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Hawaiian thank you / TUE 12-4-12 / Bride in 1956 news / 1982 Jeff Bridges flick / Monogram in 50s politics / Subject of Euclidean treatise / Troubadour's repertoire / FedEx competitor / Burlesque co-star 2010
Tuesday, December 4, 2012
Constructor: Elizabeth C Gorski
Relative difficulty: Medium
THEME: Rated PG — theme answers are two-word phrases where first word starts with "P" and second with "G"
Word of the Day: DHL (36A: FedEx competitor) —
DHL Express is a division of the German logistics company Deutsche Post providing international express mail services. Deutsche Post is the world's largest logistics company operating in all four corners of the globe.[2] DHL is a world market leader in sea and air mail. (wikipedia)
• • •
Again, I worry that I've missed something. It's just PG phrases, right? There's not some hidden, tricky thing going on here, is there? I like the grid, on the whole, but you could go on and on and on with this theme. These answers make nice phrases, but I expect themes to be a little tighter than this. PETER GUNN, PETER GABRIEL, PETER GRIFFIN, PARTY GIRL, POWER GRAB, PAN GRAVY ... you can play along at home if you like. Maybe a revealer like RATEDPG would've made the puzzle feel tighter. One thing I do like is the decision to go 74 instead of 76 words—that's why you have those nice long Across answers adjacent to the top and bottom theme answers (i.e. MINI-DONUT and "HERE YOU GO") (17A: Small treat for a coffee break + 58A: "As requested..."). There's maybe a little more crosswordese than I like in my Tuesday grid, but the sweet long answers more than make up for it. PEACH PIES (31D: August bake sale inventory) and WIND-UP TOY (11D: Clapping monkey or chattering teeth) add an enjoyable bounciness to the grid.Theme answers:
- 20A: Weapons-testing area (PROVING GROUND)
- 31A: Subject of a Euclidean treatise (PLANE GEOMETRY)
- 38A: Cheap seating area in a theater (PEANUT GALLERY)
- 52A: Bride in 1956 news (PRINCESS GRACE)
Very daring and modern use of PIMPS in the 1D slot ([Gussies up, in modern slang]). I particularly like the hard tonal and generational contrast between "gussies" and PIMPS. I'd never heard of MAHALO until I actually went to Hawaii (46A: Hawaiian "thank you"). Just noticed that the word is just an anagram of ALOHA + M. I used to have a huuuuuge Grace Kelly obsession (I think I have "Mogambo" on VHS somewhere around here ...). I don't like the PRINCESS business because it effectively ended her acting career. I could watch "Rear Window" over and over. And over. And I have. Where was I? I forget. Oh well. Moving on. Troubadours! I was thinking of a lot of different technical answers here (lays ... gestes ...), but it's just the straightforward SONGS. I have no memory of "Burlesque," so CHER took a few crosses to get (53D: "Burlesque" co-star, 2010). On the other hand, I do have some memory of "TRON" (40D: 1982 Jeff Bridges flick)Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
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75 comments:
Hey, where's everybody?
Medium for me too. On review, words were all gettable from the clues, but for some reason it took longer than average for a Tuesday.
When will we ever get rid of Pia Zadora?
So, yesterday autobiographical states and today Parental Guidance? Seems a bit odd/thin (to use Rex's terminology), although I liked this one. Zippy stuff...WINDUPTOY, MINIDONUT, HEREYOUGO, PIMPS, PHONEIN... Mini theme EMIR, AGHAS, IMAM... Mini-mini theme GRACE and DIANA.
Just not sure if I've really grasped the theme.
One erasure: iron for PERM. Oh, and medium for me three.
Not sure, but maybe since each theme answer is 13 letters, it's actually PG-13.
Is it Medium if I needed some crosses and couldn't get all the answers from the clues? I would say "easy" based on my own idiosyncratic standards, but I did need more than a few crosses. The theme was irrelevant, since it affected my solving not at all, and only Rex could divine it. What I did see was same as @Jae, the mini themes, and they were more fun to find than the real themes, which I never noticed.
I liked WINDUP TOY, and I think PIMPS means nobody can call the NYT "staid" any more. And I'm with @anon: it was a disappointment to see Pia Zadora. I had hoped she was maybe gone for good.
As to where is everybody, it took a long time before the puzzle appeared on the NYT site, but when it did, it downloaded into AcrossLite on my iPad without nary a hitch. Maybe they fixed the problem and everyone will come drifting back here?
I hope!
First an Acme puzzle, second they fixed Across Lite, now a Ms. Gorski puzzle, life is good.
I'm going with easy with this one. Only one write-over. Someday I will learn to spell AVANT rather than AVeNT.
Mr. RAWLS is certainly getting a lot of ink lately, and why are we trying to off PIA ZADORA, that's a cool name that is fun to say.
I think crossing Eero with erde was a bit mean for a Tuesday!
@Jim Peredo -- PG-13--You may have something there, it explains the answer PIMP.
@anon 2:26 -- Yes it was.
PIMPS at One DOWN!!!!! You go, Gorski!
(How was this not written by Paula Gamache???!)
Definitely PG-13, which is why all puzzles should have titles!!! it would add such another layer...
There would be less denouncements of thinness, etc.
With a title, it would have elevated this another step...to have all the PGs be 13 letters makes this more than it appears at first glance.
(If my puzzle had been titled STATE BODIES it wouldn't (perhaps) have been so unclear to folks.)
LOVED WINDUPTOY and REQUIEM...very classy!!!!
ERDE/EERO looks like a mistake but isn;t.
Liked the simple cleverness of 51D Cat Calls
@chefwen
I share your one write over, I had ExaCT for EVICT, but AXANT wasn't cutting it. (Hey, how can you not comment on MAHALO??!)
MAHALO, Pelizabeth Gorski!
Very nice overall medium Tuesday. I just had to google "gussies up" and "deep-six" since those are terms that probably haven't been used since my grandparents were born.
I also don't quite understand why it was these 4 PG phrases. Could've went with more interesting stuff IMO. But I did like WINDUPTOY.
Monday - Andrea, Tuesday - Liz....it's going to be a great week.
@Rex...i was waiting for the Rated PG 13 reveal too and thought Liz wound have hidden 13 in there somewhere. Still fun!
Asked math genius daughter what Euclid was known for. Eye roll...."PLAIN geometry, Mom". That held me up for awhile. Kind of smacked myself when I realized my goof.
No Sudoku for me or that other numbers puzzle on the NYTimes magazine puzzle page where there are little math problems in the squares....horrors. Daughter loves those.
Happy Tuesday. Will it be Paula tomorrow? Ladies week, perhaps?
Was nobody else annoyed at the two US 1 clues in a row (63/64 across)?!?
@Unknown 5:08:
Count me as one who enjoys when two clues are linked like that, especially when they're right next to each other. I think it's fun.
EERO crossing ERDE sucked.
Zippy puzzle, I thought it had a lot of fun words and phrases: PEACH PIE, LINSEED, REQUIEM, HERE YOU GO, PHONE IN, WIND-UP TOY. Great clue for UGLIEST, love that Latin. And the OREO clue was good.
Didn't need/use the PG theme to finish, but I appreciate learning that it is PG-13! Too bad, Rex's Paul GIAMATTI doesn't fit. Not sure why people don't like the theme entries - they are all valid, all different things/names, and they have 13 letters. It's fine with me for a Tuesday.
In my neck of the woods, PROVING GROUNDs are for cars, not weapons. GM has one down the road from me.
I meant Paul Giamatti, no caps. My keyboard is acting up today. Grrr.
Easy Tuesday for me. Not a single erasure. Liked the longer fill, MINIDONUT, HEREYOUGO, WINDUPTOY, etc. Gave it a little zip. Have watched every Grace Kelly film many times. A fine actress. "Rear Window" is one of Hitchcock's best. Loved Raymond Burr as the heavy.
I have to agree with @Milford about PROVING GROUND. I pass Ford's on a regular basis.
We have PRINCESS GRACE and Princess DIANA today to celebrate the royal pregnancy. We also have a REQUIEM and ELEGY to bring us back to ERDE.
PG-13 makes this a tighter theme, so thanks for seeing that @Jim Peredo.
ERDO/EERO would have caused a DNF for me once upon a time. Today..."HMM, we haven't seen EERO in awhile."
A nice Tuesday in my book.
That's ERDE/EERO obviously.
Grrr! Misspelled DHL as DSL.
As Jim P noted the PG-13 theme is neat. SO Rex you may have missed something.
A pleasant Tuesday outside of messing up the easiest fill on the grid... but I can let that go.
As a young dk we played capitals while we worked. We then moved on to principle State products. We were nothing but dweebs for whom no amount of PIMPS would have helped... but BOISE a gimmie!
🍩🍩🍩 (3 Donuts) Thanks Liz.
When my sister was young, she repeatedly heard my mother say,
"Her name is Beth. Her full name is "Elizabeth, but we call her Beth" One day, when she was playing with her favorite doll, a guest asked her what her doll's name was. She said " Her name is Peggy. Her real name is Elizapeggy, but I call her Peggy."
Maybe La Liz was once called Peggy....
Super fast Tuesday. With all due respect, I feel like we usually get a little more sparkle than this from a Gorski puzzle, but I supposed there's only so much you can do on a Tuesday.
Loved the Paul Giamatti appearance :-)
We didn’t have to wait long to learn that the PG of this puzzle by Liz Gorski was Parental Guidance (Suggested) as evidenced at One down by the use of a word that seems to signal “Yuck!” for many lovers of the English language, PIMPS.
As used here it is actually rather benign, meaning “To make better, to fix up”, (as in the television show “Pimp My Ride”), but take a peek at “pimp” in the Urban Dictionary and it has 285 separate definitions of the word, almost none repeatable in polite company and therein lies its Scarlet “O”, as in “odious”.
But, there’s much more to the puzzle than One down, especially one of the strangest clues in memory, “Clapping monkey or chattering teeth” giving us WINDUPTOY. For a brief moment it was outrageous and off-putting, but only for a brief moment as it easily morphed into a clever delight.
As I looked at the theme, other PG’s popped into mind, Prison Garb, Point Guard, Pearly Gates for example and then a scan of the grid said, “Pause, Genius”, all of the Gorski PG’s are thirteen letters long with no plurals, (PG-13?), leaving the finding of additional qualified thirteen letter PG phrases to someone with a higher Pay Grade than mine.
Least favorite entry, TETR; favorite “least” clue, “Least pulchritudinous” and last but not least, favorite three word phrase, HEREYOUGO.
Thanks, Liz. The puzzle was Pretty Good and deserves a Passing Grade!
Where is Puzzle Girl?
JFC
Ah yes, the theme in the main blog should be changed to (or at least amended to include) PG-13.
MaryRoseG: To access the puzzles, use this URL.
http://www.nytimes.com/crosswords/index.html
The links are at the bottom of the page. But the Doonesbury link seems to have vanished.
"Not sure, but maybe since each theme answer is 13 letters, it's actually PG-13."
"With a title, it would have elevated this another step...to have all the PGs be 13 letters makes this more than it appears at first glance."
.......................
I missed the '13' also, and was disappointed in this one - until I found out what I missed. Very cool.
I don't get how the NYT can over-rely on revealer entries (sometimes to the detriment of the puzzle) and still refuse to use titles, flat out refusing to put a perfectly good device in the toolbox. Titles can be subtle and classy and sophisticated as well (and far superior to some of the revealers we see).
I can get that maybe some folks think the 'pros' deserve the little secrets that can be hidden in a puzzle, like upper echelon members of a secret society, privy to inner workings of existence, and that the 99% can lump it. But when a whole lot of expert solvers don't get the AHA, is the genius in it wasted? If a tree falls in the forest . . .
.......................
"and I think PIMPS means nobody can call the NYT "staid" any more."
Uh, yeah, we certainly can. It isn't very often that the NYT strays even to PG-13 territory. Maybe that's why they kind of hid it today.? If you're over 13, there are other crosswords that are more adult. The clue to PIMPS was sufficiently lame, by aplenty, to get the entry through.
Another of the many days where Rex's write-up and the comments add so much to the puzzle for me. I hadn't thought of "Rated PG," much less "PG-13" (thank you @Jim Peredo) and the resulting joke of "PIMP." Remembering that DIANA and PRINCESS GRACE both died in car crashes was making me feel sad, but I feel better about it after @Z pointed out that they received a REQUIEM and an ELEGY. @jackj - LOL at your extra PG's!
Pretty easy puzzle today. Had no idea what the theme was til I finished and saw the PG's.
Love orzo. Love peach pie.
Thank you, @Jim Peredo, for enhancing the theme with your observation ... Liz was super subtle in her execution of PG-13 but once you see it, it sure adds to the appreciation of this puzzle.
Great start to the week so far, can't wait to see who Will has scheduled for tomorrow ... another fantastic woman constructor?
PG-13 is fun! Uncommon to use the grid meta-info to parse the theme on a Tuesday, so thanks, Liz, for that. Easy/Medium here, 9 miles, Stamford to Rye, in the fog.
PIMPS was last to fall, of course, so all's forgiven for the Roman numeral at 4D.
PUSSY GALORE is only 11. Darn!
The usual elegant, well-thought out puzzle by Elizabeth Gorski. I don't think a Tuesday needs a title or a reveal, I was glad to figure the 13 out myself.
Loved the three Eastern leaders and the two princesses, the requiem and the elegy.
It's only Tuesday, and we've had some quality puzzling this week already!
I had no idea about Burlesque, but I had the C, it's four letters, so CHER.
EERO Saarinen - who designed the wing-shaped TWA terminal at what is now JFK - was maybe the most famous architect of the 1950s, and has a first-name you're bound to see a lot of, so stop grousing and remember him!
ERDE, on the other hand, would have been better clued with Mahler than with Brahms, at least on a Tuesday.
Like everyone but @Jim Peredo, I too missed the 13 part of PG-13. Very nice! Aloha MAHALO, Ms. Gorski!
Like many, I too have a problem with PIMPS at 1D - not because it strays into eyebrow-arching territory, but because it doesn't fit the clue, "gussies up." Primps, maybe, but not pimps.
As pointed out by @jackj 8:53, the term is used in the TV reality show "Pimp My Ride" but that doesn't really refer to "gussying up" but rather to modifying a car so as to turn it into a pimpmobile, a kind of outrageous street sled. I must confess that I've never actually seen the show, so I might be way off base here. Nevertheless...
Okay, so reading/catching on to the PG-13 thing redeemed the theme significantly for me, but boy howdy was there a lot of junk/ crosswordese in this thing, at least in my experience. I actually don't mind roman numerals so much, and AGHAS can happen to anyone, but TETR, AES, ORA, STA, ETRE, EERO/ERDE, UNI, UNE, and ULAN? That's just a lot of gunk in one setting.
ERDE is a word that I only know thanks to musical satire (Tom Lehrer's "Alma" references Mahler's "Das Lied von der Erde," and Anna Russell's Ring Cycle analysis discusses "My friend Erde, the green-faced torso").
A reminder of the Disney film, TRON, brings back one of life’s priceless moments.
In 1982, Disney held a pre-release, “by invitation only” screening of TRON at their Burbank studio, attended by Disney CEO Eisner, COO Wells and 200 industry big wigs and assorted celebrities, all of us encouraged to bring our children.
About half-way through the film as I watched with my then 5 year-old son, he turned to me during a quiet, slow scene and with a child’s innocent candor loudly asked, (in the hushed screening room), “Daddy, when will this movie be over?”
Oops.
Everything that Rex said- except for obsession with Grace Kelly...
Realizing that the theme was PG-13 would've made it Pretty Good- but I didn't til coming here.
At the point at which I had PROVING GROUND and PLANE GEOMETRY, my imagination strayed to the possibility of another mathematically oriented puzzle, which was not to be, but the actual puzz is fine for a Tuesday.
One of the best Tuesdays in ages.
I won't fib and say I caught the 13 (thanks @ Jim Peredo) but seeing it now really elevates it for me.
@ jackj, Funny story. Out of the mouths of babes...
Did any one else put WELT in before correcting it to ERDE?
@DB Geezer - I hadn't thought of "Welt," as I was thinking of "earth" in terms of the ground/soil. But your question reminded me that ERDE appears in a verse of Brahm's REQUIEM:
So seid nun geduldig, lieben Brüder, bis auf die Zukunft des Herrn. Siehe, ein Ackermann wartet auf die köstliche Frucht der Erde und ist geduldig darüber, bis er empfahe den Morgenregen und Abendregen.
Be patient, therefore, brethren, until the coming of the Lord. Behold, the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient over it until it receives the early and the late rain. (James 5:7)
Zipped through without ever noticing the theme.
Quibble: I've never heard the cheap seats called the Peanut Gallery. That name comes from the Howdy Doody kids show way back when. I sat in the Peanut Gallery once as a 6 year old. The seats were up close. Clarabell the clown, played by Bob Keesham, later Capt. Kangaroo, gave all the kids peanuts. Hence the name.
when i think of the term pimping a car it is gussied up so i think the definition is apt.
I'd like to hear from Liz to see if she meant this theme to be "PG-13" and if so, why didn't she have it as a reveal?
"but boy howdy was there a lot of junk/ crosswordese in this thing"
Yeah, if you didn't get to enjoy the AHA of the gimmick it was pretty sad.
(I do mind roman numerals. For me, they are totally contrived entries of random letters. I know we're supposed to over look that, but . . . )
Maybe because LA LIZ trusts you to work it out.So pull up you big kid panties and stop sniveling.EERO/ERDE would have been brutal to anyone who had never crossed words before.I could kick myself because I noticed that all the theme answers were the same lenght-offset but didn't take it that one more step!.The RRN entry however was pushin it!
Fun puzzle. Like others, didn't get the 13 part of the PG13 theme until I came here. Wonder what % of solvers caught on? Seems fairly low even here.
@ jackj - So are you an industry bigwig or an assorted celebrity?
If not for the Supreme Court, we could've had PRESIDENT GORE.
Parking Garage
Pressure Gauge
Phyllis George
Plains Georgia
Polite Gesture
Puzzle Gimmick- can lead to
Puzzle Griping?
@jackj:
Cute story, but Eisner didn't become Disney CEO until 1984.
Another pleasant puzzle from Elizabeth Gorski. Nothing flashy (not a bad thing) and nothing complicated (it is Tuesday). Overall, I like it. No write-overs is also a good thing.
But . . . it’s got a random Roman numeral and overused abbreviations for the Social Security Administration and subway stops. Enough please. And I wish we would make up our mind on the spelling of words. Is it ADZ or ADZE? I thought RASP, but skipped that one on the first pass because I really wanted ADZ but needed a 4-letter word.
WIND-UP TOY and PEACH PIES are very good.
Very ingenious of our host to notice that if you add a letter to a word you can make an “anagram”, even though ALOHA-M is nothing. Why Paul Giamatti and not Peter Gabriel or Peter Graves.
@Jim Peredo – good observation. Now, imagine how much better the puzzle would have been (with forgiveness to RRN) if the RRN was XIII.
gee. pussy galore sure looked older than 11
Jeffrey@1:58PM-
Yikes, your point reminds me it was Card Walker and Ron Miller not Eisner and Wells.
The passage of time certainly wasn't much of a friend to my memory.
Thanks.
@ Lawprof - PIMPS as a synonym for "gussy up" is accurate. It is a neologism, cf. the TV show "Pimp my Ride."
Favorite related TV skit is the Kramer technicolor dreamcoat skit, in which he is truly pimped up and mistaken for one.
Not much to comment on that hasn't been said. My EVICT was EJECT, UNE was LES, and DHL was UPS. All easily fixed.
Easy-medium. Thanks, Ms. G. President Garfield too would like this one.
@jackj
Fabulous story, no matter who was president!!!
Poetic license, fading memory, great anecdote trumps one or two details!!!
On a related note, @12:04...
Just as @rex said that maybe a little extra crosswordese is overlooked when there is sweetness in the overall theme!
(i of course wish he'd feel that way more often!)
C'mon, once again it's the GLUE!!! If even La Liz has to use it, can't we all just accept and understand that constructors avoid as much of it as s/he can, and anything in there has been rewritten and attempted to be smoothed over as much as possible, but it remains as necessary.
If it's there, at this stage of the game, there was probably a reason in order to make the overarching theme work!
Very important to look at the "forest"!
Crushing to have people still zero in on four or five less than ideal words when there are 70 that range from fine to fabulous in support of a theme.
(Not saying puzzles should be immune from criticism, that makes things better all around...but again, better if it is literally "constructive"!
even tho I should know by now it's a losing proposition to respond to the naysayers, when folks start listing the gunk only... it does not elevate or enlighten.)
Midday report of relative difficulty (see my 8/1/2009 post for an explanation of my method):
All solvers (median solve time, average for day of week, ratio, percentile, rating)
Tue 7:18, 8:57, 0.82, 5%, Easy
Top 100 solvers
Tue 4:26, 4:41, 0.95, 39%, Easy-Medium
@acme - You are not alone. In a puzzle with 70 words, something has to be 70th best.
If a baseball hitter goes 3 for 4 with 2 HRs, a double and a strikeout, he had a great day. Why focus on the strikeout.
@jackj - Still love your story, although perhaps I zeroed in on the 70th word! Mea culpa!
Pam Grier, pray God, Peter Gent (ex-Dallas Cowboys reserve wide receiver and author of the novel "North Dallas Forty," died 2011), Paulette Goddard, Peter Graves, Pangaea...
By Jove, I think you got it! Brilliant! I was trying to figure this out. Thanks.
@Crosscan - That's what I always say. Then people say, yeah but the strike out was with bases loaded, two outs in the bottom of the ninth when you're down by one run. That I get meaningless hits but strike out when the game's on the line. That I always do that.
Damn, my hip's starting to hurt.
@Rex ... I too, love "Rear Window." Fascinating story with James Stewart and Grace Kelly at their best. Raymond Burr is perfect and all the supporting actors, too. Plus Grace Kelly's clothes are exquisite ... every single outfit!
@acme & @Jeffrey ... I agree. It is so easy to criticize the tiniest thing and totally miss the whole wonderful experience!
3 and out.
@Rex
In case you haven't seen it, I recommend "To Catch a Thief"- also a Hitchcock classic with Grace Kelly and Cary Grant.
Pia Zadora-- I was wondering that too! S Harris
This week's relative difficulty ratings. See my 8/1/2009 post for an explanation. In a nutshell, the higher the ratio, the higher this week's median solve time is relative to the average for the corresponding day of the week.
All solvers (this week's median solve time, average for day of week, ratio, percentile, rating)
Mon 6:27, 6:46, 0.95, 32%, Easy-Medium
Tue 7:25, 8:57, 0.83, 7%, Easy
Top 100 solvers
Mon 3:52, 3:41, 1.05, 79%, Medium-Challenging
Tue 4:21, 4:41, 0.93, 33%, Easy-Medium
I'm still not convinced, thoughtful dissent by anonymous at 11:44 and retired_chemist at 4:17 notwithstanding, that pimp is a synonym for gussy up. If a pimp were to hear that you said his car was gussied up, he'd come looking for you.
@MaryRoseG: Sudoku has nothing to do with math. Not a single mathematical operation need be performed; it's a logic puzzle. For proof, simply substitute ABCDEFGHI for the numbers. Same deal.
@anon 8:15: Yeah, well, "Thief" was shot on location--guess where? Uh-huh, Monaco. How do you think they met? For that reason, I never did like the movie. I can still imagine Grace in the role of Eve Kendall in North by Northwest--not that Eva Marie Saint didn't do a teriffic job--but still...
And now to deal with today's offering. The unstated PG-13 (!) theme does add a layer of cleverness, and I agree that a revealer would have brought it together--but how would you do that? Can't use numbers (maybe Roman, but we have one of those already), so: PGTHIRTEEN? HMM, 10 letters. PGBARMITZVAH? Drat, 12!
Never heard of a MINIDONUT. Are they the holes? I did like the mini-themes, already noted, and most of the longer entries. It's a little heavy on hackneyed and bad fill, the UGLIEST of which is QANDA. HONE crossing PHONEIN is a bit inelegant.
Easy as PEACHPIES for me; I'll give it one thumb up.
Re one down "Gussies up, in modern slang", the word should be PRIMP. A pimp is someone who oversees prostitutes. I'm surprised that Rex didn't catch this.
What @Acme said, so called crosswordese is necessary, and I find it helpful to break open an area that might be stumping me.
Another 'PG' Pan Gram
Lots of good stuff today. I was thinking that PEANUT GALLERY arose from the bleacher section in old ball parks. MINI DONUT and PEACH PIES whet my appetite. 'Chattering teeth' invokes a smile.
Many mahalos, Ms Gorski!
Not much to say about today's puzzle. It went smoothly, with my only write-over being HERA for LedA. Not too up on mythology, I guess.
As for @Charley's explanation for "peanut gallery", my mother used that expression long before Captain Kangeroo. I've always thought it referred to the cheap seats way upstairs. Maybe the third balcony, used by people who could only afford peanuts???
@syndi-Anony 12:00pm HAH! I'm not quite sure where your comment belongs on the rude to erudite scale but it's pretty funny!
Any puzzle with "Me and Bobby MCGEE" in the grid gets kudos from me.
Didn't we just have MAHALO a few days ago?
@DMG, as one who grew up on the (Canadian) Howdy Doody TV show, I thought PEANUT GALLERY originated there as well. But kudos to you - your Mom was right. Goggle says "A peanut gallery was, in the days of vaudeville, a nickname for the cheapest (and ostensibly rowdiest) seats in the theater, the occupants of which were all too willing [in the view of the performer] to heckle the performer. The least expensive snack served at the theater would often be peanuts, which the patrons would sometimes throw at the performers on stage to show their disapproval. The phrases "no comments from the peanut gallery" or "quiet in the peanut gallery" are extensions of the name, meaning the great unwashed should defer to their betters.
In the late 1940s the Howdy Doody show adopted the name to represent its audience of 40 children."
Call me prim if you like but count me in the PRIMP crowd. Also, I know some folks have had it with PIA but I'll accept her every time over OREOS, RTES, ARC, SSN, STA and probably several other perennials I've missed. At least we were spared SSTS today (I think).
Despite the less than stellar fill, loved the PG-13 theme. And great observation, @Ginger, pointing out that it wasn't a PAN GRAM!
Primp is what your daughter does. Pimp (up or out) is what someone else's daughter does before going to the bar.
I can't believe that I forgot to mention that today is Elvis Presley's 78th birthday -if you're looking for an appropriate way to mark the occasion, go here: http://dirigonzo.blogspot.com/2013/01/happy-birthday-to-king-of-rock-n-roll.html and click on the link to a great birthday tribute to the King.
@Spacecraft: I think @MaryRoseG is referring to Kenken, which is somewhat like Sudoku but does involve some math, and which also appears in the New York Times.
Just starting to get a feel of the NYT crossword!
Loved PG 13.
Medium here as well, so-so- on the fill.
One complaint about the cluing: "Dies Irae" is *not* a requiem. Rather, it is one section of the requiem mass. This is like cluing BIBLE as "Leviticus, e.g.".
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