so he's probably out gallivanting somewhere. Which leaves you with me, PuzzleGirl. Let's just try to make the best of it, okay? Hey, it could be worse -- we could have a sucky puzzle today, but we don't. I like this puzzle a lot! I had many Aha!'s, only a couple WTF?'s, and, who knows? Maybe some of the fill reminded me of a story or two. Let's find out.
Good stuff:
- 15A: Continue the journey (ride on). Also the name of the bus service in Montgomery County, Maryland. I had MOVE ON at first.
- 18A: How some are offended (mortally). With the MO in place I wanted MORALLY, but of course that doesn't fit.
- 23A: Tribulations (ills). Had WOES here.
- 25A: Baseball's Belinsky and Jackson (Bos). When I saw that I needed to do the write-up for today, I admit I panicked a little. Sometimes I can't even finish the Friday puzzle! So I did get some help from PuzzleHusband. About this particular clue, PuzzleHusband says "I just don't think of Bo Jackson as a baseball player." Fair enough.
- 30A: Visitors (sojourners). Great word.
- 35A: Cousin of a woodcock (snipe). Sounds like these are good birds for crossword puzzles. Wikipedia tells me they have "cryptic" plumage. Whatever that means.
- 40A: Ones with read faces? (timepieces). Also Eric Clapton's two-volume "best of" compilation. I was on the right track here but kept thinking it should end with -WATCHES or -CLOCKS.
- 56A: "Your children are not your children" poet (Gibran). Apparently the third best-selling poet in history after William Shakespeare and Lao Tse.
- 57A: Bank of America Stadium team (Carolina). Again, went straight to PuzzleHusband for this one. He immediately said, "Carolina Panthers?" and I'm all, "Well, PANTHERS has the right number of letters but doesn't fit with the crosses." The cross I had was the O from NOSH (54D: Have a little something). Ya know, the 4th letter of CAROLINA. D'oh!
- 1D: Goal of middle management? (trim waist). Again, I was on the right track here, but with the I*T in place I thought it would end with DIET.
- 3D: Acting (ad interim). Note to self: Learn more Latin.
- 12D: One with a high Q score (celeb). I knew this had something to do with movie stars. I found the following explanation here: "Twice a year, 55,000 families are asked their thoughts about 1,800 public figures in entertainment, sports and business: Have you heard of them? Are they one of your favourites? How much do you dislike them? The answers are transformed through a mathematical equation into a single numeral. That number, the Q Score, is the oldest and best-known gauge of celebrity." So now you know.
- 13D: Five-time Horse of the Year, 1960-64 (Kelso). Since it wasn't Seabiscuit, Seattle Slew, Secretariat, or Affirmed, I couldn't come up with it without the crosses.
- 44A: Got by (did OK). With D*D*K in place I thought for sure I had hosed something up. Aha!
- 53A: Start of a "Name That Tune" bid ("I can…"). As in "I can name that tune in three notes." I've been told that an aunt of mine was a contestant on "Name That Tune" in the 1970's. She didn't win, but legend has it she went home with a year's worth of Rice-A-Roni (2D: Quaker Oats product).
- 7D: Rolling Stones hit just before "Honky Tonk Women" ("Jumpin' Jack Flash"). When I had WOES instead of ILLS, "Brown Sugar" came to mind but, obviously, didn't fit. PuzzleHusband isn't a big Stones fan, but "Jumpin' Jack Flash" is on the same album as "Sympathy for the Devil" and, as far as I'm concerned, every song mentioned in this paragraph Rocks. The. House.
- 31D: Some court contests (one-on-ones). Love this one. So many different types of courts.
- 32D: Shortage in a rush-hour subway (elbow room). Got this with only the B in place. Awesome answer.
- 42D: Intimate (suggest). I knew I was on this puzzle's wavelength when my first thought was "'intimate' is a verb here, not an adjective." I guess you can only fool me so many times with that one.
- 16A: In Dutch (up a creek). I understand "up a creek" but have never heard the expression "in Dutch."
- 20A: Practice (ply). PuzzleHusband: "You know, like 'ply a trade'?" Gotcha.
- 22A: Turkey's dewlap (wattle). Pretty sure I've heard "wattle" before, but never "dewlap."
- 62A: Weed (hasheesh). No. No. No. Possibly with a "Var." designation, but spelled this way? No. Plus, I thought weed was marijuana. Isn't hashish ... something else?
- 34D: Dry state (soberness). Sorry, but I have to protest this one too. The word is "sobriety." "Soberness" might work in other contexts, but not in the one where "sober" means "dry."
- 46D: Base of support (plinth). My favorite new word of the day.
Pura Vida, PuzzleGirl
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70 comments:
My moment of brilliance, getting THINWAIST from the IS didn't turn out so well. The NW caused me to go from a record Friday time to an average Saturday. HIKEON worked for RIDEON. Oh well. HASHEESH? I'm with PG on this one. No.
Thanks for the writeup PG.
Wow, I can't believe I am one of the first commenters today! Puzzle girl, terrific commentary! I needed my friend Google to finish, but I finished the NW and SE on my own. So Progress. My favorite: Weed: HASHEESH. The word in Arabic literally means grass, like the stuff you mow. So, I was very amused when I first heard "grass" and "weed" for marijuana.
Yesterday's commentary was fantastic as well!
Last night, it appeared Rex was about to be thrown into a New Zealand children's museum prison for crossword blogging without a license. [There's a sentence I have never typed before].
Do we know if he is safe?
Nice Friday puzzle on Friday for a change. I like words with J and K in them, being my secret idnetity's initials, so JUMPIN JACK FLASH crossing JAMPACKS is a double dose of delight.
I call SHEESH on the spelling of HASHEESH.
My one error was the Name That Vowel crossing of GIBRAN and PLINTH.
I also wanted 1D to end in DIET. Tried APOLLO XIII instead of APOLLO ONE but it didn't want to fit.
Two thumbs up on the puzzle and the emergency write-up.
PS. the puzzle has both "Mac" and "in Dutch", BUB UP A CREEK, just the opposite of our Mac!
PPS. Marijuana and Hashish are derived from the same plant. It's a difference in processing. I agree that the spelling is a variant, but the long ee sound is actually closer to the proper pronunciation... I will shut up for now...
I thought this was way beyond easy for me. I did finish with no googles, but it was a hard slog all the same. For the longest time I had Period/Promtion at 1A/D and just wouldn't let go. I kept writing in stuff and taking it out. Just no confidence in stuff like wattle (if Rex were writing we'd get another Ally McBeal diatribe, I'm sure) or mender. Loved the whole NE corner - just some great clues and fill. And how come no one is taking issue with "UPROSE" for rebelled? I just sounds so wrong!
NIce rescue, PG - Rex left us in very good hands.
THanks Puzzlegirl, good comments
I always thought IN DUTCH meant being in trouble with the law or authorities...
See Chuck Berry's almost grown
I'm doin alright in school, they ain't said I broke no rule...I ain't never been in dutch....etc
"In Dutch" is, or at least was, a fairly common expression in the NY area, meaning "in trouble." Of course, it is derogatory towards the good people of the Netherlands, who are one of the nations who have decriminalized hashish (Not HASHEESH! Sheesh!), which is a form of cannabis, just like marijuana, but is usually in solid form, and may be made from several parts of the plant, rather than just the leaves. (This from Wikipedia, not personal experience.) The -ee- spelling gets 126,000 hits on Google, many referring to a book called the Hasheesh Eater, while the -i- spelling gets 1,790.000 hits. Yes, Var., for sure.
I agree on SOBERNESS, as well. Just a clunky word. Also had to question MORTALLY offended. When has anyone ever died from being offended?
Re: Bo Jackson. He was an all-star once, and had four 20-home run seasons. Seems like he qualifies for baseball.
I did the puzzle in 12 minutes while talking to the wife and watching TV. Thought it was a fairly easy Fri. puzzle.
About the non-topical pictures -- got the "brown sugar" and the "cheech & chong" but what do the other two represent?
Wow.
I wouldn't exactly call this puzzle "easy," but at least I did finish it unassisted. Eventually. I got halfway through with big gaps in the NW and SE corners and decided to take a break and go for breakfast. When I came back I was able to slowly fill in the rest. So, it was definitely doable. But easy? Not for me...
@anonymous: Sojourner Truth
"Q" and Captain Picard from Star Trek TNG
I found this one to be easy-medium. Finished in pretty good time without googles.
I also like all those J's and K's as if I'm getting all those extra scrabble points. The SE fell very quickly. The NE was the last to fill in.
Also, agree with PuzzleGirl (good write-up, btw) on wanting WOES and TIMECLOCKS. Now that I'm semi-retired, they really do go together.
Don't you just love GLOWER?
Ooops...gotta check the cake for the father-in-law's 80th b'day.
Puzzle girl is right about Hashish. Its a variant spelling. Hash is the dried and compressed resinous portions of marijuana.
I do question the "easy" portion of her solution, though. For a Friday puzzle, this was surely a medium. The NW corner really slowed me down. All puzzles are easy in retrospect, but when you are staring a blanks and something doesn't come to mind, its not easy at the time. Aerole, for instance, only came from crosses. I thought the prickly parts were the leaves or the fruits. As for cobble, couldn't come up with a 6 letter fruit (peach cobbler anyone?). Finally got somewhere by looking up Cosell and then getting "waist" and now it looks easy. But not when doing it.
Jumpin John Farmer! Good puzzle and according to JimH, nine new words in a single day and all founded on a PLINTH. STLEO was Leo I who met with Attila The Hun (really) and together they formed the basis of all crosswords in 452 AD. As an aside, when I once had to memorize the Popes, Leo's successor was among the easiest...Hilarius.
Cryptic plumage is common for female birds, but many species don their dull colors only when they lay eggs and stay on the nest until the babies fly off. This change makes them blend into their environment and then they return to a more festive color and why not? They know the words of Kahil Gibran found in The Prophet.
Great write up PG. I found this more medium than easy though. Agree completely about the var. hasheesh and the mystically "dutch"
I solved a Friday without cheating, so it must be easy.
--Steve
I liked this. Disliked SOBERNESS and UPROSE intensely, did my usual wild flailing at CAROLINA, but was so delighted at being able to finish unaided, and so startled at my knowledge of both WOODCOCK and saggy turkey's bits, that i'll let my gripes alone. Enjoyed the write up, thank you.
The first thing I put in was LOL (55a: Text te-hee) and from that wanted "GET OFF OF MY CLOUD" for 7D, which fit, but was quickly dismissed because I really liked DID OK and ALL SIZES went in next.
thought this was a tough puzzle - lots of googling. Also noticed Mac and Dutch. Growing up we certainly want to be in dutch - that meant you would be punished.
Anyone ever had hashish brownies? There was a cookbook in the 60's with the recipe.
For a great treat.. add some thyme to your rice-a-roni
I meant.. DIDN'T want to be in dutch
Had everything West of
JUMPINJACKFLASH and very damn little in the East all in about 10 minutes.
Chipped away in the SE, getting MOE ICAN LOL. OCALA got me CAROLINA which broke open the entire section.
North of there was a bit more problematic. Had an AHA moment with WATTLE and then COSELL. ADINTERIM was a total guess but it led to the solution of the puzzle.
I spent 30 minutes East of 7D but finally finished without help.
To paraphrase Nancy Sinatra: I got started in a fever, hotter than a pepper sprout.
ANY reference to Calvin and/or Hobbes makes me smile...
My grandma from S. Carolina always used "in Dutch" so I was tuned in for that one but up a creek seemed a bit off. Granny used it for something you had brought on yourself.
Never heard of Nan Britton or Mary Lou Williams.
Skyes was a bit of a stretch.
Liked the clues for Lie and Rob Roy.
How did I know waddle?
I also thought this was a medium for a Friday. Thank goodness for some dependable crosswordese to get me going or I might have tanked this one. Sorry Mr. Farmer but this aging hippie can't live with hasheesh. Otherwise very fun puzzle. Thanks for last minute write up PG!
Cosell was my first fill, just from scanning the clues. Didn't like this one, kind of boring.
Wattle reminded me of one of Rex's least favorite TV shows...
Don't want to get in Dutch for mentioning Calista Flockheart.
Finally, having SOBERNESS for sobriety is like having normalcy for normality...just plain wrong.
Hoping for a better tomorrow.
Not having a puzzlehusband around as a resource, I did not have an easy time with this. Fought all the way through, resisting googles, and finally filled in the last letter, the "D" in ride on.
Mary Lou was my first gimme--love those Louis Armstrong Hot Five records. Remembered "wattle" b/c that was the thing Ronald Reagan wore under his chin. I'm with those who don't like "uprose". But the puzzle has an appealing freshness, and all is forgiven.
I'll put in that UPROSE is a little off for me, too. Just because UPRISING is a noun, you don't necessarily have to UPRISE as a verb, especially since the verbal to RISE UP exists, and is no more cumbersome than UPRISE is. There are very few hits when searching UPROSE, but Merriam-Webster online has it and dates it to the 14th century. Go figure.
uh oh, I think that wattle violates the Operation: Stop Referencing "Ally McBeal" rule, as that is where I learned the word.
also, was looking for a six letter fruit for cobbler but then Hayley Mills' (for those of you born before 1960) song came to mind - see Cobbler, Cobbler on youtube
http://youtube.com/watch?v=aakp-A5Y0mg
thanks puzzle girl for another homerun - like "Bo Knows"
Forgot to ask phillysolver: You're kidding when you said you once memorized all the popes--no? The most I ever memorized, religion-wise, were the 12 sons of Jacob and the 12 lesser (?) prophets.
@Bill in NJ--Surely you realize that Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazleton were covering Johnny Cash and June Carter with "Jackson."
construction call for help ..sw.. - any ideas (answer doesn't help)?
From dictionary.com
Dewlap - a pendulous fold of skin under the throat of a bovine animal.
Turkeys are bovine?
Tough clue.
Great puzzle though.
PuzzleGirl's a pro. (First I heard of this "PuzzleHubby" character, though.) My electricity came back on eventually and I got to watch Meadow park her car. Well worth the wait.
I thought the puzzle was super easy except the SE, and that was pretty super-easy too, once I got a foothold--it just took a while.
I know "in Dutch" only from Springsteen's "You Can Look (Better Not Touch)" (or maybe the first phrase is parenthetical and the second one is the title. I'm all for parentheses in titles of stuff, by the way.)
There's a Schoolhouse Rock video that prominently features ELBOWROOM. Manifest destiny and all that. I bought the complete Schoolhouse Rock DVD a year or so ago, for my son. I liked them when I was a kid, but just for the music; I didn't really learn anything from them. My kid does, though. My wife said yesterday he gave some guy in the park a lecture on ligaments.
Dave - Any quadruped can have dewlaps.
BUB reminded me of the Fred Allen show. Yes, I'm that old, but in denial. One of the denizens of Allen's Alley was Titus Moody. a taciturn New England farmer. His habitual greeting was "Howdy, BUB."
Mrs. Nussbaum was portrayed by the sister of my then dentist. He was a fine dentist and also a very bright and witty man.
REUSEABLE gave me pause.
Fine job on short notice, PuzzleGirl. Thank you.
Comments are coming quickly, but scroll back to Bill from NJ for a pretty accurate recap of my experience.
Yes, I'm young, and I gallivanted. (With even youngers.) Thanks for stepping up, PuzzleGirl. It's a tournament weekend for me, but local, so there'll be more gallivanting, possibly especially on Sunday night thanks to PuzzleCouple.
If I'd been around I'd have surely linked to something like this, which I saw way too many times on late 80's cable to excuse having so much trouble coming up with it today. I might have included a picture like this, and my family used to eat here all the time.
Instead, I'll just respond to PuzzleHusband with this.
This puzzle was a gas gas gas,
sg
I only know dewlap from the Simpsons (http://www.snpp.com/episodes/7F22.html ):
Marge: [watching Lisa show Maggie flashcards] What's a zebu?
Lisa: It's like an ox, only it has a hump and a dewlap. [indicating to Maggie] Hump, and a dewlap! Hump and dewlap!
Miriam - turkeys are quadrupeds? Three and out - love a solution to my construction issue though - assume the thanks when you get me an answer.
Dave: I can't believe I breezed through the puzzle but made that gaffe. I must have been thinking of a Photoshopped picture of a 4-legged roast turkey which a friend sent me one Thanksgiving. At least I hope it was Photoshopped.
I need lunch.
I don't know about the brownies, but "The Alice B. Toklas Cook Book" contains a recipe for HASCHICH (sic) FUDGE. She says it "might provide an entertaining refreshment for a Ladies' Bridge Club or a chapter meeting of the DAR."
Ulrich
Catholic Grade School 1961...The nuns believed everything should be committed to memory. Learned the typical curriculum requirements of States and Capitals, Countries and capitals (so out of date now), Planets and moons (poor Pluto), Ten Commandments, Bible Verses, Poetry Lines, Shakespeare and yes, Popes. The Popes thing was sort of extra credit, but you were required to know the first ten and the last ten.
@phillysolver...how about the kings and queens of England?
Willy, Willy, Harry, Ste,
Harry, Dick, John, Harry three,
One, two, three Neds, Richard two,
Henries four, five, six – then who?
Edwards four, five, Dick the bad,
Harries twain and Ned the lad,
Mary, Bessie, James the vain,
Charlie, Charlie, James again,
William & Mary, Anna Gloria,
Four Georges, William and Victoria,
Edward, George, then Ned the eighth
quickly goes and abdicat’th,
leaving George, then Liz the second,
and with Charlie next it’s reckoned.
That’s the way our monarchs lie
since Harold got it in the eye!
Thanks, PuzzleGirl -- especially for explaining the "high Q" clue... Also thanks to PhillySolver for further discussion of "cryptic plumage" (though like Ulrich I'm sometimes not sure when Philly is pulling out collective legs, like a SNIPE hunt).
However, as Foodie noted, HASHEESH is not wrong -- may be considered a variant today, but was the preferred spelling in 19th century Brit lit: see Dickens' "A Traveller's Tales", plus Kipling et al.
Anyway, I thought it was a quite a satisfying puzzle and was pleased to solve it without help, though it was daunting at first and took a good while... The "goal of middle management" was my favorite clue, and the least favorite was "Celtic canines" or SKYES for Skye Terriers, relating to but not interchangeable with the Isle of Skye in Scotland (Scottish Gaelic name: An t-Eilean Sgitheanach, or Norse name: SkÃð). Maybe they are slangily "SKYES" to the Queen or the dog world?
Furthermore, Wikpedia says "Just over 30% of the residents on Skye speak Gaelic". Perhaps the dogs are all bilingual... Sometime somebody also might discuss whether the terms Celtic and Gaelic are totally interchangeable? Grrr.
∑;)
Medium for me. An enjoyable puzzle with some tough spots.
Saw DIDOK (one word) after it fell into place through crosses and figured, "Oh, that must be some eastern European composer I've never heard of." Probably Ivan Didok or his brother Igor Didok, who together collaborated on "The Ogre and the Water Nymph." Or some such.
SW was hardest for me, with the fictional-children-I've-never-heard-of MICAH/MOE cross and HASH without the courtesy of a (var.)
Also wanted Waddle for WATTLE. WTF on KELSO for me. Did not like SOBERNESS. Like some others, did not feel MORTALLY was on-spot cluing.
Keep up the good work PG and the rest of the AD INTERIM triumvirate.
Brooklyn
@steve-
I understand that it was just a cover but I referenced the Nancy Sinatra/Lee Hazelwood version that I hear in my head.
Thanks for reminding everyone that it was originally Johnny and June Carter Cash who originated the song
@foodie: thank you for your kind words! I never heard of the expressions myself, got it through crosses. Please don't start calling me bub.
I had a hard time with this puzzle. Oddly enough, I did the whole upper left quadrant first, pretty easily, then got mired everywhere else. I had to google for the first time in weeks! There was one Natick for me: 48A and D.
I like a lot of the words (in hindsight): jampacks, sojourners, one-on-one and wattle; I see a lot of dewlaps around our house in CT
(turkeys, not humans!).
SNIPE do seem to be rather common in these parts. I was thinking EMPTY SEAT before ELBOW ROOM, and for the legendary MacGregor, I first had FARMER, but I didn't think our constructor would be quite so vain. Considered CAPN CRNCH before RICEARONI, and happened to guess correctly on MOE, MICAH and I CAN.
I have an accidental hashish brownie story. On a bike trip, staying at friends of friends, awoke early and nibbled on the only food available. Sat down and read the only book I could find, B'rer Rabbit, and started to find it tremendously funny. Then I got worried, realizing the spikage, but wondering whether it might have been laced with LSD or something, since the sensation was so intense. Anyway settled down somewhat, got on my way, but never traveled very far that day due to numerous stops for snacks.
Blue Oyster Cult is playing at the Santa Cruz Boardwalk this evening, so I'm pretty stoked about the flash back to adolescence. Unlike the Stones, I don't listen to BOC anymore.
p.s. I found an answer to my question -- No, the two terms are not exactly interchangable. There are currently six Celtic languages derived from Old Celtic, of which only three are Gaelic: these are found in Ireland, Scotland and the Isle of Man. The other three are non-Gaelic -- Welsh, Cornish and Breton (in Brittany, NW France).
∑;)
Just finished my Hasheesh vs Weed research. Very scientific. Walked around Washington Square park, making sample purchases from the 'vendors'. For purely research purposes mind you. Asked to purchase 'Weed' from 63. Not a single one responded with Hasheesh. By this research, the probalibity that the two are equivelent is (1/2)**63, which is a really, really low number.
As an unrelated aside, there's a really, really big party at my place tonight. You're all invited. Especially all you foodies who've been bugging me these past months. I'm begging you, come. Even if all you've got is RICEARONI. But no F***ing beets.
Or vegemite
Nice stick save, PG. Enjoyed the puzzle and the write-up.
@NYC Market, we're having dinner at USC tonight. Might have to stop by, especially if you made any purchases in the park.
Bo Jackson was as spectacular on the diamond as on the football field. I saw him hit the biggest home run I've ever seen (steroid era included) at Royals Stadium. Then the heavens opened up in the third inning and the game was called, so it didn't even count. It's a shame his career was cut short.
My dad's boss in the early '80s was a four-star AF general, Robert E. "Dutch" Huyser. Apparently he earned the nickname early in life because he was always "in Dutch".
http://www.arlingtoncemetery.net/huyser.htm
What a way to step up ad interim, Puzzle Girl!
I love getting all my drug info from this blog! No idea that Hashish/Marijuana was from the same source!
(Too bad 9D was MARYLOU not MARYJANE...)
@Ashish, what did YOU think of the spelling?
This was my fastest Friday ever,
(18 minutes) despite being unable to come up with WATTLE (except by the crosses).
Originally all I could think of was GOBBLE...and then thought Dewlap was Dewar's...and wasn't there some whiskey with a pic of a wild turkey on the bottle and maybe somehow that was related?
So much for SOBERNESS.
Didn't know half of the proper names: NAN, MICAH, MOE, MARYLOU,
STLEO, KELSO...
only knew GIBRAN, BO, COSELL and ROBROY, but for some reason it didn't seem to matter!
In the end, my favorite AHA! moment was PLY. When I had PL? I could only think of the PLO!
Tintin and Andrea beat me to the "ad interim" comment. Great job from the whole guest blogging team. Some very funny stuff. Sure you're just filling in? Rex better make his way back soon. Remember Wally Pipp.
Thanks for comments on the puzzle today.
- john farmer
Medium for me. Far from easy. Took along time to get going, but once I got going it went well. Finished in NW, despite getting Cosell as my first answer. Two Fridays in a row! I'm happy.
Jeez Louise (or is it Sheesh, Hasheesh)
Clearly, the right spelling is Hashish - and the cockneys call it Ashish! (and hasheesh is var. but it is a Friday so all is well and no var.'s needed in the clues)
The story goes that those who smoked Hashish were called hashashins and they got into murderous ways and were then called assassins. Really!
[Aside, Ashish means "blessing" in one of the Indian languages and is one of the words found in the Indian national anthem].
JJF - thanks for the call-out! Promise to put a var. of your name in one of my puzzles :-)
Ashish
NEW BELGIAN BEER? / PASSOVER DINNER STATE
Had more trouble with this one than all of you. I bypassed the SOBERNESS controversy completely (and wrongly). Wound up having an "E" instead of an "O" at the end of ST LEO, and "BUD" instead of BUB, leaving me with the ridiculous "ST LEE" & even stupider "SEDERNESS" (see, what had happened is I was thinking of sere for dry, and...never mind!) At least I got my ROB ROY today.
Best puzzle of the week so far, and great pickup by PuzzleGirl, but lame excuses from Wade & Seth G. Hell, isn't PG in Costa Rica? Loved the picture of Q and Picard - my wife is a huge Star Trek fan, and when an episode comes on featuring Q we both instinctively mumble under our breath "F***in' Q!" (Ya see, he always mucks up everything then has to reset the universe and.. never mind!) PG - my understanding is that the origin of UP A CREEK does not meet any meal test.
Once saw Bo Jackson run up and along the center field wall, using it like a banked curve on a racetrack, to make a spectacular catch. He just made it look routine - meteoric career for probably the most amazing pro athlete ever.
Fergus, are you sure the Stones still listen to BOC? - Just joshin'.
There's a great Jeff Beck tune - "Around the plinth" - only reason I know that word.
I hear that Bill Wyman still pays air bass to all the songs on "Secret Treaties."
Bill D, I am also a keen practitioner of the deliberate misread, especially with signs and public notices.
62A is a clue from one who has tried neither. Raw marijuana is weed, pot, combustible herb, etc. Hasheesh is a processed marijuana byproduct which concentrates the resinous matter that carries most of the THC. Anyone who has been to Amsterdam and tried them both (none of us good Americans would ever smoke them here, would we?) would not consider hashish "weed". A definite WTF!
I thought this was going to be my fastest Friday ever until I slowed up in the northwest. (Side question; What's the difference between "slowed up" and "slowed down?" I am glad that I'm a native speaker of English...) I had "thin waist" and "rolled oat" for too long. Like others, I have my doubts about "uprose" and "soberness."
I know "interim" and "ad hoc" but not "ad interim."
Still, I got it all in pretty good time.
Isn't Wally Pipp the guy who said "more cowbell"?
Mostly easy for me also except for SE where I needed to do some guessing at the PLINTH/GIBRAN/REUSEABLE (wasn't sure of the var.) Turns out I knew the GIBRAN book but not who the author was. I was also guessing at the MOE/MICAH. I guess the Simpson's bartender doesn't work on Fri.
I started off like imsdave with THIN and HIKE which took a while to correct but no other major problems (except SE).
Like many I was not fond of SOBERNESS and UPROSE but, overall really liked this one. Nice job PG and JFF!
@Blanche thank you - it was the alice b toklas cookbook for the brownies
There was a M*A*S*H episode in which Frank Burns is reprimanding Hawkeye and Trapper, and Hawkeye looks at Trapper and says something like "Golly gee, Annie Lou, are we in Dutch", implying a schoolkid usage of the phrase. I like it.
Nice piece of construction John. The Northwest and Southeast corners are looking very Longo-esque. It's tough enough to fill a 6x6 -- let alone extend three columns to 9. Count me among those who love to just stare at the filled grid. -Joe
I guess you all have the weed/hashish thing covered, but I'll just whine a little anyway. Saying weed and hashish are equivalent is, to my mind, like saying opium and heroin are equivalent. Different stuff, same source.
Secondly, the definitive resource for the phrase "in Dutch" is the hold up scene in Raising Arizona, when Ed notices her husband robbing the convenience store while she's waiting in the car and starts yelling at him. Hi urges the clerk to hurry up with the money because he's "in Dutch with the wife." I can't do a link to save my life, but here's the clip:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=wiEVykrGhSw
Also, the "you ate SAND?" moment is at around 3:15 here:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=XBR8_W7i1G0
I mean, do yourself a favor and rundon'twalk if you haven't seen this movie. The entire ten minute pre-credits intro is something nearing cinematic nirvana. Okay I'll stop now. But seriously go watch it.
To be sure, Alice B. Toklas's recipe is for fudge, but in this movie, I Love You, Alice B. Toklas, the hippie girlfriend of the Peter Sellers character makes brownies for him. She doesn't divulge what the active ingredient is, and so when his parents and his recently jilted fiancée drop in, they're in for a bit of a trip.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HvCaZzLg3Y0
I love this movie.
I'm alive, and properly connected once again. Took a while. I'm infinitely grateful to PuzzleGirl for rescuing me. Off to do Saturday's puzzle and blog it. Blog post will be short, as I am in the home of extended family and am very conscious of being (apparently) anti-social.
OK, Saturday puzzle time now.
rp
Good to hear you are a free man, Rex.
PCs suck. I cannot figure out how to do a screen grab of the finished grid ... off to find help. Then blog.
rp
Agreed, PCs do suck. But I do know that Alt-PrtScr will put an image of the entire window on the clipboard, from which you could paste it into a graphics application and crop the edges. I'm sure there's a better way than that, but I don't know it.
not sure why i'm bothering now, two days later, but i thought i'd check in here. (i'm on vacation.) did this puzzle on paper during my flight and found it deee-lightful. the grid itself is amazing, and many of the clues were spot-on, too. then i came here and found everybody complaining about things that seem perfectly okay to me.
[Turkey's dewlap] is a perfect clue. the WATTLE (not waddle, by the way) in the turkey's version of what in bovines is called the dewlap. how could anybody object to that? look at these clues that we've all seen for PAW. it's the same thing.
MORTALLY offended is a common turn of phrase. obviously it's an exaggeration, as nobody indeed has ever died from it, but that's a colorful expression and a wonderful clue.
UPROSE and SOBERNESS--people are complaining about these because there is another way to say the same thing? i don't get it. both answers are perfectly good words. (the one i'm not sure of, and nobody else seems to mind, is ENROBE. i'm not sure that's equivalent to [Attire].)
finally, HASHEESH. i don't know what the rule is with [Var.]. maybe there isn't one. if there is an alternate spelling which is sufficiently common, then neither one really needs a [Var.]. (think INURE/ENURE, or EMIR/EMEER/AMEER, or RAJA/RAJAH.) that said, i'm not sure whether HASHEESH qualifies. as for the clue, well, it's a little hard to say with certainty what a slang term like [Weed] does not refer to. certainly it does refer to marijuana; i'm not really sure about the extension of it to include related products like hash. i won't pretend to be an expert in the culture of such things, so i'm generally inclined to give the benefit of the doubt.
My favorite puzzle in some time.
Enjoyed you summation Puzzlegirl.
Tough for me in the NW corner until I got timepieces.
Favorites were elbowroom and trimwaist.
My favorite puzzle in some time.
Enjoyed you summation Puzzlegirl.
Tough for me in the NW corner until I got timepieces.
Favorites were elbowroom and trimwaist.
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