.png)
Big name in electric toothbrushes / TUE 5-16-23 / Tech site since 1994 / Biblical patriarch who had "ha" added to his name when he was 99 years old / Result of complete sound cancellation / Actress Fisher of Eighth Grade / Tex-Mex snack named after their inventor Ignacio Anaya / Zen garden tools
Tuesday, May 16, 2023
Constructor: Katherine Baicker and Adam Wagner
Relative difficulty: Medium
Theme answers:
- NONCHALANCE (17A: Casualness ... even though 18-Across [CHALANCE] doesn't mean urgency)
- INDOLENT (24A: Lazy ... even though 26-Across [DOLENT] doesn't mean active)
- DISCOMBOBULATED (36A: Flustered ... even though 39-Across [COMBOBULATED] doesn't mean poised)
- MISNOMER (50A: Wrong name ... even though 51-Across [NOMER] doesn't mean the right name)
- UNBEKNOWNST (59A: Not yet discovered ... even though 60-Across [BEKNOWNST] doesn't mean discovered)
Michael Robert Henrion Posner (/ˈpoʊznər/ POHZ-nər; born February 12, 1988) is an American rapper, singer, songwriter, and record producer. He released his debut album, 31 Minutes to Takeoff, in 2010. The album includes the US Billboard Hot 100 top 10 single "Cooler than Me" as well as the top 20 single "Please Don't Go". In 2016, he released his second album, At Night, Alone. A remix of his 2015 single "I Took a Pill in Ibiza" from the album peaked in the top 10 on the charts in 27 countries around the world, including hitting number one in many and the top five on the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States. [...] He attended Duke University, where he was a member of Sigma Nu fraternity. He graduated with a B.A. in Sociology with a 3.6 GPA. (wikipedia)
• • •
The downgrid fill is not as good as the stuff up top. Love love love the "BE HONEST" / "I CAN'T LIE" juxtaposition, but the fill peaks there. UEY is always unwelcome and NONOISE seems quite forced and POSNER, yeesh, you stumped me there. I'd've definitely changed that to New Yorker food writer Helen ROSNER (mostly because she's a solver and I know it would please her, but also because the Duke fratboy-turned-rapper was a total mystery to me—ah well, not every puzzle proper noun is gonna resonate with my particular life experience, so ... I learned a name? That's theoretically a plus. I think). Anyway, you go from NO NOISE through POSNER to NO USE, which is ... a journey. The NOs! THA NOS. Come On, Feel THA NOS! That is my alternate name for this puzzle now. No kidding. (No, kidding)
My experience with CRUSHes for most of my young life was no no no they were not "prospective sweethearts" (39D: Prospective sweetheart, say). They were pains in the middle of my chest that wouldn't go away, yearnings, completely detached from the realm of possibility let alone actuality. Very happy for y'all who actually turned your CRUSHes into sweethearts on the regular. I guess I had CRUSHes on some of the people I dated before I started dating them. Yes ... OK, maybe the clue is more apt than it felt. I just associate CRUSH with youth and (relative) innocence. Also, unattainability. It's definitely a state of unrequited desire. Anyway, it's a word I associate with my pre-adult life, where there were CRUSHes galore but no "sweethearts" to be found. Adulthood was somewhat kinder to me. I'm sure there's more to say here, but I'll save the rest for my therapist. See you tomorrow.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
Save And Share :
90 comments:
I love “words” that are never used without their prefixes or suffixes, so I kinda liked this. I’ve always been jealous of people who are supercilious. The most I’ve ever managed is just plain cilious. There’s probably a term for this kind of word. @LMS probably knows it, but we haven’t seen her in a while. (Come back!)
Besides DISCOMBOBULATED, I also liked NONCHALANCE and UNBEKNOWNST as just cool words. The latter is such a medieval sounding word that sticks around just because of the phrase “unbeknownst to me…” which is just fun to say. It was beknownst to me that NACHO is the nickname for Ignacio, but unbeknownst to me that there was a real guy named Nacho who invented the snack. ¡Muchas gracias, Nacho!
Rex mentioned a lot of the good non-theme stuff. I am a journalist and APNEWS stumped me for a bit. But it is indeed a non-profit. Rex, I loved your riff on CRUSHes, I still get them but you’re right that they are not the same “pains in the middle of the chest” that they were in middle school. I can have a crush now and remain quite combobulated.
What is NSFW?
@Rex, if you go with ROSNER at 44D you're left with RAS at 44A. The only clue I can think of for that is "Newark mayor Baraka," which I guess is okay for those in the tristate area but might not be crossworthy elsewhere.
As is usual for Tuesdays, I tried to solve without reading the clues for the long acrosses. My only non-typo overwrite was vioLs for CELLI at 6D.
I agree with OFL about CRUSHes. I always came out of them CRUSHed.
RAS is common fill. 72 times in Shortz era. And NSFW = not suitable for work—in the grid all the time.
Not Safe For Work
You could clue RAS as “dorm bigwigs, for short.”
It was fine. “Chalence” doesn’t mean urgency, and sure it may not mean anything else, but the puzzle’s intention became obvious— subwords that don’t stand on their own own.
THANOS crossing SHUE = Shoddy Editing.
I’m surprised Rex wasn’t pleased at learning Che Guevara’s given name.
ERNESTO/CHE and IGNACIO/NACHO in one puzzle. There is an idea for a theme hiding here… a theme to give all the grumpy solvers a day of complaints.
Ah, thanks. Didn't think of the dorm guys.
Clue for 1 Down is a little off - AP is not-for-profit, not nonprofit. Threw me for a while.
Theme answers gave me a smile. Nice to now know where name for nachos came from.
I usually start with the downs, so my problem at 1D, not figuring out 2D immediately and not knowing 3D slowed me down, for a Tuesday.
Thanos is the major villain of The Avengers multiverse saga (Infinity War and Endgame). He’s spawned many internet memes and is a cultural icon. He’s literally at the same level as Darth VADER culturally as far as movie villains go. I don’t think this is a case of shoddy editing at all.
I think Rex was a little hard on the theme here, which I liked. In the first run-through the theme clues are incomprehensible, and then as crosses fill in you get it and then you puzzle it out - and it’s clever. That’s what makes a puzzle fun. I also really like UNBEKNOWNST, great word, and NONCHALANCE was nice too. INDOLENT, another good word.
Enjoyed learning about ERNESTO being Che Guevara’s real name and NACHO being a nickname for Ignacio.
Theme was neat but formed no part of the solve for me.
Never heard of POSNER so glad it wasn't dAS/dOSNER. Wondering if SHUE/THANOS will cause complaints (oh, I see it already has). I'm guessing most people will know one or the other, so probably OK.
Huh, I assume that Rex already knew Che’s given name, like I imagine will have been the case for many of us lefties in the commentariat (I decidedly don’t worship him ofc). The reason Che got that nickname is because Argentinians pepper their Spanish with the word “che”; it means something like “pal” but it has about as many functional meanings as the word “hey” does in English. So when ERNESTO was in Guatemala, he got called Che after his proclivity for the interjection.
Anyway, I agree with Rex about the theme, down to DISCOMBOBULATED maybe being worth the price of admission. And yes, good, fun words in the themed answers, I just wish they had been clued differently. I fervently agree with @Wanderlust; let us all take a moment to bow our heads in gratitude to the ingenious NACHO (and come back @LMS!).
NONOISE was a bit green painty for my taste, but hey, the puzzle had so many good words and phrases in general that I’ll (almost) give it a pass. I really liked “Zen garden tools” for RAKES. And yep, BEHONEST and ICANTLIE together was quite a nice construction flex. @Lewis will love that one, I bet.
Easy-medium with a little bite today, generally quite enjoyable.
All I have to say is that I'm perfectly gruntled with this theme. DISgruntled is a word, so...
Quirks are one of life’s treasures, IMO. Without quirks, all things, living and not, would be predictable, and our world would be blah, bland. And, perhaps because they deviate from the norm, quirks are funny. So, I’m quite fond of quirks, as they keep things interesting and make me smile.
Here’s a puzzle dedicated to one of the little quirks of our language – words whose prefixes mean “not”, but what follows the prefix isn’t the opposite of what the word means.
Katherine and Adam zeroed right in on this quirk, and yes, it made me smile, made me go “Hah! Never thought about that!”, and got me thinking, “Ain’t life grand?”
So I’m won over already, but then they pad the sweetness with buzz in every theme answer – fabulous words all. They present a junk-free grid, one with lovely quirks itself, such as a threesome of three-letter palindromes (BIB, AKA, EWE), ELSE crossing ELSIE, three answers that sound like letters (SEE, EWE, ARE), and there’s even a DOOK with NOUSE.
Plus, the construction was so skilled, to get a square with a number to appear after every theme prefix.
Thus, this puzzle, for me, was a delight. It has set me bounding into my day. Thank you so much for making this, Katherine and Adam!
Enjoyed this one a lot. The theme was fun and well executed, and the fill seemed pretty clean to me.
@Wanderlust - the general term is "unpaired words" and, in the case of negative prefixes or suffixes like non-, dis-, -less, etc. they can more specifically be called "orphaned negatives." This puzzle appears to be all the latter. (An example of the former but not being the latter is "over/underwhelm" vis-a-vis "whelm." But most unpaired words are orphaned negatives.)
Agree as usual, except on the “medium” ranking. I flew through pretty quick but was not doing Downs only. Thanks as usual for making me laugh.
I had a 1 1/2 Natick here. No clue to NSFW or THANOS so no way to solve ACTxxST. Otherwise this was delightful, including those negative-prefixed words.
It was nice to see a theme that actually pertained to words, rather than to something non-verbal. This is a crossword puzzle, after all. It isn't a visual trick with scrambled or upside-down letters.
Not too difficult, except for 2-Down. I've never heard anyone say BOOYAH. But I'm old, and never lived in "the hood."
Usually it's the host that brings you the menu, but it depends on the restaurant I suppose.
I think this is my least favorite NYTXW theme I've encountered! Obviously "nomer" isn't an English word on its own, but it comes from the same Latin root word as "name" does. None of the theme clues made sense to me.
Easy enough, but not a fan of the themer clues. Found them hard to parse, to be honest...and treated this as a themeless.
I'm another fan of these kinds of words so I liked this one a lot. I had the WNST at the end of UNBEKNOWNST and without having read the clue was wondering what kind of ST I might be on, maybe TOWNST or DOWNST or whatever. Real answer was way better.
Funny to run into OFL's treatise on CRUSHes because I had it filled with acrosses and never read the clue. I had several in my high school days but for me it meant more like an attraction that I never acted on. Shy me.
@Anon and @Conrad-I was an actual RA in college. It paid my room and board but I never felt like a "bigwig".
I think I've mentioned before that my dearest friend in Spain was named NACHO (Ignacio). When my students learned that NACHO was an actual person's name, many of them found it hilarious.
Very nice Tuesday indeed, KB and AW. I Knew Basically most answers instantly, but I did learn that SOCIAL has a plural, so I guess it was All Worth it. Thanks for all the fun.
Sorry to see RP wasn't gruntled about the theme.
Unlike Rex, I was actually gruntled with this theme.
Happy International Day of Light. I’m not entirely sure what that means, except that it celebrates “the contribution of light and light-based technologies to various fields and areas of life, including arts and culture, education, medicine, communications, science, and sustainable development.” And commemorates achievements such as Humphrey Davy’s creation of incandescent light in 1802, and Theodore Maiman’s first successful operation of a laser in 1960. But I digress, before even getting started.
Well, I thought this was gusting and gainly. Is the term for the themers "unpaired words"? Words that have no opposite constructed in the conventional way by removing a negating prefix? Oh, I've just seen @Peter P's 7:45 comment which talks about "unpaired words" and "orphaned negatives" – thanks for that. I thought the references in the clues to the parts of the words sans prefix as separate across answers was clever and made the point very well. And all the themers are gorgeous words that roll around playfully on the tongue.
I knew about the NACHO/Ignacio connection from the NACHO Varga character on Better Call Saul. But it’s just the best that someone named Ignacio invented NACHOS. BOOYAH and LECTOR were new to me. I agree about the unavailable/unrequited aspect of CRUSHes. I wouldn’t use the term for someone to whom I’m attracted who actually has the potential to become a partner.
UNICLUES:
1. Possible answer to “How can we get this party started---immediately?!”
2. Pseudonym that lacks subtlety.
3. Circles made in fields by aliens?
4. Possible answer to “What’s the name of that quiet sheep?”
5. Declaration to a certain denizen of the southern hemisphere that you’re a truth-teller (or, hmm, might you be a fibber?).
1. “NACHOS ACT FAST.”
2. A.K.A. UNBEKNOWNST
3. CROP CRUSH
4. “INA, NO-NOISE EWE.”
5. “I CAN’T LIE, AUSSIE.”
[SB: Sun & Mon, 0. My last word yesterday was this crowd-pleaser.]
Here is the start of an article that appeared in the New Yorker many years ago. In order to get at the complete article you need to be a subscriber to the magazine.
How I Met my Wife
Anyway, I thought I'd post this pareil tale of bridled passion.
How I met my wife
by Jack Winter
Published 25 July 1994 - The New Yorker
It had been a rough day, so when I walked into the party I was very chalant, despite my efforts to appear gruntled and consolate.
I was furling my wieldy umbrella for the coat check when I saw her standing alone in a corner. She was a descript person, a woman in a state of total array. Her hair was kempt, her clothing shevelled, and she moved in a gainly way.
I wanted desperately to meet her, but I knew I'd have to make bones about it since I was travelling cognito. Beknownst to me, the hostess, whom I could see both hide and hair of, was very proper, so it would be skin off my nose if anything bad happened. And even though I had only swerving loyalty to her, my manners couldn't be peccable. Only toward and heard-of behavior would do.
Zipped through this and got my best Tuesday time ever. Didn't even know there was a theme. The words seemed to reveal themselves. I solved all puzzles with crosses only and then downs only and cycle back to acrosses only.
I would have thought that BEKNOWNST was a word, but the dictionary doesn't agree with me. But word or not, it sort of means 'not undiscovered,' so I don't think it really worked as a theme answer. The beauty of DISCOMBOBULATED, OTOH, is that it's just made up. There must be other examples of that. All I can think of is 'copacetic,' and that's not a negative.
The London SOHO is fine. The Manhattan one is fine, too, as a neighborhood--but it inspired a wave of copycat neighborhood namings based purely on their orthography. Here in Boston we now have SOWA, NOWA, and sometimes DOCRO, and no doubt I am forgetting many more. Too much of a good thing, I say.
I thought the theme was really good, with the constructors not only coming up with a clever idea and exceptionally tasty words to illustrate it, but also managing to include five different prefixes and, as @Lewis pointed out, "to get a square with a number to appear after every theme prefix." Terrific in concept and construction.
@Lewis, I also noticed ELSIE, imagining her introducing herself and than adding, "Or ELSE, for short."
@Peter P, Thank you for introducing me to orphaned negatives!
Hey All !
We need to back-formate these "non-word" into actual words. Like YesterPuz's BICEP. Or gruntled. (Isn't gruntled an actual word, though?)
NOMER would be a fun one. Go up to your CRUSH, and say, "Hey there, my NOMER is Roo." That's a good ice-breaker.
I one met someone who later became my girlfriend by taking up cigarettes. I didn't start smoking, I just started going around with an unlit cigarette. Boggled her mind, we started dating. Ah, youth.
Neat TuesPuz. Tough to fill those upper and lower 7-letter sections cleanly, especially with a Themer there. Nice job.
44A could've been clued with the old stalwart Faux ___.
Came at the lower Themer from the back end, ending up with ___WNST, thinking I must have something wrong somewhere. Cool, but odd run of letters. UNBEKNOWNST to me at that point to be correct.
Har.
Time to go back being INDOLENT. I'm definitely not DOLENT. Plus, I'm s procrastinator. What a combo, a lazy procrastinator. 😁
Two F's
RooMonster
DarrinV
Thank you!
Just FYI, at Milwaukee Mitchell Airport, they have a "recombobulation area" just past the TSA checkpoint, where you can collect your stuff, put your shoes back on, and generally recover from being discombobulated after going through security. From what I understand, it is the only airport with such a designation.
They seem to be called lonely negatives. I liked them all, especially NONCHALANCE.
Jeff Chen intimated that there are twenty-two Terrible Threes in the grid. Actually, there are twenty, the legal limit. Including ORR, not only in the Hockey Hall of Fame but also in the Crosswordese Hall of Fame.
BTW, is "intimate" a lonely negative?
Online clues versus hard copy clues sure can be different:
Online:
53A - Actress Elisabeth of “Leaving Las Vegas"
Hardcopy:
53A - Actress Elisabeth
PS I have had a crush on Marsha Brady for 50 years
I am not superstitious…. But I am a little stitious…
Has CELLI ever been clued “Vermi ending?” I see vermi means wormlike, and vermicelli is pasta that literally means “little worms.” (I could’ve done without knowing that.)
@Carola, re: "ELSIE, or ELSE for short" -- Joseph Heller had a character Virginia who introduced herself as "Virginia -- Virgin for short - but not for long!"
Hm. I thought I was joking yesterday when I said the NYTXW team must have a lot of people on vacation, but the person in charge of themes is definitely phoning it in. A cute, easy, pleasant, and enjoyable puzzle, but I'm with 🦖 on the theme, uuuuuh, woof. I wish they'd COMBOBULATE better at the home office.
As a regular white shirt wearer and oft spaghetti eater I don't see a BIB as high-chair accoutrement. I see it as a necessary defense against the inescapable truth of time.
I'd like to know how people get cool nicknames. ERNESTO becomes Che. I get called names all of the time, but none I'd want to go by.
The town representative for an Alaskan beauty pageant is MIS NOME-R. When everyone is aware an ENBY is transitioning to a single gender identity, they're an UNBE KNOWNST.
Uniclues:
1 How goth daughter in the back seat on a family vacation sees Wyoming highlight.
2 Hence the oak begineth.
3 Chef's statement to a den full of boys watching Game 7.
4 Triumph for one keeping up with the Joneses.
5 Topic for New York based middle-school poet.
6 Rashly take scissors to a photograph.
7 Self-described travails of bedless one living upside-down.
1 {EYE ROLL} TETONS
2 ACORN RISES
3 NACHOS! ACT FAST.
4 BOO-YAH ICE MAKER
5 SENECA SONICARE
6 CROP CRUSH
7 I CAN'T LIE AUSSIE
As @Ride the Reading says, the clue for APNEWS is wrong. There is a huge difference between an Not for Profit and a Nonprofit, both technically and in real life practice.
I call shenanigans on DISCOMBOBULATED, as etymology online lists its origins as a nonsense-word made up in the golden age of made-up nonsense-words to mean nonsense. I'm not impressed that taking off the prefix doesn't result in anything.
Thx, Katherine & Adam, for the 'crunchy' ABS, et al! 😊
Med-hard (Wednes. time).
I didn't ACT FAST enuf on this one, but I sure enjoyed the battle. A fine puz! :)
___
2 cell dnf on Croce's 808 at the German noble crossing the 'transitioner' & 'course of study'. Pretty much an unthinking gaff. :( Otherwise, a med. puz, with lots of value for the time spent. :)
___
On to KAC's Mon. New Yorker (hi pablo).🤞
___
Peace 🕊 🇺🇦 ~ Compassion ~ Tolerance ~ Kindness & Freudenfreude to all 🙏
TIL Ignacio >> NACHO. The snack, not the nickname. There was a Nacho character on Breaking Bad, but I get if you didn't watch because it was NACHO cup of tea...
Also, I think of "Act now!" or "Before midnight tonight"...
Loved the "Reservoir provider" clue!
I was also killed by the SE corner, even though I knew NSFW and THANOS.
My problem was that I went with YENTLS instead of YENTAS and that gave me LASSIE instead of AUSSIE.
Since I didn't know the actress, having her name be SHAE instead of SHUE seemed perfectly plausible, so nothing was there to let me know where my mistake was.
Just one more reason why I hate proper names in a puzzle.
@Anonymous 7:17 AM
Saying Thanos is "at the same level as Darth Vader" is like saying the preacher in the church down on the corner is at the same level as the Pope.
I've always wondered if couth was a word and Unbeknownst to me, it is and means "cultured, refined, and well mannered." If all three are needed, we're all uncouth. If not, most of us are semicouth at best.
There is some controversy in the geekiest of forums that Beknownst is an actual work, although archaic.
At least NONOISE meant what it said, theme-wise. I'd think @Muse darlin would eat this theme subject up.
staff weeject pick: INA. Prefer a gadda-da-vida clue, tho. Primo weeject stacks, NE & SW.
POSNER was about the only no-beknownst.
fave thing: WACO, home of Dr. Pepper. Have been to that original popsite.
Thanx for gangin up on us, Baicker & Wagner folks. NotNotNice (that's good, btw) TuesPuz.
Masked & Anonymo4Us
**gruntz**
Given how Rex normally rails against any mention of strongmen or other unsavory types in the puzzle, it's curious how Che goes unnoticed despite his huge body count and well documented cruelty
Loved learning about “lonely negatives” and am impressed that each themer has a different prefix. Congrats to Katherine and Adam for their IMpeccable taste. Your talents have made an INdelible impression.
Thanks to @GAC, too, for “How I Met My Wife.”
I just hope these lonely negatives can each find a CRUSH to save them from becoming DISappointed with life.
Medium. I really enjoyed this one. Reminded me of an Arsenio Hall catch phrase. Fun Tuesday and Jeff gave it POW.
I remember that Adam Wagner recently constructed a solo puzzle that I thought was one of the best puzzles ever. Though, being me, I have no idea what it was. When I finish writing this, I'll go take a look.
Meanwhile, this was fun -- as I suspected it might be. Once I got the first themer, NONCHALANCE, I tried to answer all the other themers with no crosses. I got INDOLENT that way. MISNOMER too. But I sometimes needed the first letter to get the prefix and one other letter as well. I think I needed the C for DISCOMBOBULATED and the B for UNBEKNOWNST. Don't quite remember.
You can solve this puzzle without even reading the 2nd half of the themer clues. But it won't be nearly as much fun. Playful, breezy and enjoyable. Lovely Tuesday.
If NACHOS had been invented by Francisco, they’d be Panchos.
Don’t even try to guess what you’d get if you crossed a newt with a mouse. It’s NOUSE.
I was once on an ice breaker. It had an ICEMAKER, but it couldn’t be run while the ship was in motion. Basically, it was a make or break proposition.
I loved this orphaned negatives puzzle, though clearly it left only a delible impression on some. Thanks, Katherine Baicker and Adam Wagner.
Thought this a light and fun puzzle, had a good time figuring out the theme answers from minimal crosses.
Once had lunch with Ernesto—well, stood in line at the UN cafeteria with him. He looked young and spiffy in starched/ironed green army fatigues and whispy beard—not at all like gritty terrorist.
Shout out to long past Tuesday puz: Feb 26, 2013 had some road names as theme and right under Ventura Highway the constructed had “Ace” and no one commented on the joke. Have been going through old Tuesday puzzles and had to comment on that.
This came up pretty recently:
The New Yorker, July 25, 1994 P. 82
SHOUTS AND MURMURS about man who describes meeting his wife at a party. In his description, he drops many prefixes. It had been a rough day, so when I walked into the party I was very chalant, despite my efforts to appear gruntled and consolate. I was furling my wieldy umbrella for the coat check when I saw her standing alone in a corner. She was a descript person, a woman in a state of total array. Her hair was kempt, her clothing shevelled, and she moved in a gainly way. I wanted desperately to meet her, but I knew I'd have to make bones about it, since I was travelling cognito. Beknownst to me, the hostess, whom I could see both hide and hair of, was very proper, so it would be skin off my nose if anything bad happened. And even though I had only swerving loyalty to her, my manners couldn't be peccable. Only toward and heard-of behavior would do. Fortunately, the embarrassment that my maculate appearance might cause was evitable. There were two ways about it, but the chances that someone as flappable as I would be ept enough to become persona grata or sung hero were slim. I was, after all, something to sneeze at, someone you could easily hold a candle to, someone who usually aroused bridled passion. So I decided not to rush it. But then, all at once, for some apparent reason, she looked in my direction and smiled in a way that I could make heads or tails of. So, after a terminable delay, I acted with mitigated gall and made my way through the ruly crowd with strong givings. Nevertheless, since this was all new hat to me and I had no time to prepare a promptu speech, I was petuous. She responded well, and I was mayed that she considered me a savory char- acter who was up to some good. She told me who she was. "What a perfect nomer," I said, advertently. The conversation became more and more choate, and we spoke at length to much avail. But I was defatigable, so I had to leave at a godly hour. I asked if she wanted to come with me. To my delight, she was committal. We left the party together and have been together ever since. I have given her my love, and she has requited it.
@Bob Mills 7:57 -- to be honest, I've heard BOOYAH more from Jim Cramer and CNN's Mad Money than really as any sort of street slang. I guess in sports, too. At any rate, I don't really think of it as something you'd only (or even mostly) hear in the "hood," as you put it. It was pretty normal slang in my neighborhood in the mid-90s. That along with NBA Jam's "BOOMSHAKALAKA" (not originating with that game, but popularized by it, plus some music around the time.)
Also, it's a type of stew up in the Green Bay area of Belgian origin (supposedly.) Not to be confused with the burgoo, another stew with a mish-mash of meats and vegetables, of Kentucky and neighboring states.
@kitshef: "Theme was neat but formed no part of the solve for me."
But the thing is, @kitshef, it COULD have. And you would have had much more fun if you'd tried to guess the themers with few to no crosses. Trust me. That's what I did and I had a lot of fun guessing.
I loved this in a freaky sort of way. What to do with NON,IN,DIS,MIS and UN...Hmmmm. Could that be some old English word....NONINDISMISUN. I like that word.
See how my mind works. So these little prefixes mean "not." I'll dance with them anyway. Now to find out if I take the "not" out of the equation and see if the remaining sneaky words means something. They did!.
I danced with CHALANCE and he told me his name is valid in an old timey sort of way. Well, I'll be darn.
I then danced with DOLENT, COMBOBULATED NOMER and BEKNOWNST. After I finished I looked you up and I'll be darned if these are actual words that nobody uses any more. Was that the secret here?
I did have fun. I had fun with all of your answers.
The beginning of this puzzle did puzzle me. AP NEWS and spelling BOOYAH was probably the hardest to get. No matter, I found a way to get you....
I did wonder how Katherine and Adam came up with this idea and then make it so fun. I'll remember this puzzle even though you threw in ERNESTO [Che] Guevara. @Weezie beat me to it about where Che comes from. If you know any Argentinians they throw "Che". around like some NACHOS invented by Ignacio who's name is short of Iggy. Try this "Pero Che, que boludo." By the way ERNESTO means sincere. How's that for a MISNOMER....
Uniclues:
1) "They're real and they're spectacular!" (line from "Seinfeld")
2) Wear this to avoid dribbling food over your midsection at elegant dinners
3) On second thought, please don't, you Grim Reaper, you!
1) EYEROLL TETONS
2) ABS SOCIALS BIB
3) BE HONEST, THANOS
EasyEd, so funny you mention that puzzle from 2/26/13. I remember that puzzle and even took a picture of it that I just found. It had THUNDERROAD in it and I sent it to my sister, we are both big Bruce fans.
@Carola -- Hah! on your ELSIE comment!
Another "I solved as a themeless" so I don't really know how I feel about this puzzle.
I know POSNER much better than Rosner (never heard of her), so I have to disagree with you there Rex.
I found this to be a top of the tier Tuesday! I loved the entire concept of the “orphan negative prefix” and for whatever reason, I love all the themed words. Just a lot of fun, and was sorry it was over.
@Peter P, thanks for reminding me that not only did my son say BOOYAH when he was a teen, but that Jim Cramer said it a LOT on Mad Money.
@Nancy…I usually skip over “uniclues” stuff, but your first one caught my eye….oh…you are SUCH a BAD girl! 🤣
@Gill I…you showed tremendous restraint today and I loved your last two sentences…
@burtonkd 11:04
PERO CHE...Que magnifico. El story del dia.....
@Beezer 12:11. HAH!...you know me too well... :-)
@BurtonKD, @Gill and @all the other names I can't remember, your clever, hilarious and informative comments on the theme were a joy!
Our most predictable responder in praise of the unpredictable...
Sigh.
I enjoyed the theme, partly because I have used DISCOMBOBULATED in the wild. Once when asked how I feel after getting a bad beat in poker, I said "Frustrated, exasperated, DISCOMBOBULARED even". As to it being a made-up nonsense word, both the online Merriam-Webster and my old Random House hard copy list it as a "real" word with roots in the mid 19th century. Besides, aren't all words made-up words?
I did a bit of a metallurgical nit EYE ROLL at 10D "'Stainless' metal" for STEEL. STEEL is iron plus carbon and is very stainable; it will rust and corrode without the addition of chromium. I see where the clue is going but I would propose "Chromium makes it stainless" as a better clue because STEEL by itself isn't stainless.
The clue for 52D RAKES "Zen garden tools" reminded me of the famous Ryoanji Temple rock garden in Kyoto, Japan. Here's an image of an apprentice monk who RAKES the garden.
@Lewis pointed out something I hadn't noticed: each orphaned word starts on a numbered square. That's impressive! Also Jeff Chen's Puzzle of the Week.
"Big opportunity for scoring in hockey"... BREAKAWAY didn't fit but PENALTY briefly did. But the biggest opportunity, and the best answer, would have been EMPTY NET (when a team is trailing with only a minute or two left in the game, they often pull their goalie).
[Spelling Bee: yd 0, my last word this 7er. QB streak 7 days! (not counting Sat and Sun which I skipped)]
A professor introduced me to these non words many years ago. He called them ‘non-existent positives.’ The best one that i have ever come up with is ‘gnorant.’
"Save the rest for my therapist" is, in light of this blog post, spot-on, self-aware, hysterical self-deprecation. Bravo.
Fun fact....Milwaukee Airport has a "recombobulation area" after TSA.
@M&A wrote his preference for Gadda Da Vida for INA. I agree!
This might be the all time best clip from The Simpsons…The songwriter supposedly was so drunk, he MEANT to explain to band mates the song In the Garden of Eden but slurred his way to rock history.
Simpsons Play I. Ron Butterfly
Ps. Saw I. Ron in 1970 - somehow they stretched this 17 minute song into a full half hour…
I was a little surprised that Rex didn't know who Mike POSNER was, since I think of Rex as pretty aware of pop culture stuff. His debut single, "Cooler than Me," was recorded in his dorm room at Duke and got to #6 on the Billboard singles chart. It's forgotten now, but his later single, "I Took a Pill in Ibiza," was HUGE. It has 1.5 Billion (yes, with a "B") views on YouTube and is one of the 150 most-watched YouTube music videos of all time. It was also nominated for the Grammy for Song of the Year. It came out about 5 years after "Cooler than Me," which was already forgotten by then. It's one of those songs that has a very catchy beat in the SeeB remix, which was the hit version, but the lyrics are almost mournful, as Posner sings about how he had his moment in the sun but all he feels now is an emptiness and lack of connection.
It's at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=foE1mO2yM04 .
The last goal I scored in my long hockey career was an OPENNET tally.
Was just so gassed at the end of my shift - hell, I was 62, playing with 30somethings! - flung the puck from our goal line and “raced” (slowly) to the bench. Was greeted by my team standing wanting me to slap each glove. All for an intentional icing?
THAT’s when I noticed the opponents had pulled the goalie, and I had inadvertently given our team a 2-0 win.
Meantime, my teammates thought my “what’s the big deal” attitude was the epitome of NONCHALANCE…
Thought this a light and fun puzzle, had a good time figuring out the theme answers from minimal crosses.
Once had lunch with Ernesto—well, stood in line at the UN cafeteria with him. He looked young and spiffy in starched/ironed green army fatigues and whispy beard—not at all like gritty terrorist.
Shout out to long past Tuesday puz: Feb 26, 2013 had some road names as theme and right under Ventura Highway the constructed had “Ace” and no one commented on the joke. Have been going through old Tuesday puzzles and had to comment on that.
Backformation is the word for it! I was hoping it'd be in the grid somewhere, but the words you'd get through backformation for today's themers aren't really used (i.e. real words), so it didn't make as much sense.
Anon 10:30
I don’t think Rex does normally weigh in on bygone despots. IDI AMIN has made the puzzle six times (full name) since Rex started the blog and he has never commented on it. I'm not going to go back and look at all the individual IDIs and AMINs but I'd wager Rex has made a comment in his blog less than 5% of the time.
I think the likes of MAO and CHE and POL POT generally (not always) escape comment because they are historical. Rex mostly reserves his ire for the current – or at least the recent.
Lighten up, Rex. This was a fun puzzle and a relatively easy one. Almost like scoring on an OPEN NET.
Has Rex jumped the shark? I, for one, find this theme entirely appointing.
Here's a cut and paste from merriam-webster .com/dictionary/discombobulate
discombobulate
verb
dis·com·bob·u·late ˌdis-kəm-ˈbä-b(y)ə-ˌlāt
discombobulated; discombobulating; discombobulates
Synonyms of discombobulate
transitive verb
informal
: to cause to be in a state of confusion : UPSET, DISORIENT
… inventing cool new ways to discombobulate the old order.
—Kurt Andersen
Executives of other NHL clubs are hopping mad at St. Louis president Jack Quinn and general manager Ron Caron for once again discombobulating the NHL's salary structure.
The highest rated synonyms are "bewilder, perplex, confuse, and puzzle".
I would define DISCOMBOBULATED as being perplexed and flustered to the point of being upset, being "thrown off ones game".
If you play enough poker hands, sooner or later some extremely unlikely outcome will give you a "bad beat". Sometimes there will be a series of these. Then you will know at a personal level what it means to be DISCOMBULATED.
A wonderful theme, and so nicely executed.
Frankly, I thought rex would rail against WACO for all its associations, and TESLA as well for the E. Musk connection.
And then he goes and says nothing. Nothing.
I'm not sure if I should be DISMAYED, or MAYED.
A friend claims he was in a foreign airport where the area just beyond security was labeled "Recombobulation Area."
Avengers End Game is the second highest grossing film of all time (#5 even after adjusted for inflation), Avengers Infinity War is #6. The “preacher down the road” has generated almost $5 billion dollars in world wide gross.
Gary I get your point that many people discovered Marvel with the movies, but Marvel Comics isn’t new. They’ve been publishing since 1939 (as Timely, just after Detective Comics started), and Thanos has been a supervillain since at least the early 70s. The character has appeared in hundreds, if not thousands of published periodicals (comic books). Jussaying…culture is more than pop culture, and just because it’s not your thing doesn’t mean it’s not more familiar to others than the Pope.
-signed, a woman who was dismissed for her niche fandom as a nerd kid, and dismissed again when the niche got too popular.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
DAM EWE
I’ll ACTFAST, ORR what ELSE,
and BEHONEST about the NOISE,
UNBEKNOWNST about my SELF,
ERNESTO, ICAN’T LIE with BOYS.
--- ELSIE ANN POSNER
Anonymous 11:45 (fourth comment up from here):
Your friend lied about being overseas. He was trying to hide the fact that he was actually on a "Laverne and Shirley" tour.
I was whelmed, perhaps a bit under. I must BEHONEST; ICANTLIE: I nonchalantly wrote in oraTOR for 9-down, which is 1000% more used than LECTOR. Seldom have to deal with writeovers this early in the week. But that was the only glitch; from then on I was combobulated.
DOD is Elizabeth SHUE: BOOYAH!
And yeah, Mr. POSNER was 59a to me. Doesn't belong in a Tuesday grid.
Points off for UEY (Lewis and the APNEWS?). Par.
Wordle birdie.
Oh - the odds and ends of the English language.
I'd disagree with UNBEKNOWNST, tho beknownst 'tis a word seldom used today - if ever.
Did you, too, spend some time thinking of other examples?
Diana, Lady-in-Waiting for Crosswords
Post a Comment