THEME:imaginary new products from Apple, all beginning with "i" (a la iPad, iPod, etc.), all of which are puns on words/phrases starting with "eye":
Theme answers:
iLIFT (14A: New push-up bra from Apple?)
iBALL (8D: New sports equipment from Apple?)
iSTRAIN (12D: New colander from Apple?)
iSHADOW (40D: New tracking device from Apple?)
iDROP (52D: New parachute from Apple?)
iLASH (66A: New whip from Apple?)
Word of the Day:Robert EDEN(36A: British P.M. between Churchill and Macmillan) —
Robert Anthony Eden, 1st Earl of Avon, KG, MC, PC (12 June 1897 – 14 January 1977) was a British Conservative politician who served three periods as Foreign Secretary and then a relatively brief term as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1955 to 1957. [...] His worldwide reputation as an opponent of appeasement, a "Man of Peace", and a skilled diplomat was overshadowed in 1956 when the United States refused to support the Anglo-French military response to the Suez Crisis, which critics across party lines regarded as an historic setback for British foreign policy, signalling the end of British predominance in the Middle East. Most historians argue that he made a series of blunders, especially not realising the depth of U.S. opposition to military action. Two months after ordering an end to the Suez operation he resigned as Prime Minister on grounds of ill health, and because he was widely suspected of having misled the House of Commons over the degree of "collusion" with France and Israel. (wikipedia)
• • •
Found this one pretty GRIM, for a boatload of reasons. As soon as I worked out iLIFT in the NW, all hope drained out of me. A bunch of *&$^ing "i-" words? Nonsense words? All over my grid? Lord, why? At that point, I didn't see the "eye" pun, but once I did, I didn't care. It didn't add anything pleasurable to the experience of putting fake i-products in the grid. Further, the theme material here is Obscenely thin. 34 squares by my count. That is Nothing. Your thinnest themes usually have ~40. And there are a ton of potential themers on the table. iPATCH and iTEST and iLINER iLIDS iCHART iLEVEL iCANDY iTEETH etc. etc. Then there's the matter of non-theme i-answers in the grid—a serious elegance f*&%-up. If your (superthin) theme involves i-starters, then no other answers should be i-starters. It's not hard to do. In fact, this grid almost does it, but for the inexplicable IBID / IED crossing, and then INA. Why is no one thinking of these little details? Again, there's hardly any theme here. No pressure on grid. Make it nice. And the fill, ugh. It's probably not too far below NYT average, but I mentally checked out at BOTA (30A: Leather bag for wine). With so little theme pressure, grid should've been soooooooo much better than it was. There is a germ of an idea here, but it's very awkwardly and poorly expressed here.
Appears the puzzle was considered overeasy at some point and so some of the clues were toughened up. That EDEN clue, yeesh. Prime Minister for like 2 years in the '50s? Sure, I know that ... :( ... That one's position near BOTA made that section a little rough-going. I had FORESEEN before FORETOLD (42A: Predicted), conflated WMD and IED and ended up at first with IMD, totally blanked on the meaning of [Perfidy] (!?!?) (DECEIT), and then misread 1D: Casual greetings (HIS) as a singular and wrote in HEY. There were what felt like a bunch of non-theme "?" clues too, esp. up front. Still, low 4s is a pretty normal Wed. time for me.
Relative difficulty:Medium-Challenging (*for a Tuesday*) (3:51)
THEME:"THE JOY OF COOKING" (40A: Classic kitchen volume ... or a hint to 18-, 24-/53- and 62-Across) — themers are two-word food items where the second word is a rough synonym for "JOY"
Theme answers:
ORANGE ZEST (18A: Marmalade ingredient)
TURKISH / DELIGHT (24A: With 53-Across, a sugary treat)
CORN RELISH (62A: Sweet and tangy picnic side dish)
Word of the Day:HAMAN(35A: Purim villain) —
Haman (Also known as Haman the Agagite המן האגגי, or Haman the evil המן הרשע) is the main antagonist in the Book of Esther, who, according to the Hebrew Bible, was a vizier in the Persian empire under King Ahasuerus, traditionally identified as Xerxes I. As his name indicates, Haman was a descendant of Agag, the king of the Amalekites, a people who were wiped out in certain areas by King Saul and David. (wikipedia)
• • •
Harder and weirder than most Tuesdays. Can't say clunkier, 'cause Tuesday's gonna clunk, historically speaking, that's for sure, and this one clunked about the normal amount ... but definitely harder and weirder. I like the germ of an idea that is underneath / behind this puzzle. When I finished, I honestly had no idea what was going on for ... about 5-10 seconds. That's actually an eternity when compared against the time it takes me to understand most Tuesday themes, which is no time. First thought was "those are foods ... you don't really 'cook' them ... I mean, you do ... but they're cold, so ... but ... where's the joy?" Then I realized why we were presented with this insane menu from the Association for Strange Food Cravings picnic: DELIGHT, JOY, RELISH. That's the "joy." It's a long, convoluted way to go for a joke. I admire the ambition, and I realize that there can't have been a lot of potential themers to work with. Pretty narrow straits. Still, between oddness of (cold) food types and that oddly split themer, I thought the execution here only so-so.
Played significant harder than most Tuesdays. Cluing often veered toward Friday. 30A: It might end with an early touchdown (RED EYE). That is a great clue, but one that probably should've been saved for when that serious ambiguity of wording (football "touchdown"?) could've helped toughen up a puzzle that requires toughening up. This one did not require it. Took me (comparatively) forever just to get out of the NW. I mean 1A: Croquet needs (PEGS)??? I see balls ... mallets ... those little arced goal thingies you hit the ball through ... and I'm out. I mean, when you show me PEGS, I can kind of see them, but a. no one really plays croquet and b. that is the damnedest clue for word like PEGS, which has So Many potential clues. I also had HOLD for BIND up there (17A: Secure). Only because I knew ELIHU did I get that all sorted out without serious solving time damage. But the difficulty / strangeness / wavelength issues just kept coming. From the feeling of "which touchdown?" to the feeling of "which Homer?" at 48A: Image of Homer, perhaps (CEL). And the SE corner: [Words to live by] in five letters? I got at least two other ideas before the (singular!) TENET occurs to me. No idea Beethoven was born in BONN. [Mother ___]!? Yes, LODE, that works, but that is down the list of Mother ___ things that might occur to me. None of this is really the puzzle's fault. Shoulda been a Wednesday, probably. Grid is decent, without too much junk, and with some interesting longer Downs.
THEME: DUCK, DUCK, GOOSE (58A: Children's game ... or the circled words in 20-, 28- and 48-Across) — embedded in each themer is (in order) a duck, a duck, and a goose:
Theme answers:
TRIBUTE ALBUMS (20A: "Bowiemania" and "Come Together: America Salutes the Beatles")
APARTHEID ERA (28A: 1948-94, in South Africa)
SWORN ENEMIES (48A: Bitter rivals)
Word of the Day:NADINE Gordimer(50D: Literature Nobelist Gordimer) —
Well I thought this was lovely. Very simple, but perfectly executed. Those are, indeed, a duck a duck and a goose, respectively. Plus the theme answers themselves were fairly novel. Clever, neat, easy—I really don't expect much more from my Mondays. Actually, scratch that last sentence, as it implies that doing this sort of thing is easy. If it were, I'd be writing something sunny like this every Monday. The truth is, coming up with a neat Monday theme concept, and then executing it cleanly, is really quite hard. There aren't that many people I trust to do it on a regular basis. Writing easy puzzles of high quality is, in fact, tough. So while I don't expect more from my Mondays than "clever, neat, easy," that actually ends up being a reasonably high bar.
I could've done without ABORC (which I always read as a single word—like some discarded Tolkien creature), and EDUCE (a word that always makes me want to egest my lunch), and ENACTOR (it's a word, but just barely) and PONES (OK in the singular, but somehow grating in the plural). Everything else is clean, though. I have a weird lot of admiration for CROP UP (54A: Appear, as problems). It's just a nice, crisp phrase, and, yeah, it duplicates the "UP" from GUSSIED UP, but that's a pretty minor dupe. Nice to have NADINE Gordimer (anti-apartheid writer) to offset the downerness of APARTHEID ERA. I also like NOGOODNIK. How do you not like NOGOODNIK? It's among the best of the -niks, along with refuse and beat and peace. I am going to beat it now, so I can eat some more birthday cake. Peace.
Relative difficulty:A few clicks over average for an experienced but not professional solver.
THEME:"Mixology" — Words -- some in circles alternating with some not in circles -- are mixed together to form new words. A "mixologist" is a fancy word for "bartender"; I was hoping for a theme along the alcoholic line, but perhaps that's wishful thinking as we wind down the holiday weekend.
Word of the Day:SANTORINI(83D: Island whose volcanic eruption is rumored to have destroyed Atlantis) —
Santorini (Greek: Σαντορίνη, pronounced [sandoˈrini]), classically Thera (English pronunciation /ˈθɪərə/), and officially Thira (Greek: Θήρα [ˈθira]), is an island in the southern Aegean Sea, about 200 km (120 mi) southeast of Greece's mainland. It is the largest island of a small, circular archipelago which bears the same name and is the remnant of a volcaniccaldera. It forms the southernmost member of the Cyclades group of islands, with an area of approximately 73 km2 (28 sq mi) and a 2011 census population of 15,550. It is the most active volcanic centre in the South Aegean Volcanic Arc,
though what remains today is chiefly a water-filled caldera. The
volcanic arc is approximately 500 km (310 mi) long and 20 to 40 km (12
to 25 mi) wide. The region first became volcanically active around 3–4
million years ago, though volcanism on Thera began around 2 million
years ago with the extrusion of dacitic lavas from vents around the Akrotiri. The island is the site of one of the largest volcanic eruptions in recorded history: the Minoan eruption (sometimes called the Thera eruption), which occurred some 3,600 years ago at the height of the Minoan civilization. The eruption left a large caldera surrounded by volcanic ash deposits hundreds of metres deep and may have led indirectly to the collapse of the Minoan civilization on the island of Crete, 110 km (68 mi) to the south, through a gigantic tsunami. Another popular theory holds that the Thera eruption is the source of the legend of Atlantis. (Wikipedia)
• • •
Laura here, guest-posting as a birthday gift for Rex. You know what would be cool, faithful blog readers? How about donating to the blog as your birthday gift to Rex? (Either by PayPal via the link above or via SNAILED [64A: Moved at a crawl] mail.) He has written this thing every single day of every year for the past decade, save for a few days here and there from us guest-posters. That's maybe 340-ish days per year, brought to you ad-free (unlike puzzle host publication The New York Times), all out of the goodness of his heart (and he is a real person, with thoughts and feelings and a heart), and all because he's interested in and dedicated to solving puzzles. You know what I'm thankful for, this holiday season? This blog. Its MIXOLOGY has brought us together. Maybe I'm not fully clear on why or how, but it has, after all (as with the theme answers [see what I did there]).
122A: Day of the month (IDES) + Succeed (PAN OUT) = Some recital pieces (PIANO DUETS)
"Hmmm ..." That's a lot of themers. I need the services of a mixologist after typing out all of those. Felt like a very classic theme; nothing too sparkly or hip, but very familiar and homey (kind of like my Thanksgiving dinner). I wanted 119A: Network with 303 stations to be PUBLIC RADIO but no fit. Fill came together smoothly, if not too excitingly, some fresh (48D: Chain that sells chains [ZALES]) and some stale (118D: Bygone boomers, for short [SSTS]). The WNW gave me some trouble; could not get the obvious 62A: ___ season (DEER) even thought that's what it is right now here in northern New England. Also, there was quite a spate of geography trivia in the southern hemisphere of the grid, including the aforementioned Word of the Day (SANTORINI): 81D: After Rainier, highest peak in the Pacific Northwest (MT ADAMS); 91D: Capital where Robert Louis Stevenson died (APIA) (capital of Samoa); 110A: Remote land in the Pacific (NAURU). Send a postcard via 99A: Correo ____ (foreign mail stamp) (AEREO).
Bullets:
32A: In Tahitian it means "good" (MAITAI) — Here's our mixology! Usually we see this clued as "Mai ___" or "___ Tai" so it was refreshing (much like a MAITAI) to guess at the whole word. For the last word on MAITAIs in crosswords, listen to this refreshing new podcast.
14A: "Back to the Future" antagonist (BIFF Tannen). I've had enough with bullies. Do we need to go back in time to fix things?
Had to flat-out guess the last letter: guessed right, which means NATAL must've been somewhere in the back of my brain, but yikes, that is not a great cross. Definite Natick territory there, as LAMPED is (as its clue says) "British slang," so not likely familiar to most solvers (incl. me). Just a rough, rough cross. Should've set off alarms. But oh well, I got it right. I liked this puzzle fine, though it is perhaps overfond of proper nouns (current, to their credit, but still...). I know WHAT'S APP solely because of the fact that [Facebook acquired it in 2014 for $19.3 billion]—I've literally never heard of it or seen it in any other context—so that answer is current but dull to me. I had no idea MUSLIM ERA was a thing (29A: Religious period dating from A.D. 622). PANERA, sure, but MUSLIM ERA? News to me. I don't believe in RURALIST. Like, I don't believe anyone uses that word or identifies with that word or anything. The clue uses "city slicker" as RURALIST's counterpart, but the thing is, "city slicker" is a term that has been used. By humans. Living humans. Who in the world calls people from rural areas RURALISTs? Sounds like a term that a time-traveling Victorian might use. "I say, where might one find suitable accommodations in Nebraska? I am unfamiliar with the ways of you RURALISTs." I also totally disbelieve in PRIED UP (!?!?!) (8D: Raised, as a trapdoor). Oh, and noir detectives (and their novels) are hard-boiled, not HARD-EDGED (40A: Like noir detective novels, typically). Come on.
On the other hand, I did like TINFOIL HAT, and (with a heaping dose of ironic nostalgia) ACE OF BASE (both of them gimmes). PUB GOLF was also, oddly, a gimme, in that I knew it had to be [something] GOLF, and since drinking was involved ... and the remaining bit was three letters ... PUB (33A: Drinking game where each bar that's visited is considered a hole). I guess it could've been "BAR," but I had that stupid trapdoor answer ending in "UP," hence the "P," hence PUB. "F" from GOLF made EGOSURF easy, so no trouble up there. I never saw "THE MARTIAN" (16A: Sci-fi hit whose tagline is "Bring him home"), but I'm Twitter-friends with one of the producers because a. we went to the same college, and b. he is a crossword solver. I have a feeling Paolo Pasco knows this, as I am Twitter-friends with him as well (he is my daughter's age, btw). Speaking of age, today is my birthday. I am older than today's constructor and younger than dirt. It's an OK age to be. That is all. I need to go see how my birthday cake turned out...
Word of the Day:ELLA Raines(6D: Actress Raines of "Tall in the Saddle") —
Ella Wallace Raines (born Ella Wallace Raubes, August 6, 1920 – May 30, 1988) was an American film and television actress. // Born Ella Wallace Raubes near Snoqualmie Falls, Washington, Ella Raines studied drama at the University of Washington and was appearing in a play there when she was seen by Howard Hawks. She became the first actor signed to the new production company he had formed with the actor Charles Boyer, "B-H Productions", and made her film debut in Corvette K-225 in 1943. Immediately following her role in that film, she was cast in the all female war film Cry 'Havoc', made the same year. In 1944, she appeared soon after D-Day as a most classy pin-up in the GI magazine, Yank. She starred in a series of big films including the film noirPhantom Lady, the comedy Hail the Conquering Hero, and the John Wayne western Tall in the Saddle. Soon, she began appearing in such films as 1945's The Strange Affair of Uncle Harry with Geraldine Fitzgerald and George Sanders and the 1947 thriller The Web. With the exception of Brute Force, in which Raines appeared with Burt Lancaster, none of her later films were nearly as successful as her previous movies and her career began to decline. (wikipedia)
• • •
Two puzzles. N/NW was the first—hard—and then the rest was the rest—mostly very easy. Took as long to do the N/NW as it did to do the rest of the grid. Maybe if I'd known who ELLA Raines was, or knew my cello attachments, or could see my way to any confident entries besides BOA and ARID, things might've been different up there, but ye gods. 1A: Strongly disparage (BASH) could've been many things. 14D: Marathon runner's bane (HILL) could've been many, many things. I went through all the 4x4s I knew, and while "piece of wood" crossed my mind, BEAM did not. Had RNS for MDS (32A: Ward healers, for short). Nice clue on TRAWL, but very hard (19A: Drag out of a bed?). So I had to claw for every damn answer up there. I think I got SEER and then inferred WAR at the end of 4D: Open hostilities (HOT WAR), and then put the "L" after the "W" before eventually getting TRAWL. Once IMPALA fell (23A: 1958 Chevrolet debut), then I crawled back up and across those long Acrosses (neither of which was anywhere near obvious).
But after that—no resistance. BYPRODUCTS went down easy (15D: Unlooked-for results). I stupidly went with RASSLE instead of RUSTLE at 25A: Take stock? and BAH instead of HEY at 9D: Affronted shout, and those errors caused some trouble, but not much. LEGOLAS helped me get the NE sorted (11D: Orlando Bloom's "The Lord of the Rings" role), and then I backed into LESSON PLAN and immediately dropped all those 5-letter Downs in the middle. Eventually, I was barely looking at clues. Got HEAVENSENT without looking (40A: Arriving at just the right moment). ESAU and TERM, same thing. HORATIO (37D: Speaker of the line in 40-Down) didn't even require my checking the cross-reference. I remembered "HAMLET" had come up earlier, so I assumed that was the reference, and was right. Had to wait a bit on the end of SPACE ___ at 56A: Landing gear? (SPACE SUITS), and had to change I'M FIRST to ME FIRST (39D: Selfishly eager cry), but no problems otherwise. Goes without saying that this is a well-made puzzle. Patrick Berry Fridays (or any days) are rarely anything else. Not exceptional by his standards, but his standards are ridiculous. And so to bed. Hope you enjoyed your Thanksgivings. See you Saturday.
THEME:fun and pun with STATE / POSTAL CODES (38A: With 59-Across, necessary substitutions, phonetically) — in familiar phrases, full state names replace words that sound like those states' postal codes when read aloud, e.g. [Bryan Cranston, e.g.*] could be a clue for MAINEWINNER, because he is an "Emmy" winner and "Emmy" => ME => state postal code of Maine.
Theme answers:
MONTANA NEST (17A: *Place where kids aren't found now) (Montana = MT = "empty")
NEBRASKA TIME (27A: *Whenever) (Nebraska = NE = "any")
Word of the Day:Kings of LEON(53D: Rock's Kings of ___) —
Kings of Leon is an American rock band that formed in Nashville, Tennessee, in 2000. The band is composed of brothers Caleb Followill (b. January 14, 1982, lead vocals, rhythm guitar), Nathan Followill (b. June 26, 1979, drums, percussion, backing vocals) and Jared Followill (b. November 20, 1986, bass guitar, backing vocals), with their cousin Matthew Followill (b. September 10, 1984, lead guitar, backing vocals). // The band's early music was a blend of Southern rock and blues influences, but it has gradually expanded throughout the years to include a variety of genres and a more alternative, arena rock sound. Kings of Leon achieved initial success in the United Kingdom with nine Top 40 singles, two BRIT Awards in 2008, and all three of the band's albums at the time peaked in the top five of the UK Albums Chart. Their third album, Because of the Times, also reached the number one spot. After the release of Only by the Night in September 2008 the band achieved chart success in the United States. The singles "Sex on Fire", "Use Somebody", and "Notion" all peaked at number one on the Hot Modern Rock Tracks chart. The album was their first Platinum-selling album in the United States, and was also the best-selling album of 2008 in Australia, being certified platinum nine times. The band's fifth album, Come Around Sundown, was released on October 18, 2010. Their sixth album, Mechanical Bull, was released on September 24, 2013. The seventh studio album, WALLS, was released on October 14, 2016.[1] The group has 12 Grammy Award nominations, including 4 wins. (wikipedia)
• • •
Very mixed feelings about this one. I was up down up down, feelings-wise. I think I ended up on the mostly positive side, but things didn't start out so great. That NW corner — my first two answers were SRA and ATPAR, ugh. When the answer I was struggling to see before I got out of there ended up being OTOES, well, my happiness dial was turned all the way down to 1, and my hopes were not high. Too much junk packed too tight into square one (figurative square one—there's like 25 actual squares in my "square one" today ... is "Square One" the name of a breakfast cereal, because if not, it really, really should be...) OK where was I ...? Oh, right. Junk fill party in the NW. Puzzles that begin that way usually continue that way—but, in an unexpected Thanksgiving miracle, not this one. This one cleaned up its act, and fast. With a couple of exceptions, short fill stayed tolerable, but then bam, those long Downs started coming in, and they are all fantastic: RATFINKS! ALL SMILES! SMELL TEST! GO TO TOWN! I mean, dang, that's a grand slam, where long non-theme Downs are concerned. It's weird how once I started enjoying the puzzle, I also started *flying* through the puzzle.
But there was another down turn. Namely, the theme reveal. I enjoyed discovering the theme up there at MONTANA NEST, hacking my way through that Bizarro phrase, then thinking about how it could possibly be the answer to [Place where kids aren't found now], and then ... Figuring Out How. In My Head. No. Revealer. Needed. I thought "Oh, this'll be fun, trying to figure out which states are involved and how ... cool." But then I run into this totally unnecessary, clunky, giant divided revealer, which is not only massively anti-climactic—it takes valuable real estate away from another potential themer. Puzzle buckles under the weight of its own ponderous over-explanation. You gotta have some faith that solvers can work this out for themselves, or else have some other, subtler way of doing the reveal. Maybe STATE alone could've borne that weight if clued properly. Anyway, that was a drag. But the generally cute theme and lively grid win out, I think. Hard to stay mad at a Thursday puzzle I do this fast (almost a minute faster than yesterday).
Bullets:
1A: Male hedgehogs (BOARS) — I had BEARS. I know this makes not a lot of sense, but they look more like bears than BOARS to me. This made my "tribe" (from 2D: First tribe encountered by Lewis and Clark) start with an E, so I thought ERIES. Unfortunately, my "tribe" went on to start ET- so ... unless there were some British boys who formed a lost "tribe" called the ETONS ... yeah, I knew something was wrong.
48A: Spanish dramatist ___ de Vega (LOPE) — I knew this. Unfortunately, I "knew" it was LUPE. I also thought I knew 8D: Film for which Gregory Peck had the highest-paid performance of his career, with "The" when I plunked down ROBE ... a film that Peck wasn't even in ... the answer is "OMEN."Then there was the small problem of thinking 1D: Cartoon title character adapted from a Felix Salten novel was BABAR (it's BAMBI).
16A: "My Orcha'd in Linden ___" (classic poem) (LEA) — I have no idea what I'm looking at here. Any part of it. It's gibberish to me. "Classic?" "Poem?" If you google this, right now—my orcha'd—you will get an entire page of crossword bot sites (don't click on any of them, they're horrible SEO junkfests). My point is classic shmassic. It's by someone named William Barnes ... of whom I also have never heard.
46D: Cheats, euphemistically (STRAYS) — great clue. I also liked the basketballness of 51D: Baskets made from beyond the arc, informally (TREYS). Better basketball than Yet Another playing card-related answer. (Note: I'm not really mad at playing cards per se; just bridge; all bridge clues; can't stand 'em; never lead anywhere good? ONENO?! No, thanks)
FLASH MOBSTER (52A: Ostentatious member of the Mafia?)
Word of the Day:FO'C'SLE(6D: Ship part spelled with two apostrophes) —
Forecastle (pron. fowk-sul; commonly abbreviated "fo'c's'le") refers to the upper deck of a sailing ship forward of the foremast, or the forward part of a ship with the sailors' living quarters. Related to the latter meaning is the phrase "before the mast" which denotes anything related to ordinary sailors, as opposed to a ship's officers. (wikipedia)
• • •
As "+ X = Wackiness" themes go, this was OK. -STER changes the meaning of the word it's added to each time. I can't believe HAM-to-HAMSTER wasn't somehow involved, since the potential for primo wackiness there seems quite high. Also, the clues were either tepid of slightly off-seeming. "Ostentatious" is "flash-y" more than it's FLASH. Why FLASH wasn't imagined as a verb in that clue, I will never, ever, know, since that's the much funnier way of imagining the phrase FLASH MOBSTER. Also, there is nothing about "alt-rock concert" that makes me think HIPSTER. Zero. I barely know what "alt-rock" means anymore. *Maybe* "indie rock" would've got you there. This "Definitive Guide to Hipster Music Genres," while tongue-in-cheek, is pretty wide-ranging, and while alt-folk and alt-rap make appearances, alt-rock, no. Be accurate. Shoegaze. Twee. Those are ... closer, anyway.
This puzzle should've been very, very easy, he said to himself, looking back over the grid. So why was my time average, even slightly above. Well, in a ... word? I guess it counts as a word. In a word: FO'C'SLE (6D: Ship part spelled with two apostrophes). That is the horrid outcome of someone's wanting CHASE SCENE so bad that he's willing to completely ignore the nightmarish -CS- consequences in the cross. English doesn't want to do that. So we get this ship part I've literally never heard of or seen in this form, which, btw, may be spelled with two apostrophes but is also spelled with three apostrophes (in fact, the 3-apostrophe spelling seems much more apt, since that's how many you need to account for all elisions). If you had asked me what FO'C'SLE was short for, I would not have been able to tell you. Even on a guess. I looked it up, saw "Forecastle," and went "... huh. OK." Also, FIND as 6A: Edit menu option??? I can't think of a duller, more horrible terrible boring and unthoughtful clue for FIND. Infinite clues, and we get this beige, office-manager nonsense. Ugh. So, yeah, I was held up a lot right in the north.
[43D: Tight hug]
Turns out I really hate the word AGLET (48A: Tip on a sweatshirt string). Just ... hate it. It looks stupid, and it doesn't look like it's pronounced, and it can also be spelled AIGLET, and I would never use it. AD REP exists only in crosswords, so I'm not fond of it either. It has all the excitement of [Edit menu option]. How is TOOT a [Palindromic blast]? I get the palindromic part, but ... is it "blast," like "good time.?" Because it sure as hell isn't "blast" like "blast your horn." TOOT is to "blast" what "whisper" is to "yell." Had the D- and thought 35D: One of a Disney septet was (duh) DWARF. Completely and utterly forgot who Nathan Hale was (?!) (SPY). Had ZESTY for ZIPPY (64A: Full of oomph). I think that's all the trouble spots. Good day.
Relative difficulty:Medium-Challenging (*for a Tuesday*)
THEME: NON KOSHER (57A: Like the four things named in the circled squares) — just what it says:
Theme answers:
AHA MOMENT (18A: When you get it)
POPULAR DEMAND (23A: Something might be brought back by this)
SPORK (37A: Versatile eating implement)
NBA CONFERENCE (47A: Eastern or Western, for hoopsters)
Word of the Day:MAJESTIC Theater(21D: ___ Theater, venue of "The Phantom of the Opera," the longest-running production in Broadway history) —
The Majestic Theatre is a Broadwaytheatre located at 245 West 44th Street in midtown Manhattan. It is one of the largest Broadway theatres with 1,645 seats, and traditionally has been used as a venue for major musical theatre productions. Among the notable shows that have premiered at the Majestic are Carousel (1945), South Pacific (1949), The Music Man (1957), Camelot (1960), A Little Night Music (1973), and The Wiz (1975). It was also the second home of 42nd Street and the third home of 1776. The theatre has housed The Phantom of the Opera since it opened on January 26, 1988. With a record-breaking 11,335 performances to date, it is currently the longest-running production in Broadway history. (wikipedia)
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This was a mess for me. I mean, a mess to solve. The theme is OK, if a bit wobbly and uneven, but the clues, in parts, felt Not Tuesday. Fine, but tougher than I expected. Let's start with the theme, which was awkwardly expressed, from my vantage point, for several reasons. First, I didn't really notice it until HALAL (65A: Opposite of 57-Across, to Muslims), which is in the *position* of a potential revealer (final Across answer) but is ultimately not directly related to the theme *at all*. Symmetrical with HALAL is ... CHOPS ... which ... was that clued as somehow PORK-related, in an earlier draft? Seems like an odd coincidence to have CHOPS at 1-A in a clue about NON-KOSHER foods and have it *not* relate to pork. Weird. Further, LARD is not a meat, when the other NON-KOSHER things ... are. BACON and PORK are ... the same meat. PORK is not embedded across two words the way the other themers are, so style points off there. NBA CONFERENCE is a pretty weak stand-alone answer, though I appreciate how hard it must've been to embed "bacon" in any two-word phrase, let alone one of a particular length. The whole thing works, in that it is a functional, defensible puzzle, but as I said, wobble wobble.
The roughness of my solve came largely from the NW (where I always start), which had a passel of late-week, unexpected clues. Accurate, fine, but not Tuesday—not in a bunch like that. 1A: Musical talent, informally I wanted something like ... EAR, not CHOPS. ONE UP is not obvious as a verb (3D: Outdo). CRISP is not not not obvious as a noun (1D: Cousin of a cobbler). And RAN IT? Forget it. No idea what was going on there. I mean, I can see, now, how you might say it in a theater-related sentence, but that is just bad fill. Acceptable to hold something together in a late-week puzzle, maybe, but there's nothing even particularly *theater* about it. The past tense adds another level of ugh-ery. Stumbled over yet another theater clue at MAJESTIC—I had the -AJ- and quickly wrote in TAJ MAHAL. It fit. Lucky me. 56A: Meeting point for tailors? (SEAM) crossing 52D: Kind of client (E-MAIL), also super-Tuesday tricky for me. Throw in my inability to spell PINOCHLE, and my going for GAPED over the icky OOHED at 7D: Expressed amazement, and you get the full effect of my inelegant progress through this grid. I mean, look at this:
I solved this at runtpuz.org, where you can upload any puzzle in .puz format and solve in their applet and then get a bunch of stats afterward. The interface needs a lot of work, and I don't fully understand all the stats, but it's pretty cool nonetheless. The above grid represent first 1/3 (green) second 1/3 (white) and last 1/3 (red) of my solve. If I'm killing a puzzle, those colors are self-contained blocks, usually with green in the N/NW, white in the center/E/S, and red in the S/SW. Not a lot of jumping around when I find a puzzle easy. But the above grid, yikes. That is some flailing. I mean, the green and red hold together OK, but the white shows you how badly I was jumping around. SO many answers have three different colored squares in them. Such inefficiency. Sigh. Anyway, try runtpuz.org for yourself sometimes. Here's all the data for my solve today.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
P.S. "There's so many ways to clue BOYS, and you have to go with this stupid [turns on hair dryer so I can no longer hear her totally justifiable complaints]"—my wife. (63A: Word before and after "will be")
Relative difficulty:Easy (though I solved the online / AcrossLite version, which just had regular old cluing...)
THEME: AGAINST ALL ODDS (60A: How an extreme underdog wins ... or this puzzle?) — in newspaper version of the puzzle, there are *only* even-numbered clues; then there are the theme answers, which begin with non-odd numbers, and the grid shape, which is 14x16 instead of the usual 15x15—so even the dimensions aren't "odd":
Theme answers:
ZERO VISIBILITY (16A: Driving condition in a blizzard)
TWO THUMBS UP (22A: Approval from Siskel and Ebert)
FOUR TOPS (29A: R&B group with the #1 hit "Reach Out I'll Be There")
SIX FLAGS (45A: Amusement park with the Nitro roller coaster)
EIGHT MEN OUT (50A: 1988 film about the Black Sox scandal)
Word of the Day:Nitro roller coaster(at SIX FLAGS Great Adventure) —
This is an everything-but-the-kitchen-sink type of puzzle. Just throw all non-odd-numbered stuff you can think of in there. Theme answers are not really "against" anything. They're just a basic sequence from ZERO (not an even number, so weird here) going up two at each increment until EIGHT. Grid shaped different. And then (in a move that weirdly can't be replicated online or in the AcrossLite version), cluing is evens only. I don't know if this would've added any difficulty to the puzzle at all. I doubt it—principle of solving is still the same; nothing weird to figure out. Just different numbers. None of this anti-odd stuff really adds anything to the solve. I finished in near-record time (2:31) with no clear sense of theme at all. I guess this puzzle has unusualness going for it, and that's ... something. Fill is pretty boring / cruddy, except for a few of the theme answers, which are quite nice (esp. TWO THUMBS UP).
There are many SIX FLAGS theme parks, so 45A: Amusement park with the Nitro roller coaster seems ... let's say, overclued. That roller coaster is at SIX FLAGSGreat Adventure in Jackson, NJ. But there are SIX FLAGS all over the place. Per USA Today, "SIX FLAGS operates parks in 19 locations." SIX FLAGS is a fine stand-alone answer. Just not as (so specifically) clued. Speaking of weak clues: 57D: The Bible's Garden of ___ (EDEN). That is a clue that has given up on life. That is a clue that doesn't want to be a clue. That clue suffers from ennui. That clue phoned Phoning It In and told it to phone it in. That clue is the FLAT SODA of clues. That clue exists solely to make the clue [Cosmetician Lauder] look good.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
P.S. ADES is the worst please everybody stop stop stop using it. Thanks.
My friend Craig compared solving this to doing homework, and I have to agree. The crossing gimmick is OK, but it wears thin quickly. What you're left with is just trivia, and trivia of very uneven familiarity. WASHINGTON / DELAWARE came without my having to think at all, whereas the YANGTZE does not leap readily to mind when I think of MAO, and the BEREZINA? Well, I've never heard of that. Ever. I am certain I'm not alone in that. There's also the minor but pretty hilarious problem, caused by theme crowding, of LINDBERGH's crossing not only the ATLANTIC, but the RED SEA as well. Just him and MOSES ... leading the Israelites ... (if you know anything about LINDBERGH's, uh, political leanings, then this imagined team-up is especially funny). There are some interesting longer non-theme answers in the grid—I particularly like the DIET SODA / SEXOLOGY juxtaposition, for some reason—but overall, filling this in felt more like drudgery than fun.
The shorter fill is once again particularly noxious. A GIBER (AGE TEN!) who REPENs his XOUTS? Man, XOUTS really truly hurts. Can't fathom anyone's using or saying that ever. Lots and lots of other over-familiar repeaters, and not a lot of payoff. I have no problem with some low-rent junk if it's holding up something lovely, but not much is truly lovely here today. Today's difficulty was mostly in the vague cluing. [Entice] for BAIT, for instance. I needed 3/4 of that before I could tell what was going on. And occasionally there was (for me) difficult trivia, like ANZIO, NANNIE, and (as I've already said) BEREZINA. [7-up, e.g.] is a pretty good misdirect, though the uncapitalized "U" should've clued me in that it wasn't referring to the soda brand. See also the very next Down, 6D: Partridge family member (HEN), which I thought was referring to the musical TV show of the '70s. But there were no tenacious trouble spots. I had MACK at 10D: ___ truck instead of TACO. That probably caused the most problems.
So, hey, this week I'm launching "On The Grid," a (probably) monthly crossword podcast with my friend Lena Webb. We taped the first installment last month in Somerville, MA, and now it's edited and done, so if you have 24 minutes, give or take, check out Episode 001: "MAI / TAI". Thanks.
A long time ago, I was solving this puzzle and got stuck at an unguessable (to me) crossing: N. C. WYETH crossing NATICK at the "N"—I knew WYETH but forgot his initials, and NATICK ... is a suburb of Boston that I had no hope of knowing. It was clued as someplace the Boston Marathon runs through (???). Anyway, NATICK— the more obscure name in that crossing—became shorthand for an unguessable cross, esp. where the cross involves two proper nouns, neither of which is exceedingly well known. NATICK took hold as crossword slang, and the term can now be both noun ("I had a NATICK in the SW corner...") or verb ("I got NATICKED by 50A / 34D!")
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