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"Ich bin ___ Berliner" / TUES 5-29-22 / Thorny savanna tree / Title role in the Best Picture of 1962 / "The ___ of Pooh" (Benjamin Hoff book)
Tuesday, May 30, 2023
Hello, everyone! It’s Clare, back for the last Tuesday of May as we head into summer. I’ll be sitting in front of my TV (or computer or phone) over the next couple weeks watching the French Open, which should be great even if the-always-dominant-on-clay Rafa isn’t playing. I’ve also been going on more bike rides (now that I’ve gotten my bike fixed up and won’t get flats every other day) and enjoying the weather and the nice park and bike trails near where I live. It’s also been perfect weather for drinking wine on the patio and reading a book, so I’m hoping we can stave off the extreme heat and humidity for a little longer.
Anywho, on to the puzzle…
Relative difficulty: Pretty easy
THEME: EIGHT BIRDS (4D: With 50-Down, things centered in Across answers in this puzzle) — eight across answers in the puzzle have a type of bird centered in the answer
Theme answers:
I thought the puzzle was pretty cute and clean overall. The theme didn’t help with the solve at all and wasn’t something I saw until I stared at the puzzle for a little while after I finished. But, the construction of the puzzle and working those eight birds in there was impressive, and overall I enjoyed it. I especially like the theme if you think about the looking for the birds in the puzzle after you’ve finished the puzzle as a sort of bird watching, which is ultimately the theme.
- PROBING (15A: Like some nosy questions)
- BEAGLES (16A: Dogs like Snoopy)
- FRATERNITY (23A: Brotherhood)
- MALARKEY (30A: Baloney)
- LAWRENCE (41A: Title role in the Best Picture of 1962)
- BALLOONIST (46A: Aeronaut propelled by hot air)
- REGRETS (57A: Feels remorse over)
- SCOWLED (61A: Made an angry face)
Imani Perry (born September 5, 1972) is an American interdisciplinary scholar of race, law, literature, and African-American culture. She is currently the Hughes-Rogers Professor of African American Studies at Princeton University and a columnist for The Atlantic] Perry won the 2022 National Book Award for Nonfiction for South to America: A Journey Below the Mason-Dixon to Understand the Soul of a Nation. Perry is the author of six books and has published numerous articles on law, cultural studies, and African-American studies, including a book about Lorraine Hansberry. She also wrote the notes and introduction to the Barnes and Nobles Classics edition of the Narrative of Sojourner Truth. (Wiki)
• • •
I had a fairly easy time with this puzzle (even without the help of the theme), partially because the fill was mostly quite smooth. The acrosses were fun words that you don’t often see in puzzles. I particularly liked MALARKEY, LIMEADE, BALLOONIST, and FRATERNITY, which are words that a constructor typically wouldn’t use or really be able to fit in the puzzle. There also weren’t too many typical crossword-y words, and I just generally didn’t have those moments where I groan at a puzzle because I was annoyed.
I think the puzzle was let down slightly by the construction, which needed to be that way for the birds but which resulted in a lot of similar three-letter answers. Having ABA (10D), AMA (27A), ALA (56D), and also ALE (51A) in the puzzle is rather repetitive and clunky. Same with EWE (55D) and ENE (58D). Also, having RUED (24D: Felt remorse over) and REGRETS (57A: Feels remorse over feels off) didn’t do it for me; I’m generally not a fan of repeat clues unless they’re right next to each other, and these aren’t even close. I’m not sure about the spelling of CAGY (19D: Hard to pin down), even if Google tells me it can be spelled that way; I much prefer “cagey.” I also for whatever reason hated the clue/answer for 19A: Nickname that might drop -vin or -eb) with CAL. That’s a long way to go for a three-letter answer. My sister went to Cal (aka UC Berkeley), and I would’ve loved to see it clued relating to Berkeley!
In general, I’ve got a positive impression of this puzzle and enjoyed the solve, though I don’t think I’ll be engaging in any more bird watching any time soon.
Misc.:
- With the clue for 62A: Stupefied, my mind immediately went to Harry Potter and what happens after someone waves their wand and yells “stupefy,” and then the person on the receiving end becomes temporarily paralyzed. Anyway… IN A DAZE is much more apt for the real world.
- Yay for MENS REA (64A: Legal term meaning "guilty mind") in the puzzle! I sometimes actually fear seeing legal terms in a puzzle because it’ll feel embarrassing if I don’t get them easily. But thankfully this one popped to mind immediately. And there was another lawyer-y term in there: ABA (10A: Lawyers' grp.). I couldn’t miss that one, as they’re always sending me emails. Hmm… that reminds me that I need to go renew my bar membership.
- So I was one of the people who liked Comic SANS (38D: Comic ___ (oft-mocked typeface) before I realized it was the font that everyone loved to trash. Now there’s also the font Papyrus that people make fun of. (I’m mostly thinking of this SNL skit with Ryan Gosling about the choice to use Papyrus as the font for “Avatar,” which never fails to make me laugh.)
- Maybe it’s the fact that I’m writing this as it’s getting kind of late, but I’ve had some fun looking at the puzzle and reading the answers across, from left to right, as if they’re phrases, Like: a BEAGLES … EMBARGO or how you may have SCOWLED … IN A DAZE or you might ACHIEVE … PROBING as you analyze the puzzle. I can imagine President Biden serving MALARKEY … DILLS at a White House function.
Yes, I’ll wrap this up now.
Have a great June and stay cool!
[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]
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72 comments:
Well typical me...I'm for the birds. Except, well, we really have nine birds sitting in the ACACIA tree. You see, ANI (sort of in the middle) is also a bird.
I got my EIGHT early and I thought maybe it could be featherwEIGHTs. Hah. No this one was for the birds...no feathers in sight unless you count some AVE.
Good enough Tuesday....and you add some adult words that I can't pronounce.
I suppose I should know either the award winning author _____ Perry or whatever the answer to Reddit Q&A, but for me the necessary M was Natick city for this solver.
Other "things" centered in Across answers included OBI, BAR, ILL, HIE, and ARE.
Easy. No erasures and IMANI was my only WOE. Like @Clare I finished and then went looking for the dead center theme BIRDS. Cute idea with a pretty smooth grid, liked it, or pretty much what @Clare said.
Look at all those birds. Glad they tipped us off or I'd have missed them all. Definitely a wheelhouse solve for me except the EIN/EGAN cross and nothing seemed likely except E.
Tee-Hee: LAID.
Uniclues:
1 Tree without a metaphor.
2 Go to Roswell, New Mexico.
3 Best course of action supported by anyone who ever lived next to one.
4 "I wish I ordered lemonade."
5 How I spent my life.
6 "You are not that sweet."
7 "Am too."
1 LITERAL ACACIA
2 ACHIEVE PROBING
3 BEAGLES EMBARGO
4 LIMEADE REGRETS
5 SCOWLED IN A DAZE
6 "THAT'S A LIE LEMON"
7 LEMON: "THAT'S A LIE" (~)
Good theme, but what a weird revealer. EIGHT BIRDS? EIGHT BALLS, that's a phrase. NIGHT BIRDS could be a different but weirdly specific theme.
I have a real problem with IMANI crossing AMA at the M on a Tuesday. It took several guesses before I got it.
[Spelling Bee: Sun -1, missed this 4er which is a brand new acceptable goofy word that I somehow got 2 weeks ago. Mon currently -1 AGAIN!!! missing a 6er arggh.]
Hi @Claire! You're on your way to writing uniclues. See @Gary's examples!
Very easy puzzle. Since the EIGHT came early I was looking for, perhaps, the word for 8 in other languages and didn't see the birds until the second half of the revealer. Which, wait, what?? What is EIGHT BIRDS?
Alison Steele, the NightBIRD. Behind the EIGHT Ball. Wearing All Birds. Ate birds.
But I can't come up with anything for EIGHT BIRDS??
BTW I keep seeing what I thought were Canada Geese here along the Rhine, but really? So I looked it up and yes, my eyes did not deceive, there are apparently Canada Geese all around the world. In Europe it looks like they were originally introduced in Norway for hunting.
Nice writeup, @Clare!
@Tom T: I guess it's time for even us non-Redditers to learn that Q&A in Reddit is Ask Me Anything.
My only overwrite was LiMes before LEMON for the puckering fruit at 48D. Fun, easy puzzle.
Absolute Natick. I was looking forward to a nice Rex mini-rant for this one.
Great write-up and thank you for directing us to that Papyrus video - what a gem 😂
Yes, me too - absolute Natick at AMA/IMANI. I’m happy to learn about IMANI Perry, but couldn’t care less about anything to do with Reddit, although thanks for the explanation of what AMA stands for, @Conrad.
I like the birds but although when I got the revealer I thought, “oh there must be bird names hidden in the themers”, I forgot to look for them until I read Claire’s (lovely as usual) write-up.
Agree 100% with Clare. I’ll also add that I didn’t know AMA as clued (apparently, it means Ask Me Anything). Since I’m not familiar with IMANI Perry, I had a Natick at 22D/27A and, as a result, my first Tuesday DNF! That should never happen. "Ask me anything", UGH. On a Tuesday, just stick with the admittedly overused, "Doctors’ organization ".
Very easy and enjoyable - but I agree on CAGEY and the RUED/REGRETS (which seems like a deal breaker) !
AMA was a gimme for me but I think for a large part of the puzzle-solving demo that is too esoteric for Tuesday
Me too.
Nice theme for a Tuesday. Once I got the word BIRDS, I knew what the trick would be, but finished solving before I went back to look for the birds. Then I thought about how many of them I have seen in the wild - not sure about a TERN but I have definitely seen all the rest. And I have definitely seen terns about a million times in crosswords, along with ernes, which I suspect exist ONLY in crosswords.
Following yesterday's awful theme, got a really enjoyable one today. Happy to say I have seen all of the birds - LOON and LARK least frequently.
Clare - Stupefy doesn’t paralyze; it knocks you out. Petrificus totalus paralyzes.
I was just thinking yesterday about what athletes birds are, how they speed full-bore and land on a dime, say, like they do onto my bird feeder, or make a perfect vertical move from one limb to another in any direction or distance look effortless. And then yesterday I saw a bird wedged in the space between the eave and a downspout angled down just under it, with no room to spare. How did it get itself in there?
Six years ago, my wife gave me our birdfeeder, which hangs just outside our kitchen window, and it’s a source of pure joy, watching the goldfinches grow brighter through the spring, seeing babies being guided by their parents, getting to know the regulars.
So, give me a bird puzzle and I will be enchanted, is what I’m saying. Further enchant me by including six palindromes – and I don’t ever remember seeing more in a 15 x 15: AMA, EWE, ALA ENE, ABA, plus a rare-in-puzzle five letter palindrome, RADAR.
Enchant me even farther by echoing the theme with AVE, which recalls “aves” the class of birds, and AFOUL, for isn’t that what we’re doing here in this puzzle, looking here and there for A FOUL? (Close enough.) Or by crossing LEMON with LIME.
And thus, this outing charmed me; a most lovely way to take flight into my day. Thank you, Kathryn!
I had EIGHT BALLS at first. Of course, that didn't work, but I didn't even see the birds until all was said and done. And, not all of the long answers have birds nested within them, hmm.
Still, an enjoyable, light Tuesday puzzle!
Looks like Monday we got the BETE part and today we got the NOIRE part as answers of BETE NOIRE. I always enjoy old-timey words like MALARKEY, so that made me smile. Yesterday, on a gameshow re-run, I came across the phrase "fell off the turnip truck" which I haven't heard in donkey years and now feel the need to incorporate into daily conversation.
Enjoyable puzzle overall. I have this horrible habit of wanting to spell GIST as GyST that I can't seem to break out of. ARMLET is a new word for me, but easily inferable. I've just never had any occasion to actually use that word, though I've seen armlets very rarely IRL.
If you're going to have a presidential quote from 1963 (back when presidential statements inspired instead of inspiring cringes) and a movie from 1962, you have to be gracious about a Reddit clue.
I open the windows first thing in the morning just to hear the birds singing. Liked this a lot.
I really enjoyed this one. The theme answers were varied and fresh and didn’t give the game away. My only quibble is one of Clare’s: I would have liked REGRETS to have been clued differently
I sympathize with those stumped at the AMMA/IMANI cross - the Reddit AMA is approaching crosswordese, but apparently not there yet.
Can't be a true Natick. Ama, Ask Me Anything gets used with the same clue, all too often
This is the sixth time since October of last year that AMA has been clued with Reddit. It's the only reason I wasn't Naticked there as well.
In addition to the icky AMA crossing IMANI, I also didn’t recognize AENEAS, MENSREA and ACACIA. Fortunately it’s Tuesday, cuz they would have been pretty nasty with late-week crosses.
Nice smooth Tuesday, had EIGHT instantly and waited until the end to find out EUGHT what? Then the search for BIRDS, which was timely, as we have been spending time opening our camp on a small lake and listening to the LOONs, and for the first time in a very long time we have an EAGLE's nest close by. That's exciting but not great news for any LOON chicks or offspring of the Canada geese who are also summer residents.
I didn't know IMANI, but I have finally learned AMA from crosswords. That is all I know of Reddit, and all I need to know.
ACACIA and its child ACAI are always handy in SB. even if it takes me too long to think of them.
And alas, my Boston cagers were not CAGY enough. So near and yet so far.
Enjoyed your Tuesday birdfest, KL. The Kestrels Left, apparently, and that's OK. Thanks for all the fun.
For everyone complaining about the M in IMANI - pretty well inferable. I’m not familiar with the work of Ms. Perry, nor her name, but that was not a tough square.2 IMANI is a fairly common name. I have known several. I can’t think of any other common name with a different letter in place of the M.
Not sure if I'm a TWIT or a TWAT - but was definitely KEALOA'd with that one - sigh.
Happy World Multiple Sclerosis Day.
I love birds. I love watching them at the feeder and in the wild. I enjoyed the puzzle and noticed a few of the birds along the way – LARK and LOON were hard to miss – but found the rest post-solve. It’s true that the revealer, EIGHT BIRDS, was pretty arbitrary. But maybe that doesn’t matter since it describes the puzzle perfectly. The only EIGHT-title I can think of is Louisa May Alcott’s EIGHT Cousins, which maybe nobody reads any more. I read it as a kid after enjoying Little Women and searching out more of Alcott’s books. Hey, maybe you could do an EIGHT Cousins bird theme with the members of the Corvidae. Words with an embedded crow, raven, jay and rook might be possible, but good luck with magpie, jackdaw, chough and nutcracker.
The word GAMUT always makes me smile because I once had a colleague who used the expression “Throw down the GAMUT.” You’d think it wouldn’t come up much, but he found a surprisingly large number of instances in which to use it. To this day, if I ever use the expression (correctly, I hope) I always have to stop and think “GAMUT or gauntlet?”
I was also stopped by THAT’S A LIE! It’s something my mother used to say, not about the utterances of others, but about something she herself had just said if she suddenly realized that she’d made a mistake. Example: “I read today that 90% of Canadians love winter. [pause] THAT’S A LIE! 90% of Canadians love summer. Only 10% of Canadians love winter.”
Anybody remember the movie, The AGONY and the Ecstasy? It starred Charlton Heston as Michelangelo and Rex Harrison as his patron, Pope Julius II. Rex got extremely fed up with how long it was taking Chuck to paint the Sistine ceiling and he kept tromping into the Chapel, peering up the scaffolding and demanding “When will you make an end?” To which Chuck always replied, “When I am finished!” My sister and I thought this was the funniest, most redundant exchange in the history of movie screenwriting, and were convulsed when we saw the movie for the first time and in subsequent viewings. And, of course, we adopted the interchange ourselves whenever conceivably appropriate.
[SB: Sun 0, Mon -1. Funnily, my last word on Sunday was an answer in today’s crossword. Yesterday I was annoyed that they wouldn’t accept OGIVE, which I think might have been deemed OK at one time. I missed a goofy word, though – sigh. @okanaganer, I hope you tracked down your elusive 6er.]
Thx, Kathryn; this was an excellent creation! 😊
Hi Clare; good to have you back, and thx for your write-up! 👍
Easy (could've run on a Mon).
LITERALly, a smooth solve all the way.
The theme was for the BIRDS (in a good way)! 🦅
I'm always reminded of tsgt Don MALARKEY ('Band of Brothers') when I come across the word/name. A war hero and fellow Oregonian.
ACACIA shows up often in the NYT' Spelling Bee.
T.E. LAWRENCE's experiences in WWI were nothing short of amazing! 'LAWRENCE of Arabia' is a great movie. Haven't read his 1926 book 'Seven Pillars of Wisdom' yet, so will track it down at the local library. A Goodreads review has this to say:
"Seven Pillars of Wisdom is an unusual and rich work. It encompasses an account of the Arab Revolt against the Turks during the First World War alongside general Middle Eastern and military history, politics, adventure and drama. It is also a memoir of the soldier known as 'Lawrence of Arabia'.Lawrence is a fascinating and controversial figure and his talent as a vivid and imaginative writer shines through on every page of this, his masterpiece. Seven Pillars of Wisdom provides a unique portrait of this extraordinary man and an insight into the birth of the Arab nation." (Goodreads)
A fun puz today; liked it a lot! :)
___
Re: Croce's 812; I wrecked on the tracks (one-cell dnf). Otherwise an easy-med solve.
___
On to Anna Shechtman's Mon. New Yorker. 🤞
___
Peace 🕊 🇺🇦 ~ Compassion ~ Tolerance ~ Kindness & Freudenfreude to all 🙏
Geez... I finished w/ ACAdIA/dIRRI.. dumb error. Guessed right on AMA/IMANI cross. Now I know AMA means Ask Me anything on Reddit. Thanks for whoever mentioned that. MENSREA/TZE was tough too.
Hey All !
Pretty neat construction, but agree EIGHT BIRDS is kind of an odd thing/phrase. Maybe if there was a book titled that, or a movie or something. At least there's no "help" in finding said BIRDS, ala, asterisked clues or circles/shaded squares.
REGRETS, love seeing those tattoos where it's spelled Regerts.Big plastered NO REGERTS across ones body.
26A clue, drop the y to get "Dogs like Snoop" - the answer could be "HIGH". Har.
Got a kick out of SB crossing words ACACIA and CIRRI.
MENSREA always reminds me of the funny Gene Wilder/Richard Pryor film "See no Evil, Hear no Evil." Wilders character is deaf, but can read lips, Pryor's character is blind. They get arrested, and Wilder sees the cop say they have MENSREA, then the cop turns away, and thinking it sounds like a disease, Wilder starts freaking out about how he got MENSREA. It's funnier than I am describing it. 😁
Anyway, this Leo is gone. I, MAN, I. 😜
Two F's
RooMonster
DarrinV
Any bird-centric puzzle is fine by me. The ROBIN chicks in the nest on the light fixture just outside my family room doors fledged sometime between 5PM yesterday and 8 this morning. I'm going to miss the ongoing story, but I'm glad I can use actually open the doors and let some air in, which I haven't been able to do for the last month. I've always said birds are the best and cheapest way to had interest to your life - just pay attention to them, and the miracle they are. We have 6 of 8 of them around here, with the exceptions of TERNs and LOONs.
@AMA WTF folks - I had thought that AMA had both firmly embedded itself in the crosswordese list, as well as the general consciousness. Guess not. Is now.
@Clare - Is there really cycling season in DC? Is the last day of winter & first two days of spring really a season?
It didn't occur to me until I was all the way down at BALLOONIST to look for a theme. I hadn't noticed one. So I looked. Ah, yes. There was EAGLE and TERN and LARK and WREN. Plus my just-filled-in LOON. What clever BIRDS wordplay would wrap it all up in a neat nest?
Quelle disappointment. Just EIGHT BIRDS. That was it as far as the revealer went. Oh, well -- there were other compensations -- like lively and imaginative cluing. It's obvious that thought and care were put into the clues and I enjoyed the puzzle for that reason.
But I knew from the get-go that I would DNF. Because this very clean puzzle, with very few proper names, put one name I didn't know, the 22D author, in the worst possible place. A "Reddit Q&A" is a...A?A. What on earth? I ran the alphabet three times and couldn't come up with a middle letter that made any sense to me. Seems it's AMA. What on earth is AMA? Someone will please tell me, yes? Or perhaps someone already has; I'll go read the comments now.
@Lewis - Last night for our outdoor dinner, we were watching the swifts fly around with their amazing acrobatics. Hard not to think they must be enjoying themselves.
bar>ABA
For AMA, thanks anon 7:51. Fool me once, shame on the puzzle/fool me six times...
I am frustrated by the responses here where people assume because they don't already know something, it is not worth knowing(or including in a puzzle). Reddit is a fantastic resource for all kinds of info that is just tough to find elsewhere.
Is there a subreddit for asking specifically about obstetrics? It could be called OBAMA.
Even with all of the diversity efforts the NYTXW has been going through, you still never see a WOMENSREA.
Given the revelations in the Access Hollywood tape about what a star is allowed to do, I don’t even want to know what they let a STAREAT.
I got 11D by asking “Siri, what’s the term for wispy clouds?”
I really liked going back and finding the EIGHT BIRDS. It would have been devilish to have one of them upside down so that you had to flip the bird to complete the puzzle. Thanks for a fun time, Kathryn Ladner.
Great writeup, Clare! Needn’t worry about the possibility of not recognizing a legal term in Latin. We have discarded most of them in an attempt to make the language of the law understandable to all. ( As a retired law school prof, I would recommend that law school students should consider taking a course in legal history particularly one concentrating on the complexities of the English common law. It’s fascinating!)
@kitshef 7:11 AM
+1 Phew-ee! Thanks. I panicked when I read Clare's spell. Using the wrong magic can get your eyebrows blown up. And Harry Potter uses, "That's a lie," more than once, but most notably when he inflates his aunt.
@Barbara S. 9:06 AM
I love having you tell us what day it is. National Paper Airplane Day was my favorite so far.
I got the EIGHT part of the revealer, glanced down and saw a TERN and a LARK, and went to 50D to see if BIRDS would fit. It did, and I wa in business. Unlike some here, I thought it was kind of neat that the clue told you they were centered in across answers, but you had to solve the revealer to see that they were birds, and how many of them there were. The theme did help me get Jennifer EGAN -- I'd heard of her, but with no idea what she wrote, but I was obviously looking at an EGRET there. (I saw two great egrets on my morning walk, I think doing some kind of courtship, so that was fun.)
I've never used Reddit, but read something about it once that explained Ask Me Anything, and it struck me as so weird that I never forgot the term. Think about it -- would you ever agree that people you don't know could ask you ANYTHING? I sure wouldn't, or at least wouldn't agree to answer them. I suspect it doesn't really mean that, but the phrase stuck with me anyway.
The one thing that bothered me was LES, as clued. Guitarist Paul? Brown with a band of renown? Fine. But would the NYT accept THE clued as "In ___ Night Kitchen?" I doubt it. Does it make it better because it's in French? Not to me.
EIN didn't bother me as much, maybe because I didn't notice it; and I don't think there are alternatives.
@Barbara, I always had that same GAMUT/gauntlet problem, mostly because I had no idea what a gamut was. Then I started reading some history of early music and learned about Guido of Arezzo, who drew a hand, marked the knuckles and fingertips with the names of all the notes within the range of human voices, and used it to teach singing. Apparently the lowest note was Gamma Ut, hence GAMUT. I never saw the use of it, but at least now I know what a gamut is, so I don't confuse it with gloves anymore. But then there's the 'gantlet,' something one is made to run, which also confused me.
In addition to the LEMON/LIME crossing, it was nice to see both Lao-TZE and the TAO he wrote about in the puzzle.
Today's musing: Since LITERAL literally means 'by letter,' how did it come to mean 'word for word?'
Natick at AMA/IMANI otherwise a fine, very easy puzzle. I also found the birds after completing the puzzle.
Maybe there's a secret to using Reddit. When an internet search leads me there I know I'm barking up the wrong tree. Not once have I seen anything useful.
@Pete 9:25: glad your ROBINs fledged. We had a sparrow nest under a light fixture, but we think a bluejay ate the eggs :(.
I don't do Reddit but AMA has been here a number of times. I remember it because it's cute.
It took 24 Terrible Threes to accomplish this meh theme. Too expensive.
Naticked here, too.
Solved most of this with no idea what the theme could be or how EIGHT might fit into it and was pleasantly surprised in the end to discover all of those hidden BIRDS. Also impressed that each is exactly centered within the themer. Nice job, Kathryn Ladner.
Bird watching theme…beautiful article on the pleasures of bird watching in NYT Sunday opinion section, by Christian Cooper.
So happy to learn that his encounter with off leash dog and vindictive owner in Central Park three years ago has launched his book and National Geographic show.
Count me among those who find the AMA/IMANI cross to be a lot of MALARKEY. I inferred it, but SCOWLED as I penned that M.
I'm a terrible birder in real life, and was equally bad here, not spotting a single one of the EIGHT BIRDS amid their grid camouflage as I solved. Even at the second part of the reveal, I wondered, "What starts with BI...?" Ohhhh! Very cute, very nicely constructed, enjoyable to solve.
Help from previous puzzles: AMA (my mule-like resistance to having to learn it crumbled after its last appearance at another Natick-y junction, and I determined to just remember "medical association"; thanks to Conrad for explaining the meaning). No idea: IMANI. Claim to fame: my husband went to high school with one of the two kids in LAWRENCE of Arabia. Cries out for uniclue: INGOT AGONY.
True. It has been used enough in the past few years that I have begun to remember AMA but I didn’t remember what it stood for, just that it was an alternative clue/answer for doctors’ group. They already had lawyers group after all.
But the puzzle also has lawyers organization/ ABA and people would have complained about doctors group/AMA in the same puzzle. Not so simple as it looks to “correct “ things. Also the Reddit clue has been used more than once before.
I also got Naticked at the IMAMI/AMA cross. Other than that, it was a fine Tuesday puzzle.
Nope nope. And NEIN. Nine BIRDS, that is. Can U spot the centered, Across BIRD that they missed?*
Anyhoo, cute puz otherwise. IMANI/AMA was a tough guess at our house, too, tho.. I knew I'd seen that Red dit clue before in puzs, but it just wouldn't stick. Maybe if it were a medical-related Q&A Red dit dept., then it would stick better. But, hey -- M&A even mis-remembered GAMUT as GAMIT, at first -- so, pitifully limited hope here, in any case.
staff weeject pick definitely goes to AMA.
fave stuff: GAMUT/UNIFIED. LEMON/LIMEADE. EMBARGO/AGONY.
Thanx for givin us the bird *nine* times, Ms. Ladner darlin. Good job, hidin them birds -- especially that extra runty one.
And hi and thanx to Clare darlin. Another nice bogsub job.
Masked & Anonymo3Us
* = 44-Across: ANI = {Black cuckoo}, in old xword parlance.
**gruntz**
TZE / MENSREA zapped me.
Still a true native because even though the Reddit clue comes up regularly it’s not easy to remember which letter goes in middle. And I think that might the first time I even say the meaning (ask me anything). I might remember it now!
Hi, All, been trying not to clutter up the place echoing others’ comments, but I just had to stop by to share a most enjoyable way to remember the name IMANI. They revolutionized the chamber music world.
Nice puzzle - I immediately saw the EAGLE and had fun flushing out BIRDS as I went along.
Coincidentally, I was just talking with a colleague who has “pet” birds; he told me some of them can live 75 years or more.
Did anyone else see RINGO crossing the second part of MALARKEY and think of his real name (Richard) stARKEY?
One more thing. While scouring the acrosses for centered hidden words I saw that all but two of the seven-letter ones had three-letter words/word combos centered: AC HIE VE, EM BAR GO, ST ARE AT, LI MEA DE, UN IFI ED and IN ADA ZE. Well, ADA isn’t a word but it does give us another professional organization. And both ADA and IFI add to the palindrome count.
PS. @jberg, @Barbara S, when I saw GAMUT I decided to look it up on Etymology Online:
1520s, "low G, lowest note in the medieval musical scale" (the system of notation devised by Guido d'Arezzo), a contraction of Medieval Latin gamma ut, from gamma, the Greek letter, used in medieval music notation to indicate the note below the A which began the classical scale, + ut (later replaced by do for greater sonority), the low note on the six-note musical scale that took names from syllables sung to those notes in a Latin sapphic hymn for St. John the Baptist's Day:
Ut queant laxisresonare fibris
Mira gestorum famuli tuorum,
Solve pollutis labiis reatum,
Sancte Iohannes.
That’s all, I promise. Until next time.
Hello Clare!
Solved as a themeless (until I saw there was one when I got here). I enjoyed it.
Yes, thanks for the explanation of AMA.
I never understood how people could say they solved a puzzle as a themeless. Until today. I get it now.
@Barbara S, it was this silly thing which I've never missed before. It seems to be a bad week for that sort of thing.
Your goofy word I generally get since everyone uses it a lot.
Fun little puzzle to bop along solving, with a fun mini puzzle after the revealer
Some answers I really liked: Malarkey, Balloonist, Mens Rea, Gamut, Hordes
I didn’t know Imani Perry, but AMA is not only a frequent crossword answer, but also pretty mainstream. President Obama did one back in 2012:
https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/z1c9z/i_am_barack_obama_president_of_the_united_states/
Other celebs who have done AMAs: Bill Nye, Madonna, Tom Hanks, Martha Stewart, Bill Gates, Bill Murray, Harrison Ford, Morgan Freeman, and Arnold Schwarzenegger.
@A - thanks for posting the IMANI winds: the horn player was my roommate for a year:)
Don't keep up with when religious holidays happen as much as I should so maybe I NEED to ask Reddit if LENT is ANEAR. (@egs, you're starting to rub off.)
Used to live on ACACIA Lake Drive. There was a beautiful ACACIA tree called a huisache (we sah chay) in the yard. Wiki says the huisache is a shrub or small tree. BZZT! I call A FOUL. This tree was so big that it shaded half of the house.
EIGHT BIRDS? No. We have a ROBIN, TERN, LARK, WREN, LOON and OWL. That's six. Then some EAGLES landed. That's at least EIGHT BIRDS right there. When the EGRETS waded in the minimum goes up to ten. Throw in an ANI (44A) and we're looking at eleven or more birds. If you don't believe me, just AMA Reddit.
Clare, enjoy your write ups and takes on thr puzzle!! Thanks! Before you dismiss bird watching out of hand try this..download the Merlin bird app which is supported by Cornel Univ..Then when you are on your patio drinking wine turn on the sound id and see the list of singers you are hearing! Fun
To those complaining about the Naticky AMA:
Per Wiki: "As of February 2023, Reddit ranks as the 10th-most-visited website in the world and 6th most-visited website in the U.S."
I am not a Redittor but what's wrong with learning something important in today's pop culture from a crossword? In fact, it's one of the main reasons I so enjoy doing the NYT crossword.
@Joaquin - Keep that up and you're going to have kids traipsing all over your lawn.
@Gary Jugert (10:24)
It's really too bad that I'm not posting every day because I've missed some gems. May 12 was National Limerick Day, for example, and the 15th was National Pizza Party Day -- not simply National Pizza Day, you understand, the Party element is key.
@jberg (10:28) and @A (12:46 PM)
Thanks to both for the etymology of GAMUT. I had no idea about its musical origins. @A, that hymn was celestial. I'm floating.
@okanaganer (1:59 PM)
Hah! Guess what? Your silly word was my second-last one and I normally have no problem with it. What was up yesterday?
Like most of you, AMA would have been a Natick but for the fact that I'd seen it in puzzles a few times and it somehow lodged in my brain. So I'd say this was fair for anyone who does the NTYXW on a regular basis. I'd agree w/ Clare that there were a number of 3s that weren't great, BUT, with so many constraints on the fill because of the theme, I can easily live with them. Great fun puz!
I was suspecting at least one person thought it was Ana DiFranco. I don’t think Twat is a word that’s quite acceptable for NYT, but definitely something the editor should keep an eye on.
HOw delightful to do abird watching tourof the puzzle after finishing.
MENS MALARKEY
I’m IN LITERAL AGONY,
ACHIEVED REGRETS IN many ways,
I’ll TIE one ON for ALICE, see,
I could STAREAT her for DAZE.
--- RON LAWRENCE
Excellent puzzle. All of the themers are dead center of the words they are contained in. A little bit of junky fill, but not much. Fun solve.
The whole thing was ruined for me by a totally ungettable natick. No one, LITERALly NO ONE, is going to know 22 down. And for the few of us who never went to Reddit, 27 across didn't even make any kind of sense. What do they call FAQs except...FAQs?? The ONLY two letters I could safely eliminate were B and L--because ABA and ALA appeared in the grid!
So: DNF. A shame, too, because the central placing of EIGHT BIRDS in those across answers is extremely clever, and the revealer's two parts are symmetrical, a nice touch.
Wordle bogey.
Ha! As I confidently filled in AMA for "Ask Me Anything," I knew I had seen it many times, but I'm not sure why. Just doodling around on the internet is my best guess.
And no, @Spacey, I did not know 22D, so knowing AMA was a very good thing indeed.
We have two birds, quails, who have taken up residence in our front garden - I've named them Ben and Henrietta. They seem nice, but didn't show up in the puzzle.
Diana, Lady-in-Waiting for Crosswords
PS - I wonder how @Rondo is doing in France with the demonstrations/riots going on...Saw a photo in today's paper near the Arc d'Triumph, but didn't see him in it.
Straight forward puzzle spoiled by several pissers. Some kind of an agenda going on with those?
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