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Hello, everyone! It’s Clare, back for the last Tuesday of October, which has seriously flown by. I was solving this puzzle while watching the ManningCast on ESPN2, which was rather fun (if a little distracting, especially when President Obama was a guest). In general, right now is the golden time for sports, with the Premier League, the MLB playoffs, the NBA and NHL starting back up, NFL games on all the time, and the NWSL championship and the MLS Cup playoffs wrapping up. I’ve basically just had the TV on in the background 24/7 trying to keep up with everything! Too bad my Steelers look awful, and my Liverpudlians aren’t killing it like they usually do.
Anywho… on to the puzzle!
Relative difficulty: Easy-medium
Theme answers:
This puzzle was kinda nice? The grid itself is visually appealing, with so few black squares in it. The construction of the grid is impressive, with how the creators worked two eight-letter board games into the theme. Using the board games in the puzzle worked well and tied tightly to the revealer. There were also other answers that sort of related to the gaming theme throughout the puzzle, with DISC (1A: It's black on one side and white on the other, in Othello), ANTE (14A:
Casino buy-in), PURSE (15A: Holder of keys, phone and IDs) (though clued differently, a purse can be the prize for winning a game), PIECE (15D: Jigsaw item), and even MUD HEN (9D:
Toledo minor-leaguer, named for a marsh bird) (a member of a team that plays a game; yes, I know I’m reaching here).
- SCRABBLE (ascending diagonally from the first letter of 42A)
- RISK (ascending diagonally from the first letter of 62A)
- CHESS (ascending diagonally from the fourth letter of 24A)
- MONOPOLY (ascending diagonally from the second letter of 60A)
INXS (a phonetic play on "in excess") were an Australian rock band, formed as The Farriss Brothers in 1977 in Sydney, New South Wales. The band's founding members were bassist Garry Gary Beers, main composer and keyboardist Andrew Farriss, drummer Jon Farriss, guitarist Tim Farriss, lead singer and main lyricist Michael Hutchence, and guitarist and saxophonist Kirk Pengilly. For 20 years, INXS was fronted by Hutchence, whose magnetic stage presence made him the focal point of the band. Initially known for their new wave/pop style, the band later developed a harder pub rock style that included funk and dance elements… In September 1988, the band swept the MTV Video Music Awards with the video for "Need You Tonight/Mediate" winning in 5 categories. (Wiki)
• • •
The only piece of the theme that really irked me was the revealer: STEPS UP ONE’S GAME (7D). Does anybody talk that way? One needs to step up one’s game? People say, “step up your game” or “step up my game” but not that “one should step up one’s game.” I know I’m being a bit of a stickler, but that was a big piece of the puzzle to not be the common usage. Granted, I didn’t use the theme or the revealer at all in my solve, but I was annoyed when I looked back.
Hello, Natick at 58D/64A with VMI (Keydets' sch.) and INXS ("Need You Tonight" band, 1987) crossing each other. I’ve never heard of VMI (and the name of the obscure mascot in the clue surely didn’t help). I didn’t know the name INXS, either (though I’ve definitely heard “Need You Tonight” before), so getting the “I” there was tough and was the last letter I put into the puzzle. I thought it might be a “U” for “university” or maybe a “C” for “college” or maybe… or maybe…. An “I” for “institute” was pretty much the last thing on my radar. I put “char” instead of SEAR for 50D: Scorch on a grill, which caused me some trouble in the southwest corner, too.
The puzzle seemed to skew a tad older, which made some parts of the puzzle challenging for me. See: ELSIE (56A), the clue for POPO at 38D: The fuzz, INXS (64A), Lisa LOEB (16A), and SEE SPOT RUN (3D). My dad told me that the beginner books in first grade featured Dick, Jane, and Spot, but an interesting tidbit is that, when I was googling to figure out what SEE SPOT RUN was a reference to, I came across someone who said the line SEE SPOT RUN actually never appears in the books but is constantly referenced. It seems like one of those Berenstein vs. Berenstain bear paradoxes (see: the Mandela effect). Also, for whatever reason, I read the answer as “sees pot run,” which makes no sense and is quite funny to me looking back.
I really disliked the double use of “tab” at 22A: Soda can opener with POP TAB and 31A: Key above Caps Lock as TAB. I know working around “Scrabble” must’ve been tough, but it’s pretty ugly to repeat like that. Those are both alongside TBAR (23D) and TERRA (34A), which makes that section have way too many T’s, B’s, A’s, and R’s. Then, in the opposite section around “monopoly,” you’ve got WOOING (49A), OOPSIE (45A), AFOOT (37D), and FOO (41A), which is a whole lot of double “oo”s.
Overall, I enjoyed most of the clues used in the puzzle. My favorite clue/answer in a long time was 55A: Road gunk … or, when doubled, tooth gunk as TAR. I legitimately laughed out loud at that one. 4D: Inner ear? as COB is also pretty cute. Then, in other places, you’ve got words clued in kinda different ways, such as for TERRA (34A: Word before firma or incognita), EONS (54D: Periods longer than eras), and SAUCE (24A: Chimichurri or hollandaise). I always appreciate novelty.
Misc.:
Misc.:
- The crossword is apparently the debut for both constructors, so congrats to them!
- I was just part of a DEPOSITION (28D: Testimony under oath) last week and will be in probably many more in my legal future. I just hope that I don’t become MOOT (61A: Not worth having, as an argument).
- My uncle was once the national Scrabble champion. No one will play Monopoly with my dad again because he gets maaad at the game (and his angry eyebrows come out). I can’t play chess with my much younger cousin because she’s way too good. The only real memory I have of Risk is when I was given the game as a birthday present as a kid, and it was the “Lord of the Rings” version; we never actually played the game, but I took the ring that was part of the game and wore that around for a while. I should’ve kept that ring in my pocket for when the new “Rings of Power” premiered.
- 44D: Belief system as CREED makes me think of the trailer that recently dropped for “Creed III,” which will be Michael B. Jordan’s directorial debut and will also star Jonathan Majors. He’s in the new trailer that just dropped for Ant-Man 3, too, and appears poised to be the big bad in Marvel for the foreseeable future. He seems wonderful, and I’m very much here for him taking over Hollywood.
An easy, fun, and clever puzzle. Liked it a lot.
ReplyDeleteCongrats to the constructors on their great debut!
Hi Clare! Wholeheartedly agree with most of your points:
ReplyDelete- "ONE'S" GAME... exactly. Also I wanted STEPS UP TO THE (well PLATE doesn't fit)...BAG?
- VMI would be unknown except I remember it as a Natick I complained about a week or so ago.
- skewing older: LOEB, FOO Fighters, INXS. It's the 90s again!
I remember SEE SPOT RUN from my childhood. Run, Dick, run. Sigh!
For me MOOT always conjures MOOT COURT. Right up your alley?
[Spelling Bee: don't ask. Mon pg-1 so far, major slump continues, 6 days no QB. Brain fatigue perhaps.]
That was fun. Never played RISK and was never taught CHESS, but I had SCRABBLE and MONOPOLY down to a science.
ReplyDeleteEnded up with a wrong box at 64A and 58D, didn’t know VMI or INXS and threw an a instead of an I. OOPSIE!
Congratulations on your fine debut.
Perfectly serviceable Tuesday. I agree with Clare that having two 8-letter games is great, though I despise Monopoly and any of its spawn (Dog-opoly, Horse-opoly, Ridgewood-opoly. . .). I guess some kind of SNOBBY-OPOLY could be fun, with properties like Gstaad RR, 5th Avenue, Rodeo Drive. . . and the hotels would all be little Four Seasons George Vs.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of Gstaad, wouldn’t it be cool if a ski resort had a Tea BAR? Bet one already does.
Clare – I couldn’t agree more on your ONE’S comment. Anyone who talks like that, I don’t want to sit next to them at a dinner party. (Actually, I was hoping against hope that it’d be YOUR instead of ONE’S.)
The clue for REHASH had me sit up. Unless one is debriefing about how the “plan” went, and one is maybe on the third debrief, and it’s a bit contentious, REHASH as clued just feels off. I did look into it long enough to learn that the HASH in REHASH is the same hash in hashbrowns. Then I lost interest and kept it moving.
I was feeling pretty bad for those Toledo minor-leaguers; a MUD HEN doesn’t really seem fierce or intimidating enough to conquer anything, but then I remembered the UC Santa Cruz Banana Slugs. I just googled, and chickens do eat slugs, so, well, you go, MUD HENs. Do your thing. (It’s not lost on me that, as a TAR Heel fan, I really can’t laugh at anyone else’s mascot.)
I was fascinated with the clue for IDEAS – all those thins. How ‘bout things thin thinkers think?
RAID/CRIES and ICKIER. Yesterday morning I jumped out of my skin when I saw a roach the size of a Matchbox Corvette lumbering across my classroom floor. I’ll pick up a snake in the woods that I have never met (true story), but one roach sighting creeps me out like nothing else.
PURSE – holder of keys, phone, IDs, wadded-up Walmart receipts, uncapped ChapStick, four dirty pennies, errant stick of gum, hearing aid batteries, pair of scratched-up clip-on sunglasses, one AAA battery, Mom’s grocery list from two weeks ago, four PIECEs of that soft-center strawberry hard candy for Jamarion that I keep forgetting to slip him (while teasing him again that he likes old-lady candy), nail glue, floss, worn-out emery board, sandwich toothpick with the Cuban flag. . . damn.
I get you on the INXS and VMI crossing. My dad went to VMI so I had a leg-up there, but honestly I did think, 'That's a super hard clue for most people and I don't know this crossing AT ALL.'
ReplyDelete
ReplyDeleteSolved it as an easy themeless, ignoring the circles and the clue for 7D. Only overwrite was the kealoa at 44D: CREdo or CREED. Totally missed the @Claire TAB duplicates.
Agreed. But I guessed creed knowing it might be credo
DeleteThe Mandela effect note prompted me to turn up an actual use of the phrase SEE SPOT RUN in the first edition of the Dick and Jane reader "We Look and See" which can be viewed on Etsy:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.etsy.com/listing/1059888391/we-look-and-see-1st-edition-basic
But this may not have survived into later editions. It does seem right to say the phrase has nowhere near the prominence in the readers that pop culture and memory have associated with it.
I liked the puzzle a lot. I went after the circles right away, getting SCRABBLE first. Then I got the other 3, doing some extra fill along the way. Finishing it off was fun. However, I made a big problem for myself in the NW. I had runSPOTRUN (guess I confused Spot with Forrest) and had trouble letting it go. In fact I resorted to Google to get Lisa's name. Following a firm head slap, I put in the remaining letters. I noticed TAB TAB. Inelegant but not upsetting. Disagree with Clare on the reveal. It was SPOT(sorry) on. Delightful puzzle.
ReplyDeleteLiked the theme and it’s execution except for one little bit to pick. Chess is not a commercially created board game like the others but it is a board game so I’m. Liked that 1A was a nod to another game and the INXS reference. Nice Tuesday puzzle.
ReplyDeleteLoved Claire’s write up until she got to the Liverpool part. Come on you Spurs! :)
ReplyDeleteHa! My beloved Newcastle did you in this week!
DeleteYes they did. Very painful.
DeleteThanks, Claire, for introducing me to the Mandela effect. I always enjoy and look forward to your write-ups. As Rick says in “Casablanca,” “Play it again, Sam.”
ReplyDeleteEnjoyed the theme for a change - it contributed to the solving experience in a positive way without unduly taxing the grid. If these are in fact first time constructors, I hope they stick with that approach for a long time and don’t get the urge to go all Jeff Chen on us. Step Up ONES Game seemed fine to me - although I did try “to the plate” first. One of the better Tuesdays we’ve had in a while !
ReplyDeleteI’ve decided that Rex needs a version of kealoa (his brilliant invention) for when three answers work equally well. So I checked to see if there is another Mauna, and the third one that comes up is Ulu. So the SNOBBY/snooty/snotty conundrum (“stuck-up”) can be a kealoaulu. Happy to help.
ReplyDeleteThe theme was cute enough for a Tues. I basically know how the pieces move in CHESS but I admit sheepishly that I have never really played (same with Bridge - and boy was ELY Culbertson an obscure but fairly crossed answer). I played MONOPOLY a lot as a kid but I don’t think I would bother with it now. I love to play SCRABBLE and probably like most of us cruciverbalists here, I’m pretty good but I can’t compete against the people who know all those tiny words that aren’t really words. (Remember the Words With Friends craze? Does anyone still play that?) Now RISK, on the other hand, my friends and I played obsessively. I had a strategy that could usually win. Not long ago, I played a much more challenging modern version of the game and my strategy didn’t work AT ALL.
For those keeping track of appearances of the nether regions in the puzzle, both REAR and ANAL today. Lovely.
@LMS - my favorite football team name that must make its opponents positively wet themselves with fear is a high school here in Washington DC - the Cardozo Clerks. I often pass it on my bike ride to and from work, and the sign always makes me laugh. They may not win much but they will take care of that post-game paperwork like you would not believe.
The story behind today's Anal and Rear. It was in this puzzle constant reader that we can hear Will Shortz's voice. "There comes a time when one must Step Up One's Game, and that day is today. We are close to wearing out Ass, even with the recent triumph of Asses. In this puzzle I want two, that's right, two backend references to that part of the anatomy, no butts about it. One at the top and one at the bottom."
ReplyDeleteMy 89-year-old mother's Purse weighs at least 10 pounds (see @Loren above) and is the size and shape of home plate. I'm convinced it will play a part in her demise.
Found this mildly difficult for a Tuesday.
I'll avert my eyes from the board games (unaccountable aversion) and attend instead to the pleasures of Dick and Jane meeting Dr. Seuss IN A BOX (Green Eggs and Ham), encountering a MUD HEN, and the reminder of my SONICARE OOPSIE on its initial outing when I turned it on before ONE is supposed to. Thanks to @Clare for the fine write-up.
ReplyDelete@Wanderlust 7:15 - Thank you for the laugh.
I usually don't like circles, but they didn’t bother me too much today. In fact, I kind of liked the way they were used, but don’t tell anyone. Overall, a very pleasant puzzle with some nice touches and clues, though I generally agree with the issues Claire points out. My main hangup was wanting POP Top — never heard of POP TAB.
ReplyDeleteI have never felt as legit old as I do today, knowing that someone has never heard of INXS. I guess it makes sense, but that was such a sock in the ego! It was even the “word of the day”! POPO I only know from doing Xwords, but I guess I never had much interaction there.
ReplyDeleteI guess I've been a progressive as far back as reading the Dick and Jane (and Sally and Puff and SPOT) books: I never liked MONOPOLY. Buying and selling and handling money and foreclosing--the whole thing made me sad, and I didn't have a trace of the cutthroat in me. So you win; what does that mean? That you've driven all your opponents into poverty? Ugh. Never played RISK either; isn't it subtitled "The Game of World Domination?" Not into that either. I still have my ancient SCRABBLE game, though, along with some scores from the 1970s. Much preferred cards.
ReplyDeleteAll that "About Me" aside, I enjoyed this puzzle. 58D was impossible (the "Keydets?" That is one sad mascot, and what does it look like?) without the downs that filled in everything but the "I" in INXS. So that was OK. Just weird. Never heard of a POPTAB. In fact, I've never heard anyone refer to that thing by name, now that I think about it. Doesn't everyone know MUDHEN from "M*A*S*H?"
Funny riff on today's "ass clueS," @JD. Is this an insight into Shortz's life that we'd rather not have? Is he having...uh...digestive system issues? Inquiring minds do NOT want to know!
Very nice writeup, Clare, and in line with your "Joy of Sports" riff, GO, PHILLIES!!!!!
The revealer was so awkward that it ruined the rest. Fill was fine
ReplyDeleteWhen I’m solving the NYT puzzle I’m usually also thinking about what will irk Rex. I nailed it today with the theme clue (Step Up One’s Game). It sounds like a passive aggressive coach, ha.
ReplyDeleteBut then I was really surprised that Rex didn’t know who INXS were. I think he and I are close in age. I was very confused by that.
I had never heard of VMI either.
Well, of course, Claire was reviewing. Silly me.
A fun puzzle all in all. I didn’t see the theme until I was done, but it did make me smile, which is nice.
Fun discussion Claire - although I was hoping to have Rex here to stomp his feet over the use of Aura again. Harmless theme - I don’t like board games and I really don’t notice circles when I solve. Some gooey fill to fit with the diagonals - but mostly clean.
ReplyDeleteI liked the O-fest in SE with OOPSIE and FOO atop WOOING and crossing POPO. VMI was in the puzzle a few days back.
Klinger always referred to the MUDHENs. I’m all in with everyone bashing ONES GAME.
I don’t need a DEPOSITION to believe
Enjoyable Tuesday solve.
Had to be SCRABBLE going up through the circles so out went SNOOTY and in went SNOBBY and that was it for erasures, I think. Paying attention to that particular quadrant made me notice the TAB duplication, which is one TAB too many. I would replace POPTAB with POPTOP, which is correct, but then SCRABBLE wouldn't work, so no.
ReplyDeleteTERRA reminded me of a story a friend told me about a guy he knew who was running an elevator to an observation deck at the 1964 World's Fair. The first time he brought a group back down, someone said "Ah, TERRA firma!" and he thought, that's pretty good. He went on to hear it approximately every time the elevator came down all summer.
I think we just had VMI and I liked the clue for SPIKED.
Nice concept and execution and congrats on a Tuesdebut, AS and NS. A Solid and Nicely Structured effort, and thanks for all the fun.
Wonder what Rex would have said about the TAB repeat, especially since they're so close to each other.
ReplyDeleteWhen I read the clue for 7D I immediately thought it would be "rises to the occasion," but of course that doesn't fit... And I bet Rex would have been even less diplomatic than Clare was about the ONE'S phraseology.
Also not fond of 19A, ANS.
I had to come here to be reminded of the game Othello. Wondered what the heck a DISC has to do with Iago and Desdemona.
But I liked it. Who knew there was a contract bridge hall of fame?!
Used to be many more players but there still is an "American Contract Bridge League" with a fairly large membership holding national, regional and local events. Ely Culbertson was one of the creators of modern contract bridge a hundred years ago and is in the ACBL Hall of Fame. Now that skews old!
DeleteI see constructors as artists, and just as people appreciate the differences between visual artists or musical artists, I do the same with crossword puzzle makers. The best constructors, to me, are the one-of-a-kind whose puzzles don’t need their names on top, because it’s obvious. Constructing to them has become so natural that their puzzles sing with their voices. And when one of their puzzles shows up, I do a little leap for joy before even filling in the first square.
ReplyDeleteI also like when a debut comes around, raising the possibility of a brilliant new voice. So, it was quite cool to see a double debut today.
This puzzle had technical excellence, because diagonal answers make it very hard to cleanly fill the grid. It had some sweet cluing – I’m looking at you, clues for COB and TAR. And the theme was simple but endearing. Makes me eager to see future puzzles from this pair.
I think my favorite answer was SEE SPOT RUN, and I’m amazed to see that it has never appeared in the 80 years of the NYT puzzle. There’s a lovely PuzzPair© of PEN and INXS, and that pair, combined with SEE SPOT RUN evoked the image of a pen-caused shirt-pocket blob. (That image makes me smile, because I’ve had a few of those.) I also liked the backward OOF over OOPSIE.
Congratulations on your debuts, Ashleigh and Nick, and thank you for making this!
@Lewis 8:43 AM
DeleteDelighted to see you PuzzPair© PEN and INXS as you are most certainly pronouncing it "INKS" which is exactly how a college friend pronounced it back in the day and we roared. Luckily I learned to pronounce it "IN EXCESS" prior to seeing their rather clever spelling or I would have done the same thing. Even more luckily, every song I heard from them has also been long forgotten and I'm left for better or worse with Bach, pronounced "BATCH."
I learn today the founder of INXS goes by the name Garry Gary Beers, and I think I should go by that too.
VMI appeared in a Sunday (or maybe Saturday?) a few weeks ago, and was a NATICK for me. Not this time! Surprised to see it again so quickly. Quite obscure.
ReplyDeleteTwo easy puzzles in a row – not that I expect much difficulty out of Monday or Tuesday, but they sometimes offer a bit of resistance. Still, an enjoyable puzzle that got me reminiscing about board games.
ReplyDeleteThe Mother of All Board Games for me will always be MONOPOLY. During my childhood, my father and I spent countless hours glued to the MONOPOLY board. The usual drill was that we’d make a pact to get up early on a Saturday morning. We’d start playing when it was still dark and no one else was up, setting up either in the living room and or on the dining room table. Dawn would break, other people would eventually straggle in, the life of the house would resume. People would try to talk to us, only to be answered by grunts and monosyllables, although my father and I were perfectly articulate with each other as we worked through whatever titanic struggle had evolved over hours of intense play. Oh, and we deemed it a better game if there were four players instead of two, so we’d each play for ourselves plus one of the household cats. And Dippy and Tigger were as cutthroat as anybody. Ah, the bragging rights that accompanied victory. How sweet it was.
Both Parcheesi and Snakes & Ladders (and yes, it was “Snakes” and not “Chutes”) figured prominently in my young life. This is interesting:
The game [Snakes and Ladders] was popular in ancient India by the name Moksha Patam. It was also associated with traditional Hindu philosophy contrasting karma and kama, or destiny and desire. It emphasized destiny, as opposed to games such as pachisi [Parcheesi], which focused on life as a mixture of skill (free will) and luck. (Wikipedia)
It makes you wonder what unconscious lessons I was learning at the age of 7.
My most amusing adult board game memory is playing Trivial Pursuit at a house party on New Year’s Eve. The host’s 12-year-old daughter was presiding, reading out the correct answers whenever anyone messed up. A stellar moment was when someone failed to correctly identify Mikhail Baryshnikov, and our young assistant read “Mick-hail Barry-Sneak-Off.” She didn’t understand the hoots and roars at first, but then laughed as loud as anyone when told the right pronunciation.
[SB: Something tells me I won't be rivalling @okanaganer's extended successes, but I've got a 3-day QB streak going at a time when he's in the doldrums. Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown, though. I know that killer word is just waiting for me.]
KateA
ReplyDeleteI kept trying to imagine discs in the play Othello. Like sun images? Back parts? Didn’t know the game. Otherwise, good.
Pretty quick and easy today. While making the revealer more colloquial, we should probably end it with a preposition YOSTEPYOURGAMEUP.
ReplyDelete@LMS - Karma is amazing: just yesterday, you were mentioning how women act with or sans men present upon seeing a creepy crawly - and today you got to put it to the test! I also wonder if there was any talk of changing the TARheels name because of the Civil War pride element. Interesting case, since it was a derogatory term that was claimed as a badge of pride.
EGRETS would be a good name for a ballet team, so lithe and graceful, always on point.
Everyone feel free to cut and paste your VMI/Natick comments from a couple of weeks ago.
Ugh. If INXS is that out of date, I am apparently much older than I feel. Or at least older than I felt before reading this write-up!
ReplyDeleteOh, sweet, Clare day.
ReplyDeletePlenty to appreciate here, but ICKIER is my runaway favorite moment. DEPOSITION is probably the most disappointing entry, and POPO is the one you think, "gawd, please don't."
Those diagonal answers probably made for lots of challenging times putting this little bit of amusement together.
LOEB and ELY are new to me. They will also be new to me next time I see them.
LNETHS:
Our editorial crew had a meeting and agreed we'll eventually become inoculated from pearl clutching with a daily regimen of REAR an ANAL. Butt, they don't know what asses we can be.
Uniclues:
1 Soda, duh.
2 Toothpaste on the television.
3 I'll get a job for you.
4 Asphalt worker at the bar.
5 Wilma!
1 POP TAB SAUCE
2 SONICARE OOPSIE
3 WOOING CRIES (~)
4 TAR GENT SPIKED (~)
5 YABBA CREED
My wife and I experienced the Mandela Effect recently. We watched a DVD of Fargo and both strongly believed that a scene had been left out. When Steve Buscemi buried the suitcase of money in a snowy field, he marked the spot with a red ice scraper. We both vividly remember a scene where he goes back for the money and sees that the ice scraper has disappeared under another blanket of snow which had fallen. I did a little research and am now quite sure that such a scene wasn't in the movie.
ReplyDeleteOh, boo hoo! I don't now that singer, so I thought she might be Lisa LOEw. I wondered for a moment how COw=inner ear, even with teh ? there, but I didn't think about it long enough to come up with COB/LOEB
ReplyDeleteOther than that, a fine puzzle. It got me wondering, though, has the meaning of "Luxury" changed? OMNI is a brand of hotels, but not really top of the line, like the Ritz, the Plaza, the Hay Adams, etc. Does luxury just mean that there's room service?
I'm strictly an Oral-B gent, never heard of SONICARE, but that's on me.
@TTrimble from yesterday -- I may have phrased my comment poorly. That singer is certainly famous, I just meant that the clue gave me little to go on.
ReplyDeletePopo? Really?
ReplyDeleteHey All !
ReplyDeleteNo CHUTES AND LADDERS? 😂🤣
Fun puz. The constructors get in four Diagonals, And stick a 15 Revealer down the middle, which crosses two of the Themers. Nice.
Had POPTop first, so once I circled back around, changing it to TAB, I didn't even notice the other TAB I already had in. So no foul registered until I came here.
Too bad RAUOOT isn't a game, could've had a three-peat in the center Diagonal.
No SESH haters today? Also no POPO "never heard of that" comments, either. We were rife with them last time it was in a puz.
Good job, Ashleigh and Nick. Some fun clues, nice fill considering the constraints.
REAR clued as Butt, the ASS infatuation continues. How about "back of a ship" or somesuch? Hopefully one day we'll get BADONKADONK.
One F
RooMonster
DarrinV
Anyone who has seen Grey Gardens is familiar with VMI and Little Edie's march through the foyer with her American flag to the tune of the VMI Spirit or VMI Fight Song.
ReplyDeleteIf you haven't seen Grey Gardens, seek it out. It's sad, funny, heartbreaking, poignant.
A completely ignorable theme and I ignored it. And the fill that resulted from the ignorable theme -- fill such as FOO, OOPSIE, YABBA, SESH and POPO -- made me wonder if there were any grown-ups in the room.
ReplyDeleteAgree, CHESS is an outlier here. MOOT is wonky . Had cOPs before POPO. Was wavering between chip and DISC for the OTHELLO CLUE. Had POPTop before POPTAB and IRONic before IRONON. EON seems to show up every other day. Nice puzzle and theme. Loved the diagonals
ReplyDeleteGot fooled by the Othello in 1A, but figured it out in the end; the last two squares filled were the C & B of COB.
ReplyDeleteMy son graduated from Evergreen in Olympia WA, where the mascot is the Geoduck (pronounced GOOEY-DUCK), a "very large saltwater clam." The go to cheer for Evergreen fans is, "Go, Geoducks! Let it all hang out!"
I call them POP Tops or Pull TABs but never POP TABs. Don't know about the rest of you. When there is a time to STEPUPONESGAME I do not mind at all. Some times you just gotta. OK by me. It's you snotty folksy types looking down on it.
ReplyDeleteUh oh, mods -- was my comment censored or spiked? Please let me know. I can adjust it.
ReplyDeleteCongratulations to both constructors on their debuts with this nearly perfect Tuesday.
ReplyDeleteDid I enjoy solving it? Absolutely! Did it STEP UP my GAME? Not really. As already pointed out, I once again have the image of someone’s derrière while sipping my morning coffee, and oh look! It’s double the fun today - a noun and an adjective. My only other raised eyebrow was POPO which sounds pretty silly. Who on earth says that? Still, the theme was very cleverly done. Could have been just straight across but I can see that a lot of effort went into making them diagonal. I would like to have seen Trivial Pursuit which in my opinion is Pulitzer Prize of all board games.
I went shopping for a new PURSE recently. My birthday was in September, and I decided to treat myself to a really “good” bag. Some swaggy designer thing that I could hoist on my arm like Samantha in Sex and the City with her ill gotten Birkin. Not that anyone in my social strata would ever know the difference; it was just something I wanted to do for myself. A reward for having survived the last few years of Covid and my BAE now being in a memory care center and fading a little more each day. I had my old no-label purse and was prepared to swipe my credit card for whatever it took. But OOPSIE! In my limited shopping venues, there was not a single model that remotely appealed to me. In desperation I even looked online. Nada. Zilch. But I haven’t given up. Christmas is coming.
Pretty hard comments on answer to 7D. I sometimes “talk that way” although most people don’t use the word “one’s” but “their.” Also, we are talking about a “hint” here and the answer clearly qualifies. Finally, seems the visual is overlooked: the circles are in the form of “steps.” . Perfect answer. Great Tuesday puzzle!
ReplyDeleteEnjoyed the puzzle and the clever theme but my favorite moment was learning about the Mandela Effect. So congrats to Ashleigh and Nick for stepping up their game and thanks to Clare for the revelation. As it turns out, Nelson Mandela actually didn’t die in prison and Ricky Ricardo never told Lucy she has some ‘splaining to do.
ReplyDelete"Board" does not appear in the puzzle nor the clues. Clair used it and Ashleigh stated, "I also really love board games" in her comments. So board GAMEs it is. But the last time I looked, CHESS was a board game. I think there is even a thing called a CHESS board. So why are some declaring that CHESS is an outlier? Makes no sense.
ReplyDeleteThx, Ashleigh & Nick, for an excellent Tues. offering! :)
ReplyDeleteHi Clare, good to see you; thx for your comments! :)
Med.
Thot I'd RACE thru this one, but OOPSIE, did RUN into a snag with my CREDO.
First encounter with the TBAR at Mt. Hood was a disaster. Got my skis crossed and ended up head-first in a snowdrift. 🎿
Had the 'Keydets' recently; VMI was a gimme.
Mom & Dad gave me a head start with reading, so SEE SPOT RUN was easy fare in grade one.
Played lots of RISK at college.
I was definitely GAME for today's adventure; good VIBES! :)
@jae, pablo
Totally forgot about Croce's 754 yd; will tackle it td. 🤞
___
Peace 🕊 🇺🇦 ~ Compassion ~ Tolerance ~ Kindness to all 🙏
Re: so called Mandela effect. Some folks used to swear that in "Psycho"(a film in black and white), that the blood going down the shower drain was bright red.
ReplyDeleteHow did INXS fall off anyone's radar?
ReplyDeleteThe Oregon Ducks and Oregon State Beavers names wouldn’t, in and of themselves, strike fear in the hearts of opponents. And, in fact, the Beavers actual prowess hasn’t caused much fear since the days when they were coached by Dee Andros, a portly man nicknamed the Great Pumpkin due to his girth and his penchant for dressing in orange because the school colors are orange and black.
ReplyDeleteI don’t really get the outcry about STEPSUPONESGAME. Is there a requirement that answers be phrased in the way that one would encounter in conversation (see what I did there)?
MUDHEN, of course, is also the nickname of the F-15E Strike Eagle. Maybe it evokes more fear than one would think.
I agree with @LMS that the REHASH clue seems off. You REHASH a past event, not a planned one. M-W indicates that I’m wrong.
@Lewis. I’m not seeing why PEN and INXS are a Puzz Pair.
After seeing what the conceit was with SCRABBLE, I decided to see if I could get the remaining games by finding just one cross for each and then figuring out the game. It worked, leading to a blazing fast time. I enjoyed this debut a bunch. Congrats and thanks, Ashleigh Silveira and Nick Shephard.
@egs
ReplyDeleteMaybe @Lewis is pronouncing INXS inks.
@mathgent (9:23) I would’ve sworn you are right but now you’ve got me wondering. What I’m thinking is that the camera pans back to that fence row but by that point, Steve Buscemi is long gone. However, the movie is on STARZ tonight and I’m going to make it a point to watch. Also I recently saw a trivia quiz asking where Marge stayed when she went to Minneapolis. Their answer was the Radisson but I think not - she had lunch at the Radisson but she didn’t stay there. So I’ll watch for that too. Otherwise it’s going to haunt me. 😄
ReplyDeleteGeorge C. Marshall went to VMI and the Marshall Foundation is therefore on campus. My Dad was involved with them for his retirement job, so I know it and Lexington well. VMI was the last of the military institutes to go co-ed allowing one female student in 1995 after losing a Department of Justice case. It did not go well and she ended up dropping out, but in 1997 they admitted 30 students. More recently it's been in the news for its racist culture and for promulgating the "Lost Cause" version of the Civil War.
ReplyDeleteAs for the puzzle? I enjoyed it, my last moves were fixing that "one's", as I had stuck in Nap instead of NOD when I thought the phrase might be "Step up and ..." and forgot to correct it.
I was all set to point out that the Cardozo Clerks must be law clerks, as opposed to secretarial-type clerks, since Benjamin Cardozo was a lawyer and Supreme Court Justice. But the school is named after a different Cardozo: Francis Lewis Cardozo, clergyman, politician, and educator. While their team name is the Clerks, the logo features an owl. The school is now the Cardozo Education Campus and it combines two former high schools: Central, and Cardozo Senior. J. Edgar Hoover graduated from Central. Marvin Gaye and Maury Wills graduated from Cardozo Senior.
ReplyDeleteMarvin Gaye was a Clerk? I had no idea. (I’m the one who posted the earlier comment.) Thanks for doing the research!
DeleteOoooh...I see OMNI came back into the fray and tried her hand at MONOPOLY.
ReplyDeleteA whimsy Tuesday. What a surprise. And how could we not have another ANAL REAR square to make our day...Hi @JD. I guess if you want to play OOPSIE with grown-ups, you must include some tee-hees. I want to call the POPO and have a YABBA with Mr. Will.
This would've made a great story but I won't RUNE the day.
I enjoyed one thing: ISLA Cuba.
@Whatsername
ReplyDeleteDid Marge go to the Radisson to meet her old high school acquaintance?
Brutal to be told that Lisa Loeb and INXS skew older. Legit, but oof.
ReplyDeleteMedium. deet before RAID pushed this out of the easy range. @Clare the two TABs almost right on top of each other were a tad jarring for me too. Normally duplications don’t bother me, but this one was kinda in your face. Not too bad for a Tuesday with circles given the theme constraints, liked it. Nice double debut.
ReplyDelete@Whatsername (11:33). That's it! It's just a shot for viewers, Buscemi wasn't there. I just told my wife. We both thank you.
ReplyDeleteThough I would have had it from the crosses, I remembered VMI because it was an answer recently – in the 10/1 puzzle to be exact, clued as "Sch. that's home to the Keydets". Sometimes it helps to pay attention, whaddaya know. (In the earlier puzzle the V caused a natick for many.)
ReplyDeleteI found this sentence in an article about the Mandela effect:
Other people believe that the Mandela Effect is linked to conspiracies involving the Large Hardon Collider
[sic]
I kindly request the mods to respond (see my 10:23 post), because now I've tried to submit, twice, my post with my reactions to today's puzzle, and really don't see what the problem might have been. Was there a problem, or did both comments get eaten by blogger.com?
ReplyDelete@TTrimble
ReplyDeleteI didn't see nor did I delete the post you're talking about.
@Gary Jugert -- Thank you for my TIL of the day!
ReplyDeleteHi Clare aand welcome in! Always live to have a fellow sports fan in the house. I couldn’t agree more about this time of year being the epitome of a sports fan’s best dream. If only my sweet son-in-law’s Dodgers hadn’t tanked after such an impressive season. In addition to all the sports you mention, Clare, I indulge NCAA sports as well, especially women’s basketball and softball. But I digress.
ReplyDeleteEasy as it was, I really enjoyed this cute theme. Too bad the reveal needed to include the ever-so-SNOBBY sounding “ONE’S.” Alas, can’t have everything.
I would have Naticked in the SE had we not just had the Keydets in very recent me. I had not a glimmer of hope on 64A even With _NXS. Nada. So happy to know VMI’s odd mascot.
Theme was very straightforward but I really enjoyed the clever construction that had the games “stepping ip” diagonally. A tight, solvable Tuesday. Hopefully many solvers’ first complete no cheat, no Google finish.
This puz had some game.
ReplyDeleteThe constructioneers RISKed Death by Diagonals for their fillins, but actually pulled it all off pretty well. POPTAB+TAB and ANS were kinda desperate, but the rest was SESH-type stuff and interestin stuff U don't see a lot [DOLAPS, MUDHEN, ICKIER, INABOX, YABBA, etc.].
M&A has always luved board games, but don't find folks that want to play em too much, anymore. faves: Sorry. Cabby. Pictionary. Clue. Bananagrams. Facts in Five.
Chess, Scrabble, Monopoly, and Risk are all ok, but one game seems to go on almost forever. They are marathon-ish type games. btw: STEPSUPONESGAME seems fine, IM&AHO. Gets the reveal-job done.
staff weeject pick: ANS. Could have been improved upon, with a clue such as: {Articles of impeachment??}.
Thanx for gangin up on us, Ashleigh & Nick folks. And congratz on yer two half-debuts. Cute TuesPuz.
Masked & Anonymo5Us
**gruntz**
I was in disbelief and had to hit the "check word" button to see if I had made a mistake when 21A POP TAB was followed two rows down by 31A TAB. Really?
ReplyDeleteI wonder how many people know the back story of how 6D ANAL can be clued as "Meticulous to a fault". Some may think saying ANAL is a way to use a naughty term [tee-hee] and sound sophisticated while doing it but anyone who has a passing familiarity with psychology and psychiatry of the last 75 years or so knows it is hopelessly antiquated and totally discredited. Plus it is incomplete. If you're going to dredge up the Freudian mythos, you should distinguish between ANAL retentive and the ICKIER ANAL expulsive.
As further evidence of the NYTXW becoming one of the last bastions of classic psychoanalytic mumbo jumbo, ANAL appeared 8 times in pre-Shortzian puzzles, all of them clued along the lines of "Chem. process" or "Kind of geom.", while ANAL has appeared 45 times during the Shortzian era with every single one of them having Freudian based clues. QED.
There was a Mandela Effect NYTCW Sunday June 8th 2019. Don't really like the name because that is one I do not misremember. Would prefer the Tarzan or Bogart Efeect. Neither said ME TARZAN YOU JANE nor PLAY IT AGAIN SAM if my memories of my misrememberings are correct.
ReplyDelete@Barbara S: Our favorite variation is Triple Dirty Word SCRABBLE. Any interpretation of a dirty word anywhere on the board counts triple. One player contested that "It" counts triple, as in "Do It"... Reluctantly, we agreed.
ReplyDelete@Anoa Bob. I posted once that I disliked ANAL as usually clued. Why not use a medical or anatomical clue? It is, after all, a real word in those contexts. (While Ass* is just a vulgar term with no real medical use.)
ReplyDelete*Except for the animal.
Some time ago I spelled Clare's name incorrectly and was called out for it (but not by name). I will pass that on now, you guys know who you are: it's not Claire or Clair.
ReplyDelete[@Barabara S, congrats on you! Yes I can't believe I've gone from a QB streak of 23 in 24 days, to unable to get it even once.
yd my missed word was this 7er which I only knew as a name.]
Lisa Loeb=“skewed older?” Ouch!
ReplyDelete[News flash: td 0. QB finally!]
ReplyDelete@TTrimble (12:14) Yes, the Radisson was where she met her friend Mike for lunch. But the reason I doubted the trivia quiz was that when she first checks in to her hotel (wherever that is), she asked to use the phone. During the ensuing call, she asked the person on the other end if they know a good place for lunch downtown. The person says the Radisson and Marge says oh is it reasonable? So if she was already at the Radisson she probably wouldn’t be asking that. I may not be able to tell even by watching the movie again, but I’ve already googled it unsuccessfully so it’s my last resort.
ReplyDelete@mathgent (12:45) I think that’s it yes, but I’ll report back tomorrow either way.
@Whatsername – Here's the lunch scene – you are correct, she's clearly not staying at the Radisson because she comments "this is a nice place" when she arrives to meet her friend, who replies "well it's a Radisson."
ReplyDeleteI didn’t have See Spot Run because the series we learned to read from was Jerry and Jane which preceded Dick and Jane.
ReplyDeleteWorld War 11 banished all Jerries from our primers because it was a name for the German enemies. Cancel Culture I guess,
along with The KatzandJammer Kids!
Looking back, I remember the first word I learned — my big sister taught me to read OXYDOL from the soap box… that was way more interesting than the primer list of words!
There’s nothing wrong with the theme—the revealer clearly says this is what the person does. Nothing about the revealer indicates that this would the actual phrase spoken by the person doing it. Don’t try to be like Rex and perform acrobatics just to find a nitpick; it’s not a good look for writing quality criticism.
ReplyDeleteWould the belief that Mama Cass Elliot died as a result of choking on a ham sandwich be considered an example of the Mandela Effect? Mama Cass's death came up in conversation recently but at the time I'd forgotten about the Mandela Effect and didn't raise it.
ReplyDelete@okanaganer: Your missed word from yesterday was my last, but it was a complete fluke. Sometimes just before I give up, I enter a word or two that I know won't be accepted, just out of sheer perversity -- and as a way to punish Sam Ezersky. (Don't try to fathom the logic -- there isn't any.) Yesterday that was my final defiant word! Hah! Congrats on today. I'm still workin' it.
@Barbara S. – I'd characterize Mama Cass's ham sandwich death as an urban legend.
ReplyDelete@ttrimble 1:03
ReplyDeleteI sympathize. None of my comments get through the moderator(s) and they are benign. Today I commented that Po po can also refer to rear end. See Guy Mitchell "Feet up pat him on the po po ...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=noj9p4wnhPQ
INXS was an awesome 80s-90s band with a very sad, icky demise. But I’ll let you all check Wikipedia for that story.
ReplyDeleteSince urban legends were brought up...
ReplyDeleteThe comments I tried to post earlier were largely about urban legends, like the one about the demise of Michael Hutchens of INXS (almost certainly a suicide and not a rumor about something more salacious taking place in the hotel room where he passed). I also said something about being VMI being well-known -- if you happened to be a Virginian.
But after several attempts to post, where I even edited to remove a conceivable sticking point, with both attempts rejected by blogger.com apparently, I gave up.
Thanks to @Anders about looking into the urban legend about SEE SPOT RUN.
There were a few other throw-away lines in my comments which were meant to be humorous, about other things in the puzzle. Needless to say, they were in no way important.
@MKMcG
Thanks. Usually my comments do get through. I routinely copy and save my comments for events like today's, but after several attempts today to get whatever I said published, just threw my hands up, and now am settling for the watered-down comment you are reading now. If this doesn't get through the filter, then screw it.
@TTrimble
ReplyDeleteYou must have missed my earlier response.
I never saw, nor did I reject the posts you're referring to.
Sometimes, blogger.com is tough to deal with.,
@Joe Dipinto -- urban legend, OK, maybe. But don't people generally admit that urban legends are fiction (even if they repeat them for fun), whereas I think a substantial number* of people truly think a ham sandwich led to Cass's demise.
ReplyDelete* Where do I get this notion about a "substantial number"? A totally unscientific polling of friends, family and acquaintances.
@Moderator
ReplyDeleteThanks! Sorry, I really misspoke in my paragraph "But after several attempts to post...", with the thing about editing my comment. That may have made it sound like I was blaming mods, whereas in fact I did see your post and internally accepted your explanation. I was grumpy and annoyed when I wrote that, is all. But I regret misspeaking in this manner.
Yes, confound this blogger.com.
@Joe D (3:59) Than you, excellent point! And one I had not thought of. But that’s more fuel for the strongly worded email I intend to send to the trivia quiz folks - that is if I can find their website again. 😄
ReplyDeleteVery easy Tuesday for a PR. I didn’t even realize there was theme until I came here. No complaints tho, I enjoyed it.
ReplyDelete@Barbara – it could just be that the ham sandwich story wasn't debunked frequently or publically enough over time.
ReplyDeleteIn any case, I see a difference between thinking something is true thanks to continued repetition by external sources, and actually remembering that something happened differently than the way it did. Did anyone really remember that Rick says "play it again, Sam" in "Casablanca"? They just knew he said something similar, and since the paraphrase was used as a film title and also became quoted to death, they assumed it was the actual line.
Mathgent's example of remembering a brief sequence in "Fargo" that wasn't actually there is more like what's being described by the Mandela effect, imo. But it doesn't seem like that big a deal to me. People misremember details about things all the time. Nelson Mandela was in prison for a very very long time; it's not that surprising that some people would "remember" that he died there.
@Joe D. The more I think about it, the difference I see between Mandela dying in prison and Cass dying of a ham sandwich is that no one ever promulgated the Mandela story -- it was just something that seemed to evolve as true in people's minds over time. In contrast, the ham sandwich, even if never offered as the official cause of death, was at least speculated on at an early stage in the investigation, because a partially eaten sandwich was found in Cass's room. So that seems like a profound difference -- an idea that can't be linked with anything factual (Mandela) v. misinformation that did get reported in the media but was later proven wrong (Cass). So I guess to answer my original question, I'd conclude that the Cass story is not an example of the Mandela Effect. I'm not convinced it's an urban legend, though. If the tale of alligators living in the NYC sewer system is an urban legend, then I feel the Cass story is too close to something that actually happened to be put in the same category, even though erroneous details about live on.
ReplyDeletePerfect for a Tuesday. Light theme, little junk.
ReplyDeleteEasu peasy. Should have been filed for Monday. Other than that, it’s a very solid offering by two new constructors. Congratulations to Ashleigh and Nick!
ReplyDeleteThere may be ICKIER puzzles out there--but I don't think I'll bother searching for them. No fill junk??? POPTAB/TAB, ONE'S in the revealer answer, POPO (a '90's term clued with a '60's term), OWNSIT instead of the real-life OWNS up (my first answer, of course)...much more crosswordese. Ashleigh & Nick: keep those day jobs. Double-bogey.
ReplyDeleteWordle par.
BAR TAB
ReplyDeleteELSIE FRIESfor A cop,
"SEE his UNTENDED DOing?
That GENT SPIKED my POP
with IDEAS of WOOING!"
--- ELY LOEB
corrected:
ReplyDeleteBAR TAB
ELSIE CRIES for A cop,
"SEE his UNTENDED DOing?
That GENT SPIKED my POP
with IDEAS of WOOING!"
--- ELY LOEB
Insert TAR tirade here. There is no TAR on your road.
ReplyDeleteNot a LOT here, but there is APPLE SAUCE.
Wordle par.
Easier than Monday, por moi.
ReplyDeleteI had a friend when I was a kid who cheated outrageously at Monopoly. Made up rules all day long. Could be one of the reasons I don't like competition - playing, yes. Competing - meh.
Diana, LIW
More about those Cardozo Clerks:
ReplyDeletehttps://wackyhighschoolmascots.blogspot.com/2024/04/clerks-cardozo-education-campus-dc.html