Projecting rim of metal beam / TUE 12-22-20 / Field of mathematics pioneered by John von Neumann / Greek tourist destination / Italian name of six popes / Equine animal in rural dialect

Constructor: Any Yanni and Jeff Chen

Relative difficulty: untimed, but felt much slower than a typical Tuesday

THEME: CLOUD "nine" (24A: With this puzzle's central black squares, ecstasy) — black squares in and around the center of the grid form the number "9"; other themers (I think) include:

Theme answers:

• SHEER BLISS (18A: Rapture)
• HAPPY PLACE (59A: Comforting mental state)
• SHANGRI-LA (4D: Heaven)
• WONDERLAND (31D: Realm of marvels)

Word of the Day: CORFU (9D: Greek tourist destination) —

Corfu (/kɔːrˈf(j)uː/, US also /ˈkɔːrf(j)uː/) or Kerkyra (Greek: Κέρκυρα, romanized: Kérkyra, pronounced [ˈcercira]) is a Greek island in the Ionian Sea. of the Ionian Islands, and, including its small satellite islands, forms the margin of the northwestern frontier of Greece. The island is part of the Corfu regional unit, and is administered by three municipalities with the islands of Othonoi, Ereikoussa and Mathraki. The principal city of the island (pop. 32,095) is also named Corfu. Corfu is home to the Ionian University. (wikipedia)

• • •

It's my favorite number, but that didn't help enjoyment much here. It's an interesting idea that gets weirdly executed. HALF of me is happy that I got a Tuesday grid that is at least interesting—with a bunch of (eight!) longer (9+) answers that allowed for more interesting fill than you usually encounter on a Tuesday. But that happiness was offset considerably by two things—grid structure and theme execution. I don't know what CLOUD is where it is. Why isn't it at the top of the grid? The top is where a CLOUD should be. Plus, in that position, the whole grid would read "CLOUD 9" much more naturally. Here, the CLOUD is just sort of awkwardly jutting out of the top of the "9"; it looks sloppy. Further, the list of themers ... are they not really signaled as themers for a reason? As with yesterday's puzzle, this set seems very ragged and not consistently synonymous with each other, let alone with "CLOUD 9." SHEER BLISS feels right, but the list drifts away from the theme from there, with WONDERLAND being the farthest afield. WONDERLAND is a place (a literal physical space) filled with, well, wonders, and while a WONDERLAND might put you on CLOUD 9 (which is strictly a metaphorical emotional state), it does not necessarily do that. If you've read "Alice in WONDERLAND," you know that frequently she was nowhere near CLOUD 9. SHANGRI-LA is an ideal (if imaginary) *place* (again, not a state of being). HAPPY PLACE is close, but also suggests a state of denial, a place you retreat to comfort yourself when you are decidedly *not* on CLOUD 9. 

The grid structure, necessitated by the whole "9" construction, also leads to some unpleasantness. I don't care for the long non-themers right along themers of the same length. Confusing. I thought IN A GOOD WAY was theme material for a bit, but ... I guess not. Not a fan of these false themers, which are as long as themers and in theme-seeming positions but are not, ultimately, themers. Bigger issue with the grid structure is the horrendous lack of flow. That is, it's a super-segmented grid, with both fussy little crannies in the middle and then isolated grid pockets literally everywhere, with the worst being the giant NW / SE corners, which are accessible from the rest of the grid only via the narrowest of apertures. May as well be separate puzzles. It was fiddly and annoying to solve this one. Very ragged / start-and-stop. Oh, and lots and lots of short fill (again, necessitated by the whole "9" thing), which ended up being less than entertaining to fill in. But again, I will say that the longer answers go a long way toward keeping this thing interesting. I just wish the execution of the theme here had been (much) more elegant. 

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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