THEME: in like a LION, out like a LAMB — there's a word ladder (...) that goes from LION to LAMB, and then there are three themers, each of which starts with a relevant season-changing word:
Theme answers:
MARCH OF PROGRESS (???) (17A: History moving forward)
WINTER WONDERLAND (41A: Snowy expanse)
SPRING HAS SPRUNG (62A: Cry when warmer weather returns)
Word of the Day: Michael PEÑA (14A: Michael who played the title role in 2014's "Cesar Chavez") —
I honestly don't get this at all. Any part of it. It makes no sense. Well, the "in like a lion out like a lamb thing" I get. It's a saying, so why not try to make a puzzle around it, I guess, but why *this* puzzle? Why 16-wide? May see a weird place to start complaining, given how many other problems ther are, but seriously. To make the ladder a true ladder, with 4-letter "rungs" going right down the middle? Is that it? I can tell you that that does not make a word ladder any more appealing (the appeal of all word ladders being permanently set at "zero"). You could put WINTER SOLDIER in the middle, or WINTER [anything] that makes an odd number, and bring the damn grid back to 15 wide. Stagger the stupid "rungs," who cares? As is, you have this conspicuous (and ugly) black "L"s wrapping around the 15s in the NW and SE. Bizarre. Then there's the very fact of a word ladder—one of the least pleasurable crossword theme conceits of all time. Then there's the odd theme answer progression. MARCH answer not about MARCH, but WINTER and SPRING answers definitely about those seasons, and anyway, the adage refers to weather, not the literal seasons. And it's a dumb adage anyway, if you've experienced March in central New York (this last bit is not the puzzle's fault).
What else? The fill. It is inexplicably bad. My printed-out grid is filthy with red ink. Long Downs are fine (the only part of the puzzle I like), but who the hell is NOREEN? I had -OREEN and absolutely no idea, and with the first word in ladder unclued ... solving fun! OXX is to fill what word ladders are to crossword themes, i.e. the worst. ING NOVAE OMOO INRE (!) ALAI (!!) MINIMA ELNINO PAAR APSE TSAR ASADA XIII LALA LEI NAW ASTI SIB AVER ELSA ENID HRE. That there is an assault. A crosswordese / junk fill assault. Maybe change MARCH OF PROGRESS to something snappier—did you all know that was the name of this illustration??
I did not. Anyway, do a different MARCH. Make WINTER and SPRING answers be unrelated to the seasons. Refill the entire grid. I don't know. Do something. This is the longest streak of not liking the puzzle that I have ever been on. 9 days (I'm told—I don't actually keep track of these things). How is the "Best Puzzle in the World" routinely this mediocre? Puzzles should be fun to solve. Fun. And clean. Clean is fun. I CAN'T believe this prestigious puzzle org. can't get its dang act together. It's really, truly, genuinely frustrating and disappointing.
Yeah, word ladders are kinda vague and mundane, so agree with Rex there. Took a minute to get MINIMA. Had LIEN as the second ladder it and thought maybe eINIMA was a new way to evacuate oneself mathematically. EDIE and OMOO are back, along with LALA and LOO. At least "eke" got a rest today. Is it possible to construct a puzzle without crosswords see?
A pretty routine Wednesday. Even with some write overs I still knocked almost a minute off my average time. KMART/KOHLS caused a brief confusion. VIKRAM/BIKRAM only required my reading the 49A clue to clear up.
ING is a bit of ese I need to brush up on. MINIMA is odd but not hard to guess once it starts. It turns out it's really just the plural of minimum.
As far as the word ladder goes I found a better one
March • begins with Winter and ends in Spring and • in like a lion and out like a lamb are very much related March progressions. And wonderland and has sprung are most apt. Nice puzzle. And crosswoidese is where the crosswoid is.
You know what pisses me off? Being expected to know B-list TV actors' names. One here or there is fine, if I can get it on the crosses. Naticks, that pisses me off too. And Broadway, again, one or two is fine, but too many, bah. It's trivia, it's not fun, it's rote dullness.
None of that was a problem today.
You know what doesn't piss me off? Word ladders. I won't go so far as to call them fun, but they don't piss me off like they do Rex. 16-wide also doesn't piss me off. EL NINO doesn't piss me off, it's a real thing we've been dealing with all winter. Carne ASADA is good stuff. MARCH OF PROGRESS doesn't piss me off -- it's fine. Maybe not top of the shelf stuff, but it's fine. really. XIII and OXX? not the best, no. But it doesn't piss me off.
Same thing goes for this puzzle: Not the best, but it didn't piss me off. I liked seeing the word LIMN. I wish I could use it in conversation. I liked CORDON BLEU and LET IT SLIDE. I liked the themers.
I don't know why Rex has to get pissed off when he doesn't like something. You're a smart guy, Rex. Find better ways to pan.
Consistency of thematic answers is the hobgoblin of the passionate crossword constructor. I bear him no ill-will for it. Easy to see his complaint in this puzzle. I'd be happy with just the words winter and spring in seasonal phrases, and March in a third phrase. Winter on top, spring on the bottom, March in the middle. And the word ladder, 2 above March, 2 below.
But I ain't doin the work. In fact I probably couldn't do the work.
Good clue for SKEWER. Gave me a visceral reaction that wasn't very pleasant. So to those of you who don't like clean clues with dirty answers, what do you think of dirty clues with clean answers? Same standards?
The NE filled in easy, then slower scattered progress until I got WINTER and LION, got the theme and the ladder which sped me along quite nicely. Jack PAAR is never bad fill for me. I saw the exploding Bayer aspirin bottle. However, Jean Shepherd almost got the gig. O well.
OK, a word ladder is a turn off, to begin with. But, we go from LION to LAMB, which is pretty cool. I've heard that expression each MARCH I've been on this planet. I teach an adult literacy class and we just talked about this very thing just last week. Somebody somewhere must have noticed that WINTER turns to SPRING in thirty days, and reveled in the glory of seasonal PROGRESS. Nice! In the desert, we no longer wear socks with our sandals.
Much of the solve seemed strained. Lots of fill was foreign to me. Some was beastly; looking at you EDGILY, and not liking what I'm seeing. If the constructors were going for misdirect, then they successfully confused the heck out of me. Even stuff I oughta know, like CORDON BLEU crossing a WTF like LABILE resulted in floundering. And another thing!!! If MINIMA is a term you throw around the break table, then enjoy your world!
That being said, terrific themed puzzle; just not anywhere near my wheelhouse.
ANDY Samberg seems like a nice enough guy, talented, funny, blah blah blah. I kinda have to hate him for the fact that he has been married to Joanna Newsom, happily, I assume. I first heard her recordings around 2004 and was smitten. Hand up for a hard crush. I hope he is worthy.
The past two days our school has had a three-hour delay because of extreme temperatures. I just said …in like a lion, out like a lamb to Mr. Knight, a retired English teacher-cum-sub* (who I got in a heated fight with over the singular they, surprise surprise).
I’ll take a word ladder theme over an anagram theme any day. Different strokes and all that. I took today as announcing… MARCH OF PROGRESS. We’re heading from WINTER into SPRING. Unfortunately. Bitter, polar cold is my happy place. In the summer I get depressed and don’t even want to get out of bed. Weird.
Here’s my word ladder: April SHOWERS/SLOWERS/May FLOWERS. Ok. Needs some work.
Yeah, I agree with @TomAz that Rex could limn his dislike for a puzzle in a kinder, gentler way, but, heck, he’s pretty much the Simon Cowell of crossworld. And boy his is a cross world, huh? After reading today’s write up, I look back at this innocent little weather grid and see ANGER, NAW, BILE, MEAN, I CAN’T, DRAT, BUT NO, SKEWER, LETHAL. Kool Aid? – No thanks. I’m good.
I thought the clue for LET IT SLIDE (“not be bothered”) was off; I let stuff slide all the time, but it still bothers the crap out of me. If I let it slide, I just move on outwardly. Inwardly I die a thousand little deaths over and over again.
Mary Lou, erik – timely theme, with a nice, neat word ladder. I liked this just fine.
*The totally legit but unsettling Latin conjunction cum that I feel creepy using. Too many Cosmopolitan confessionals? I dunno. I still hear the word used on the radio, but to see it in print, well, I bet it’ll suffer the same fate as niggardly. One of those words elbowing its way into print must be akin to being a dead-ringer for Charles Manson exploring Times Square.
I never use LMAO but that's exactly what I did when I read "he's pretty much the Simon Cowell of the crossworld". Thank you for always being the straight up Paula Abdul to his Simon.
Man, I finished this thing before I even started it. Word ladders are OK but this was was just too obvious. Everything about this puzzle was obvious.
(lights Cuban Montecristo No.2 cigar)
I disagree with Rex that the NYT puzzle should be "fun to solve." Bullshit. A real puzzle should punch you in the mouth from the get go and never let up. If you want "fun" puzzles go to Red Lobster and ask for the children's place mat. Those things are fun as hell.
(sips Vesper martini from Baccarat flute)
Same goes for young people who think anything before their birth is unfair material. Kiss my ass. See that evolutionary poster up above? That pathetic chimp on the left end is you, millennial xword solver. Thirty years ago that was me. See the guy walking erect on the right end? I'm out of frame to the right of him in a fucking spacesuit.
(shifts Lamborghini Sesto Elemento into secret 8th gear)
There was one clue/answer here that the constructors missed, if they would have even known of it. "Lowest number not found on a grandfather clock." You'd have to rework the clue slightly but the answer is IV. It's probably a Saturday clue, but Wednesdays should start the real tough stuff. I shouldn't even have told you about this.
(empties clip of Sig Sauer P226 9mm pistol through closed moonroof)
Listen, I'm doing about 200 km/h and I don't even know what that is in normal speed but it's pretty fast and I'm approaching the Swiss border and I'm covered with coke and I have to get these diamonds to Zurich so I'm gonna have to go now.
You need to pitch that plot to someone in Hollywood. Boffo. BTW, the last word in my comment to start today's diatribes was automangled. Should have read "crosswordese"
I thought the theme was brilliant, going from LION to LAMB (which came up in a conversation with my wife yesterday), and PROGRESSing from the WINTER WONDERLAND to SPRING HAS SPRUNG. I visualized the winter wonderland -- a gorgeous white expanse -- when I filled in that answer, and I felt the joy that comes on the day when you really get the feeling that spring has sprung. That is something that rarely happens in puzzles for me -- an actual visualization and an actual reboot of a joyful feeling. It is because this puzzle was published at just the perfect time and combined the perfect elements.
Yes, there was some skudgy fill, but there were eight long answers and I adored seven of them. Seven of eight is tough to pull off in a daily puzzle. Overall, this stands out as one of those special puzzles that not only worked my crossword mechanics, but also truly moved me. Thank you, you two!
My IQ was exercised today in what felt loke a slog, but played like a lark, maybe the beginning and end of a word ladder, but my Ph.D. Is in another subject area.
I feel like there is more to this theme than I'm getting. It's clearly a reference to MARCH comes in like a LION but goes out like a LAMB ... but it doesn't seem to quite work. I’ll go back and read Rex and comments and see whether it’s just me, or it really doesn’t quite add up.
I loved your comment... very funny! I have to disagree with you on the grandfather clock clue though... our grandfather clock, handed down for generations, has IV and not IIII.
Okay, I checked Rex, and for good measure checked Deb Amblen (both of whom appear to have been on drugs while writing, by the way). Apparently, I didn’t miss anything; it’s just a very thin theme.
As I mentioned yesterday, there is an opportunity, Rex, to create the world's best daily puzzle. I don't understand why so much energy is devoted to carping about the perceived inadequacies of the NYTXW, without a commitment to creating a better series.
Is it a requirement that puzzlers should hate word ladders? I think they're fun, and this one was quite appropriate to the theme. Lighten up: spring will be here soon.
@LMS. Glad you pointed out the questionable connection of "not be bothered by" and LETITSLIDE. For me, another disconnect is "and yet..." being answered BUTNO. I just don't see that.
There was just too much I disliked for this weak theme to be entertaining. @ LMS and @ JOHN X saved the day. @ JOHN X, you sound like Hunter S. Thompson today. Good luck! I'm not fond of word ladders either but aren't all of the letters supposed to change. The L is the first letter all the way down. I also did not like so many clues in quotation marks. They all had a negative vibe and I had a hard time trying to imagine myself saying those things. Too frustrating, phooey, and yet..., didn't intend, it's mine. Spit in the food was a nauseating clue. Reading the titles of Pena's work I can see why I've never heard of him. And I've never heard of the snowman song much less who it is sung to. Maybe Sam Smith, whoever that is, wrote it. Rex, you have one more female for your list but even the talented Mr. Agard couldn't save this sorry piece of work. Gee, I sound like Rex today but this is how I felt even before I read the review.
Count me among the “I strongly dislike word ladders but I greatly enjoyed this puzzle” crowd. Anything that gives hope of warmer weather is fine with me. And I found this to be a highly enjoyable solve.
And @JOHN X’s post was worth the price of admission.
I'm going to go join @kitshef in his corner. I'd join @JOHN X as well, but I think he flew off a cliff somewhere in the dessert. I liked the entry of LION and the ending of LAMB. I wondered why it was ruined by a word ladder with two words that have nothing to do with the changing season. LIMN? Well, maybe. You can defuse the seasons with color. LIMB? Why? Life or LIMB? And then you have words that I don't think I'd ever use in every day parlance: EDGILY? LABILE? MINIMA? BIKRAM? NOVAE? I'm going to add IODIDE. Oh, and NAW...Desperation is rearing its head. "And yet..."becomes BUT NO? What is that? I really liked the MARCH WINTER SPRING idea but then somewhere in that DELI LABILE area I began to WONDER. Not all bindi's are RED DOTs but the red color represents love and honor. When I was into my Janism period, I read about the significance of the "Third Eye." The black dot is made from herbs and it is seen as holistic medicine. Any other color is worn purely for decoration or to conceal wisdom. Lets see...what else did I like....GIANT PANDA.
Want to make a word ladder a little less awful? Don't be a slacker and CLUE THE DAMN ANSWERS. This whole "Rung #x of the ladder" is bull shit with a capital BULL. You have highlighted them with circles and non-clue clues. Why not let the ladder be discovered by the solver? Why not let us have the nice moment of puzzling over "is that it?" and then see the whole "In like a LION out like a LAMB" thing. But NOOOOoooo. Us solvers are too stupid to figure it out so the NYTX is going to put not one, but TWO flashing neon arrows pointing to the ladder. LET IT SLIDE? F that.
BTW - I see Rex once again demonstrates that if he likes you he's going to rave about your puzzle and if he hates you a pan is guaranteed. Never Ever Ever let the facts stand in the way of your points.
@LMS - I only ever use it in relation to high graduation honors.
@Steve - You're blue - try skipping the captcha. I haven't been forced to do one here for years.
@JOHNX, way to spice up the morning slog through these comments. I'll have what he's having.
This played hard for me, well over average time. Lots of minor stumbles slowed me down. Forgot how to spell PAAR (I had Parr), and what the hell is LABILE anyway? I stupidly wrote "great panda" instead of GIANTPANDA. Iodine instead of IODIDE.
Agree with all - great clue on SKEWERS.
But OXX ("Losing line in tic-tac-toe") is the worst fill I can remember in a while.
Is Captcha really necessary? Anyone who would take the time to write a robot program to spam a crossword blog really has too much time on his/her hands.
Very difficult to post today, third and final stab: quite a slog, get LION and LAMB but whassa LIMN or LIMB doin in there? Liked CORDONBLEU. EDGILY, LABILE, KOHL’S. Look forward to Thurs.
A clever theme. A dense theme. And a very welcome theme. Because SPRING, when/if it ever finally HAS SPRUNG cannot come soon enough for me. NYC is not a WINTER WONDERLAND right now. You want alliteration? I'll give you alliteration!
From your lips to God's ear, as they say, Mary Lou and Erik. We already have the LION part. Will the LAMB part follow soon? Will it follow at all? Stay tuned. Meanwhile a timely and very cute puzzle.
I must be getting better at crosswords finally because my time is consistently twice Rex’s, not including DNFs. Today was like butter. I have no issues with word ladders. And this one was charming if too easy. Haven’t we seen one just like it before? I bet Lewis will know. Plus any puzzle that uses a losing Tic Tac Toe clue immediately loses a star in its rating. One less Nova, (LOX) would have been better. We are having a reverse March progression here in sunny Florida. The month began with high 80s temps but today is 49. Brrrr.
Wow! A lot of ANGER for what I thought was a good diversion. I learned a new word today (LABILE), which is always fun.
I wanted "zero" for 45A ("Lowest number not found on a grandfather clock") -- no doubt some mathematicians will take me to task for that -- but hat tip to @JOHN X for pointing out that if one ignores zero (which is not a time, except in the 24-hour system: 0:00), IV would indeed be the answer. (In case some readers are perplexed, the usual representation of 4 on a clock that uses Roman numerals is IIII.)
I was only slightly disappointed that the LION > LAMB word ladder didn't include some other animals, or "Ides" in the center, but word ladders themselves don't bother me.
@LMS -- Thanks for your observation on cum. I don't have the same adverse reaction to it that you do. Indeed, used judiciously, it is more precise than the lazy slash, which is what many people would use these days (i.e., English teacher/sub). On that score, if I would have written @Rex's sentence fragment as "A crosswordese, junk-fill assault." Using a slash instead of a comma there makes me have to look back on the left side of the mark to figure out which words are paired with the right. The comma just lets me roll along without the jarring back-shift.
@Z: LOL. Exception that proves the rule. It’s about 90% accurate. Maybe the joy of keeping the hate streak alive outweighed his fondness for a constructor. Maybe he really didn’t like it. We’ll never know. What we do know is that Sharp’s stated aim of ousting Shortz from his job precludes him from being a disinterested critic.
Wow, is RUNE something that shows up frequently in crosswords ? I noticed Rex left it off of his list of garbage words for today, but that may be because there are so many of them. As is the case all too frequently, this NYT offering is filled with arcana (btw, when archana is used in the context of crosswords, it is synonymous with garbage). Add BIKRAM, LIMN, OMOO, ASADA and OXX to the aforementioned RUNE and this thing is giving off a very foul smell.
I’ve taken Rex up on his suggestion and started doing the Washington Post puzzles - so far a small sample size, but they have all been much cleaner and more fun to solve than the NYT (although Shortz has set the bar pretty low in that regard).
Where I grew up, "In like a lion, out like a lamb" was a prognostication not a descriptor. If the weather at the beginning of the month was tumultuous, then the weather at the close of the month would be calm. Also, see the reverse, "In like a lamb, out like a lion." I always took it to mean that March was a transitional month and the weather is usually crazy throughout the month here in the Northern Hemisphere. Obviously, it's no more true than the groundhog thing or "Red in the morning, sailor take warning" sayings, but as kids it gave us something to talk about.
Also and FWIW, when I was growing up we still had the Farmer's Almanac in the house and it was supposed to be able to predict everything from weather to corn prices to what your Aunt Ida was going to serve for Thanksgiving dinner this year. So there's that.
For the record, I hate puns more than I hate word ladders. So I didn't hate today's puzzle, but Rex is right to point out those Ls in the corners. Those are indeed unsightly.
Do word ladders bother you? How about anagrams? How about crosswords? The grumpy primates are out in force. I blame the weather.
Missed yesterday's IQ kerfuffle. I would have said that vocabulary is usually a pretty reliable measure of intelligence, assuming that mine is superior, and today up jumps LABILE to expose my ignorance. Pride goeth, and all that.
Also, ASADA for me is an adjective. This would be like describing a seafood restaurant offering as a "fried".
Thanks to EA and MLG for springs thoughts. Put in LION at the top, dropped to LAMB at the bottom, and had fun filling in the middle. Good times.
@Anonymous 9:52 AM -- Technically you are right, but according to Wikipedia, "Originally, the term El Niño applied to an annual weak warm ocean current that ran southwards along the coast of Peru and Ecuador at about Christmas time. However, over time the term has evolved and now refers to the warm and negative phase of the El Niño–Southern Oscillation and is the warming of the ocean surface or above-average sea surface temperatures in either the central and eastern tropical Pacific Ocean." Sounds close enough to me, but I suppose if one is an oceanographer, that description is no longer current.
A taqueria option is "asada"??? Um. No. Go into Arby's and say, "I'll have a grilled". Maybe if your idea of a taqueria is a Chipoltle in Iowa or something. Yikes. I just can't.
I really liked "whim" and it was downhill from there. Lion to Lamb is okay, and "limn" is also a very nice word. But no, and I don't mean and yet, I mean but no, not a fun or interesting solve, though the sex expo thing might be.
Hey All ! Who knew SPRING got moved to MARCH 6? Har. I thought this was a good puz. Nothing about Word Ladders makes me want to put a SKEWER in my eyeballs. Damn, Rex, it's like someone stole your dog, and you went all John Wick on their asses. The word ladder was an extra neat aspect to go along with the three Across Themers to tie in the whole Change of Seasons thing. Let the puz be what the puz is. I also liked seeing our old friend OMOO, it's been too long. How are you?
The sideburns black squares were a bit jarring, but that will happen with 15's in a 16 grid. Funny to see OXX, cousin of Rex's God of Bad Fill OOXTEPLERNON. This one's line is OXXLEITOP. Nice.
@Steve, @Z -- just FYI: I never get Captchas on my laptop but I get them about half the time, inconsistently, on my iPad. I don't get them for days then I do for a while and then back and forth... I'm trying to convince myself I enjoy them.
I appreciate a puzzle with a lot going on, so this was a way above average Wednesday for me. I’m not a fan of word ladders as the main course in a puzzle, but as an appetizer this one is dandy. The three long themers were familiar but they told the story well. With some unusually tough answers for midweek like RUNE, LIMN, MINIMA, REDDOT (not NOREEN for heaven’s sake!) I felt we were being served a full and satisfying three course meal. It was much tastier than what Anthony had for supper in the North End of Boston on Wednesdays back in the day.
as to the word ladder. TeeVee whetherpersons, mostly, tell us that there are two cycles of seasons: solar and meteorological. the latter is what actually matters, and defines winter as (the full months of) Dec, Jan, Feb. March, from the 1st, is spring. not that it seems so this week in NE.
@Roo Monster: Can someone explain the OKRA clue? Probably slap my head when I find out, but now, the ole brain is flummoxed.
no one yet, so... its that slimy, circular semi-veg that southerners think is edible. usually, from what I hear, an ingredient in gumbo and other stews. not often, even for southerners, from what I hear, eaten straight up. gag.
Got pounded in the East starting with GREAT- instead of GIANTPANDA and no earthly idea what LABILE was (or a bindi, for that matter). Thank goodness for ENID to give me a toehold or I’d still be stuck there. Probably the highest proportion of crosswordese I’ve seen used in a while, but I didn’t hate the themed answers, and the ladder was moderately clever, so I’ll call it even and walk away.
Roo Monster : if no one else has commented, okra is clued as a side dish eaten in the south. Clever clue, but okra isn't a side dish unless it's fried. I liked this puzzle. I don't mind word ladders as a puzzle form; we used to do them as a riding-in-the-car game. I liked the long answers--in fact, just about everything. Clever clues: south side, current event, spit in the food.
@Tom, Of course it’s possible to construct a puzzle without crosswordese. The triumph of this one is that it seems to be made out of nothing but. And I think the icing on the cake is that the theme is a word ladder which is the most dismal of all types. And a pretty dismal ladder at that.
... later: I typed and tried to post the paragraph above before reading all the comments. Pressed “publish.” No Captcha required, but Google did make me log in (maybe I haven’t commented for too long?}. Page refreshed; that is usually a good sign. Then read all the comments and my comment was still in the box. Hmmm, sometimes that happens, but with moderation, all things are extreme. so I’ll add: thanks whoever pointed out that “March” comes between “Winter” and “Spring” in the long clues, and March is the month where Winter becomes Spring, so ... no. Still lame.
@John x - yours is definitely the prize comment. More than made up for the puzzle. @LMS - I always enjoy your essays.
I read the theme as @Loren and @Lewis did - in MARCH we PROGRESS from WINTER to SPRING, i.e., in like a LION, out like a LAMB (and my experience is the same as @Dorothy's, if it's in like a lamb, then it's out like a lion.) We headed South from Dorchester on March 1, stopping for lunch at Ruby Tuesday a couple of times, where they offered sides of grilled zucchini, onion rings, fries, but not OKRA. It started to snow as we left, picked up over the weekend, and by the end of Monday there'd been 15.5 inches-- so I'm looking forward to balmy weather when we return at the end of the month. It's cold here on Captiva today, but warmer tomorrow, they say.
I liked it fine; my only real quibble was the no one in the field would assert that history is aa MARCH OF PROGRESS -- they'd sneer "Hah! Whig history!" and refuse to take you seriously.
The hardest part for me was that in the printed paper the little - after the I in 24D was too small to make out, so I put in IOdinE. It took me all the crosses to see that 44A was not EnGILY.
An option is not a menu item, it's how you want the item prepared. "I'll have the grouper;" "Do you want that baked, grilled, or blackened? Or maybe ASADA?" That said, I don't think it applies to taquerias.
Oh yeah, the other tough part was that the song "WINTER WONDERLAND" has a lyric about building a snowman -- not the lyric that's clued, but it took me a bit to remember it correctly. So I was looking for a song-related theme at first. I've never seen Frozen, obviously (if that's the right movie).
What I learned today: the Honora > Nora > NOREEN etymology.
Incredible nitpickery: When I climb a ladder I start at the bottom, so rung #1 would be LAMB.
Thank you all for your comments. Today’s episode is entertaining and educational!
The discussion on “cum” reminded me of the time I spent clerking at my state’s Supreme Court where one of the Justices (not the one for whom I wrote), brilliant and enamored with Latin had a tendency to overuse “qua” and “cum.” We, the lowly lawyers who reveled in our task, yet spent all of our time in the shadows, made horrible, filthy jokes and puns in his style... I rarely use the word as a result. I also regret some of the parodies because the Justice was a mentor and I have nothing but respect for him and his generous spirit. Learned so much in those early years.
Generally speaking, I find a word ladder puzzle enjoyable when the “ladder words” are clued like all the other words and we “discover” the conceit at the reveal clue. That said, the whole theme was consistent and indeed made me long for warm weather. We have suffered mightily here where many of us do not own “real” winter clothing.
The angry blog today would put me off taking a class from Professor Sharp if his professorial style is as angry as is his alter ego. I would hope that as a teacher, he is able to employ more constructive ceitical technique. As my dear Gran used to say, “You catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar.”
Circling back to the court, the erstwhile Justice was known to have a temper. Indeed on occasion one could hear his loud voice from behind his chambers door, but I never experienced that explosive temper either in the classroom (he was an adjunct while I was in law school) or while conversing during my tenure at the court. He was one of the most patient of tutors and one to be revered. I hope Professor Sharp is just as patient and kind yet demanding in his teaching environment.
@Roo Monster - your link to the clock-face article didn’t work for me; some extra stuff was stuck on the beginning. I’m going to try but it’s been so long since I’ve coded HTML I’m not sure it’ll work. ... nope. It’s being rejected because the quotation marks around the address are showing up as “typographer’s quotes” rather than “inch marks”. Anyway, that’s how I interpret the error message. Both my physical keyboard and built-in iPad keyboard render it that way, so maybe it’s a Blogger thing. Rather than spend the rest of the morning fighting how to change that , here’s the address: http://mentalfloss.com/article/24578/why-do-some-clocks-use-roman-numeral-iiii
Speaking as a Noreen, I can tell you that there are many of us out there. BTW, ill give away my general age by telling you that my name was picked by my Irish parents from the dancers on the Arthur Godfrey show. ANd I grew up near Binghamton. So there!!
@Nancy...I can always count on you. If I were hoping no one pushes me onto the subway track, I promise you I would never say it EDGILY. I might say it profanitly. @Z. Nice try. NAW. Not in a taqueria. No one would enter and tell Manolo you'd like your taco ASADA or the burrito ASADA. You might have that choice in an Argentine restaurant.
Fried okra is an incredibly common Southern side dish - and, yes, eaten "straight up". For this the large pod end is removed and discarded, and the remainder of the pod sliced into coins. Those are shaken with flour (or cornmeal) and salt to taste (or sometimes lightly battered), and then fried in vegetable oil, and drained thoroughly.
The battered version is most common in restaurants, because they can make it fast, by tossing frozen, pre-battered okra pieces into a deep fryer - meaning you usually end up with more breading than actual okra.
The other method, though, is the real deal, the home-made version. Home cooks don't batter okra - they shake and fry. We fought over my mother's. It's crunchy, addictive, and not remotely icky.
As far as un-fried okra, a lot of people actually do like it. It's usually made with the pods left whole, either boiled alone or stewed with tomatoes. The trick to getting rid of the majority of the "slime" (as some call it) is, again, to discard the pod end. I grew up eating it and enjoyed it; my mother made it fairly often in the summer when fresh okra was available. That said, it's true a lot of folks can't get past the texture issues, not just the slime but the slight fuzziness of the pod.
But fried okra, when made correctly, is the food of the gods :-)
March in like Noreen the LION, LIMN the LIMB in the winter, spring out like a LAMB. Got it. Not too bad. Somehow, M&A's gut says to circle only the LION and LAMB themers. @RP always likes to keep the circled stuff down to its essential minima.
The puzgrid racin stripes in the NW & SE are A-ok by m&e. Mighta been way better than havin a 15x15 puzgrid with the mysterious WINTERSOLDIER [not long enough] in the middle row, anyhoo. Geeez, @RP.
Sooo … three real long themers, plus four more short themers, is a lotta theme coverage. At such times U just gotta brace yerself, @RP … la Bile of Ow de Speration will pretty much hafta ensue. It is written, on some ancient tablets handed down from the Crossword gods that now reside in a storage place known only to Noreen the XIIIth.
M&A learned some new stuff today: LABILE. BIKRAM. What a "bindi" is [37-D clue]. Also sorta learned a little about NORENE, but as @RP said, crossin her with "rung #1" was a bit sadistic. Fortunately, there ain't many LIO? words. fave fillins: All the extra-longball Down answers, of which there were four. Primo stuff. Especially admired HEARTHINGS. ELNINO also seemed apt, to accompany this puztheme.
staff weeject pick: OXX. To which @RP has already bestowed a rousin 5-hoot salute. OXX was probably needed, tho, in order to defend & keep Noreen intact.
Thanx for gangin up on us -- and for givin spring a good nudge in the lamb's quarters -- Mary Lou darlin & Erik dude. Inspirational.
WILL SHORTZ HAS GOT TO GO! You complain about 9 consecutive days, or so …, of wretched puzzles. I'd say more like 9 years. Why has he been granted such a long tenure, long enough to evidence slackening interest, or care, on his part? Do we know why he hasn't been replaced?
The NE nearly SKEWERed me (love the clue for 23D, I laughed). A three-letter big bank ending in G must be aiG. I put that in, I took out NOVA_. I wondered if cASe had a large plant in Huntsville, AL. Finally saw TEST and the RESTS was the MARCH OF PROGRESS.
I saw that LION and LAMB were going to be the ends of the ladder right away but finding the middle two was tricky. I love the word LIMN. That it sounds the same as LIMB is just a bonus in the puzzle. I usually turn my nose up at word ladders but the underlying theme made this one worthy, in my opinion.
The view out my window is the definition of WINTER WONDERLAND, though it could possibly be mistaken for a moonscape. Big mounds of snow and more possibly arriving this weekend. When I grew up, our take on "in like a lion, out like a lamb" was often reversed in a Punxsutawney Phil sort of way. If March came in like a LAMB, it was sure to go out like a LION. MN often gets most of its snow in MARCH. My roof is praying it won't happen this year! At least I think that's what all of that creaking in the ceiling is - or maybe I'm just HEARing THINGS.
I completely agree with Rex. This puzzle ruined my morning coffee. (covfefe? Heck, why not make that an answer too?) XIII, OXX, all the others that Rex noted … And why, exactly, NOVAE, instead of the standard English NOVAS? I see how MARCH related to WINTER and SPRING, as the transition month between the two seasons, and how it related to the word ladder … I even liked LIMN. If you’re going to have this ladder thing, why not work in that word? I did not know that the name of that particular poster was MARCH OF PROGRESS. That’s also wrong (though not the puzzle’s fault). It trades on the old idea of a SCALA NATURAE (how about that for a crossword answer?) which every biologist will tell you is non-existent. It implies, falsely, a TELOS (another crossword answer!) that doesn’t exist. Evolution is just change in allele frequencies over time and all extant species are equally successful and well-adapted. I would love to see a biology-themed puzzle, with accurate biology.
davidm Your scientism is bankrupt. In fact, not only is life teleologic, it's transcendant too. Carlo Lancelotti does a wonderful job explaining as much. If you care to give him a google- search for his essay on Auguato Del Noce's take on modern totalitarianism.
@Gill I - Tacos with carne ASADA are a common menu item in taquerias and taco trucks everywhere I've dined. And carnitas. and chile verde. and tacos camarón. If it is small or can be chopped you can find it on a taqueria menu near me. And probably near you. And now I think I need to run for office with my signature motto: A Taco Truck On Every Corner!
@Anon9:15 - Classic. Ridiculous. But Classic.
@Anon1:04 - Sure. The NYTX rakes in the dough for the parent company. The question Rex poses (obsesses about? nags about? screams fruitlessly into the abyss about?) is whether, by appealing primarily to a narrow demographic, the NYTX is becoming the Mary Worth of crossword puzzles.
Difficult but interesting puzzle, based on an enduring motto:March comes in likea Lion and leaves like a Lamb”. What is all the fuss about? Grow up!!!!! ( note use of vernacular grammatical construction which has its own poetic truth)
Complaining about a puzzle's APPEARANCE? Really? The ells in the corners bother you? Tell ya what bothers me: Since when is Kohl's an alternative to Target? Doesn't the former sell mainly clothing, with perhaps some jewelry, cosmetics, and housewares? Whereas Target has those + Everything Else. But, no...
Speaking of months, my brain was as slow as molasses in January in working on this one. I did finally realize that the last ladder rung would be LAMB, but I completely overlooked the naming of our current MONTH and the hopeful call for PROGRESS on the transition from WINTER to SPRING. Nice job by the constructors! I wish I'd appreciated the wit while solving. DRAT.
I was hoping that just for once the answer would be nave instead of APSE, but it was not to be. Some day I'm going to do a puzzle with all the alternatives to crosswordese. Hydrox not Oreo.
I hate word ladders, but I thought this one was cute and liked winter turning to spring in the month of March, especially since March is particularly LION-ish this year.
Late to the puzzle today, but still a delight on arrival. I find Rex’s vitriol amusing and ride along with John X in response; truly, I felt shaken not stirred today. Thanks to all for your amusing and enlightening contributions. They are often more fun than the solve itself.
Well, the word ladder isn't "apt". It's completely pointless, actually. Just keep LION and LAMB, with circles or gray shading, but clued regularly. And really, LION should be at 1a and LAMB should be at 72a. So yeah, it kind of doesn't work.
"Winter Wonderland" is a nice seasonal ditty, but I'd rather listen to this song, which hit #1 in NYC in March of 1966:
All the leaves are brown And the sky is grey I've been for a walk On a winter's day I'd be safe and warm If I was in L.A. California dreamin' On such a winter's day
@Z. OK. Yeah, carne ASADA - certain moi. I make it at least once a month. But just seeing ASADA on its little itty bitty lonesome, looked all wrong. @Anony 2:28. Thanks for the laugh, but honestly, don't you see @JOHN X flying off the dessert? I do know the difference but Mr. smart pants, Autocorrect, begs to differ........
@BD 3:18 Check The clue: The lowest number NOT used on a grandfather clock. My comment (and yours) was meant humorously. But is an accurate answer. I considered ZERO as a possible answer while doing the puzzle. I see the humor in your comment but the accuracy or relevance is obscure.
Risking a repeat reply here, but as of now my first one seems to not be showing up.
This is not the place to discuss this, but, since Anonymous insisted on raising it:
CAERLO LANCELOTTI would make a good obscure answer to an equally obscure Sunday xword clue. Otherwise, LOL.
I do not subscribe to scientism.
Evolution has no telos and is not transcendent. It's just one damn thing after another. Most of genotypic change appears to occur because of drift, not selection. Random.
But I would love to see a nice crossword puzzle grounded in philosophy!
davidm, Did you read the essay? Either way, what's so funny? Also, I neiter raised the questuon nor insisted on anything. I offered a rejoinder to your observation.
Instead of crossword puzzles with a bunch of stupid proper names of obscure “celebrities,” I’d love to see a puzzle with answers like this:
RANDOM MUTATION, NATURAL SELECTION, GENETIC DRIFT, ABIOGENESIS, HYDROTHERMAL VENTS, PROKARYOTES, EUKARYOTES, PHYLOGENETIC TREE, CLADISTICS, DEOXYRIBONUCLEIC MOSAIC, NEUTRAL EVOLUTION, JUNK DNA, MICHAEL BEHE IS A LIAR, CREATIONISTS ARE IDIOTS.
I remember the Fury car chase scene in Captain America: The Winter Soldier. It is definitely one of the more intense scenes in the MCU. When I first saw that in the theaters, there was the scene wherein the truck wheels plowed the cop car, I was like, "Woooo!" out loud.
All this back and forth, including Rex’s comments, remind me of the Harry Truman observation. “It takes a carpenter to build a barn. Any dumb ass can kick it down,” or something to that effect.
Fill woes a la OFC, but I HEARTHINGS are getting a little better as the week marches on. I don't share his aversion to word ladders, but I too wish the words were clued normally and we get to discover the ladder progression.
Also agreed that the long themers are inconsistent, as OFC explained. But at least we had some fun long downs, and a learning experience (LABILE, BIKRAM). Thanks be to fair crosses for those two.
Not as bad as its immediate predecessors, but still a bogey. I don't MEAN to be MEAN, but ICAN'T LETITSLIDE.
MIxed gimmick and theme today, a bit messy, and yet they'll do just fine.
The constructors may have tried to do a bit too much here, mixing the word ladder and seasons theme, and including some tough fill like the IODIDE/EDGILY cross. NAW instead of "nah" was an irritant, and BUT NO clued by "And yet..." didn't quite seem apt.
LION to LAMB helps tie the thing together just enough to make it an interesting grid.
Word ladders don't bother me. However MARCHing TO PROGRESS doesn't grab me. Really bad ankle. Other than that, not a bad puzzle, certainly not worth the ANGER that many commenters unleashed on it.
I was going to pick a rare nit about "I" but closer inspection revealed a tiny negative sign which made it IODIDE, so OK.
John X was hilarious today, and the puzzle was fine.
Ii knew some wouldn't like the ladder - too bad. I loved the MARCH(ING) theme of LIONs and LAMBs. Tho we do still seem to have lion-like remnants this "spring" here and there. @Rondo said his fair city was due to have a monster storm again. Ahhh, the lovely Midwest.
“The appeal of all word ladders being permanently set at ‘zero’”: well, it ain’t necessarily so.
Vladimir Nabokov makes word golf a part of his novel Pale Fire: hate to love in three, lass to male in four, live to dead in five. And it'd be strange to read the novel without thinking about pale to fire: pale, pile, file, fire, a sequence of great relevance to the novel.
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Yeah, word ladders are kinda vague and mundane, so agree with Rex there. Took a minute to get MINIMA. Had LIEN as the second ladder it and thought maybe eINIMA was a new way to evacuate oneself mathematically. EDIE and OMOO are back, along with LALA and LOO. At least "eke" got a rest today. Is it possible to construct a puzzle without crosswords see?
ReplyDeleteA pretty routine Wednesday. Even with some write overs I still knocked almost a minute off my average time. KMART/KOHLS caused a brief confusion. VIKRAM/BIKRAM only required my reading the 49A clue to clear up.
ReplyDeleteING is a bit of ese I need to brush up on. MINIMA is odd but not hard to guess once it starts. It turns out it's really just the plural of minimum.
As far as the word ladder goes I found a better one
ENID
INRE
AMDY
DRY
LABILE
BUTNO
REAR
SEX
ICANT
SIT
That's what I think of word ladders.
March • begins with Winter and ends in Spring and • in like a lion and out like a lamb are very much related March progressions. And wonderland and has sprung are most apt.
ReplyDeleteNice puzzle.
And crosswoidese is where the crosswoid is.
I love reading your posts. I can always count on you liking the puzzles, especially when Rex doesn't. :))
DeleteYou know what pisses me off? Being expected to know B-list TV actors' names. One here or there is fine, if I can get it on the crosses. Naticks, that pisses me off too. And Broadway, again, one or two is fine, but too many, bah. It's trivia, it's not fun, it's rote dullness.
ReplyDeleteNone of that was a problem today.
You know what doesn't piss me off? Word ladders. I won't go so far as to call them fun, but they don't piss me off like they do Rex. 16-wide also doesn't piss me off. EL NINO doesn't piss me off, it's a real thing we've been dealing with all winter. Carne ASADA is good stuff. MARCH OF PROGRESS doesn't piss me off -- it's fine. Maybe not top of the shelf stuff, but it's fine. really. XIII and OXX? not the best, no. But it doesn't piss me off.
Same thing goes for this puzzle: Not the best, but it didn't piss me off. I liked seeing the word LIMN. I wish I could use it in conversation. I liked CORDON BLEU and LET IT SLIDE. I liked the themers.
I don't know why Rex has to get pissed off when he doesn't like something. You're a smart guy, Rex. Find better ways to pan.
Consistency of thematic answers is the hobgoblin of the passionate crossword constructor.
ReplyDeleteI bear him no ill-will for it. Easy to see his complaint in this puzzle. I'd be happy with just the words winter and spring in seasonal phrases, and March in a third phrase. Winter on top, spring on the bottom, March in the middle. And the word ladder, 2 above March, 2 below.
But I ain't doin the work. In fact I probably couldn't do the work.
Good clue for SKEWER. Gave me a visceral reaction that wasn't very pleasant. So to those of you who don't like clean clues with dirty answers, what do you think of dirty clues with clean answers? Same standards?
The NE filled in easy, then slower scattered progress until I got WINTER and LION, got the theme and the ladder which sped me along quite nicely. Jack PAAR is never bad fill for me. I saw the exploding Bayer aspirin bottle. However, Jean Shepherd almost got the gig. O well.
For the love of Murgatroyd, why not run this puzzle in 2 weeks, on the first day of SPRING?
ReplyDeleteIn western Canada, where I live, it is still, quite atypically for this time of year, a WINTER WONDERLAND.
Okanaganer
Rex is right. It sucked.
ReplyDeleteOK, a word ladder is a turn off, to begin with. But, we go from LION to LAMB, which is pretty cool. I've heard that expression each MARCH I've been on this planet. I teach an adult literacy class and we just talked about this very thing just last week. Somebody somewhere must have noticed that WINTER turns to SPRING in thirty days, and reveled in the glory of seasonal PROGRESS. Nice! In the desert, we no longer wear socks with our sandals.
ReplyDeleteMuch of the solve seemed strained. Lots of fill was foreign to me. Some was beastly; looking at you EDGILY, and not liking what I'm seeing. If the constructors were going for misdirect, then they successfully confused the heck out of me. Even stuff I oughta know, like CORDON BLEU crossing a WTF like LABILE resulted in floundering. And another thing!!! If MINIMA is a term you throw around the break table, then enjoy your world!
That being said, terrific themed puzzle; just not anywhere near my wheelhouse.
ANDY Samberg seems like a nice enough guy, talented, funny, blah blah blah. I kinda have to hate him for the fact that he has been married to Joanna Newsom, happily, I assume. I first heard her recordings around 2004 and was smitten. Hand up for a hard crush. I hope he is worthy.
The past two days our school has had a three-hour delay because of extreme temperatures. I just said …in like a lion, out like a lamb to Mr. Knight, a retired English teacher-cum-sub* (who I got in a heated fight with over the singular they, surprise surprise).
ReplyDeleteI’ll take a word ladder theme over an anagram theme any day. Different strokes and all that. I took today as announcing… MARCH OF PROGRESS. We’re heading from WINTER into SPRING. Unfortunately. Bitter, polar cold is my happy place. In the summer I get depressed and don’t even want to get out of bed. Weird.
Here’s my word ladder: April SHOWERS/SLOWERS/May FLOWERS. Ok. Needs some work.
Yeah, I agree with @TomAz that Rex could limn his dislike for a puzzle in a kinder, gentler way, but, heck, he’s pretty much the Simon Cowell of crossworld. And boy his is a cross world, huh? After reading today’s write up, I look back at this innocent little weather grid and see ANGER, NAW, BILE, MEAN, I CAN’T, DRAT, BUT NO, SKEWER, LETHAL. Kool Aid? – No thanks. I’m good.
I thought the clue for LET IT SLIDE (“not be bothered”) was off; I let stuff slide all the time, but it still bothers the crap out of me. If I let it slide, I just move on outwardly. Inwardly I die a thousand little deaths over and over again.
Mary Lou, erik – timely theme, with a nice, neat word ladder. I liked this just fine.
*The totally legit but unsettling Latin conjunction cum that I feel creepy using. Too many Cosmopolitan confessionals? I dunno. I still hear the word used on the radio, but to see it in print, well, I bet it’ll suffer the same fate as niggardly. One of those words elbowing its way into print must be akin to being a dead-ringer for Charles Manson exploring Times Square.
I never use LMAO but that's exactly what I did when I read "he's pretty much the Simon Cowell of the crossworld". Thank you for always being the straight up Paula Abdul to his Simon.
DeleteROFLMAO (which I do not use but have to) for your completing the hilarious metaphor!!
DeleteAlways love your posts. Thank you. (I hate summer too).
DeleteMan, I finished this thing before I even started it. Word ladders are OK but this was was just too obvious. Everything about this puzzle was obvious.
ReplyDelete(lights Cuban Montecristo No.2 cigar)
I disagree with Rex that the NYT puzzle should be "fun to solve." Bullshit. A real puzzle should punch you in the mouth from the get go and never let up. If you want "fun" puzzles go to Red Lobster and ask for the children's place mat. Those things are fun as hell.
(sips Vesper martini from Baccarat flute)
Same goes for young people who think anything before their birth is unfair material. Kiss my ass. See that evolutionary poster up above? That pathetic chimp on the left end is you, millennial xword solver. Thirty years ago that was me. See the guy walking erect on the right end? I'm out of frame to the right of him in a fucking spacesuit.
(shifts Lamborghini Sesto Elemento into secret 8th gear)
There was one clue/answer here that the constructors missed, if they would have even known of it. "Lowest number not found on a grandfather clock." You'd have to rework the clue slightly but the answer is IV. It's probably a Saturday clue, but Wednesdays should start the real tough stuff. I shouldn't even have told you about this.
(empties clip of Sig Sauer P226 9mm pistol through closed moonroof)
Listen, I'm doing about 200 km/h and I don't even know what that is in normal speed but it's pretty fast and I'm approaching the Swiss border and I'm covered with coke and I have to get these diamonds to Zurich so I'm gonna have to go now.
(clenches teeth with look of grim determination)
You need to pitch that plot to someone in Hollywood. Boffo. BTW, the last word in my comment to start today's diatribes was automangled. Should have read "crosswordese"
DeleteYeah, calling Andy Samberg funny is like calling Yoko Ono a singer. Google him and Family Guy.
ReplyDeleteI thought the theme was brilliant, going from LION to LAMB (which came up in a conversation with my wife yesterday), and PROGRESSing from the WINTER WONDERLAND to SPRING HAS SPRUNG. I visualized the winter wonderland -- a gorgeous white expanse -- when I filled in that answer, and I felt the joy that comes on the day when you really get the feeling that spring has sprung. That is something that rarely happens in puzzles for me -- an actual visualization and an actual reboot of a joyful feeling. It is because this puzzle was published at just the perfect time and combined the perfect elements.
ReplyDeleteYes, there was some skudgy fill, but there were eight long answers and I adored seven of them. Seven of eight is tough to pull off in a daily puzzle. Overall, this stands out as one of those special puzzles that not only worked my crossword mechanics, but also truly moved me. Thank you, you two!
My IQ was exercised today in what felt loke a slog, but played like a lark, maybe the beginning and end of a word ladder, but my Ph.D. Is in another subject area.
ReplyDeleteI feel like there is more to this theme than I'm getting. It's clearly a reference to MARCH comes in like a LION but goes out like a LAMB ... but it doesn't seem to quite work. I’ll go back and read Rex and comments and see whether it’s just me, or it really doesn’t quite add up.
ReplyDeleteVery fond of the SKEWER clue.
@JOHN X
ReplyDeleteI loved your comment... very funny! I have to disagree with you on the grandfather clock clue though... our grandfather clock, handed down for generations, has IV and not IIII.
I hate these EFFING Captchas where you have to pick pictures.
ReplyDeleteSTOP USING THEM!
Not the worst xword I've seen lately.
ReplyDeleteA minute plus off average Wednesday time.
Don't know why I care about that, actually...
Okay, I checked Rex, and for good measure checked Deb Amblen (both of whom appear to have been on drugs while writing, by the way). Apparently, I didn’t miss anything; it’s just a very thin theme.
ReplyDeleteThis is an excellent puzzle.
ReplyDeleteAs I mentioned yesterday, there is an opportunity, Rex, to create the world's best daily puzzle. I don't understand why so much energy is devoted to carping about the perceived inadequacies of the NYTXW, without a commitment to creating a better series.
Unless I'm missing something...
Is it a requirement that puzzlers should hate word ladders? I think they're fun, and this one was quite appropriate to the theme. Lighten up: spring will be here soon.
ReplyDeleteJohn X, "I ride with you, Jefe."
ReplyDelete@LMS. Glad you pointed out the questionable connection of "not be bothered by" and LETITSLIDE. For me, another disconnect is "and yet..." being answered BUTNO. I just don't see that.
ReplyDeleteOXX also appears in many winning and tied tic-tac-toe games.
ReplyDeleteOXX OXX
XOO XOX
OXX XOO
perhaps the clue could just be random line from some tic-tac-toe game or a hug and two kisses.
SLOG FLOG FROG FROM PROM PRAM TRAM TEAM TEAK PEAK PARK LARK
ReplyDeleteMaybe it's time for us to go gaze at videos of Giant Panda babies.
ReplyDeleteThere was just too much I disliked for this weak theme to be entertaining. @ LMS and @ JOHN X saved the day. @ JOHN X, you sound like Hunter S. Thompson today. Good luck!
ReplyDeleteI'm not fond of word ladders either but aren't all of the letters supposed to change. The L is the first letter all the way down.
I also did not like so many clues in quotation marks. They all had a negative vibe and I had a hard time trying to imagine myself saying those things. Too frustrating, phooey, and yet..., didn't intend, it's mine.
Spit in the food was a nauseating clue.
Reading the titles of Pena's work I can see why I've never heard of him. And I've never heard of the snowman song much less who it is sung to. Maybe Sam Smith, whoever that is, wrote it.
Rex, you have one more female for your list but even the talented Mr. Agard couldn't save this sorry piece of work.
Gee, I sound like Rex today but this is how I felt even before I read the review.
Target and Kohls were the subject of an article in today’s WSJ.
ReplyDeleteGoing back to eating okra on the south side.
ReplyDeleteLoved it. Webb is an atronym.
ReplyDeleteCount me among the “I strongly dislike word ladders but I greatly enjoyed this puzzle” crowd. Anything that gives hope of warmer weather is fine with me. And I found this to be a highly enjoyable solve.
ReplyDeleteAnd @JOHN X’s post was worth the price of admission.
I'm going to go join @kitshef in his corner. I'd join @JOHN X as well, but I think he flew off a cliff somewhere in the dessert.
ReplyDeleteI liked the entry of LION and the ending of LAMB. I wondered why it was ruined by a word ladder with two words that have nothing to do with the changing season. LIMN? Well, maybe. You can defuse the seasons with color. LIMB? Why? Life or LIMB? And then you have words that I don't think I'd ever use in every day parlance: EDGILY? LABILE? MINIMA? BIKRAM? NOVAE? I'm going to add IODIDE. Oh, and NAW...Desperation is rearing its head. "And yet..."becomes BUT NO? What is that?
I really liked the MARCH WINTER SPRING idea but then somewhere in that DELI LABILE area I began to WONDER.
Not all bindi's are RED DOTs but the red color represents love and honor. When I was into my Janism period, I read about the significance of the "Third Eye." The black dot is made from herbs and it is seen as holistic medicine. Any other color is worn purely for decoration or to conceal wisdom.
Lets see...what else did I like....GIANT PANDA.
Want to make a word ladder a little less awful? Don't be a slacker and CLUE THE DAMN ANSWERS. This whole "Rung #x of the ladder" is bull shit with a capital BULL. You have highlighted them with circles and non-clue clues. Why not let the ladder be discovered by the solver? Why not let us have the nice moment of puzzling over "is that it?" and then see the whole "In like a LION out like a LAMB" thing. But NOOOOoooo. Us solvers are too stupid to figure it out so the NYTX is going to put not one, but TWO flashing neon arrows pointing to the ladder. LET IT SLIDE? F that.
ReplyDeleteBTW - I see Rex once again demonstrates that if he likes you he's going to rave about your puzzle and if he hates you a pan is guaranteed. Never Ever Ever let the facts stand in the way of your points.
@LMS - I only ever use it in relation to high graduation honors.
@Steve - You're blue - try skipping the captcha. I haven't been forced to do one here for years.
NOREEN - just because.
A real slog. Get LION to LAMB, but
ReplyDeletewhassa LIMN or LIMB ???
Liked CORDONBLEU and EDGILY.
Look forward to Thurs.
@JOHNX, way to spice up the morning slog through these comments. I'll have what he's having.
ReplyDeleteThis played hard for me, well over average time. Lots of minor stumbles slowed me down. Forgot how to spell PAAR (I had Parr), and what the hell is LABILE anyway? I stupidly wrote "great panda" instead of GIANTPANDA. Iodine instead of IODIDE.
Agree with all - great clue on SKEWERS.
But OXX ("Losing line in tic-tac-toe") is the worst fill I can remember in a while.
Is Captcha really necessary? Anyone who would take the time to write a robot program to spam a crossword blog really has too much time on his/her hands.
Excellent, clever puzzle. Well done. Thanks very much Ms. Guizzo and Mr. Agard.
ReplyDeleteAwkward as all hell. Had to google the word “Transept” for 56D and check that “LIMN” was even a word, no real flow of a theme. Meh.
ReplyDeleteVery difficult to post today, third and final stab: quite a slog, get LION and LAMB but whassa LIMN or LIMB doin in there?
ReplyDeleteLiked CORDONBLEU. EDGILY, LABILE, KOHL’S. Look forward to Thurs.
A clever theme. A dense theme. And a very welcome theme. Because SPRING, when/if it ever finally HAS SPRUNG cannot come soon enough for me. NYC is not a WINTER WONDERLAND right now. You want alliteration? I'll give you alliteration!
ReplyDeleteSHIVERING SIBERIAN SUFFERING. FRIGID FROSTBITTEN FARCE.
And I gather most of the country is even colder.
From your lips to God's ear, as they say, Mary Lou and Erik. We already have the LION part. Will the LAMB part follow soon? Will it follow at all? Stay tuned. Meanwhile a timely and very cute puzzle.
HAHAHA! Your alliteration sounds like Yosemite Sam after once again having lost bugs bunny following a long and frustrating chase through Alaska!
DeleteI must be getting better at crosswords finally because my time is consistently twice Rex’s, not including DNFs. Today was like butter. I have no issues with word ladders. And this one was charming if too easy. Haven’t we seen one just like it before? I bet Lewis will know. Plus any puzzle that uses a losing Tic Tac Toe clue immediately loses a star in its rating. One less Nova, (LOX) would have been better. We are having a reverse March progression here in sunny Florida. The month began with high 80s temps but today is 49. Brrrr.
ReplyDeleteWow! A lot of ANGER for what I thought was a good diversion. I learned a new word today (LABILE), which is always fun.
ReplyDeleteI wanted "zero" for 45A ("Lowest number not found on a grandfather clock") -- no doubt some mathematicians will take me to task for that -- but hat tip to @JOHN X for pointing out that if one ignores zero (which is not a time, except in the 24-hour system: 0:00), IV would indeed be the answer. (In case some readers are perplexed, the usual representation of 4 on a clock that uses Roman numerals is IIII.)
I was only slightly disappointed that the LION > LAMB word ladder didn't include some other animals, or "Ides" in the center, but word ladders themselves don't bother me.
@LMS -- Thanks for your observation on cum. I don't have the same adverse reaction to it that you do. Indeed, used judiciously, it is more precise than the lazy slash, which is what many people would use these days (i.e., English teacher/sub). On that score, if I would have written @Rex's sentence fragment as "A crosswordese, junk-fill assault." Using a slash instead of a comma there makes me have to look back on the left side of the mark to figure out which words are paired with the right. The comma just lets me roll along without the jarring back-shift.
@Z: LOL. Exception that proves the rule. It’s about 90% accurate. Maybe the joy of keeping the hate streak alive outweighed his fondness for a constructor. Maybe he really didn’t like it. We’ll never know. What we do know is that Sharp’s stated aim of ousting Shortz from his job precludes him from being a disinterested critic.
ReplyDelete@JOHN X. Eagerly awaiting your novel, or is it already out?
ReplyDeleteWow, is RUNE something that shows up frequently in crosswords ? I noticed Rex left it off of his list of garbage words for today, but that may be because there are so many of them. As is the case all too frequently, this NYT offering is filled with arcana (btw, when archana is used in the context of crosswords, it is synonymous with garbage). Add BIKRAM, LIMN, OMOO, ASADA and OXX to the aforementioned RUNE and this thing is giving off a very foul smell.
ReplyDeleteI’ve taken Rex up on his suggestion and started doing the Washington Post puzzles - so far a small sample size, but they have all been much cleaner and more fun to solve than the NYT (although Shortz has set the bar pretty low in that regard).
P.S. in crosswordese land, Spring comes in like a LEIA and goes out like an ELIA.
ReplyDeleteNo problem here and I enjoyed it. Different folks know different things and I knew most of this. What I didn't know I enjoyed learning.
ReplyDeleteTHIS
ReplyDeleteTHIN
SHIN
SHIM
SHAM
SLAM
SLAW
SLEW
BLEW
Lol
DeleteWhere I grew up, "In like a lion, out like a lamb" was a prognostication not a descriptor. If the weather at the beginning of the month was tumultuous, then the weather at the close of the month would be calm. Also, see the reverse, "In like a lamb, out like a lion." I always took it to mean that March was a transitional month and the weather is usually crazy throughout the month here in the Northern Hemisphere. Obviously, it's no more true than the groundhog thing or "Red in the morning, sailor take warning" sayings, but as kids it gave us something to talk about.
ReplyDeleteAlso and FWIW, when I was growing up we still had the Farmer's Almanac in the house and it was supposed to be able to predict everything from weather to corn prices to what your Aunt Ida was going to serve for Thanksgiving dinner this year. So there's that.
For the record, I hate puns more than I hate word ladders. So I didn't hate today's puzzle, but Rex is right to point out those Ls in the corners. Those are indeed unsightly.
For @GILL (8:36) -- How to use EDGILY in a sentence. How about a Tom Swifty:
ReplyDelete"I hope no one pushes me onto the subway tracks," said Tom EDGILY.
You're welcome.
Do word ladders bother you? How about anagrams? How about crosswords? The grumpy primates are out in force. I blame the weather.
ReplyDeleteMissed yesterday's IQ kerfuffle. I would have said that vocabulary is usually a pretty reliable measure of intelligence, assuming that mine is superior, and today up jumps LABILE to expose my ignorance. Pride goeth, and all that.
Also, ASADA for me is an adjective. This would be like describing a seafood restaurant offering as a "fried".
Thanks to EA and MLG for springs thoughts. Put in LION at the top, dropped to LAMB at the bottom, and had fun filling in the middle. Good times.
El Nino has to do with temperature not current.
ReplyDelete@Anonymous 9:52 AM -- Technically you are right, but according to Wikipedia, "Originally, the term El Niño applied to an annual weak warm ocean current that ran southwards along the coast of Peru and Ecuador at about Christmas time. However, over time the term has evolved and now refers to the warm and negative phase of the El Niño–Southern Oscillation and is the warming of the ocean surface or above-average sea surface temperatures in either the central and eastern tropical Pacific Ocean." Sounds close enough to me, but I suppose if one is an oceanographer, that description is no longer current.
ReplyDeleteA taqueria option is "asada"??? Um. No. Go into Arby's and say, "I'll have a grilled". Maybe if your idea of a taqueria is a Chipoltle in Iowa or something. Yikes. I just can't.
ReplyDeleteI really liked "whim" and it was downhill from there. Lion to Lamb is okay, and "limn" is also a very nice word. But no, and I don't mean and yet, I mean but no, not a fun or interesting solve, though the sex expo thing might be.
Hey All !
ReplyDeleteWho knew SPRING got moved to MARCH 6? Har. I thought this was a good puz. Nothing about Word Ladders makes me want to put a SKEWER in my eyeballs. Damn, Rex, it's like someone stole your dog, and you went all John Wick on their asses. The word ladder was an extra neat aspect to go along with the three Across Themers to tie in the whole Change of Seasons thing. Let the puz be what the puz is. I also liked seeing our old friend OMOO, it's been too long. How are you?
The sideburns black squares were a bit jarring, but that will happen with 15's in a 16 grid. Funny to see OXX, cousin of Rex's God of Bad Fill OOXTEPLERNON. This one's line is OXXLEITOP. Nice.
Here is a cool article on why Clocks have IIII for 4.
Can someone explain the OKRA clue? Probably slap my head when I find out, but now, the ole brain is flummoxed.
Erik, keep up the puzs, and the hair! But, add some F's! None again today. Do constructors have an adversion to F? :-)
LETHAL WHIM
RooMonster
DarrinV
@Steve, @Z -- just FYI: I never get Captchas on my laptop but I get them about half the time, inconsistently, on my iPad. I don't get them for days then I do for a while and then back and forth... I'm trying to convince myself I enjoy them.
ReplyDeleteI appreciate a puzzle with a lot going on, so this was a way above average Wednesday for me. I’m not a fan of word ladders as the main course in a puzzle, but as an appetizer this one is dandy. The three long themers were familiar but they told the story well. With some unusually tough answers for midweek like RUNE, LIMN, MINIMA, REDDOT (not NOREEN for heaven’s sake!) I felt we were being served a full and satisfying three course meal. It was much tastier than what Anthony had for supper in the North End of Boston on Wednesdays back in the day.
ReplyDeleteAgree with Rex. Terrible puzzle, poorly imagined, poorly edit.
ReplyDeleteas to the word ladder. TeeVee whetherpersons, mostly, tell us that there are two cycles of seasons: solar and meteorological. the latter is what actually matters, and defines winter as (the full months of) Dec, Jan, Feb. March, from the 1st, is spring. not that it seems so this week in NE.
ReplyDeleteClue for 69A should have read:
ReplyDeleteSamberg, who is the OPPOSITE of funny
oh yeah. transept is a lousy clue, i.e. ambiguous. the 4-letter answer can be either NAVE (mostly) or APSE (possibly wrong). bah.
ReplyDelete@Roo Monster:
ReplyDeleteCan someone explain the OKRA clue? Probably slap my head when I find out, but now, the ole brain is flummoxed.
no one yet, so... its that slimy, circular semi-veg that southerners think is edible. usually, from what I hear, an ingredient in gumbo and other stews. not often, even for southerners, from what I hear, eaten straight up. gag.
A side dish served in the South
DeleteGot pounded in the East starting with GREAT- instead of GIANTPANDA and no earthly idea what LABILE was (or a bindi, for that matter). Thank goodness for ENID to give me a toehold or I’d still be stuck there. Probably the highest proportion of crosswordese I’ve seen used in a while, but I didn’t hate the themed answers, and the ladder was moderately clever, so I’ll call it even and walk away.
ReplyDeleteFor me, Noreen is a husky-voiced statuesque brunette from Pittsburgh. Haven't thought about her in years. But I am now.
ReplyDeleteRoo Monster : if no one else has commented, okra is clued as a side dish eaten in the south. Clever clue, but okra isn't a side dish unless it's fried. I liked this puzzle. I don't mind word ladders as a puzzle form; we used to do them as a riding-in-the-car game. I liked the long answers--in fact, just about everything. Clever clues: south side, current event, spit in the food.
ReplyDelete@roo 10:51
ReplyDeleteOkra is a side dish in the South.
@Tom, Of course it’s possible to construct a puzzle without crosswordese. The triumph of this one is that it seems to be made out of nothing but. And I think the icing on the cake is that the theme is a word ladder which is the most dismal of all types. And a pretty dismal ladder at that.
ReplyDelete... later: I typed and tried to post the paragraph above before reading all the comments. Pressed “publish.” No Captcha required, but Google did make me log in (maybe I haven’t commented for too long?}. Page refreshed; that is usually a good sign. Then read all the comments and my comment was still in the box. Hmmm, sometimes that happens, but with moderation, all things are extreme. so I’ll add:
thanks whoever pointed out that “March” comes between “Winter” and “Spring” in the long clues, and March is the month where Winter becomes Spring, so ... no. Still lame.
@John x - yours is definitely the prize comment. More than made up for the puzzle.
@LMS - I always enjoy your essays.
I see your point @John X but the number four is still four no matter how you write it and is found in the clock.
ReplyDeleteI read the theme as @Loren and @Lewis did - in MARCH we PROGRESS from WINTER to SPRING, i.e., in like a LION, out like a LAMB (and my experience is the same as @Dorothy's, if it's in like a lamb, then it's out like a lion.) We headed South from Dorchester on March 1, stopping for lunch at Ruby Tuesday a couple of times, where they offered sides of grilled zucchini, onion rings, fries, but not OKRA. It started to snow as we left, picked up over the weekend, and by the end of Monday there'd been 15.5 inches-- so I'm looking forward to balmy weather when we return at the end of the month. It's cold here on Captiva today, but warmer tomorrow, they say.
ReplyDeleteI liked it fine; my only real quibble was the no one in the field would assert that history is aa MARCH OF PROGRESS -- they'd sneer "Hah! Whig history!" and refuse to take you seriously.
The hardest part for me was that in the printed paper the little - after the I in 24D was too small to make out, so I put in IOdinE. It took me all the crosses to see that 44A was not EnGILY.
An option is not a menu item, it's how you want the item prepared. "I'll have the grouper;" "Do you want that baked, grilled, or blackened? Or maybe ASADA?" That said, I don't think it applies to taquerias.
Oh yeah, the other tough part was that the song "WINTER WONDERLAND" has a lyric about building a snowman -- not the lyric that's clued, but it took me a bit to remember it correctly. So I was looking for a song-related theme at first. I've never seen Frozen, obviously (if that's the right movie).
What I learned today: the Honora > Nora > NOREEN etymology.
Incredible nitpickery: When I climb a ladder I start at the bottom, so rung #1 would be LAMB.
Thank you all for your comments. Today’s episode is entertaining and educational!
ReplyDeleteThe discussion on “cum” reminded me of the time I spent clerking at my state’s Supreme Court where one of the Justices (not the one for whom I wrote), brilliant and enamored with Latin had a tendency to overuse “qua” and “cum.” We, the lowly lawyers who reveled in our task, yet spent all of our time in the shadows, made horrible, filthy jokes and puns in his style... I rarely use the word as a result. I also regret some of the parodies because the Justice was a mentor and I have nothing but respect for him and his generous spirit. Learned so much in those early years.
Generally speaking, I find a word ladder puzzle enjoyable when the “ladder words” are clued like all the other words and we “discover” the conceit at the reveal clue. That said, the whole theme was consistent and indeed made me long for warm weather. We have suffered mightily here where many of us do not own “real” winter clothing.
The angry blog today would put me off taking a class from Professor Sharp if his professorial style is as angry as is his alter ego. I would hope that as a teacher, he is able to employ more constructive ceitical technique. As my dear Gran used to say, “You catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar.”
Circling back to the court, the erstwhile Justice was known to have a temper. Indeed on occasion one could hear his loud voice from behind his chambers door, but I never experienced that explosive temper either in the classroom (he was an adjunct while I was in law school) or while conversing during my tenure at the court. He was one of the most patient of tutors and one to be revered. I hope Professor Sharp is just as patient and kind yet demanding in his teaching environment.
I don't like ladders, but I always stick with Erik (& Mary Lou) so I enjoyed it.
ReplyDelete@Roo Monster - your link to the clock-face article didn’t work for me; some extra stuff was stuck on the beginning. I’m going to try but it’s been so long since I’ve coded HTML I’m not sure it’ll work. ... nope. It’s being rejected because the quotation marks around the address are showing up as “typographer’s quotes” rather than “inch marks”. Anyway, that’s how I interpret the error message. Both my physical keyboard and built-in iPad keyboard render it that way, so maybe it’s a Blogger thing. Rather than spend the rest of the morning fighting how to change that , here’s the address: http://mentalfloss.com/article/24578/why-do-some-clocks-use-roman-numeral-iiii
ReplyDeleteToday’s OKRA may have just been leftovers from yesterday’s Fat Tuesday “Ingredient in gumbo” OKRA, but “South side?” is an inspired clue.
ReplyDelete@Banana
ReplyDeleteAh ha, South side, as in a Side dish of the South. D'oh moment ensuing!
Let's try that Clock link once more, and if it doesn't work this time, then just Google it. :-)
IIII or IV?
RooMonster
I thought the theme was great, I only turn to Rex to find out why he thinks it horrible, because I know he will.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking as a Noreen, I can tell you that there are many of us out there. BTW, ill give away my
ReplyDeletegeneral age by telling you that my name was picked by my Irish parents from the dancers on the Arthur Godfrey show. ANd I grew up near Binghamton. So there!!
Regarding ASADA: How would you like your ahi? Grilled, blackened, fried, or baked? That’s how an adjective becomes an “option.”
ReplyDeleteTypical Wednesday.
ReplyDelete@Nancy...I can always count on you. If I were hoping no one pushes me onto the subway track, I promise you I would never say it EDGILY. I might say it profanitly.
ReplyDelete@Z. Nice try. NAW. Not in a taqueria. No one would enter and tell Manolo you'd like your taco ASADA or the burrito ASADA. You might have that choice in an Argentine restaurant.
@ Banana Diaquiri and @Roo Monster:
ReplyDeleteFried okra is an incredibly common Southern side dish - and, yes, eaten "straight up". For this the large pod end is removed and discarded, and the remainder of the pod sliced into coins. Those are shaken with flour (or cornmeal) and salt to taste (or sometimes lightly battered), and then fried in vegetable oil, and drained thoroughly.
The battered version is most common in restaurants, because they can make it fast, by tossing frozen, pre-battered okra pieces into a deep fryer - meaning you usually end up with more breading than actual okra.
The other method, though, is the real deal, the home-made version. Home cooks don't batter okra - they shake and fry. We fought over my mother's. It's crunchy, addictive, and not remotely icky.
As far as un-fried okra, a lot of people actually do like it. It's usually made with the pods left whole, either boiled alone or stewed with tomatoes. The trick to getting rid of the majority of the "slime" (as some call it) is, again, to discard the pod end. I grew up eating it and enjoyed it; my mother made it fairly often in the summer when fresh okra was available. That said, it's true a lot of folks can't get past the texture issues, not just the slime but the slight fuzziness of the pod.
But fried okra, when made correctly, is the food of the gods :-)
Pickled small okra pods are quite an hors d’.
ReplyDeleteMarch in like Noreen the LION, LIMN the LIMB in the winter, spring out like a LAMB. Got it. Not too bad.
ReplyDeleteSomehow, M&A's gut says to circle only the LION and LAMB themers. @RP always likes to keep the circled stuff down to its essential minima.
The puzgrid racin stripes in the NW & SE are A-ok by m&e. Mighta been way better than havin a 15x15 puzgrid with the mysterious WINTERSOLDIER [not long enough] in the middle row, anyhoo. Geeez, @RP.
Sooo … three real long themers, plus four more short themers, is a lotta theme coverage. At such times U just gotta brace yerself, @RP … la Bile of Ow de Speration will pretty much hafta ensue. It is written, on some ancient tablets handed down from the Crossword gods that now reside in a storage place known only to Noreen the XIIIth.
M&A learned some new stuff today: LABILE. BIKRAM. What a "bindi" is [37-D clue]. Also sorta learned a little about NORENE, but as @RP said, crossin her with "rung #1" was a bit sadistic. Fortunately, there ain't many LIO? words.
fave fillins: All the extra-longball Down answers, of which there were four. Primo stuff. Especially admired HEARTHINGS. ELNINO also seemed apt, to accompany this puztheme.
staff weeject pick: OXX. To which @RP has already bestowed a rousin 5-hoot salute. OXX was probably needed, tho, in order to defend & keep Noreen intact.
Thanx for gangin up on us -- and for givin spring a good nudge in the lamb's quarters -- Mary Lou darlin & Erik dude. Inspirational.
Masked & AnonymoUUs
**gruntz**
WILL SHORTZ HAS GOT TO GO! You complain about 9 consecutive days, or so …, of wretched puzzles. I'd say more like 9 years. Why has he been granted such a long tenure, long enough to evidence slackening interest, or care, on his part? Do we know why he hasn't been replaced?
ReplyDeleteThe NE nearly SKEWERed me (love the clue for 23D, I laughed). A three-letter big bank ending in G must be aiG. I put that in, I took out NOVA_. I wondered if cASe had a large plant in Huntsville, AL. Finally saw TEST and the RESTS was the MARCH OF PROGRESS.
ReplyDeleteI saw that LION and LAMB were going to be the ends of the ladder right away but finding the middle two was tricky. I love the word LIMN. That it sounds the same as LIMB is just a bonus in the puzzle. I usually turn my nose up at word ladders but the underlying theme made this one worthy, in my opinion.
The view out my window is the definition of WINTER WONDERLAND, though it could possibly be mistaken for a moonscape. Big mounds of snow and more possibly arriving this weekend. When I grew up, our take on "in like a lion, out like a lamb" was often reversed in a Punxsutawney Phil sort of way. If March came in like a LAMB, it was sure to go out like a LION. MN often gets most of its snow in MARCH. My roof is praying it won't happen this year! At least I think that's what all of that creaking in the ceiling is - or maybe I'm just HEARing THINGS.
Thanks, MLG and EA, for a timely puzzle.
I completely agree with Rex. This puzzle ruined my morning coffee. (covfefe? Heck, why not make that an answer too?) XIII, OXX, all the others that Rex noted … And why, exactly, NOVAE, instead of the standard English NOVAS? I see how MARCH related to WINTER and SPRING, as the transition month between the two seasons, and how it related to the word ladder … I even liked LIMN. If you’re going to have this ladder thing, why not work in that word? I did not know that the name of that particular poster was MARCH OF PROGRESS. That’s also wrong (though not the puzzle’s fault). It trades on the old idea of a SCALA NATURAE (how about that for a crossword answer?) which every biologist will tell you is non-existent. It implies, falsely, a TELOS (another crossword answer!) that doesn’t exist. Evolution is just change in allele frequencies over time and all extant species are equally successful and well-adapted. I would love to see a biology-themed puzzle, with accurate biology.
ReplyDelete@Roo, enjoyed the John Wick reference.
ReplyDeleteThe fourth line of this finished puzzle is my wife's exact thoughts when I'm in one of my "moods"..........
ReplyDeletedry, hot expanse-desert
ReplyDeletesweets after dinner-dessert
davidm
ReplyDeleteYour scientism is bankrupt. In fact, not only is life teleologic, it's transcendant too.
Carlo Lancelotti does a wonderful job explaining as much.
If you care to give him a google- search for his essay on Auguato Del Noce's take on modern totalitarianism.
@Gill I - Tacos with carne ASADA are a common menu item in taquerias and taco trucks everywhere I've dined. And carnitas. and chile verde. and tacos camarón. If it is small or can be chopped you can find it on a taqueria menu near me. And probably near you. And now I think I need to run for office with my signature motto: A Taco Truck On Every Corner!
ReplyDelete@Anon9:15 - Classic. Ridiculous. But Classic.
@Anon1:04 - Sure. The NYTX rakes in the dough for the parent company. The question Rex poses (obsesses about? nags about? screams fruitlessly into the abyss about?) is whether, by appealing primarily to a narrow demographic, the NYTX is becoming the Mary Worth of crossword puzzles.
Re:granddaddy clocks: If 0 is always a natural number these days, shouldn't the correct answer be ZERO?
ReplyDeleteDifficult but interesting puzzle, based on an enduring motto:March comes in likea Lion and leaves like a Lamb”. What is all the fuss about? Grow up!!!!! ( note use of vernacular grammatical construction which has its own poetic truth)
ReplyDeleteComplaining about a puzzle's APPEARANCE? Really? The ells in the corners bother you? Tell ya what bothers me: Since when is Kohl's an alternative to Target? Doesn't the former sell mainly clothing, with perhaps some jewelry, cosmetics, and housewares? Whereas Target has those + Everything Else. But, no...
ReplyDeleteIt's still an alternative, doesn't matter the merchandise.
Delete@albatross shell:
ReplyDeleteRe:granddaddy clocks: If 0 is always a natural number these days, shouldn't the correct answer be ZERO?
well ...
only during a military attack, which happens on D-day at 0-hour. but I doubt there are many battlefield-hardened grandfather clocks.
Speaking of months, my brain was as slow as molasses in January in working on this one. I did finally realize that the last ladder rung would be LAMB, but I completely overlooked the naming of our current MONTH and the hopeful call for PROGRESS on the transition from WINTER to SPRING. Nice job by the constructors! I wish I'd appreciated the wit while solving. DRAT.
ReplyDelete@John X, awesome post.
How did Jason 2:05 not get disapproved. This is vile and disgusting and doesn't belong on this blog.
ReplyDeleteI was hoping that just for once the answer would be nave instead of APSE, but it was not to be. Some day I'm going to do a puzzle with all the alternatives to crosswordese. Hydrox not Oreo.
ReplyDeleteI hate word ladders, but I thought this one was cute and liked winter turning to spring in the month of March, especially since March is particularly LION-ish this year.
Late to the puzzle today, but still a delight on arrival. I find Rex’s vitriol amusing and ride along with John X in response; truly, I felt shaken not stirred today. Thanks to all for your amusing and enlightening contributions. They are often more fun than the solve itself.
ReplyDeleteWell, the word ladder isn't "apt". It's completely pointless, actually. Just keep LION and LAMB, with circles or gray shading, but clued regularly. And really, LION should be at 1a and LAMB should be at 72a. So yeah, it kind of doesn't work.
ReplyDelete"Winter Wonderland" is a nice seasonal ditty, but I'd rather listen to this song, which hit #1 in NYC in March of 1966:
All the leaves are brown
And the sky is grey
I've been for a walk
On a winter's day
I'd be safe and warm
If I was in L.A.
California dreamin'
On such a winter's day
@Z. OK. Yeah, carne ASADA - certain moi. I make it at least once a month. But just seeing ASADA on its little itty bitty lonesome, looked all wrong.
ReplyDelete@Anony 2:28. Thanks for the laugh, but honestly, don't you see @JOHN X flying off the dessert?
I do know the difference but Mr. smart pants, Autocorrect, begs to differ........
I also had ZERO as the lowest number not on the grandfather clock, until I saw Biloxi, and then of course had to be XIII.
ReplyDeleteI learned the ditty as SPRING IS SPRUNG, which caused me trouble for the longest time.
Why OB ___ and not Ob ___ as the clue? Why would the B of Ob be capitalized?
Some Junior High School doggerel:
ReplyDeleteSpring has sprung
The grass has ris
I wonder where the birdie is
The bird is on the wing
But, that's absurd
The wing is on the bird
@BD 3:18
ReplyDeleteCheck The clue: The lowest number NOT used on a grandfather clock. My comment (and yours) was meant humorously. But is an accurate answer. I considered ZERO as a
possible answer while doing the puzzle.
I see the humor in your comment but the accuracy or relevance is obscure.
Risking a repeat reply here, but as of now my first one seems to not be showing up.
Oh, it was fine. Y'all are overly sensitive.
ReplyDeleteThis is not the place to discuss this, but, since Anonymous insisted on raising it:
ReplyDeleteCAERLO LANCELOTTI would make a good obscure answer to an equally obscure Sunday xword clue. Otherwise, LOL.
I do not subscribe to scientism.
Evolution has no telos and is not transcendent. It's just one damn thing after another. Most of genotypic change appears to occur because of drift, not selection. Random.
But I would love to see a nice crossword puzzle grounded in philosophy!
I'm with @GILL I-ever seen this on a taqueria menu--carne asada(or a la plancha, frita, al horno..)? Neither have I.
ReplyDeleteHe dicho.
davidm,
ReplyDeleteDid you read the essay?
Either way, what's so funny?
Also, I neiter raised the questuon nor insisted on anything. I offered a rejoinder to your observation.
Instead of crossword puzzles with a bunch of stupid proper names of obscure “celebrities,” I’d love to see a puzzle with answers like this:
ReplyDeleteRANDOM MUTATION, NATURAL SELECTION, GENETIC DRIFT, ABIOGENESIS, HYDROTHERMAL VENTS, PROKARYOTES, EUKARYOTES, PHYLOGENETIC TREE, CLADISTICS, DEOXYRIBONUCLEIC MOSAIC, NEUTRAL EVOLUTION, JUNK DNA, MICHAEL BEHE IS A LIAR, CREATIONISTS ARE IDIOTS.
That would please me over my morning covfefe. :-)
@unknown 8:43 pm, I’d love that too.
ReplyDelete@Unknown 8:43
ReplyDeleteNERD
Aw, I thought this was sweet!
ReplyDeleteI remember the Fury car chase scene in Captain America: The Winter Soldier. It is definitely one of the more intense scenes in the MCU. When I first saw that in the theaters, there was the scene wherein the truck wheels plowed the cop car, I was like, "Woooo!" out loud.
ReplyDeleteAll this back and forth, including Rex’s comments, remind me of the Harry Truman observation. “It takes a carpenter to build a barn. Any dumb ass can kick it down,” or something to that effect.
ReplyDeleteFill woes a la OFC, but I HEARTHINGS are getting a little better as the week marches on. I don't share his aversion to word ladders, but I too wish the words were clued normally and we get to discover the ladder progression.
ReplyDeleteAlso agreed that the long themers are inconsistent, as OFC explained. But at least we had some fun long downs, and a learning experience (LABILE, BIKRAM). Thanks be to fair crosses for those two.
Not as bad as its immediate predecessors, but still a bogey. I don't MEAN to be MEAN, but ICAN'T LETITSLIDE.
There was a TSAR named Paul??
REDDOT WHIM
ReplyDeleteIt’s no MARCHOFPROGRESS, the chemist LETITSLIDE,
he’d RUNE the MACAW’S TEST with LETHAL IODIDE.
--- SAM BIKRAM
MIxed gimmick and theme today, a bit messy, and yet they'll do just fine.
ReplyDeleteThe constructors may have tried to do a bit too much here, mixing the word ladder and seasons theme, and including some tough fill like the IODIDE/EDGILY cross. NAW instead of "nah" was an irritant, and BUT NO clued by "And yet..." didn't quite seem apt.
LION to LAMB helps tie the thing together just enough to make it an interesting grid.
I liked it.
Word ladders don't bother me. However MARCHing TO PROGRESS doesn't grab me. Really bad ankle. Other than that, not a bad puzzle, certainly not worth the ANGER that many commenters unleashed on it.
ReplyDeleteI was going to pick a rare nit about "I" but closer inspection revealed a tiny negative sign which made it IODIDE, so OK.
John X was hilarious today, and the puzzle was fine.
One letter write-over having had IODInE first; must sharpen up the bifocals on that agate type to pick up all that’s there.
ReplyDeleteWINTERWONDERLAND for sure. Much of MN is under a blizzard or WINTER storm warning. After 70 degrees Monday. And not MARCH anymore.
Agree that John X had a tremendous comment. Highlight.
Loved The Sopranos and yeah baby EDIE Falco.
Tried to love this puz, BUTNO. I MEAN it’s OK.
BILOXI BLEW
ReplyDeleteI HEARTHINGS about SEX, and ICAN’T say who,
BUTNO body suspects who James CORDONBLEU.
--- NOREEN LABILE
Ii knew some wouldn't like the ladder - too bad. I loved the MARCH(ING) theme of LIONs and LAMBs. Tho we do still seem to have lion-like remnants this "spring" here and there. @Rondo said his fair city was due to have a monster storm again. Ahhh, the lovely Midwest.
ReplyDeleteDiana, LIW
“The appeal of all word ladders being permanently set at ‘zero’”: well, it ain’t necessarily so.
ReplyDeleteVladimir Nabokov makes word golf a part of his novel Pale Fire: hate to love in three, lass to male in four, live to dead in five. And it'd be strange to read the novel without thinking about pale to fire: pale, pile, file, fire, a sequence of great relevance to the novel.
<can someone explain why ¨English head¨ is LOO ?
ReplyDelete