Kilt-wearing Greek infantryman / SUN 10-3-21 / Former telecom giant that merged into Verizon / Football sideline reporter Kolber / Final creature encountered in "Dr. Seuss's ABC" / Inaptly named bear of a tongue twister / Opportunities to win a vacation on "Wheel of Fortune" / Northern California town once home to the palindromic bakery

Constructor: Trenton Charlson

Relative difficulty: Easy

THEME: "Snoozefest" — just a lot of Z's ... forty, to be exact. At least that's the what the puzzle is telling me; no way I'm actually counting (111A: Quick nap ... or a playful description of the 64-Down here) (64-Down = ZEES):

Z-containing long (Theme?) answers:

• FUZZY WUZZY (22A: Inaptly named bear of a tongue twister)
• FREEZING DRIZZLE (28A: Winter weather hazard)
• RAZZLE DAZZLE (45A: Ostentatious display)
• ZIZZER ZAZZER ZUZZ (63A: Final creature encountered in "Dr. Seuss's ABC")
• PRIZE PUZZLES (86A: Opportunities to win a vacation on "Wheel of Fortune")
• BUZZFEED QUIZZES (101A: "Which Disney princess are you?" and the like)

Word of the Day: EVZONE (34D: Kilt-wearing Greek infantryman) —

The Evzones or Evzonoi (Greek: Εύζωνες, Εύζωνοι, pronounced [ˈevzones, ˈevzoni]) were several historical elite light infantry and mountain units of the Greek Army. Today, they are the members of the Presidential Guard (Greek: Προεδρική Φρουρά, romanized: Proedrikí Frourá), a ceremonial unit that guards the Greek Tomb of the Unknown Soldier (Greek: Μνημείο του Άγνωστου Στρατιώτη, romanized: Mnimeío tou Άgnostou Stratiόti) and the Presidential Mansion in Athens. An Evzone (Greek: Εύζωνας) is also known, colloquially, as a Tsoliás (Greek: Τσολιάς; pl. Τσολιάδες, Tsoliádes). Evzones are known for their distinctive uniform, which evolved from the clothes worn by the klephts who fought the Ottoman occupation of Greece. The most visible item of this uniform is the fustanella, a kilt-like garment. Their distinctive dress turned them into a popular image for the Greek soldier, especially among foreigners. (wikipedia)

• • •

Very easy and punishingly dull. I guess the title, "Snoozefest," is supposed to be a winky bit of self-deprecating humor, but as I read it, everyone involved knew this was super boring and thought maybe they could just play it for laughs. It's a defensive title: "see, we already called it boring, so ... yeah, we're definitely in on the joke, and if you call it boring, you're just being redundant now, and obviously don't get irony, which is what we meant to do here, irony, yes, that is definitely part of the theme. Intended!" The entire puzzle rides on your being nostalgically charmed by ZIZZER ZAZZER ZUZZ. Yeah, it's a funny name, I got it without help, but this puzzle is still a dud. For a while I was really hoping that the theme would be something besides a bunch of Z's, and I see that the revealer seems to want to give the whole thing a raison d'etre, tie a bow on it, what not, but a "Z" is not a "wink," exactly, and honestly who cares about any of this. It's not hard to get 40 Z's into a puzzle if you make it your theme. The (well spaced-out) themers contain 27/40 of the Z's. So then you just have to cram in another 13 ("cram" being the operative word), and if you don't care about the overall quality of your fill, the cramming is not hard. No one's day is going to be improved or brightened by NANTZ over ORTIZ or ONZE or ZAC or ADZ, but if your mission is to Scrabble-f*** your way across a 21x21 expanse, you can do it. Oh, no, it's *22*x21. More room for Z's! Just stunned that this is anyone's idea of a good time. But the rule of thumb is, if your puzzle is a huge nothing, themewise, make it real easy, because then, people will be high on a feeling of triumph and forget, or not mind as much, that your theme was garbage. It's all so cynical. 

There was only one "????!" part of the puzzle, and that was DEANERY (wha?) crossing EVZONE (no, seriously, Whaaaaaa?). I actually stopped my solve to look up EVZONE (once I had all the letters in place and saw no other ways to go). It looks like an abbreviation. My first thought was to sing "Get in the zone / E.V. ZONE!," which is a play on the jingle / slogan for AUTOZONE, which then weirdly showed up in the puzzle (82D: Big name in car parts). Crazy. Anyway, EVZONE hasn't been in the puzzle for 29 years, i.e. this is its first appearance in the Shortz Era. Even Maleska only used it once—"Too obscure!" the notoriously obscurantist editor was said to have exclaimed. I think EVZONE is just there to make you forget the fact that the puzzle forced you to write in the incredibly dumb-sounding DEANERY (33A: Jurisdiction of a Catholic church official) (DEANERY, btw, hasn't appeared for *forty-seven* years—Maleska wouldn't touch it even once).

I didn't even have any good mistakes today. I had -AMA at 20A: Paul Simon's "___ Rock" and tried to make it "MAMA Rock," that was kinda funny (it's "I AM A Rock," of course). I thought that song was Simon & Garfunkel. Aaaaand it was. At least that's the version that became famous in the mid-'60s (Simon had written it and recorded it earlier as a solo act, but who cares?). I had no idea what PRIZE PUZZLES were, but it's not like that made a damn bit of difference. I knew Z's were gonna be in there somewhere, so figuring out the answer parts was no trouble. I'm done thinking about this one now. Good day.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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