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Former Disney head Michael / MON 12-17-12 / Pakistani tongue / James Bond film involving Fabergé egg / Wedge fractions in Trivial Pursuit / Cleveland b-ball team /
Monday, December 17, 2012
Constructor: Elizabeth A. Long
Relative difficulty: Medium
THEME: Feline follies — feline names in non-feline answers
- KITTYHAWK (17A: Wright flight site)
- TIGERLILY (11D: Perennial whose flowers are typically orange with black dots)
- CAT SCAN (40A: Hospital diagnostic)
- "OCTOPUSSY" (64A: James Bond film involving Fabergé egg)
- DANDELION (35D: Source of some fluff)
Word of the Day: MUKLUK (8D: Eskimo boot) —
n.
- A soft boot made of reindeer skin or sealskin and worn by Eskimos.
- A slipper with a soft sole resembling this boot.
[Yupik maklak, bearded seal.]
Read more: http://www.answers.com/topic/mukluk#ixzz2FGOY8JXf
• • •
As far as the overall quality of the grid is concerned, I'd give this a thumbs-up. I mean, MUKLUK, come on. That's great stuff. Really up your typical easy-Monday puzzle. Even the gross words like EXTRUDE and GRISTLE add some welcome color and interest, and I wouldn't mind if every puzzle had "OCTOPUSSY" in it. RECUE made me double-over and dry-heave a bit (52D: Feed the same line), but everything else was solid-to-good. As for the theme, I don't think it works very well. Far, far too loose. You've got two big cats and then ... three generic names for a house cat. The group coheres only at a very broad taxomonic level. Isn't "COUGAR TOWN" still on the air? We really need some more big cats up in here.
Spent the afternoon watching "Full Metal Jacket" and the making-of documentary that accompanies it on the Blu-Ray version. You'd think I'd be too raw from all the child-killing, but somehow I needed to turn *into* the horror, and I needed to do it through art. It's a truly beautiful movie. Unbearably grisly and horrifying in many parts, it's true, but the human cost of war, for both the dead and the living, has rarely been better illustrated.
[Here be profanity]
As for the rest of this puzzle, my two little hiccups in this puzzle both came at the beginning and both involved geography. Took one look at 1A: There is Nothin' Like a ___" ("South Pacific" song) ("DAME") and thought answer was probably GIRL (no musical lover, I), so then tried to confirm it at 1D: Senegal's capital (DAKAR) and realized I couldn't remember what Senegal's capital was. The "G" in GIRL made me think GABON, but of course that's a country, not a capital. Of course this confusion was fixed quickly, but it still felt frustrating. I also had no idea what to do with 6D: It's bordered by three countries with "-stan" in their names (IRAN). If I'd really thought about it, I would've seen that the answer had four letters and there are really only so many four-letter country name options in that part of the world: IRAN, IRAQ ... I'm gonna say that's it. Well, there's OMAN, but that's on the Arabian peninsula. But I was going at Monday speed and so ended up having to build IRAN via crosses. Everything else was highly gettable. I had to read the Trivial Pursuit clue a couple times to figure out what was being asked, but in the end, my time was quite normal for a Monday.Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
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71 comments:
OOOOH, I really liked this puzzle and by golly, there is truly nothin like a DAME. Throw in the FAT/CAT SCAN(ning) the BEDROOM with a MONGOL from DAKAR wearing MUKLUKS from IRAN who speaks URDO and what do you get? An OCTOPUSSY!
COUGAR would have been a nice addition. Every young man (or girl) should be mauled by at least one.
I don't generally buy into the 'too loose' argument, and won't sign on this time either. Sure, it was a little thin, but the rest of the grid was the better for it. I'll take that trade.
I liked that the long Downs both happened to be flowers. And it's a shame that the HAWK swooped down on that poor KITTY.
The Contrived Roman Numeral could have been easily removed. WTF?
Lots of choices, but I would trade Contrived Roman Numeral for cross-referenced CHI / NHL. Yeah, the abbreviations kinda suck too, but a nice bone for people that remember when hockey was a sport people played.
You can leave PSN just as it would be, or switch to: GSN, MSN, SSN, USN . . .
For that matter, DEAF / FAT could be reworked with no problem also. This may be the laziest Contrived Roman Numeral ever.
This puzzle has great TEXTURE. Solid theme with lots of intelligent, interesting fill.
I think the CLI at 41D is the optimum fill in that spot. With it in place, there are no abbreviations in the surrounding area. It's a Mon. puzzle, and this lets newbies know that if you're going to get into crossword puzzle solving, you better know your Roman numerals. And who doesn't know C for 100, L for 50 and I for 1?
Was an opportunity missed at 40A CAT SCAN to clue it so that it ties in with the other four theme entries? It also parses CATS CAN, and KITTY, PUSSY, TIGER and LION are all CATS.
Very easy Mon. Almost completed it with just the across answers. My only hiccup was where to put the I in KEILLOR.
Odd theme. Tame CATS across, wild cats down??
Pretty smooth grid RRN and RECUE notwithstanding, so just fine for a Mon.
Enough about the Roman numeral it was just fine in a fabulous puzzle!!!!
Light bouncy, five theme entries...
It's less loose if you think of CATSCAN as the reveal smack in the middle...
This is a SCAN of CATS from a little KITTY to a PUSSYcat to a LION to a TIGER.
Yes COUGAR would have been fun, but COUGARTOWN is 10 and you have four fabulous bouncy 9s:
KITTYHAWK
TIGERLILY
DANDELION
OCTOPUSSY
all 9s, two in front, two in back...
then a 7 reveal across the center. LOVE IT. VERY well constructed and the type of puzzle I dream of making...
Light, bouncy, fun, fun words, lots of Js and Ks
( Thank you, Elizabeth, Long... now the next time Will tells me I can't have tough nonMonday words like EISNER, MUKLUK, EXTRUDE, CAVS, KEILLOR, DAKAR I'm gonna whip this perfect little puzzle out so fast his head will spin and my whining will for the first time be heeded!)
4Ks 2 Xs gave it just the crunch it needed and I love TAGALONG right down there as my cat BlackJack loves to do as I go from room to room!
Obi and Gracie (see avatar) wanted me to say "FIve cats. What's not to like. Great puzzle."
@Clark - How did Roxie like the puzzle?
I'm the original Cat Lady (after my Mom) and I loved it.
Thanks Elizabeth A. Long. More please.
Ps just read this is the anniversary of Kittyhawk! dec 17, 1903 (coincidence? Should have waited another year?)
Very easy puzzle even for a Monday. Almost too easy. Did it by doing only acrosses aka @jae. Liked the theme.
Favorite answer was DANDELION for Source of some fluff.
Gotta like a cat-themed puzzle.
Can't wrap my head around the tragedy here in CT...
Took a little longer than the average Monday for me, lots of fun, different words like MUKLUK, MELODY, GRISTLE (ew), JAMB, and the pair of green gems, JADE and EMERALD.
I will admit that although I did see the feline theme (post solve), I only saw it as the horizontals, completely missing that the two flowers (which I did notice paired up nicely as flora) were also part of the CAT theme, until Rex showed it. Nice!
@Rex - just referenced Full Metal Jacket this weekend, as my husband and friend were trying to remember the movie source of the line "What's your major malfunction?!"
Need to send my kids to school today, normally an easy routine, but today it feels rough.
I liked this puzzle just fine, but when CATSCAN fell right in the center, I *really* liked it!
Liked the multicultural north with DIEM, IRAN, URDU, MUKLUK (I love mine), and NILE.
Fun pairs – JADE & EMERALD, GRISTLE & FAT, REEL & CELS, CORNELL & YALE, PEST & TAG-ALONG, MELODY & GLEE, and OKS crossing YEAS.
Got a kick out of the redundant OVER REDO next to each other.
Thanks, Ms. Long. Good fun!
Hoped for a feline theme with KITTYHAWK.
My FAT CATS earn their keep by eliminating the occasional PEST that wanders in.
Would have been fun to have an OWL in there, with which they could to go TOSEA.
Fun puzzle - thanks!
Thanks for those pairs, Loren...
And meant to say, I was surprised to learn that MUKLUK is a real word, not made up by some adman.
YEA! I thought it was very EASY. I didn't even look at the theme until it was finished. Many of the answers were standard 'crosswordese' and other fill-ins were not obscure
Allergic to cats but loved the puzzle! After KITTYHAWK, I was expecting horizontal theme answers featuring two animals, so at first I missed how TIGER LILY fit in and thought that the source of fluff would be Dryer LInt!
Would the FAT / CAT cross kinda count as a theme answer?
As others have noted, the puzzle has many delights. I especially liked the GLEE club's MELODY and the combination of GRISTLE + TEXTURE - for the idea and the texture of the words themselves.
@Loren - I also loved the Latin DIEM over URDU, both crossing the Eskimo MUKLUK. Then with IRAN crossing the NILE and KITTYHAWK, we've got a lot of geography going on. Thanks for all of those other pairs!
@JohnV - I appreciated your post last night.
Rex's site is loading strangely on my iPad today...is it me? Anyhoo, I didn't even see the kitties until I came here. DUH! And for sure I will spend the rest of the day humming "There is nothing like a GIRL...nothing in the world...."!!!
Hate to be redundant but loved the scattering of JADE and EMERALDS through this gem of a puzzle!
@jae, it's funny you say that about the wild & tame cats. I was thinking that the KITTY, CAT and PUSSY are purring and lying innocently across the grid and the wild, ferocious TIGER and LION are pouncing either up or down the grid. Fun visual!
Loved GRISTLE, TEXTURE, TAGALONG, DANDELION, MUKLUK, OCTOPUSSY, JAMB and DUNK.
Marvelous Monday, thank you, Elizabeth Long!
Love the new format! Makes reading the posts and REVUeing the puzzle easier! Thought the puzzle was well done
I thought this was easy and delightful. I missed that CATSCAN was the reveal - but then, I was writing so fast I never even saw the Roman numeral! CATSCAN is a wee bit of a stretch, since it's supposed to be written CTSCAN, but who cares?
Interesting that 12/17 is the anniversary - but only of the first powered flight. The Wrights had been experimenting with gliders at Kitty Hawk for at least two years before they hung an engine on the beast. It was the gliding that taught them how to achieve lateral control, which was really their monumental breakthrough.
Four familiar felines ACTUP and wonder how one femme fatale, OCTOPUSSY, made it out of the BEDROOM and into their puzzle, especially, they sniffed, because she was not even curvaceous, she was just downright FAT. (Sorry, if the doggerel is too catty).
This was a rather EASY, gentle offering from Elizabeth Long until it was greatly perked up by the likes of MUKLUK, GRISTLE, MONGOL, EXTRUDE and TAGALONG but it also had such as CLI, TOSEA, ALA, REDO and RECUE doing their best to be “deperkers” of the unsuspecting puzzle.
Seeing KITTYHAWK included as a theme entry recalled an acquaintance from the past, one time literary agent now turned interior decorator, KITTY HAWK(s), daughter of noted film director Howard Hawks, who carried her rather awkward name elegantly without fear of being upstaged by Wilbur and Orville.
The puzzle might have been stronger if the PUSSY, KITTY and CAT had stayed on the sidelines sniffing their catnip and let a CHEETAH, COUGAR and LYNX take the leading roles for the family Felidae. (Or maybe it’s just because I’m a dog person).
Fun easy Monday puzzle.
I know someone who is going to luv this puzzle immensley. His initials are MA. I'm sure he will tell us how many!!
Always nice to have pussy galore on a Monday morning, is what I'm saying. Kinda blah theme, for my appetite.
Easy Monday, under five miles in the fog.
I may be the only person in this space who has never seen "Jeopardy!", so I had to rely on the actual clue for 4D -- rather than the 14A cross -- which I believe is incorrect. EXTRUDE means, "to force, press, or push out, to shape by forcing through a die", e.g. "The machine extrudes enough molten glass to fill the mold." It does not mean "Stick out". This had me staring at ONE friggin' letter to finish.
@Susan McConnell -
Same here on a new format coming up on my iPad. I wasn't able to type in the Comment box (letters didn't show up). At the bottom of the page there's a link to "View Web Version" - I clicked on that and got to the familiar version of the site.
I wonder if anyone else using an iPad is having trouble entering comments on the new format.
@JohnV - read the complete definition.
As a hater of RRNs in almost every situation, I think this one is just fine. It crosses the revealer and helps us to have EMERALDS.
Totally misunderstood the T.P. clue, throwing in Slices and then ewerS for water carriers. Having IDol before IDLE helped make the corner a mess. Thankfully, it's Monday, so it cleaned up quickly.
Lots and lots of great words today. Ms. Long must be a great DAME.
@anon 9:39 - Merriam Webster seems to agree with John V. EXTRUDE
Krusty's thoughts on MUKLUK:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YAkOVsoYV5Q
verb (used with object)
1. to thrust out; force or press out; expel: to extrude molten rock.
2. to form (metal, plastic, etc.) with a desired cross section by forcing it through a die.
verb (used without object)
3. to protrude.
4. to be extruded: This metal extrudes easily.
Well, now I'm just suicidal over <a href="http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://craziestgadgets.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/baseball-bat-pepper-mill.jpg&imgrefurl=http://craziestgadgets.com/2009/07/30/baseball-bat-pepper-mill-spices-up-your-grand-slam-breakfast/&h=460&w=296&sz=31&tbnid=m_KpWe2-90kpXM:&tbnh=90&tbnw=58&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dbaseball%2Bbat%2Bpepper%2Bgrinder%26tbm%3Disch%26tbo%3Du&zoom=1&q=baseball+bat+pepper+grinder&usg=__AlMWNr8JhI6-Dgpd3c38JYBUJ0w=&docid=vU9bHBqly9c2IM&sa=X&ei=OjrPUJC7FLK30gHC3oCoCQ&ved=0CGkQ9QEwAw&dur=206>this</a>.
Meow! I liked it.
I knew Dakar from the African reporter for NPR who signs off from there. I hate the way she says it. She sounds kinda evil somehow.
Great words in the grid. Thanks Ms. Long.
Well, now I'm just suicidal over this .
@Dictionaries: I see where that can be found, but I'm not persuaded. I'll stay with Merriam-Webster on this one.
@Two Ponies, couldn't disagree more. Whenever Ofeibia Quist-Arcton signs off with her signature "DaKAAAAAR" I love it. It would be a great drinking-game cue if I weren't generally hearing it in the early morning! And, thank you Monday crossword for being super easy this week - I needed the feeling of accomplishment to start off the new week after the pain of Friday's events. Tiny blessing, but still.
[ Purrrrr ]
@ Carola: I'm solving on an iPad as well. Thanks for the hint to scroll down to access the usual view of the blog. That helped to read the comments. However, I could not post a comment from that view. When I hit the "post a comment " link, gibberish appeared I had to revert to this new view to be able to do that. This is still not right because the font that appears as I am typing is minuscule. I can barely read what I am typing. (Please overlook typos because I cannot see well enough to correct.)
I dislike the new view because the font is also very small (although nowhere near as bad as this comments box) , and I can't adjust it as I normally can. Aesthetically, this new view is blah. I really hope that these glitches can be fixed.
@Rex: help! I hope there is something that you can do.
@susanm -- your last line is very funny
Excellent Monday puzzle. People here are straining to find things about it to complain about. Just enough crunch to keep it interesting, and Monday easy. Bravo!
Cutting back on the pain meds so felt like I could take on a Monday. Liked the cat theme, MUKLUK, and the DAME. Great clever lyrics. Best part is reading the comments. Starting to feel like normal again except for the sixteen hours a day flat on my back.
I missed CAT SCAN as the revealer, but it's great. I also missed the two big cats in the downs, even greater. What's not to like? (Except Justice ALITO, of course - getting tired of him!)
Did not think that much of this puzzle til coming here and reading the comments.
@acme- thanks for pointing out CAT SCAN as the revealer among other insights.
@loren- thanks for all those combos of words that I never would've seen.
@susan m- thanks for the new lyrics- so funny!
@anon 11:19- thanks for the thank you note a la Jimmy Fallon- nice sentiment.
Makes the day brighter...
can someone explain why every day there are two or three comments that are removed. Why make a comment at all? Don't tell me it's something to do with typos or spelling errors. It's EVERY DAY. Why?
In lieu of making a comment and then removing it, I have no comment at all to make
Wonderful puzzle.
Re: Stanley Kubrick: @ Rex, if you, or any of your readers, are in LA any time prior to next June, stop by Los Angeles County Museum of Art for an exhaustive exhibition devoted to the innovative director. I just went this weekend and loved it. Plus there always seems to be at least one or two other excellent exhibitions going on at the same time. Currently: Caravaggio and his legacy.
Cheers!
Mark
@quilter - glad to hear that you are on the mend.
re:comment removal - It's my comment and I'll remove it if I want to. Freedom of Speech includes the freedom not to speak. But if you are really curious, sign in and check off email follow-ups. Then you get all those removed comments right in your mailbox before they are removed. Then you will see people's typos and omissions and the like. Scintillating stuff.
Dame elizabeth is such a pussycat.Very crunchy for a monday also very satisfying! has everyone seen Nasa's nighttime pictures? the Nile just cracks me up somehow!Anon @1232 Rex randomly deletes people's comments every day to keep things shaken up!
@Carola and Rookie -- I posted last night's comment from the "new" iPad display and am posting this one from the "web version" display. So, both seem to work and least for me. For the record I don't like the "new" display.
Octopussy today, Octomom tomorrow?
If so, I might have to recu(s)e myself.
I noticed that one of the posters has never seen Jeopardy which I always thought when hand in hand with the crossword mentality. Who knows someone here may have never seen the seventh episode of best beaches of Ulan Bator either.
@WA: re: beaches, there are only six episodes. Even I know that :)
Three and out.
@Z - Thank you. I was debating whether or not I should be justifying my earlier-erased comments to someone who posts as an anonymous. I like @syndy's idea that it's a big ol' conspiracy.
@Carola & @Rookie: same here, problems posting using an iPad - when I hit submit, my comment just disappeared.
Had it posted twice, I may have had to delete one.
@Z 12:49: LOL
@JenCT, @Carola, @etc, yup same here re iPad. I can start out typing in the comment box, but cannot insert within previous text. Then after some point typing doesn't show up at all. Also can't zoom in, which makes the Captcha a little tricky to say the least. Discovered that yesterday. Nice try on Blogger's part; too bad the mobile version doesn't work. I bet robots can do it.
Enjoyed today's puzzle, though. I thought about CATSCAN vs CTSCAN, but it's a common enough (mis)spelling that all the websites from the Mayo Clinic to WebMD, at least have that spelling as a searchable term even if they don't use it.
Nice breezy Monday with a very decent theme; no complaints here.
I can't hear MUKLUK without thinking of the Vestibules' "bulbous bouffant" routine.
Thanks Ms. Long!
@quilter1 - How nice to see you! Glad you're feeling well enough to enjoy the puzzle. The sixteen hours flat on your back sounds tough!
Thanks to the powers that be for an easy, quality puzzle to start the week off.
It looked as if it weren't going to be a good week. When I got my morning cup of coffee at my local WaWa's, I got to overhear the following snippet of conversation:
Guy making sandwitches to coworker: "If you don't like Michael Bublé and Kenny G, then you just don't GET jazz".
Guy manning the coffee station (yelling at the top of his voice): "Cleanup at coffee - Man's head just exploded".
I took a short break from work today to do the puzzle. 8 mins. Some standard easy-day-puzzle fare and no hangups, but enjoyable.
Now I know how to spell KEILLOR (don't remember ever encountering it in a puzzle before).
DAKAR seems like it should be in more crosswords and always reminds me of Ginsberg.
'til tomorrow. Back to work.
@chefwen -- Roxie is always very enthusiastic, peppy, bouncy, and happy (go-lucky even). A combination of qualities that would be insufferable in a human being but is very sweet in a dog. So if the cats like it, Roxie likes it (and she will jump all over them and nip at their ears to show it).
Can't believe this is "medium"... Easiest puzzle ever I've seen...finished before my tall Americano cooled off..
Finished this 5 AM and have been twirling around all day without getting to computer. Enjoyed it. Thanks Eliz. Long. Missed CATSCAN as part of theme. Thanks @Acme.
I've been away a lot. @Quilter1: sorry you have been laid up. Very glad you are coming along. Hey @JenCT: have missed you.
How does one solve this in seven seconds?!
There are about 200 blank cells, so that's about forty words worth of entry.
To do 40 words in seven seconds means typing at about 340 words per minute.
I suspect illicit activity of some sort.
A distraught man rushes into the vet's office with his dog in his arms. He lays it on the examination table. The vet examines the dog and tells the man "I'm sorry but your dog is dead." The man looks at her in disbelief and says "That can't be. I want a second opinion." The vet leaves the room and comes back with a cat in her arms which she places on the table next to the dog. The cat walks the length of the dog, sniffing it a few times, sits down and meows. The vet tells the man "The cat says your dog is dead, too." The man, resigned to his dog's fate asks the vet how much he owes her. "$350," the vet informs him. "Wow. That's a lot of money for telling me my dog is dead," he says. The vet replies "My initial diagnosis would have been $50 but the cat scan is an additional $300."
No, a man walks into a vet's office with a hampster in his pocket, which he lays on the table. The vet takes one look at the hampster and tells the man "I'm sorry, but your hampster is dead" The man looks at her, says "Look, this is my kid's hampster, they love it to death, isn't there any thing you can do?" The vet brings this chocolate labrador into the room, the dog smells the hampster, says "Woof Woof". The vet tells the man "Look, I'm sorry but the rat's dead". The man says "Please do everything you can". ...blah blah blah with the cat.... The bill comes to $575, ... What? ... $50 for the inital diagnosis, $200 in lab fees, $325 for the cat scan.
Elizabeth Long's cat theme is better than Rex acknowledges. It's not just five loosely connected answers relating to cats. It's two answers that pair the little and cute side of the feline family--KITTY and PUSSY--with kind of scary critters--HAWK and OCTO(PUS)--and two more answers that pair the big and scary side of the family with flowers--DANDELION and TIGER LILY. Finally, you've got CAT SCAN as a kind of reveal in the center. Loose, yes, but with a lot more oomph than just five random cat answers.
valuecompetition.typepad.com/metarex/2012/12/octopussy.html
@acme: with the greenness of the JADE and EMERALDS, would this grid not more aptly appear on the 17th of March?
I'm in with the large group who liked this. Adding to the other points refuting the "thinness" of the theme, I note that the two cats on top are in front, while the two at "bottom" are "behind."
Along with @acme's X- and K-counts we have eight U's to add to the TEXTURE: my only writeover. WHAT? How, you ask, can you have a w/o in a grid that's on the DUH! side of easy? Well, working from the top down, I had the TE of 46d in place, saw "Surface quality," and just wrote in TEnsion! No problem REDOing that, of course.
Who's calling a Bond girl--ANY Bond girl EVER--FAT? Maud is only broad where a broad should be brohohohohoad! (also from South Pacific: she could be my Honey Bun any old time!)
I'd like to RECUE Ms. Long for another puzzle, so I might RELIVE such a delightful experience.
Loved the puzzle. Personal natick -- URDU/EDWIN went with r instead of d. I'm not as smart as the normal solver here. Sad thing is my fathers name was EDWIN but ErWIN sounded good to me. Thank you for the TWO vet jokes!!! Loved them both.
A rare no perfect game for me with no write-overs and no wrong squares. I had to wait for the crosses to confirm TYRO, even though we just saw the word, clued the same way, just a few days ago.
@Texas Solver, that "D" was the last letter I filled in too, but I finally remembered URDU from previous puzzles. Until that moment I wasn't sure if the Dolt's response was DoH or DUH either, so I could have wound up with 2 wrong squares.
Time to say TGIM. I need puzzles like this after the string of DNF's I had last week! Solved this one without a single pause or write over, though not in 7 seconds! At any rate it encourages me to keep trying.
See from the comments above that the iPad download problems I experienced some weeks ago seem to be spreading. So, to anyone who sees this, I'll repeat my advice to save the site you like when you have it, and simply hit the "newer post" button every day. This has saved me from the various problems cited above, includining that impossibly small print that can not be enlarged. This does not bring me the current Syndi-Sunday puzzle, but two hits on Saturday does bring Monday.
P.S. I also copy my comments before trusting them to the robot machine. This has saved me grief more than once
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