Chocolate brand with the slogan "Irresistibubble" / SAT 2-4-23 / Tupac's Gospel / Summer novel typically / One of a set in an accordion / Unconditional condition? / Ambitious goal or innovation
Constructor: Kate Hawkins
Relative difficulty: Easy
THEME: none
Word of the Day: Booth School of Business (42D: Many Chicago Booth grads) —
The University of Chicago Booth School of Business (Chicago Booth or Booth) is the graduatebusiness school of the University of Chicago, a privateresearch university in Chicago, Illinois. Founded in 1898, Chicago Booth is the second-oldest business school in the U.S. and is associated with 10 Nobel laureates in the Economic Sciences, more than any other business school in the world. The school has the third-largest endowment of any business school.
• • •
Well this one is GORGEOUS and it knows it. Once again (over and over now) we get the Friday puzzle on a Saturday. Breezy, flowing, chock full of snazzy terms and expressions. It's wide-ranging! This is the thing I really love in a late-week themeless. When the puzzle works the same plot of land over and over, when it doesn't give all kinds of people from all kinds of age groups a shot, when it over-relies on proper nouns and trivia, well, it can feel exhilarating if it's *your* plot of land that it's working, and if you're part of the in-group it's calling out to, but ... I get too much mail from both teenagers *and* 90-year-olds explaining how the puzzle can (sometimes, often) make them feel left out, and while some amount of this feeling is inevitable for all of us, puzzles can do their best to, you know, roam. Roam, if you want to. Roam around the world. Take us on a trip. And this one did. I want to say it was in my wheelhouse, but I don't think it's flexing much of a wheelhouse, this puzzle. You don't need to be part of a particular generation or be extremely online to appreciate the colloquial zing of "IGNORE THAT!," "CUT TO THE CHASE!," HITS A NERVE, and "LET'S SEE SOME I.D." (that last one so unexpectedly good, I almost cheered out loud, but wife's still asleep, so shh). Look what great use the puzzle makes of its longer answers. Just ... pairs of winners everywhere you look. GO OUTSIDE for the MOONSHOT! Take your BEACH READ to the ART HOUSE! There's something for everyone here. Cannot imagine not finding this puzzle at least pleasant and charming, if not outright brilliant. ENCHANTing, even.
I struggled out of the gate, slightly. I thought 1A: Smart (CHIC) was ACHE ... and when that didn't work for the Downs, I took it out and decided to start with the Aristophanes clue, 1D: "You cannot teach a ___ to walk straight": Aristophanes. Well, Aristophanes wrote The Frogs (he remembered, proudly, perhaps even smugly), so the answer must be FROG. "You cannot teach a FROG to walk straight, yes, I buy that! Has the ring of truth, for sure." Well, sometimes you botch your way to success, because FROG, though wrong, had an "R" that was correct, which got me RAGÙ (14A: Grocery brand with an accent in its name). Eventually it was clear that the Marvel character had to be AUNT May (not OLLA May or whatever I was contemplating for a half second), and so everything got tidied up and then bam, like a shot, I went flying out of that NW corner on the wings of IGNORE THAT!
Funny to want ACHE at 1A: Smart and be wrong ... only to have ACHE be right later in the puzzle (32A: Long). This is what Andrea Carla Michaels (I think) once dubbed a "malapop"—a wrong answer that ends up being *right* somewhere else in the grid. It's a useful term, and it's a phenomenon that happens a weird lot. I need a word for the phenomenon of a wrong answer that's accidentally helpful because it (by chance) has some correct letters that help you get crosses (see my FROG error, above). As for other wrong answers ... I had KICK before BUCK (37D: Resist) (a very unexpected kealoa*). Had the -NSE at 41D: Flush (RINSE) might be DENSE (as in "Rife (with)" ... somehow). I struggled most with short stuff, ambiguously-clued stuff like RINSE and TEST (29D: Screen, in a way) and TUNES (33A: Some jams), and unfamiliar proper nouns like SUSAN (didn't know her) (39A: ___ Wojcicki, C.E.O. of YouTube beginning in 2014) and LEN (didn't know him ... although I've seen him many times by now, I know, I know ... I just refuse to commit "Dancing With the Stars" knowledge to memory, apparently) (49D: ___ Goodman, longtime judge on "Dancing With the Stars"). Also hard, unsurprisingly, were some of the "?" clues, particularly TRUE LOVE (33D: Unconditional condition?). I had the -RUE- part and wanted ... something to do with logic or reason, maybe, like ... well TRUE/FALSE wouldn't fit, but something like that. Then I considered the possibility that I was dealing with something CRUEL... but I worked it out, and nodded approvingly when I did. A proper Saturday clue, that one. Hope you liked this even half as much as I did. Great end to a remarkably good week of puzzles.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
P.S. AERO chocolate bars have little air (aer?) bubbles in them, hence 43D: Chocolate brand with the slogan "Irresistibubble"; "The Marvelous Mrs. MAISEL" is an Emmy-winning show "comedy-drama" on Amazon (42A: Title Mrs. played by Rachel Brosnahan).
*kealoa = a pair of words that can be clued identically and that share at least one letter in common (in the same position). These are answers you can't just fill in quickly because two or more answers are viable, Even With One or More Letters In Place. From the classic [Mauna ___] KEA/LOA conundrum. See also, e.g. [Heaps] ATON/ALOT, ["Git!"] "SHOO"/"SCAT," etc.
My main problem was in the SW. BENEficENT before BENEVOLENT at 48A, but that was only after working through a few mistakes: Thought Chicago Booth might be an art school so MfAS before MBAs. AERO was a WOE (but in retrospect inferrable because "bubble"). TRUE Lies before LOVE at 33D made me question HOWEVER and had no clue about the DwtS judge.
Well, I rarely talk about my individual solve, but I have to today, because it was just thrilling. That’s an adjective I can hardly ever remember using to describe a solve.
But there I was, having gone through the clues, with huge expanses of white in the grid, but then the SW corner opened up, with MAISEL, then INKY and SOY, then ARK (with its hilarious clue) and MBAs, and then I saw BENEVOLENT.
What followed was the thrilling part, which I’ll call a begat-fest. When often I need more than one cross to divine an answer, especially on Saturday, today, that one cross seemed to suffice – everywhere! Boom boom boom, fill-in after fill-in, and seemingly, in the blink of an eye, the puzzle was done. It filled in like a Monday, but with a big difference, because on Mondays the fill-ins feel rote, but today, seemingly, each one brought that kick, that buzz, that I get from cracking a riddle, because that is exactly what I was doing, but in a blaze of one after the other in a rat-a-tat manner.
Thrilling! OMG thrilling! I hope everyone here has experienced this, and if you haven’t, I hope you will at least once. This truly may be the first time this happened for me.
One more thing about this puzzle. It is truly GORGEOUS. There were 12 answers that I marked as, well, luscious, and I’ll just mention the five that were NYT debut answers, soundly adding to the oeuvre: STEER CLEAR, BEACH READ, LET’S SEE SOME I.D., BLOTCHED, HITS A NERVE, and GO OUTSIDE.
Kate, you gave me high excitement and beauty today. I highly anticipate your next creation. Thank you so much for a most memorable Crosslandia outing.
Chiming in with our fearless leader, this puzz was refreshing. Some great long answers that maybe took more than a few crosses to figure out, but whoa, they fell in with just a bit of thought! Good stuff.
If there was horrid short fill to deal with (which, no, hardly any 3-letter answers), then it was easily ignored.
I felt almost exactly the same about this puzzle as yesterday's: really well made, solid construction, but somewhat lacking in zing. I'm not sure how Rex manages to include GO OUTSIDE as one of his favorite bits of fill - isn't that basically 'eat a sandwich'?
I don't think Wojcicki would make the top ten SUSAN's list, although I admit CEOs are an area of weakness for me. Bezos, Buffett, Musk, Whitman ... I think that's all I have.
Hand up for the ACHE malapop. And not quite a malapop, but I considered 'LETS go outside' briefly where LETS SEE SOME ID wound up, only to have GO OUTSIDE appear.
I see your point about GO OUTSIDE being like green paint. But for me it is justifiable by virtue of the clever clue that accompanies it. Together they tell a story, an amusingly familiar story for parents, and so taken as a whole, it “is a thing.”
Wait, what? There was a KEALOA in this puzz? BUCK may have been one of the last things I filled in, but there was never any confusion of whether this or that.
This played a bit tougher than recent Saturdays for me, and looked like it would be even tougher than that until--with unfilled squares dominating the NW and North Center and down into the center--WOOSH WOOSH WOOSH and done. To use @Lewis' term: thrilling!
So much to love in this GORGEOUS grid. Certainly helped me get my REC ON for a rainy Saturday morning.
Just 14 minutes for this father/son team. We agree with the easy rating but it was a lot of fun. Loved LETSSEESOMEID and IGNORETHAT and HITSANERVE. Fun puzzle.... my 20 something son knew AUNT May and SUSAN; I knew the chocolate bar... (do they still make AERO?). Thanks, Kate, for a great puzzle. : )
NYT is no longer going publish digital Variety and Acrostic puzzles and is in fact removing access to the entire archive of these puzzles! They are offering no compensation for this loss of service and I feel they should hear about it. If so inclined, join me is emailing NYTGames@nytimes.com to express our disappointment!
Sorry to hijack this chain but I thought you all would like to know.
@Steven 7:54 Maybe that's because not a lot of people do them online? I find the online acrostic pretty much impossible, so I skip it if I don't have the physical paper. Just my 2 cents
Rex – you do grumpysome well, fine, blah blah, but when you exalt a puzzle, it’s so, so fun to read. Stellar write-up this morning.
Man oh man some terrific Saturday cluing. I really enjoyed the fight this morning, and the supreme satisfaction of (almost) wrestling this one to the ground. (A defensible “swag” for SEAT gave me a Sacramento paper called the “BWE” and a Tupac song called “Ghetgo Gospel.” I rather liked Ghetgo and could only imagine what someone with his talent did with a made-up word like that.)
The clue for RETRO had me sit up. I mean, jeez. If I’m going to Mars, I want to be on a state-of-the-art rocket, not some Volkswagen Bus of a rocket. Right? I looked into it, and it seems that this RETRO just means that some engine goes backwards to slow everything down.
Loved GO OUTSIDE. My sisters and I didn’t roughhouse a lot, but we sure bickered, and Mom would banish us to the yard and then lock the doors.
BABA Ganouj means “spoiled dad,” and I just needed everyone to know that. (BABA is Arabic for “dad” – reminding you that most babies’ first utterances involve the two lips.)
“Scout’s task” – to sit at a table in front of Walmart and make my face burn in shame when I don’t buy any cookies ‘cause I just really, really don’t like them.
OK – I have one LET’S SEE SOME ID story. When I was a cocktail waitress, I hated when people whose age looked iffy came in. If they ordered, say, Dewars on the rocks, I let it go. But order a strawberry daiquiri, buddy, and I have to see some ID. One early evening these two guys came in, and one looked iffy, so I approached bracing myself for the ID confrontation. Happily, the youngish one just ordered an OJ and then asked about the piano that was sitting there and could anyone play it. I shrugged and mumbled something about our having rented it for New Year’s Eve. I was at the bar getting their order when all hell broke loose – even the cooks came out of the kitchen to gape. I’ve never seen anyone assault a piano like that. Talk about your instant mood lifter. His name is Jason D. Williams, and we became friends. So I'm a bit of a big deal.
PS - another instant mood lifter, and I’m being totally serious here , is putting a Bugle chip on each finger and then waving them around like tentacles.
PPS - @rad26 from yesterday. Thanks, man. I love it when someone catches a little sneaky sneak reference to an entry.
As the mother of sons, I cheered when I filled in GO OUTISDE. Sometimes it's the only thing to do when they won't stop pummeling each other. I glanced up to see who the puzzle-maker was and nodded when I saw it was a woman.
Sunny puzzle for a frigid morning. No - not Saturday tough but a pleasure to work through. Agree with Rex on pretty much all of the longs - especially the two vertical 13s - LETS SEE SOME ID will easily get some eyes for Lewis’ best of the year group. BENEVOLENT and MOON SHOT are top notch.
A few oddball things here and there - I don’t like BESOT but most of the shorts are well clued like ABET and DEFT is a wonderful way to finish up. Learned about the Liberty Bell.
Enjoyable Saturday solve. Getting psyched up for a Stella Stumper.
@Pablo - I see Mt. Washington hit -108 with the wind overnight - hope you stayed inside.
I agree with Rex about the whoosh and swoosh and great expressions. The pop culture names and references (MONAE, GHETTO Gospel, etc.) were totally unknown to me but they came fairly easily from crosses. I wouldn’t call it easy, but it was fun and just crunchy enough.
It would be a public service if WS used a good puzzle like this with the GARAGE right up there at the top to announce that he is done beating that dead horse that is “this or that” GENRE or SUBGENRE.
As usual, no clue on the MAISEL, MONAE, Wojcicki’s of the world cuz I have a wheelhouse the size of a keyhole.
ETES is bad enough on its own (crossing ODEON as well), adding a “here’s a bunch of gibberish, you guess which language it means something in” clue (ERSE) gets a penalty flag for piling on.
Currently in the northeast and definitely looking forward to the time of year when a BEACH READ can actually be READ at the BEACH.
• I still remember your [Inefficient confetti-making tool] for HOLE PUNCH clue last December, one of my favorite clues of the year. And I loved your ARK clue today. • It made me smile to learn (from your notes) that you are learning to play accordion. It’s one of the instruments I play, and it can produce such rich music. As you probably know, it’s far more than “Lady of Spain” and polkas. • Your answer set today was indeed GORGEOUS. I marked 12 answers that I considered luscious, far more than usual, and five on my list are NYT debut answers, very worthy additions to the oeuvre: BEACH READ, LETS SEE SOME I,D,, HITS A NERVE, BLOTCHED, and GO OUTSIDE. Brava!
Pretty close to a personal best for a Saturday. Honestly the only day this week which played slow for me was Monday. Ebon for inky mostly because I spelled Maisel wrong was only slow spot.
Some very clever cluing and at least in my wheelhouse's neighborhood made this a pleasure to solve for me. My biggest "huh?" came at 39A; I was expecting something more exotic than SUSAN to go with Wojcicki.
I found this to be challenging. Yet it was a treat to get it done. So many terrific answers, most of them already pointed out by Rex. I had several wrong answers that slowed me down, e.g. 1A hurt before CHIC, 37A drunk before BESOT, 41A intel before RECON. And had no idea about many of the proper names. Nonetheless, I loved it.
This one felt especially colloquial to me, which I think is the first time I've described a puzzle that way. Way easy for a Saturday, but sometimes fun is fast is fun.
Unknowns were AERO, LEE, and SUSAN as clued. Had LONGSHOT before MOONSHOT. MOONSHOT is far better. Also took a while to parse LETSSEESOME ID, had most of the letters before I could make a phrase.
Nice to see TRUELOVE, the magic words Max needed to revive a mostly dead Westley in The Princess Bride. Great movie and an even better book.
Just a great Saturday, KH. Kept Hoping it wouldn't end, but alas, it did, and too soon. Thanks for all the fun.
@Son Volt-I was listening to our local weather and they said that the wind chill would probably reach at least -100 on the top of Mt. Washington and that the weather observers who stay up there were "excited". Different breed of cats. Only -16 here this AM, which is a little like winter used to be.
@pabloinnh 8:55 am. The wind chill at -100?!?! I’ve been to the top of Mt. Washington several times- ways a treat but always windy. Since I have beautiful photos in spring, summer and fall, I have considered going for some winter shots. Upon reconsideration today, I think not. I do love NH though.
Nice challenging Saturday puzzle for me. On my first pass I got some answers scattered throughout – enough to have a foothold in every section – but it took me a while longer to fill the grid out. Just a bunch of tough cluing that made for fun brain exercise. I enjoyed this a lot!
I did not find this one easy--the constructor's connotations and mine did not always match (I am still scratching my head over RINSE for "flush"and ATE for "didn't go fast"), but I did find it enjoyable. Those down answers! Also liked the repeated clues and BLOTCHED, BEACH READ, BENEVOLENT stacked so nicely on top of each other.
Count me in on the malapop--ACHE at 1A. Always fun to start off a toughie with a wrong answer! I got the NE corner with ease and then...nothing substantial until I hit the SE, just a few correct answers here and there. "Intel" instead of RECON. And TIL that accordions have REEDs and a MOON SHOT may or may not involve an actual moon. Not interested in business in any way, so the CEO, as usual, was left blank. Worse: I lived in and worked in Chicago for 25 years, had friends in academia (Loyola, Northwestern, DePaul) and never heard of Chicago Booth. There are things in life that I simply don't want or need to know anythingabout--tax prep is one, business names and terms another. Still, the Booth thing feels like a major oversight.
Amy: yes, so good! The puzzle put me in such a good mood, I even felt myself smiling as I entered some of answers: GORGEOUS. ENCHANT, BENEVOLENT. The words just made me feel happy. The long answers sparkled. And Janel Monae, always a delight. CRAB reminded me of a Beach Day when we discovered we'd plunked our chairs down next to a crab colony and whiled away some fascinating moments just watching them move about. They really can't walk straight. * Hope everyone stays warm and healthy on this cold one. Two snoogly cats are helping me. 🐈
Once I decided DRUNK didn't work for "Inebriate," I was on the right track. Took me a long time to get ARTHOUSE, because the crosses didn't make sense. Are TUNES really "Some jams?"
All in all, a good Saturday, but easier than Friday's for a change (because I didn't have to cheat).
good puzzle when i was done i admired it, BUt, I thought there were too many proper names -some of which were somewhat obscure. They could be figured from the crosses. I prefer puzzles with less such proper names
Not easy for me. Medium-challenging for me. Took me way longer than yesterday’s puzzle. I think I nearly used up an entire eraser on it. I loved it though. A shocking lack of common fill. Tough, but fair clueing.
ONE TON / ANTED was the best I could do in the top 1/3.
MAISEL / INKY provided a foothold down south, but BENEficial caused major probs.
Eventually got things worked out for a successful solve.
Enjoyed the battle! :) ___
On to Stella's Sat. Stumper. 🤞
Sad news for NYT' online Acrostic & Cryptic solvers: 😔
"Starting March 1, 2023 we will no longer publish or support digital versions of the Acrostic and Variety Puzzles. The digital versions of these puzzles were difficult to support for our technical teams, and few of our subscribers played these puzzles online. By removing support, we can refocus our resources on our other offerings." (NYT) ___ Peace 🕊 🇺🇦 ~ Compassion ~ Tolerance ~ Kindness to all 🙏
Fun puzzle but more challenging for me than some others because, like @Conrad, BENEFICENT instead of BENEVOLENT, so I put in TRUELIES instead of TRUELOVE, etc. I also wrote SHOW ME YOUR ID instead of SOME, which really slowed things down.
Very enjoyable long answers, but the names (Aunt, Susan, Len, Bee) were not in my wheelhouse. I have no idea what GARAGE is as a musical genre, but okay.
@pabloinnh - my husband grew up in North Conway and has climbed Washington more times than he can count at this point, so the first thing he did this morning was to visit the Observatory website to check the weather. 90+ mph winds! A low of -47°F! but 100 mile visibility so you can freeze to death while having a great view.
Hey All ! Finished the puz with the whoosh-whoosh Rex talks about. Weird. Was stuck-ish in each section, got NE, then little bit of the East Center, then SE, SW, filled in rest of East Center, then after the SW, my whoosh -whoosh happen in the entire West. All of a sudden, answer after answer just filled in. It was rather fun.
Nice puz, agree with Rex about no particular "age" of the puz. PPP to a minimum. Liked the quad O's of MOON GOOUT. An E fest in South Center. BEACH READ went through Brisk, Brief. Nice clue for 8D ATE. (Har ATE Down at 8Down!)
"I need a word for the phenomenon of a wrong answer that's accidentally helpful because it (by chance) has some correct letters that help you get crosses (see my FROG error, above)"
Rex found yesterday challenging and today’s easy, totally the other way around for me. Struggled with this on until the NE finally came together and then it all just opened up. But really enjoyed both puzzles.
After grouching about yesterday's puzzle (and the day before) I anticipated another grumpy day since Saturday and I don't usually mesh, but I enjoyed the puzzle even though I only put in five guesses after a complete read through. When that happens a sense of Go-ogle gloom casts its shadow over my soul as there's been some Saturdays when I am looking up every third word, but not today. I put my work boots on and finished. As always, I checked on the people names I can't possibly know -- there were only a few -- and was surprised and delighted to learn YouTube is run by a woman. Maybe that's why it, unlike the other big sites, isn't in the news every other day for heinous data crimes and egomaniacal leadership. They're probably just better at covering it up.
I like saying the word CHIC. Never noticed RAGÚ has an accent above it. I dislike seeing the word GHETTO used cavalierly in a puzzle meant to be completed by those of privilege. GO OUTSIDE is hee-larious. We have an ART HOUSE three blocks from my house and I have seen so many horrendous movies there and six good ones. I wonder why Aristophanes was talking about CRAB gaits. I will be buying a new accordion this year, but the one I want is $2500 and that's a tough justification to find. LET'S SEE SOME ID is remarkable. HITS A NERVE is also wonderful.
I like mirrored clues IF I can find the answers. Had a couple of winners today.
Uniclues:
1 Nephew's warning call. 2 Screen shot of ARSE heavy NYTXW. 3 Encourage neighbors to call the cops. 4 Get dumb ... then get dummer. 5 Binge watch Netflix. 6 Heading for one of the more popular displays at the Crosswordese Hall of Fame. 7 Wherever my wife is. 8 Be female (we're basic).
More a "medium" for me - and that was all to the good, as it gave me more time to enjoy the bounty of terrific answers - and the fun of seeing them gradually materialize during my several circuits of the grid. Thanks to @Lewis for pointing out the debut answers - that was part of the pleasure for me, the surprise of "not your usual suspects"; I especially liked BLOTCHED, STEER CLEAR, BEACH READ, and, for me the grand prize winner, LET'S SEE SOME ID (after I'd first parsed it as LET'S wElcOME In).
Re: @Rex's "I need a word for the phenomenon of a wrong answer that's accidentally helpful because it (by chance) has some correct letters that help you get crosses" - I agree. But for me that's true for acrostics rather than crosswords, where I almost never write in an answer without confirming crosses; in acrostics, though, I've found that a wrong guess on a clue more often than not yields me something in the quote that more than makes up for the mistake.
Speaking of acrostics - Thank you @Steven 7:54 and @bocamp 9:34 for alerting us to their impending disappearance from the digital realm. Shock and horror here: I can't believe I'm going to have to go back to those little boxes in the mag, with their unreadable tiny print. "Difficult for our technical team" - puhleeze!
This was a "keep the faith" puzzle for me and I found it compulsively involving. Although I suspected both CHIC and RAGU in the NW, I wasn't sure enough of either to write them in and therefore left the NW and moved east.
But my two big problems lay elsewhere. Haven't read any of y'all yet, but I'm imagining that more than a few did what I did. I had the "B" -- so that when I saw the clue "Like umpires, sometimes", I confidently wrote in BLIND. This -- along with my BalK instead of BUCK for "resist" -- made the right side of the puzzle, from MOONSHOT (couldn't see it because I had ?LON????) all the way to PICKMEUP (which I did have) really, really slow going.
What a happy surprise to see that the lady with the unspellable and unpronounceable last name had a common first name like SUSAN! There was no way of telling when I had BALK instead of BUCK.
So much here to love. MOONSHOT, as clued; GO OUTSIDE; BEACH READ; CUT TO THE CHASE; LET'S SEE SOME ID. The fill is very, very lively and the solving process was both challenging and enjoyable. Great Saturday.
A little behind on the puzzle and commentariat - musical theater production week. My experience has been the opposite of Rex: His first section filled in today, was the last for me. Friday was 25-30% easier if you go by time. Both excellent puzzles, apparently mostly in my wheelhouse.
In the spirit of the ADDAMS family and yesterdays lovely limericks,
Kevorkian's just-opened Oast Is not for patrons milquetoast If thrombosed or sclerosed, diagnosed tuberculosed, they'll be necrosed as a ghost by the host.
You know what else is a kealoa? LET'S SEE SOME/yOur ID. Fortunately, I noticed the possibility just before putting in 'your,' so I waited for the crosses.
I struggled a bit until I realized that I was not looking for a particular Mario character, but just a RACER. Also, I was very confident that suffuse = imbue -- until 10 seconds later when I got BABA. But then I couldn't figure out what it was.
This is the second consecutive day when the clue was that something had an accent in it. I wonder what that's all about.
Today's philosophical question: Is RETRO a kind of rocket, or is it just the same rocket turned around?
And another one: Can you teach a CRAB to walk crooked?
Here in Boston, the cold has overpowered our heating system. The upper floors are OK, but downstairs is about 50F. But it's almost up to zero outside, so there's hope.
Other elements that have only recently been discovered are kvellium, which imparts a feeling of pride; kvetchium, which causes annoyance; verklemptium, which leads one to be overcome by emotions; and schlepium, the effects of which are not known, but it's very hard to transport.
Yes, an easy and enjoyable puzzle for a Saturday. HOWEVER, I BOOED when I saw BEACH READ. How can anyone read anything in the bright sun? Damaging the eyes and skin at the same time.
"Parent's command when something almost gets broken by roughhousing siblings"— Clues of 10+ words tend to bug me. They're usually clunky and unnecessary.
"Use a porta-potty?" would have injected a bit of humor.
This was a medium level of Saturday resistance for me. I had a slow start because I don't accept GARAGE as a genre. It's a common descriptor for bands but not so much for the music they produce. GRUNGE would be a genre and I couldn't figure out why it just didn't work.
In the center staircase I misread the 33A clue as "Some jeans" multiple times. Only when it was backfilled later did I realize the mistake. So much for the papers tiny print.
In the SW I initially put in GIESEL supported by EBON. Luckily I recognized BENEVOLENT off of the. EVO.
Everything was clear as a (Liberty) bell when I finished. Brilliant use of phrases today.
Just a thought about the online acrostic puzzles. I can't believe the NYT will remove something from the online access that it can make money off of. I would bet that it is removing access only to make it available elsewhere for an additional charge. Time will tell. Greedy, greedy, greedy.
"...few of our subscribers played these puzzles online." I find it hard to believe that few game subscribers did the acrostic online. I always looked forward to it and always did it online, and I've seen it mentioned in the comments both here and on the NYT crossword page. Anyone else?
At some point, Spelling Bee and Wordle won't be worth the hefty annual game access price. There are already so many Wordle variations; has anyone tried Hurdle? Much, much more difficult.
Love, love love this puzzle. I knew even Rex would love it. Had no issues except my ignorance, which I managed to overcome without googling anything. This is the one you keep coming back for! Like avocados, eventually you find a perfect one out of all the flawed and rotten ones.
1) It shoulda stuck to a flower pollen diet 2) Take a firm stand on something, for heaven's sake! 3) A woman of refined taste 4) My heart's been broken once too often
1) RAGU ONE-TON BEE 2) CURE HOWEVER 3) ARTHOUSE SUSAN 4) GOSH NO TRUELOVE
I think retro is an adjective here. You did say we are talking about a kind of rocket, a rocket that breaks the vehicle by shooting its exhaust in the direction opposite of travel. Retro is often used in English as an adjective, as a style can be called retro. Vision is a French noun borrowed by English ( ultimately derived from Latin). Tele is of Greek origin meaning far. So "far vision". In this case far is an adjective also.
Great grid &a fun solve as noted above. Kate Hawkins is a real talent. Took a while to let go of “free rein” as the unconditional condition and to pass up the scout selling cookies at Safeway. ATE for eight and ARK for twosome sanctuary were ENCHANTING fill that brought guffaws.
Seemed like it was going to be a real Saturday Smackdown at first but I gradually worked my way to where I only had to look up a couple of proper names. That, IMO is indicative of a superbly constructed crossword. So thank you Kate, for this pleasant but challenging solve.
Not a fan of the duplicate clues but loved the ones for LETS SEE SOME ID and ARK. Had never heard of AERO chocolate or GARAGE related to any type of music. Numerous erasures: CAN I SEE for LETS, SLAP for ABET, SIFT for TEST, BLIND for BOOED, LOOT for HAUL and my Sacramento BEE started out as a SUN. Hi @GILL. 😎
Thinking of all you folks in the Northeast and hoping you stay warm and safe.
"I need a word for the phenomenon of a wrong answer that's accidentally helpful because it (by chance) has some correct letters that help you get crosses..." "phenomen-off?"
Let’s not go crazy expanding what’s a kealoa. It needs to be common answers with one letter differences impossible to determine without one cross. BUCK/KICK should definitely not qualify. (BALK would also be a potential answer with only the k and there are fartoo many other solving situations that would become kealoas if you expand beyond my suggested definition).
I did start with some CHIC and I did end with some DEFT....HOWEVER, I had to GUESS on GHETTO. I was correct. I even spelled MONAE and MAISEL correctly. Oh what a fabulous (AKA GORGEOUS) puzzle you are today. Enjoyment from start to finish. I had to do some eenie, meenie, miney and moing on the two booty's.... Which goes first? Let's see.... there's Rear, Loot, Pelf, Arse and others I'm sure....So...HAUL first and SEAT second. Hah! I even loved the HOWEVER/ EVEN SO clues. There is something thrilling about entering a 13 long down answer off of one letter. CUT TO THE CHASE it was. Proud and feeling confident, IGNORE THAT...should I see if I can do it again? I did but I wanted to go slowly. The longs were happily dripping down some bodacious chocolate lips. Why look! LETS SEE SOME ID just off the L in STEER CLEAR. How's them apples!. To be sure, not everything went so smooth. I had to GUESS, GUESS, GUESS a lot of the time. I wanted a BEACH book. Erase/erase. I don't know what GARAGE means in so far as some music genre. I've no idea who SUSAN (with an unpronounceable last name) is, and I get confused with PEND and PENT. Did it matter? No, because I finished. This was a PICK ME UP from start to finish. Can I have some more chocolate...please?
I found yesterday's fairly tough and today's about equally so. Or at least, it was tough until it wasn't. Didn't feel like I was making much headway, then when I finally got CUT TO THE CHASE, the rest cascaded to victory.
Had new AGE at 5A for a while; GARAGE is more commonly called by the full name of garage rock. I've never heard it called just "garage". Also had BalK instead of BUCK initially, but that's closer to meaning hesitate than resist, so that's on me.
LET'S SEE SOME ID is a fantastic answer.
I feel like TUNES for "Some jams" is backwards. Some tunes are jams, but not all jams are tunes. Not a big deal though. Just quirkin'.
Had jberg's exact experience, where I wanted "Suffuse" to be imbuE and the Mario Kart clue to be a specific character. Many possibilities there: Mario, Luigi, Peach, Yoshi, Wario, Daisy ... man, there are a lot of 5-lettered Nintendo characters!
Dia dhuit, dudes and darlins. And holy double booty, Batman! Nice, easy-for-a-SatPuz, but yet slightly feisty. The no-knows were nicely limited, at our house. Kinda liked it, as themelesses go.
staff weeject pick, of a mere six choices: BEE. It was a sorta no-know, as we don't get the Sacramento paper.
Some nice puz-debut answers here, includin: BEACHREAD. GOOUTSIDE. HITSANERVE. LETSSEESOMEID. Cool clue with a ?-mark: {Didn't go fast?} = ATE. Cool clue without a ?-mark: {Like some umpires, sometimes} = BOOED.
Thanx for the smoooth ride, Ms. Hawkins darlin. U did good work. I strongly agree with myself about this.
Masked & Anonymo8Us
p.s. Will miss the Acrostic puz, if it's really goin away. But, maybe it can be seamlessly replaced by TikTok's new Chinese Ball Looney Tunes puzs, currently bein advertised over North Carolina.
Wow great puzzle at the end of a week of great puzzles. The only problem here was it just went by too fast... 9 minutes for me.
The only typeover I can remember was LET'S SEE WHO'S ON for "Line at the door of a bar". Y'know, you're walking past a bar and your friend says "wonder who's playing here tonight..." The correct answer is soooooo much better. And hands up for the ACHE malapop at 1 across.
[Spelling Bee: yd 0, my last word was this 6er which oddly enough has been my last word several times before.]
Superb puzzle. Played somewhat easier for a Saturday, other than LETSS---OM-D which was baffling for a bit particularly as we initially had LETSS---OMeD (eVAN) - thhe ED just seemed to be the logical ending . What a fantastic aha (we refer to them as "OLEs!") when we counter-considered IVAN, then saw "ID" and the answer just whooshed in. In and of itself, LETSSEESOMEID is just such a brilliant answer to have in a puzzle as well. A big OLE! to Kate for this fabulous start to our Saturday.
@TaylorSlow - I just emailed NYTGames and made that very point about the supposedly "few" subscribers who do the puzzles, especially the acrostic. I also questioned why, after over 20 years of experience in publishing the digital versions, the technical team now inds them difficult to support. I'll still have access to the puzzles in the print edition, but after being able to do the acrostic online for decades, I'm not sure I'll return to the tortuous process of solving in the mag.
Today was a complete change from yesterday. I had a stumble with BENEficENT before BENEVOLENT but with very good reason. There is a lovely passage in the Lüchow‘s German Cookbook c1952 (with many reprints) that describes the history and ritual of Maiweinfests (May Wine Festivals) in Germany.
Dear friends of ours at Illinois introduced us to their imported version of the spring tradition. It spoke to my German heritage and our love of good friends, good food and good wine. The cookbook describes the tradition and gives Lüchow’s take on a May Wine beverage that is a perfect foundation for a tradition.
The tough part has been finding fresh Waldmeister (woodruff or May herb), a beautifully fragrant and delicate ground-covering herb that literally carpets German forests in the spring. As set out in the cookbook, the Waldmeister makes the drink. “The shoots are gathered . . . and then tied into bunches and steeped in the previous year’s Rhinewein for a few days imparting their beneficence to it and enriching it with a flavor truly inimitable.” Lüchow’s p.213.
We adopted the party as our own once we all left the U and hosted it for nearly 40 years. Each year, my husband explained our tradition’s beginnings and read the passage about Maiwein from the cookbook. We called it “The Liturgy.”
Now my daughter and “LawSon” (as I call him, since he calls me “LawMama”) are now ready to have their first one this spring. And the “where do we get Waldmeister” issue has already arisen. I told them just recently that we have all we will ever need.
As it turns out, just before the kids’ wedding at the rehearsal dinner. I discovered a lifetime supply covering the dappled ground below the thick pine forest in northern Michigan on the groom’s family property, north of Traverse City.
We were so busy that weekend, it didn’t occur to me to mention it to the kids. I did however, point it out to the Father of the Bride who, while he liked Jonathan well enough, was still a bit tepid about the wedding. It seems to be a fact of life that if a strong father-daughter bond has been forged as with my daughter and her dad, nobody is ever going to be good enough, or at least not good enough until proven worthy after years. The FOB was having some very big feelings.
Larry wasn’t being his usual jovial self. Before dinner, I poured him another glass of wine and took him out to see the sun set over the lake and told him I needed to show him something truly magical. We walked down the path toward the edge of a rocky ledge perfect for sunsets. On the way, I asked him to look down. Waldmeister carpeted the forest floor. The tiny white blooms glowed in the fading light. “That’s how I know Jon and Kate will be together forever. This native Waldmeister will impart its beneficence to their life together.” And so it has.
I can't believe they're doing away with the online acrostic. I get the Sunday magazine in paper, but it's such a pain to fill out by hand I always do it on line. That said, there's something wonky about the program. I can never get it to fill in the first letter of the first word of the puzzle until I've backspaced into it, and it often tells me I've completed the puzzle when I actually still have one space unfilled.
I work almost daily on NYT puzzles and go slowly and mostly finish each one and have fun doing them but this one made me feel clever and witty and I loved it!
I though this was more medium at just under 20 minutes but maybe I got lulled into a false sense of prowess by the recent glut of Friday Saturdays. Anyway I also loved it, especially when the last long down popped into place after a bit of a tussle (Let's See Some ID) and came straight here wondering if you thought it was a standout too.
We fund this to be an truly terrible puzzle. THEIR RITE does not sound approximately like THE RIGHT, THUMB MADE does not sound approximately like THE MAT[E], etc. Mumbling does not fix the problem. If none of the films won the Oscar for sound mixing, how does one "get" an OSCAR WINNER by reading aloud the theme answers? Or, if the point is that some or all of these films won Oscars in different categories, why isn't the answer OSCAR WINNERS, plural? This is shoddy in so many ways, most of them noted in Rex's review. Since when is "I dig" (I'm cool with that) interchangeable with "copy" (I heard and understood the message)? I do not dig. I understand the need to fudge (mumble) a bit, but this puzzle is a collection of answers that do not work (WALLHUNG) unless you take pains to excuse them, over and over and over. I wish this "special accomplishment" had not been accomplished in the NYT. The Sunday puzzles have been disappointing of late. Methinks it's time for a new editor.
G. Weissman: Seems to me "I dig" isn't too much of a stretch for "I understand". In fact, I think "I dig" (as a standalone sentence) can only mean that — seems to me that it would only be said in response to "You dig?" or "You got that?". In pretty much any other context "dig" would be transitive — "I dig that", "I dig Mozart" — and would mean that you like, or are into, the thing in question. (BTW, your comment pertains to the Sunday (5 Feb) puzzle but you added it to the comments on the Saturday (4 Feb) puzzle.)
DONTBOTHER fit very nicely into 3-down, which held me up for a few moments in the NW, but otherwise very easy for Saturday. I liked it for all the breezy fill, and DOD Janelle MONAE occupying center stage, yet I miss the teeth. (Yeh, I'm also talking about my own!) Birdie.
Wordle birdie too.
My condolences to Chad Ramey, who came a cropper at the 17th yesterday. I hope he can make a comeback. We need some new PGA blood.
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ReplyDeleteMy main problem was in the SW. BENEficENT before BENEVOLENT at 48A, but that was only after working through a few mistakes: Thought Chicago Booth might be an art school so MfAS before MBAs. AERO was a WOE (but in retrospect inferrable because "bubble"). TRUE Lies before LOVE at 33D made me question HOWEVER and had no clue about the DwtS judge.
I had the same beneficent /benevolent mixup. And thought ‘free love?’ Which held me up for a while.
DeleteWell, I rarely talk about my individual solve, but I have to today, because it was just thrilling. That’s an adjective I can hardly ever remember using to describe a solve.
ReplyDeleteBut there I was, having gone through the clues, with huge expanses of white in the grid, but then the SW corner opened up, with MAISEL, then INKY and SOY, then ARK (with its hilarious clue) and MBAs, and then I saw BENEVOLENT.
What followed was the thrilling part, which I’ll call a begat-fest. When often I need more than one cross to divine an answer, especially on Saturday, today, that one cross seemed to suffice – everywhere! Boom boom boom, fill-in after fill-in, and seemingly, in the blink of an eye, the puzzle was done. It filled in like a Monday, but with a big difference, because on Mondays the fill-ins feel rote, but today, seemingly, each one brought that kick, that buzz, that I get from cracking a riddle, because that is exactly what I was doing, but in a blaze of one after the other in a rat-a-tat manner.
Thrilling! OMG thrilling! I hope everyone here has experienced this, and if you haven’t, I hope you will at least once. This truly may be the first time this happened for me.
One more thing about this puzzle. It is truly GORGEOUS. There were 12 answers that I marked as, well, luscious, and I’ll just mention the five that were NYT debut answers, soundly adding to the oeuvre: STEER CLEAR, BEACH READ, LET’S SEE SOME I.D., BLOTCHED, HITS A NERVE, and GO OUTSIDE.
Kate, you gave me high excitement and beauty today. I highly anticipate your next creation. Thank you so much for a most memorable Crosslandia outing.
Very nice puzzle, but Saturdays usually have more sparkle -- only eight red plus signs in the margins today.
ReplyDeleteWe get Netflix DVD as well as streaming. Last night we saw King Solomon's Mines from 1950, Stewart Granger and Deborah Kerr. It holds up very nicely.
I totally agree, except that I wouldn’t call it “easy.” I found it medium challenging.
ReplyDeleteChiming in with our fearless leader, this puzz was refreshing. Some great long answers that maybe took more than a few crosses to figure out, but whoa, they fell in with just a bit of thought! Good stuff.
ReplyDeleteIf there was horrid short fill to deal with (which, no, hardly any 3-letter answers), then it was easily ignored.
CUTTOTHECHASE! Good puzz.
They just kept coming! One fresh clue after another; one fresh answer after another. I thought the fun would never end. Heck, I didn’t want it to end!
ReplyDeleteI felt almost exactly the same about this puzzle as yesterday's: really well made, solid construction, but somewhat lacking in zing. I'm not sure how Rex manages to include GO OUTSIDE as one of his favorite bits of fill - isn't that basically 'eat a sandwich'?
ReplyDeleteI don't think Wojcicki would make the top ten SUSAN's list, although I admit CEOs are an area of weakness for me. Bezos, Buffett, Musk, Whitman ... I think that's all I have.
Hand up for the ACHE malapop. And not quite a malapop, but I considered 'LETS go outside' briefly where LETS SEE SOME ID wound up, only to have GO OUTSIDE appear.
I see your point about GO OUTSIDE being like green paint. But for me it is justifiable by virtue of the clever clue that accompanies it. Together they tell a story, an amusingly familiar story for parents, and so taken as a whole, it “is a thing.”
DeleteWait, what? There was a KEALOA in this puzz? BUCK may have been one of the last things I filled in, but there was never any confusion of whether this or that.
ReplyDeleteI started with BALK
DeleteThis played a bit tougher than recent Saturdays for me, and looked like it would be even tougher than that until--with unfilled squares dominating the NW and North Center and down into the center--WOOSH WOOSH WOOSH and done. To use @Lewis' term: thrilling!
ReplyDeleteSo much to love in this GORGEOUS grid. Certainly helped me get my REC ON for a rainy Saturday morning.
Just 14 minutes for this father/son team. We agree with the easy rating but it was a lot of fun. Loved LETSSEESOMEID and IGNORETHAT and HITSANERVE. Fun puzzle.... my 20 something son knew AUNT May and SUSAN; I knew the chocolate bar... (do they still make AERO?). Thanks, Kate, for a great puzzle. : )
ReplyDeleteNYT is no longer going publish digital Variety and Acrostic puzzles and is in fact removing access to the entire archive of these puzzles! They are offering no compensation for this loss of service and I feel they should hear about it. If so inclined, join me is emailing NYTGames@nytimes.com to express our disappointment!
ReplyDeleteSorry to hijack this chain but I thought you all would like to know.
Thanks for alerting us to this disaster. I have emailed
Delete@Steven 7:54
DeleteMaybe that's because not a lot of people do them online? I find the online acrostic pretty much impossible, so I skip it if I don't have the physical paper. Just my 2 cents
Rex – you do grumpysome well, fine, blah blah, but when you exalt a puzzle, it’s so, so fun to read. Stellar write-up this morning.
ReplyDeleteMan oh man some terrific Saturday cluing. I really enjoyed the fight this morning, and the supreme satisfaction of (almost) wrestling this one to the ground. (A defensible “swag” for SEAT gave me a Sacramento paper called the “BWE” and a Tupac song called “Ghetgo Gospel.” I rather liked Ghetgo and could only imagine what someone with his talent did with a made-up word like that.)
The clue for RETRO had me sit up. I mean, jeez. If I’m going to Mars, I want to be on a state-of-the-art rocket, not some Volkswagen Bus of a rocket. Right? I looked into it, and it seems that this RETRO just means that some engine goes backwards to slow everything down.
Loved GO OUTSIDE. My sisters and I didn’t roughhouse a lot, but we sure bickered, and Mom would banish us to the yard and then lock the doors.
BABA Ganouj means “spoiled dad,” and I just needed everyone to know that. (BABA is Arabic for “dad” – reminding you that most babies’ first utterances involve the two lips.)
“Scout’s task” – to sit at a table in front of Walmart and make my face burn in shame when I don’t buy any cookies ‘cause I just really, really don’t like them.
OK – I have one LET’S SEE SOME ID story. When I was a cocktail waitress, I hated when people whose age looked iffy came in. If they ordered, say, Dewars on the rocks, I let it go. But order a strawberry daiquiri, buddy, and I have to see some ID. One early evening these two guys came in, and one looked iffy, so I approached bracing myself for the ID confrontation. Happily, the youngish one just ordered an OJ and then asked about the piano that was sitting there and could anyone play it. I shrugged and mumbled something about our having rented it for New Year’s Eve. I was at the bar getting their order when all hell broke loose – even the cooks came out of the kitchen to gape. I’ve never seen anyone assault a piano like that. Talk about your instant mood lifter. His name is Jason D. Williams, and we became friends. So I'm a bit of a big deal.
PS - another instant mood lifter, and I’m being totally serious here , is putting a Bugle chip on each finger and then waving them around like tentacles.
PPS - @rad26 from yesterday. Thanks, man. I love it when someone catches a little sneaky sneak reference to an entry.
Yes to fingertip Bugles as mood lifters!
DeleteThanks for sharing Jason D Williams. What talent!
DeleteAs the mother of sons, I cheered when I filled in GO OUTISDE. Sometimes it's the only thing to do when they won't stop pummeling each other. I glanced up to see who the puzzle-maker was and nodded when I saw it was a woman.
ReplyDeleteSunny puzzle for a frigid morning. No - not Saturday tough but a pleasure to work through. Agree with Rex on pretty much all of the longs - especially the two vertical 13s - LETS SEE SOME ID will easily get some eyes for Lewis’ best of the year group. BENEVOLENT and MOON SHOT are top notch.
ReplyDeleteAristophanes
A few oddball things here and there - I don’t like BESOT but most of the shorts are well clued like ABET and DEFT is a wonderful way to finish up. Learned about the Liberty Bell.
Enjoyable Saturday solve. Getting psyched up for a Stella Stumper.
@Pablo - I see Mt. Washington hit -108 with the wind overnight - hope you stayed inside.
TRUE LOVE will find you in the end
I agree with Rex about the whoosh and swoosh and great expressions. The pop culture names and references (MONAE, GHETTO Gospel, etc.) were totally unknown to me but they came fairly easily from crosses. I wouldn’t call it easy, but it was fun and just crunchy enough.
ReplyDeleteIt would be a public service if WS used a good puzzle like this with the GARAGE right up there at the top to announce that he is done beating that dead horse that is “this or that” GENRE or SUBGENRE.
ReplyDeleteAs usual, no clue on the MAISEL, MONAE, Wojcicki’s of the world cuz I have a wheelhouse the size of a keyhole.
ETES is bad enough on its own (crossing ODEON as well), adding a “here’s a bunch of gibberish, you guess which language it means something in” clue (ERSE) gets a penalty flag for piling on.
Currently in the northeast and definitely looking forward to the time of year when a BEACH READ can actually be READ at the BEACH.
Side note to Kate (three things):
ReplyDelete• I still remember your [Inefficient confetti-making tool] for HOLE PUNCH clue last December, one of my favorite clues of the year. And I loved your ARK clue today.
• It made me smile to learn (from your notes) that you are learning to play accordion. It’s one of the instruments I play, and it can produce such rich music. As you probably know, it’s far more than “Lady of Spain” and polkas.
• Your answer set today was indeed GORGEOUS. I marked 12 answers that I considered luscious, far more than usual, and five on my list are NYT debut answers, very worthy additions to the oeuvre: BEACH READ, LETS SEE SOME I,D,, HITS A NERVE, BLOTCHED, and GO OUTSIDE. Brava!
Pretty close to a personal best for a Saturday. Honestly the only day this week which played slow for me was Monday. Ebon for inky mostly because I spelled Maisel wrong was only slow spot.
ReplyDeleteThe guy who wants a modern rocket to go to Mars, no retro rocket for him, made my morning.
ReplyDeleteWhat is Rex's email? He has an email on his home page but the mail was returned. I spent the past half hour trying to find one. Thanks!
ReplyDeleteEmail on homepage is correct and functional rexparker @ icloud . com
Delete@anon 9:24 thanks for that. I need to get me eyes checked again
DeleteI see cloud not icloud, goodness!
Some very clever cluing and at least in my wheelhouse's neighborhood made this a pleasure to solve for me. My biggest "huh?" came at 39A; I was expecting something more exotic than SUSAN to go with Wojcicki.
ReplyDeleteI found this to be challenging. Yet it was a treat to get it done. So many terrific answers, most of them already pointed out by Rex. I had several wrong answers that slowed me down, e.g. 1A hurt before CHIC, 37A drunk before BESOT, 41A intel before RECON. And had no idea about many of the proper names. Nonetheless, I loved it.
ReplyDeleteThis one felt especially colloquial to me, which I think is the first time I've described a puzzle that way. Way easy for a Saturday, but sometimes fun is fast is fun.
ReplyDeleteUnknowns were AERO, LEE, and SUSAN as clued. Had LONGSHOT before MOONSHOT. MOONSHOT is far better. Also took a while to parse LETSSEESOME ID, had most of the letters before I could make a phrase.
Nice to see TRUELOVE, the magic words Max needed to revive a mostly dead Westley in The Princess Bride. Great movie and an even better book.
Just a great Saturday, KH. Kept Hoping it wouldn't end, but alas, it did, and too soon. Thanks for all the fun.
@Son Volt-I was listening to our local weather and they said that the wind chill would probably reach at least -100 on the top of Mt. Washington and that the weather observers who stay up there were "excited". Different breed of cats. Only -16 here this AM, which is a little like winter used to be.
Off to the Stumper.
@pabloinnh 8:55 am. The wind chill at -100?!?! I’ve been to the top of Mt. Washington several times- ways a treat but always windy. Since I have beautiful photos in spring, summer and fall, I have considered going for some winter shots. Upon reconsideration today, I think not. I do love NH though.
DeleteNice challenging Saturday puzzle for me. On my first pass I got some answers scattered throughout – enough to have a foothold in every section – but it took me a while longer to fill the grid out. Just a bunch of tough cluing that made for fun brain exercise. I enjoyed this a lot!
ReplyDeleteI did not find this one easy--the constructor's connotations and mine did not always match (I am still scratching my head over RINSE for "flush"and ATE for "didn't go fast"), but I did find it enjoyable. Those down answers! Also liked the repeated clues and BLOTCHED, BEACH READ, BENEVOLENT stacked so nicely on top of each other.
ReplyDeleteCount me in on the malapop--ACHE at 1A. Always fun to start off a toughie with a wrong answer! I got the NE corner with ease and then...nothing substantial until I hit the SE, just a few correct answers here and there. "Intel" instead of RECON. And TIL that accordions have REEDs and a MOON SHOT may or may not involve an actual moon. Not interested in business in any way, so the CEO, as usual, was left blank. Worse: I lived in and worked in Chicago for 25 years, had friends in academia (Loyola, Northwestern, DePaul) and never heard of Chicago Booth. There are things in life that I simply don't want or need to know anythingabout--tax prep is one, business names and terms another. Still, the Booth thing feels like a major oversight.
Think: rinsed with water = flushed with water; and didn’t go fast = didn’t go on a fast and ate instead
DeleteAmy: yes, so good! The puzzle put me in such a good mood, I even felt myself smiling as I entered some of answers: GORGEOUS. ENCHANT, BENEVOLENT. The words just made me feel happy. The long answers sparkled. And Janel Monae, always a delight. CRAB reminded me of a Beach Day when we discovered we'd plunked our chairs down next to a crab colony and whiled away some fascinating moments just watching them move about. They really can't walk straight.
ReplyDelete* Hope everyone stays warm and healthy on this cold one. Two snoogly cats are helping me. 🐈
Once I decided DRUNK didn't work for "Inebriate," I was on the right track. Took me a long time to get ARTHOUSE, because the crosses didn't make sense. Are TUNES really "Some jams?"
ReplyDeleteAll in all, a good Saturday, but easier than Friday's for a change (because I didn't have to cheat).
good puzzle when i was done i admired it, BUt, I thought there were too many proper names -some of which were somewhat obscure. They could be figured from the crosses. I prefer puzzles with less such proper names
ReplyDeleteHated it. No apologies, either
ReplyDeleteI had NOT INSIDE before GO OUTSIDE…. A sort of kealoa, no?
ReplyDeleteI really wanted BLIND for 24D.
ReplyDeleteOur umpires were blind for far too long before they finally were booed. Fun puzzle.
ReplyDeleteNot easy for me. Medium-challenging for me. Took me way longer than yesterday’s puzzle. I think I nearly used up an entire eraser on it. I loved it though. A shocking lack of common fill. Tough, but fair clueing.
ReplyDeleteThx, Kate, for a challenging Sat. workout! :)
ReplyDeleteMed-hard.
Way off the wavelength for this one.
Nada in the NW.
ONE TON / ANTED was the best I could do in the top 1/3.
MAISEL / INKY provided a foothold down south, but BENEficial caused major probs.
Eventually got things worked out for a successful solve.
Enjoyed the battle! :)
___
On to Stella's Sat. Stumper. 🤞
Sad news for NYT' online Acrostic & Cryptic solvers: 😔
"Starting March 1, 2023 we will no longer publish or support digital versions of the Acrostic and Variety Puzzles. The digital versions of these puzzles were difficult to support for our technical teams, and few of our subscribers played these puzzles online. By removing support, we can refocus our resources on our other offerings." (NYT)
___
Peace 🕊 🇺🇦 ~ Compassion ~ Tolerance ~ Kindness to all 🙏
Fun puzzle but more challenging for me than some others because, like @Conrad, BENEFICENT instead of BENEVOLENT, so I put in TRUELIES instead of TRUELOVE, etc. I also wrote SHOW ME YOUR ID instead of SOME, which really slowed things down.
ReplyDeleteVery enjoyable long answers, but the names (Aunt, Susan, Len, Bee) were not in my wheelhouse. I have no idea what GARAGE is as a musical genre, but okay.
@pabloinnh - my husband grew up in North Conway and has climbed Washington more times than he can count at this point, so the first thing he did this morning was to visit the Observatory website to check the weather. 90+ mph winds! A low of -47°F! but 100 mile visibility so you can freeze to death while having a great view.
Hey All !
ReplyDeleteFinished the puz with the whoosh-whoosh Rex talks about. Weird. Was stuck-ish in each section, got NE, then little bit of the East Center, then SE, SW, filled in rest of East Center, then after the SW, my whoosh -whoosh happen in the entire West. All of a sudden, answer after answer just filled in. It was rather fun.
Nice puz, agree with Rex about no particular "age" of the puz. PPP to a minimum. Liked the quad O's of MOON GOOUT. An E fest in South Center. BEACH READ went through Brisk, Brief. Nice clue for 8D ATE. (Har ATE Down at 8Down!)
Nice SatMorning PICKMEUP.
One F
RooMonster
DarrinV
33D: Unconditional condition?
ReplyDeleteHad FREELOVE and laughed..alas..TRUELOVE conquers all.
"I need a word for the phenomenon of a wrong answer that's accidentally helpful because it (by chance) has some correct letters that help you get crosses (see my FROG error, above)"
ReplyDeleteIn this case, the answer is a "frogment"
Rex found yesterday challenging and today’s easy, totally the other way around for me. Struggled with this on until the NE finally came together and then it all just opened up. But really enjoyed both puzzles.
ReplyDeleteAfter grouching about yesterday's puzzle (and the day before) I anticipated another grumpy day since Saturday and I don't usually mesh, but I enjoyed the puzzle even though I only put in five guesses after a complete read through. When that happens a sense of Go-ogle gloom casts its shadow over my soul as there's been some Saturdays when I am looking up every third word, but not today. I put my work boots on and finished. As always, I checked on the people names I can't possibly know -- there were only a few -- and was surprised and delighted to learn YouTube is run by a woman. Maybe that's why it, unlike the other big sites, isn't in the news every other day for heinous data crimes and egomaniacal leadership. They're probably just better at covering it up.
ReplyDeleteI like saying the word CHIC. Never noticed RAGÚ has an accent above it. I dislike seeing the word GHETTO used cavalierly in a puzzle meant to be completed by those of privilege. GO OUTSIDE is hee-larious. We have an ART HOUSE three blocks from my house and I have seen so many horrendous movies there and six good ones. I wonder why Aristophanes was talking about CRAB gaits. I will be buying a new accordion this year, but the one I want is $2500 and that's a tough justification to find. LET'S SEE SOME ID is remarkable. HITS A NERVE is also wonderful.
I like mirrored clues IF I can find the answers. Had a couple of winners today.
Uniclues:
1 Nephew's warning call.
2 Screen shot of ARSE heavy NYTXW.
3 Encourage neighbors to call the cops.
4 Get dumb ... then get dummer.
5 Binge watch Netflix.
6 Heading for one of the more popular displays at the Crosswordese Hall of Fame.
7 Wherever my wife is.
8 Be female (we're basic).
1 AUNT! STEER CLEAR!
2 RETRO MOON SHOT
3 GO OUTSIDE. BATHE. (~)
4 BEACH READ BESOT
5 MAISEL PICK ME UP
6 BENEVOLENT ERSE
7 GORGEOUS SECTOR
8 ENCHANT BUCK
More a "medium" for me - and that was all to the good, as it gave me more time to enjoy the bounty of terrific answers - and the fun of seeing them gradually materialize during my several circuits of the grid. Thanks to @Lewis for pointing out the debut answers - that was part of the pleasure for me, the surprise of "not your usual suspects"; I especially liked BLOTCHED, STEER CLEAR, BEACH READ, and, for me the grand prize winner, LET'S SEE SOME ID (after I'd first parsed it as LET'S wElcOME In).
ReplyDeleteRe: @Rex's "I need a word for the phenomenon of a wrong answer that's accidentally helpful because it (by chance) has some correct letters that help you get crosses" - I agree. But for me that's true for acrostics rather than crosswords, where I almost never write in an answer without confirming crosses; in acrostics, though, I've found that a wrong guess on a clue more often than not yields me something in the quote that more than makes up for the mistake.
Speaking of acrostics - Thank you @Steven 7:54 and @bocamp 9:34 for alerting us to their impending disappearance from the digital realm. Shock and horror here: I can't believe I'm going to have to go back to those little boxes in the mag, with their unreadable tiny print. "Difficult for our technical team" - puhleeze!
Thanks for the B52s shoutout! Roam if you want to. Made my day.
ReplyDeleteYes, indeed, it was our dear Andrea who coined “malaplop.”
ReplyDeleteThis was a "keep the faith" puzzle for me and I found it compulsively involving. Although I suspected both CHIC and RAGU in the NW, I wasn't sure enough of either to write them in and therefore left the NW and moved east.
ReplyDeleteBut my two big problems lay elsewhere. Haven't read any of y'all yet, but I'm imagining that more than a few did what I did. I had the "B" -- so that when I saw the clue "Like umpires, sometimes", I confidently wrote in BLIND. This -- along with my BalK instead of BUCK for "resist" -- made the right side of the puzzle, from MOONSHOT (couldn't see it because I had ?LON????) all the way to PICKMEUP (which I did have) really, really slow going.
What a happy surprise to see that the lady with the unspellable and unpronounceable last name had a common first name like SUSAN! There was no way of telling when I had BALK instead of BUCK.
So much here to love. MOONSHOT, as clued; GO OUTSIDE; BEACH READ; CUT TO THE CHASE; LET'S SEE SOME ID. The fill is very, very lively and the solving process was both challenging and enjoyable. Great Saturday.
A little behind on the puzzle and commentariat - musical theater production week.
ReplyDeleteMy experience has been the opposite of Rex:
His first section filled in today, was the last for me.
Friday was 25-30% easier if you go by time.
Both excellent puzzles, apparently mostly in my wheelhouse.
In the spirit of the ADDAMS family and yesterdays lovely limericks,
Kevorkian's just-opened Oast
Is not for patrons milquetoast
If thrombosed or sclerosed,
diagnosed tuberculosed,
they'll be necrosed as a ghost by the host.
hope that didn't HITANERVE
You know what else is a kealoa? LET'S SEE SOME/yOur ID. Fortunately, I noticed the possibility just before putting in 'your,' so I waited for the crosses.
ReplyDeleteI struggled a bit until I realized that I was not looking for a particular Mario character, but just a RACER. Also, I was very confident that suffuse = imbue -- until 10 seconds later when I got BABA. But then I couldn't figure out what it was.
This is the second consecutive day when the clue was that something had an accent in it. I wonder what that's all about.
Today's philosophical question: Is RETRO a kind of rocket, or is it just the same rocket turned around?
And another one: Can you teach a CRAB to walk crooked?
Here in Boston, the cold has overpowered our heating system. The upper floors are OK, but downstairs is about 50F. But it's almost up to zero outside, so there's hope.
From yesterday, UNOBTANIUM was new to me.
ReplyDeleteOther elements that have only recently been discovered are kvellium, which imparts a feeling of pride; kvetchium, which causes annoyance; verklemptium, which leads one to be overcome by emotions; and schlepium, the effects of which are not known, but it's very hard to transport.
Wow, @burtonkd. Of all the (excellent) OAST poems, I like yours the moast.
ReplyDeleteYes, an easy and enjoyable puzzle for a Saturday.
ReplyDeleteHOWEVER, I BOOED when I saw BEACH READ. How can anyone read anything in the bright sun? Damaging the eyes and skin at the same time.
Exactly @Lewis. Identical experience with this one.
ReplyDelete"Parent's command when something almost gets broken by roughhousing siblings"—
ReplyDeleteClues of 10+ words tend to bug me. They're usually clunky and unnecessary.
"Use a porta-potty?" would have injected a bit of humor.
Cut to the Chase.
This was a medium level of Saturday resistance for me. I had a slow start because I don't accept GARAGE as a genre. It's a common descriptor for bands but not so much for the music they produce. GRUNGE would be a genre and I couldn't figure out why it just didn't work.
ReplyDeleteIn the center staircase I misread the 33A clue as "Some jeans" multiple times. Only when it was backfilled later did I realize the mistake. So much for the papers tiny print.
In the SW I initially put in GIESEL supported by EBON. Luckily I recognized BENEVOLENT off of the. EVO.
Everything was clear as a (Liberty) bell when I finished. Brilliant use of phrases today.
yd -0
Just a thought about the online acrostic puzzles. I can't believe the NYT will remove something from the online access that it can make money off of. I would bet that it is removing access only to make it available elsewhere for an additional charge. Time will tell. Greedy, greedy, greedy.
ReplyDeleteBy the way, enjoyed today's puzzle.
Easy. No erasures and SUSAN and LEN were it for WOEs. Solid with some excellent long downs, liked it.
ReplyDelete...BUCK was my last entry.
Thank you, Ms Hawkins cor a delightful puzzle! Re: 33D— Unconditional condition? =true love= The Princess Bride!
ReplyDelete"...few of our subscribers played these puzzles online." I find it hard to believe that few game subscribers did the acrostic online. I always looked forward to it and always did it online, and I've seen it mentioned in the comments both here and on the NYT crossword page. Anyone else?
ReplyDeleteAt some point, Spelling Bee and Wordle won't be worth the hefty annual game access price. There are already so many Wordle variations; has anyone tried Hurdle? Much, much more difficult.
Love, love love this puzzle. I knew even Rex would love it. Had no issues except my ignorance, which I managed to overcome without googling anything. This is the one you keep coming back for! Like avocados, eventually you find a perfect one out of all the flawed and rotten ones.
ReplyDeleteGary J -- I especially love your #4.
ReplyDeleteUniclues
1) It shoulda stuck to a flower pollen diet
2) Take a firm stand on something, for heaven's sake!
3) A woman of refined taste
4) My heart's been broken once too often
1) RAGU ONE-TON BEE
2) CURE HOWEVER
3) ARTHOUSE SUSAN
4) GOSH NO TRUELOVE
@Nancy 10:59 AM
DeleteLaughing at the poor overweight bee, but #2 is my favorite. I need to find that cure too.
The clue for RETRO is just wrong IMO.
ReplyDeleteA "retrorocket" -- one word -- is a kind of rocket. RETRO is a prefix in this context, not an adjective.
It's like saying TELE is a "kind of vision." Silly.
I think retro is an adjective here. You did say we are talking about a kind of rocket, a rocket that breaks the vehicle by shooting its exhaust in the direction opposite of travel. Retro is often used in English as an adjective, as a style can be called retro.
DeleteVision is a French noun borrowed by English ( ultimately derived from Latin). Tele is of Greek origin meaning far. So "far vision". In this case far is an adjective also.
Great grid &a fun solve as noted above. Kate Hawkins is a real talent. Took a while to let go of “free rein” as the unconditional condition and to pass up the scout selling cookies at Safeway. ATE for eight and ARK for twosome sanctuary were ENCHANTING fill that brought guffaws.
ReplyDeleteSeemed like it was going to be a real Saturday Smackdown at first but I gradually worked my way to where I only had to look up a couple of proper names. That, IMO is indicative of a superbly constructed crossword. So thank you Kate, for this pleasant but challenging solve.
ReplyDeleteNot a fan of the duplicate clues but loved the ones for LETS SEE SOME ID and ARK. Had never heard of AERO chocolate or GARAGE related to any type of music. Numerous erasures: CAN I SEE for LETS, SLAP for ABET, SIFT for TEST, BLIND for BOOED, LOOT for HAUL and my Sacramento BEE started out as a SUN. Hi @GILL. 😎
Thinking of all you folks in the Northeast and hoping you stay warm and safe.
"I need a word for the phenomenon of a wrong answer that's accidentally helpful because it (by chance) has some correct letters that help you get crosses..."
ReplyDelete"phenomen-off?"
Let’s not go crazy expanding what’s a kealoa. It needs to be common answers with one letter differences impossible to determine without one cross. BUCK/KICK should definitely not qualify. (BALK would also be a potential answer with only the k and there are fartoo many other solving situations that would become kealoas if you expand beyond my suggested definition).
ReplyDeleteI did start with some CHIC and I did end with some DEFT....HOWEVER, I had to GUESS on GHETTO. I was correct. I even spelled MONAE and MAISEL correctly.
ReplyDeleteOh what a fabulous (AKA GORGEOUS) puzzle you are today. Enjoyment from start to finish. I had to do some eenie, meenie, miney and moing on the two booty's.... Which goes first? Let's see.... there's Rear, Loot, Pelf, Arse and others I'm sure....So...HAUL first and SEAT second. Hah! I even loved the HOWEVER/ EVEN SO clues.
There is something thrilling about entering a 13 long down answer off of one letter. CUT TO THE CHASE it was. Proud and feeling confident, IGNORE THAT...should I see if I can do it again? I did but I wanted to go slowly. The longs were happily dripping down some bodacious chocolate lips. Why look! LETS SEE SOME ID just off the L in STEER CLEAR. How's them apples!. To be sure, not everything went so smooth. I had to GUESS, GUESS, GUESS a lot of the time. I wanted a BEACH book. Erase/erase. I don't know what GARAGE means in so far as some music genre. I've no idea who SUSAN (with an unpronounceable last name) is, and I get confused with PEND and PENT. Did it matter? No, because I finished. This was a PICK ME UP from start to finish. Can I have some more chocolate...please?
I found yesterday's fairly tough and today's about equally so. Or at least, it was tough until it wasn't. Didn't feel like I was making much headway, then when I finally got CUT TO THE CHASE, the rest cascaded to victory.
ReplyDeleteHad new AGE at 5A for a while; GARAGE is more commonly called by the full name of garage rock. I've never heard it called just "garage". Also had BalK instead of BUCK initially, but that's closer to meaning hesitate than resist, so that's on me.
LET'S SEE SOME ID is a fantastic answer.
I feel like TUNES for "Some jams" is backwards. Some tunes are jams, but not all jams are tunes. Not a big deal though. Just quirkin'.
Had jberg's exact experience, where I wanted "Suffuse" to be imbuE and the Mario Kart clue to be a specific character. Many possibilities there: Mario, Luigi, Peach, Yoshi, Wario, Daisy ... man, there are a lot of 5-lettered Nintendo characters!
Really fun puzzle. Themelesses are my jam.
Got stuck with a more polite bouncer, MAYISEESOMEID slowed me down for quite a while...
ReplyDeleteI wondered if anyone else did Puns and Anagrams, my favorites. Or spent hours laboring over Cryptics. Boo hoo!
ReplyDeleteDia dhuit, dudes and darlins. And holy double booty, Batman!
ReplyDeleteNice, easy-for-a-SatPuz, but yet slightly feisty. The no-knows were nicely limited, at our house. Kinda liked it, as themelesses go.
staff weeject pick, of a mere six choices: BEE. It was a sorta no-know, as we don't get the Sacramento paper.
Some nice puz-debut answers here, includin: BEACHREAD. GOOUTSIDE. HITSANERVE. LETSSEESOMEID.
Cool clue with a ?-mark: {Didn't go fast?} = ATE.
Cool clue without a ?-mark: {Like some umpires, sometimes} = BOOED.
Thanx for the smoooth ride, Ms. Hawkins darlin. U did good work. I strongly agree with myself about this.
Masked & Anonymo8Us
p.s. Will miss the Acrostic puz, if it's really goin away. But, maybe it can be seamlessly replaced by TikTok's new Chinese Ball Looney Tunes puzs, currently bein advertised over North Carolina.
**gruntz**
Wow great puzzle at the end of a week of great puzzles. The only problem here was it just went by too fast... 9 minutes for me.
ReplyDeleteThe only typeover I can remember was LET'S SEE WHO'S ON for "Line at the door of a bar". Y'know, you're walking past a bar and your friend says "wonder who's playing here tonight..." The correct answer is soooooo much better. And hands up for the ACHE malapop at 1 across.
[Spelling Bee: yd 0, my last word was this 6er which oddly enough has been my last word several times before.]
Superb puzzle. Played somewhat easier for a Saturday, other than LETSS---OM-D which was baffling for a bit particularly as we initially had LETSS---OMeD (eVAN) - thhe ED just seemed to be the logical ending . What a fantastic aha (we refer to them as "OLEs!") when we counter-considered IVAN, then saw "ID" and the answer just whooshed in. In and of itself, LETSSEESOMEID is just such a brilliant answer to have in a puzzle as well. A big OLE! to Kate for this fabulous start to our Saturday.
ReplyDelete@TaylorSlow - I just emailed NYTGames and made that very point about the supposedly "few" subscribers who do the puzzles, especially the acrostic. I also questioned why, after over 20 years of experience in publishing the digital versions, the technical team now inds them difficult to support.
ReplyDeleteI'll still have access to the puzzles in the print edition, but after being able to do the acrostic online for decades, I'm not sure I'll return to the tortuous process of solving in the mag.
Love the show, but somehow called her Mrs. MeISEL, and couldn’t see the chocolate company.
ReplyDeleteThis was lovely. Cleverly tricky clues.
@lms thanks for the introduction to Jason D. Williams. He may out-Killer the Killer!
ReplyDeleteStumperfolk-I found today's pretty easy for a Stumper, maybe regular NYT Saturday tough.
ReplyDeleteToday was a complete change from yesterday. I had a stumble with BENEficENT before BENEVOLENT but with very good reason. There is a lovely passage in the Lüchow‘s German Cookbook c1952 (with many reprints) that describes the history and ritual of Maiweinfests (May Wine Festivals) in Germany.
ReplyDeleteDear friends of ours at Illinois introduced us to their imported version of the spring tradition. It spoke to my German heritage and our love of good friends, good food and good wine. The cookbook describes the tradition and gives Lüchow’s take on a May Wine beverage that is a perfect foundation for a tradition.
The tough part has been finding fresh Waldmeister (woodruff or May herb), a beautifully fragrant and delicate ground-covering herb that literally carpets German forests in the spring. As set out in the cookbook, the Waldmeister makes the drink. “The shoots are gathered . . . and then tied into bunches and steeped in the previous year’s Rhinewein for a few days imparting their beneficence to it and enriching it with a flavor truly inimitable.” Lüchow’s p.213.
We adopted the party as our own once we all left the U and hosted it for nearly 40 years. Each year, my husband explained our tradition’s beginnings and read the passage about Maiwein from the cookbook. We called it “The Liturgy.”
Now my daughter and “LawSon” (as I call him, since he calls me “LawMama”) are now ready to have their first one this spring. And the “where do we get Waldmeister” issue has already arisen. I told them just recently that we have all we will ever need.
As it turns out, just before the kids’ wedding at the rehearsal dinner. I discovered a lifetime supply covering the dappled ground below the thick pine forest in northern Michigan on the groom’s family property, north of Traverse City.
We were so busy that weekend, it didn’t occur to me to mention it to the kids. I did however, point it out to the Father of the Bride who, while he liked Jonathan well enough, was still a bit tepid about the wedding. It seems to be a fact of life that if a strong father-daughter bond has been forged as with my daughter and her dad, nobody is ever going to be good enough, or at least not good enough until proven worthy after years. The FOB was having some very big feelings.
Larry wasn’t being his usual jovial self. Before dinner, I poured him another glass of wine and took him out to see the sun set over the lake and told him I needed to show him something truly magical. We walked down the path toward the edge of a rocky ledge perfect for sunsets. On the way, I asked him to look down. Waldmeister carpeted the forest floor. The tiny white blooms glowed in the fading light. “That’s how I know Jon and Kate will be together forever. This native Waldmeister will impart its beneficence to their life together.” And so it has.
Great puzzle.
ReplyDeleteI can't believe they're doing away with the online acrostic. I get the Sunday magazine in paper, but it's such a pain to fill out by hand I always do it on line. That said, there's something wonky about the program. I can never get it to fill in the first letter of the first word of the puzzle until I've backspaced into it, and it often tells me I've completed the puzzle when I actually still have one space unfilled.
I concur, Rex. A thing of beauty. Wonderful when a puzzle is somehow both challenging and doable. And fresh, too. Just a GORGEOUS Saturday.
ReplyDeleteThis puzzle might not have been as good as the Excellent Adventure of Bill ANTED, where the sun’s cool and the MOONSHOT. But it was still damn fine.
ReplyDeleteSome fundamentalists asked me to join their SECTOR risk eternal damnation. EVENSO, GOSHNO I said.
39A would be a lot tougher if it was “Susan __________, CEO of You Tube beginning in 2014.”
That Keats was a pretty good poet, but I say STEERCLEAR of his ODE ON an ODEON.
Really fun, smooth puzzle. Thanks a ton, Kate Hawkins.
LOL!
DeleteNothing to say about "pend" and "pent"?
ReplyDeleteI work almost daily on NYT puzzles and go slowly and mostly finish each one and have fun doing them but this one made me feel clever and witty and I loved it!
ReplyDeleteI though this was more medium at just under 20 minutes but maybe I got lulled into a false sense of prowess by the recent glut of Friday Saturdays. Anyway I also loved it, especially when the last long down popped into place after a bit of a tussle (Let's See Some ID) and came straight here wondering if you thought it was a standout too.
ReplyDeleteWe fund this to be an truly terrible puzzle. THEIR RITE does not sound approximately like THE RIGHT, THUMB MADE does not sound approximately like THE MAT[E], etc. Mumbling does not fix the problem. If none of the films won the Oscar for sound mixing, how does one "get" an OSCAR WINNER by reading aloud the theme answers? Or, if the point is that some or all of these films won Oscars in different categories, why isn't the answer OSCAR WINNERS, plural? This is shoddy in so many ways, most of them noted in Rex's review. Since when is "I dig" (I'm cool with that) interchangeable with "copy" (I heard and understood the message)? I do not dig. I understand the need to fudge (mumble) a bit, but this puzzle is a collection of answers that do not work (WALLHUNG) unless you take pains to excuse them, over and over and over. I wish this "special accomplishment" had not been accomplished in the NYT. The Sunday puzzles have been disappointing of late. Methinks it's time for a new editor.
ReplyDeleteG. Weissman: Seems to me "I dig" isn't too much of a stretch for "I understand". In fact, I think "I dig" (as a standalone sentence) can only mean that — seems to me that it would only be said in response to "You dig?" or "You got that?". In pretty much any other context "dig" would be transitive — "I dig that", "I dig Mozart" — and would mean that you like, or are into, the thing in question. (BTW, your comment pertains to the Sunday (5 Feb) puzzle but you added it to the comments on the Saturday (4 Feb) puzzle.)
ReplyDeleteThree things I liked:
ReplyDeleteMoonshot
Recon
Beat
Three things I hated:
Render
Besot
Garage
Oneton
Erse
Ate
That’s more than 3 and there’s a lot more. The fill stunk. I seem to be in the minority on this puzzle. I did not enjoy it.
DONTBOTHER fit very nicely into 3-down, which held me up for a few moments in the NW, but otherwise very easy for Saturday. I liked it for all the breezy fill, and DOD Janelle MONAE occupying center stage, yet I miss the teeth. (Yeh, I'm also talking about my own!) Birdie.
ReplyDeleteWordle birdie too.
My condolences to Chad Ramey, who came a cropper at the 17th yesterday. I hope he can make a comeback. We need some new PGA blood.
MOONSHOT HERO (LET'S CURE THAT)
ReplyDelete"SO, PICKMEUP a ROUND eight,
GOSH, PENT UP TRUELOVE's a RACE,
GUESS I'll GOOUTSIDE TO wait,
I ACHE TO CUTTOTHECHASE."
--- AUNT SUSAN MAISEL, USAF
Have to agree it's a nice puz. Only write-over was at LETSSEEyOurID. Jannelle MONAE has talent but most of her music is not for me.
ReplyDeleteWordle eagle!!