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Relative difficulty: Medium-Challenging
Theme answers:
- IZZZATSON (i.e. IBM Watson) (3D: Technological breakthrough first seen on "Jeopardy!" in 2011)
- UPZZZZEBATE (i.e. up for debate) (17A: Worth discussing, as an issue)
- SZZZREA (i.e. ski area) (37A: Snowbird or Steamboat)
- "ICLZZZZUS" (i.e. "I, Claudius") (34D: Classic 1934 novel written in the form of an autobiography)
IBM Watson is a question-answering computer system capable of answering questions posed in natural language, developed in IBM's DeepQA project by a research team led by principal investigator David Ferrucci. Watson was named after IBM's founder and first CEO, industrialist Thomas J. Watson.
The computer system was initially developed to answer questions on the quiz show Jeopardy! and in 2011, the Watson computer system competed on Jeopardy! against champions Brad Rutter and Ken Jennings, winning the first place prize of 1 million USD.
In February 2013, IBM announced that Watson's first commercial application would be for utilization management decisions in lung cancer treatment at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York City, in conjunction with WellPoint (now Elevance Health). (wikipedia)
• • •
With SZZZREA, quarters were so tight in there, so much of the answer was blocked by "Z"s, that I just ... didn't know. I think I knew "Snowbird" was a "ski area" but "Steamboat"!? News to me (looks like it's in Colorado). I see Steamboat, I think Willie.
And I wasn't even sure "Snowbird" was a proper noun, i.e. was truly capitalized (since *all* words are capitalized at the beginnings of clues). So SZZZREA was an answer where knowing the theme (which I got from UPZZZZEBATE, above) really helped. Me: "Hmm, OK, what's a short car make? ... well, there's KIA and oh hey that's it." The short stuff in there ... again, themers getting gunked up by crosswordese clued in an ugly fashion. That clue on RTE, yeesh (38D: Inbound or outbound thing: Abbr.). Only "inbound" or "outbound" things I know are planes or maybe trains. And then yet another abbr. at ETAS, which is *also* clued in clunky fashion (44A: Plane figures?). Why no abbr. indicator here? You just gave one for RTE. You had "for short" in there for CEO. But randomly you just ... omit any such indication for ETAS? All this garbage in a tight, constricted little part of the grid. Unpleasant.
But again, I do like the concept—cars under "Z"s. Just would've liked the more in-the-language reveal, and would've liked if the crosses on two of the themers hadn't been so obnoxiously unclear. Nothing more annoying than having fussy cluing for the most ordinary boring overfamiliar answers (CEO RTE ETAS). LST is old-school crosswordese and I would not be surprised if many younger solvers are seeing this answer for the first time (45A: D-Day vehicle: Abbr.). And again we've got troublesome short fill running through a themer! When the short fill isn't helping, the already potentially hard themers just get harder. That clue on MAID too, yikes. Just baffling (33A: Folder at work, perhaps). MAIDs do fold, it's true. But lack of wackiness indicator on the clue makes MAID very hard to see, even with letters in place. Funny to have OLD SOUL in the grid, when you also have "KIA" (sort of) in the grid. Because the Kia Soul exists, OLD SOUL suddenly seems like a used car. I could've (really really) done without the MAGA-speak "dad joke" at 55A: Q: "Did you hear about the cow that cried wolf?" A: "Fake ___!" (dad joke). "Fake News" is a Trumpism, no way around it, and making that guy's dumbass catchphrases—particularly the one attacking journalists—into cutesy crossword fodder, nah, nope, not for me. Not interested in hearing from this particular "dad" again on anything. See you tomorrow.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
They could've clued 53A as "CNN reporter Jeanne ________" and it'd have been better.
ReplyDeleteWasn't familiar with her, took me work to find you meant 55A. 😄
DeleteVery ingenious puzzle, that’s for sure. I was not nearly as bothered by its eccentric clueing as Rex, but then again, I didn’t get the theme until I had finished the whole thing, mostly by just sticking “z’s” all over the place until I got congratulated. Then I stared at what had to be “ford” for a good while until I got it. Then it was just plain fun to get the others!
ReplyDeleteBy the way, when I grew up we always said “sleeping car”, not “sleeper car.”
An annoying SLOG. Too clever by half. Threw up my hands and quit. 😖
ReplyDeleteDidn't like it. Didn't like it etc
DeleteI'm with ya.
DeleteI would only edit Stuart’s comment by deleting “my hands”. The rest STET.
DeleteMe too
DeleteFinished…but had no idea what it was all about. OFL came through with the answer, of course, but what an unpleasant half-hour I just spent. Piece of trash, IMHO.
DeleteJust because something can be done doesn’t mean it should. What an annoying slog. No joy in discovery, just a ‘why?’.
DeleteDelete "my hands" . That's brilliant. I had go back and read Stuart's comment
DeleteDidn't figure out what SZZZREA is until post-solve. Points, I suppose, for having all cards that I have heard of.
ReplyDeleteBut a car-based theme is never going to to my taste, and a lot of the clues felt off to me, and when those things are true then fill like ARI and CUZ and SGT and TMZ and RTE grate more than they otherwise might. Clever, but not to my taste.
Sports crossing cars as clues is going to exclude certain types of people :P With my bare minimum sports knowledge I managed to think about the Arizona Cardinals and with all the zzzs floating around decided they must be denoted ARz. That left me wondering if there was such a thing as an iBMW to make my Jeopardy winner. And then it hit me…
ReplyDeleteAlso stuck on SLEEPer CAR and thought I had the idea wrong because that didn’t fit. Didn’t understand chart topper but got it just because I figured that was what he was going for, just had no idea why.
Overall, a good head-scratching puzzle but uncomfortably long for a Thursday.
Pretty much everything I despise in a crossword all crammed into one neat tidy little package. Start with a theme that requires turning answers into gibberish. Then make the gimmick overly cryptic, so that you have to imagine that the ZZZZ’s are a car of some kind. Include nonsense like LST and OZMA. Of course we would want to add or subtract numbers in any language of your choice (I’m partial to Urdu myself, and don’t understand why it is so underrepresented in the NYT’s daily arithmetic quizzzzzzes, hopefully it’s not an intentional slight).
ReplyDeleteI do give them bonus points for style and panache - if you are going to fill your grid with gibberish, you may as well proudly feature it front and center the way they did with SZZZREA. I love it - totally “In your face, we are the 800 lb gorilla and we will sit wherever we want”.
Hopefully someone on the editorial staff will make a mental note of the clue for OGRE (Man-eater) and will remember it the next time someone attempts to libel my good buddy SHREK with atrocious cluing.
Very tough for me, mainly in the NW and especially SE. That “folder at work” clue almost killed me. I was sure it was MAIL. I had no idea on the S in LST or the M in OZMA. So I had LI—AYING for “worrisome.” Nothing doing. I had to cheat, which I almost never do, to look up the Baum princess, and then DISMAYING became clear. Once I got the clue on MAID, I loved it - though, like Rex, I would have appreciated a ? on the clue, which would have helped me get past the more straightforward MAIL. (Unlike Rex, I like it when boring crossword fill is given clever cluing - “chart topper” for CEO is much better for me than a boring, ordinary clue like “co. bigwig.”)
ReplyDeleteAlso in that section - POT is “the devil’s lettuce”? That makes no sense. It doesn’t look anything like lettuce and you don’t eat it (at least not in leaf form). Are there people ordering POT salads? With hashish crumbles?
Car brands are not my forté, but these were all well-known ones. Ford and Kia came pretty quickly (I knew that Snowbird and Steamboat are ski resorts, and that’s actually the one where I grokked the theme - and it crosses ASPEN!) But BMW and AUDI were much harder to uncover. I also have never heard it called IBM WATSON, just WATSON. And I just think of I CLAUDIUS as a BBC series - didn’t really know it was a book first.
I knew that Equatorial Guinea was the único African country where Spanish is an official language. I once went to a conference in Namibia and met a journalist from Equatorial Guinea on the bus from the airport. Since he didn’t speak English and I do speak Spanish, he basically never left my side for three days. I don’t know why the conquistadors mostly left Africa alone. I guess they were stretched too thin to plunder every continent.
Perhaps too late but believe it or not a Pope in the early 16th Century put a line north/south on a map that went through current Brazil and said the Spanish could colonize everything to the west and the Portuguese got Brazil and Africa. Apparently, the two countries stuck to the agreement. But practically, Spain would have violated it if the “new” world wasn’t so lucrative.
DeleteI am fairly sure that the Daily Show referred to itself as "fake news" long before Trump. I may be wrong, but that's what I remember.
ReplyDeleteLoads of fun working this one. Yea - the revealer is a little clunky but ultimately fits. RUMINATES, DISMAYING, OLD SOUL all top notch fill. Another tie-in to @Z with EC’s wife and my favorite tree.
ReplyDeleteNo GURU - no method - no teacher
Enjoyable Thursday solve.
Back to back SITAR days
Whew, tough for me. I’m not much of a drinker, but I’m tempted by your offer of a highball SIP, thank you.
ReplyDeleteAt the start, I couldn’t nail any section and I scattershot answers throughout the grid. More squares filled in, but I just couldn’t seal the deal in any section to where I could completely fill in any theme answer. I did see Z’s coalescing, and finally revealed SLEEPER CAR, then saw the theme at play when I uncovered my first theme answer UPZZZZEBATE.
“Hah!”, I thought, “Great concept!” Yet, still I clawed and scraped, due to answers out of my knowledge base and tough-for-me-to-crack clues. And it was claw and scrape right through to the end. I’ve run marathons, and this had that hard-work vibe, including where the last few miles feels as hard as the whole rest of the race.
And oh yes, Crosslandia, give me a tall mountain to climb from time to time, test my mettle, let me see what I’m capable of while keeping my head small. Point out where I need to improve. This is good medicine. I wouldn’t want it every day, but I am grateful for it when it rolls around.
Drew, I loved your theme and the thorny workout you gave me. Bravo, sir, and thank you!
D-Day landing craft crossing Swiss tennis star? Oof!
ReplyDelete
ReplyDelete17A: UnZZZZEBATE (i.e. Un[der d]ebate) before UPZZZZEBATE (i.e. UP [for d]EBATE). I figured a Derd was either an old (Reo-era) car I didn't know about or a hot-off-the-assembly-line new high-tech car whose name is a portmanteau of Driving for nERDS.
I agree with Suart. At least by half.
ReplyDeleteClever, but just a pia to solve
ReplyDelete@anon (6:01). (You meant to refer to 55A.) But since she works for CNN, wouldn't it still be "fake moos?"
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed parts of this puzzle, but it had two crosses I absolutely hated:
ReplyDelete1) ARI with IZZZWATSON. (I had it clued as ARZ, because really why not use that abbreviation for the Arizona Cardinals?)
2) LST with STAN. Not sure if I've ever heard of the tennis player, and I thought that SEAN was a good name for him (and an LSE certainly sounds like it could be some sort of military weapon).
An absolute waste of time, even though I caught on to the ZZZZ-Sleeping idea immediately. I'll find something else to do on Thursday mornings...maybe I'll take up knitting.
ReplyDeleteI liked it ok, but agree with Rex about the troublesome fill and fussy clueing crossing theme answers. 34D was the one I just couldn’t parse, and it drove me to Google for the first time in a while. MAID was…less than obvious as clued, CIS was the first “gender lead-in” I thought of but didn’t feel confident in, I wanted OZMA to be Omoo or Oona, etc. So I searched “1934 novels” and there it was.
ReplyDeleteThx, Drew; doesn't get any better than this! 😊
ReplyDeleteVery hard (whew! & phew!).
Knew it was trouble when nothing made sense in the NW.
Stumbled along, slowing gaining traction here and there.
Wasn't until I parsed out the AUDI from I CLZZZZUS that I started to wake up (just a bit). lol
Went back to the SLEEPING CAR, totally got the wakeup call, and took the quickest RTE to discover the remaining CARs.
What a great workout! Loved this one whole bunches! :)
___
Peace 🕊 🇺🇦 ~ Compassion ~ Tolerance ~ Kindness ~ Freudenfreude ~ Serendipity ~ & a DAP to all 👊 🙏
Fabulous concept. I hated it but still admired it. Probably would have liked it better if I had been able to figure out the ZZZZ stuff. Had to read Rex to get it.
ReplyDeleteGot stumped because my first solved theme clue was UPZZZZEBATE which I interpreted phonetically as upFOURZEEbate (kinda wonky, but still works).
ReplyDeleteThat of course set me up for failure on the rest, LULZ.
Same thing happened to me! I managed to finish the puzzle but did not understand it at all because I was stuck on “up 4 zeebate”. Lol
DeleteEww. Where to start with this? There's too much to even try to remember to complain about. The ugliness. It's a SLEEPer CAR. IBM WATSON is a mess. Sports and actors. CEO only half makes sense. Rappers are not POETS (certainly not more than any other lyricist). GURUS are not teachers, not experts.
ReplyDeleteI'll give credit for the cleverness of the theme. It took a while to catch it because I first got UPZZZZEBATE and tried to turn it into "Up Four-Z Bate", and that threw me off every other themer. Finally saw it at SKI AREA, and that's when I begrudgingly accepted that the idea was solid, if ugly.
Had tIP for "Highball offer" (like, offering the bartender a tip for their service) which fit with trek instead of SLOG. That didn't help.
It was a good challenge, but not a lot of fun. I know I was annoyed by a bunch of other stuff, but whatever. It's finished.
I got it, I got it, I got it, I got it!!!!!!!!!!!! I, the quintessential non-car person, really, really got it!!!!!!!!!!! All by myself; no help from the blog!!!!! It took me, like, forever!!!!!!!!! I thought I was losing my everlovin' mind. But I got it!!!!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteA ZZZ goes (sort of) where a make of car goes!!!!!!!!
3D is BMI.
17A is FORD.
37A is KIA.
34D is AUDI.
Some of the rebuses don't seem to be in the exact right spot. But, look, I had 3 1/2 hours of sleep last night, so I might be wrong about that. In any event, this is one of the hardest rebuses I've ever done -- Saturday-level, as far as I'm concerned. I suffered immensely over it. I'm amazed and very, very proud to have finished it. And my "Aha Moment" was huge.
I’m so thankful for this blog. That’s all. I appreciate your explanations and your critical eye. Thanks for always posting for us. 😊
ReplyDeleteNot clever. Not ingenious. Not logical. Nonsensical. The automobile references are in the wrong answers. This is Mr Schmenner’s lame attempt to outsmart the audience. A very annoying, unsatisfying waste of time
ReplyDeleteWell, this was *brutal*, and I wound up solving as a themeless, because I was certain for a while that I had gotten it but was TOTALLY wrong. I thought it was some kind of slant homophone/french accent situation, and that the answer to 17A would be read as “UP 4 Z BATE,” you know, like four z’s? Tortured, I know, but you never know with a Thursday. Anyway, because I’m stubborn as hell and don’t let myself look for the revealer without working my way down to it, I was already so flummoxed by the time I got there that it just went over my head. I just don’t even have anything to say about the theme because I got so walloped by it that I’m still dazed, I think.
ReplyDeleteI wound up cheating on exactly the MAIl section that had you stumped @Wanderlust, made worse because I don’t think I’ve ever heard of an LST (and yes I know my general WII history, lest we begin another Vichy-gate 🙃).
And also agree with you @Wanderlust about being a fan of clever cluing helping liven up otherwise boring fill.
I thought “the devil’s lettuce” was cute; I associate that phrase with old-timey anti-drug sentiments, like something someone’s square, church-going mother would have said in the 50’s.
But oof, yeah, this one put up a real fight and I know I’m better for it, but I’ll be licking my wounds in the meantime. In case it’s not clear: I really enjoyed it.
I also got hung up on the “up for zebate” idea! Took me several minutes to realize what was going on, and even then the SKI AREA section was brutal. Nearly twice my average Thursday time!
DeleteOh, Bruce, I sympathize. But dear old Rex, who is a parody of himself, had let too many days elapse without displaying his TDS, and this was his chance. The poor man lives in Binghamton. We all should cut him some slack. If I were forced to live there I would probably have done myself in some time ago.
ReplyDeleteHuZZah for ThurZday 😊😊
ReplyDeleteHad ARZ before ARI until I saw the revealer clue suggested to look for only 14 Z’s as placeholders for cars, and I had 15 …
@mezzaluna: Yes there is a sub-brand of BMW known as ‘i’ - it’s their electric car range - I enjoyed driving their first model - the i3
Would’ve been fun to see the Datsun/Nissan ‘Z’ car show up here.
Had ATL before ARI
Delete“Plane figures” doesn’t need an abbreviation note because plane is already a shortened form of “airplane”
ReplyDelete6D English "six" + Spanish "cinq" adds up to "ONZE"???
ReplyDeleteCross the Pyrenees... it's French, ooh la la!
DeleteNice whoosh this morning, but unfortunately it was the sound of the theme going over my head. I had all the Z's in their proper places, except for the one in ZIP. Since all the other answers had only three Z's, I didn't want to put in a fourth,(which should be a technical foul) so I settled for NIL, and LOT instead of POT, which didn't make any sense. The Jeopardy themer didn't make any sense either, since I have heard of WATSON, but haven't heard of the IBMWATSON iteration, which sounds clumsy and redundant.
ReplyDeleteI think of an OLDSOUL as someone who is OLD before their time, not prematurely wise.
I actually liked fake MOOS, which was new to me, and with which I will annoy my grandchildren.
Very tricksy, DS. Didn't See what was going on, but that's my own fault, darn it. Thanks for some frustrating fun.
SLEEPINGCAR is the primary term for that railroad car and STILL Rex complains.
ReplyDeleteIBMWATSON is the ONLY term for that computer and STILL Rex complains.
Snowbird and Steamboat are two of the most popular ski resorts (aka areas) in North America and STILL - well, you see where I’m going…Too many NITS make a man NUTS!
This puzzle was tough but clever - didn’t get the car angle till after solving (with a little help from Dr. Google on the PPP). Nice job, Drew!
I can see how a lot of folks don’t like this trickery (I love a Tricky Thursday). But constant whining about words that are totally appropriate but are for some reason not to his liking can make Rex BORESOME.
Rex is not well. Like many super smart people, he has come to define himself by his intellect and anything that challenges his self image as A Very Smart Guy is a threat to his very identity and must be annihilated. When Rex fails to solve a puzzle, it must be the fault of the puzzle, because Rex can’t breeze though a Thursday, he’d have to answer a lot questions about who he REALLY is.
Delete(He’s a bitter nerd, by the way. We all the know the type.)
I find it amusing (curious?)that trivia contests like Jeopardy bore Rex? Well, I guess it helps explain his frequent, fevered rants about the NYT puzzles and the NYT puzzle staff. Without question, one of the biggest complaints on this blog, day after day, is THE TRIVIA! Go figure.
ReplyDeleteBTW, reducing a MAID’s work to FOLDER is really a crappy, elitist clue, but MAIL wouldn’t be cute enough, right?
An OK Thursday (my least favorite day) if sloggy and unnecessarily opaque in too much of the clueing.
Including folding in a maid’s work is not reducing a maid’s work to folding any more than cluing Equatorial Guinea’s official language reduces that nation to it’s officially spoken Spanish.
DeleteRazzmatazz!! What have we here? A dazzling Thursday with a touch of pizzazz! I was getting really frazzled at the growing blizzard of pesky little Zees until I got to I CLAUDIUS and the light bulb buzzed on like a bug zapper and huzzah! A bedazzling aha moment. Also a jazzy little victory dance because I just knew that 37A had to be SKI AREA and was getting dizzy with frustration. However no amount of X’s, Y’s or Z’s would’ve helped me get IBM WATSON. “Now where is that hidden buzzword SLEEPING?” I asked myself quizzically. I’m a car person but that one was bizzare. I was so bumfuzzled I could’ve jumped right off the mezzanine but . . .
ReplyDeleteI hated it until I loved it. My initial razzberries turned into sizzling admiration. So thanks Drew. If you puzzle up any more ideas like this one, I hope you won’t let anyone muzzle you. A real whizzbang of a Thursday.
@Whatsername 9:15
DeleteAwesome. 👍
Horrible!!
ReplyDeleteOf all the things to clue STAN with on 41D, some ancient and barely memorable Swiss tennis player we haven't talked about in years? Why? Couldn't find any other STAN in the universe? We go for this dumb trivia? Sigh, I LOATHE these silly obscurities. I'm sure STAN is nice, but he isn't welcome in a crossword puzzle.
ReplyDeleteYou may not be a tennis guy but the Stanimal is one of the five or six most successful players of the last 15 years. Also, “ancient?” He’s not even 40, today.
DeleteThis puzzzzzzzzle destroyed me.
ReplyDeleteLiveprof, you must have CNN Derangement Syndrome!
ReplyDeleteRe: [IBM]WATSON beating the humans on Jeopardy…Ken Jennings pointed out that it was mainly because the machine could buzz in faster than human muscles could.
ReplyDeleteUp for debate and I, Claudius were good, ibm Watson was ok, and ski area was terrible. Add in a lot of mediocre/ambiguous fill and this was a sub par Thursday. Tesla seems like it could have been worked into a longer sensical themer: ‘…tes la…’ right?
ReplyDeleteHey All !
ReplyDeleteDid figure out what in tarhooties was going on at SZZZREA, sticking a mental KIA in there to get SKIAREA, but still couldn't figure out the two Down Themers. Got stuck with CEE, with no way of seeing CEO, crossing something I couldn't figure out with IZZZATSeN. IBM WATSON. Oof.
Not being bookish, I CLAUDIUS wasn't happening, especially with two other PPPs unknown down there (all crossing, no less!), OZMA and STAN. Add in LST, and Goog ensued. Having deT for SGT definitely not helping one iota.
So an almost-puz, a bit of PPP Goog, and a Check Puzzle after getting the Almost There. Yeesh.
Interesting idea. I'm betting @Nancy might not like this, as her car knowledge is ZIP. (Hi @Nancy!)
Revealer had to be SLEEPING , not SLEEPER, as the theme works with each CAR SLEEPING, not each CAR SLEEPER. YEAH, that's it.
Now, if someone came up with an FFF theme...
One substituted F (FORD), otherwise, Zero
RooMonster
DarrinV
Similar experience to @pabloinnh's - I had NIL before ZIP and the whole SE took a long time to sort out. No clue about LST and it could've been ZST, with that fourth Z that I knew had to be there. Luckily my first guess (SST) got me the T and I never thought of SEAN for 41D.
ReplyDeleteI had the same prob as Dan. I had ARz before ARI, and actually had to count how many Zs I had, 15 one too many . then I “saw” IBM WATSON which was so clunky. I got the happy music and was very surprised as I had no idea what SZZZREA was supposed to be. Like Rex, My mind went towards Steamboat Willie and Snowbird??? No idea. And I futzed around with the work folder MAIL? pAID? MAID? This was a hard puzzle... I googled STAN’s name. I hate to google on a Thursday. But that was the only one. I liked the AROMA clue and ASPEN was a guess, I guess they are referring to the tree? I dunno. Had inNS before DENS. Thanks Drew S - I enjoyed the puzzle and it WAS challenging. I almost gave up early on, glad I didnt.
ReplyDeleteOops. After miraculously acing the extremely difficult ZZZ/car make thing, I find that I slipped up elsewhere. My "folder at work" was pAID. Doesn't that sound logical to you? I don't understand MAID. A real flesh-and-blood MAID? At work? What on earth would she fold? I mean she'd empty your wastebasket and maybe dust your desk and maybe mop your floor, but I can't imagine what she'd fold.
ReplyDeleteThis reminds me of a New Yorker cartoon from back in the day. Huge corner office at night overlooking city. Important-looking man in a suit staring morosely out the window. Maid on her knees, mopping the floor. She's speaking. "I understand, sir, truly I do. But it's also lonely at the bottom."
Challenging, and fun to figure out. The only theme answer I was able to fill in completely before understanding the concept was SZZZREA (thanks to previous puzzles for the phrase "ski area"), but I didn't see what the ZZZs were doing there. Next came the reveal and my wondering if we were looking for some rebus-y "sedan" or "coupe." Fortunately, I soon spotted the KIA in the ski area; but the rest were hard for me. For the Jeopardy and novel clues, a combination of pattern recognition and "have at least heard of" eventually saved the day; to find the FORD. I had to change my guess at cHAO to ZHAO to get the 4th needed Z. A satisfying ta-da! at the last square.
ReplyDeleteTo me the train accommodation is a "sleeping car" or, less commonly, a "sleeper" (no "car"). So no problem with that answer.
ReplyDeleteI had practically all the Z's entered in the grid by the time I reached the revealer, so I had no idea what was going on for most of my solve. When I got UPZZZZEBATE, at first I thought maybe you were supposed to read it as "up four z_ebate", and that you were pronouncing "debate" with a pseudo-foreign accent ("zebate"). Even after I got the gimmick, I still didn't know what SZZZREA represented answer-wise or car-wise, being unfamiliar with those two locations, until I saw the solution at XWord Info.
I do like the theme a lot after the fact, but I didn't really have fun solving this – the odd cluing on many short answers wasn't helping things.
♪ ...and were pressed in love's hot fevered iron, like a striped pair of pants ♪
(@Son Volt – Cowsills/sitar? I don't get the connection.)
this was just slow and terrible. the constructor should feel bad about this
ReplyDeleteThis puzzle reminds me of how much I love sleeping on sleeping cars and how easy it is to fall and stay sleep on them. Yes “sleeping cars.” Last one I was on was a 10 PM from Barcelona, I woke up at six in the morning and there was Antibes out the window! I just had a great idea which anyone is free to take me up on. Miracle cure for insomnia. Build a mock-up compartment that would make the same noise and have the same rumbling undulations as a sleeping car. You could program it to virtually go imaginary places or real ones like Antibes.
ReplyDeleteI hated this.
ReplyDelete@anon 9:01: Six, cinq, and onze are all French words, I think.
ReplyDeleteHands up for figuring this out post-solve with SZZZREA since that was the only one I was a hundred percent sure of, looking for a ski resort of some kind. Very frustrating mid-solve to have nothing pop out as even looking like a word.
ReplyDelete_ST - unsuccessfully went to google for anything other than a crossword aggregator, then remembered "land-sea transport" when visualizing what you would need for that particular invasion.
A car related puzzle theme! Any guesses anyone what @Nancy will think of this one?:) Speaking of Nancy, maybe she can weigh in on whether RAPPERS and other lyricists are POETS. Not usually my favorite genre, but yes, in my book, plus they are musicians, frequently using rhythm more than notes.
a MAID would fold towels and sheets among other things.
For birded helmets: STL>ATL>ARI - almost a word chain of wrong guesses
@Bruce Borchardt - you are probably correct about the Daily Show, but I think it has been successfully coopted in the popular understanding.
I simply must mention the absence of @Z three days in a row now...I sense a RYE appearance tomorrow.
@anon 9:19 - Stan the man just advanced pretty far (quarters?) in Wimbledon this month. More known than many other players of his career level bc he was a friend/hitting partner of Roger Federer.
I completely missed the theme - the first one I got was "upzzzzebate" which I read as "up four-z-bate" so I figured it was a homophone type pun today... Boy was I wrong!
ReplyDelete@anon 9:01 - you almost had me, but six and cinq are both French
ReplyDelete@anon 9:09 - hilarious, assuming this is parody:)
@EricStratton, maybe we can retire TDS. At this point, the guy has proven himself to be such a fraud and criminal that only a deranged person would continue to support his act.
Hello to all. This is my first post here. I have been doing the NYT puzzle since the late 1960s and IMO today’s is the most inane I have encountered . I say this not because I was unable to finish, which has happened numerous times, but even after reading Rex’s explanation , I had difficulty finishing. Perhaps my age is getting to my intellect and I salute any of you who figured it out on your own.
ReplyDelete@Nancy (9:45 AM)
ReplyDeleteAdding to what @burtonkd (10:21 AM) said:
Downton Abbey is one of my faves. I asked ChatGPT about MAIDs folding:
"Maids in historical settings, including those depicted in "Downton Abbey," would have been responsible for various household tasks, including folding laundry and clothing items. Folding was a routine part of their duties, along with washing, ironing, and organizing clothing and linens for the members of the household.
In the context of "Downton Abbey," the maids would have folded clothing such as shirts, dresses, and other garments, ensuring that they were neatly stored and prepared for use by the family members or other members of the staff. The process of folding was an essential aspect of laundry care and maintaining a well-organized and efficient household.
The show portrays the maids engaging in various domestic tasks, and folding laundry is just one of the many responsibilities they would have undertaken to keep the household running smoothly." (ChatGPT)
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Peace 🕊 🇺🇦 ~ Compassion ~ Tolerance ~ Kindness ~ Freudenfreude ~ Serendipity ~ & a DAP to all 👊 🙏
STAN Wawrinka managed to snag three major single titles during the Federer/Nadal/Djokovic/Murray era. It's odd that people talk about those as the 'big four', when Wawrinka won the same number as Murray. So how did Murray end up in the big four, and Wawrinka not?
ReplyDelete@Nancy 9:45 - that MAID is folding laundry.
Medium but not really. I paused my solve and stared off into space for a while so my brain could digest/figure out what was going on. After the pause the solve was much more whooshy. I was definitely amused, liked it.
ReplyDeleteAre the two (at least) not so sleeping cars (ASPEN and SOUL) a bug or a feature?
Me too for CEe before CEO which WATSON fixed.
Well, like someone above, I *should* have thrown up my hands and quit. What.A.Mess. This is not a crossword puzzle. It is a word game of an entirely different genre. Just what genre I have no idea....
ReplyDeleteSince the Pullman porters who worked on sleeping car trains
ReplyDeletechose to call their union, when they formed it in 1925, the
Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, I think that settles the
question of whether “sleeping car” or “sleeper car” is more
appropriate. Ironic that Michael Sharp, who likes to
virtue-signal by taking umbrage on behalf of maids,
thinks he knows more than the working-class porters
who actually worked on sleeping cars.
@Rex re: "the more in-the-language reveal" -- you mean "in-my-language" -- ngram shows much more use of "sleeping car"
ReplyDeleteLOLZ ... Drew in his DEN: "OHO! I could do a theme people will love outta cars and then surround it with so much other great stuff... AND THEN write such horror inducing clues it'll be like watching a SLEEPER CAR crash."
ReplyDeleteThe NYTXW editor in xi's DEN: "It has ASS in it, tee-hee."
The theme is a really great idea. It was super fun to see the hidden cars. The rest of the grid is surprisingly good. But the regular appearance of outlandishly clunky clues marred an otherwise wonderful outing.
With all those ZZZs you'd expect the rest of the puzzle to be pure damage mitigation, but you don't expect utterly stoopid clues.
ITS from a one-week #13 hit in 1998. BAH.
MAID ... way to reduce a profession to absurdam. Privilege (noun -> verb) much? HUMBUG.
CEO isn't the top of the chart, the board of directors is. Ask any fired CEO.
UNO ... OMG ... just go with the game, or heck, do the goofy math thing again like ONZE. They speak very little Spanish in Africa, well, uh yeah. You could've taught us it's Equatorial Guinea and we might've learned a delightful fact.
LIZ's reign happened last year and I'd already erased her from my head. Last year, adios numero UNO. They probably don't even remember her in merry old Britannia.
ETAS ... no, just no.
N-Ks: STAN. I'm pretty sure Jimmy Conners was in the only tennis match I ever watched. LST: Seems like every puzzle has a new abbreviation for something in WWII, but my knowledge of that conflict comes almost exclusively from Sound of Music.
CIS is back so prepare for somebody to troll an ignorant comment. As Taylor says, "Oh oh oh you need you need to calm down."
Air conditioning is back on. Elevator is working again. I am fired up.
Uniclues:
1 Action taken while saying, "They're just not as smart as you."
2 Adds sound effects to any dairy-related culinary outing.
3 Command to musician to play so loudly it compensates for the horrendous memory of ghastly crossword puzzle cluing.
4 AI rhymers.
5 Slogan for a meditator.
6 Truss smoothed hernia belt after quitting her job.
7 What Spanish vaccinators make.
8 American Kennel Club's ongoing nuisance.
1 PATS OLD SOUL
2 PLOP COZY MOOS
3 "SITAR! ERASE UNO!"
4 IBM WATSON POETS
5 I REPEAT OMS
6 LAZY LIZ IRONED
7 RUBELLA ORO
8 DISMAYING MUTTS
My Fascinating Crossword Uniclue Keepsake from Last Year: Probably unwelcome Ouija board salutation. BOZO SAYS HI
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
@Jimbo (10:36 AM)
ReplyDeleteWelcome aboard! 😊
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Peace 🕊 🇺🇦 ~ Compassion ~ Tolerance ~ Kindness ~ Freudenfreude ~ Serendipity ~ & a DAP to all 👊 🙏
Well. First I’ll say that @whatsername took the words out of my mouth…I hated it until I loved it! Second, I did the SAME thing as @Conrad and figured UnderDEBATE and my brain froze and could not suss out FORD and UPFORDEBATE so a DNF for me but I don’t care! Brilliant and challenging Thursday puzzle.
ReplyDeleteHmmm. SLEEPINGCAR sounds just fine to me. The only “sleeper” I think of is a “sleeper cell” but go ahead and rage on at the puzzle injustice.
@Nancy…I ALSO had pAid instead of MAID at first. I think I decided that PUMAS were the likely deerstalkers rather than a butterfly chrysalis PUpA but it was luck that I caught it.
For me, the WWII vehicle is my own private kealoa…I can never remember whether it is Landing ship vehicle or transport (flash! I JUST found out it’s “landing ship, TANK”). So, I almost always put LSV at first, then change it.
@Southside…hahaha…I take umbrage at you referring to Ozma of Oz as total nonsense! Ok. Guess I have a leg up having read every Oz book I could get hold of as a kid.
Clever theme. Took a while to parse this one. East side of grid tripped me up. Couldn't remember "Stan" Wawrinka (had Sven for a long time). Had "Mail" for "Folder at work". So the D was a problem - really didn't like "Dismaying" as the answer for worrisome. Being worried is not the same as being dismayed. You are dismayed when something bad actually happens, you are worried when something bad might happen.
ReplyDeleteI finished but so I could say I did. What a horrible start to my day.
ReplyDeleteA total Z bomb for me. But then it wasn't...but then it was.
ReplyDeleteZ's...lots of them...everywhere..ay dios mio.
Yesterday I said this would probably murder me. I'm still alive but I had feelings of torture along the way.
No idea...at all. Are these Pizza things?
Get to the reveal. SLEEPING CAR. Stare...."So what?" I breathed under my breath. Still nothing.
Oh good gravy... those are CAR names being snuck into all those annoying Z'S.
So I finally got it. I'm afraid it felt, well, it felt like it drained the bejesus out of me.
Getting to the reveal was a bit of a mess. I had the Z's in their rightful place but some of the other cluing/answers took teeth pulling. GAZANS and ZHAO. Yikes. MAID? Hardest was IZZZATSO. Didn't matter, I needed to go to bed.
I did.
@Whatsername 9:15....I needed that. My cup of coffee in hand and a mighty morning LOLZ.
@Nancy...First thing I thought about this morning was you and your hatred of car clues....But look at you! You go, girl!.
Theme was fun and challenging. STAN crossing LST was tough for me. Had to guess.
ReplyDeleteMinute I saw "Sleeping Car", thought, Rex will have a field day on this one! The second you see the word cow in any clue, assume the answer is moo(s). I didn't even read the entire clue - I'm pretty tired of "dad joke" as a concept anyway. Last time I watched Jeopardy! it was in the 60's (I think). Loved "Old Soul" - something about the concept is very endearing. Geezzzzzzzz - really got to go
ReplyDeleteThis puzzle is a great example of why Thursday is my least favorite solving day of the week.
ReplyDeleteHi to everyone who chimed in re MAID.
ReplyDeleteThe clue sort of seems bass ackwards to me. I mean, if your clue is:
"Maid at work, perhaps" and your answer is FOLDER, that works for me. Sometimes she's a FOLDER and sometimes she's an IRONER or a MOPPER-UPPER and not a FOLDER. So the "perhaps" makes sense.
But "Folder at work, perhaps"? If the maid is folding, then she's a FOLDER. The "at work" goes without saying and there's no "perhaps" involved.
Of course, I may be overthinking this:) If the object of the clue was mainly to trick me...well, it definitely worked.
Paper wasn't delivered today (which didn't make me happy to begin with) so I went on-line.
ReplyDelete4 Across SLOG pretty much sums it up for me.
I hated it
I made every “z” square an actual rebus and couldn’t figure out what was wrong. Grrr! Or should I write Zzzz!
ReplyDeleteI was with Rex until he dissed Jeopardy. I luuuuuuve me some Jeopardy.
ReplyDeleteSure it's trivia. But aren't crossword puzzles?
Amen
DeleteYarrh, I wound up with MAID after PAID, but couldn’t make sense of either, but knew it couldn’t be MAIL because I already had DISMAYING. So I finished, being somewhat compulsive, but had to come here to be reminded that “folder” has more than one meaning. D’oooh!
ReplyDeleteI have this SUBLIMINZZZZNTASY about driving an Italian sports car. But I HAZZZZZVING away 40 hours per week for gas money. Maybe I’ll just buy a PRIZZZZZAL bike or scooter and call it a day.
ReplyDeleteI’m in the wilds of BC (hi @ Okanogganer). So I’ll include answers to my “sleeping cars” below in case I’m not back in touch for a while.
I really liked this puzzle. Great challenge. Great Satisfaction. Thanks, Drew Schmenner
Answers: ALFA, TESLA, MOPED (I know it’s not a car. Sorry.)
Wowzzzers! … 14 unchecked letters: BMWFORDKIAAUDI. This does give the runtpuzs future permission to get really feisty, U realize, Shortzmeister? It's sorta like another new bizzzarro SCOTUS rulin.
ReplyDeleteThis was an old-style-tough ThursPuz, IM&AO.
Did make some of the Downs extra eazy-E, tho … Once U had one Z, U just knew what some of its neighborz were gonna be. So, overall, the precious nanosecond losses kinda evened out.
Did catch onto the theme mcguffin fairly early, at IZZZATSON (with a swift peek at the revealer included). Unlike @RP, I do care about Jep!, so that helped m&e a lot. Did cross my mind at first, that U had to lay some Z's on their sides to get W's, or somesuch. But 3 sidewaze Z's do not a W make, so abandoned that line of pursuit prontissamo.
staff weeject pick: POT. Funny clue. There were tons of "constructioneer on devil's lettuce" induced clues, in this here rodeo, IM&AO.
some fave puzzz stuff: GURUS. OLDSOUL. TARZAN. IREPEAT. DUDE. CEO & ASPEN clues, a couple of the sneaky ones to sport a ?-mark.
Thanx for all them unchecked carzzz, Mr. Schmenner dude. Fortunately, they did not cause a total MEZZZOWN solvequest, for the M&A.
Masked & Anonymo6Us
inspired by @Muse darlin, and yesterday's NYTPuz. But mostly @Muse's comment avatar …
**gruntz**
Solved this last night. Got the grid filled but still didn't understand the gimmick. I tried to insert synonyms for SLEEPING where the ZZZZZs were. No luck. So I hit the sack to get some ZZZZZs.
ReplyDeleteAfter waking and my morning coffee, I reviewed the puzzle and, boom!, I got the CAR schtick. Those ZZZZs were doubly helpful. Would have been nice if JAGUAR had been one of the ZZZZZZs.
Yup IZZZATSON was my downfall
ReplyDeleteI agree with Rex 1000%. The opaque cluing for the MAIDS/PUMA/SZZZREA crossings tipped past the line of "oh, this is fun challenge" to "this is just irritating" for me. Different cluing could have made this puzzle fantastic.
ReplyDeleteI had UP FOR DEBATE and then saw ONZE, so I thought we were dealing with an OZ rebus -- does that count as a malapop for Princess OZMA? But IZOD had the in an across, which didn't seem right. Fonally, I got to the revealer, and saw how SZZZREA worked (my stepdaughter used to live in Steamboat, which helped) -- so now I thought we had ZZZ equaling a car name, so I changed 17-A to UPZZZDEBATE, which seemed to give ma a double D. I've no idea why i didn't think of changing dHAO to ZHAO, but I didn't. But then I ran into the same problem with AUDI, went the nIl for ZIP route, and was looking at I, CLAUDInUS. The light finally dawned, though I cheated a bit -- looked up 'devil's lettuce,' which should have been inferable.
ReplyDeleteBack in my day, we called them SLEEPING CARs, and everybody knew about Landing Ship: Tanks. I think one of our local shipyards might have made some of them, so those were OK. And I finally saw IBM WATSON, which I don't remember ever knowing about. But back in the DOS days, Mr. Watson used to come out and tell you that your operating system had crashed, so that was inferable as well.
@wanderlust, back in high school we were taught that the Pope had drawn a north-south line and said Spain could have what was on the left and Portugal could have what was on the right. Brazil bulges out far enough to the Ease that Portugal got it. (France was not yet in the colony game, and England was Protestant and not listening to the Pope.) I'm sure it's a bit more complicated than that.
Linguistic musing: is the word "coozy" derived from COZY?
Totally lost me! Not relaxing at all!
ReplyDelete@Anoa Bob ninJA GUARantee
ReplyDeleteToo much ARRGH factor in the fill. Maybe a pirate theme next time.
ReplyDeleteTo help counter all the negatives here today, I'm coming on to gjve this one a big thumbs up. What a beauty! It took me a long time before I saw FORD replacing the Z's and I still had a way to go. I should have seen ICLAUDIUS sooner (loved it on PBS) but needed lots of crosses to get IBMWATSON.
ReplyDeleteWhew, this one was a struggle. I started with ARI for 1A, then thought I should switch it to ARz, when I saw all the other Zs going down. I knew I wanted Watson at 3D and figured that the puzzle would tell me later how 4 Zs made a W.
ReplyDeleteAt the end of the fill, I wasn’t confident on LST crossing STAN and had no clue what the Snowbird/Steamboat clue was asking. I thought I wanted ASPEN and RTE but wasn’t 100% sure where the Zs would go in those answers, if at all.
Eventually, I saw that the revealer mentioned 14 Zs and after counting mine, I remembered to revisit 3D and revert to ARI for the finish.
I always get a kick out of how Rex reacts to anything related to an office job. “Org chart? What in tarnation?!” CEO went in for me without hesitation.
Whew! Usually when I have a torturous time solving I'm further crushed reading about how easy all you folks thought it was.
ReplyDeleteGot most of the Z’s then took a nap.
ReplyDeleteYEAH, I got this puzzle finally but it was a bit of a SLOG. I think I got the trick at SKI AREA - with the Z's in place, I wrote KIA in the margin and wondered if the Z's in 3D were going to be KIA also but suddenly IBM WATSON came to mind and I realized what we were doing.
ReplyDeleteI was glad to put back in the SLOG and YEAH I had crossed off when they didn't work with UP for DEBATE. And I could have sworn I had just seen Chloe ZHAO's name in print so putting in the Z for FORD also was a relief.
I did end up with a DNF at MAID. I had PUMAS in 26D and changed it to pAID because that might be the kind of folder I'd have at my work. Now I see how MAID works there but, sheesh.
The clue for 34D was quite DISMAYING. I had no idea "I, CLAUDIUS" was published in 1934 since I saw the BBC series some time in the late 70s or early 80s so I thought it was more contemporary. My nIl at 62A gave me ZIP help but I finally figured it out.
Drew Schmenner, thanks for a Thursday challenge.
Remember the "Cheers" episode where Cliff went on "Jeopardy"? If Rex were a contestant, the categories would be:
ReplyDeleteHAWAIIAN VOLCANOS
THE NRA
CITIES IN MASSACHUSETTS
HARRY POTTER CHARACTERS
CORPORATE TERMINOLOGY
DOWNS ONLY (all of the answers will be types of feathers)
Final Jeopardy clue, in the category of "Home Decor":
This company makes a paint color called Evergreen Fog
@Roo (9:49) Thanks and I like your idea for an FFF based theme. But let it suffice to say that could get very interesting. 😳
ReplyDelete@Jimbo (10:36) Well now that you mention it, I do feel pretty dang smart for figuring this one out. Just kidding but I’m usually the one sighing while staring at the grid before I come here to figure out what the heck was going on. By the way, now that you’ve dropped in, don’t be a stranger.
I’m a slow solver but I almost always finish without errors. Not this time, though. Theme was too much of a stretch for me; got the revealer, got most of the Zs, but couldn’t put it all together, just didn’t grok the theme. Frustrating, not enjoyable.
ReplyDeleteI knew early on that the ZZZ's had to be replaced with car brands, but there are too many car brands! Got the FORD and KIA and CLAUDIUS, but stumped by IBMWATSON. Also thought the tennis player might be a SeAN and LSe seemed like a possible D-Day landing vehicle.
ReplyDeleteSigh
@Joe Dipinto, it confused me too so I Googled and The Rain the Park, and Other Things apparently has a sitar playing. I personally can’t catch it myself but saw other songs by other artists that I had no clue had sitar.
ReplyDeleteHi @egs temporarily in BC! Enjoy the hot weather, and honk if you drive through Penticton. And I liked your 3 sleeping cars!
ReplyDeleteI'm surprised by the dislikes today; I thought it was a fun little theme and it is Thursday, so you gimmick haters should like tomorrow better. On xwordinfo, Jeff points out this is only the 2nd highest number of Zs.
Some years ago there was a clever puzzle where the grid formed a giant Z, and the middle was filled with many double Zs. I think it was maybe by David Steinberg? I tried to find it recently but couldn't; if anyone knows the date please speak up!
[spelling Bee: yd 0, last word this 7er. QB streak now 6!]
That was awful
ReplyDeleteGot "ski area" and then the theme fell into place. Got Ozma and Tarzan and cozy quickly, so that one fell. Same with "up for debate." That left me to scratch my head raw before finally hitting on IBM Watson. The clues for "maid" and "pot" were a stretch. This one revived my faith that Thursday's could be challenging and fun again.
ReplyDeleteCorrection to above; at xwordinfo it wasn't Jeff who noted this has the 2nd highest number of Zs, it was the constructor Drew.
ReplyDeleteI'll put in a vote for SLEEPer CAR -- I've never head them called SLEEPING CARs until today, and was glad to see Rex call out that bizarre answer.
ReplyDelete@beezer – The song's Wikipedia entry lists the following:
ReplyDeleteFor this record, the arranger was Jimmy Wisner, musicians included Gene Bianco on harp, Vinnie Bell, Charles Macy and Al Gorgoni on guitar, Joe Macho on bass, Artie Butler on organ, Paul Griffin on piano, George Devens on percussion, and Buddy Saltzman and Al Rogers on drums.
Now there could have been additional musicians, but I don't hear any sitar either. I demand an explanation from @Son Volt. :-)
As a kid, I heard someone, probably a WWII vet, say that LST stood for "Long Slow Trip", and somehow that has stayed with me. Helpful.
ReplyDeleteDrew drew me in for almost an hour of head scratching appreciation. Can’t wait to see what he does to us on Friday and Saturday! Had the reveal in place & knew it had to be I CLAUDIUS, but still had to tag team the CAR/ZZZ with Madam N to finally grok the Jeopardy response before heading here.
ReplyDeleteI expect this kind of a puzzle on a Thursday, so I didn’t do too badly with it, except for the IBM Watson.
ReplyDeleteCOZY seems like a stretch. They’re much more popularly called Koozies. But that name is trademarked so COZY is one of a number of knockoffs to avoid infringements.
ReplyDeleteAre you thinking of the can insulators that keep your beer cold? Because the clue says "Warm beverage cover," which to me is distinctly referring to a tea cozy -- something entirely different than a koozy.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDelete@Joe D and @beezer - a few years ago WFUV had a show dedicated to obscure SITAR music. They played all those late 60s classics - Turn Down Day, Judy in Disguise etc and The Rain… which I always loved but never picked up on the SITAR.
ReplyDeleteVinnie Bell basically invented the Danelectro electric SITAR - I’m assuming that’s what he played on the Cowsill’s cut.
Could not come up with IBM Watson in part because the abbreviation the Cardinals use is ARZ (although I now know ARI is popular on the internet). This would normally be easy to deduce as wrong except WHY would 1A be the place you put a clue with two viable answers, the WRONG one being the theme of the puzzle....Z,s!!!
ReplyDeleteOtherwise good fun.
Wow, this was very clever! I was lost for awhile and the AHA was awesome.
ReplyDeleteSo, a rebus that wasn’t a rebus? I got the theme but wasted way too much time by first entering letters as a “Z/_” then “_/Z” then just “Z” (which made no sense, because then the car makes don’t even appear in the answers!).
ReplyDeleteHated doing this.
@Son Volt – thanks, well if it's there it got buried under all the harp glissandos.
ReplyDeletep.s.
ReplyDeleteWell, after a few c-rolls and a vodka, old M&A's head has cleared a little … I've decided to back off a bit on callin them 14 puzcar letters "unchecked".
Since they are imbedded in a themer, sorta like a fill-in-the-blank, plus they can also be clued as: {Car brand}, they kinda get clued up two different ways, even tho their just-Z crossers ain't of any help.
Soooo … ok, maybe. Sorta.
M&Also
Add me to the list of crossword solvers who don’t watch Jeopardy!
ReplyDelete@burtonkd -- I didn't see your query until just now and I'll try to answer it thoughtfully tomorrow. Anyone's answer has to, by its nature, be fairly subjective. My short response for tonight is: "it depends..."
ReplyDeleteOof! This was almost a big DNF for me. Took me all dang day - even after I got sleeping car! If it weren’t for UPZZZZEBATE , I’d have been stick a fork in me done. That was the last correction I had to make. At the end, all the squares weee full but no happy music. During the early minutes, I patted myself on the back when I saw what I was certain was DEBATE at the end of 17A so I spelled it out and moved on.
ReplyDeleteThe other theme answers confused me when the Zs started multiplying like bunnies! Just kept plodding on working the crosses until I was done - or thought I was done. But no.
So, I went slowly through looming for typos; found two but for the life of me, I couldn’t equate the Zs with both cars and sleeping! Finally, staring back at the incorrect UPZZZDEBATE and feeling 100% certain the answer was UP FOR DEBATE, the word FORD stood out and once I removed the D and added the extra Z, happy music and blessed relief!
Except that I still had to figure out the rest of the cars SKI AREA was second; I just replaced my violently murdered Honda Fit with a used KIA Soul, so the “aha” was starting. Last one for me to parse, like many of us today was the IBM WATSON. A SLOG for for sure. No joy in Mudville or anywhere else for me today, but I finished.
Now on to World Cup footie!!!
The Sleeping Car Murders is a well-received 1965 Costa-Gravas movie, so that phrase was familiar to me.
ReplyDeleteHow could this puzzle not include Datsun, maker of the famous line of Z-cars back in the day?
ReplyDeleteThis is what I expect in a Thursday. It's weird that folks who hate rebuses keep doing the Thursday puzzle. This was a struggle and I enjoyed every minute. I, Claudius was my first aha and the rest followed, albeit slowly. A great solve!
ReplyDeleteCan't remember a puzzle I've hated more.
ReplyDeleteDid not understand the theme at all, even after I finished! Would have been nice to have the z's replaced at the end of the solve like they sometimes do. So the reason for the nonsense was apparent!
ReplyDeleteAlso 1A was far too vague! There are 5 NFL teams with bird mascots, and 4/5 have head only logos.
First time figuring out the theme of a crosswords annoyed me. Usually I enjoy the big reveal. This time I wanted to tell the author to shove it.
ReplyDeleteGames are supposed to be fun. For everyone. This crossword felt particularly like the creator was smelling his own farts.
DNF. I never had a chance. It was like trying to solve a crossword in a foreign language. If anybody says they actually did this, they can call themselves outright geniuses. Mensa material.
ReplyDeleteAt least the grid yields a serviceable starter word for Wordle: a bleedover from yesterday. I got a par with that one.
I've got to be honest ....as a 35-year solver (who very rarely has a DNF), I really don't believe anyone solved this. Too many things in this puzzle that no human being has ever heard of. Just saying.
ReplyDeleteChalleging. Theme was too convoluted and not worth the effort. OZMA a WOE. CIS and LST stacked on top of it made the SE corner nearly impossible to solve. I had to ERASE quite a few times.
ReplyDeleteDid not like it, but solved after finding FORD, Got AUDI first then made sense of it. Unfun.
ReplyDeleteWordle par.