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Game of Thrones servant / MON 10-31-22 / Michelangelo sculpture whose name means compassion / Friend of Porthos and Aramis in The Three Musketeers / Hired pen or punnily the author / Small child's convenience for reaching a sink
Monday, October 31, 2022
Constructor: Emily Carroll
Relative difficulty: Easy
Theme answers:
- SCARE QUOTES (20A: Punctuation marks indicating irony)
- DOOMSCROLLS (36A: Binges on bad news, in modern slang)
- DEAD LETTERS (43A: Mail that cannot be delivered or returned)
Athos, Count de la Fère, is a fictional character in the novels The Three Musketeers (1844), Twenty Years After (1845) and The Vicomte de Bragelonne (1847–1850) by Alexandre Dumas, père. He is a highly fictionalised version of the historical musketeer Armand d'Athos (1615–1644). // In The Three Musketeers, Athos and the other two musketeers, Porthos and Aramis, are friends of the novel's protagonist, d'Artagnan. Athos has a mysterious past connecting him with the villain of the novel, Milady de Winter. The oldest of the group by some years, Athos is described as noble and handsome but also taciturn and melancholy, drowning his secret sorrows in drink. He is very protective of d'Artagnan, the youngest, whom he eventually treats as his brother. By the end of the novel, it is revealed that he is the Count de la Fère. He was once married to Milady de Winter and attempted to kill her after discovering that she was a criminal on the run, an event which left him bitter and disillusioned. However, during the course of this novel, he is able to get his revenge on Milady. (wikipedia)
• • •
The fill is also a problem. Below average, *especially* for a puzzle with such a light, undemanding theme. I hadn't even finished up the NW corner and I was already getting bad vibes. MEME MENSA NEMO MAMAS ASSAY ... it all felt very stale, very warmed over. ATHOS ADHOC SHAQ, same. And then ... HODOR??? A "Game Of Thrones" ... servant?? Look, maybe if your fill were sparkling, or at least butter-smooth, you could get away with HODOR—a little flourish to show off your "GOT" fandom. A little wink. Whatever. If you cross it fairly (as is the case today) who cares? And yet ... its comparative obscurity (on a Monday, in *this* tired grid) is somehow a little galling. I feel like you gotta earn HODOR, on a Monday, and this grid doesn't. ARIA SPA ALI PIETA IMAM IMAX EXES LASE EROS ATARI SNOOT ONTOE ESTD ELAN ERSE (!) ICARE (crossing IAGREE at the "I"!?). No, the grid just doesn't feel sufficiently polished for a Monday NYTXW with a low-density theme. The theme should be tighter and the fill should be cleaner. That's all. [scans the grid again] Yeah, that really is all.
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77 comments:
I don’t get this theme either. Felt very easy, generally. I do like the term doom scroll, so I thought that was fun.
Easy. Cute and delightful with some fine long downs, liked it a bunch. I’m perfectly willing to stretch the meaning of “pun” when the puzzle makes me smile.
We are currently watching the final season of “The Good Fight” on Paramount +. In a recent episode the doctor that is treating Diane for being depressed about current events advises her to stop DOOM SCROLLing.
@bocamp & pabloinnh - Croce’s Freestyle #756 was medium for a Croce. For me the NE and SW were the toughest. The SW, especially, had some pretty obscure stuff. Good luck!
Four-year-old trick-or-treating at Rex Parker's house:
4YO - Trick or treat!
Rex - What are you supposed to be?
4YO - I'm a ghost.
Rex - You call that a ghost costume? The eye holes are not symmetrical and there's a tag on it. And since when do ghosts wear Nikes?
4YO - Can I have some candy mister?
Rex - OK. But next year you better have a better costume.
Saw Tár last night and agree with Rex on that. I more or less agree with him on the puzzle, although I would just accept SCARE, DOOM, DEAD ad GHOST for the Halloweeniata that they are and go eat my Candy Corn.
Fun little puzzle. Thanks, Emily Carroll.
P.S. No ASS today. AEs (ASS Equivalents): SEAT, END. HAs (Hidden Asses): ASSAY, ASTOR (as in, I got my ASTOR up bad by that gerbil).
I always do Mondays by looking at only the down clues. (You may be tired of hearing me say this, but I really look forward to this day... I never used to care about Mondays, but this method makes for a unique solve. Today I got there without cheating at all and it was really great. So if Mondays don't get your blood flowing, please try it at least once; I don't guarantee anything but I love it. Anyway,...)
I got stalled by drawing a blank on who wrote "Mockingbird". After finally remembering HARPER LEE, the only piece left was the "Like most Gallaudet students" clue... and I suddenly thought: DEAD!, which made me laugh (it may be historically true), then DEAF which made sense.
I really liked the theme. Pretty decent for Halloween.
[Spelling Bee: Sun 0. My last word was a goofy 5er which I've never seen outside of SB.
My SB week, Mon to Sun: -1, 0, 0, 0, 0, -1, 0. Missed these 2 words this week. Getting better!]
Complaining about the theme, but no mention of the 4th themer, GHOSTWRITER? Alas.
Well, it was a Monday, so a lot of XW fill. Wait, IMAX was in there? Guess I filled that in on the crosses and never read the clue.
Forget it, Jake, it's a Monday.
Happy Halloween! Phew that theme is tortured, but it's Día de Muertos so it seems fitting. I can hear your screams already.
I've only today learned my "zealous use" of quotation marks is "scary and ironic."
I'm gonna start crying about Game of Thrones clues like some here cry about Disney and Harry Potter. HODOR is the worst. I hope NEMO finds whoever he is and then promptly misplaces him again.
My high school job was working in an ASSAY office. We'd get in truckloads of ore, burn it up in a highly unenvironmental way, and then take the resultant tiny pieces of gold and weigh them. We had to wear respirators and get tested for lead poisoning. One time a scorpion came out of one of the boxes from South America. I killed it with a broom handle.
EMORAP made me LOL. We'll make up categories for everything won't we?
Uniclues:
1 Laila looks longishly into lousy and lewd online malingering.
2 The dump.
3 Oh please, I just took off my shirt, let's not go too far with the admiration.
4 Smartist guy on the block works to learn how many leaves fell from trees this fall.
5 Where most ladders come from.
6 A supernova.
1 ALI DOOMSCROLLS
2 DEAD LETTERS' END
3 SUN GOD PECS
4 MENSA ADDS PILE
5 STEP STOOL ROOTS (~)
6 STAR SCAR
Shout-out to my favorite GHOSTWRITER – Hey, Bruce!
I like this theme: common phrases reinterpreted so that the first word is spookysome and the second one is writing-related. Works for me. Pretty much impossible to find other possibilities… SHADOW PLAY? Nah.
I was today years old when I heard of DOOMSCROLL. If I’m scrolling, it’s through my tailor-made Google feed (thanks to my phone’s eavesdropping maybe? – it always serves me up stories about linguistics, Bravo TV, and recently, saffron) or TikTok (mainly exhausted teachers and hapless dogs, though this one made me laugh out loud.) I would imagine that if you’re surfing any news from any source, you’re DOOMSCROLLing.
Speaking of scrolling. . . if you’re on Tinder, and you’re serious about finding your forever guy, you’re groomscrolling, amirite?
Liked STEPSTOOL crossing NOT UP TO IT. I’m willing try some dangerous sh** before I cave and go fetch the STEPSTOOL. And then I’m struck at how much easier it is, standing on something safe and stable – not balancing one foot on the bed and stretching the other foot over to the windowsill in order to reach the ceiling air vent to close it ‘cause our house is so damn hot and I want a cold bedroom love ya Mom mwah.
Also liked PIETA crossing I CARE. I had no idea PIETA meant “compassion.”
“Hats” before EGOS. JK.
@akanaganer – me, too, for “dead” before DEAF. I vaguely thought Gallaudet must be some famous cinematic zombie university or some such.
45A – surgical souvenir. . . I just googled if you can up your surgery souvenir game and take home what’s rightfully yours. From Slate, my first hit: Generally, yes. Many hospitals are willing to return everything from tonsils to kneecaps. Can you imagine what a hoot it’d be to have your kneecap in a jar? That talkative busybody neighbor who stops in unexpectedly and won’t leave? No prob! Hey Janet, did I ever show you. . .? Bet she’d back out of there pretty fast and cross you off her Drop-By List.
Happy Halloween! I was thinking yesterday about how I used to sneak into Sage’s bedroom at night to cadge any Butterfinger I could find in her Halloween stash, and I remembered this essay about (kind of) Halloween. It’s the first 17 minutes.
@Rex is just doing his thing but I am so glad I'm not in a position where I have to over think and analyze puzzles. I kinda take them at face value and enjoy(mostly)them. Some are more fun or impressive than others, of course.
Resisting the urge to make this comment a comment on @Rex and the growing suspicion that he might just be a tiny bit obtuse at times when it comes to themes. I myself am perfectly thick so who am I to talk.
@Egs, Thank you for the Ass watch. I Agree that hidden Asses also count and the term of art Ass Equivalents is now firmly planted in my brain.
Astor, Recon, Not Up To It, Shod and Snoot, untaxed Sins. This is all good Monday fun. Dead Letters and Ghost Writer are great.
My five favorite clues from last week
(in order of appearance):
1. Flat ... or inflate? (3)
2. It goes door to door (8)
3. Event that might include poetry, but not pros? (7)(5)
4. Grant in folklore studies? (5)(6)
5. Bank run, perhaps (6)
PAD
CORRIDOR
AMATEUR NIGHT
THREE WISHES
ERRAND
Looks like it’s just me but I don’t get SCAREQUOTES. I know the phrase “air quotes”. Never heard of SCAREQUOTES.
I still find it amusing that Rex parses the theme entries down to the last syllable. I just noticed three scary things and there’s a ghost - so ok, I get the theme - cute, move on.
I agree with Rex - that whole section with ARDOR, ATHOS and ERSE is kind of a cop-out. A nit for a Monday though.
Frankly, I don't know how anyone could have "fun" or find "enjoyment" doing a puzzle today when there are so many tragic events in the world demanding our attention online. Just this morning, I learned that terrorists are blowing up post offices and destroying all the mail inside. Post offices!!! I just can't take take my eyes off this story.
On another note, if you don't have an aversion to watching Roman Polanski movies, do watch Ewan McGregor and Pierce Brosnan in The Ghost Writer. THAT is one scary movie.
We don’t see these words associated with others type themes much anymore - this one had more nuance with the second term added and it is a holiday Monday. Rex nailed it though with the lack of clean, overall fill - should have known right off with EXECS.
I actually liked to see the highly heroic HODOR and thought IN ANY CASE was good. Love HARPER LEE but just tire of constructors having full proper names take up so much real estate. I only ever really liked MAMA.
SHOD, MES, ESTD, PECS etc - the list goes on - drag this down.
The EARLS
Pleasant enough Monday solve.
I raised my eyebrows a tad when I got to the clue for HODOR. I thought it might be looking for a special word for "servant" that they used in GoT (and which I couldn't think of) but the crosses let me know they were looking for HODOR. Rather dismissive, calling him a servant, when he played a key part in the series. Poor HODOR.
I missed the second half of the theme because, as usual, I didn't bother to finish reading the clue for GHOSTWRITER, just stopped at "Hired pen". But yeah, the Halloween tie-in of the theme was obvious. I'm listening to my favorite college radio station where the student DJs are digging in the stacks for spooky music, solving a Halloween-themed puzzle and eating the KitKats out of my Halloween candy so I'm in the trick-or-treat mood.
Emily Carroll, thanks!
What's to not get? SCARE DOOM DEAD, ghost ghost ghost. QUOTES SCROLLS LETTERS, write write write. GHOST WRITER.
I have long believed it's not actually possible to overthink things, but to tie oneself into such knots just to arrive at such blisteringly stoopid conclusions has me thinking maybe I ought to walk that back.
I love the theme entries on this one, but I was not a fan of that SNOOT/WETS cross. Especially when SNOOD/WEDS was right there! (Seriously, outside of crosswords, has anyone ever used the word "SNOOT" for the past 100 years?)
Extremely easy for me. Smashed my Monday PR and didn't even feel as though I was particularly sharp.
I liked the theme first-word progression which suggested a mini-tale of someone who receives a SCARE, which prompts DOOM, then the next thing you know, that person is DEAD and becomes a GHOST. Perhaps it all comes full circle, and that ghost scares someone new…
Emily is so versatile, able to produce puzzles of all difficulty levels. On her 13th NYT puzzle she completed the cycle (a puzzle for every day of the week), and now, at 16 puzzles in, exactly half of her puzzles are early week (M-W), and the other half the more difficult side of the week.
Today, I liked the poetic feel of STEPSTOOL crossing ON TOE, not to mention the joke implicit in ON TOE combined with NOT UP TO IT. I also liked the two-word column 11 – STAR and SCAR. Plus, the PuzzPair© of EGOS and ME ME. Finally, my Libra sensibility loved seeing, in the midst of the Halloween frightness, that calming word meaning “compassion” right in the middle.
I adored this, Emily. Thank you!
Administrative note: Once again, I’m off for a week, for a lovely out-of-town family event. Next week’s “favorite clues” will appear on Tuesday, instead of their normal Monday. Wishing all a superb week ahead!
I don't mind that Rex has his red pen out. That's his self-assigned job here. I just want his criticisms to be fair and well thought out. I think his points today were more or less UP TO IT.
(I wonder if he gets into grading? It's by far the aspect of my job I like the least.)
I AGREE that today's was easy, even for a Monday.
EMORAP: yuck. I didn't know it, and I don't want to know it: the word looks ugly. Also, I'm not GONNA thank Emily Carroll for how GONNA was clued; I loathe the song and the Rickroll MEME, and I'm NOT UP TO having an earworm planted as I'm trying to start this day and week. But as my wife just said, unrelated to this puzzle: what are ya _____ do?
My wife is the sensible one. No kid who doesn't live on this cul-de-sac comes to our door on Halloween (and any kids from this street are now grown up); the adjoining street is a steep hill and our street is boring and quiet. So Andrea sensibly bought a single packet of candy. I was the purchaser in past years and made well sure we were armed to the teeth with my childhood favorites, including Reese's, Peppermint Patties, and Mounds. You can't be too careful when it comes to warding off tricks!
@Egs
Hah! Last week the Blogger gremlins were playing tricks on me and rejected multiple attempts to get a comment posted. I thought maybe the problem was that my first attempt mentioned the urban legend of Gere and the gerbil and it didn't pass the sniff test according to a moderator. (Although it's not like them to reject such things.) Anyway, I'd mentioned the interesting fact that there is not a single published report from any ER or any medical journal anywhere in the US of any gerbil extraction. I'm not pulling that out of my ASS; I read it in Snopes.
Amy: Happy Halloween everyone! A couple of the neighborhoods we walk around on our daily sojourns are observing the holiday this evening. Looking forward to seeing the costumes and hoping to score one of those little tubes of 4 or 5 malted milk balls. 🧡
@Joaquin — yes, exactly. Rex is being entirely too nit-picky about this. I thought it was a nice, Monday-easy Halloween puzzle that didn’t say HEY LOOK AT ME, I’M A HALLOWEEN PUZZLE. Instead, it just plunked in some cute and mild-mannered spooky references in a pleasant way.
Happy Samhain, y’all!
Maybe I'm just not deep enough but I thought the GHOSTWRITER revealer was fine. Looked back and thought-yeah, you can write QUOTES, you can write SCROLLS, and you can write LETTERS, and the preceding adjectives are all kind of scary, like a GHOST, so OK.
HODOR? Really? OK.
Every time I see an old friend like ERSE I am transported to my early crossword days when I learned words like this, the spackling of fill. A small sort of thing but indispensable.
Nice Halloween Mondecito, EC. Extra Critical analysis not necessary or appreciated, and thanks for all the fun.
@jae-I'll get going on the 756. It's also tough Monday day in the New Yorker, so work to be done. Wish it wasn't such a nice day.
Happy Halloween to al who celebrate. Spooky songs night at the hootenanny.
Well that was fun! It’s Halloween which really brings out the kid in me, so I don’t want to spoil it by rummaging thru the constructor’s work looking for my favorite like it’s a bucket of candy. I just appreciate that GHOST WRITER is a great idea for a holiday crossword theme and it made me smile on a Monday morning. If it was too easy or too hard or too anything, I don’t really care. I’m choosing to seize the day.
All three themers were clever. Then there were the hidden horrors of some EXES and EGOS plus frights like a SCAR and the price of GAS. HARPER LEE even reminded me of the creepy Halloween scene in her book. But I think the scariest thing in the grid to me was the thought of SWIPES on a dating site. Thank you for making this, Emily. It was a real scream.
Someone recommended a Roman Polanski movie. I too want to recommend one -- his version of Macbeth. Perfect fare for Hallowe'en night. I watched the version of Macbeth that was free on Prime last night, it LEFT OUT ALL THE FUN PARTS! No fillet of a finny snake, no eye of newt. Just murder and insomnia. Phooey.
With the exception of DOOM SCROLLS -- which I find an interesting term for rather interesting behavior -- everything else about this slam-dunk puzzle bored me to tears.
Thx, Emily, for the spooky Halloween puz! :)
Med.
Counterclockwise solve from MEME to PDF.
Used my STEP STOOL to look UP TO HODOR, SHAQ & HARPER LEE.
Enjoyed the fun romp this a.m.! :)
Thx @jae; got it queued. Have to finish the Sat. Stumper & Cryptic first. May take the entire week. lol
Nary a foothold for the Stumper's Texas / SE section.
@TTrimble (5:59 PM yd) re: NYT' Cryptic
Got the upper left quad so far; not easy, but as always, rewarding to solve. :)
___
Peace 🕊 🇺🇦 ~ Compassion ~ Tolerance ~ Kindness to all 🙏
This was easy and fun. although I agree with Rex's critique. My biggest gripe is HODOR crossing ERSE, which was a potential Natick for me. R was my first guess, but I had several other consonants lined up and ready to plug in if the R failed to trigger the happy music.
Hey All !
Boo!
Har
Sorry, Rex, but I also think you're reaching to find a nit. The LETTERS may not be ABC, etc., but are still "written". You need letters and punctuation to write LETTERS, no? And Revealer sums it up nicely. And aren't SCROLLS and LETTERS basically the same thing? Asking for a tomb raider friend.
Anyway, a sorta kinda Halloween theme. Out here in Las Vegas, the tourists on The Strip (read: early twenty-somethings) make Halloween a week-long event. They probably started on Thursday this year (I don't drive Limos anymore, so I really don't go to The Strip), and get dressed up to go to the nightclubs on Thursday, Friday night, Saturday night, Sunday night, and tonight. And the girls (excuse me, young ladies) wear the skimpiest, shortest skirts imaginable. One year I saw one that only covered three-quarters of her ASS. Cheek cleavage. Always curious when they go shopping, see this six inch skirt, and say "Yeah, this'll fit." There's yer SCARE QUOTES. 😁
IN ANY CASE, liked this puz. Couple of "closies", EXES/EXECS, DEAD/DEAF, MEME/NEMO (kidding on the last one.)
@pablo
No B's today, so can't even try to come up with a Pablo. Scary
One F
RooMonster
DarrinV
@Joaquin 12:20 AM
But seriously, when DID ghosts start wearing Nikes? Shouldn't they wear POOOOOOOOmas? And how hard is it to take the tag off? You're 4, you've torn your whole house apart, and suddenly you're too busy for a tag?
I miss Z's comments.
I had the same reaction as @Rex to the sketchy relationship of the reveal to the other theme answers and see what he means about the other creaky (maybe like a haunted house?) entries, but for me all was redeemed by DOOM SCROLLS, such a great phrase in its ordinary usage and here raised to the level of genius by the repurposing of SCROLLS as a noun.
@Lewis 8:33 and @Whatsername 9:09 - Thank you for pointing out the extra Halloween fun in those complementary answers in the grid.
egsforbreakfast -- Can we count ERSE (9D), as a variant?
Dia de los Muertos is tomorrow
Really enjoyed this lovely Halloween puzzle! Lots of fun. Thank you, Emily!
Rex’s review today reads like a parody of a crossword review. Got a couple of chuckles out of it.
Liked the puzzle’s Halloween theme and the way that both parts of each themer contributed to the revealer. Yes, the puzzle was easy, but it is Monday.
Q. What do you use to fix a broken staircase?
A. A STEPS TOOL
I t occurs to me after some not very serious thought that our spooky hootenanny night should include GHOSTWRITERS in the Sky.
Sorry.
Mrs. MEME was a STAR SNOOT who liked to DINE at the PIC PECS SHAQ. She would look all PERT as she sat on her STOOL listening to the MAMAS sing a RAP ARIA to EMO.
The specialty of the SHAQ was the HODOR PIE TA. MEME would always eat it but it gave her GAS. NEMO, her STEP SUN, would hand her EXECS but they never worked. She would YEN for the LIEU. Looking like a one EYED GHOST she would PACE her PERT self in front of the "I CARE" sign hoping she wouldn't have to EXAM her STOOL for a MES of WETS ...or she'd be DEAD.
She survived the SCARE, and although NOT UP TO IT, she'd head back to her SEAT and order another HODOR PIE TA.
A WRITER, sitting in the PIC PECS RECON room, like QUOTES. One involved LETTERS to a DEAF SUN GOD named EROS. His favorite said that HARPER and LEE would SHARE the backyard SPA with SHAQ and a GHOST would appear in a LONG DRESS standing on ONE TOE. He had a PIC of a SCAR on his PEC and would shout " Your SINS are GONNA make the IMAM PAVE the way to your DOOM." We'd be on the EDGE of our STOOL waiting. The PIC of OVID tucking his DEAD SCROLLS AWARD in his ATARI, would SCARE the PCS off your TEE and make you LONG for an END. Mrs. MEME, a SNOOT EGO MENSA herself, said that the ROOTS of these QUOTES were GONNA PILE on and SCARE the ASSAY off of everyone. I AGREE, shouted her STEP SUN, NEMO. ""I never MET a DEAD GHOST that could SCARE the PCS off my TEE."
They left the RECON room and would SNARE a SEAT at the WETS bar. Mrs. MEME would DINE, once again, on some PIE ET and listen to some HODOR RAP. No GHOST to SCARE any DEAD patrons of the PIC PECS SHAQ. The DOOM had lifted.
The END....or maybe not?
And now for some holiday sounds to frighten you out of your wits. Hey, @Rex, I found the Halloween track you recorded. Too bad that other group had a bigger hit with it.
And now to the puzzle: What's wrong with everybody this morning? This is a perfectly fine Monday offering for the occasion. I wish for once though they'd clue I CARE with "Well, it matters to me!" Like (borrowing @Joaquin's script):
Rex: You call that a ghost costume? The eye holes are not symmetrical and there's a tag on it.
4YO: Oh, big deal. No one's gonna care.
Rex: Well, I CARE!
@SonVolt played the Earls so I must play the Viscounts. And we close out our set with one more macabre melodie - have a ghostly Halloween, mwahahahaha!
The gentleman to my right on the screen greeted me at my local pharmacy last week when I went to get my Covid booster. I suggested they keep him on as a permanent resident since he looks how most people probably feel most days after reading all the DOOM in the news.
@Joaquin (12:20) 🤣🤣🤣
@JW (8:17) Ditto. 😄
@Lewis (8:34) Happy trails.
I’ve been around awhile since knowing about DOOMSCROLLING (well, since 2016 pre-election when it became a common thing to do). But was today years old when I heard of SCAREQUOTES. Never knew there was an actual name for that.
And, despite a few explanations here (eg J W 8:17), I still don’t exactly get the “pun” part of the reveal. I thought puns involved sound-alike words: play classical music with prudence = Handel with care. And such.
Still a fast and fun Halloween puzzle.
PIETA out.
@ Son Volt (7:53am)
I take your point, but the FULL proper name is Nelle Harper Lee.
So many people overthinking this one. I found it fun with a cute Haloweeny tie-in.
As for Hodor, I cringed at first. There were hundreds of GOT characters. I can remember a handful by name. BUT, the minute it started to fill, I knew it immediately. And it’s much less obscure than any number of other characters from TV/films/literature we’ve seen in previous puzzles.
Come to conclusion that a puzzle with faults can be fun. For me, that was today’s 🧩.
🦖 pointed out some inconsistencies and weak points, and I mostly agree, but it was nevertheless smile-worthy tight in concept, and enjoyable.
And a brilliant puzzle with no faults can conversely be NOT fun or enjoyable. 😏😒☹️
For me, that was yesterday’s Sunday 🧩.
Perfect Monday Halloween 🧩 for fun! 🎃 👻💀👻🎃
🤗🎃🦖🦖🦖🎃🤗
As an added Halloween treat, it would have been fun if the puzzle could have been worked to have BOO RADLEY in 35D as the complement to 11D's HARPER LEE.
Show some PIETA for poor HODOR, whose life was horrific- the scariest thing in the puzzle! Except for when you get caught up in
DOOMSCROLLING. That was a fun word to see. Thanks for a Halloween theme.
@lodsf – You're right, there's no pun at work in the reveal, it's a stupid clue. I really get the feeling the editors understand the meanings of words less and less.
YES! Halloweeny puz. Like.
And yep. In a punny way, a writer that's a ghost might well write spooky stuff, such as what the three other themers sound like. QED.
[@Joaquin, 12:20am: har, re: yer @RP Halloween theory.]
staff weeject pick: TEE. Better Halloweenesque clue: {Trick or Treat starter}.
fave moo-cow eazy-E MonPuz clue: {"To Kill a Mockingbird" novelist} = HARPERLEE.
Thanx, Ms. Carroll darlin. Superb job, and Happy Halloween!
Masked & AnonymoUUs
**gruntz**
just putting in one vote that HODOR and ERSE is not a fair cross, I had no idea what that last letter could be at all
Fantastic selections - Thanks!
Dear Editor,
EMORAP is spelled wrong, there's a C missing.
ERSE/HODOR/ATHOS killed me. How in the heck is that Monday material? I had to put in several guesses before I got the winning music. All I had was E--E to work with. Double natick for me. Grr.
Love this Halloween puzzle – it has a literary flair in all the theme answers!
My favorites: SCARE QUOTES and GHOST WRITER.
There are ancillaries, too: ATHOS (lit again), SUN GOD (costume), AWARD (for SUN GOD, best costume), SCAR (Frankenstein’s monster, runner-up award), DRESS (up).
HAPPY HALLOWEEN, all!
And to @Barbara S., happy pumpkin carving!
Have a work deadline; will be back to read everyone this afternoon and hope I wasn’t too duplicative of anyone else’s post.
Thanks, Emily Carroll, for the great fun!
I actually liked the theme more after reading Rex/'s criticisms; I think he misses it. The clue says that the GHOST WRITER is someone who might write the answers -- not only the second words -- to the theme clues. That is, a writing ghost might write quotations that are scary, scrolls that predict doom, and letters from the dead. It's all good.
To whoever asked, air QUOTES are used orally/visually -- you hold up your fingers to look like quotation marks. SCARE QUOTES are written; and yes, it is a long-standing usage among writers and editors.
My granddaughter takes ballet classes, and this fall began going ON TOE. It hurts like hell, and she is now recovering from an ankle injury, but it hasn't stopped her. I guess it makes more sense than playing football after a concussion, but it kind of floors me.
@jberg
Yes, it does hurt. I forget how old my daughter was when she went en pointe; she might have been 10. The bones down there need to be a certain age before it's safe to do (some girls start too soon, unfortunately). But, your granddaughter probably feels proud: it's a big STEP UP! Good luck to her. It's a magnificent art form.
Last night, my wife and I watched Ballet Now, choreographed by Tiler Peck. It's terrific.
And yet nobody mentioned that we got Rickrolled by the puzzle today.
Oddly enough, this is the - I don't know - third time or so, my absolutely favorite commenter, NANCY, has complained about the Monday puzzle being blah or boring or too easy. Isn't that the point, Nancy, of the Monday puzzle to be as easy as possible so that beginners and non-regulars can dip their toe in and see how they like it - and maybe get a little confidence to give Tuesday a try? I actually thought that this was a little too modern-slangy for a Monday.
@NYD Seems you’re correct! But you mean that hitting Preview is what screws it up?
YESTERDAY SUNDAY, OCTOBER 30
Wordle 498 3/6*
⬜R 🟩A⬜ I ⬜S⬜E
🟩W🟩A🟨T⬜C⬜H
🟩W🟩A🟩L🟩T 🟩Z
⬜🟩⬜⬜⬜
🟩🟩🟨⬜⬜
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
@Liveprof 10:20 am. I considered ERSE as being, perhaps, an Irish AE. But if you don’t draw the line somewhere, you’ll never hit bottom.
I did not understand anything NYDenizen, 2:03 wrote.
Wordle 499 3/6
⬜⬜🟨⬜⬜
🟨🟨🟩⬜⬜
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
@NYDenizen (NYD for short)
You're welcome.
I stopped at @Joaquin to write my post:
What @Joaquin said!
The end. Unless there is something controversial AFTER @Joaquin. 🤣
@wordler Yeah. l don’t blame you. But now that NYD explained the blog ‘Preview’ bug, most of what l wrote is irrelevant (unless you want more info on the onelook.com scripting). In any case l deleted 2:03 and and we’re back to business as usual. Sorry about the distraction.
@Ttrimble/jberg…we have friends that have a daughter that is currently a professional (ballerina/ballet dancer?). The only thing I have heard about this is a proclivity for bunions? Well. Then there is the anorexia thing BUT I take that aside (because I’ve always been thin)…But I also think of female ballet dancers as being similar to thoroughbred jockeys…that is, a certain “petiteness” and “build” is required to go pro (similar to gymnasts) Am I wrong? I’m really not trying to be weird/crappy, etc.
@bigsteve46…you live by the sword you die by the sword! Lol…don’t get me wrong, I’m quite fond of of @Nancy and love her comments.
I agree: clearly a Natick.
I was in Rex's position on the theme until the clear explanation given above by @JW and @LMS.
Did anyone mention that To Kill a Mockingbird adds to the Halloween theme by virtue of the central roll Halloween plays in the novel's climax? Maybe I scrolled the comments too quickly or maybe it was too obvious. Oops. I see @whatsername did. I guess TKAM is a kid's ghost story in its own way. And a culture's ghost story in another way. Which makes Lee a ghost writer. Theme sweet theme. Doom sweet doom.
Rare that I need every cross for a Monday word. Hello, HODOR. I liked it. One thing about Mondays is they are generally very easy, so I tend to notice bad fill less and appreciate good long answers more.
Rex is right about the third themer being a bit off. Maybe the reveal needed a tweak. Still, it’s pretty good overall and a nice switch from tired old Hallowe’en clichés.
I tell you, the slang dictionary is becoming thicker than Webster's. Pretty soon we will lose English altogether, and go around saying "SCAREQUOTES!" Or am I DOOMSCROLLing? Sheesh.
This is a little easier to understand once you realize when it came out--a fact not obvious to us in syndication. Okay: SCARE, DOOM, DEAD, GHOST. A logical, if macabre, progression.
Problems in the fill. No way is HODOR Monday fare; neither is the clue for ALI. On Monday give me Muhammad or even MacGraw--but NOT some actor from a movie I never heard of.
Had EMOpoP before EMORAP, but all the crosses were gimmes, so none of these mattered. Three entries with two separated M's: MEME, MAMAS, IMAM. Some kind of record? It just felt...unedited. Bogey.
Wordle bogey too.
Ha ha. I managed to have a 2-letter dnf. If you cross "soonscrolls" with "net" you can see what I mean.
Thought something was, you know, off...
Diana, LIW for Tuesday
Um - @Spacey - the actor and picture both won "best" Oscars - not exactly unknowns. Just sayin. (and no, I never saw the picture, just heard about it)
Lady Di
GONNA HOSE?
GOD, IAGREE with my EXES
about SINS MET through EROS,
INANYCASE, YEN for sex is
NOT just UPTO your EGOS.
--- EARL HARPER
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