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Onetime Mughal capital / SAT 12-11-21 / Food often served with plastic grass / 1991 platinum debut album by a female singer / Small-batch publication / Grp. with much discussed amateurism rules
Saturday, December 11, 2021
Constructor: Hal Moore
Relative difficulty: Easy
Word of the Day: ERIKA Alexander (49D: Actress Alexander of "Get Out") —
Erika Rose Alexander (born November 19, 1969) is an American actress, writer, producer, entrepreneur and activist best known for her roles as Pam Tucker on the NBC sitcom The Cosby Show (1990–1992), and Maxine Shaw on the FOX sitcom Living Single (1993–1998). She has won numerous awards for her work on Living Single, including two NAACP Image Awards for Outstanding Actress in a Comedy Series. Her film credits include The Long Walk Home (1990), 30 Years to Life (2001), Déjà Vu (2006) and Get Out (2017). (wikipedia)
• • •
And after I worked a lot of the crosses and put a lot of the shorter stuff together, all I saw was cleanness. Instead of descending into awkward darkness, this one floated up, at least a little if not well above average NYT grid quality. Everything was just working, and not just working, but bouncy. Tasty. Good like a CHEAP QUESADILLA from a RAD TAQUERIA. Or a RAD QUESADILLA from a CHEAP TAQUERIA. One of those. The moral of the story is, set your expectations to "Dread" and then you too can occasionally get the rush of being pleasantly surprised!
The grid is really open, so there's nowhere to get well and truly stuck, and lots of opportunities to get toeholds from 3- 4- and 5-letter answers (I always try to attack the short stuff on late-week puzzles before I ever even look at the long stuff). As I said above, the "Q"s in this one gave me some concern about where the puzzle was headed aesthetically, but they proved to be a launching pad, making those long Downs very easy to get and thus sending me sailing into the middle and bottom of the grid, right from the jump. Not only is the grid not packed with odd, whimsical "J" and "Z" arrangements, but the "Q"s end up being really the only place you see those Scrabbly letters flaunting themselves ostentatiously. There's one "Z" there in the EUROZONE ZINE ("Siri, what is the world's most boring ZINE?"), and a couple of stray "K"s, but otherwise we stay in the realm of colorful fill with relatively common letters. PENCIL SHARPENER, RUMOR MILL, MELATONIN, all winners. HI-TOP FADES was a fantastic way to close things out—really lucky that that was my final long Down, because it put an emphatic "hell yeah!" exclamation point on a puzzle that I thought was gonna plod and sag. I nearly spun out at the end when I wrote in LENIENCE rather than LENIENCY, but luckily I checked the cross instead of just looking at ETD and being satisfied (60D: Paycheck abbr. = YTD). Very pleased with this one. Taste of Friday's puzzle, absolutely gone from my mouth. All I taste now is QUESADILLA. It's nice.
Other things:
- 23A: Promulgate (ISSUE) — I guess they both mean "send forth" or "put out," but I think of "promulgate" as something you do with an idea generally and ISSUE as something you do more as a discrete act ... I'm not explaining this well, but they feel somehow not quite lined up. But close enough, I suppose.
- 16A: "Rumors are carried by ___, spread by fools and accepted by idiots" (old saying) ("HATERS") — no, sorry, I challenge. You are not going to convince me that "HATERS" is "old." "Old saying" is such a hedge. Someone said it, or they didn't. Give me an actual quotation or get lost. How "old"? What is "old" here? 2014? "In my day, we had a saying ... 'HATERS gonna hate'"—me in forty years to a bunch of befuddled children at some kind of family gathering, if those still exist, probably
- 53D: Card games are played in it (MLB) — sometimes it pays to do a lot of puzzles, particularly hard ones—I just saw a variant of this clue last night, as I was solving my way through a puzzle backlog of titanic proportions. It was a "Fireball" crossword, I think. The answer was MLBGAME and this "Card" misdirection was part of the shenanigans ("Card" being short for (St. Louis) Cardinal, and MLB standing for "Major League Baseball," of course).
- 24D: Tender union? (EUROZONE) — I get that they share a currency in that "zone," and so they have a "union" of (legal) "tender," but what is "tender union" even punning on? What's the wordplay? Is it supposed to evoke marriage or something? When I google it in quotation marks, the first hit is the NYT's own puzzle site. That doesn't suggest that the phrase has much ... currency.
- 51D: Name for a Dalmatian (OREO) — first I'm hearing of this, but if you say so
- 25A: Food often served with plastic grass (SUSHI) — yesterday, CHIRASHI; today, SUSHI. It's a raw fish extravaganza! Tasty! Doesn't exactly *go* with my mole chicken QUESADILLA, but whatever, I'll make do.
[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]
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118 comments:
Thx Hal; loved it! :)
Easy-med. Could have switched this one for yd's.
Much of this was on my wavelength, and thx to fair crosses, the mystery parts came together nicely.
PENCIL SHARPENER was a beaut! Had COO, so teaCher's pet (or some such) was my first thot.
Recall a DOGLEG where, if one could hit a high 3-wood off the tee and over the trees, an eagle was a distinct possibility. ⛳️
Wore a flatTOP in the days of my youth. Got a noTOP in boot camp.
Liked this one a lot! :)
___
yd pg -2* / td pg -2 (t.o)
Peace ~ Compassion ~ Tolerance ~ Kindness to all 🕊
The letter E was flaunting itself ostentatiously everywhere in the puzzle. Totally ruined the puzzle for me.
This was a faith solve for me; at no point did I allow myself to think NOHOW; I kept a straight faith through the whole thing. Rather than pack my bags when I got stuck, I detoured to elsewhere in the grid, and awaited my return from another direction. Not always, but often, persistence pays off, as it once more did today.
There were several highlights for me.
• That new clue, and a terrific clue at that, for OREO. And, to boot, it was a misdirect, as SPOT seemed like a lock.
• [Treatment for jet lag] – the first thing to pop into my mind was “pickle juice?”. (Those who solved Tuesday’s puzzle may relate.)
• Seeing SAW right by the “old saying” referred to at 16A.
• Three palindromes – ORO, OSSO, DOD – plus the palindrome-suggesting ABLE (as in “was I…).
The grit was delicious, Saturday worthy, with “Hah!”-worthy clues (especially those for MLB and PENCIL SHARPENER), and enough footholds to keep the faith. What a delightful Saturday puzzle, Hal. Thank you so very much!
Good challenge on the "old" saying Rex. Haters definitely stood out in that clue. A quick Google search hit on a book published in 2011. Too lazy to delve further, but I would guess that was the original coinage.
More than 30 years ago, we had a neighbor with a dalmatian named Oreo.
Very easy. One Saturday long ago I had a streak going. For some reason, I had to solve on paper. When I got back to the computer, I retyped the puzzle I had already solved into the app, just to keep the streak. That bogus time remains -- and will for all time -- my Saturday PR. Today's solve was only 2-1/2 minutes slower. Only hangup was a bleary-eyed misreading of the 30D clue. Thought it said San Rafael's countRy.
I can’t believe I broke open the NE by knowing ALANIS Morrissette.
Remember her? And that crazy ex-girlfriend song of hers?
��And I'm here, to remind you
Of the mess you left when you went away
It's not fair, to deny me
Of the cross I bear that you gave to me
You, you, you oughta know��
I’m pretty sure that guy doesn’t need to be reminded of anything.
Here is the Friday puzzle! Within seconds of a personal record for me for Saturdays. Enjoyable, but not as much of a challenge as I like on a Saturday
Lots of interesting clues - REQUIRED READING, PENCIL SHARPENER (got this with no letters to help), EUROZONE, BACK SEAT, DOG LEG (was thinking of class courses until the end), RUMOR MILL - these all stick out among the best.
Lots of 3-letter and 4-letter fill, which surprises me for a late week puzzle that does not have long stacks. A high percentage is real words (at least as clued) and relatively little is abbreviations and the like.
Well...I felt like I was climbing up a hill with a sack of potatoes on my back. A potato would fall out here and there making my load a bit lighter but then I'd bend over to retrieve it only to fall on my face in a facial mud.
What was your first entree? you ask...Can you believe TAQUERIA/QUESADILLA? I didn't fall for the Mole ruse. Nope...I saw what you did there. By the way...your 61A is really not correct if you want to get all literal. DE NADA means "you're welcome." "It's nothing" is really "es nada." Your Spanish lesson for the day.
I had some trouble with the names. I always do. I use to listen to music all the time on the radio but now it's NPR and they don't play SHAKUR. They also don't talk about Scooby-DOO nor that EARLE guy.
I took my time; I sat back and relished what I accomplished....a fine Saturday that needed no salt on my mashed potatoes. Thankee mucho, Hal Moore.....
Forgot - loved the clue for QUESADILLA (with the mole misdirection)
Easy but super yummy Saturday. I did have a raised eyebrow at HATERS but just ever so slightly. I think Tender Union is a great clue, not sure what Rex’s problem with it is.
Yeah Yeah, easy for a Saturday and easier than yesterday’s puzzle, but the infelicities really bothered me. First, the HATERS clue is an unforced error. Absolutely no need to have RUMORs in the clue, especially when the clue for RUMOR MILL is pretty good. Just clue HATERS with Taylor Swift or, I dunno, get creative. But duplicating an answer was not necessary. Second, D.O.D. crossing DODD? No thanks. Third, I guess it’s Saturday, but why the dead spaghetti western director instead of the still currently a country country? Fourth, and this is more on restaurateurs not the puzzle, but a TAQUERIA is a place that serves tacos. As an ironically fancy sounding faux Spanish term for a taco joint (or even better, a taco truck) I like it. But get your grilled cheese sandwich outta here. Yeah Yeah, actual TAQUERIAs aren’t actually just TAQUERIAs, but I demand purity from my fake Spanish words probably just coined for marketing purposes!
(BTW - I did look up TAQUERIA last night just to confirm what I was pretty sure was correct. M-W traces it to Mexican Spanish from 1982)
Right with Rex at screwing up my nose and thinking “Oh no. Not one of those guys who likes letters.” And also thankful that this turned out not to be the case. Not as fond of REQUIRED READING. Around Grade Four is where the emphasis flips from learning to READ to READING to learn. Around Grade Four is also about the time kids develop a dislike for READING and some for school. Coincidence? I READ a lot. Always have since I learned how. Very little of it has ever been REQUIRED READING.
I thought the obvious name for a Dalmatian would be “Spot” and it being Saturday I knew that wouldn’t be it. Still, I had a frisson of disappointment when I saw the answer and realized the clue wasn’t the wine. OTOH, I really liked the EUROZONE clue. That’s the kind of wordplay that makes me smile. Mole -> TAQUERIA also got a smile here.
Re "Rumors are carried by...."
Never fear. Eventually this will be universally attributed to Gandhi, or Abe Lincoln, or Socrates, each of whom is indisputably said to have said a lot of things they never said.
Then it will become a REAL old saying.
"Roll down to cheesy burger and kick her ass"?
Really? That's the best clip you got?
Yesterday we got a Friday puzzle that would have extraordinarily hard for a Saturday. Today, we get a Saturday puzzle that belongs on Wednesday. I’m not even sure what we were supposed to find difficult. STEP TO, I guess. And ERIKA. But all the crosses were easy on both of those.
Really the only hold-up was not believing HATERS could appear in an “old” saying. The oldest reference I could find was way back in 2011. Although to be fair, I did not look very hard
I’m calling out Rex for not calling out the fact that “rumors” in the 16A clue was repeated in the 29A answer RUMORMILL. I thought that was a crossword taboo…
This puzzle was a push over that took half the time of yesterday's solve. The NYT claims to give these things to test solvers. For this to run on a Saturday they must have given it to the B-team.
All four 3 letter entries in the NW were early week material. The high value letters limit the possibilities and as always made the solving easier. Both grid spanners we're user friendly and provided leverage throughout a puzzle that needed no leverage to begin with.
Very recently we had SAN RAFAEL clued with MARIN. Compare cluing GLEAM with twinkle to the recent cluing of coruscate for GLINT. It's like this puzzle was deliberately dumbed down.
yd -0
1 across
DEMOCRATS wouldn't fit.
Enjoyable clues on the long downs, as others have already mentioned. Was savvy enough to realize that SPOT probably wouldn’t fly in the SW - but was pretty blown away to see an imaginative clue for OREO. Unfortunately, today’s solving experience is tempered by seeing Shortz go down the slippery slope of crossing foreign words with each other (DENADA, which is Saturday-fair, and SAL which could have been clued a dozen other ways). We’ll probably start seeing that type of garbage show up on Thursdays and Sundays now. Maybe next Saturday we can have one whole mini-section (call it “Shortz Shorts”) containing only foreign and made-up words). El Grande Bummer.
Oh, and it being Saturday, I thought the Dalmatian would be a person from Dalmatia, and was thinking Luka or Ivan or something.
@J. Bartlett - From your mouth to God’s ears. 😂🤣😂🤣😂 As @Toki Wartooth mentioned there is an actual quote from a book by Ziad K. Abdelnour that’s the top hit, but the next hit is a NYTX answer site and half the top hits are similar sites. The link above is the tenth hit when I search and leaves the impression that the quote is a bible verse. Wowser. To be fair, that site doesn’t say the quote is from the bible, but the quote is displayed in poster above “25 important bible verses about rumors”.
Shh. Don’t anyone tell Rex that DoD stands for Department of Defense. Surely he didn’t intentionally pass on such a golden opportunity to launch into one of his “I can say a lot of stupid things about something I find distasteful” rants.
Yeah, puzzle seems to be misdayed.
Same feeling as @Gill, but whacking through it with a machete and a flashlight. Not easy. Worked counter clockwise, finally getting a toehold in the SE corner with NCAA, Arden, Cheap, and then some Leniency. That led upward to Atsea, Pain, Nohow & Fred LTD, Purveyors of Fine Pencil Sharpeners.
Quest, Quesadilla, Taqueria should go down in crossword history. Totally agree with @kitchef, Haters is too new for an old saying.
This is what what google pops up for Step To (the last and most difficult answer to fall):
African-American Vernacular, slang, transitive
To challenge, confront or fight (with someone). Walter was angry, so he stepped to Bill.
There's a battle for the ages. "Well Walter, I hate like the dickens to step to ya but by golly that's my Pencil Sharpener."
Nice puzzle - although I didn’t find it as easy as others. The Q stair is so neat - I agree with Rex that it stands stronger without being part of a pangram chase. I liked both of the long spanners - add TALISMAN, HI TOP FADE and LENIENCY and we’re cooking.
Another California county today. For me - ISOTONIC x MELATONIN was an unfortunate addition. No idea on Six Feet Under or ERIKA.
Never a huge EARLE fan - but there were moments especially with the great Iris Dement
Enjoyable Saturday solve
Easy for a Saturday, sure, but fun and satisfying too. I guess it helps not to be irritated by the letter Q, poor thing, as I found it helpful in deciphering the "mole" misdirect, and I should know better Agree with @GILL I about the ESNADA answer--"No es nada" would be even better, but applying Joaquin's Dictum, the anwer works well enough.
I'm attributing any glitches and slow downs in this one to the difficulty of obtaining three-way bulbs for my light source. The brightest setting on my reading light blew out yesterday, leading to the country/county confusion, joined by a confront/comfort misunderstanding. Sheesh.
HITOPFADES took me back to my days of a flat top hair cut when an option was leaving the sides long, leading to a "flat top with fenders". Don't see those much any more.
My favorite possibly right answer was DEGREE for "course challenge". Well, I did have the D and the G.
Nice enjoyable Saturdecito, HM. I've rarely Had More fun on a Saturday, so thanks.
SAME HERE!!!!
Still don’t get the “plastic grass” thing…any explainers out there?
Hey All !
Had the entire West side and center done in 19 minutes, was feeling great about my fastness. Then, 10 minutes of staring at the East side, getting nowhere (a few answers sprinkled in), I had to Goog just to restart. First one was the Rapper. Dang, should've recognized good ole Tupac from ___K_R, but didn't. That let me get the NE, center, but got stuck again in SE. Looked up ERIKA, and got the rest. Except... DNF! Had Rex's original E at LENIENCe/eDT. Drat.
NOHOW went through NaHaW, NuHuW. Fun.
Thought I kept asking @Gill Huh? with all the QUEs in the NW. Har.
@Anoa
Only three POCs, is that a record of some sort?
@The Joker
🤣🤣
Thought I had more to say... but brain says nope. Oh, did have darkSIDE for NEARSIDE first, as no one says NEARSIDE. 😁
yd -6 should'ves 4
td not going well, we'll see later...
One F
RooMonster
DarrinV
Bax, a lot sushi is plated (or boxed to-go) with that weird little comb of green fake grass as a decoration. I do not know why--maybe to separate the glob of wasabi from everything else?
Anyway, I also got caught by the LENIENCE/ETA thing. "Earnings-to-date"... made sense at the time. Cost me a good 30 seconds to track that sucker down, but still got a PR. Definitely easy for a Saturday.
@Bax’N’Nex: your takeout sushi containers don’t come with cute little upside down hula skirts separating the fish from the wasabi and ginger? I don’t think I’ve ever gotten takeout sushi without them. Maybe it’s a regional thing.
@Z and @J.Bartlett, 16A appears to have been said by "Ziad K. Abdelnour, Economic Warfare: Secrets of Wealth Creation in the Age of Welfare Politics," which was published in 2011 (or he said it in a speech). Clue said, "old" not how old 😂. That came from GoodReads.
In the PREQUEL, a dog walks into an OREO factory. The factory explodes, and out walks the world's first dalmatian.
The GLEAM on the new-fallen snow this morning says finish your coffee and STEP TO it. I have a driveway to plow, promises to keep. Maybe put the snowshoes on later and walk in the woods.
Okay,I know it was easy for a Saturday, which is usually a buzz-kill for for me, but I'm with Rex on this one. The long fill was so "in the language" and there was just enough mis-direction in the clues that some thought was required in every corner. Could it have been a Friday ? Yep, but who cares.
@Southside, I think you're getting a little carried away with your foreign-language fixation today. We seem to get "sal" a couple times a week, and if "de nada" is unfamiliar, you apparently have never said,"gracias" to anyone.
@jd, Loved your "battle for the ages".
Oreo for a Dalmatian? Not actually okay. “Oreo” shouldn’t even be used as an answer for an Oreo clue. It’s time to stop black and white clues for “oreo.” Oreos are chocolate wafers with white creme filling. Aren’t they very dark brown, not black? I bet nobody would eat black chocolate. It was clear they are brown and white when they made white wafers with chocolate filling for a while. (And they were the best Oreos.)
Tougher for me than for most of you, it SEEMs. I like to start at 1A and keep on with the acrosses until I get an answer I'm confident of. AIR seemed too obvious, and GPA only one of many things by which one might be ranked. So my first entry was COO. (Coulda been 'aww,' but that seemed a worse fit). That gave me TRIO and OSSO, and I was off.
Then I eventually got to 44 and confidently wrote in 'sunshine,' until I ended up with a blank space, and the I from ISOTONIC in the wrong place. Only then did MELATONIN occur to me (I've never used it, and I've had a lot of jet lag). I finally got the bottom half pretty much filled in, and was able to see REQUIRED READING to get me back into the top.
So it was an enjoyable but slow solve.
@Bax'N'Nex--Nothing to explain, it's how SUSHI is often served. If you want to know why, read this.
Excellent Saturday that I actually enjoyed solving. I suppose that’s because it was on the easy side but it was no cakewalk and IMHO, most deserving of Jeff Chen’s POW. Loved the long downs and the fun clues for both. “Card” games was priceless as was the BACK SEAT advice giver. But RUMOR MILL not so much.
In my day, the cousins of crew cuts were called FLAT TOPS. My old friend EARLE ZINE PANE used to sport one.
Plastic grass is served with it? OR IS IT? I knew there was a reason I never EAT SUSHI NO HOW. On the other hand, I love a good QUESADILLA. I suspect Chef @GILL can whip up a really tasty one. She probably could have her own TAQUERIA from what I’ve heard,
Agree yesterday's and today's could be flipped. Only complaint is this was over too fast.
When I taught 1st grade for a year a while ago, we went through 3 pencil sharpeners. Arg.
A friend once commented they thought I ordered Sushi for the wasabi. Pass those little fake grasses with your leftover green globs over here, thanks!
Much easier today than yesterday though I started out with a blot on my grid where (the too obvious) "Spot" went in as the Dalmatian name, 51D. I was saved by the Spanish DE NADA/SAL. I now thought the Dalmatian name was going to be a Eastern European first name. olEg? OREO arriving in the grid gave me a chuckle.
I wasn't liking the cross of ISOTONIC and sodA TONIc. When QUESADILLA made me rethink that, I considered coLA TONIc but MELATONIN finally cured my jet lag.
disTURB/PERTURB.
Hal Moore, this was a smooth, fun Saturday solve, thanks.
Very easy in the west -- much, much easier than yesterday's -- and I thought perhaps the days had been switched. But then I got to the east and I struggled with what seemed like rather youth-y fill. STEP TO means to confront? The names SHAKUR and ALANIS are familiar to me because of xwords, but not because I would have known them from the clues. ERIKA and FRED were not familiar to me at all.
Some of my right coast struggles were completely on me. The biggie was Elizabeth ARPEL instead of ARDEN. That's my era and she's also not a rapper, so how could I not have known that? But I didn't know what to do with HI TOP FApES.
MELAnONIN before MELATONIN (I was obviously thinking of melanin; I confuse all these sleep-related things). And all I could think of was BLACK sEA, though I didn't write it in.
It was the cleverest non-proper name clues that helped me the most: PENCIL SHARPENER; RUMOR MILL (which I got from the RU) and BACKSEAT. I needed the help of crosses for TRIO (11D) -- couldn't come up with it on my own.
The funniest clue for OREO that I've ever seen (51D). No, I'm not going to name my Dalmatian that (!) -- but y'all can do whatever you like. (FWIW, I won't name him "Spot" either.)
Not a hater, but this was perched between a Wednesday and a Friday (without being a themed Thursday).
well card games, when I was knee to a grasshopper, were played with MLB (Topps, IIRC) trading cards. in my world, this was a flipping game. the winner got the most cards (as one might expect) by matching. I think.
32A kind of a kealoa (helping Rex pump it up): Ran could easily be BLED or FLED. See also darkSIDE NEARSIDE for the moon.
Was never stuck, but the NE and SE were slow coming into focus. I got up to heat up my coffee and everything was obvious when I returned. I love it when that happens.
Ghandi to the British: "Leave OR I SIT"
Froogy went a'courtin in hopes to be A'WED.
I like Department of Defense crossing the Department of Defense Department
I like clues like the one for TOETAG using "Six Feet Under" You have a chance to get it even if you never saw the show.
Steve EAgLE sounded like a good all-American name for a country rocker, which led to a brief flirtation with essential work being REQUIREDgoADING. Aforementioned coffee break sorted that out instantly.
@JD - I love your "step to/pencil sharpener" sentence!
some day, some day, there'll be a clue naming some public school educated (half) Black Brit actress for OREO. then we can watch soooooooo many heads explode.
This was a Saturday puzzle that made me happy. It was tough but ultimately do-able without a cheat. (Unlike that nightmare of a struggle yesterday, I might add). Getting to the MOLE containing chocolate and not spycraft or tunnels was a struggle for me. I wasn’t prepared for Spanish. When faced with the menu at a Mexican restaurant I stick with fajitas so TAQUERIA was new to me.
@Z 8:10....You've probably been to Mexico but, if not...you do see the word TAQUERIA - especially on your favorite side street in maybe, Oaxaca. It's not really a faux term.
I believe the word taco means spoon or something akin to it. You'll also see one on every corner in Mexico City. Boy do I love those little puppies - especially "al pastor."
By the way...Mole is the most delicious (and time consuming) sauce this side of the Rio Grande . A good one can take hours - if not days - to make. the ground chiles and chocolate alone are worth every peso from the Pecos river to the "La Catedral" restaurant in Oaxaca.
Anybody heard from @LMS? Have not seen a post in awhile
That 'hater's quote is claimed by ziad k. abdelnour who was born in 1960. Though the word dates back to the 14th century, there is no way it is biblical. It's hilarious someone has already tried to attribute it to the bible, as another commentator shrewdly noted they would. My dad passed along a top eight list yesterday that was allegedly Cicero. Hi-top fade took what felt like ages for me to get. I had everything but the p. Sadly, I did not have that 'hell yeah' moment. Just a whimper of frustration at being so slow.
Not on this puzzle’s wavelength at all. No fun.
Cripes. Late commenting today because oof! About a quarter of my solve time was spent finding my very (but not very) stupid error.
Thought it was a typo, so did my scan of the puzzle: across, then down....
Oh, hello EAs! What the hell do you mean? Grrr. Was so sure of "Black sEA" waaaaay back while doing the acrosses....So, I guess that's technically a DNF.
*sigh* Well, I won't tell anyone if you don't.
Shifty. Very shifty. But, it's obvious now that we can't have ATSEA and sEA in the same grid. OR IS IT? One really doesn't know anymore, does one? So, either I stand proudly after a clean solve OR I SIT sulking, draped in my ignominy. (Thought I'd just throw in an all fancy and high-falutin word as a distraction. Wait, is that how you spell high-falutin? OR IS IT high-falootin? OR IS IT "hi, falutin - where've you been?")
Dear Gof, make me shut up!
I really liked this one a kealoa. It all felt fresh and the cluing was superb and didn't PERTURB.
🧠🧠🧠
🎉🎉🎉🎉
Like most of you, I found today to be much easier than yesterday's.
Yesterday felt like a Saturday circa 2005, when the puzzles were uniformly much tougher.
Like some of you, I too wonder why "Q" is a Scrabbly letter? Don't *all* the letters appear in Scrabble?
It's hard for me to tell when rex is just saying things for the sake of his daily schtick, and when he's really bothered by something that is, in the grand scheme of things, overwhelmingly trivial.
P.S. Do they really serve SUSHI on plastic grass?? Fancy. Do they also tote it in an Easter basket??
Okay, hang on. For 25-Across, "food often served with plastic grass," why is the answer Sushi? That little piece of green plastic often served with sushi (in the States, anyway) represents Shiso, a broad-leafed plant in no way related to grass. Does the constructor really think it's grass? LMAO. Seriously, it's not like sushi is some novelty and the constructor can be forgiven for not knowing the nuances of such a rare dish.
My level of angst over this completely incorrect clue/answer would probably lead some people (read: Millennials) to call me a hater, which is what they call anyone who disagrees with them or who points out a mistake. It helps keep their bubbles intact. The term hater, however, is relatively new; the fact it was clued as being part of an "old saying" (16-Across) is hilarious. I only started hearing that term in the last twenty years (which, to a Millennial, is old, I suppose).
I hope Rex added some real shiso to accompany his chirashi; it's quite good!
Easyish and much easier than yesterday’s. NE was last to fall because I held onto solo before TRIO for way to long. Very smooth with plenty of sparkle, liked it a bunch! Jeff at Xwordinfo gave it POW.
A new study shows that MELATONIN improves memory in older lab mice and may be protective against cogent decline.
If so, that’s just stupid. What could be the reason for it?
Taqueria is a faux marketing word. 🤣🤣🤣. Someone needs to get out more instead of snuggling up with an, at best, mediocre dictionary.
After 50+ comments, I can add my "Me, too" for...finding it on the easy side for a Saturday, having lots of fun solving it, making short work of the west side, and going in for the long haul on the east. Normally, throwing caution to the winds isn't my solving style. But my immediate entry into the TAQUERIA via AFT's T, with "Ha ha, can't fool me with your moles!", gave me the (over)confidence to start writing in answers with abandon. Exhilarating while it lasted. Favorite answer: RUMOR MILL - but so many were so very good.
Do-overs: QUESo...something, REQUIRED courses, lil Kim before SHAKUR, fLED before BLED, NO way, Black sEA. No idea: STEP TO, ERIKA.
Hand up for HATERS hate. The only thing I hated. And 2011? Really?? Old??? Just shoot me now.
@JD 911am The GPS* war of the aughts is nothing to laugh about. But I did. 🤣
*Great PENCIL SHARPENER
Inflation lower under Clinton than George I, lower under Obama than George W, higher under Trump than Obama. Will shortz would have looked pretty dumb cluing Democrat that way
@JD - “Old” was fine by me. Shake it Off is 7 years old, old enough for the teen fans of the song to now be college graduates and experiencing their first wave of nostalgia. The “old quote” is at least a decade old, as old as the Beatles were when they broke up.
I do find the entire internet quote machine fascinating. Digging down I also see this quote being attributed to Nishan Panwar, but never with a where or when, and also on lots of posters with the attribution being “unknown.” Scrolling down lots of the sites using the saying, they all seem to be from 2018 or later. I haven’t clicked through on all the links but the quote seems to be equally distributed between four types of sites, Quote sites, Crossword cheater sites, vaguely Christian sites, and vaguely Yoga sites. By “vaguely,” I mean sites with lots of cultural markers of Christianity or Yoga, but it not being clear to me that there is any actual expertise associated with what’s on the site. In summary, the quote isn’t as old as lots of old sayings, but it does seem to express a truism shared by many and is pithy enough to fit on a poster.
Also, the TAQUERIA thing also reminded me of this article about “French tacos.”
@Gill I - I thought me demanding linguistic purity would have been enough of a hint that I was being a wee bit sarcastic. Mostly I laughed at using “taco joint” to clue QUESADILLA. It’s perfectly legitimate but still tickles my inner prescriptivist. I will say that my mom had some opinions about the Spanish she spoke as opposed to the Spanish she heard spoken around her that had more than a little “get off of my lawn” to it, so I was also channeling her a little bit.
@Gill I & @pabloinnh - re: DE NADA - That’s the difference between translating the words and translating the phrase. The clue is the equivalent English phrase to the Spanish phrase. We don’t say “of nothing” in response to “thanks.” Likewise, if you want to get really literal (and have people look at you funny) you could translate “you are welcome” to “usted son bienvien” (or something like that).
Wondering why I liked it. Not crunchy, not sparkly. But it's lively. Some surprises were unearthed without having to sweat.
Looked up MELATONIN - - I learned something.
The search for the perfect clue for OREO continues.
We saw the new West Side Story yesterday. Liked it better than the first movie but I prefer two or three of the stage productions I've seen.
@Conrad: Glad to see there’s someone else in the same boat, being obsessive about streaks. Had exactly the same experience having solved on paper and then loading it in, back when the app kept a leaderboard (I was at #2) and updates often failed; my Sunday best has ever since has been untouchable. This one was 30 seconds short of an actual best for Saturday; what a beautiful puzzle! Rare indeed to have both easy and delightfully clever at the same time!
Wow, what a fantastic puzzle. This one left my speechless at the beauty of construction. It took me a while to get a hold but after laying in REQUIRED READING, that got my TAQUERIA and then QUESADILLA and it was off to the races. Ever answer was fantastic, one after another after another. Pure perfection.
Only nit is that I still dislike the "Card games are played in it" clue, even after @Rex explained it (since I didn't get it myself). Cardinals are the Cards not the Card (its always plural). No one would say, "Let's watch the Card game."
I thought of "promulgate" as a rule/order being promulgated from the government, so "issue" then followed quite nicely!
The "Rumors..." quotation is actually pretty stupid if you look at it. It should be:
Rumors are started by haters, spread by fools and accepted by idiots"
"Carried" and "spread" are redundant. Whoever made that up is either a fool or an idiot.
When I saw the Q's I knew we were in for a harangue. We get 70+ words on the potential horror of Q in paragraph one. If that already seems like a lot, just wait. In paragraph three "As I said above..." ushers in 115+ more words on the subject, dragging in J, Z and K, of course. Groan. please shut up.
I enjoyed the puzzle, and though it seemed a little easy for Saturday, it deservedly got Jeff Chen's "Pow!" for the week. (Except for RUMOR unnecessarily appearing twice. Sloppy.) DOD crossing DODD is an amusing juxtaposition. PERTURB should be in the puzzle more. I was thinking about making OSSO buco recently, and 12d was the first clue I latched onto, so I consider that a nudge.
But OREO is a terrible name for a Dalmatian. Cookies and Cream would be more suitable. Or get two of them and use one name for each.
Talk is cheep.
@RooMonster: check out today's Wall Street Journal puzzle. You'll appreciate it.
@Z:
The word your searching 4 is transliterate.
@Z I can't disagree, even though old is relative. An old saying seems to reach "saw' level. Seven years is a long time ago for a college grad. At Medicare eligibility age, a colonoscopy from seven years ago seems like yesterday.
Of those sites you cited, I'd put my trust in Goodreads. It think it shills for Amazon, but at least it's about books. Dammit man! Don't make me read this book to verify.
Seems that @Rex was initially put off by the three Qs in a row. I have inside info that the puzzle originally had another Q and was the constructor's hat-tip to all the Scrabble haters with a hidden "4Q".
@Z-Well thanks for the translation lesson. Clearly, you have reason.
Fun Fact. After doing an archive puzzle from a Friday in 2009, I read Rex comment on one of the entries : " Today's odd couple: LIN-Manuel Miranda (25A: "In the Heights" Tony winner _____-Manuel Miranda) and EERO Lehtonen (14D: Finnish pentathlete Lehtonen). Never heard of these folks. The Tony Awards no longer mean anything to anyone outside of the island of Manhattan. I'd appreciate it if we could stop acting as if anyone who wins a Tony is fair game."
A subsequent comment by a reader :The story of "In the Heights" was on PBS last night -- a great play. You will be hearing about Lin-Manuel Miranda (a Wesleyan grad) in the future.
Kinda cool.
Anon 10:49 said "Not on this puzzle’s wavelength at all. No fun."
That's at least 2 of us.
Pretty cool, for a themeless puz. Nice run of Q's 'n' U's. [With touches of "Spanish seasoning", a la 57-D.]
Also, some great clues. {Dirt farm?} = RUMORMILL. HATERS carryin rumors. PENCILSHARPENER makin good points. Moles rootin around at the TAQUERIA. etc.
I recommend we lift up our DOGLEGs and give this puppy a themelessthUmbsUp.
Had SPOT before OREO for the dog's name, tho.
staff weeject pick: MLB. Gotta go with any runtword with this kind of extra-feisty clue. Good thing all its crosses were real fair, or M&A'd been forced to come down there, Shortzmeister. Just sayin.
Thanx, Mr. Moore dude. Primo job.
Masked & Anonymo6Us
ode to weejects:
**gruntz**
Maybe those obsessed with times and streaks should GO TO THE RAPY. HAR!
My favorite comments this morning.
JD (9:11)
JD (9:43)
Frantic Sloth (11:06)
Joaquin (12:14)
,
@M&A
You do know what a dog does when it lifts ups its leg, don'tcha? 😂
Oreo people. I don't want to intrude on @Joe D's territory, but y'all might enjoy "Oreo Cookie Blues". Stevie Ray does it but Lonny Mack wrote it. Sorry, I don't know how to imbed.
3 and out.
So how long did I stare at pencil sharpener & still not get it???
Today wasn't my day I guess.
@JC66 – would M&A's suggestion be considered "Damning with faint sprays"?
Plus I wanted "Spot" not Oreo
@JC66, 12:39pm - har. yep, best to lift up a front leg. That's where the dog's thumbs probably are, anyway.
M&A Kennel Club
@TJS – Intrude away! Just don't suggest any songs with Q,K,J, or Z in the title. Here's your link.
@JD - GoodReads is the only one of the sites I clicked on that I trust. It even gives the name of the book. After having been bitten a few times I no longer trust any quote from the internet that doesn't give me the where and when the quote was made.
@Bad Mouse - I don't think so.
@jb129 - I hate when that happens. The "good points" are being made are on the students' writing utensils, literal PENCIL points not rhetorical points.
"I woke up this morning, and none of the news was good
The death machines were rumbling 'cross the land where Jesus stood."
That's a Steve EARLE song, "Jerusalem", and is more than worth a listen. I've liked him since Guitar Town, and was thrilled when he made an appearance at the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass show that Warren Hellman used to put on in Golden Gate Park in San Francisco. Really, in comparison to most of his work, that collaboration with Iris DeMent kinda fell flat. As opposed to John Prine's collaboration with DeMent, one of the best that ever was.
Just wanted to point out that "De Nada" very much means "it is nothing" in Spanish. It has been the equivalent of our "you're welcome" for a very long time. There is probably a story there, but then again, there is one for "you're welcome" too -- which probably meant, "You are always welcome to my help, so there is no need to thank me."
TAQUERIA probably goes back to the glory days of East Los Angeles. I used to go down Whittier Boulevard simply to stop at a random TAQUERIA for a little fuel before continuing down I-5 to see my parents in San Marcos. The food was consistently better than what we had in San Francisco, even if that's where the burrito was invented. We had a TAQUERIA Santa Rosa, too, where I now live, which was pretty good. But a lot of California Spanish words came from LA.
The puzzle was less satisfying than yesterday's, but satisfying overall. I too thought of my elementary school days, seeing that PENCIL SHARPENER.
Here's yesterday's puzzle! And A-A-RON is back from the other day (see Key & Peele if my spelling looks odd).
Loved PENCILSHARPENER and RUMORMILL as clued. Are IRAQ & IRAN kealoas for anyone else?
So many writeovers, like others spot before OREO, fLED before BLED...
Still a quick solve, fun, thanks!
@Gill 7:45
Thank you, had esNADA, forgot to include in list of writeovers, but knew DODD. Not a fluent Spanish speaker but I did briefly think it was wrong.
YTD doesn't appear on check...only on pay STUB
@Z...You were being sarcastic????? Well, shiver me timbers.
Look, I'm no purist and I don't get my panties all tied up in a wad, but if you're going to use foreign phrases, then use them properly. DE NADA should've been clued as "you're welcome." The NYT gets these wrong often. I remember our friend @Ulrich, who use to comment here many moons ago, also complained that many German phrases were just plain wrong. It's not hard to get them right.....
My two centavos.
I swear.I typed in cognitive decline not cogent decline. Dang!
Awesome puzzle, no googles, no mistakes, 21 minutes for the Father and Son amateur solving team. Thanks for a terrific puzzle! Much smoother and easier than yesterdays.... : )
Yep, ROO @9:36, I did notice the very restrained use of the plural of convenience (POC) and there isn't a single two-for-one POC, where a Down and an Across share a letter count boosting final S. I think that lack of non-nutritional filler, so to speak, makes a noticeable difference and gives the grid a more robust, heartier feel to it even though it has 36 black squares (I double checked my count and verified it at xwordinfo.com!).
I had ES NADA (61A) at first for "It's nothing" but wasn't surprised when DE NADA filled in.
One kind of taco that's not likely available from a TAQUERIA is a "taco de billar" which, for reasons unknown to moi, means "pool cue". I first heard this from a friend who had jury duty for an assault and battery case (the trial was conducted in Spanish) where some guy attacked another with a "taco". He had never heard it used that way and at first thought it was hilarious that someone would actually attack somebody else with a "taco" and thought it must have been a hard shell taco!
@mathgent, Two in on day. Humbled and honored.
I thought 60 down was ETD, as Earnings To Date is a thing, so it cost me about 20 minutes of fruitless searching for a typo. Thus I hated this puzzle with a fiery hot passion.
16A, with it’s Old Saying clue, had me thinking back on certain non-star crossed Haters. I have to believe that “carried” is a typo for “created”, at which point everything except “old saying” makes sense.
This may have been pointed out already, but in case not…. IRAQ/IRAN is a frequent KEA/LOA. If the clue is “Former home of the Shah, you just fill in IRAN. But for today’s clue, I just left the Q off until I had some inkling of what was going on.
@Conrad 6:52 am. Your inadvertent personal best story made me chuckle about a slightly less innocent version featuring my mom. She was a jugular-seeking and highly skillful game player Even after Alzheimer’s limited her other functions, she could still STEP TO any and all members of our game-oriented family. Well, the family myth has it that she and Dad would go to some coffee shop in Chicago on Sunday mornings (or afternoons, not sure when the first Sunday edition would arrive) where a crowd of top notch solvers would work on the NYTXW Sunday puzzle, separately but in a collegial way, calling for and receiving help as needed. Bragging rights to the fastest. This must have been late 1940’s. So one Sunday she gets the idea to have a friend in New York get the first edition and read her all of the clues and answers long distance. It seems extravagantly expensive, but that’s the lore. So with a several hours or more advantage, she walks into the coffee shop, picks up a clean paper and has completed the grid and walked out in a minute or two, leaving the steaming carcass of the puzzle for all to inspect. Some of the details may have blurred over the decades, but I’ve no doubt that it’s at least “truthy”.
I agree with the consensus on difficulty, but still a very, very nice Saturday puzzle. Thank you, Hal Moore.
Seems like the default setting for how Rex will find the puzzle is "dread"
yesterday i barely made it halfway. not only was it mercilessly hard for me, but even switching to open-book test style to finish, it didn't get easier and it was also monumentally boring. a few good clues and OLIVER was a nice head slapper, but most of it sucked. was stunned to see my time at about an hour and a half, because it felt like three or four hours.
today was the opposite, thank glob. perhaps a bit too easy for a saturday (if i can finish it in a half hour i'm sure many people finished in a fraction of that) but it was thoroughly enjoyable so i didn't mind too much.
it did take me a minute to see OREO - when i came across that clue i thought for sure it must be SPOT, but i was absolutely not budging on DE NADA. DISTURB before PERTURB held me up in the NE which was last to fall in, even long after i decided "moles" must be the delicious collection of sauces and not an animal or skin bit.
i do agree that HATERS made me raise an eyebrow. i googled the quote and google returned a page on goodreads that claims it is from "Ziad K. Abdelnour, [and his book] Economic Warfare: Secrets of Wealth Creation in the Age of Welfare Politics." if that's true, that book was published in 2011, making "old saying" a pointless and even incorrect misdirect. but one nit in all of saturday, not bad, not bad at all.
new to me: DOGLEG
thanks to rex for the explanation: EURO ZONE
@JOHN X i loved that album, had it on cassette tape (which my father forbid me from purchasing, but i received it as a birthday gift during a slumber party) and played it to death, went on to keep it in all my cars through the years long after tapes fell out of fashion. nothing like screaming along to vent your frustrations after some teenage drama or another.
anyway, that song in particular sticks out because for ages i thought she sang "it's not fair, to deny me, the cross-eyed bear that you gave to me." i was only 12 or 13. i imagined this ex won it for her at a carnival or some such, or gave it as a valentine's gift, and now that they were broken up he wanted it back for some reason. lol!
oops, meant NW, not NE. also apologies for beating a dead horse with the HATERS sourcing ;)
Two anons - not on my wavelength either, though I have learned to prepare some rather good turkey quesadillas. and oh yes, i also made a delicious chicken mole a couple of times, which didn't prevent me from missing the mole misdirection completely.
yd pg -4; td pg -4
@Anon 9:50am although i am bored of seeing OREO in the crossword in general, it is fair to consider it black and white. countless black and white pets over the years have had the name for this reason. consider also, the classic NY black and white cookie, which is also not black. there are other examples, and we could also talk about how the ocean isn't literally blue either, but, i think my drift has been caught :)
@anonymous 11:29. I guess I've seen a lot of fake marketing stands selling tacos in Oaxaca....
@Gill I - Well, now you got me wondering what the heck “you’re welcome” means. As is often the case, I found something interesting at Merriam-Webster. In that discussion of “no problem” they assert that “you’re welcome” is actually only from the early 20th century. Who knew?
@stephanie - I’ve always loved a good break-up song. No, don't ask me to apologise. I won't ask you to forgive me. If I'm gonna go down, you're gonna come with me. Hand in hand. I may or may not have screamed along to that song to vent frustration in response to some teen drama. 😆😆
Gill,
Please. When z is in error he claims he was being ironic or sarcastic. You know that right?
I mean you’re smarter, better travelled, better educated. More appealing. Why even deign to respond to the transparent,y false claims of an egomaniac? I ask earnestly. You are as integral to this board, and as insightful (more actually) as any of the regulars. Why feed the troll wit a name? Yeah, I said the quiet part out loud. Z isn’t just a big mouth he’s a troll. Your response is the 10,000th example of what I make that claim.
@egsforbreakfast – Uh huh. Check these out:
Started
Created (can't find anything on that Gajveer Singh attribution.)
But the majority of internet images has it as "carried". On posters, t-shirts, etc. I think it's some recent trope that got mangled with repetition.
Good grief! Does she always sound like that?
Having never listened to ALANIS, but intrigued by the lyric that @JOHN X cites, I went to YouTube to hear the song. I couldn't decide -- especially in those constipated opening bars -- if ALANIS had a really bad stomach ache or if she'd been lying six feet under for three days, complete with TOE TAG, and had then been dug up and brought into the recording studio a moment before her cue.
Where's Barbara Cook when we need her?
Sorry, @JOHN X. You know I want to love what you love:) Couldn't.
@Z oh, a fine choice indeed!
@JohnX - I went to a Halloween party about the time that song came out. It was boring, there was no life to it whatever, considering half of the attendees were women in their 20s or 30s. When that song came on, all the women jumped up, congregated, started dancing and singing at the top of their lungs. It was then I realized that there are things going on in the world to which men are totally oblivious. Sure, the lyrics often have only a casual relationship with coherence. But yeah, 100% evocative of the angst and anger of women. It just wasn't written for you. Or me.
@Nancy - she's right where I need her.
@ ?...We all know who the trolls really are.
Here is something that is partly sourced from M-W but maybe a bit more about welcome.
https://www.csmonitor.com/The-Culture/In-a-Word/2019/0829/The-role-of-you-re-welcome-in-polite-society
No worries seems to have replaced no problem over the last year or two.
@Nancy
@JOHNX makes no claim of liking the singing. So his taste might agree with yours- or not. Maybe they played in some prison he was in to torture uncooperative inmates.
I found the puzzle to be quite difficult. I would have trouble believing some of you who said T-W easy except there were so many of you. Puts me in my place.
I did enjoy it but needed more than my 3 Saturday look-ups to finish. Never heard of HITOPFADES but knew what they described. TALISMAN theQsteps REQUIREDREADING were good and I got before the look-ups. Sure flubbed it elsewhere.
I likes DOD-DODD. Part of the dry humor. Like the RAD PENCIL SHARPENER. The TRIO clue. The Q's. Why people who do not enjoy spelling amusements get upset about rarer letters being used befuddle me. Why would they even notice?
@albatross shell - Nice link. I have heard the “arrogant” “you’re welcome” but in my experience it’s still a rare form. But then, I still use periods when I text, too. I remember “No worries” having a brief run when Crocodile Dundee was huge, but I’ve noticed the recent resurgence, too.
Hmmm. St. Louis Cardinal…Card? Methinks not. They are the St. Louis CardinalS. Stanford’s team is the Cardinal. I believe the clue is a reference to “line-up cards” where much of the strategic game of MLB is played.
Enjoyed this, and it played easier-than-usual for me, but for SLUED. Who knew? Well, probably a lot of you.
Good one. ORISIT ??? The cluing for MLB (53D) should have added the word “briefly” since it does not indicate abbreviation in any way. That made it a touch unfair. Also, DODD crossing DOD wasn’t very elegant. AIR (1A) was a bit obtuse in its cluing. But overall, it was quite an enjoyable challenge despite a few minor blemishes.
Had to guess on the final letter. Guessed correctly.
However, by then I had had to look up a buncha PPP. You know what I mean.
Diana, Lady-in-Waiting for Crosswords
Having fun anyway
So we've just been introduced to a new term for switchable crossword entries: the "KEALOA." And now we SEEM to be searching for them! Viz:
____ENCY, "Something a judge might show." Is it CLEMENCY or LENIENCY? We have to wait, don't we?
___TURB, "Unsettle." It's DISTURB, right? ORISIT? Aha, what about PERTURB? Ay, there's the rub. I propose we call them "TURBS," because whether you're DISTURBED or PERTURBED...dude, you've been TURBED! I think TURBS sounds better than KEALOA. SCAB/SCAR would just be too awkward.
Once again, apparently, I have been living under a rock this long time. The letters in 26 down forced themselves in, but when I looked at HITOPFADES I thought, uh-oh, where did I screw up? This to me is nothing more than a nonsensical conglomeration of letters. I left it--because I didn't know what else to do!--and was absolutely floored to see that it was right!
Had I done this in PENCIL, I'd have needed the other end, not a SHARPENER. Shoulda known better about the "TURB," but I jumped the gun with DIS. Also I had the wrong SIDE of the moon, the Star Wars, or dark, side.
I seldom start in the NW, and didn't here, so I sorta backed up into those Q's. By that time I already knew the puzzle wasn't a Scrabble-f***ing spree, so that was just a last-minute oddity. Lovely ALANIS is DOD. A different kind of grid, with the majority of longer stuff going vertical. Fun to do. Birdie.
CHEAP QUEST
At ISSUE IS the RUMORMILL,
I GUESS you'reABLE TO repeat,
ALANIS, FRED, and ERIKA will
make a TRIO IN the BACKSEAT.
--- AARON MARIN
Easy after turning a TApasbar into a TAQUERIA. That's an inkfest to start with. The rest provided much LENIENCY.
Not much chatter above re: RUMOR in both a clue and an answer. NOHOW that's supposed to happen. And as @foggy also noticed, crossing DOD and DODD not optimal.
A nice summer drink would have your gin with ISOTONIC.
Except for noted deficiencies, not bad.
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