.png)
Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium
THEME: EYE (37D: Word that can follow each half of 20- and 60-Across and 11- and 36-Down)
Word of the Day: GIGOLO - n., pl. -los.
- A man who has a continuing sexual relationship with and receives financial support from a woman.
- A man who is hired as an escort or a dancing partner for a woman.
Despite an over-reliance on partials and abbreviations (way too many to mention), and an over-fondness for olde schoole crosswordese - OONA (15A: The last Mrs. Chaplin) and ELIA (37A: Director Kazan) rarely come out and dance together any more, and even RIATA (62A: Gaucho's rope) and ALOU (64A: Baseball's Moises) DODDER a little (45A: Walk unsteadily) - this seemed a solid puzzle. Right over the plate for a Tuesday. The theme holds up pretty well, with a couple of exceptions: SEEING EYE holds up only in front of "dog," and a GLASS WALL barely holds up at all. I mean, surely there are GLASS WALLs in the world, but as a theme answer goes ... well, it doesn't hold up nearly as well as the other three.Theme answers:
- 20A: Attack helicopter (black/hawk)
- 60A: In the altogether (buck/naked) - my wife had a hilarious error here, which she refuses to let me discuss in public
- 11D: Really steamed (seeing/red)
- 36D: See-through partition (glass/wall)
Big name day today, with three splashy Downs: PLACIDO (4D: Tenor Domingo), KEILLOR (21D: Radio host Garrison), and JACOBI (49D: Derek of "I, Claudius"), the last of which is the most obscure of the three and most likely to have given someone somewhere trouble, especially as it abuts KURT Warner, who is well known if you follow football today, but we know that's not true of a good chunk of you (61D: Quarterback Warner). What *I* don't follow are composers, especially those who compose for stage or screen, and so ARLEN was rough for me in the SW (66A: "Over the Rainbow" composer Harold). I stared at a blank where that "R" was supposed to be for what felt like a long time (maybe a few seconds), even though the IRA cross, in retrospect, seems quite obvious (63D: Portfolio part, for short). Also skidded a little at BANKABLE (8D: Sure to bring in money), where I started to write BANK ON IT then stopped and just waited for crosses. Biggest mistake was seeing -ER-- at 23A: Raptor's roost (aerie) and immediately writing in PERCH. This made the 1D: Tourist mecca off Venezuela (Aruba) rather difficult to see - don't know of any "mecca" that goes AR--P.Bullets:
- 1A: Org. for boomers, now (AARP) - total gimme, but this word "boomers" interests me now, since it was used to clue SSTS the other day. Flexible.
- 26A: Snack machine inserts (ones) - if you are lucky. Mine refuse to be inserted a lot of the time.
52A: Cornell or Pound (Ezra) - just reading about Pound last night, in passing. Frederic Wertham, the anti-comic book psychiatrist who wrote "Seduction of the Innocent" (which led to Congressional hearings on comic books in the 50s), apparently did not believe that Pound should have been able to plead insanity and thereby avoid treason charges following Pound's collusion with the Italians during WWII.- 68A: Sons of _____ (group promoting Irish heritage) (Erin) - interesting roundabout cluing approach to another bit of olde timey crosswordese. Makes ERIN more interesting, actually, though I think I still prefer ERIN Moran.
- 71A: Root beer brand (Dad's) - a gimme. Love root beer, but I drink Boylan - got a frosty four-pack just waiting for me to get home from work tonight.
- 13D: Classic game console letters (NES) - hey, this anagrams to ENS. (47A: U.S.N.A. grad) and SEN., i.e., John McCain. The only SEN. in this puzzle, though (I think), is ARLEN Specter.
- 30D: Colonel Sanders facial feature (goatee) - economy is in a downward spiral, and yet brand new, deluxe temples of chicken with this guy's mug all over them seem to be sprouting up all over my town.
- 59D: Girl with the dog Spot (Jane) - of Dick & Jane. Sahra went through a brief but important period of D&J reading early on, thanks to a gift from my grandmother. She has since given them up for Betty & Veronica (among others).
- 62D: Luftwaffe foe: Abbr. (RAF) - I'm sure the Luftwaffe were terrifying, but their name now sounds like a fabric softener.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
BOring! I had zero trouble, and zero fun, with this one.
ReplyDeleteMaybe we have to have a down week after a good one.
Or maybe tomorrow will be better...
Hi "Rex,"
ReplyDeleteI'm relatively new to this site but noticed at the tournament that your name really isn't Rex Parker...what's the story behind changing it?
I liked the puzzle and agree with General Parker that it was "right over the plate for a Tuesday".
ReplyDeleteThe answer of the day was, of course, 61-Down ... KURT. But Mr. Takaro missed a great opportunity to clue it with "Occassional contributor to the world-famous Rex Parker blog". Oh well. Maybe next time.
@Rex: I did exactly the same thing with BANKONIT. Wrote in BANK and waited to get ABLE.
ReplyDeleteI liked this Tuesday with interesting words like WHIZBANG, BUCKNAKED (very funny, Sandy!), GIGOLO, PLACIDO, JACOBI and JOVE.
Thank you, Rex, for "Over The Rainbow" by Israel Kamakawiwo'ole. It is so beautiful. I hope it will be in my head all day.
Ah, how many had METRO for London line and not QUEUE? After living in Commonwealth countries my whole life this word is just a regular one to me, so took a while to get. Honeymooned in ARUBA, very nice place and my wife still wears the T-shirt from 1989.
ReplyDeleteI'm the son of a boomer so David Lee Roth's version of Gigolo has been running in my head.
Anyone notice that crosswords have adjusted for inflation? It used to be coins inserted in snack machine slots and now its ones.
ReplyDeleteA fairly easy puzzle but several names I didnt know but got them from acrosses. Could someone explain NES and Jove for zeus
ReplyDelete@anonymous 8:51 Most of here in Rexland don't use our real names. We have blog names. But there is no harm in using your name.
NES = Nintendo Entertainment System
ReplyDeleteJove = Roman equivalent of Zeus (like Juno = Hera, Ares = Mars, etc.)
Oops, make that Mars = Ares
ReplyDelete@chefbea -NES is a name part if a home video gaming system.
ReplyDelete-Jove is the counterpart of zeus. I remember him because my cool cousin started saying By Jove! when I was a kid.
Typical Tuesday - not a workout, but nice enough.
EYE liked this one!
ReplyDeleteWALL-EYE is new to me. So is LAWYER-EYE.
That version of "Over the Rainbow" is the first song in my IPod. Defines "hauntingly beautiful".
My sister is now old enough to join AARP but I don't dare tell her (See SEEING RED).
So since it's a fairly straight forward puzzle, I thought I'd pose a question to the group: do you ever go through spells where Friday and Saturday are just impossible? Seems like the last 2 or 3 weeks I've just bombed. Normally I at least finish, albeit with a google or two. Anyone else have this happen? I'm hoping this weekend breaks the pattern. Just curious.
ReplyDelete@hereinfranklin...I feel your pain. Fridays and Saturdays are either/ors for me. About half the time I'll think I have a chance and bull through; other days...too many clues that I just can't relate to.
ReplyDeleteMust have been very inside-crosswordeesey as I got it all after filling in only about half and then figuring out the rest from crosses.
ReplyDelete"Advancing newbie" says "moderate + for a Tuesday" which are often easiest of the week for me. Go figure. I thought some themed answers were really really awkward with EYE.
@hereinfranklin ... some of us hit that wall at earlier points in the week currently Thursdays for me, I hope to advance to that next level.
I agree--solid Tuesday fare.
ReplyDeleteLoved the shout-out to Jacobi, whom I've seen twice on Broadway, as Benedick in Much Ado and Alan Turing in Enigma. He carried the show both times (well, there weren't many others in Enigma to begin with, but still, he was terrific).
Read on only if you want to learn German through this blog (as SethG is learning French). If gut means "good" and Abend "evening", why isn't "good evening" gut Abend in German? The answer: An unflexed adjective appears only as part of a predicate as in das Essen ist gut ("the meal is good"). If an adjective modifies a noun, it receives an ending that depends on many things, among them the case of the noun. Guten Abend is the direct object (accusative) case and is short for Ich wünsche dir/ihnen einen guten Abend ("I wish you a good evening"). Same thing with Morgen.
A bumpy Tuesday for me. I went through the London line as "QUITE" and then "QUE UP" before QUEUE...Duh. Don't know NES. I had trouble with the JOVE/JACOBI crossing. Another duh to me. Wanted ALLAN and ILA for the ARLEN/IRA.
ReplyDeleteI did like the answer SOBER for Unloaded, and ARSON for going up. Actually, I did contemplate ARGON for going up, as in a gas.
So, kind of fun, but too choppy with the short words and matches with EYE.
Just OK, did not make me rhapsodic.
ReplyDeleteI wanted the clue for 60A to be George Costanza's fantasy porn star name.
Will-o-the-wisp is a great word.
Vending machines can be picky about accepting your ones but I have never found a slot machine that had any trouble at all.
From talking to all my friends, the AARP is most certainly NOT an organization for boomers. They have no interest in their agenda whatsoever. YMMV
ReplyDeleteLike plantie bea, I also had QUEUP 'cause I was never a video gamer. I'm so old that my college days were filled with pinball machines...some with the pop-up scores, not the LED scores.
ReplyDeleteAnd like joho, thank you for the Iz "Over the Rainbow." It's been my favorite version since first hearing it when I saw "50 First Dates." Now I know about the singer. Very sad.
So I would have called this puzzle easy-medium if I'd been a gamer and gotten NES.
I jumped on the chance to get my AARP card when I turned 50. Give me my discounts!!!
ReplyDeleteAs is sometimes the case, the puzzle today was OK. Rex's writeup was better. It took me longer to decipher the pic of the lady with the fish. Since I couldn't recognize a Walleye if I looked one right in...(never mind), I thought at first maybe that was Oona, but somehow that's not how I envisioned her.
ReplyDeleteAgree with Rex on glass wall: Glass ceiling? OK. Glass wall? Not so much. And like many, I never do laundry without first tossing in one of those Luftwaffe sheets.
Speaking of Oona and Jacobi, Elia, Ezra, any/of the Alou brothers, Arlen, and the ever-popular Peer Gynt's mother Aase, I think there should be crosswordese for the names of people who remain famous only because of crossword puzzles? Rex, you rightfully cry "natick"...why not cry "oona" once in awhile? And puzzles that use too many can be Uber-Oonas or something like that.
Solid Tuesday, where I think the only answer I didn't know was "Dad's". Returning to the cold today, and happily so. This evening I will listen to Israel.
ReplyDeleteFor [Do a cashier's job] I had ring instead of SCAN. Man, I'm getting old.
ReplyDeleteHAWKEYE!
Did anyone notice that there is a mention of Jacobi in the NYTs on the same page as the puzzle. That's how I solved that clue!
ReplyDelete@37A: "director Kazan" and 55 D,"director Kurosawa"...shouldnt there be a limit as to how many directors are clued in one puzzle???...seems to violate some sort of unwritten rule....if the had clued two football players, people would be screaming...
ReplyDeletethought puzzle was at least an intermediate for a tuesday.
@crosscan - I think LAWYER EYE is a synonym of EVIL EYE.
ReplyDeleteYes, another solid Tuesday. And another NYT debut! Congrats Mr. Takaro!
ReplyDeleteI had O_E_ in 26 Across and the clue had "snack" in it. OREO! They're inserted by the guy who fills the machine, right? It got fixed fairly quickly.
I hear that version of "Rainbow" all the time now. Who would have ever thought that the Judy Garland version might be usurped by another? I really like this new take on the song.
During my teens years I worked at this tiny food stand in the park next to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. We were famous for our shredded chicken sandwiches and our root beer, which was the old-fashioned, non-carbonated kind. We had to mix the "secret ingredients" and water together. That was good stuff. The base syrup by itself had the effect of crack cocaine. (I may exaggerate.) That kind of root beer is hard to find these days. In cans, I prefer Barq's.
@rosetattoo: true story:I saw the mention of Derek Jacobi winning an award for "Twelfth Night"on the crossword puzzle page.(My wife and I had recently seen a production of "Twelfth Night" in Manhattan.) I saved the article and underlined the part where they mention Jacobi, to show my wife later. When i got to 49D, i said to myself that i know nothing of "I,Claudius" and went looking for other clues. I think the phrase is "Brain Dead".
ReplyDeleteJacobi also played the lead, Brother Cadfael, in at least one of Ellis Peters' medieval mysteries for the BBC... Cadfael is a great character, Welsh-born herbalist and ex-Crusader who brings his worldly experience to bear on problems affecting the monastery, including the continuous wars in the 12th century over the succession to the throne.
ReplyDeleteVery good puzzle -- no complaints!
∑;)
An OK Tuesday. Nothing great, agree with the "no complaints" group.
ReplyDeleteThis was all right. A rather cute theme. A Walleye is a pike or a horse and where did lawyer-eye come from? At least one didn't have to know the cameo actor from the 1961 cult classic "Godzilla III versus Rocky IV in over-time."
ReplyDeleteUlrich, you are my hero. That takes nerve, man!
To those struggling with Fri. and Sat., I can always get them but Google saves the day fairly often.
BTW- Jupiter and Jove are one and the same, Roman counterparts to Zeus...
ReplyDeleteI too am mystified by Laywer Eye, especially since 40A is lawyerS and 37D doesn't refrence 40A.
ReplyDeleteGuess you guys are pulling a (lame) lawyer joke on a slow day ;-)
.../Glitch
When did people start taking me seriously?
ReplyDeleteCross-EYE-can
Well. I have a complaint - about that bottom left corner.
ReplyDeleteI don't know what a gaucho is, or this rope he uses called a riata, and I've never heard of Estes park.
Apart from writing ALLEN instead of ARLEN (random guess), I got all the other letters right, but still was completely stuck at the I and T of RIATA.
Learning that it's crosswordese makes me understand why it would be considered a fair word for a Tuesday - but I suppose I haven't been doing these crosswords long enough.
So, not really a complaint in the end - but a grumble about reliance on crosswordese.
For me, the #1 version of "Over the Rainbow" is by Eva Cassidy.
ReplyDeleteI don't know how to post a link to it. Maybe someone else can?
Eva Cassidy does "Rainbow"
ReplyDeleteMy only hiccup was bucknaked which I had as barenaked, probably because of the band. Warning to those under 50: AARP is relentless. You get solicited when you hit that birthday, and they never stop. I think they're only good for supplemental health insurance. Though the membership fee is chump change even if you're poor, it's not even worth it.
ReplyDeleteAgree a solid, if not very challenging Tuesday. No real uglies.
ReplyDeleteGigolo crossing with Keillor? Just asking...
Never even noticed Kurosawa was in the puzzle--the name fell in through crosses and I guess I never even read the clue. But I think 2 film directors is fine, especially since ELIA is such a common bit of crosswordese that it doesn't take much time to suss him out.
ReplyDelete@ Adrian, OK I'll bite.
ReplyDeleteGaucho is Spanish for cowboy (close enough anyway) and his rope is la riata. American cowboys turned that phrase into lariat. Both words turn up fairly frequently.
I can't help you with Estes Park but I doubt many people were stumped.
If you solve enough puzzles these will become gimmees.
@hereinfranklin: I think we all find puzzles that just don't break open easily. I've found the only way to get through them is to just perservere. You can't give up. NEVER SAY DIE. If you just put the puzzle down and come back to it, it's amazing how much more you'll "suddenly" see. I won't Google anymore because it takes all the satisfaction out of it for me. But that couldn't hurt if you need it to get it done!
ReplyDelete@Crosscan
ReplyDeleteI don't take you seriously, and out of respect, I ask the same of you.
@Doug
Re: AARP --- you know not of what you blog. I'm several hundred $ ahead (over my chump change membership), and haven't bought ANY of their insurance --- yet.
.../Glitch
Touche, Glitch.
ReplyDeleteSince the word of the day is gigolo, I can tell you this. Today I read that Helg Scarbi, dubbed the Swiss gigolo, yesterday received six years in jail for fraud. One victim was a BMW heiress who said he was charming, attentive, and a little sad; she said this stirred something in her and eventually gave him eight million dollars. Good grief.
ReplyDeleteAnd the puzzle was a solid Tuesday, which I enjoyed doing.
@hereinfranklin - I did my first Fri/Sat in early January and I am getting better overall. Some weeks are better than others. So just stick with it and have a good time while you are learning. That is essentially the advice I have seen here many times. Good luck.
If crossword constructors ruled the universe, OONA Chaplin would have married Mel Ott and given birth to the entire ALOU family.
ReplyDeleteOona Ott....I like the sound of that.
Oona Ott! LOL LOL LOL
ReplyDeletealso @ Adrian -
ReplyDeleteWe ALL have some things we don't know and can't guess. Sometimes they cross and there we are. Two Ponies is right. With experience you'll find that there will be fewer and fewer for you. That said, the ones that troubled you are pretty common, and I would say they are not only crosswordese (though, OK, substantially they are).
Rex pointed out OONA and ALOU, which are on my top ten list of names that will at some point be remembered almost exclusively in crosswords.
So hang in there.
Nitpick alert: Blackhawks are not attack helicopters. They are utility helicopters used for the transportation of troops and materiel. Apaches and Cobras are attack helicopters.
ReplyDelete@Glitch - Re yesterday, thank you. I'm hanging on to delighted with my fingertips.
ReplyDeleteanonymous 2:49
ReplyDeleteThat is not a nitpick! that is quite valid to know!
Liked this puzzle in it's construction, lots of the clues seemed fresh...even tho the GLASSWALL was tenuous, I shouldn't throw stones!
@crosscan
I take you seriously in an unserious way, seriously
@any-nun-muss 2:49 / fellow nitpicker: I started to try Apache something or other :-)
ReplyDeleteAlso my O on AARP - stick with AAA for travel discounts.
I remember Arlen because he was known as "Hap." Not that I knew him.
ReplyDelete- Tom in Pittsburgh
@Two Ponies & retired_chemist
ReplyDeleteThanks for the info/encouragement/advice. I know you're both right. I was just mortified at not being able to finish a Tuesday puzzle and had to vent somewhere.
But, even though I am learning the crosswordese as I do more of these puzzles, they still feel very unsatisfying to me. I'd much rather work out a common word from a clever clue than remember a bizarre word from another crossword I did. Although actually, I knew OONO (not personally!) anyway.
(1) AARP news for those who haven't caught up yet: the letters AARP do not stand for any words. They used to, as did FFA and SAT and KFC. But officially, now, those sets of letters are the companies' names.
ReplyDelete(2) How stupid does one have to be to give a gigolo 8 million dollars! If I were a woman who hired a gigolo, you can be darn sure he wouldn't get more than $800,000 from me.
Crosswordese to new solvers is no different than football players and film directors are to experienced solvers with a pop culture animus. Both groups who intend to become proficient at crossword puzzles must learn these things or forever gripe.
ReplyDeleteI'm like Rex as I had little knowledge of film and stage composers but I made it my business to start looking them up when I was stumped.
When I started doing puzzles there was no Google around so I had to resort to dictionaries, encyclopedias and magazines but, like joho said, I never gave up.
So I learned something while getting good at crosswords. I guess it all depends on how much you want something.
The first time I ever heard Israel K.'s version of "Somewhere over the Rainbow" it was 2 in the morning and it was behind the closing images of a TV program called "Cold Cases" and I was so overwhelmed that I started to cry.
ReplyDeleteNot something that a 60 year old man likes to admit but there you are. And to think I had heard that song all my life!
@edith b
ReplyDeleteI suppose my comment must have offended you in some way for you to react like this.
I'm not about to give up, and I continue to learn crosswordese, so I suppose I must want it enough.
I just wanted to express an opinion.
When Two Ponies started with 'OK I'll bite', I suppose I should have known that I had become (honestly unwittingly!) controversial.
Anyway - this is my 3rd post, and I at least know enough of the local etiquette to shut up now.
@Adrian ... I don't think you offended anybody!
ReplyDelete@Bill from NJ ... if ever there was a song that can evoke that kind of emotion, this is the one. Sweet of you to share.
no no no, Adrian. I'm sorry if I gave the impression I was offended because I wasn't. Your post took me back to when I was a girl who had to learn everything and, unlike today, there was no place for someone like me to go to find answers to my questions.
ReplyDeleteIt is true there is a learning curve we all go through to gain proficiency at crossword puzzles and sometimes it seems so unfair.
I remember the first time I was exposed to a rebus puzzle. No one told me you could put more than one letter in a square!
I guess my point is you have to learn by doing and we are all in the same boat.
I'm sorry if I gave offense because that was the farthest thing from my mind.
To avoid compromising my personal "blethics":
ReplyDeleteI won't further the AARP AAA thread other than say I use both.
I will bow out for today as this is #3.
.../Glitch
My fourth post - Sorry!
ReplyDeleteI didn't want to leave anyone thinking I was sulking at home - and I wasn't offended, just... surprised.
My first rebus (didn't know the term at that point) was a Sunday puzzle last year which needed a picture of a spider in one square!
I don't think crosswordese is unfair, per se. It just requires a different puzzle solving process that I don't like (as much).
So, no offense taken or given. Is there an offensive blog we can be directed to?
Estes Park Colorado is beautiful; my aunt and uncle would vacation there every summer, so that is always a gimme for moi.
ReplyDeleteWalleye Pike broiled with butter is a midwest Friday night fish fry favorite, very tasty.
Had no trouble with the puzzle except for the bare naked goof, but that was easily fixed.
Favorite of the day WHIZBANG!
@Adrian, I said "I'll bite" because no one had yet answered you. Sometimes a comment is ignored (as mine often are) and other days an innocent query is pounced upon. Usually a kind and thoughtful reply prevails esp. if someone is a tyro (more crosswordese). I simply meant I would be the first to respond. Happy solving!
ReplyDeleteI am loathe to gesture it, but, meh. This one just didn't do it for me.
ReplyDelete@ Ulrich: In Ihrem Beispiel, warum ist Essen aktiviert?
@ plantiebea: You can have me anytime.
@ Ken: Thanks for explaining both the picture and what a walleye is.
As a kid, I was into ESTES model rockets. They had some address out in Colorado, so when I learned of ESTES Park, Colorado (from crosswords) decades after the hobby, I just assumed the rockets were named after the place, and took it as a pleasant reminder of my youth.
ReplyDeleteHa, I just looked it up. The company is named after its founder, Vern ESTES. I never knew.
In today's NYT (A20) is an article about the last cash register repair place, for those who think cashiers ring up purchases and not SCAN.
And coming soon to a NYT crossword near you, the now late Jimmy "I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus" Boyd.
@chefwen - Thanks for reminding me of the appearance of WHIZBANG. It brought to mind The Music Man, and a little Google research yields this wonderful, serious item about Captain Billy's Whiz Bang. (The article is longish and quite serious and very politically correct, although it references material which is not. There is even an oblique reference to crossword puzzles.)
ReplyDelete@ Bob K - thanks for the Captain Billy's Whiz Bang reference. Very interesting. I think it was GeorgeNYC who said yesterday that he liked the learning experience in the late-day blog, when we get off on tangents. Me too.
ReplyDelete@ Bob K.
ReplyDeleteThat was difinitely worth the read, smiled through the whole article. Thanks!
@Tom in Pittsburgh
ReplyDeleteHarold Arlen shared the Oscar with E.Y. "Yip" Harburg for "Over the Rainbow."
He was not known as "Hap" as far as I can tell.
@SEEINGEYE
ReplyDelete(actually if it's used with dog only, shouldn't it be seeing eyeD?)
synchronistically (sp?) someone just sent me this joke:
Actually, it's too long, so I'll just submit the punchline about two women trying to get into a bar with their dogs...
..."Once again the bouncer said, Sorry, lady, no pets allowed.'
The woman said, You don't understand. This is my guide dog.
The bouncer said, A Chihuahua?'
The woman said, "A Chihuahua?
They gave me a frickin' Chihuahua?"
difinetly, HUH? No wonder I have such a hard time with some puzzles, learn how to spell, lady. Let's try definitely, DOH!
ReplyDeletePretty cool theme; OK puzzle.
ReplyDeleteJust relaxing in the sunshine on a bench with the puzzle before doing some grocery shopping. After the the SCAN and doing the BAG, the check-out guy asks, "Weren't you just outside doing a crossword puzzle. You seemed to be doing it really fast." Well, it's only Tuesday. "Tuesday?" Yeah they get harder during the week. Today shouldn't take more than ten minutes. "Well I don't see anyone else doing it like that. Must be a lot of knowledge stored up there." Aw, shucks, maybe, but I like the way it makes me give every word four or five different meanings. "Keeps your mind sharp, but does it help clarify your thoughts?" To which I didn't rightfully know the answer.
So maybe another cashier's job is to remind us that this crossword practice has some particular relevance to everyday life, stretches it to some degree, for which benefit we don't very well understand.
@ acme: You're right. It was too long. :~)
ReplyDeleteCan anyone direct me to a link to the onion puzzle. I'd like to try it tomorrow. Thanx
ReplyDelete@Kristin O'b: Over on Rex's sidebar there's a link to Ephraim's Crossword Puzzle Links. Knock yourself out!
ReplyDeleteI'm posting with my back to the tv that has the Nederland-Dominican Republic game on. Can you believe it??
ReplyDeleteGot back to the cold safely and made my typical back-from-a-trip dinner: Pasta Putanesca. Always have all the ingredients on hand, and it is delicious....
@ArtLvr: did you ever watch the old English series : "Catweasel"? It was wonderful. Our son has a friend who looks just like him.
@Chip Hilton: that was a really funny comment!
@Adrian: I think you are getting the humor going around here. You will do well.
@ mac - humor? Aren't we ALWAYS decorous, sober-sided, and drab? :-)
ReplyDeleteNaaah, didn't really think so....
@Allan: I'm just getting back online. essen is a verb, meaning "to eat", as well as a noun, if it's capitalized, meaning "meal" or, more generally, "fare".
ReplyDelete@retired_chemist: Funny to see your smiley mouth sitting there like a lost parenthesis.... (read yesterday's posts).
ReplyDeleteI don't think my country (the Netherlands) realizes what just happened. They beat the Dominican Republic twice! I think some of those Dutch guys will be moving to the USA in the near future.
Rex, By any chance, was your wife's mistake about BUCK NAKED related to the Ice-T song known as L.G.B.N.A.F.?
ReplyDeleteIn other hip-hop-related news, for a minute I had the frisson of thinking WHIZBANG was going to be SHIZZNET. But no, turns out we're back in the 1950s.
@ mac - how could I forget a lost parenthesis? ☺ Is that better?
ReplyDeleteWasnt Jacobi one of Clifton Webb's rivals in LAURA?
ReplyDeleteWhy dont they let blind people skydive? It scares the s*** out of the seeing eye dogs!
ReplyDelete@PuzzleGirl: Thank you.
ReplyDeleteSEEING EYE also holds up in front of "single," in the baseball sense of "a soft ground ball that finds its way between infielders for a base hit."
ReplyDelete@ Ulrich: danke
ReplyDelete@ AJS: Good point.
So long, folks. You're off on another plane.
ReplyDeleteI kind of enjoyed this puzzle, and did it at a leisurely pace with multiple interruptions.
ReplyDeletewith absinthe.
Adrian- Brother, I am with you. I would want any puzzle, no matter how difficult, to be assailable by a person unversed in crosswords.
I like the way AARP sounds.
AQUA x QUEUE is neat.
DIGS, GOATEE, and GIGOLO deserve each-other's company. I can dig it.
LAWYERS at the tail end of BANKABLE entering GASOVENS? don't know what to make of that.
I like JOVE, and EZRA BUCKNAKED
RUSSO by AQUA and SEEINGRED
USDA SCAN; BLACKHAWK AERIE..
Just liked the words, man... thought it was a cool puzzle.
GOSH LOCALS INAWE!
ReplyDeleteGOATEEd LAWYERS
OnTHE DODDER!
TEPID EDENS?
Ms. Liquid in LA,
ReplyDeleteSame wave length. Thanks to you I took not a little downer about an hour ago.
City of Night
Actually Rex, there's one more SEN. in the puzzle: Sen. John ENSIGN (R-Nevada)
ReplyDeleteHow adorable -- his name's abbreviation anagrams to his job's abbreviation. And vice versa, duh.
Yeah, Rex old buddy. What's the deal with your pseudonym, alias, a.k.a., non de plume, nom de guerre?
ReplyDeleteYour real name is so sharp. Sincerely.
Hey, Syndicated People: Sorry I haven't updated the syndicated link the last few days. I always forget to do that when Rex is away! I'm on it now though!
ReplyDelete5wl....
ReplyDeletenp, pg, thx
- - Robert