Canadian crooner Michael / FRI 9-15-17 / Basic beverage in baby talk / Parker so-called queen of indies

Constructor: Damon Gulczynski

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium

THEME: none 

Word of the Day: John von NEUMANN (32A: Computer science pioneer John von ___) —

John von Neumann (/vɒn ˈnɔɪmən/; Hungarian: Neumann János Lajos, pronounced [ˈnɒjmɒn ˈjaːnoʃ ˈlɒjoʃ]; December 28, 1903 – February 8, 1957) was a Hungarian-American mathematician, physicist, inventor, computer scientist, and polymath. He made major contributions to a number of fields, including mathematics (foundations of mathematics, functional analysis, ergodic theory, representation theory, operator algebras, geometry, topology, and numerical analysis), physics (quantum mechanics, hydrodynamics, and quantum statistical mechanics), economics (game theory), computing (Von Neumann architecture, linear programming, self-replicating machines, stochastic computing), and statistics. (wikipedia)

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Wow, context / inflection means everything on a clue like 27A: "Seriously!" I thought it was being said like "I MEAN IT!" not like "I KNOW, RIGHT?" (which is a real thing people say and a great answer). That is, I thought "Seriously!" was an exclamation of insistence, not an exclamation of agreement. Beyond that, I had the -NGER and wanted DÖPPELGANGER at 6D: Look-alike (DEAD RINGER), and I confidently wrote in MEDIA CIRCUS for 21A: Atmosphere around a celebrity trial, say (MEDIA FRENZY). Wanted AVEO for NOVA and then *got* AVEO later on. Weird. Wouldn't [Nutso] be CRAZED, and [Semi-nutso] HALF-CRAZED? (29D). Do people really remember Peter Fonda's *character's* name from "Easy Rider'? Needed most of the crosses to get WYATT. Grew up in California and know all the [University of California campus site]s but somehow blanked on the only one that anyone in my family actually attended! (SANTA CRUZ). And I had the "Z"! I think I saw the "Z" and my first thought was "Oh, there must be a campus site I don't know," instead of thinking, "Oh, it's where your ****ing stepbrother went to college, idiot!"

["... 'cause we can't see EYE-TO-EYE ..."]

There's nothing wrong with this puzzle, but it felt a little flat. I think my standards for themelesses are starting to rise, as I know they're much easier to fill with interesting answers than themed puzzles (which have serious restrictions by nature). It's not shocking that I have historically liked Fri and Sat puzzles much better than those from other days of the week.

[from "Did Rex Parker like the puzzle?"]

Good themes are hard to pull off, and *especially* hard to pull off without dragging the non-theme fill down. Good themelesses, while they can be challenging to make, are generally easier to make *interesting* / splashy than themed puzzles are. So something like today's themeless puzzle, which is merely solid, leaves me a little cold. Without theme restrictions, you should be able to do a little dazzling with the fill. You can always dazzle with the cluing. But this clue dazzles on neither front. Again, it is not weak or bad. But I want art. Or cheap thrills. Or both. Something. I dunno. Maybe if the cluing were much better, it would've felt less like a warm-up puzzle and more like a Main Event.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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