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Miss Hungary of 1936 familiarly / SAT 5-28-16 / 1960s sitcom matriarch / Sights at Supercharger / Sound effect in comic BC / French frozen desserts / 1999 parody featuring starship Protector / Title brat of kid-lit
Saturday, May 28, 2016
Constructor: Frederick J. Healy
Relative difficulty: Easy
THEME: none
Word of the Day: ATTELET (20A: Decorative skewer for serving hors d'oeuvres) —
n. 1. (Cooking) a type of skewer with an ornamental handle which is used for holding foods for presentation at the table, but not while cooking. (thefreedictionary)
• • •
Constructing software (armed with a sizeable wordlist) can help constructors do really nice things, like running stacked 11s through stacked 11s (as in the center part of this grid). It can also convince you that putting stuff like SUL and THEICE and ATTELET in your puzzle is a good idea. Google didn't even believe me when I told it [define attelet]
I tore this thing up thanks to some very helpful letters in very helpful positions. Let's start with the letter "Z"—two of them, actually. First answer into the grid was ZSA ZSA (1D: Miss Hungary of 1936, familiarly). Why did I know that? Dunno. Just did. And I didn't "know" it. It just felt right. And right away—two "Z"s. Two high-value letters. I knew ZOT was right, and after trying A LIFE for 27A: "Get ___!" (A GRIP), I put in PATHS and thus got a grip on the NW corner. Done, and fast. PETE (or, to be precise, PE_E...) was there before I ever saw the clue at 14D: He said "You kind of live and die by the serve" (eloquent!), so no problem there. The most important answer for me in the top half, though, was SELIG (25A: Manfred succeeded him as baseball commissioner). Not only was it a gimme, but it gave me a terminal "G" at 7D: "Morning Mood" composer. I wrote in GRIEG reflexively, and that gave me all the first letters of the Acrosses in the NE. One letter in one easy answer opened an entire section of the puzzle right up.
[So ... "Peer Gynt" composer, really, then ...]
Bullets:
- IN STIR (18A: Doing time) — I have a vast reservoir of olde-timey expressions no one uses any more, like ... lots of synonyms for "money" and "jail." Speaking of olde-timey expressions: NATTY (38A: Spruced up). Got it off the "N."
- HAN SOLO (35D: [Spoiler alert!] He dies in "The Force Awakens") — cute clue, but Monday-easy.
- AS TO (48D: Repeated words in a multiple-count verdict) — can't say I like ASTO as fill, but I admire this highly original clue.
- STRIPE (12D: IBM logo feature) — that is the weirdest, randomest STRIPE clue ever. I can see the logo in my mind's eye, vaguely, but of all the STRIPE-y things in the universe ... blah. Pretty blah.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]
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71 comments:
Easy for me too. My experience was similar to @Rex's starting with ZSA ZSA and GALAXY QUEST as a gimmies. Tried to spell YIPPEE with an iE, went through ROd and ROy before LILY MUNSTER showed up, and ATTELET was a WOE, but that was about it.
Well not quite. I also had NIkE IRON for 34d which sorta made sense but CANE made much more sense than CAkE as a gag gift.
Not quite as lively as yesterday day's, but still a fine effort, liked it.
After solving (*) @Frederick Healy's Saturday puzzle, and reading @Rex's review which describes the aforesaid puzzle as easy, I have come to several conclusions: #1, I really need to get A_LIFE (er, make that A_GRIP); #2, I should see more science fiction/adventure movies -- got as far as GALAX... and now I can skip the latest Star Wars installment knowing that you-know-but-I-didn't-know-who dies therein; #3, All involved in surprising me for my 40th birthday, many years ago, missed the memo about CANES; #4, I'm glad to have missed out on fraternity parties with their BEER_CAN detritus. The * means, as is my wont, that I started to apply the "check" and "reveal" keys fifteen minutes into my "solve."
So, we have lummoxes in both 9- and 24-Down, and two truly different kinds of overseas heads in 32- and 44-Down. The PETE_SAMPRAS clue was an apt reminder of the style of this great tennis champion. No need to debate ON vs. IN when today we simply have THE_ICE. And thanks for not requiring us to know any specific rapper names when we are given HIP_HOP (that part I got), but--call me ELITIST--is it MUSIC??! GRIEG must be turning in his grave. Of course, the M required from 35-Across was hard to find when it overlapped DELUXE_HOTEL as my first stab for 17-Down, but even fixing that still left the ever-so-plausible DELUXE_MOTEL (@Rex would agree). HATH sounded suitably Shakespearean, but still needed one more letter, perhaps to compensate for SEPT as the answer for 49-Across being one letter too long.
I appreciated the mini-meditation on marriage, featuring a kind marrying PASTOR ministering to (Google informs me) the still-alive at age 99, nine-times-married ZSA_ZSA Gabor, who was a PRE_marital Miss Hungary 80 years ago. And it was interesting to be reminded of Albert Einstein's second wife, ELSA, the great man's cousin. Many scholar have concluded that Einstein's first wife, Mileva Marić, was a significant contributor to his revolutionary discoveries. Their 1919 divorce settlement included a provision that she would share in the financial windfall of his Nobel Prize, which he did not actually win until 1921 (but you didn't have to be an Einstein, or even a divorce lawyer, to know that it was inevitable).
I had GALAXY QUEST as my first long answer - and with the second A, confidently wrote in "andre Agassi" instead of PETE SAMPRAS ... who knew that the two tennis players had the same number of letters?
Husband recently returned from a business trip to Tokyo and brought me a beautiful, little Cloisonné vase. I so wanted that for 10D as I already had the C in place. It took me a while to figure out how to spell it and realized that it wouldn't fit. DAMN!
Got ZSA ZSA off of ZOT (being the cartoon zealot that I am) and the rest just fell into place.
ATTELET was a new one for this cooker. I'll not forget it and will now amaze people with my "big word" knowledge.
Love an easy Saturday.
I ZIPPEd along Rex's path through GRIEG, but then things got tough. I didn't know GALAXY QUEST and couldn't exactly remember PETE's last name. So I went table-hopping among the various quardrants until I was left with ELS? x ?TTELET: A, E, or I? Went with the A, but my YIPPEE at finishing was tempered by the thought that it wasn't the fairest of crosses.
Do-overs: ClosE before CEASE, sLIP before BLIP (confusion of airports with marinas; loved that clue), SUd before SUL.
It's not IN *the* STIR? Had oaf forever at 9D because oaf = Lummox. While ASS does not.
LILY MUNSTER! Any puz that references the lovely Yvonne DeCarlo is going to get a big thumbs up from me, even though I had problems in the NE since I was too hooked on OAF instead of the eventually correct ASS. Which is what I felt like after it all fell together. ;-)
I enjoyed this one, ATTELET notwithstanding.
Cheers,
Brennan
No objection to the two UPs?
@George Baraany: Please listen to the score from Hamilton. It may convince you that hip-hop is -- or can be -- music.
Can't report an easy one here. My cases don't close with ZIPPERs. Well, now I see they can. I guess. I went immediately to a briefcase or attaché case. Maybe we elitist snobs just own Coach cases that close with those pretty gold latches with the male and female parts. That make that satisfying thwap sound when you open them. And you look around to see if everyone appreciates your discerning taste.
I was the event planner at a country club and know my way round a skewered morsel. Never laid eyes on the word ATTELET. But I had to laugh at the clue "you kind of live and die by the serve." No, no, dear. You can't just use wooden toothpicks for the bacon-wrapped scallops. So pedestrian. Shudder. We'll use our sterling attelets and schedule extra staff to patrol lest Eloise's little brats don't figure out how to make them attelet atlatls to launch the little lamb kabobs.
I put in "busted" for the clue "gotcha" with no hesitation. You know – you catch your son (who is still looking for a job and living at home but trying really hard to be a considerate guy) drinking straight from the OJ container. Busted, buddy. To be fair, I came home two days ago, and he had vacuumed, emptied the dishwasher, done three loads of laundry and then folded all my clothes and I'm not making that up.
I also thought, but didn't commit to, "hard core red" for what those 28 states are.
Why, why, why do I head straight to "lav" first? LOO is always the number two choice. Sheesh.
I also laughed at THE ICE that gets broken at a mixer. With sturdy little pick to access all the beer someone put in ice and not on ice.
So anyway, I had a dnf because of IN STIR. That it wasn't "in jail" was clear immediately, so I tried to make "inside" work. That made my IBM logo a "steppe," and I felt unobservant. How had I not known that? And my fancy vase was fashioned out of "cui glass." Made a mental note to make sure I owned at least one. But that made 11D ELD_IST. Hmm. El deist? I guess that guy could be all high and mighty. But driving around in his natty little VW Gep kinda brings him down a peg.
I agree, though – nice marquee answers. Off to the Stumper.
On IBM and its STRIPE, note that SERIFS fits there and is more relevant. It took me a while to erase that (as well as AndreAgassi for PETESAMPRAS, like @Ron Painter above).
I also got ZSA ZSA pretty readily from Miss Hungary of 1936, familiarly, just by thinking "who is a well known Hungarian beauty from the middle of the 20th century?" It's a great example of a clue that's not exactly obvious, but worded carefully enough that a thoughtful solver can tease it out even without having known that Zsa Zsa Gabor was ever Miss Hungary in the first place.
Another clue I wanted to praise for its careful wording was 52A: Spills inadvertently. When I saw this, I wondered, what on earth? Why even say "inadvertently" there? How else would you spill something? And, of course, if "spill" is used in the sense of "divulge a secret," you absolutely can "spill" either inadvertently or on purpose. That's a beautifully written clue.
Enjoyed this one until I came to a grinding halt in the NE, where I had no chance with GLACES and INSTIR crossing GRIEG and CUTGLASS -- not to mention the oddly clued STRIPE and the tail end of ATTELET crossing the aforementioned GRIEG. I cannot understand how anyone can rate a puzzle "easy," even by Saturday standards, with that corner.
This would have been a record day if not for the DELUXEMO-EL/HA-ST crossing. I also had a T in there. It took a long time to time to find my error since some Shakespeare words can be a lot like rapper names to me.
I got ZSAZSA off of ZOT. I used to read BC in the Sunday funnies section. Ah, those were the days...do they even still have Sunday funnies any more?
I never got a CANE for my 40th B-day...nor know of anyone who got one. Black balloons, maybe. But not a cane. That's kind of an expensive gag gift.
I really liked LILYMUNSTER, though it was really random. I had junecleavER at first and felt pretty good about myself for getting that with only the -ER. But, flexibility!
As for HANSOLO, it was so easy it was made difficult. I couldn't believe that was the answer...and it made me even more suspicious that it fit. But I put it in there until I was proven wrong...which I wasn't.
Pretty easy Saturday.
I'm sure oN STIR would be just as a good. Speaking of which, if you didn't read the comments of yesterday's constructor you should. Of course, I may be biased since his opinions on his puzzle parallel my own.
There are WOEs, but ATTELET can only be called a WTF. OFL observed on Twitter yesterday that he ran into the esey "anent" in the wild twice last week. I will guarantee that the same will never happen to anyone regarding ATTELET. Worse, it caused an inadvertent and fixable DNF at the GTI/STRIPE crossing. I had no idea what a STRoPE might be, but GTo is definitely a car thing and ATTELET made STRoPE seem plausible. Otherwise an enjoyable solve.
Very easy a la Rex.
DNF as I never changed SNARe UP.
Best clue was ZIPPER which made ZSA ZSA a gimme. DELUXE MODEL opened up entire puzzle.
There was a crossword routine about BIG APES in an Abbott and Costello show that I cannot recall but it was hilarious!
Thanks FJH.
Yup, a fairly easy Saturday in this household too. SELIG our first gimme, and zipped in PETESAMPRAS off that E. We were off and running. Got a kick out of the "Spoiler Alert!", haven't seen the movie - we solved form the crosses, but couldn't help but peek (sigh).
We're quarreling here over who yelled "That has to be ZSAZSA" first. I usually pitch with an eightIRON, so 34d tough for me. Rex shouldn't complain about IN STIR given all his Marlow novels, I don't think the word jail exists in that world. We had MOtEL before MODEL at 17d, don't wanna think about that.
"GALAXY QUEST" is a really dumb parody of movies I've never really cared about, it features over-acting that would embarrass Jim Carrey. I've laughed myself silly all 10 times I've seen it - no idea why.
Gotta run to Walmart to buy some ATTELETs to hold my wieners, onions, and Jersey tomatoes on the Hibachi tonight. See ya.
OK, rub it in with all those "easy" comments. This was DNF for me. I never watched the Munsters (my loss, I know), and figured out the Portuguese South from the name of the Brazilian state, remembered incorrectly as Rio Grande de Sud. So I didn't have a hope on ATTELET.
Lots of other things held me up: GeleES before GLACES, "Right to work" (written in with a sigh) before NATO MEMBERS, rosin bag before NINE IRON (to go with Bud SELIG), but all those got fixed. I finally ran the alphabet to get LILY, but that was only after I cheated to get SUL. With a D in there, nothing worked.
I also got IN STIR right away, only to have Gelees give me 'lug,' so I changed it to the horrid IN gaol. And I thought a frat would get a keg (or two), but NEHI saved me on that time. No idea it was bottled in Cleveland, but a 4-letter soft drink is either cola or NEHI.
ROSE TEA is easy enough as a crossword answer, but does it actually exist? All the references my search engine turns up are to Red Rose Tea, a brand of orange pekoe.
@George_Barany -- I don't know this stuff very well either, but I think the "MUSIC" part of the clue is not a quality judgment (not that you can assign quality to a whole genre anyway) but to distinguish rap, the music, from other aspects of hip hop culture.
Young person's woe: At the end I was left with ATTE_ET and SU_ crossing _I_YMUNSTER. Never heard of the first, don't speak any Portuguese, and have never seen The Munsters. Very frustrating crosses.
Finished w/o google, do by definition, easy. It was hard for me, and INSTIR sounded so wrong that I tried GReiG thinking eNSTIR could somehow be less wrong-sounding.
A 1985 GTI was my first new car. $9 grand for the DELUXEMODEL. T hat car was literally the most bang for the buck fun to drive. Took the esses as if on rails, as they say.
In fact, I would beat the Porsche 911s through the esses at Lime Rock...an immensely satisfying feeling.
I didn't care that they would blow past me in the straight...any BIGAPE can go fast in a straight line... It's ZIPpering through the turns without LETting it SLIP that separated the girls from the men.
Thanks for a good Saturday, Mr. H.
As a crusty oldtimer, I had Lamarr (Hedy) instead of ZsaZsa and then Zorina (Vera), and I must admit I've never heard of GalaxyQuest. Sounds like a car. Plus I had Rene Lacoste instead of Sampras, and Forchet instead of that outlier attelet. Touche! Foiled again. Haha. Even so, I managed to finish this puzzle without cheating and in near-record time. A swift and fun Saturday.
medium Saturday for me, and I imagine there's a sharp generational divide on this one. never seen the munsters, didn't know zot or zsa zsa. didn't know Grieg which made instir quite difficult as well. luckily hansolo and petesampras were such gimmies. also, as a golfer, I don't think I've ever seen anyone use a nineiron to pitch, which is a shot almost universally done with one of several wedges
When I finish Saturday's puzzle on Friday night, I'm not happy. Now what am I going to do? What I'm saying is that it was too easy.
So he dies, does he? I won't tell my wife and spoil it for her, too. (Though I did tell her that a character we know and love dies. Wookie?)
Anyway, a lovely puzzle but too easy for Saturday.
Very challenging for me, even with gettting "zsazsa," "grieg," "glaces," "selig" and "petesampras" right away. Oh, and "assessed," too. But it was a lot of work from there on, never having heard of an "attelet" in my long life and not sure of how to go south in Portuguese: sur? sud? And clue for "blip" was hard. Anyhow, liked it by the time I finished, which was a loooong time.
I started with ZSA ZSA and get A ROOM, but that was easily fixed. GALAXY QUEST was anything but a gimme, even with GALA in place, and the east side of the puzzle as a whole played harder for me. Really really liked the clue for NATO MEMBERS.
I'm GOBSMACKED by the people who found this easy. It wasn't easy at all for me, and I naticked on two letters. I didn't know ATTELET (was missing the L); I didn't know LILY MUNSTER; and I thought that "south" in Brazil was either SUD or SUR. Never thought of SUL. Now if I'd been in a crossword tournament, and gotten this close on a challenging, but fun puzzle, I would have been ready to shoot myself. In a non-tournament setting, I'll do what I always do in similar situations: I'll pat myself on the back for not cheating, and pronounce this puzzle "solved" -- which is just about almost was.
I was thinking that even we oldsters wouldn't remember who Miss Hungary of 1938 was -- and, indeed, why in the world should we? -- and then ZSA ZSA sashayed in at 1D. And when I saw her, I said "Aha." Didn't know CANES were given as 40th birthday gag gifts. Doesn't seem all that uproarious to me, to tell the truth. Had enough letters to see PETE SAMPRAS immediately. Loved the clue for 40D. Had CLOSE before CEASE at 30A. Bet many others did too. Bet we were supposed to make that mistake. All in all, a really nice puzzle, I thought.
@George B -- I loved your post today -- especially on ZSA ZSA and on Einstein's wives. But I do enthusiastically second @Conrad's 7:09 comment: To gain a new respect for HIPHOP, listen to the score of "Hamilton." And, remember, this is coming from someone with a very limited tolerance for modern pop music.
@lms -- Always remember: LAV is here and LOO is over there. Across the pond, as they say.
YIPPEE, I got a rap clue...
After yesterday's harrumph, today was the DELUXE MODEL.
Like you @chefwen, I was trying for the cloisonne but I can't spell it anyway. I looked at that clue for ages. CUT GLASS, so simple...
@Loren, your VW GEP made me laugh...Gas Emission Parody?
GALAXY QUEST took me longer than I wanted because I've never heard of it. ATTELET new one for me and I promise never to utter it.
@George...Good post!
Hi Leapy!
Why do I love hamburgers and hot dogs so much?
Agh, puzzles are sweeter when you're solving in the Vermont woods. It's a good thing I finally watched the latest Star Wars flick last week or my mellowness would have evaporated when I saw 35D. As a rule, I would like to suggest that WS nix all spoilers from alternate genres for a good long time period. In the digital age everything old can be enjoyed for the first time via Netflix and Amazon.
I have to confess to some help today from my DIL, when I couldn't fathom the first name of Mrs. MUNSTER. Without the L, ATTELET was impossible. Actually it was impossible with the L too! In my ign;orance I just called them mini skewers.
@Nancy, I'm happy you had a tennis clue today. I know you'll rejoice.
Easy-medium for me, and hand up for Deluxe motel. I needed all the crosses for attelet. I have some skewers with decorative ends, but they go on the bbq. Tonight for the first time.
My husband once gave an oversized tennis racket with a cane handle to a friend with a big birthday.
On to the stumper. Indoor day, it's much too hot in CT.
"Morning MOOD" annoyed the heck out of me. I think they added the word 'mood' for some new-agey 'increase your toddler's IQ by force-feeding him Mozart and stuff' recording."If it's Grieg I'm not doing the rest of the puz" I said, and I didn't.
The whole point of labeling something a [spoiler] is that it allows people to avoid it. The spoiler tag means don't read this if you don't want to know about the experience/info/whatever. You can't do that with a crossword clue. So essentially, that cluing not only ruins the surprise for those who don't know, but also breaks the rule of how you're supposed to use spoilers on the internet.
And curse Sir Walter Raleigh he was such a stupid GTI. Seriously, never heard if that MODEL of car, so DNF. Even if I had put down STRIPE I would not have remembered it in relation to IBM.
I had no compunction in Googling for LILY Munster. But I did get HAN SOLO. Maybe the only movie I've seen this year. Did get PETE SAMPRAS off the PE-E. In the SW, I confidently put down "Elaine" for the brat, before NINE IRON forced ELOISE. Not a popular name now, but when i was a little boy that was the name of the girl who lived next door to me.
Hands up for DELUXE "hotel" before MODEL.
I'm with @Nancy. This wasn't easy. I got the NW easily and much of the rest but dang! No way I'd know Ms. Munster. And down SUL? Finally googled for NIN (beats me why I didn't recognize the dear stalwart). Lots of blank space there for a long time. Ultimately ended with the DELUXEMOtEL. Ugh! But I do think it was a good puzzle. Saturday's are supposed to be hard and on this gloomy Saturday, nice to have something to share with my coffee.
@OISK from yesterday, if I am looking for a New York Times while traveling, I generally find one at the nearest Starbucks. They seem to have a deal with the Times to stock the paper, along with the local paper. I'm pretty sure I was able to get the Times at a Starbucks in Park City when we stayed there for a few nights years ago.
Not easy for me. I did the NW corner fast - knew Zsa Zsa immediately, for some reason. Then things slowed, but did still okay in the SW and SE. And then got stuck.
The center was hopeless because I'd never heard of that movie or that person, Pete Sampras (I don't enjoy sports & don't follow it). The NE was a lost cause because I couldn't get a handle anywhere. I didn't know Grieg was the composer, and though I could picture the IBM logo, I still couldn't imagine what word described it that started with S.
Not easy at all for me. DNF.
Agree with @conrad and @nancy re Hamilton.
The strength of the puzzle today for me was in the cluing with many delights: ZIPPER, LETSSLIP, DONNED, PATHS, NINEIRON, NATOMEMBERS. I wanted "rosin bag" for the pitcher's aid, then thought maybe the clue meant an aid for salespeople, before the answer finally revealed itself.
What do I want from a Saturday puzzle? A mighty but fair fight with a shot at victory. Some BLIPs, sometimes feeling like I need a CANE, but with an eventual satisfying RESULT. And Frederick, you delivered. Thank you sir.
I had the E in SELIG and A in GALAXY QUEST, and confidently put in Ilie Nastase, and thought, how nice to have his whole name in the puzzle. It was quickly fixed, but here we have a third tennis player with the same number of letters.
One that I know of 😉.
I'm with Lobster, Nancy et al who are perplexed at the easy rating. While I did find significant portions of the puzzle reasonably easy, there is just no way I can agree with an easy rating with the ne. As previously noted, lummox is a clumsy and perhaps implicitly a stupid person but, an ass as a descriptive term is an entirely different matter that is clearly a comment on the personality and is an indication of what that person chooses to be. None but a slapstick comedian would choose to be a lummox.
I could certainly do without in stir, attelet (which spellchecker does not want to accept) or Grieg as well.
Much of the rest of this effort was decent and interesting. However, I do wish the head(s) overseas would be forever removed from crosswords. It is not that I don't get them every time. It is just that I think we are all past being tired of them, no?
Me, too, bud! I had a pretty good go of it on the way up, but WOE'd to a halt in the NE. Glaces ... attelet ... huh? Not as tough as a typical Saturday, but still ... DNF; bummer.
I was a big PETE SAMPRAS fan growing up, and even I had to laugh at the boringness of the most interesting quote they could attribute to him.
Any reference to "Galaxy Quest" is awesome. I think it ranks as one of the top five funniest all-ages movies in history.
I had the exact same solving experience as Rex. I mean exact. The gimmes were the same. I knew it had to be zsazsa, because who else would it be that fit? I knew Galaxy Quest and Selig. The other stuff took a little work, but the operative word is "little." Not hard enough for a Saturday. Now about to do an acrostic that will be not hard enough. Getting frustrated with Shortz.
@Georgebarany As with all genres, much is crap. But should you care to find out what makes hip hop or rap great, try Tupac, or Notorious BIG or A Tribe Called Quest or Nas. Even JayZ.
Natcked on ATTELET and LILYMUNSTER. I'm an Addams Family kind of guy.
Had SUD instead of SUL, so Mrs. MUNSTER's first name just wasn't registerin, for many extra precious nanoseconds. ATTELET/GRIEG/GLACES was all safely in the no idea column. The big boys in grid central (GALAXYQUEST, etc.) were what saved M&A's bacon. Probably more of a "medium" solvequest, in the M&A Galaxy, overalls.
Don't know what got into my head, when I wanted PASTER, before PASTOR. {"Get ___!"} is a nice, feisty, full-of-possibilities clue. AROOM was first reaction. fave Weeject Cafe patron = GTI. (Better clue: {Git all messed up??}.) Honrable mention to that ZOT in the ZSAZSA.
themelessthUmbsUp, and thanx, F.J.
Masked & Anonymo6Us
crash course in runtpuzzletry:
**gruntz**
This went down two minutes faster than yesterday's so yes it was easy. It would have been super easy if I had known what came after GALAXY or was more familiar with the name GRIEG. I hate to admit it but getting the Q of QBS and the CU of CUEIN took some thinking. There are moments in otherwise easy solves when your brain suddenly decides to take a little break.
I was an Addams Family fan. The Munsters never appealed to me so I had to change SUR to SUL to get LILY. As to ATTELET I consider it the highlight of the puzzle. It's just the kind of unknown rarity I expect from a Saturday.
If you're unfamiliar with INSTIR watch "The Shawshank Redemption". Morgan Freemans character uses it in a voice over monologue when he's worried that the Tim Robbins character is committing suicide.
@George,love your comment: it lit up the whole solve.
I also got into having the whole thing all over again with yesterday's BEER and ICE. Except that I figured the frat'd have a kegger, so had a BEERcup instead of a CAN. In the Loo. Was CLOSE to CEASE, but no other write-overs cause I went slow and careful: I wasn't about to get into a RaTRACE.
Some personal likes:
Had just watched a tennis clip that showed PETE SAMPRAS giving the line judge The Stare after a questionable call. I call that serendipity.
Enjoyed having AGRIP 'in a' puzzle, despite no Nero or Caligula. Little boots on the ground.
Had just read a piece on what used to be called the HADST RON Supercollider. The current DELUXE MODEL now may have found a surprise massive particle, but nonetheless has recently suffered a power outage after a Beech Marten chewed through a transformer power cable. Seems DELUXE is still on the side of the rodents.
Pleased to see star billing for the fancy sandwich picks as I've always been an ATTALETic supporter.
Best was the double nod to the PASTOR MUNSTER, the INSTIRminably Barred of Quincy. Howie m'luv,if you're out there, have a Happy Memorial Day weekend.
The same to all y'all out there. Don't let your NINE_IRON RUST.
@Tita...Shut the door, girl! You were racing at Lime Rock? In a VW? And winning? You are too cool and I bet it was red.
I started with 27A putting get 'a room' very quickly ... .... Don't know what that says about me. Zsa zsa and Eloise were my other certainties and at least those were right. Any time I finish a Saturday puzzle without help, I know Rex will say it was easy. A nice mix of generational clues I thought. The aforementioned (correct)gimmes for this old solver and then hip hop and galaxy quest to make me feel young ))). .. I enjoyed this one!
Hopeless.
The Saturday puzzles used to be my weekend treat, tough and clever. Now not so tough or clever. B.C. hasn't appeared in my local paper in ages. ATTELET? But still better than REALTROOPER. 10-4
@George Barany, I bet I use Check more than you do. I'm so morally compromised I even use it on Mondays. But I try to maintain some standards and avoid Reveal ...even if it means running the alphabet, Checking after every letter.
I thought a lot of the answers were a little off, starting with ASS instead of OAF for lummox, and SO I SEE for "Gotcha". But others were a lot of fun, like NATO MEMBERS. (The only time I can think of where "NATO members" are anything but scary.).
Oh, and GALAXY QUEST is one of my faves. Those who haven't seen it should put down your puzzles and go watch it. It's on Netflix, or you can pay to watch it on Amazon (because your Prime subscription gets you practically nothing), or Vudu, or Google Play,or Fandango (huh, who knew? tired of selling tickets, they stream now). What are you waiting for?
NATTY means exactly the opposite of what it should.
@Hartley...yes, it was red! Every car I've bought has been what I've dubbed Arrest-me Red.
@Larry 7:02pm, Remember that broken GLASS CUTs both ways. 'S hard.
When you're at the fish market shopping for dinner, make sure what you're getting is real grooper.
A cane for your 40th, huh?
Which birthday earns you the oxygen tank?
Not easy for me, and I didn't much care for it. Never heard of ATTELET, though I eventually guessed it correctly, and I have no idea what COATED cheese would be (cheese with a rind? If so, bleah). Eventually I got everything except the Portuguese SUL (I kept trying to work in SUD and SUR, both of which are Spanish), without which I had LIDY... or LIRY...). Morticia I would have remembered.
For the first - and likely last - time, I knew a car answer. Former GTI driver.
Don't know what the time limit is on movie spoilers, but this was waaaay too soon.
SOISEE RESULT
ELSA, the DELUXEMODEL, DONNED a slip,
her NEHI socks and NATTY slippers,
I said, “LETSSLIP out.” I’d HOPED she’d get AGRIP
ASI ASSESSED things PASTOR ZIPPER.
--- RON TESLAS
I can’t believe there isn’t more uproar as a RESULT of two UPs and three, yes count ‘em, three INs. SNARLUP TORNUP CUEIN INSONG INSTIR. This puz must be by one of OFL’s pals or ELSA he’s asleepwritin’. Normally, one instance of that sort of thing would have been TORNUP into shreds. But two? And a triple at that? The words ELITIST SNOB come to mind.
Not that I didn’t enjoy the puz, I usually don’t notice those BLIPs. Two words written over at SUd and BEERCup, but they fixed themselves.
Attaching MUSIC to HIPHOP might be stretching it.
SOISEE ZSAZSA must have been a yeah baby back in her day, but she and her sisters never really did much for me. CUEIN Green Acres theme here.
One of the Natashas I dated in Odessa, Ukraine used realNATTY in her email address, and that she was, in all states of dress. Yeah baby.
Any puz with a RON in it can’t be too bad, despite the INs and UPs. Long and longish answers were pretty good, though I don’t know when next I will use the term ATTELET. @BS might.
Saw the d in deluxe model right off. Deluxe motel? Never wold have entered my mind. Must be a generational thing. Had trouble until I got off the Galaxy Queen.
Not quite easy--though for a change the NW fell into my lap. I thought many of the modern generation might have more trouble with it, not knowing ZSAZSA, but I guess I underestimated her staying power.* The lady is without question today's DOD.
*But that's another story. Despite many gimmes, I almost DNF because of GTI. Never heard of it. GTO, sure. But what's a STRoPE? Dunno. There's the barber's STROP, and the poet's STROPHE...and anyway, doesn't that logo have STRIPEs? So I changed it to an I--though I wholeheartedly agree the clue is arbitrary as hell. Feature of: spokesanimal Tony, or some home outfits, or...well, you get the idea.
"Wasn't sure, say" is a rotten clue for HOPED. These are not the same things. For example, I'm not sure that rap = HIPHOPMUSIC (aren't they two distinct forms?), but I HOPE nothing. I supremely do not care one way or the other. Well, I guess I momentarily HOPED that was the correct answer in the puzzle!
Raggedy around the edges, this one doesn't live up to the potential started by that wonderful long middle. It's a par, as if he stiffed a NINEIRON and then blew the short birdie putt. C'est la GTI vie.
Its rare that I and @Rex solve a puzzle similarly, but today ZSA ZSA was my first entry, then ZIPPER, SELIG, GRIEG, and so forth. Of course the Sci-fi film was an unknown for me, and it took awhile before I realized that the 28 states were countries.
One write-over when I put in sLIP for the airport spot, stupidly, so when I got LETS SLIP, had a d'uh moment and corrected to BLIP.
Otherwise, a pretty smooth puzzle in the medium range, for me, and I liked it.
After working hard to get the central puzzle solved, I dnf'd in the NE. Had my person doing time "inside" and I was sure of it. So I just kept shaking my head.
Had get a room before GRIP, but that quickly changed.
Now I can add ATTELETs to my vocabulary - I have seen them but didn't have a name.
Challenging Sat. for me.
Diana, Lady-in-Waiting for Crosswords
Yes, this one was relatively easy, after seeing it in completed form. But I ATTELET this one go when it exceeded my self-imposed time limit on an otherwise active weekend.
So, objectively easy, but a voluntary DNF today.
DNF'd because I stayed at the DELUXEMOtEL littered with BEERCANS and CUTGLASS.
I was slowed down in the NE because I couldn't think of the rapper who wrote "Morning Wood".
40D reminds me of my friend John who would say "Fat penguin" in bars and then would say "I was just thinking of something to break the ice.
@Woody204 - effin' hilarious, come back often.
And @rainy I look for all you guys every day, don't ever stop, any of you.
What an odd mix of easy-peasy and all-but-impossible. Delighted to see GALAXYQUEST featured front and center, and enjoyed seeing ZOT for the first time in ages. But sad to say I had absolutely no clue on the ATTELET/SUL/LILYMUNSTER CROSSING.
@Wooody - Don't remember seeing you before, but "Fat Penguin" made me laugh!
Diana,LIW
Not sure what prompted the inclusion of the link to Endicott by Kid Creole and the Coconuts, but loved seeing it. Did not realize anyone else on the planet remembered that very minor "hit." Gives me hope that I might see "If You Want to be Happy" at some point.
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