Naval threats, according to an old saying / WED 3-27-24 / Release following the GameCube / T that comes before Y / Characteristic sound of Yoko Ono? / Chum, in Champagne

Wednesday, March 27, 2024

Constructor: Rich Katz

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium


THEME: Instructions for turning SCREWDRIVERS (54A: Toolbox tools): RIGHTY TIGHTY / LEFTY LOOSEY (19A: With 36-Across, mnemonic device for turning 54-Across ... or a hint to the answers to the starred clues)  — you must mentally supply "tight" on the right side of the grid three times (following, or to the "right" of, three answers), and "loose" on the left side of the grid three times (before, or to the "left" of, three answers)

Theme answers:
  • SKIN tight (9A: *Closefitting)
  • "HANG tight!" (35A: *"Don't go anywhere!")
  • "SLEEP tight" (64A: *Rhyming partner of "Good night")
  • Loose TOOTH (13A: *Wiggler in a child's mouth)
  • Loose LEAF (39A: *Like some paper and tea)
  • Loose LIPS (65A: *Naval threats, according to an old saying) 
Word of the Day: "Loose LIPS Sink Ships" (65A) —

Loose lips sink ships is an American English idiom meaning "beware of unguarded talk". The phrase originated on propaganda posters during World War II, with the earliest version using the wording loose lips might sink ships. The phrase was created by the War Advertising Council and used on posters by the United States Office of War Information.

This type of poster was part of a general campaign to advise servicemen and other citizens to avoid careless talk that might undermine the war effort. There were many similar such slogans, but "Loose lips sink ships" remained in the American idiom for the remainder of the century and into the next, usually as an admonition to avoid careless talk in general. (The British equivalent used "Careless Talk Costs Lives", and variations on the phrase "Keep mum", while in neutral Sweden the State Information Board promoted the wordplay "En svensk tiger" ("A Swedish tiger" or "A Swede keeps silent": the Swedish word "tiger" means both "tiger" and "keeps silent"), and Germany used "Schäm Dich, Schwätzer!" (English: "Shame on you, blabbermouth!").

However, propaganda experts at the time and historians since have argued the main goal of these and similar posters was to actually frighten people into not spreading rumors, even true ones, containing bad news that might hurt morale or create tension between groups of Americans, since the Federal Bureau of Investigation (in charge of dealing with enemy spies) had rounded up the key agents in June 1941, so that the nation "entered the war with confidence that there was no major German espionage network hidden in U.S. society." [...] 

Historian D'Ann Campbell argues that the purpose of the wartime posters, propaganda, and censorship of soldiers' letters was not to foil spies but "to clamp as tight a lid as possible on rumors that might lead to discouragement, frustration, strikes, or anything that would cut back military production." (wikipedia)
• • •

This theme grew on me as I circled the grid and realized how many layers it had, but I cannot tell you what a corrosive effect bad fill has on my initial mood and impression when solving a puzzle. I went "uh oh" at the very first answer I entered (IROC) and then "you must be joking" when the very next answer I got was OTOH. Junk, junk, right out of the box. I took a screenshot right there, but had no idea that things would actually get worse before I'd ever even left the NW corner (I threw that first screenshot away and took this one instead):

[note: doubling OTOH with IMHO later on did not, I repeat not, make things better]

Only-for-the-vowels IONIAN, the dreaded ON TOE ... this is the kind of tiresome short stuff that longtime solvers will have become inured to over the years, but I think a lot about people who aren't longtime solvers and how crummy this fill must seem. Plus, there's no reason to accept bad fill as a standard in the most high-profile crossword in the country. Again, it's a matter of density here—no one answer in particular, but a concatenation, a barrage. True, the NW is the worst of it, but the olden/boring fill is everywhere, as if the puzzle is barely holding itself together to accommodate the theme ... only the theme isn't really that demanding. Yes, you have not just three longer answers, but the six short ones that are more or less fixed in place. That does put stress on the grid. But it's your job to make the effects of that stress near invisible, particularly in a grid that doesn't actually hold any good fill at all beyond the instructions / revealer. It is fun (in a way) to discover the right/left gimmick, so you don't necessarily need sparkly fill today. But you do need it all to groan a little less.


Another issue with the puzzle—an inevitable one—is that the entirety of RIGHTY TIGHTY / LEFTY LOOSEY goes in in one whoosh. True, you don't know the gimmick that's awaiting you, so the solve is nowhere close to over, but it's odd to give away that much real estate at once, especially since (as I say) there  is not another really interesting answer in the entire grid. The rest of the solve is just gunk and gimmick. Luckily, the gimmick is a good one. Didn't feel that way at first, but the theme ended up developing in an interesting way, with multiple ahas to be had. Firstly, I had TOOTH and had no idea anything was "missing" from the answer. Seemed right—a TOOTH can often be found wriggling in a child's mouth. Correct on its face. Mentally-supplied "Loose" not required. I could see that that clue was starred (*) but the answer seemed literal so I didn't think much about why and moved on. I got the long instructions right after that and didn't really read the clue all that closely (I tend not to with paragraph-long clues), so I thought the only thing left to discover was the last long answer, which turned out to be SCREWDRIVERS, which was ... disappointing. I mean, on-the-nose, obvious. Of course that's what RIGHTY TIGHTY / LEFTY LOOSEY refers to (that, or screw-top caps, jar lids, etc.). Nothing new there. Thud. Then I got LEAF and thought "that sounds wrong ... LEAF tea? LEAF paper? ... are those the terms?" But ... close enough, I thought, and kept going. I think it was only when I finally hit bottom, where LIPS made no sense without "loose," that I saw the gimmick. Or part of it—it was fun to realize a little later that missing "loose" was accompanied by missing "tight," and that each missing-word answer was appropriately oriented in the grid ("tight" answers on the right, "loose" answers on the left — RIGHTY TIGHTY / LEFTY LOOSEY, ta da!


I liked also that the missing-word answers varied in terms of how hard they were to pick up, and that SLEEP, for instance, really played on the missing word (forcing some solvers, undoubtedly, to wonder how in the hell SLEEP rhymes with "Good night"). Then there was the ambiguity trap at 35A: *"Don't go anywhere!," which, if you didn't fall into it, you probably didn't know existed. But I fell in. I came up from below, had the "H," and wrote in not "HANG" but "HOLD." The whole puzzle promptly seized up as every short cross over there failed, though even with "HANG" in place, ZIG was hard (why not ZAG?) (26D: Veer quickly) and TIN was hard (why not CAN?) (25D: Recyclable material). So that tiny area was a thorny mess for me. Otherwise, largely because the long theme stuff was so easy, this one played on the easy side, for sure. 


Explainers:
  • 21A: T that comes before a Y (TAU) — not sure what the "Y" is, so I'm gonna look it up now ... OK, it's upsilon (or ypsilon), the twentieth letter of the Greek alphabet, and yup, it follows TAU directly. "Y" is what upsilon looks like in capital form (in lowercase, it's just a regular old "u").
  • 61A: Characteristic sound of Yoko Ono? (LONG "O") — a "letteral" clue, asking you to consider "Yoko Ono" not as a musician but solely as a name—a name containing four LONG "O"s. Yesterday, SILENT "B," today LONG "O," tomorrow who knows?
  • 34D: Name found when reading between the lines? (ELI) — this is some cryptic crossword-type cluing: ELI is a buried word that you can find if you literally read between "thE LInes." Cute.
That's it. Enjoy your day. See you tomorrow (Opening Day!). Take care.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]

99 comments:

Conrad 6:08 AM  


Fun puzzle. I enjoyed it a lot more than @Rex did, but I'm one of those "longtime solvers" who "have become inured to [crosswordese] over the years."

Only one overwrite, slUG before CHUG at 7D.

Back when I learned the Greek alphabet, I was taught that an upper case upsilon had "curvy" arms, unlike a Y with its straight arms. But the interwebs seem to accept the straight-armed upsilon, so I can't complain. It did prevent me from typing in TAU immediately after I read the 21A clue.

Bob Mills 6:21 AM  

Very frustrating. I caught on to the left-right theme fairly quickly, but got a DNF because I never heard of a football player wearing a KIT. I also missed out on the SCENEV/ATVS cross (what is an ATV?).

If football is being used here to mean what we call soccer, that's a very unfair clue.

Steve Kimberly 6:44 AM  

Such a mean write-up. The constructors of these puzzles have FEELINGS.

Eric NC 6:44 AM  

All Terrain Vehicle

SouthsideJohnny 6:48 AM  

ATV is an all terrain vehicle.

I rarely try to decipher the clues that come off as questions on a math exam (or clues that go on and on and are in such small font that I can’t read them) so I “kind” of got the RIGHTY TIGHTY to SCREWDRIVER connection, but the theme experience ended there. It may have been a better solve if I dug my heels in a bit and focused on the theme.

No clue on the KIT/football/soccer connection, and coming out of the gate at 1A with a trivia question is always a buzz-kill for me.

Anonymous 6:50 AM  

lol this is a net-positive review, what are you talking about?

Anthony In TX 6:51 AM  

This was one of those where there's a little trick, but it's more or less solveable without "getting" the trick.
I had the puzzle worked almost through before it all kind of fell into place for me. Not really all that clever, IMO, but a fairly breezy 8-ish minute Wednesday and a decent enough puzzle. Hopefully there's something really fun waiting for us tomorrow...

Lewis 7:17 AM  

Once again in Crosslandia, ingenuity on display. Here Rich crossed paths with the phrase RIGHTY TIGHTY, LEFTY LOOSEY, and didn’t just move on. He IDLED for a moment, wondering if there was a theme there, flashed on it, and got on it.

Minds like this are the benefactors of we, the solvers. Marvelous wordplay and riddle rich theme here.

But it took skill to pull off, because this theme uses up a sky-high 61 squares – more than a quarter of the puzzle! It didn’t leave Rich many options for filling in the grid, and that he did so at all, not to mention did it without glaring ugliness, IMO, well, I say bravo to that!

Puzzpoints:
• I can’t believe the ETRE clue – [Oh, to be in France!] – has never been used before! There’s been plenty of clues including “to be”; there’s even been [To be, in France], but never with the “Oh”! Bravo again, Rich!
• I like how the puzzle is on a first-name basis: ABE, CHET, ALF, ELI, ILSA, HEDY, KIT. And, I love LOOSEY.
• Sweet cross of DAREDEVIL and EVIL (close enough to Evel, no?).

What a hoot to crack the layers of this theme. Thank you for coming up with it, Rich, and more please!

Justin 7:21 AM  

Not that I actually knew this, but Google found me The Football Kit Archive described thusly:

Football Kit Archive is the state of art archive for all old and new football kits, or if you prefer it, soccer jerseys.

So I guess that's soccer's version of hockey sweaters don't call them jerseys.

I'm just saying... 7:27 AM  

I quit after the second "to a texter" clue - ugh!

Twangster 7:27 AM  

I expected Rex to mention that you can both "hang loose" and "hang tight."

Anonymous 7:37 AM  

Great theme. Rex is right that the fill is creaky, but I didn’t really notice that during the solve.

Andy Freude 7:41 AM  

Any puzzle that inspires Rex to post a John Prine song is a good puzzle in my book.

Iris 7:43 AM  

Don’t like cars, didn’t know IROC. Also never heard of the marquee mnemonic. And didn’t get the joke till Rex explained it, after I had already solved the puzzle and found it annoying. I really don’t understand these elaborate conceits that you don’t have to figure out to solve the puzzle. To borrow a line from Billie Eilish, what are they made for?

Anonymous 7:48 AM  

I always assume that the term “footballer” is referring to a soccer player. I’ve not heard that term used when referring to American football players.

Anonymous 7:51 AM  

I had Pea green crossed by lefty loopey. Took 15 minutes to get out of that one

Dr.A 7:54 AM  

I’m a long time solver and the fill was god awful. Cute theme definitely liked that but the fill was a disaster.

Diane Joan 7:56 AM  

I had fun with this one! It made me start the day with a smile. Have a great day all!

H.J.M. 8:11 AM  

NO SPOILER ALERT??????

I can'r believe that Citizen Kane has been ruined for me for all time by the spoiler in 66A. Oh the humanity!

But I imagine that enough screwdrivers will get you pretty tight. And make your lips pretty loose.

Anonymous 8:16 AM  

I was left with _ROC and _ONI_N in the NW corner. Had to resort to looking up.

mmorgan 8:16 AM  

I was going back and forth between thinking the theme was cute and cutesy, and landed on cute. And clever. With a solid gimmick/hook like this, I tend to barely notice stale fill. I just live with it and take it in stride. But then when I see a puzzle that has little to no trite fill, I really appreciate the difference.

Son Volt 8:24 AM  

Fun theme - awkwardly filled. Two texting clues to start set the stage. Liked ERSATZ, PINTO and PURGES.

Never bought into the cool jazz thing but always liked CHET’s version of this gem

8d is a little obtuse - there are other requirements needed to classify as KOSHER. The ROTGUT - CHUG pair was neat.

I liked the theme just fine.

The great one

Fun_CFO 8:36 AM  

KITs are the whole uniform, not just jerseys. We (American football fans) don’t really reference NFL players as “footballers”, while European soccer players are commonly known as “footballers”, and their uniforms are KITs.

I thought this was a decent midweek puzzle. Wednesdays kind of get lost in the week and I thought this hit the right balance. The core theme was good, but easy. Having the six starred clues, appropriately placed, gave it some needed depth. Also agree the rest of the grid was a bit rough.

Anonymous 8:37 AM  

I thought it was actually a strong review.

Anonymous 8:39 AM  

Lots of gimmes balanced out by tougher cluing further down the puzzle, felt medium overall. Took a while to get the theme answers

Only reason I knew KIT was from Ted Lasso - the KITman was an ever present character in the locker room

RooMonster 8:41 AM  

Hey All !
Seemed like a very chopped up grid. Wondered why, then discovered as I solved. Ah, six extra Themers to contend with the Three Long Themers. Actually impressive, to get 9(!) Themers in a 15x15 grid. The price to pay is 44 Blockers, yeesh. But surprisingly, there isn't as many threes as it seems there was. 20, a bit high on threes, but seems upon first look at the grid, there'd be more.

Got Revealer first, then looked at 19A Themer, saw it was RIGHTYTIGHTY, and immediately filled in 36A partner. Had a couple of the Short Themers already in, with realizing I was missing TIGHT and LOOSE, and when I got the Long Themers, said "Aha! The Themers on the LEFT need LOOSE in front of them, and the ones on the RIGHT need to be followed by TIGHT." Pretty neat.

So it turned into a nice WedsPuz. So many Themers, two in each section, tough to get clean fill. Came out pretty decent. Nice job, Rich.

Two F's
RooMonster
DarrinV

burtonkd 8:45 AM  

Soccer players (footballers). Cyclists also wear KITS. Was surprised the first time someone told me "Nice new KIT" when I had on fresh lycra:)

Characteristic sound of Yoko Ono =
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7GMHl7bmlzw&ab_channel=TheMuseumofModernArt

Say what you will about text-speak OTOH and IMHO, but it is not old, creaky, 20th century fill. Complaints are an example of someone who has done too many puzzles getting triggered too easily. (Maybe I'll get there someday...)

Same NW corner has unimpeachable CHET Baker, the beautiful (albeit vowel-laden IONIAN Islands), a delicious TORTE, the descriptive and colloquial ROTGUT, lithe ballet dancers ONTOE, perhaps painted by yesterday's EDGAR, memories of childhood with a (loose)TOOTH. All while being intersected by 2 thematic elements.

Cars I've mostly seen in xwords: IROC and TTOP

JJ 8:49 AM  

For the Yoko Ono clue I immediately put in NOISE

Whatsername 8:49 AM  

I liked the puzzle and admired the theme structure - not just the answers, but also the cleverness of the RIGHTY/LEFTY grid layout. Not much resistance in the fill, but the theme did make me stop and think for every entry. KIT threw me briefly as every footballer I know wears a uniform called a uniform. Overall though, no complaints on this really nice Wednesday.

Gary Jugert 8:56 AM  

This mostly makes sense except for the SCREWDRIVER. Why not SOCKETWRENCH, or FINGERS, or PLIERS, or STRINGWINDER, or basically every tool ever made to turn anything, except pipe fitting stuff, and motors, which often goes the opposite direction. But even then, tools are tools, and like a gender-fluid nightclubber on ecstasy, they can go either way. The more significant design in question is the direction of the inclined helix around an axis. I suppose everyone has a favorite way to screw, eh?

Otherwise, the puzzle was fun to work.

ERSATZ is my 17th favorite word just a skosh above SKOSH. Also a fan of ROTGUT.

Uniclues:

1 Ballet makes me sick.
2 What a hat-hating French poodle does.
3 Colt gone to the dark side.
4 Talent show star sent to rehab.

1 NAUSEATED ON TOE (~)
2 YAP AT BERETS
3 EVIL PINTO TYKE (~)
4 IDOL CHUG IDLED (~)

My Fascinating Crossword Uniclue Keepsake from Last Year: The uncomfortable feeling things could be way more exciting. DECAF'S PAIN. 

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Nancy 9:03 AM  

If I had ever heard that mnemonic even once, my life might have been completely different. Who knows -- I might be really handy, a DIY-er, maybe even a building superintendent. Because it's not just SCREWDRIVERS, I'm pretty sure. It's radiators. And light bulbs. But not faucets. RIGHTY?

I'm such a klutz when it comes to physical objects and how they work. Why did no one ever give me this mnemonic?

It would have been helpful to know it here, too. But happily it was inferable -- even though I don't know my SEA green from my PEA green.

Just the RIGHTY amount of crunch, I thought. I found the puzzle interesting and enjoyable. My main problem came in the NE, before I had figured out the trick, when I had the S and so wanted SNUG for "close-fitting". It didn't help that I have no idea why a KIT is a footballer's uniform. Nor that I really didn't know what a bobblehead does. Both KIT and NOD only came in once I had the SKIN of skintight.

My favorite clue/answer was hooch/ROTGUT. It reminds me of Rahar's -- the only pub near the Smith College campus. Students went there because there was no other place to go. Every drink they served tasted either like nail polish or lighter fluid.

SusanA 9:14 AM  

Well, newish solver here - learning to do the NYT Xword was an on-again-off-again C19 project, and have been at it daily about a year.
This was easily the most fun in a while. I sailed along, able to resolve my poor guesses with crossers.
As for the fill Rex disliked… an absence of sports and fishing trivia had me smiling. Yes, the NW was a bit dull, at first I thought it was TTOP, and had to leave it blank for a bit.
OTOH is the least of what has lately become far too many weird short forms that I wonder if anyone uses even in text messages IMHO.
I thought the middle top was fun, with KOSHER, PINTO, CHUG and also liked PICO and NAUSEATED.
Yes, I had to look up IONIAN but the themers made me smile.
Despite having my own tools since my first apartment, I only learned this mnemonic after becoming a homeowner. And may have learned it from Mag Ruffman’s show, A Repair To Remember.
I did find it easy for a Wednesday, and fast, for me.

Thanks for your fun column, I look forward to it after every solve.




beverly c 9:16 AM  

Stumped on the top half with that NW corner initially. Bottom filled pretty well, and then I saw that LEFTY LOOSEY, RIGHTY TIGHTY would fit with a couple of errors removed. Ah ha! It was like opening little gifts to see how the right/tight, left/loose would work along the edges. Thanks Rich! Nice!

PS. Thanks @burtonkd for mentioning the good fill in the NW. IONIAN is fair and ROTGUT is very colorful - it almost stumped me!

Anonymous 9:17 AM  

How is that unfair? Soccer is called football by billions of people. And even the US soccer leagues refer to the uniforms as “kits.”

Ben 9:23 AM  

"61A: Characteristic sound of Yoko Ono? (LONG 'O') — a 'letteral' clue, asking you to consider 'Yoko Ono' not as a musician but solely as a name—a name containing four LONG 'O's."

Personally, I never consider Yoko Ono as a musician. Just ask Chuck Berry.

Rachel 9:27 AM  

Finally, a theme I really enjoyed! It's been a while. I got the gimmick first, as in I realized you need to add loose to the left side and tight to the right side, and then I pieced together the righty tighty and lefty loosey, and only then did I understand the screwdriver instructions clue, at the very end. I thought the theme was a piece of magic. So fun!

Greg P 9:31 AM  

1A/1D was almost a legitimate Natick. I had no idea for the car and pretty much any consonant would have worked for _ONIAN. Ionian is too common to be a real Natick, though I was familiar with the Sea and not the islands

Alice Pollard 9:38 AM  

KIT was ridiculous. YOKO is getting alot of crossword ink of late. it had to be HANG TIGHT because it's on the right, per the theme. Kinda liked the theme.... it did help get SKIN, I think I first had Slim . Medium Wednesday for me and I enjoyed it

Arysta 9:40 AM  

I liked this one pretty well. I clocked RIGHTYTIGHTY really early which revealed a lot of things.

I will say I hate every clue about Yoko Ono, and I wonder why there are SO many? People under a certain age just aren't going to be that familiar with her.

Kathy 9:41 AM  

Considering Yoko Ono not as a musician, but solely as a name…in this case I’m willing to let the shopworn long vowel answer slide!

I loved the theme, but the puzzle is chock full of crosswordese because of it. Someone suggested last week that themes should not be a hard and fast requirement on specific days and that some good puzzles might go begging as a result. I heartily agree. I will choose clever cluing and wordplay over themes (and construction feats) every time.

Carola 9:41 AM  

I loved it. The core mantra is one I use all the time, and it delighted me to see it get celebrity status in a crossword. And I thought the layout was genius. The first theme answer in the NE eluded me: after I had to discard Snug, I left it blank. But soon after, the TOOTH on the LEFT became a LOOSE TOOTH, and I pounced on LEAF, SLEEP, and LIPS - not HANG, though, because I could only think of "sit TIGHT" and had to wait for crosses. Last in: the footballer's KIT x SKIN. A real treat of a Wednesday, light-hearted and a lot of fun to solve.

Do-over: Snug before SKIN. Help from previous puzzles: IROC.

@Lewis 7:17, thank you for pointing out the ETRE clue - I never saw it, as crosses filled in the squares. Oh, what an "Oh" can do :)

AJ KIMMEL 9:43 AM  

The constructor has a tense problem. Joe was biding time in the Senate (hence, sen) but is still a Democrat (dem). A person who is a bit green is nauseous.

Nancy 9:50 AM  

"I really don’t understand these elaborate conceits that you don’t have to figure out to solve the puzzle" says @Iris.

I completely agree with you in principle, Iris -- it's just that I don't agree that you can necessarily solve this puzzle without knowing the theme. If you don't know KIT, as so many here didn't, how can you get to SKIN as the answer to "closefitting"? I think you really, really need that TIGHT.

@JJ -- I wanted the answer to the Yoko Ono clue to be RASPS.

G. Gipp 10:00 AM  

@Anonymous (9:17am)

Maybe so, but...

If you compare most super bowl wins by country to most world cup wins by country, the United States comes out way on top with 58 super bowl wins to Brazil's 6 world cup wins. It's not even a contest.

And we likely got way more CTE cases than any of those other countries, as well.

So we can call the uniforms anything damn thing we want, and no foreigners in their short shorts are gonna steal the name of our sacred sport.

So there!

Nancy 10:03 AM  

I can't tell you how often over the years, @Carola, your solving process/adventure has mirrored mine almost to the letter. The same initial errors. The same order of progression through the puzzle. The same timing of -- and reaction to -- our Aha Moments. It's almost uncanny.

I'm sure I've mentioned this before.

Anonymous 10:13 AM  

I’ve never seen Footballer used to refer to a player of American gridiron football. It’s always used for players of association football (soccer). Not unfair at all!

Leslie 10:16 AM  

Yes, most people say nauseous, but nauseated is correct. I forget why.

Teedmn 10:17 AM  

I saw SKIN TIGHT right away, wandered back to the LEFT and saw LOOSE TOOTH and then kind of forgot about the starred clues in order to fill in the theme answers. After RIGHTY TIGHTY went in, I mentally placed LEFTY LOOSEY in the SCREWDRIVER spot (because, as usual, I stopped reading the clue for 19A once I got to the first cross-reference), but it didn't fit. Of course, it showed up at 36A as promised and I solved to the bottom easily. I went back to look at the other starred clues and snorted a tad when I saw why SLEEP didn't rhyme.

Thanks, Rich Katz!

Jonathan Brown 10:28 AM  

My daughter’s Frozen obsession has turned the Casablanca heroine into a Disney Ice Princess in the recesses of my mind.

Peamut 10:29 AM  

Characteristic sound of Yoko Ono: atonal screaming LOL!

Whatsername 10:44 AM  

@G. Gipp (10:00) You tell ‘em!

@AJ KIMMEL (9:43) Yes he’s still a Dem, but the clue is fine because Joe was bidin’ his time in DEL/Delaware.

jberg 10:56 AM  

Contrary to my usual style, I figured out the trick right at the top--Snug wouldn't work with anything a bobblehead might do, and KIT seemed the only plausible answer for 10-D (for some reason, the English use the word KIT to refer to everything you have on at a particular moment--it's not limited to sports). So there was SKIN and it didn't make sense without an added TIGHT. But I still needed the long themers so see that it would sometimes be LOOSE -- and then I saw the left-right thing, and my admiration for the puzzle soared.

I thought ON TOE was fine, probably because my granddaughter is studying ballet intensely. YAP AT, OTOH...

I did check all the crosses before committing to IROC, though. I have to remember that it's a kind of Camaro, whatever that is. Do those letters stand for something, or is it just a misspelled boast?

@AJ Kimmel-- the answer is DEL, not DEm.

Carola 11:10 AM  

@Nancy 10:03, thank you for letting me know! That adds an extra smile to the day.

Beezer 11:11 AM  

I thought this was a very fun puzzle, and for whatever reason the “crosswordese” didn’t bother me at all. Plus, I learned what a KIT is, so you can’t beat that!

@Carola, I am SO with you on the mantra! I used to follow my Dad around when he would fix (or try to fix) things around the house and I learned the mantra early (plus the fact that the “pointy” screwdriver is a Philips-head). I guess since using tools isn’t an every day occurrence for me, I STILL say RIGHTYTIGHTY LEFTYLOOSEY every single time I use a screwdriver.

@Leslie…there are some folks that are persnickety about the use of nauseous versus nauseated (I am NOT one of them) but your observation made me look it up and I was still confused! Hah…I got a Merriam-Webster hit which basically says “who cares…everyone will know what you mean”!

EasyEd 11:13 AM  

Thought this was a fun puzzle, long on both theme and junk fill, so unfortunately not perfect. Hand up for pEA green and Snug fit! Kinda spot filled in using the junk fill and gradually got theme picture. Some time in London made KIT come to mind, otherwise would have had no idea, don’t recall use in USA. I remember vividly my introduction to the international stature of “soccer” at a meeting in Geneva with a European group. On a break from one meeting we were watching a World Cup match on TV when the conference manager came in and called everyone back to the meeting room. The room erupted with a series of vehement (but humorous) negatives at the idea of leaving the match and no one moved until there was a break in the action…






Gene 11:19 AM  

It seems to me that most everyone enjoys the NYT puzzles more than Rex (usually) does. 😁

Anonymous 11:31 AM  

Same. I did manage to solve though. The only letters that work phonetically with I_N and T_U are “a” and “o” — so with that narrowed down I was able to get TAU. IONIAN crossing IROC isn’t inferable, but that was my last missing square so I tried every letter until I got the happy music.

Anonymous 11:36 AM  

It’s DEL (Delaware), not dem.

Anonymous 11:42 AM  

At one point, “nauseous” meant causing nausea and “nauseated” meant affected by nausea. But now, they both mean the same thing primarily and the original usage of nauseous (“that rotten milk is nauseous”) has fallen out of use.

jb129 11:44 AM  

Awful.

Anonymous 11:45 AM  

Righty tighty, lefty loosey? Yeah, people say it. but anyone who's ever worked in the world of mechanical things cringes whe he hears it. It's always clockwise and counter clockwise. Except in the UK where it's clockwise an anti clockwise. Of course many English cars have fasteners which employ left hand threads, which utterly invalidate the righty tighty left loose nonsense.

GILL I. 11:47 AM  

RIGHTY TIGHTY???? and that had something to do with SCREW DRIVERS? Good gravy, this one flew RIGHTY over my head. I do, though, know people who say whitey tighties. Lets see...underwear versus screw drivers.

Then I get to that LEFTY thing and decided LOOpEY sounded about {right]... Is that another SCREW DRIVERS thing?

LIPS? Is that really you? I had no idea where Joe was bidin time. What Joe? DEL? is that LOOPEY LIPS?

PECK? You aren't a PINT? KILLED? I guess....SKIN is close fitting? See?....This is how it went for me. I've been doing puzzles a long time and this one screwed me. New solvers got the theme and had no trouble. This OLDER chica maybe needed a cold SCREW DRIVER or two and then get some SLEEP.

Thursday is gong to kill me.

johnk 11:51 AM  

I never heard the subject mnemonic device. I've just simply known what to do with the tool. Just as I knew what to do with this very easy, and quite enjoyable puzzle.
BTW, what's the name of the cocktail made with vodka & Milk of Magnesia? The Phillips Screwdriver.
I guess Fagliano must have too much to do these days, what with having to edit these larger crosswords AND write his regular mini page 3 ones. Today, he had CHIMP clued as a monkey. Wrong primate, Joe!

CT2Napa 12:01 PM  

Put in REED for "surf turf" and got LEAD from the crosses, so DNF'ed because in reviewing the puzz I don't read the clues.

LorrieJJ 12:06 PM  

For Yoko Ono, I wanted to put "screech" cause, if memory serves, those were her vocal contributions to John Lennon's songs. But too long.

Anonymous 12:10 PM  

ATV = all-terrain vehicle

egsforbreakfast 12:12 PM  

Wagner to Johann Strauss: Who's DANUBE?
Johann: oh, that's Richard Strauss.
Wagner: Guten tag, Richard. Do you Waltz?
Richard: No, IROC!

Did you hear about the acid-tripping dyslexic? He accidentally scored a DSL line. I mean, he was kinda bad, but he never DAREDEVIL.

Personally, I thought this was a very good puzzle given the severe constraints imposed by the top-notch theme. Thanks, Rich Katz. Ignore those poor dogs yelping at you.

What if this were a cooking blog?

Today we tasted a grilled cheese sandwich made with these ingredients:

1.Sicilian pane a l'antico rustico
2.Grosse Tomme de Bufflonne cheese
3.White Truffles gathered this morning in Umbria
4.Corno di Toro Italian peppers
5.Fresh mayonnaise made with Almazaras de la Subbetica olive oil from Spain

I'm never happy when I take the first bite of a sandwich and find that the bread is made with flour! I mean, flour? Sure, I suppose you might use flour out of desperation, but it certainly didn't bode well for the rest of the sandwich. But I'm expected to write about this stuff, so I continued in from the corner and found (wait for it) ...... cheese? Are you serious? Cheese, it turns out has been used in 44,264,982 grilled cheese recipes in the post Joy of Cooking era alone! Maybe if you've been eating for years you just ignore this kind of stuff, but I like to think about brand new eaters who are undoubtedly baffled about why you would use bread and cheese in your sandwich.

Taking another bite, I encountered a truffle, and I thought, "maybe this sandwich has some redeeming quality." But then I thought, why truffles? And in particular, why these truffles? But something else was bothering me and I couldn't put my finger on it until I took another bite and then the light bulb lit up! Corno di Toro peppers! I mean, sure, it fits into the sandwich ok, but they were already old a hundred years ago. Please do us all a favor, chefs, and drop this clunker from your ingredients list.

And the mayo. If you've got to use mayo in your sandwich, please call it something like "condiment named after a Minnesota clinic." Or better yet, just tear down your sandwich and rebuild it without mayo.


Signed, Rex Parker, Roi de Cuisine





Masked and Anonymous 12:15 PM  

Nice tight/loose/screwy puztheme mcguffin. Liked it.
fave themer: HANG LOOSE/TIGHT. But since it's a righty, U gotta screw it TIGHT -- right?

staff weeject pick: KIT. Gotta go with the most-discussed runt entry, here. Evidently it sorta means "soccer jersey". Sooo … Loosely fits, I reckon.

other fave stuff: NAUSEATED DAREDEVIL [Too bad they couldn't cross DAREDEVIL with EVEL, instead of EVIL]. ROTGUT. ERSATZ. ABCD [har].

Thanx for the fun, Mr. Katz dude. Everso slightly hardery than average WedPuz, at our house. Which works for m&e.

Masked & Anonymo4Us


**gruntz**

Whatsername 12:15 PM  

Echoing @Beeser’s response to @Leslie … what I found was that the word “nauseous” originally meant something which causes nausea. For example, the odor from the rotten eggs was nauseous. OTOH, “nauseated” was the proper way to express the feeling of experiencing nausea. The odor from the rotten eggs made me feel nauseated. However, as with many expressions over the course of time and repeated usage, either word is now considered acceptable.

Anonymous 12:19 PM  

IROC = international race of champions

Lauren 12:23 PM  

Thanks so much for John Prine. Made up for the bad fill.

Anonymous 12:37 PM  

I thought it was DEN (not the state).

jae 12:39 PM  

Easy but then I’ve screwed and unscrewed my fair share screws over the course of several decades…plus no erasures and no WOEs. So this week my Tuesday puzzle showed up on a Wednesday.

Clever and cute, liked it, but @Rex is right about the fill.

Bob Mills 1:14 PM  

I've been contradicted several times here regarding my scolding reference to the clue wherein "footballers" meant soccer players. Allow me to plead my case.

We're English speaking, but we're not in England. If there were no other way to identify a kid wearing a kit as a footballer, OK. But that isn't the case. "KIT" could be clued in various ways that have nothing to do with football OR soccer. If the constructor absolutely had to mean kids wearing T-shirts when referring to a KIT, then using "footballers" to describe those kids is very misleading. All the more reason to use soccer, a game played far more often than football among young children.

Picquart 1:16 PM  

I'm a new reader here, but must say I have already reached the conclusion that Rex has raised crossword criticism to the level of an art. He is making me aware of wheels with wheels of crosswordism of which I had no idea, though I've been doing the NYT puzzles for years, and found enjoyable many things in this puzzle that caused Rex pain.

And the number of readers here demonstrates the truth of what I'm saying, it seems to me!

Color me grateful!

JonnyZ 1:28 PM  

Tougher for me than others because I have somehow tightened and removed lids and screws all my life without ever hearing “Righty Tighty/Lefty Loosey”. Loosey? If you say so.

Kit definitely refers to soccer. ATV means All Terrain Vehicle.

On the whole I thought it was fun and on the easy side for Wednesday.

walrus 1:31 PM  

yet another recommendation to try solving downs only as far as possible—i lucked into “rightytighty” early on and avoided all the * trickiness. in addition the downs clueing seemed cleaner overall than the acrosses.

okanaganer 1:58 PM  

@Twangster 7:27 AM said: 'I expected Rex to mention that you can both "hang loose" and "hang tight."' Me too. In fact when I first saw the revealer, I thought well obviously we will put LOOSE before the answer, and TIGHT after the answer, to get congruent meanings. No, but that would be way cool! Though very difficult to achieve.

[Spelling Bee: Tues 0.]

okanaganer 1:59 PM  
This comment has been removed by the author.
Ralex 2:07 PM  

Bravo egsforbreakfast (12:12)!

Anonymous 2:18 PM  

They might be "texting-ese" but they are also obvious abbreviations for very common phrases. So I think it's fair.

Anonymous 2:45 PM  

I’m shocked by how many commenters have never heard the phrase “Righty tighty, lefty loosey.”

Anonymous 2:50 PM  

I think it's the other way round ... tighty whities. Just sayin'

Gary Jugert 4:43 PM  

@Anonymous 2:45 PM
Me too. Next thing kids won't be able to count back change.

gregmark 4:52 PM  

Biggest hurdle for me was knowing this phrase in the opposite order: LEFTY LOOSEY *then* RIGHTY TIGHTY.

dgd 5:25 PM  

Read Rex not comments yet.
Liked the puzzle more than Rex. Because the crosswordese made it an easy puzzle, and didn’t bother me at all and I liked the gimmick. Only holdup was Daredevil and Del. Forgot what a base jumper was for a bit didn’t see the joke at 58 down right away.
Interesting to see 2 answers from WW Ii
ERSATZ (meaning replacement in German) seeped into English usage. Wonder if it is obscure to young people now? And obviously loose lips sink ships.
BTW while the item Rex quoted about loose lips is accurate as far as it goes, J Edgar Hoover had no clue in dealing with spies The only reason why the eight German agents were immediately arrested in ‘41 was that one of them wanted to escape Nazi Germany and as soon as he was dropped off by a German sub on Long Island he called the FBI on the others. J. Edgar was able to keep this detail quiet. His greatest ability was self promotion.

Anoa Bob 5:46 PM  

I believe the word "nausea" comes from classic Greek meaning "sea sickness". Thus the similarity with "nautical". If you have ever been sea sick or had motion sickness you understand what nausea really is.

Got a whole drawer in my tool chest dedicated to SCREWDRIVERS. Never heard the RIGHTY LEFTY thing, always just remembered clockwise vs counterclockwise. Thought this puzzle was clever and well constructed, given the constraints of all that theme material.

orangeblossomspecial 7:40 PM  

Archie Bell was the brother of USC running back Ricky Bell. Unfortunately, Ricky developed a disease as a pro and died after five or six years of professional football.

CrosswordMantra 9:44 PM  

What a clever and engaging crossword puzzle! The theme of RIGHTY TIGHTY / LEFTY LOOSEY is brilliantly executed, weaving the mnemonic device into the grid with such finesse

JT 10:00 PM  

AJ KIMMEL - "Nauseated" is correct. Originally, "Nauseous" referred to something that CAUSED nausea. Over the years it has come to mean also the way someone feels. But nauseated is what many of us were taught to use, and nauseous was considered wrong.

CDilly52 11:02 PM  

I agree that this is a net positive review. Often, I try to remember that @Rex is a teacher and this review seems more focused on identifying weaknesses and offering alternative suggestions than some of his real rants.

CDilly52 11:34 PM  

@Lewis nailed this one, when he said Rich “idled” for a bit. That’s exactly how I imagined this puzzle’s development might have worked. I revere all of you constructors. It’s not a gift I possess.

Often, I think it likely that a constructor has an idea for a theme but doesn’t quite have all the ingredients for a “complete dish.” When working a puzzle of this ilk, I ponder how long it might have taken and by what route the constructor(s) arrived at the finished product.

Today, I’d bet the farm that we actually got to see the process, and that made this lots of fun for this long time solver. Fun and cleverness at this level allow me to forgive and forget the crosswordese (and yep, there’s a lot of it today) as I enjoy my trip through the grid looking for more “loose” and “tight” things.

And enjoy I did. There was a momentary thought of “Is that all there is?” even after I turned the blank spaces at 54A into SCREWDRIVERS, because I had been putting together some Ikea storage pieces earlier today with my three different SCREWDRIVERS and guessed correctly on the tool immediately after entering the righty and lefty parts of the grid. Consequently, when I hit SKIN at 9A (my first second level theme answer after getting the first level ones done) I said “Oh, wow!” glanced back quickly at my earliest NW entries and chuckled at the (loose) TOOTH. The remainder of the solve was so delightful as I looked forward to all the other theme entries.

As a bonus, Rich nearly got me a DNF. The SE corner took me way too long, and I had it all except CUE and LONG O. For whatever reason, I just couldn’t get away from Yoko’s persona, her family, her music and her voice. The use if the word “sound” also misled me perfectly. Perhaps I was so engrossed in the theme that my brain just disconnected from the cleverness of these two last clues. I finally sussed out “oh, literal sound of Yoko’s name,” and “oh, breaking like 8 Ball!” Sheesh. All told though, what a delightful solve. Thanks Rich. I agree with @Lewis. More please.

Anonymous 2:54 AM  

HANG tight
HANG loose
SKIN tight
loose SKIN
SLEEP tight
loose [lose] SLEEP
loose LIPS
tight LIPped
but flip for TOOTH

Adam12 11:02 AM  

Horrific solving experience. As a heart surgeon, the redeeming FYI clue was MITRE. More Catholic than British but it’s the name origin of the mitral valve which to some, looks like a Bishop’s hat when viewed upside down.

kitshef 8:22 AM  

Liked it just fine. Don't understand @Bob Mills' objection. You hear 'football player', you think gridiron. You hear 'footballer', you think soccer.

Aviatrix 12:54 AM  

Fascinating how unfamiliar Americans seem to be with the word KIT applying to equipment. I guess it arose in English after the American revolution. It's just a normal word for the equipment appropriate to something, so military kit, cycling kit, soccer kit, "Pack Up Your Troubles in Your Old Kit Bag" ...

I see ONTOE and I know Rex will whine, but that's his bit.

Anonymous 10:49 AM  

This puzzle could have used a bit of editing.
Will Shortz > Joel Fagliano

spacecraft 11:09 AM  

Cutesy, but oh my, the fill! Take the SE corner. Please. SCENEV? LONGO?? I was positively NAUSEATED. That corner needs to be PURGEd.

A no-know at 1-across didn't help. Luckily I knew IONIAN. Clue for CHUG was new to me. Then the desperado letter string ABCD. Really?

Theme was SKIN tight but too obvious. A clunker all the way around. Double-bogey.

Wordle birdie...that's 5 in a row. (Just signed my death warrant for tomorrow.)

Burma Shave 12:15 PM  

TIGHT (LOOSE?) ROTGUT USER

ABE tried non-KOSHER one DAY,
it LEFT him NAUSEATED,
he’d CHUG SCREWDRIVERS RIGHT AWAY,
that DAREDEVIL was ELATED.

--- CHET PECK

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