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Relative difficulty: Medium-Challenging (*for a Monday*, he said, prophylactically)
THEME: Celestial stuff, I guess — theme answers end in GALAXY and parts thereof:
Theme answers:
- 17A: Randy Travis or Travis Tritt (COUNTRY STAR)
- 24A: Minivan since the mid-'90s (FORD GALAXY)
- 34A: Drummer for the Who (KEITH MOON) — Weird coincidence: I listened to Side A of "Who's Next" not 20 minutes ago.
- 49A: Arizona N.B.A.'er (PHOENIX SUN)
- 57A: Clark Kent and Lois Lane's paper (DAILY PLANET)
Word of the Day: "RIFIFI" (18D: Classic 1955 Jules Dassin heist film) —
Rififi (French: Du rififi chez les hommes)† is a 1955 French crime film adaptation of Auguste Le Breton's novel of the same name. Directed by American filmmaker Jules Dassin, the film stars Jean Servais as the aging gangster Tony le Stéphanois, Carl Möhner as Jo le Suédois, Robert Manuel as Mario Farrati, and Jules Dassin as César le Milanais. The foursome band together to commit an almost impossible theft, the burglary of an exclusive jewelry shop on the Rue de Rivoli. The centerpiece of the film is an intricate half hour heist scene depicting the crime in detail, shot in near silence, without dialogue or music. The fictional burglary has been mimicked by criminals in actual crimes around the world.After he was blacklisted from Hollywood, Dassin found work in France where he was asked to direct Rififi. Despite his distaste for parts of the original novel, Dassin agreed to direct the film. He shot Rififi while working with a low budget, without a star cast, and with the production staff working for low wages.Upon the initial release of the film, it received positive reactions from audiences and critics in France, the United States, and the United Kingdom. The film earned Dassin the award for Best Director at the 1955 Cannes Film Festival. Rififi was nominated by the National Board of Review for Best Foreign Film. Rififi was re-released theatrically in 2000 and is still highly acclaimed by modern film critics as one of the greatest works in French film noir. (wikipedia)
• • •
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
Finished slightly north of my typical Monday time. If I don't count the time I spent searching for a typo after the grid was filled, anyway.
ReplyDeleteThe theme was kind of just there (unconnected astronomic stuff), but it was nice to have a meatier Monday overall. I hadn't noticed the more-open grid, but now that Rex mentions it, it makes sense in explaining why I felt like I was thinking a bit rather than just filling on autopilot, as happens with most Mondays. The long downs especially were nice, and outside the rightly spurned OCAT, there wasn't the typical crappy short fill that is often the SCOURGE of early-week puzzles. I'd love to see more Mondays like this.
OPEN UP LOSER, IRAN THY PLAN by PHOENIX! SUN, you BIG APE, CAPSIZE the MENU! A ROCHE is a SCOURGE! In SALEM it causes AGITA and ANGST! ROGER that AGASSI and don't let KEITH MOON KAREN!
ReplyDeleteDONE....
ANGST before AGITA with consequent geckoes before IGUANA made for a sloppy beginning.
ReplyDeleteRIFIFI? Saturday clue. Finished with a Wednesday time.
Apart from OCAT, I'd add URAL.
Holy Tuesday or maybe Wednesday Batman. Did not know RIFIFI, had BIGoaf for APE and SHA NA NA for LA LA, had to correct misspellings of ANGST and SCOURGE (wanted an A in there somewhere)...tough Mon.
ReplyDeleteMy granddaughter has been doing Monday's this summer and she is still working on Andrea's from last week. She's in Tech Camp at UCSD this week so I think I'll skip this one.
That said, I liked it. Reasonable theme plus a smooth grid with some crunch.
I'll shake my fist at a few other things:
ReplyDelete* Some bizarre, super-tough words for a Monday (AGITA, GITANO, the aforementioned RIFIFI).
* I don't mind two UPs generally, but it's weird that they cross one another at the U with UP TIME and OPEN UP. PLAN crossing PLANET caught my eye too, but at least those are different words.
* Three partials (O-CAT, IF AT, NO SEE)....four if you count the awkward prefix KER, which, sadly, is also the name of Forest Whitaker's character in the official worst movie of the 2000s, "Battlefield Earth."
* GOOGOLS. Can googol really become a plural? I thought it was 1 followed by 100 zeroes, but maybe that's its own unit, so if you had 2 GOOGOLS you'd have 2 followed by 100 zeroes? Or maybe it's just a catch-all term for unspeakably large numbers. Whatever, it still feels odd.
Having said that, I like that Mondays can feel tough but doable in a normal-ish time (I'd put this more in the Tuesday camp). All the theme answers are pretty lively and the clue for ASH TRAY is awesome.
. . . "RIFIFI." That seems like a real proper noun dividing line—you know it or you don't, and on a Monday, your time is going to skew significantly if you fall into the latter category. . . .
ReplyDeleteDidn't need to know it. Didn't even see it til the crossword was done. Three of the six letters cross theme entries and the other three are all easy.
OCAT does stand out as the worst entry, but it's a good trade.
For some strange reason I started out on the bottom and worked my way up. Noticed that 61A and 1A were the same clue and held off on ANGST until Ms. Bening set me on the right path. Great movie BTW!
ReplyDeleteA little dicier that your usual Monday, but I like that. Husband looked at his copy and said "is this really a Monday"? Embarrassingly, I did not look for a theme and didn't get the theme until all was said and done. DOH!
Good one Mr. Arbesfeld.
ReplyDeleteHard bec Monday theme with Tuesday fill...
I always have to walk that tightrope too!
I love Alan Arbesfeld puzzles, as they always "sing"
(this one more so than others between SHALALA, KAREN Carpenter, COUNTRYSTARs Travis and Tritt, KEITHMOON, YES...
and even the word RIFIFI.
I don't think I'd have had YEP and YES in the same puzzle or the UPs crossing,
but again I liked how you could "hear" this puzzle.
KER plop! YEP! OPEN UP!!!
ANd nice Scrabbliciousness with CAPSIZE, GALAXY, PHOENIX.
YAY, AA!
Was the Ford Galaxy actually a mini-van?
ReplyDeleteNot to my knowledge. Unless maybe in Europe. Not in the US. It was Freestar and Windstar.
DeleteNine minutes is challenging Monday range. AGITA? At 1A? YEP, definitely not going to be a lot of personal records today.
ReplyDeleteFORD GALAXYs are still in production? I did a quick check and it isn't listed on the official website even though Wikipedia shows it still is in production in Belgium. Interesting. In these parts (World headquarters hometown) you see lots of Flexes and Edges, but nary a Ford minivan.
@Ted Cole - Yes. Are you remembering the Ford Galaxie?
ReplyDeleteNice crunchy Monday, and I did need some crosses for agita and Rififi. Like capsize a lot, and Keith Moon in the middle.
ReplyDelete"Huh huh. He said... 'prophylactically.'"
ReplyDelete"Yeah. Yeah! That was cool! Hehhehhehhehheeheehahhahheehahheh."
GOOGOLS??? Not a word I've heard of
ReplyDeleteSome AGITA but generally a NETGAIN as Monday's go.
ReplyDeleteJust missing Mickey's pal and former planet: Pluto.
Z et. al, I was thing Galaxie as well when I thought, mini van how the mighty have fallen. Early car for me was a 1965-66 Ford Galaxie 500. It was white with a mid-sized V8 and spotlights. It was from some government agency that inspected things like silos and grain mills. Girl friend Jamie thought it was "oddly cooler" than the VW bug and then bus it replaced.
Hence my opinion of this puzzle: Oddly cool.
🌟🌟🌟 (3 Stars)
Gitano and Octad also very cross-word-ese
ReplyDeleteThinking about Evil's comment yesterday about those new to solving, which I was just a couple of years ago and a puzzle like this would have been a killer for me although Rififi in my movie memory bank along with Shalala
Was overtired last night - just went through the motions.
ReplyDeleteNever even noticed the theme, which is too bad, because it is a subject I love.
CAPSIZEd my 14.5' sailboat in Lake Candlewood in late October - a full turtle, in fact. The Lake Authority guys just happened by, and deftly rescued the boat, then refused to take any recompense.
They appreciated a huge batch of homemade cookies and a case of imported beers! They were real STARs in my book.
Nice observation, @acme, re: the sing-songiness.
Thanks, Mr. Arbesfeld.
Kinda weird. I find COUNTRYSTAR and PHOENIXSUN distracting, because the celestial bodies they're referring to are essentially the same thing. FORDGALAXY is distracting because it is a whole comprised of the other theme answers' parts. A re-structuring might have helped this.
ReplyDeleteAll in all, just good enough. Some would say good enough isn't good enough for the supposedly best puzzle out there, but whatever.
Best news of my day: the note about Jeff Chen taking over at xwordinfo.com, preventing the site's demise. Yesss!
I was going to complain that it was the Ford Galaxie and not the Galaxy, but it turns out there's both of them. The Galaxie was an American full-sized car; the Galaxy is a European minivan. Who knew?
ReplyDeleteI immediately wanted "dread" for 1A and keep reading 31A as, "I FAT." I wonder what this says about me? Perhaps I need an ANALYST to treat my ANGST.
ReplyDelete@Mitzie, because GALAXY is the whole big thing and the other answers the tinier parts in it, it seemed like it should be the reveal. It's not a big objection, though, as we have five solid theme answers. (Great news about xwordinfor.com!)
I learned RIFIFI which is great.
@Agita Capsize Menus, I'd throw ELTON John into your musical mix, too. Fun!
Thank, Alan Arbesfeld, for getting us off to a good start!
Thanks!
ReplyDeleteI agree - tough for a Monday.Never heard of googols or rififi.
ReplyDeleteShout out to puzzle husband at 14 across!!
Also...thanks Jeff Chen!!! Now I can still get the puzzle.
ReplyDeleteSolid Monday puzzle. 7-letter words in all the corners really stood out and gave a usually tame Monday puzzle some bite. Good fill all around.
ReplyDeleteExcept SSS, a bit of a cop out. As Anoa Bob would point out, not much of a difference between that and 3 black squares.
Jeff Chen - great news, thanks!!
My all-time worst Monday time, by a lot, mostly due to the YEP/OPENUP crossing, but also RIFIFI. I also thought I remembered the Ford Galaxy from my youth in the 60's, so thought it couldn't be the answer with the 90's clue. Who knew Ford would give their cars homonym names?
ReplyDelete@Questinia – Me, too, for ANGST before AGITA. We’re probably among tens of thousands who did that. Tricky, tricky, Alan.
ReplyDelete@Evan – I noticed those crosses, too.
@Mac – note in my margin – CAPSIZE – "great word!" Its meaning is so un-inferable from its appearance.
BIG APE, LOSER, SCOURGE
CLOCK, DST, UPTIME
EAR, EYE
SRA, CASAS
TENSE, AGITA, ANGST . . .AGASSI will OPEN UP to his ANALYST until he finally RELAXES!
SIAMESE or IGUANA – what’s your pet of choice? Mine is actually a Newfie.
RIFIFI, SHALALA. Ho, ho, ho.
SALEM, ASHTRAY. Hi, Mom. So glad you quit.
ROGER. Copy. Ten four. Is there a difference? When I was working on a boat in Alaska, the first time I had to use the radio, I felt silly saying “over” - like I was some Seasoned Radio Talker Poser Wannabe. After we talked on top of each other a few times, I started saying it and appreciating it. And a Seasoned Radio Talker was born.
@Tita – it’s actually when I think about space and how it fascinates my daughter but holds hardly any interest for me that I marvel that the arguably boring linguistic phenomenon of deixis can have me staring out of the window forever, contemplating. . .we’re all so very different. My husband and I walk through the woods at our farm, and he’s noticing the hawk or the stunning view while I’m searching the ground, looking for turtles, mushrooms, snakes, creepy-crawlers. . .
Give Jeff Chen a mask and a cape. What a guy! Yay!
I never count words or black squares, but I did today. Cool. @Rob C –YES! Four triple seven stacks *on a Monday*!! And two have a six next to them! I enjoyed this one, Alan.
Fastish.
ReplyDeleteGot the RIFIFI, but was unsure.
Once more, never noticed theme.
Enjoyablle tough-ish Monday. Needed the theme (from PLANET, SUN, STAR) to get me MOON and GALAXY. Really nice chunks of 7-letter words.
ReplyDeleteLove ELASTIC over I FAT!
Also love RIFIFi - fantastic movie.
@loren - There's also ROCHE with its Valium, if AGASSI needs that before he RELAXES.
Rarely a fan of Mr. Arbesfeld's puzzles, but I can't complain too much about this one. Felt Tuesday-ish, especially with the low word count, but a lot of nice fill makes up for the scattered gunk. Fails in spades the "would I give this to a new solver?" test that I apply to Monday puzzles, particularly with the RAFIFI/OCAT stuff.
ReplyDeleteI dearly remember our family's battered Galaxie 500, aka "the tank." Could land helicopters on the hood and roof simultaneously, and my 4'10" mother was barely visible to passersby when she was driving that beast. Good times...
This was fun, altho perhaps not the make and model to introduce skittish beginner NYT solvers to the puz. Coulda simply clued RIFIFI for me as "Thou shalt get this from the crosses". The double-A-meister didn't necessarily build this grid for MonPuz consumption, tho. Maybe this was just the easiest puz left in the pool, at closin time.
ReplyDeleteI personally treasure OCAT, when it is used as a Down entry. Just needs to be clued as "Mexican snack, comin back up". Speakin of stuff on the M&A wantlist: howbout NADO, clued as "Shark-___". Some constructor needs to stp up to the sushi bar, on this one. thanx.
I'm proud of myself...evidently One OCAT has finally found a place in my memory banks, so I was ready for it today, that doesn't mean I liked it, just that I remembered it.
ReplyDeleteStill giggling at I FAT/ELASTIC. Clever, clever, clever!
This puzzle left me seeing stars, metaphorically. Four write-overs on a Monday! ! A, ANGST before AGITA, of course (and then rub it in at 61 A!); 9 D, CREDIT before CHARGE; 11 D, SHA NA NA before SHA LA LA;and, 28 D, TIES TO before TIES IN!
ReplyDeleteFortunately, RIFIFI, especially as clued, was an rock solid gimme. (But I never suspected that Dassin was an American who moved to France!)
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ReplyDeleteMedium-challenging here.
ReplyDeleteHand up for ANGST @ 1A, which disappeared quickly when crosses ruled it out. Interesting that it reappeared @ 61A.
Agree there was a later week feel to the whole puzzle.
I am, like others, reparsing 31A and taking it personally....
Thanks, Mr. Arbesfeld.
I zipped through so rate it easy. The stuff I didn't know, like RIFIFI was solved by crosses and no naticks today. I liked the theme. Agree that one OCAT should never see the light of day again. I only know it from crosswords and still remember my Huh? moment from the first time I saw it.
ReplyDeleteI think ONE O'CAT may be an early form of baseball played by EELS. Other than that, I enjoyed the puzzle, more than I usually do on a Monday, in fact. Maybe that means it was too tough for a Monday. But just right for me.
ReplyDeleteI think Evil has a point. One thing I know happens here, because they've complained about it, is we go on and on, and by the time the syndicated solvers get here they have to scroll through "100 comments" is I think what they said, before they get to their part.
Challenging Monday for sure. Played more like a themeless as the theme was no help sussing out the fill.
ReplyDeleteYet another reason why Jeff Chen is just the best. Thanks, man!
@Ellie54
ReplyDeleteA googol is the large number 10 to the 100th power; that is, the digit 1 followed by 100 zeroes:
10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000.
And if that's not big enough,
A googolplex is the number 10googol, i.e. 10 to the 10to the 100th.
As an aside, I've been told by those who seem to know that the largest real number that physicists can get a handle on is 1x10 to the 64th. Give or take.
ReplyDeleteThe number is arrived at by measuring the size (diameter?) of the universe using the smallest known particle diameter. This could be the Fermi or Planck unit, not sure about that.
Number theory is quite weird. Anyone interested in how the googol and googleplex got their names can go to this site which is almost written in English. I find it fascinating just to read the stuff, never mind understand it.
http://io9.com/5807256/whats-the-biggest-number-in-the-universe
LOVED the clue for ASHTRAY. Don't need a movie in the clue for Annette Bening. Minimual grid gruel, though I'd add IRR to the list of those already mentioned. I guess you don't need much for a theme on Monday.
ReplyDeleteIt did have more heft than the typical Monday. I liked it. It had the feel of being done by a pro.
@rex -- prophylactically?
m&a -- good one on OCAT!
I like SETTLES crossing RELAXES, and I take some satisfaction seeing ROCHE cross LOSER.
Agree that this was relatively tough for a Monday with stuff like SSS, TIESIN [it could have ben to or on], OCAT, OCTADS, TES, YEPS, SHALALA [put down SHANANA first] and AGITA. Never heard of KEITHMOON either. Finished fairly fast [for me] with a couple of writeovers. It would have been difficult to take a DNF on a Monday. Whew!
ReplyDelete@joho from yesterday...cool about your work on NBC (as the 10th Ave building says)...
ReplyDeleteThey started with one building at 14th/9th, then added I think 4 buildings over the years - when they reached and crossed 10th Ave, and filled that building, they abandoned this site and moved to Jersey.
Aren't I the font of knowledge...!
@Anon from yesterday too - I had not been around for a long time - but have been personally reaching out to @Sparky.
Haven't heard back. She usually at Lollapuzzolah...
Like you, I miss her!
@Melodius Funk - thanks for the article. Was doing okay until the Orders of Magnitude section, then got totally lost in trying to comprehend what 3^^^^^3 was trying to notate. Fun, fun, fun.
ReplyDeleteFun and easy today with only one correction (WATCH before CLOCK as I neglected to check a cross before making my entry). No idea on 18D, but I never saw it as the Acrosses filled it in for me.
ReplyDelete@Evan - Didn’t notice the 2 UPS or PLANs in the grid, but I did notice the plural GOOGOL. My fist is shaking, but perhaps not as much as yours.
YEPS Rob C, I don't think I've ever seen a puzzle start with such a POC fest. All the first five Downs are Plurals of Convenience, with three of them ending in the sore thumb at 30A SSS.
ReplyDeleteAs someone once remarked, a googol here, a googol there, and pretty soon you're talking about some serious GOOGOLS!
Kinda takes the edge off the at-first-glance wide-openness of the grid.
RIFIFI sounds like some sort of complicated reworking of a home mortgage, although it is fun to say, what with the I FAT crossing.
@Melodious - that article is starting to sound like my brother-in-law who taught theoretical physics at MIT. Think Sheldon from the Big Bang Theory (except without Sheldon's sparkling personality)
ReplyDelete@Anoa - the ironic thing is that SSS is not itself a plural, unless it was clued as the sound of two tires deflating. or would that need an E?
I started with DREAD in 1A which did not help that corner. I continued on though and got through the rest then back to the NW where I sorted the things out. Got RIFIFI with the crosses. In fact I never got back to the clue and didn't realize that it was done until I read the blog. I do think this is a mixed Monday Tuesday puzzle. I liked the suggestiont that you might measure a Monday puzzle by whether a beginner would be able to do it. Certainly don't think that was true of this one. An enjoyable puzzle, but perhaps because it was more complex than a usual Monday so gave me pause for thought.
ReplyDeleteWould have been impressive if 41D, 42D, 43D, 48D and 55D all started with S to mirror the first 5 downs.
ReplyDeleteBut then we have two "SSS" entries, so never mind.
ReplyDeleteMidday report of relative difficulty (see my 8/1/2009 post for an explanation of my method and my 10/15/2012 post for an explanation of a tweak to my method):
ReplyDeleteAll solvers (this week's median solve time, average for day of week, ratio, percentile, rating)
Mon 6:49, 6:09, 1.11, 87%, Challenging
Top 100 solvers
Mon 4:21, 3:47, 1.15, 94%, Challenging
In September, 1997, so the story goes, some Stanford grad students were helping Larry Page choose a name for his search engine. "Googolplex," said Sean Anderson. (They'd already sensed how big this could become.) "Googol," Page replied. Anderson, checking to see if the name was taken, typed g-o-o-g-l-e into his browser and made the most famous spelling mistake since p-o-t-a-t-o-e. Page registered the name within hours, and today, Google isn't a typo, it's a verb, one with a market cap of about $160 billion.
ReplyDeleteper wikipedia
ReplyDeleteThis week's relative difficulty ratings. See my 8/1/2009 post for an explanation and my 10/15/2012 post for an explanation of a tweak I've made to my method. 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.
ReplyDeleteAll solvers (this week's median solve time, average for day of week, ratio, percentile, rating)
Mon 6:50, 6:09, 1.11, 87%, Challenging
Top 100 solvers
Mon 4:15, 3:47, 1.13, 89%, Challenging
Well, any grid that starts out with AGITA at 1a is not gonna be rated easy. It's a perfectly OK word--just one that nobody ever actually speaks. I've met it before, but only in other crosswords.
ReplyDeleteWhat I have NOT met before is the classic (???) RIFIFI. Hard to call a film a classic when I, a film buff, have never heard of it. Nor (you won't believe this) have I ever heard of GITANO; I needed every cross. Me, I'm a Lee man.
So, easy? Not. But the theme subject is right up my alley--they don't call me spacecraft for nothing--and so it was a most enjoyable solve. The fill, with a few noted exceptions, contributed a lot to the enjoyment. Well done, Mr. Arbesfeld; you have added yourself to my stable of favorite Alan A's, along with Messrs. Alda, Arkin, and A-Dale.
Learnt AGITA today and, heeding the words of my Grade 4 teacher who said the best way to remember a new word is to use it three times, here goes: fajita agita (uneasy feeling about the quality of my Tex-Mex supper), margarita agita (same thing about my Tequila cocktail) and cogito ergo agita (I think therefore I'm stressed). Now I won't forget it!
ReplyDeleteProving I'm not a robot today involves entering iofoca, who may have been the company CEO when the FORD GALAXY and/or Galaxie were introduced...
@Waxy in Montreal - Cute visual rhymes of agita with fajita and margarita, but you might want to check the pronunciation.
ReplyDeleteThanks Primetime @Bob. Hope my demonic mnemonics didn't cause you any agita.
ReplyDelete@Waxy, Lou Iofoca was the savior of Kreislur, not Ford.
ReplyDeleteIsn't Pig's girlfriend in "Pearls" named Agita? Pig gave his mom an electric chair today.
ASCRIBE(ing) Alan A with giving me AGITA before ANGST. Got to go see my ANALYST, ANNETTE, or is it ART(S), who sees me ATCOST. Sorry, I'll stop.
capcha: bodapte. When you've become accustomed to bodacious?
I must say I enjoyed this one quite a bit as a departure from your average Monday. The theme: simple but solid. The cluing: appropriate where it had to be, especially in the crosses for RIFIFI. It had a lively feel to it right from 1A, where I was going to enter ANGST, but saw that GOOGOLS was 2D and so went from there. I was going to say how my AGITA kicks up when certain people like to say "here's what *I* would do...", or other self-referential puzzle-conastructing comments; or those who say "can you imagine crossing UPTIME and OPENUP at the U?!", but I won't do that.
ReplyDeleteI've been getting into foreign films (Netflix, Zip, obscure video stores, avid film buff friend), and so I phoned this friend who is an expert, and asked him about RIFIFI. "Great, classic film", was his reply, and he has a copy! So I will see it soon.
capcha: kersyn adjunct to kerplop and kerplunk
Didn't know RIFIFI or KEITH MOON, (who I wish could have been QB Warren) yet the crosses were fair, and the puz was fun. Much more fun than the usual Mon.
ReplyDeleteOCTet, before OCTAD, and YEaS at first too. Slight objection to YEPS, should be YuPS, but these are just minor
nits.
@SIS and @Waxy GO HAWKS
I enjoyed this puzzle right up until I realised it had tricked me into thinking this was Wednesday.
ReplyDelete