A&E docuseries with footage of criminal trials / SUN 6-11-23 / Related to part of the small intestine / Beer brand with a bicycle in its logo / Harmful aquatic overgrowth / Boxy window installation in brief / Trio in a Latin learner's lesson / Elicitors of some blessings / Sound record label co-founded by Drake / Flower whose name sounds like a branding iron

Constructor: Sam Ezersky

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: "Words, Words, Words: A Themeless" — so, no, no theme

Theme answers:

• nope 
  

Word of the Day: CALLALOO (33D: Caribbean stew) —

Callaloo (many spelling variants, such as kallaloo, calaloo, calalloo, calaloux or callalloo; Jamaican Patois: pronounced kalalu) is a plant used in popular dishes in many Caribbean countries, while for other Caribbean countries, the dish itself is called callaloo. Cuisines including the plant Callaloo or dishes called callaloo varies throughout the Caribbean. Countries like Jamaica and Belize refer to an indigenous green leaf vegetable, Caribbean amaranth, as callaloo. In countries such as Trinidad and Tobago or Grenada, the dish itself is called callaloo, and uses taro leaves (known by many local names such as 'dasheen bush', 'callaloo bush', or 'bush') or Xanthosoma leaves (known by many names, including cocoyam and tannia).

Since the leaf vegetable used in some regions differs, some confusion can arise among the vegetables with the dish itself. This, as is the case with many other Caribbean dishes, is a remnant of West African and Taino cuisine.

Etymology of the word callaloo can be traced to Caribbean Patois, with influences from the African word kalúlu. (wikipedia)

• • •

I'm just never gonna get the appeal of these ("these" being themeless Sundays). And this one seemed particularly joyless and sloggy and ... off. SHRUBBY? What are we doing here? Nothing that anyone does in a 21x21 puzzle is ever going to seem special or interesting because the canvas is 21x21, i.e. huge. So what? Big answers, who cares? And these big answers aren't even that great. COGNOSCENTE? With an "E" at the end? (i.e. in the singular??). DAIKON RADISH? Isn't that redundant? Are there non-radish daikons? Is there, like, a DAIKON TOMATO? ELEPHANT? BARCALOUNGER? And SOLD AS IS? How is this different from ... just ... AS IS? (44A: Price tag caveat (buyer beware!). SET A LIMIT : EAT A SANDWICH :: WON THE WAR : ATE THE SANDWICH. KOOPAS? TURNA? Which part of this grid am I supposed to like? ACUNIT crossing ... ACU? DID OKAY with the ridiculously fully spelled-out OKAY? You get someone on staff to do a Sunday themeless placeholder, why? Are submissions really that bad? That low? The whole enterprise feels insulting. Even the title feels insulting. "We couldn't be bothered to think of a clever title, so here you go, 'Words, Words, Words' ... it's Shakespearean, I think. Who knows? Enjoy!" I mean, JUNKETING, really? Please don't tell me you enjoyed JUNKETING. The worst part of the grid, for me, was ALGAL BLOOM, specifically, the second "L" in ALGAL, my lord. If you have no idea (as I had no idea) what the name of the "heroine" is in "To All the Boys I've Loved Before," then SARA JEAN seems pretty damn reasonable, so ... yeah, I had ALGAS BLOOM. I mean, it's bad, but is ALGAL BLOOM ... good? I think I even saw the first "To All the Boys I've Loved Before" movie, and liked it, but the name of the "heroine" — nope, no memory. No way. ALGAL, yeesh. One of the worst bits of fill Of All Time and you decided to implicate it in a terrible cross? AMO AMAS AMAT ... is 3x crosswordese supposed to undo the crosswordese? I find this entire thing completely baffling. I need to GET SOME AIR. 

Seriously, I can't really "credit" any of the answers here because there's so much room, and software makes themelesses so much easier to create now, that I don't know what's to "like" or "not like." KID ACTORS? I'd say no, you mean CHILD ACTORS, but ... OK, shrug, I dunno, if your software wordlist says so, sure. In any puzzle, themeless, themed, easy, hard, you name it—in any puzzle, it's gonna be hard to like the CHRONO OVO BOCA AROOM conglomeration. I like FAT TIRE (81A: Beer brand with a bicycle in its logo). I like GET SOME AIR. I like BARES ALL reasonably well. But overall, I don't see what there is to love about something like this. Everything is fine, it's all fine, but so what? There's nothing special, no personality. I'd rather have a themed puzzle that is at least *trying* to do something than whatever this is. I know there are those who are great defenders of the Sunday themeless. To me, it just feels like giving up.

Random stuff:

• 21A: Flower whose name sounds like a branding iron (RED HOT POKER) — this is a decent entry. I first saw / noticed these for the first time in New Zealand this past winter, which is to say summer (winter here, summer there—it was late December). They're a pretty common decorative plant there. They provide nectar for TUI, an iconic NZ bird I wish I saw more of in the NYTXW. The flowers look something like this:

• 58A: Port city in Spain's Basque Country (BILBAO) — I would not know about this city were it not for the fact that there is a Guggenheim museum there. It's got that distinctive Frank Gehry design. If you know the Disney Concert Hall in L.A., then you know what I'm talking about. Here's the Guggenheim BILBAO:

• 6D: A&E docuseries with footage of criminal trials ("COURT CAM") — what on god's green earth? Had the COURT- part and then nooooo idea. Trying to imagine watching any "A&E docuseries," let alone this voyeuristic courtroom stuff ... Nope, can't do it.
• 32D: Ivy seen among cliffs (CORNELL) — I go to Ithaca all the time (going today, in fact, to Cinemapolis, to see "Sanctuary"). Familiar with the gorges (you see "Ithaca Is Gorges" t-shirts around town). "Cliffs," huh? I dunno. OK, Sure. I guess that's what the sides of the gorges are, technically.
• 36D: Marine animal that resembles a flower (SEA LILY) — I'm guessing this is some kind of ... what, mollusk? I dunno. Hang on ... nah, they're crinoids. 

Crinoids that are attached to the sea bottom by a stalk in their juvenile form are commonly called sea lilies, while the unstalked forms, called feather stars or comatulids, are members of the largest crinoid order, Comatulida. Crinoids are echinoderms in the phylum Echinodermata, which also includes the starfish, brittle stars, sea urchins and sea cucumbers. They live in both shallow water and in depths as great as 9,000 meters (30,000 ft). (wikipedia)

• 76D: Burglar, in older slang (YEGG) — grateful for the opportunity to post one of my favorite vintage crime fiction titles:

• 77D: Neighbors of Afghans (TAJIKS) — if I had to name all the -stans, I think I'd name Tajikistan last. It's the Delaware of -stans, in that respect.

Hope you liked this more than getting burned with a RED HOT POKER. See you when I see you.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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