Fantasy sports scoring standard, informally / TUE 1-9-24 / Writer/podcaster Harris / Exhibited heliotropism, as a flower / Thousand-dollar bill, slangily / Rank's counterpart, on a chessboard / Lawn game played with a ball known as a pallino / Dip that might be made in a molcajete, informally

Constructor: Adam Wagner

Relative difficulty: Normal, maybe a little north of Normal (despite being an undersized puzzle)

THEME: TUESDAY (55A: Part of a calendar septet, and a phonetic hint to this puzzle's theme) — three answers have abbreviations for "two" of the (other) seven "day"s in them. 

Theme answers:

• FOLLOWED THE SUN (18A: Exhibited heliotropism, as a flower)
• SOLOMON NORTHUP (32A: Abolitionist who wrote "Twelve Years a Slave")
• SAT IN THE FRIDGE (49A: Went uneaten, as some groceries)

Word of the Day: AISHA Harris (48D: Writer/podcaster Harris) —

Aisha Harris is an American writer, editor, and podcaster. She was a staff writer, editor and podcast host at Slate before moving to the New York Times in 2018 as an editor. Since 2020, she has been a co-host and reporter for the NPR show Pop Culture Happy Hour. [...] In December 2013, Harris wrote a piece for Slate examining the cultural origins of Santa Claus and suggesting that the near-ubiquitous representation of Santa as white could be eschewed in favor of a wider symbol, such as an animal. In response to Harris' piece, Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly responded by asserting on her program The Kelly File that "Santa just is white", and stating that the same was true for Jesus Christ. Kelly's comments drew heavy criticism from a variety of news outlets; in response, Kelly accused her criticizers of "race-baiting". Harris appeared on CNN and criticized Kelly's response, stating that Kelly's statements simultaneously played the role of victim and that Kelly downplayed the comments as a joke after the initial backlash. (wikipedia)

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***ATTENTION: READERS AND FELLOW SOLVERS*** : Hello from the first properly wintry week of the season! And Happy Newish Year! It's early January, which means it's time once again for my annual week-long pitch for financial contributions to the blog. Every year I ask readers to consider what the blog is worth to them on an annual basis and give accordingly. So ... 17 years ... not bad. At this time last year, I was recovering from COVID and still dealing with the very fresh grief brought on by the untimely death of my cat, Olive. I was very grateful for the blog at that point, since it grounded me in routine and gave me a place where I could lose myself in a pastime I love, and share that love with others. OK, yes, true, I don't always *love* crosswords. Sometimes it's more hate-love or love-hate or "Why are you being like this, you stupid puzzle!?" It ain't all positive vibes, as you know. But I realized last year that part of what makes this blog so fun for me, and what makes it a solace to many readers, is the sense of commiseration it provides. Sometimes the puzzle thrills you, and maybe I agree with you, and maybe I don't; and sometimes it infuriates you, and maybe I agree with you, and maybe I don't. But either way, the blog is here; it's *always* here. You get to have your feelings validated, or you get to shake your head at my errant judgment and often breathtaking ignorance, but either way, you get to share an experience that's an important part of your daily life, and maybe you learn something new. Above all, I hope you feel that there is a real person with a real life and real emotions and (very) real human flaws who's telling you what it was *really* like for him to solve the puzzle. I never wanted to be an expert, offering some kind of bloodless know-it-all advice and analysis. I wanted blood. Blood on the page. There will be blood! ... But also, music videos. And Words of the Day. And, if you hang around long enough, cat pictures. Like this one:

This is Ida (she put herself in the bin, I swear). Ida is the happy sequel to last year's grief. At the beginning of January, I was mourning. By the end of January, I was still mourning, but now I had a new companion (as did my other cat, Alfie, who *really* needed one). Why am I talking about my cats? Because they are constant, they give shape and rhythm to my day, and I love them even if they sometimes drive me crazy. Just like crossword puzzles! (See that! Segue! This is why you should pay me the big bucks!) 

However much I love writing this blog (and I do, a lot), it is, in fact, a job. This blog has covered the NYTXW every day, without fail, for 17 years, and except for two days a month (when my regular stand-ins Mali and Clare write for me), and an occasional vacation or sick day (when I hire substitutes to write for me), it's me who's doing the writing. Every day. At very ... let's say, inconvenient hours (my alarm goes off most mornings at 3:45am). Over the years, I have received all kinds of advice about "monetizing" the blog, invitations to turn it into a subscription-type deal à la Substack or Patreon. But that sort of thing has never felt right for me. I like being out here on Main, on this super old-school blogging platform, just giving it away for free and relying on conscientious addicts like yourselves to pay me what you think the blog's worth. It's just nicer that way. 

How much should you give? Whatever you think the blog is worth to you on a yearly basis. Whatever that amount is is fantastic. Some people refuse to pay for what they can get for free. Others just don't have money to spare. All are welcome to read the blog—the site will always be open and free. But if you are able to express your appreciation monetarily, here are three options. First, a Paypal button (which you can also find in the blog sidebar on the homepage):

Second, a mailing address (checks can be made out to "Michael Sharp" or "Rex Parker"):

Rex Parker c/o Michael Sharp
54 Matthews St
Binghamton, NY 13905

The third, increasingly popular option is Venmo; if that's your preferred way of moving money around, my handle is @MichaelDavidSharp (the last four digits of my phone are 4878, in case Venmo asks you, which I guess it does sometimes, when it's not trying to push crypto on you, what the hell?!)

All Paypal contributions will be gratefully acknowledged by email. All Venmo contributions will get a little heart emoji, at a minimum :) All snail mail contributions will be gratefully acknowledged with hand-written postcards. I. Love. Snail Mail. I love seeing your gorgeous handwriting and then sending you my awful handwriting. It's all so wonderful. My daughter (Ella Egan) has once again designed my annual thank-you cards, and once again those cards feature (wait for it) cats! My cats: Alfie & Ida. This year, an elegant set of five!

These really capture the combination of beauty and goofiness that I love in cats (and puzzles, frankly). I'd say "Collect All Five!" but every snail-mail contributor will get just one and (hopefully) like it! Please note: I don't keep a "mailing list" and don't share my contributor info with anyone. And if you give by snail mail and (for some reason) don't want a thank-you card, just indicate "NO CARD." Again, as ever, I'm so grateful for your readership and support. Please know that your support means a lot to me and my family. Now on to today's puzzle... 

• • •

This one is slim (14 rather than 15 squares wide), but it did not play particularly fast for me. Lots and lots of names took care of that. Names are always extreme hit/miss where solving speed goes—power boost if you know them, brick wall if you don't. Actually, there's also stuff like BIFF, where you kinda sorta know it, but need a cross or two to job your memory. Ask me how many tries my brain made at SOLOMON NORTHUP today, yeesh. The SOLOMON part came easily enough, but first of all my brain just yelling "SOLOMON GRUNDY!" at me, and second of all, even with NOR- in place I kept missing: NORTON? NORTHUM? Even the correct answer (NORTHUP) really wants to be something else (NORTHRUP is more common, isn't it???). Anyway, not the answer's fault. Just pointing out how names can be time-killers and puzzle-slowers, and from MIKA to AISHA, I got somewhat to very held up at least a few times. (Really really tried to erase all memories of "Morning Joe" but ... apparently I'm going to have to try harder—no offense to the people involved with that show, which I haven't looked in on since 2016, but wall-to-wall Trump content is not what I'm looking for ... ever). As for the puzzle's theme, as with yesterday, I don't think I quite "get" the full meaning of the revealer, so I feel like I'm inventing one. I see that there are "two" "days" in each themer, but I don't know what to do, "phonetically," with the "S" in TUESDAY. Move it to the end, and you've got "two days," which is what we see in each answer. But keep it where it is, and it's "two's day" or maybe it's "twos day," a day for twos, or pairs, of which there is one (i.e. one pair of "days") in each themer. Otherwise you've got "two is days" and aside from not really making sense, somehow I don't think the NYT is going to go in for the grammar on that one. 

The themers themselves feel very ... well ... SOLOMON NORTHUP (despite my failure to get ahold of it cleanly) is solid, but the others feel kinda makeshift. I might (might!) give you FOLLOW THE SUN, but in the past tense (which it obviously has to be in to pick up the "WED."), it feels less ... good. In fact, both FOLLOWED THE SUN and SAT IN THE FRIDGE are giving off mild "ATE A SANDWICH" vibes (ATE A SANDWICH being my paradigmatic example of a verb phrase that has no business trying to stand on its own in a grid). I had real trouble parsing SAT IN THE FRIDGE, because my brain never left the grocery store. I was imagining products still on the shelf (nothing in the clue about perishables). I can imagine there are constructors looking at SAT IN THE FRIDGE and thinking "well, better go add SITS IN THE FRIDGE to my wordlist ... it's 15! Might come in handy some day." Please resist.

I got held up today by game stuff too. Even though I made ROTO my Word of the Day sometime very recently, I completely blanked when I hit 37A: Fantasy sports scoring standard, informally (ROTO) [note: the ensportification of ROTO is only very recent—last three appearances have gone that way, clue-wise, but before that is was mostly [___-tiller], [___-Rooter], or (further back) [Old newspaper section] (short for "rotogravure")]. If Fantasy *baseball* had been specifically mentioned, I might have had a shot, since it's "Rotisserie League Baseball" from which the term ROTO originally developed. But as clued, my brain just looked at me and shrugged. Same with 8D: Rank's counterpart, on a chessboard (FILE). If "on a chessboard" had been left off entirely, I might've gotten it easily, but since it was not left off entirely, I assumed I was dealing with some technical chess-y thing, and not being a chess player, I had no idea. But it's just the FILE from the ordinary term "rank and FILE," which I was unaware had anything to do with chess. I thought it was military originally, referring to ... what, non-officers? Hang on ... "ordinary members of an organization as opposed to its leaders." Yes, that's what I was thinking. But chessboard? Well whaddya know: "The columns of a chessboard are known as files, the rows are known as ranks, and the lines of adjoining same-coloured squares (each running from one edge of the board to an adjacent edge) are known as diagonals" (wikipedia). Definitely a case of added information being totally unnecessary and confusing, but congrats if you're a rejoicing chess fan, today is truly your day.

WENT KABOOM is good, though it only makes me think about how GO KABOOM is better. I can't even remember seeing G-NOTE ... ever (46D: Thousand-dollar bill, slangily). Actually, I'm sure I *have* seen it (you see a lot of things in 30+ years of solving), but ... Do people carry those? C-NOTE is common, as it is a denomination that is ... common ($100). But G-NOTE, yeesh. This is only the third G-NOTE of the Shortz Era, and the first in nearly a decade. Whereas C-NOTE ... well, you don't see it so much in the past few years (as constructors have gotten somewhat better at keeping their crosswordese to a minimum), but for the first two decades of the Shortz Era you saw it quite a bit. It's got 48 total Shortz Era appearances. C-NOTE 48, G-NOTE 3. That's a rout. That answer wasn't hard ("G" is a common abbr. for a thousand, "C" a hundred, and there's no confusion in my mind about that (for once!)). But the G-NOTE did make me go "really?" Apparently, yes, really. Elsewhere, though, the fill gets a lot brighter, with HOUND DOG, SHOT PUTTER, FLIRTED, and CHILI OIL really spicing things up. I even liked OF YORE, not because I like prepositional phrases so much, but because I find that particular prepositional phrase funny, and handy (I use it fairly regularly when talking about stale fill and themes). Lastly, a tip of the hat to that clue on ALOHA (7D: Lei man's term?). If I gotta endure another ALOHA, that is how I want to endure it—with extreme punnage. Overall, this had a little more bite than your typical early-week puzzle, and certainly put up a lot more resistance than yesterday's nice but exceedingly easy puzzle. 

[Please forgive this '80s indulgence, but the dancing ... I could not resist the dancing...]

Still burning off the Holiday Pet Pics so ... let's keep going:

[Here's Clover after devouring an elf that tried to "invade" the house (thanks, Robin)]

[This is Macron, who is apparently a dog actor or model or politician. He got his name, I'm told, because, "like the French President he is smart, handsome and loves older women." (thanks, Jon)]

[This is Sasuke, lying atop a 21yo who is home for the holidays (thanks, Andrea)]

[Cats like Spot here know they are gifts and act accordingly (thanks, Peter)]

[Hey, Django, you OK buddy?]

[Django apparently had one hell of a New Year's Eve (thanks, Kennan!)]

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]