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Hand tool for boring holes / MON 6-11-18 / Tropical tree with hot pink flowers / Danny DeVito's role in 1975's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest / Spreadsheet amount shown in parentheses
Monday, June 11, 2018
Constructor: Gary Cee
Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium (2:56)
Theme answers:
- SIDECAR (17A: Motorcycle attachment)
- MIMOSA (21A: Tropical tree with hot pink flowers)
- GIMLET (53A: Hand tool for boring holes)
- MARTINI (61A: Danny DeVito's role in 1975's "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest") [why is "1975's" in this clue???]
noun
• • •
The hardest part of this puzzle by far was the themers. Every one of them except SIDECAR is best known as a drink name, so cluing them otherwise was rough. But nothing about this puzzle was rough in the least, so it ended up being snugly in Monday difficulty territory. GAVOTTE is maybe not quite a Monday word, but it's featured in one of the better known songs in pop music history, so I figure people at least know it that way. (I always thought she was saying that he watched his "silk cravat")
Putting short drink names on ME is not technically so difficult, but I like the concept. I think it works. The grid is way too crammed with repeaters (a nicer word for "crosswordese"), largely because it's constructed in a super-choppy way, creating tons of 3- and 4-letter answers. So that part was less than pleasant. But for all that, the grid was pretty smooth, and there are some nice moments (LOOK ALIVE! TIDE OVER), and so, especially in the wake of yesterday's disaster, I will take this.
UPI EMI BMI RPI REI UPS ... only two of these were actually in the puzzle, but a lot of these answers bleed into one another in my head. I got UPI and EMI right, but I feel like it was dumb luck. My fingers just instinctively entered my first guesses and then the crosses confirmed them. Not really much to talk about in this one. ONE YARD is absurd, as it opens the floodgates for [insert number here] YARDS. Well, probably a number 100 or less. Still, ONE YARD, harrumph. Never did get the whole WREAKS / WRECKS (havoc) thing straight. Actually, I know it's WREAK, but I feel like people pronounce it "wreck," which makes me wonder if that's a mistake or if that's its actual pronunciation, spelling be damned. Anyway, it's WREAK, and the past tense is just WREAKED, if you somehow didn't know and find yourself needing this info in the future.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]
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91 comments:
Did Carly Simon ever reveal who that song was about? Does anyone care anymore? Whoever the self-absorbed stud is, he's a shriveled old man now with a pill caddy and a walker and velcro straps on his shoes.
Super easy for me. The theme helped me out with GIMLET and MARTINI which I would have had to ponder or fill in around. Didn’t know singer Grande but it pretty much filled itself in.
Any puzzle that includes alcoholic beverages is just fine by me. Thank you Gary Cee.
Easy-medium for me too. Yup, nicely done and smooth, liked it.
...and WREcKS before WREAKS.
This week's relative difficulty ratings. See my 1/2/2018 post for an explanation of my method. In a nutshell, the higher the ratio & percentage, the higher my solve time was relative to my norm for that day of the week. Your results may vary.
(Day, Solve time, 26-wk Median, Ratio, %, Rating)
Mon 4:21 4:30 0.97 38.1% Easy-Medium
Another silly error extended my solve by about 30 seconds. Without that my time would have been 3:46, which is in the low end of my Easy Monday range.
It's a pretty good Monday theme and puzzle, I think, though the clue for GIMLET threw me a bit. My error was because I can never remember that it's WREAKS havoc, not WREcKS. GAVOTTE seems like a tough Monday answer and I wouldn't have been able to come up with MARTINI without the theme. It's kinda nice to use the theme on a Monday, for a change.
From the FWIW department: According to the Google Books Engram Viewer, FLACKS reached its peak usage in 1975 and has been on the wane since.
26A reminded ME immediately of this tweet:
"PM Justin Trudeau of Canada acted so MEEK and mild during our G7 meetings only to give a news conference after I left saying that, 'US tariffs were kind of insulting' and he 'will not be pushed around.' Very dishonest & weak."
Trudeau is "very dishonest & weak", whereas Kim Jong Un "has been very open and I think very honorable". Go figure.
Other words in this puzzle were also evocative at 7 a.m.: RAT, BLOT, LIP, RACE, WREAKS LOSS from the OUTSET, ME, ME, ME, ME ...
Hand me that menu agin, please. I think I'm in need of a SIDECAR, or MIMOSA, or GIMLET, or MARTINI (shaken, not STIRred).
Got the reveal (35A) immediately, but didn't notice the drink names above the shaded letters. So I had MAmTINI at first for 61A. (I forget that her name was ERMA, not EMMA.)
Normal Monday time for me, otherwise: 16 minutes on the nose.
Nice construction, Mr. Cee.
Gavotte/Ravi cross on a Monday? I know I'm supposed to know Ravi, because something, but it's Monday, fCs.
It was a pleasant surprise to have some late week material mixed in with the Monday fill. FLACK started things off. I needed the K to be reminded of the word.
The highlight of the puzzle was the cluing for GIMLET and MIMOSA. I love it when they bring back the "old" stuff. The xwordinfo clue lists for both words are the polar opposites of each other when it comes to the pre and post Shortz eras.
GIMLET was the one that slowed me down. Now I know where the old " gimlet eyed" phrase comes from.
The kicker was the Saturday level clue for MARTINI. The only character I know with that name is Mr. Martini from "It's a Wonderful Life". I'd paid little attention to the theme, while solving, so I was momentarily perplexed by the clue.
As for the theme, I solved this with my phone and didn't notice the gray ME squares until after I'd finished. The revealer made it obvious that drinks were involved but I never stopped to put it all together. That would have wasted time. As it was this still came in at Monday time but I got to enjoy a little late week mystery in the process.
If I'd paid attention to the theme, it might have helped the awful ERMA/MARTINI cross. And the GAVOTTE/RAVI cross is absurd for a Monday. I just googled it because I couldn't be bothered to spend the time running the alphabet. The rest of the puzzle was so easy that I barely looked at the downs.
JOHN X, the wikipedia page for the song has quite a lot of info on the subject actually. It's apparently three separate people whose names contain an A, E and an R. We also know that the second verse is about Warren Beatty and that one of the people is called David.
GAVOTTE was new to me in more ways than one.
All these years I thought Carly was singing:
You had one eye on the mirror as you watched yourself go by,
This was relatively quick and easy monday.
My only hangups being eMirs for IMAMS and a mis-spelling of Reba's name...both easily fixed.
When I got DRINKSAREONME- I was actually thinking maybe there were more than one drink above each of the MEs,
but nope, I didn't think the EPITAPH above the SIDECAR, nor the GAVOTTE above the MIMOSA were drinks.
I'm more of a teetotaler so what do I know.
Thanks Mr. Cee
Supposedly it’s Warren Beatty.
Too easy but I liked the theme.
I didn't remember that MARTINI was the name of the Joe Pesci character. I tried to think of a better clue. "Rossi's vermouth partner" isn't good because the classic martini has vermouth in it.
I've heard that Carly was singing about Warren Beatty. I think that they dated for a while.
I solved it while watching the Tony's. Sara Barelles (sp?) is a terrific performer.
I've heard it's a composite.
I like the transition from yesterday's GARROTE to today's GAVOTTE, plus some cool word pairs: NIP/LIP, THRILL/SILL, and BRA/BRO, and the mini-theme of words ending with T (8). There are two bonus cocktail-related theme answers: STIR and NIP.
It's a terrific theme based on a phrase so common, I find it amazing that it hasn't been done before, but a quick search leads me to believe it hasn't. Props to Gary for pulling it out of the ether.
We're all gangsters now. RAT: spy or informant.
Very nice. It was pretty easy to go around and fill in the MEs once I saw the deal. I think I would have liked this more if the MEs hadn’t been circled. We still would’ve gotten it.
Yeah – weird to learn that GIMLET is a hand tool for boring holes. Boring hole. Hmm. I guess for me that would be any golf hole. Now I can think of a lot of boring a-holes… Makes you revisit something like
We decided to cut out the boring a hole portion of our presentation.
I knew SIDECAR no prob. My first job was a cocktail waitress, and I was hired the same day as this drop-dead gorgeous girl with thick Pantene commercial-grade blond hair. She was going to Vanderbilt. I was going to Georgia Southern. The jealousy was overwhelming. The only thing I could do was to learn faster and better than she did, and I started by memorizing a bajillion drinks and their garnishes since we had to garnish our own drinks. A SIDECAR is kinda like a brandy margarita with a sugar-RIMMED glass. Dry Manhattan, lemon twist. Sweet Manhattan, cherry. Perfect Manhattan, both (at least at Quinn’s Mill in Atlanta). Pimm’s Cup, cucumber. Old Fashioned – muddle that fruit… Our bar was so busy that we had to call our enormous orders to the bartender in a specific order (bourbon, scotch, gin, vodka, rum brandy, tequila, call, soft, blended, beer, wine, frozen - I still remember it.) This ensured that the bartender lifted, say, the well bourbon bottle only one time, didn’t have to turn around several times for various non-well liquors, etc.) That calling order was the be-all and end-all for a cocktail waitress. Early on, a bartender blew up and threw a strainer down the length of the bar when a waitress messed up the order. I devised a secret little number system I used when taking orders and had the calling system completely mastered in just a couple of days. Pantene girl struggled for a couple of weeks. Thing is, she was really nice, and I ended up showing her my system.
I’ll add to the mondegreens. I thought Carly was singing that your carpet was apricot. It wasn’t ‘til later when the whole does the carpet match the drapes deal came onto my radar screen that I thought mystery guy could be a strawberry blond.
Gary Cee – good one! Did you consider Gibson instead of GIMLET so it could be clued more Mondayish?
I thought this was a lovely, smooth, extremely pleasant and very well-crafted Monday puzzle. Refreshing and impressive after some recent dreck and at-best meh stuff we've had. Thank you!!
Never heard wreak pronounced like wreck.
The app was missing the <— in the LEFT clue. It was like a Zen Koan. “Pointing in this direction: “. Deep.
Ha, if I ever have a cocktail party, now I know who to consult for selecting a DRINK MEnu. I
Joe Pesci? How did he get into this?
I agree that this was easy, but with one caveat. For anyone who isn't a regular crossword solver or somehow involved in education that NEA/ERMA crossing is going to be brutal for new solvers. Actually in general I would say this puzzle is going to lean on the challenging side for that audience. ARIANA Grande and RAND Paul are the only two entries keeping this puzzle in this decade (and only just). Other than that this puzzle could have been printed verbatim 30 years ago. As many of you often point out to me, "old" isn't necessarily bad, and while I agree it does mean that this isn't going to be easy for the younger solvers. Being Monday I feel like that's a fair critique since it's the day most likely to have a puzzle sent to younger folks to give it a try. I would really like to see this day in particular start trending more in the new/fresh direction.
RAVI/GAVOTTE was OK I think. Didn't get Gavotte immediately but RAVI was a snap. My dumb moment was quickly typing in listenup for 20D and not noticing it was a lettershort. Fixed it all up later. I accidentally put in BRO-22A as down and then read 22D clue and had a quick laugh (Seinfeld episode re: bra for men. Kramer and Frank fought over the name, BRO vs. manzier. Sid Farkus-"I know when I'm wearing Ban-Lon there appears to be some jiggling."). I didn't use the theme in solving but enjoyed it after.
Other than MCiNTyRE, quickly replaced with MCENTIRE, this basically filled itself in. I’m OK with that on Mondays, and the theme gave some solid entertainment.
SIDECAR is in my top 10 drinks. I’ll take it over a MARTINI any day.
SIDECAR is named after the motorcycle attachment.
MIMOSA is named after a plant.
GIMLET may have been named after the tool.
And I’m not going to bother looking it up, but I’ll bet MARTINI was named after Danny DeVito’s character.
Yeah, I could never figure out what Carly Simon meant by "the wife of a clothespin."
What a fun puzzle...Emeril, baking a pie, cooling a pie and all the drinks!!! We have a mimosa tree which is in full bloom. I put a picture of it on facebook last week. Imagine some of you saw it
Guys. It was me.
Cute theme that was well executed. At first I thought it would be "All about me" until I saw the grid spanning revealer. Gimlet as a tool was a surprise.
Hey Bartender ! :-)
Nice MonPuz. Where's the Jaegermeister? Har.
Fill wasn't too bad, with the layered themers. Kinda disappointed at the top and bottom cheater squares. Would've been that extra oomph had those been removed. One mans opinion, and all that.
Had EPIThet for EPITAPH, always mess those up. Is EPIThet even a word? Will look it up. Couple of letter writeovers, LeSS-LOSS, oLDEST-ELDEST. The three longer Downs are nice. Found ala @Lewis from 22A a boggled BRAVO. Sums up puz for me. So, COOL.
Hi, My Name Is (NAMETAG) :-)
RooMonster
DarrinV
Another "Beat the Boss Monday!" I tied my previous record (2:41), and erased some bad memories from last week's slog.
Bring on the week!
MCENTIRE is no stranger to crosswords, but I spelled it a few different ways before landing on the improbable truth. On its own, it brings to mind what might someday be the final and most grandiose offering from McDonalds.
I did so much yard work this weekend. Even re-cleared the paths in the woods. Then I just walked around barefoot and looked everything over. Then watched part of Henry V and slept very well.
Fun and well done, thanks Mr. Cee. This was a breath of fresh air after yesterday. Also nice symmetry of the themers.
We hardly ever see crossworthy Reba's last name. Spelling it right had to wait for crosses. Speaking of spelling, I wish I could remember how all the guys spell Neal/Neil. Gets me every time.
Flacks was a new word for me.
I kinda know my way around a workshop so I guess that's how I knew Gimlet.
What Monday puzzles ought to be. Noticed the symmetry of the "ME's". very nice.
WREAK havoc makes me think of "Cry havoc" and dogs of war, which reminds me of Ian McEwan's wonderful book "Black Dogs" in which actual war dogs enhance the plot. One of McEwan's best IMO.
Would you call this one a Cee ME puzzle?
@Birchbark - very amused by your MCENTIRE reinterpretation.
I can't think of Carly Simon without thinking of James Taylor of course. In "Sweet Baby James" I heard .....the birches seemed dreamlike on account of that frostin'... because I had not heard of the Berkshires back then.
One more nice aspect of the theme is that the ME's are, as best as possible, under the middle of the drinks above them.
Gee Mr. Cee, I had hoped for a STINGER and maybe a ZOMBIE. The only outlier in this nice puzzle was MARTINI. Yeah, the name of someone in the cuckoo's nest.
Let's see...SIDECAR = Brandy...MIMOSA = Champagne and both the GIMLET and MARTINI can be gin or vodka. MANHATTAN would have been nice with some of that Canadian Whiskey. I'm wondering if Trudeau will retaliate and add a value tax tariff to the goodies we import eh?
Fun Monday, Monday. Speaking of Carly, I just saw a special yesterday on the Mamas and the Papas. Michelle is the only living one left and she never understood a single thing about that song. Why can't you trust Monday?
John x what an ugly slap at the aged. And the first comment on the blog. Sorry to see you have such thoughts in the middle of the night.
You’d think that, wouldn’t you?
I find it amusing that I am now learning new words to Carly Simon’s classic hit! Reminds me of when I was in grade school, and a friend & I played a 45 record of Elton John’s Benny and the Jets over and over trying to suss out what is un-sussable without liner notes. The lyrics we came up with are still something I treasure... better than the real thing IMHO.
I knew abut the gimlet tool from the phrase "gimlet eye." At the company I worked for there was a woman who had a genius for finding mistakes. Everyone had her proofread their work. She was often described as having gimlet-eyes.
A much better than average Monday.
Another vote for a Manhattan - with a cherry thank you. I think this would have been very difficult for a new solver because of the RAVI/GAVOTTE cross.
I was in Staples on Saturday and there was a woman with her husband going thru the checkout. She had copied a bunch of Monday NYT puzzles for the two of them to work on. She said they each worked on a copy then compared to see the answers. They only did the Mondays because the rest of the week was too difficult. I'm pretty sure that the husband had some sort of dementia and my heart just swelled for this woman and what she was doing for herself and her husband. Definitely the highlight of my day.
I would rate this one “easy.” BTW, I always thought the past tense of “wreak” was “wrought.”
A saucy Monday. I thought the theme was nifty and well-executed. Loved the Shaw quote, liked the clue for NAME TAG, and love the word FLACKS -- a lovely put down of press agents, several of whom I have come in the last year to despise.
I liked the two pie recipe directives. Because while I can't BAKE a pie, I can COOL one with the best of you.
It was appropriate to have STIR as a part of this puzzle. But I would have clued 45D differently. I would have said: Red ------, like your eyes after consuming too many of 17A, 21A, 53A or 61A.
Fun puzzle.
A fine Monday offering. Nice theme, the tons of short short fill wasn't grating, and some nice fill, and just enough challenge to remind you this is a puzzle. You're not going to find many better than this at a Monday level of difficulty.
Regarding You're So Vain, the whole point is it is not about any one person, but about those of us who are so vain that we think the song is about us. The "you" here is an archetype (there's a better term, but it is escaping me at the moment) for all those people in our lives who think we live in their orbit. So, yeah, it is Warren Beatty and maybe James Taylor, but also your Aunt Martha and that person you dated in college who makes you wonder about your judgement (you know the one).
Ok, smarty-pants OED, what IS the present tense of “wrought?” I guess it’s “work” but wreak would be so much better.
As would have been the puzzle without the shaded squares. The revealer already told us to look for MEs, having them flagged felt like cheating.
French dances starting with g: galliard, galop, gavotte, gigue. You need a second letter only if it’s 5 letters long.
That’s my public service for today.
I have checked the grid five times. I have checked the clues five times. She's nowhere to be seen. The song is nowhere to be seen. Why is everyone talking about Carly Simon?????
She held an auction to secretly reveal who it’s about - https://www.cbsnews.com/news/carlys-secret-to-highest-bidder/
Also Mick Jagger is the uncredited background singer. Once you hear it you can’t not ever hear it again.
@Nancy. Guess it pays to actually read our host’s write-up sometimes.
Yes @Anon 9:40
@Warren Beatty 7:53
You're so vain!
:-)
RooMonster
Easy.
Flac - wasn't it "Wife of a close friend" (I don't see Carly Simon either - maybe she's with Warren Beatty).
@Anon 10:36 -- You're right. I saw the big Carly link when I went back to Rex, but still didn't understand why it was there. Guess when one's eye has been in *skimming mode* for so long, it's hard to break the habit. Now I see it has something to do with GAVOTTE in the song "She's So Vain" -- so it is relevant after all. My mistake.
Great MonPuz. Drinks are on Cee.
Learned a couple new things:
* GAVOTTE. Havin that cross IMAMS might maybe make this a touch-and-go spot, for newbie solvers.
* FLACKS. Not familiar with this as meanin "press agents". Dictionary cites it as havin "unknown origin".
staff weeject pick: M&E. Lil old ME gets to participate in the theme gimmick. Like.
fave stuff: SALMON. LOOKALIVE. TIDEOVER. Outstandin weeject rows, at grid's top and bottom. ONEYARD [admire its ONE-sie desperation].
Thanx for the fun & the ME-time, Mr. Cee.
Primo write-up, @RP. Enjoyed yer [partial list] recital of weejects that were not in the puz. Especially the ones with U's.
Masked & AnonymoUUs
**gruntz**
@Nancy. "You had one eye on the mirror and watched yourself GAVOTE. I always thought she was saying "You watched yourself go out." Another of @Loren's "mondegreen."
I thought the past tense of WREAK was WROUGHT.
Easy theme to suss and ME need not be shaded.
Not easy to create a Mondayish clue set but this one was perfect.
Thanks GC.
At the time of Simon's song (yes, I am that old), there were lots of theories but I mostly heard that it was about Mick Jagger (whose voice can be heard in the chorus). And who in fact continues to work out like three hours a day and pad his yellow tights so that he can continue to perform.
p.s.
This may sound kinda weird.
When M&A printed out the SunPuz yesterday, it came out in all-blue print, except for the LOL emoji pic clue, which was sorta reddish orange. Worried the M&A. Thought the day-um printer was startin to break down, or somethin.
Today, the MonPuz printed out in black&white -- except for some gray "ME" squares -- as normal.
Sooo … ok, I guess … as long as the TuesPuz don't come out in pink.
M&Also
Just finished watching The Departed... Nice closing scene of a rat ambling across a window after the last 'rat' was finished off.
The clue for 34-Down is deliberately misleading. The arrow points WEST in map terms. Saying it points LEFT is so obvious as to be pointless as a clue.
p.p.s.s.
And another thing! …
Today, when M&A printed off the New Yorker puz, it printed the Across clues and grid on one side of the page, and the Down clues on the other side. Makes for a kinda awkward solvequest! [snort]
Weren't in pink or nuthin, at least.
M&AllThrough
So I Googled. Confirming Wikipedia - In a 2015 Los Angeles Times interview Carly Simon revealed that the second verse refers to Beatty and the first and third to other men whose names she has no intention of revealing. So all guesses above might be right.
My egomaniac had "One eye in the mirror as you watched yourself go by" (hi @Mr. B), hence GAVOTTE had to fill.
My five favorite clues from last week:
1. Person whose inner child has been released? (6)
2. Rock singer? (7)
3. Expert in calculus (3)
4. Fifth place? (6)
5. Gets accustomed to a transplant (7)
MOTHER
LORELEI
DDS
BOTTLE
REROOTS
Relax, it's Monday
A toast to Gary Cee for a well constructed Monday puzzle.
Besides Carly Simon, the ISLEY Brothers, ARIANA Grande, RAVI Shankar, and Reba MCENTIRE, the grid suggests such music artists as NEIL Sedaka, Roberta FLACK, TOMMY Lee, IRIS DeMent, COOL J, Warrel DANE, Toby RAND, and Bevery SILLs.
c'mon. where's The Limeliters????
@Banana Duaquiri (12:47) - They're on my Kingston Trio channel on Pandora.
Liked the nice rebussy quality of the drinks literally being on me. Fun stuff, although I can't remember the last time I had a mixed drink. Too many great IPA's around here.
The wreaked/wrought discussion reminded me of another archaic(?) past tense, "pight",
which shows up in Britten's Ceremony of Carols--"My soul with Christ/Join in the fight/Stick to the tents/ that He hath pight". So "pight" was once the past tense of "pitch"? It would be fun to read that Chris Sale pight a good game.
I had to look GIMLET-eyed at this puzzle - the east-central part had me out in LEFT field. I started 20D with Listen, entered COOk at 30D, and looked at 34D's arrow and put in LEss. Press agents as skACKS? I did dig my way out of that mess but it made for an embarrassingly long solve time for a Monday, out beyond Wednesday averages.
For some reason, this theme seems familiar, at least the DRINKS ARE ON ME part but neither Rex nor Jeff Chen mentioned it so I guess that's ON ME.
Thanks, Gary Cee.
That’s hilarious!
@Teedmn: yep. I had the same deja-view feelin, about this puztheme. Buuut … closest M&A Memory Banks Lane could come up with in the NYTPuzs was a supercool 10 Feb 2000 Manny Nosowsky gem. His 100th NYTPuz, btw.
Outlaw M&A
I liked this puzzle a lot (especially the theme) but the SE was a mess - there should not be multiple crosses that rely on the solver’s familiarity with certain proper nouns.
I think I would’ve remembered gavotting while wearing an apricot scarf so I’m pretty sure it wasn’t about me.
I'm impressed that the Carly Simon video has both "gavotte" and a pie cooling! Loved the theme - I don't think the ME's needed to be gray either, but for a Monday, I'm okay with it. Funny to hear that RAVI could be problem - for someone of my generation that is a total gimme.
Just a quick Monday here. My couple of misteps in the mini were more memorable.
I always thought it was about James Taylor due to East Coast references.
I always thought of James Taylor as being self-affacing, but she would know wouldn't she.
My printout was resplendent featuring light green tinted MEs being used as inadequate coasters for our DRINKS. So festive!
I have enjoyed hanging out in restaurant bars for many years. Some of my dearest friends have served me at places either in the past or present. I love watching a staff run smoothly or melt during a crush. So, I loved the @LMS story about her experiences serving drinks, especially the details about calling out drinks. Every place that is busy and successful owes it to the staff and to management for organizing the system. Wish I could have experienced it at Quinn's Mill.
Carpet was apricot was close enough, but I never embraced it and feel fulfilled with the GAVOTTE lyric. The song made ME want to visit Nova Scotia and see the total eclipse of the sun. I have toured the beautiful province, but have only seen a few partials.
Up until just now i thought the lyric was “warched yourself a lot”
Who was the dancer in the video? He was obviously disguised. He moved like Jagger, but didn’t seem as thin.
Hey Mike,
There's an article in Polico about your pal Obama taking meetings with 2020 hopefuls. Michael Bennett was named.You should put down the pulp and comics and look arou so you'll know what and who the hell you're talking about when you get politcal.
...make that “watched”...
NIP ANEMIA
LOOKALIVE TOMMY, you AMATEUR,
IT’S RAD BRO, RAVE about the THRILL you saw,
VOW not to be so MEEK, good SIR,
IT’S COOL when ARIANA removes her BRA.
--- SIGNOR EMERIL MARTINI
How much havoc will The Donald WREAK at his secret meeting with his puppet master in Finland? We'll all need a stiff drink after that. Stay tuned...
Having never seen the lyrics, for 45 years I always thought it was “cavort”; but ITS GAVOTTE. Guess that makes me the idiot from the OUTSET. So, ‘scuse me while I kiss this guy; no, I actually knew that one from the get-go.
I used to think I might have this as an EPITAPH on my headstone: This one’s ONME. Har.
There are two choices ONMERIT for today’s yeah baby: the ELDEST is the always buoyant Reba MCENTIRE and current COOL pop tart ARIANA Grande.
Lotsa 3s but also lotsa 6s and 7s to compensate. And lotsa COOL DRINKS in the puz. Stop over sometime and the DRINKSAREONME.
Not into Monday morning drinks, or making things all about ME, but this time is an exception.
Got some kicks from GAVOTTE, ARIANA, and ISLEY, amusement from Shaw's EPITAPH, and seeing Reba's last name for a change.
Liked it, and glad to see that Rex did, too.
Just out of curiosity, are any Syndies doing the new New Yorker's Monday Crosswords? I've been doing them since it they started (May 14th) ago and it's pretty good. Challenging, but good. Here's the link... https://www.newyorker.com/crossword/puzzles-dept
ME ME ME ME ME. Are we in tune now? 'K
fun Mon. Noticed the drinks one by one, but not the them 'till I was done.
Diana, Poetess
In my paper there were no circles or shading but I figured it out anyway. Yay ME!
This was pretty well a pitch-perfect Monday puzzle, with a clever theme and revealer. The theme enabled me to get MARTINI since I had ONMERIT in place below it. I've seen the movie twice but do not remember the name of Devito's character.
My Dad was a carpenter and he always had a GIMLET handy to quickly make pilot holes in wood. I do wonder how a drink came to be named for it, though.
Easy, yet quite enjoyable puzzle. Btw, I'm pretty sure one of the guys Carly was singing about was James Taylor, not that I care.
British Royal Navy Surgeon Rear-Admiral Sir Thomas Gimelette first added lime cordial to gin to prevent scurvy in the British Navy. Hence GIMLET.
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