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Relative difficulty: Easy-medium
THEME: DISGUSTING— Theme answers contain words you'd say when you find something gross (highlighted by the bubbles).
Theme answers:
- DOUBLECHIN (17A: Facial feature that could be eliminated by cosmetic surgery)
- MAGICKINGDOM (23A: Disney World attraction)
- JUGHEAD (36A: Friend of Archie and Betty in the comics)
- SAYAFEWWORDS (48A: Speak briefly)
- DISGUSTING (57A: "Gross" title for this puzzle)
Word of the Day: PECTIN (6D: Marmalade ingredient) —
Pectin (from Ancient Greek: πηκτικός pēktikós, "congealed, curdled"[1]) is a structural heteropolysaccharide contained in the primary cell walls of terrestrial plants. It was first isolated and described in 1825 by Henri Braconnot.[2][3] It is produced commercially as a white to light brown powder, mainly extracted from citrus fruits, and is used in food as a gelling agent, particularly in jams and jellies. It is also used in dessert fillings, medicines, sweets, as a stabilizer in fruit juices and milk drinks, and as a source of dietary fiber.
• • •
It's a surprise Annabel Monday! I had to look up why Rex wanted me to write this week instead of last week and was reminded that that was because last week was his donation pitch. I hope he's ok with me thanking everyone that donated! You're the ones who keep Annabel Mondays financially viable at all!!!! Also thanks to everyone else too for just looking at the days when I blog, even the ones who only come complain that I missed something Rex would've gotten, because hey you're usually 100% right and I appreciate constructive criticism. For real, I don't want to get sappy but I love doing this. I love words.Anyway, today's puzzle left me with...mixed feelings? I didn't even know whether to call it easy or medium, because while there weren't any quadrants that left me staring blankly at the screen for ages, it took me way more go-throughs and wrong guesses than it usually takes to really get into the groove. I found myself scratching my head at vague clues like "__ put it another way..." and "Come to __" (I was so sure that was MAMA!) and "Metropolitan ___." I guess the puzzle suffered from Blank Overload a little bit. The cluing for ESTA also hit one of my pet peeves; just say the language you're referring to, you don't need to name a region or city to try and be clever, honestly. But I did like parts of the setup, like ABCS on top of SINE. And although I had issues with some clues there were some clues I really liked--the one for WINO was funny! One time my local radio station changed their name to WOMB for a day as a prank, I think it was for Mother's Day? It was funny.
The theme was, y'know, a Monday theme. I don't like when letters are circled but you're not going to really do anything with them--write a phrase, do some unscrambling, what have you--but it did help me with SAY A FEW WORDS and MAGIC KINGDOM (I was so sure the latter was going to be one of the rides), and I've always had sort of a weakness for gross stuff. The word choices kind of reminded me of Garbage Pail Kids, which I never had but always eagerly pored over the ads for in my comic books. I guess I'm a grown-up now and can buy them for myself, but they don't hold quite the same appeal as they did when I was ten and thought anything slimy was the coolest thing on earth.
 |
| this is actually the only Garbage Pail Kid I could find on Google Images that didn't make me a little nauseous |
Bullets:
- JUGHEAD (36A: Friend of Archie and Betty in the comics) — Speaking of things I loved when I was ten I used to absolutely devour Archie comics! I feel like I've discussed this before on this blog but I never really "got" Jughead until I became a teenager and truly discovered the appeal of food and naps. I can't find it now, but there was this comic where Jughead discovered a crawlspace and made it into a little secret hideaway where he could stash snacks and hide out from his responsibilities to take naps in privacy, and I really admire that. I think we all deserve secret nap rooms.
- ELLE (41A: Fashion monthly founded in France) — Hey! See? This is how I would clue a word that also means something in a foreign language! Not just "Her, in Paris." >:P
- SETA (31A: ___ good example) — I had thought for sure this looked familiar, like I had seen it as a word in other contexts, but when I did some digging I found out it meant "in biology...any of a number of different bristle- or hair-like structures on living organisms," according to Wikipedia. Apparently geckos have them on the pads of their feet to keep them sticky. So I guess that's a bonus Word Of The Day because I already picked out the first Word of the Day.
- OGRE (55D: Menacing fairy tale figure) — Actually these days I think most people's first thoughts when they think of ogres are a little more...layered. (Unrelated to Shrek, but the same goes for orcs, because I feel like 99% of my friends are playing half-orcs in at least one Dungeons and Dragons campaign.)
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ULEE, ORFEO, JUGHEAD, and JEFFY in the same location in the grid on a Monday? UGH.
ReplyDeleteReally not sure what to say about this...it was easy for me, I’m not a fan of circled letters, but I think I enjoyed it as a reasonably good Monday... but I really got a kick out of Annabel’s write-up and I just love the way her voice has evolved and grown over the years. It’s been fun and fascinating to watch. Good luck with your last semester!!!
ReplyDeleteThis took me a little more than a minute over my average. I drew a blank on 1A, started the middle then ran into trouble with PECTIN. The NE is where I really got the puzzle going, inspite of misreading the 12D clue as "Wedding vacation rental."
ReplyDeleteThe only other problem was thinking 36D was JEFRY and filling in 48A as SAYAREWEDONE. I actually wondered if EWE was an alternate spelling and of all the things to clue me into there being a problem, it was thinking 50D should be ISNT. I didn't even bother to find out that it didn't fit. It was easier to finish the east side and then back fill 48A correctly.
Hi Annabel, one more semester, you can do it.
ReplyDeleteI used to say those words a lot before Rex armed the blog with moderators who keep the creeps at bay. I miss the flow of conversation that we used to have, but it was getting too nasty for even me who can curse with the best of them, but not to the point that it’s DISGUSTING.
Fun, easy Monday. Little hang up with 43A, had to rely on downs as I know very little about opera, not my cuppa.
Nice Monday puzzle, not too challenging, not too easy, about just right. There were several clues that I did’t get right away, but the crosses saved my skin in all cases.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed your review, Annabel, as I usually do. Like you I was a big fan of Archie comics, but my Archie comics were of the 1950s variety. I could never figure out why Archie was so smitten with Veronica Lodge (whose father didn’t care for Archie) and so oblivious to Betty, who spent all her time trying to get Archie to notice her. I dug Jughead, too, but he was too much of a loner for me. I spent much too much time reading comics way back then, but I still read them today. Comics were kind of innocent then, but they grew up, so to speak, in the 70s and later. (I hasten to add here that I don’t mean political comics, which had and have a long and rich tradition of piercing balloons of all kinds.)
Medium. Pretty smooth and delightfully DISGUSTING, liked it.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Annabel. Nice write-up. Absolutely agree with your view on today's circled letters. I came close to tying my best time for a Monday, but thanks to write-overs (mAmA before PAPA, for example), I didn't. Speaking of write-overs, who else slotted in "orange" before PECTIN?
ReplyDeletePECTIN is KINDA cool. Because it is an edible natural substitute for other products, it is being put to a lot more uses nowadays than just marmalades and jams, and world demand has been growing at an annual compound rate of 6% a year, which is uuuuuuge! Fun fact: Mexico is the world's leading exporter of PECTIN, and the United States its leading importer. Ain't trade great?
A few nits on the cluing:
-- 14A is clued as "Well, isn't that something!", yet the answer is simply "I'LL BE". I would say that the "Well" would normally be needed before I'LL BE also.
-- EDISON (47D) was not the inventor of the incandescent lightbulb, he was the perfecter of it. Decades before EDISON demonstrated his relatively inexpensive, commercially viable version of the incandescent lamp, British and French inventors had already made working models. At least stick the word "American" in there as part of the clue.
-- Why "professional" as a qualifier for "work" (28D)? "Work" by its lonesome would work just fine as a clue for EMPLOYMENT.
Nice to see Mrs. 'mericans' name today (ANN).
I love your write-up! Very fun read. I'm in grad school and the semester is AMPing up here, too. Also, have you seen any of Riverdale, if you liked the Archie Comics? It's based on the Archie Comics, and it's your typical teen drama fare, but it's entertaining enough when you need a mindless break from the grind of school.
ReplyDeleteNot easy to come up with these theme answers, IMO -- best alternative I could come up with is LUMBAR FUSION. Credit to Craig on these, plus congrats on the debut. I like the palindromic answers OGRE and ERGO, and ULEE has made a resurgence -- twice in December plus today after a three-and-a-half year absence. I guess yesterday's puzzle is still lingering in me -- when I wrote in 36A my brain chimed in DEMIJOHNHEAD.
ReplyDeleteCan't wait to see what @Nancy has to say about the circled letters.
ReplyDeleteSome nice semi-thematic material today made this (a little) more interesting than the average “little circles” puzzle (my second-least favorite theme type, with pithy quotes winning the booby prize).
ReplyDeleteMESS, STALE bread, STEAMed mussels, ALOE, EELS, ACNE, and OGRE up the ICK factor. In a different way, so does having ORTO and KINDA right next to each other. And Gluck sure sounds like it fits the theme.
Almost a Natick, but sailed through unscathed. Good Monday.
ReplyDeleteI didn't buy "The 20 in 20 Questions" as a clue for GUESSES. You don't guess 20 times in 20 Questions unless you're playing randomly. You ask narrowing questions and then eventually you guess.
ReplyDeleteI had canoe for vacation rental but bailed out in time. Edison spent winters here in Fort Myers; his home, lab and gardens are a museum and we have a "Festival of Lights" in February.
ReplyDeleteIsn’t this a lot of words for a Monday puzzle?
ReplyDeleteI think that the clue on está was fine and preferable to just “this in Spanish.” It adds an extra, albeit easy layer to the clue. Agree with Annabelle on the clue to WINO, though RP would’ve torched it for making light of alcoholism. Thanks for not being a crab.
ReplyDeleteGlad to see you Annabel!!! even though it is the second Monday. Fun easy puzzle
ReplyDeleteNo complaints but for the ULEE / ORFEO cross. (In retrospect, not so tough, but that's true of everything.)
ReplyDeleteHaven’t had any alcoholic clues in ages so I had high hopes that we were no longer touting all the nasty names for folks afflicted with the disease.
ReplyDeleteVery sorry to see the answer to 53D.
Hi Annabel. I can’t believe you only have one more semester? Tricky Monday puzzle that did prove DISGUSTING to me because of the sophomoric WINO joke. Grow up, NYT. @Z thanks for the Korean cistranslation. :)
ReplyDeleteThis one missed the mark for me. ORTO, ORFEO, JEFFY, ULEE, SETA, NOEND -- too much junk for a Monday.
ReplyDeleteI do like KNEE and KNEAD, TIDY and MESS, and SHE crossing ELLE.
@Dan Katz makes a very good point -- only a goof GUESSES 20 times.
27-Down is a terrific movie, which I highly recommend.
Cryptic clue du jour: Princess follows gold German auto
Here's how NYT puzzlers play 20 Questions.
ReplyDeleteOn:
Mon 20Q
Tues 18
Wed 16
Thurs 10
Fri 7
Sat 4
Sun 6-8
Fri
It takes some confidence to write a puzzle with built-in criticisms right there for the taking. Fortunately none of them apply.
ReplyDelete"Come to papa" has a creepy feel to it and made me think of the Bob Seger song.
Orfeo is some high-end stuff for a Monday and crossing it with Ulee was the trickiest spot for me. I can never remember if it's Ulee or Ulie. Orfio seemed just as viable but I made a lucky guess.
And yes, it's 20 Questions not 20 Guesses.
Nice write up Annabel. I like alliterative clues using geographic hints because they add some whimsey and an extra layer of knowledge needed to suss it out.
As for secret nap rooms, great idea but one thing I like about adulthood is realizing that my entire house is a secret nap room! I have a code worked out with the kids next door. If I have a red sock hanging from my front door knob it means I'm napping. It works great.
Just a little above a Monday level of difficulty here, maybe a Monday+. Liked the theme and the answers.
ReplyDelete"This in Tijauna" is almost generic for a clue. My (small) complaint is that it could be esta, este, or esto (hi GILL I.). So why don't I just write in EST and wait for the crosses? I do, I do.
Review nit: Let's not clue ELLE as "her". You'll mislead many of us.
A fine Monday.
ReplyDeleteI see Annabelle’s point but I disagree. The use of various towns and cities functions in a variety of ways. For example, if 27D were reversed the A in ROMA would tell us the answer is in Italian. The obscurity of the town is also a difficulty intensifier. Today we get Tijuana, Saturday we might get someplace like Sogamoso. Just seeing, “this in Spanish,” over and over would be tired and tiresome very quickly. Sure, a little more creativity wouldn’t hurt, but I’m good with, “this in some random town in a Spanish speaking country,” clues.
So we get onomatopoeic(try spelling that!) words for DISGUSTING. My favorite YUCK didn't show up. I suppose something like NAVY UCKERS would be a bit much for Monday? Uckers is a real word. It's a card game played by the Royal Navy. Hah!
ReplyDeleteWOO is just sitting on top of DISGUSTING and I find that offensive. I miss WOO. WOO is good. Would you DAB ICE on ACNE. It's in that little corner. If you look at 12D and make a little right turn, your weeklong vacation rental is a CONDOM. Hey, and it's right next to BLIND DATE. BLIND DATES never work out even if you're being WOOed. Why do your best friends always think they know who to hook you up with?
ARM TOE TUMMY DOUBLE CHIN JUG HEAD. Body parts.
This was an amusing Monday; you could make up a story.
Thanks Annabel for your refreshing write-up and good luck to you.
No same here in the bunch Craig Stowe.
Nothing like the transition from sweet things yesterday to DISGUSTING today.
ReplyDeleteI never heard of JEFFY but I did know JUGHEAD. Is this a generational thing? If it is, I figure everyone will know one or the other and no one will Natick.
ReplyDeleteRe 60A: I don't want to "hit the tarmac" when I LAND, thank you very much. I want to alight, very, very gently.
Are BLIND DATES always "romantic setups" (11D). I've had some that were ICK, some that were EWW and some that were only BLECH.
A pleasant enough Monday, with a very clean grid despite the DISGUSTING theme.
(Apologies if this is 4th post- new computer/cache woes)
ReplyDeleteFun fact: Marmalade is called that because the Portuguese made a thick jam with Quince. @Annabel- "Quince, in Oporto" - MARMELO. The Brits loved it, but couldn't grow Quince trees in their climate, so they came up with their version, stuffing a jar full of orange rinds and called it the same thing.
Quince is something that you apparently can't eat until you boil it for about 17 days. Well, a couple of hours, anyway. Then you get this absolutely wonderful very thick paste that you can slice. That with a slice of feta on a cracker - super simple hors-d'oeuvres - and yum!!
(If you have some fun cookie cutter shapes, you can really jazz them up.)
And, Quince are very high in PECTIN.
@'mericans - Quoing chez vous.
What an odd thing to hate - circled letters in puzzles. Why are they so reviled? Please explain.
Cute puzzle, and fine write-up by Anabel - thanks!
Pretty straight forward Monday, though I agree with those pointing out you don't play 20 Questions by making 20 guesses. I also don't think of RAMADA as MARRIOTT competition, and held on to HILTON for too long. KINDA enjoyed the Patriots' ROMP yesterday, but suspect the Chiefs will be harder to TREADON.
ReplyDeleteMy five favorite clues from last week:
ReplyDelete1. Oh, what an actress! (6)
2. Character in "All's Well That Ends Well" and "A Midsummer Night's Dream" (10)
3. Works toward one's passion? (4)
4. Something that's secretive (5)
5. Something lost in old literature (8)
SANDRA
APOSTROPHE
ODES
GLAND
PARADISE
Burn the whole thing down over JUGHEAD JEFFY ULEE ORFEO, which has to have stumped more people than just me.
ReplyDelete@Lewis - at your insistence, I'll retell my related story...
ReplyDeleteCustomer service agent: "Please spell your last name."
Me: "D, APOSTROPHE, A, N..."
Agent: "Wait - not so fast - how do you spell APOSTROPHE?"
Am I the only one who stumbled on the ORFEO/ULEE crossing? I had ORFlO/ULlE forever, that moved the needle from average time to 2 minutes (!!!) over my average for a Monday as I scoured the puzzle for the errant entry. I cry foul.
ReplyDeleteLove your writeups, Annabel. And yes, everyone deserves a nap room.
@Didn't mean to disappoint you, @Anonymoose (6:42). I wrote before reading the comments, as I always do for my first post. And for some reason, the annoying tiny little circles didn't annoy me enough today to mention. But now, @Tita (10:11) has posed the very sincere question of just why tiny little circles are annoying. (As opposed to gray squares which never bother me at all). And there actually IS a perfectly logical reason that I've never before explained. Now, I feel I owe everyone, not just @Tita and the Moose, my explanation:
ReplyDelete1) Trying to fit my own letter inside that tiny little circle means I have to make my own circumscribed letter a bit smaller than my other letters. This makes it a)somewhat harder to read and b)offends my sense of letter symmetry. (You should know that my completed handwritten puzzle is usually a thing of beauty.)
2)Before I fill in my own letter, each tiny little circle looks like an "O". Even now that I've gotten more used to them through repeated exposure, those unwanted and inaccurate "O's" can futz up the solving process, while being totally unnecessary. Gray squares accomplish the same thing, while confusing me not at all.
Does it make perfect sense now, O Blog? Please tell me it does :)
Hey All !
ReplyDeleteDISGUSTING. Har.
What a novel concept for a puz. Too bad constructor Craigs' last name isn't Ross. CraiG ROSS.
Enjoyed this EWW of a puz. Had a few GUESSES at first, which is not too common on a Monday. Consider that a PLUS. Had mAnoFEWWORDS first, even though that's missing an F. ROut-ROMP, Cabin-CONDO, zeTA-IOTA (not Greek alphabet proficient.) So the puz made me use the ole brain a bit. I'LL BE.
So a fun ROMP, with NO END of ICK-ness. YES. (This kind of rhetoric is STALE, ain't it?) But, I'm probably not gonna stop. WOO!
2 F's. ERGO, not enough. But better than zero.
URDU ORFEO
RooMonster
DarrinV
Fun Monday puzzle. Thanks very much Mr. Stowe!
ReplyDeleteVery outstandin debut MonPuz. Hits about all the check boxes: Solid fill*. Four themers and a gross revealer. Under 20 weejects [15]. Some complimentary long-ball fillins goin Down. Acceptable levels of U-respect. The Circles [yo, @RP]. Some funky clues, sprinkled amongst the moo-cow ones. Nice job.
ReplyDelete*Toughest spot for the M&A: JEFFY/ORFEO. Woulda gone with JIFFY, and then ILLY instead of ELLE. Personal preference, tho.
@Lewis: Primo extra themer find, with yer lumBARFusion . This was a neat puztheme mcguffin idea as is, but it woulda been real extra powerful, if all the full-length themers were also KINDA disgustin things in their own right, like LUMBARFUSION or maybe DOUBLECHIN. How'bout dusTMItes, f'rinstance?
staff weeject picks: ICK. UGH. EWW. KINDA brave, havin a puztheme that showcases disgust!
fave clue: {Tippler's favorite radio station?} = WINO.
fave moo-cow eazy-E MonPuz clue: {Rink surface} = ICE. Lost opportunity, tho: WOO/WINO/NOOSE coulda been MOO/MINI/NOISE. Of course, then U woulda lost the primo WINO clue. But … MOO … oooh. Agonizin constructioneer trade-offs; it's why we tune in to WINO, on occasion.
Thanx and congratz, Mr. Stowe. Keep up the good work.
Ditto to U, Blu'Bel darlin. Superb blog write-up. Talkin possible Pullitzer, here.
Masked & Anonymo6Us
biter alert:
**gruntz**
For me a difficult Monday. Many acrosses had to await down crosses, including erasing ROUT to make ROMP. And couldn't be sure about intersection of what did in fact turn out to be ORFEO and ULEE.
ReplyDelete@Nancy, I would never have thought of that -- my handwriting and hand lettering are never going to constitute works of art -- but it makes perfect sense. I wonder what the editing rules are for when to shade squares and when to use circles.
ReplyDeleteI also love your desire to "alight" -- we just got back from 11 days in England, where the recorded announcements on buses say things like 'alight here for Buckingham Palace (or wherever)' and it seemed so much nicer than "get off." I love America, though, I really do.
@Annabel, here's a third way of cluing it -- "mushroom in Madrid." Thanks for the writeup, and congratulations on your impending graduation!
My biggest problem was that, still thinking public transit, I wore in chanGe for "transfer (to)." I kept it in spite of ABCS, but SLOT finally convinced me to change.
Wonderful WINO radio, by George Carlin:
ReplyDeletehttps://youtu.be/kPDq7ljDvvg
This is a non-DISGUSTING little Monday puzzle. Congratulations, Craig Stowe, on your NYT debut.
ReplyDeleteI got down to 36A and with ___HEAD in place, I splatzed in EMIT into 38D for "Give off light", leaving me with __EHEAD and thus _EH in the circles. "Oh, we're going from bad to better", I thought, because obviously the circles were going to hold meH, a step up from the others. This led me to wonder who decided BLECH was better than ICK. But a few answers later, I was not getting a warm GLOW from "emit" and I saw things were not going to improve, theme-wise.
Fun, easy, and a NOEND DOOK, so a good start to the week.
Sorry, my comment should have read "BLECH was worse than ICK."
ReplyDelete@Nancy, whenever is see the little circles I think “Oh Goodie, circles” then I try to imagine which adjective you’re going to pair with them.
ReplyDeleteI’ve come up with some pretty amusing ones.
A cute Monday theme, evoking admiration for its DISGUSTING answers. The neighboring PECTIN and AD HOC completed BLECH for me and also geve me the first two letters of ICK; with that, I figured the remaining two would fill their three circles with UGH and EWW, the question was, how? Fun to see how the constructor did it.
ReplyDeleteDo-overs: neat before TIDY, Cabin before CONDO.
Thanks to @Nancy for suggesting that BLIND DATE could be a bonus theme answer. It certainly was, in my limited experience (one), starting with the giving-the-finger-shaped ashtray on his coffee table.
@Sir Hilary - I got it (cryptic clue), thanks.
@Tita - Thanks for the appetizer idea. I never know what to put out on an appetizer plate.
Nice to see you Annabel!
@Nancy - I’m with @jberg, my penmanship is closer to Pollock than Michelangelo, and not a particularly good Pollock at that. Nevertheless, I’m with you on preferring gray squares to circles. I even get a brief frisson of superiority whenever I see circles on the blog after having had gray squares in the print version.
ReplyDeleteFemale constructors (or lack of) are a frequent topic here. Has anyone ever wondered about black constructors? You never mention that.
ReplyDeleteIn the current fervor for inclusiveness I am surprised it has not come up in conversation.
I got snarled by the ULEE/ORFEO cross, as well. I had to take an educated guess on the E, but I had never heard of either of those two words. I actually initially guessed "I" for ULiE/ORFiO, so I technically finished it incorrectly. That crossed annoyed me for being on a Monday, but it seems like ULEE is one of those bits of crosswordese I need to add to my collection.
ReplyDeleteGreatest Monday in a long time.
ReplyDeleteAll -otherwise unguessable- proper names made guessable and finally gettable by crosses and efficient, imaginative or at least solid and yet clever clueing.
Breezed through this with a smile.
A plea: Hire more first-timers!
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteAs a former Wellesley music and med/ren major, I'll take ORFEO whenever I can get it.
ReplyDeleteGood luck on you last semester!
Best,
Lisa, Wellesley, '87
Let me SAYAFEWWORDS. I KINDA felt it was a TRAP but went with ULiE and ORFiO anyways. When it comes down to my GUESSES all BETS are off. This is what separates the JUGHEADS from the EDISONs. ERGO it WASN'T to be and now I have to PEI the price with yet another DNF. On a Monday! UGH!!! I'm no WINO but I KNEAD a drink or TWO. ONE can only take so much bad NOOSE. But don't worry. ILLBE Back.
ReplyDeleteAmusing. Always liked JUGHEAD. If this is a debut, Mr. Stowe, what took ya so long? No spring chicken, thou, as evidenced by your choices for ANN (including DOD Miller) and the George Carlin shout-out via "Wonderful WINO:"
ReplyDelete"Sunday! Sunday! Amphetamine Speedway!" Ah, that takes me back.
I might say BLECH to a couple of AP's* (ORTO, SETA), but all in all a very promising opener. Note how all the theme expressions cut through two words--YES, even JUG-HEAD. Tough to pull off.
For the 20 of 20 questions, I wanted YESORNO, which fits, but we already have YES and NOEND. The clue for EMPLOYMENT seemed a bit odd; most jobs are decidedly NON-professional. One Monday outlier: the Gluck spelling of Orpheus is hardly at home this early in the week. Still, enough DISGUSTING stuff for a birdie.
*For newcomers: Awkward Partial
TWO WOO, ORTO EWW
ReplyDeleteI'LLBE KINDA trusting that my BLINDDATE'S TUMMY is thin,
but BLECHH, what's DISGUSTING is ACNE and a DOUBLECHIN.
--- JEFFY EDISON
YES, KINDA easy. Roughly seven minutes and that's about as fast as I can go even with no GUESSES. WASNT BLECH one of those WORDS that MAD Magazine *invented*?
ReplyDeleteYES, JUGHEAD is a character that goes waaaay back. I WAS allowed to buy an Archie comic book at the news stand when we went to the Union Depot to pick up relatives from out of town, back when air travel WASNT really an option. I'd read that comic book to NOEND, even every WORD of every ad. Always liked JUGHEAD.
I'll SAYAFEWORDS about ANN Blyth as a mermaid: SHE fills the yeah baby bill.
A very DISGUSTING puz. Nice Monday. Happy Prez Day.
Two rather odd little themers in a row. Remember Sunday? Cat got your tongue?
ReplyDeleteTypical difficulty for a Monday, which is very good for the beginning solver. Remember them?
But, new solvers might think tis is the sort of theme they will oft encounter. Nae, nae. But not, in any way, UGH.
Diana, Lady-in-Waiting for Crosswords
Did someone say "breakfast test"? BLECH may be the grossest, drawing a lot of unwanted attention I would think.
ReplyDeleteEMPLOYMENT may or may not be "professional work".
Doubt there is actually a WINO "radio station".
Wanted GPS before MAP.
A bit off-putting but amusing at the same time.