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Rearrange to fit, jocularly / SAT 5-25-24 / Vocally negative fans, in sports slang / Old currency of Massachusetts / Shot with English / Drag through Hollywood / Sub-Saharan menaces / Religiously mandated surname for Sikh men
Saturday, May 25, 2024
Constructor: David P. Williams
Relative difficulty: Easy
Word of the Day: Reggaetón (3D: Reggaetón, e.g. => MÚSICA) —
Reggaeton (UK: /ˈrɛɡeɪtoʊn, ˌrɛɡeɪˈtɒn/, US: /ˌrɛɡeɪˈtoʊn, ˌreɪɡ-/), also known as reggaetón or reguetón, (Spanish: [reɣeˈton]) is a modern style of popular and electronic music that originated in Panamá during the late 1980s, and which rose to prominence in the late 1990s and early 2000s through a plethora of Puerto Rican musicians. It has been popularized and dominated by artists from Puerto Rico since the early 1990s.It has evolved from dancehall, with elements of hip hop, Latin American, and Caribbean music. Vocals include toasting/rapping and singing, typically in Spanish.
Reggaetón, today, is regarded as one of the most popular music genres, worldwide; it is the top music genre among the Spanish-speaking Caribbean nations and one of the primary modern genres within the Spanish-language music industry. [...]
Several established, world-famous performers—notably Puerto Rican-American Jennifer Lopez and Shakira from Colombia—have embraced the style, recording numerous duets and collaborations with top reggaetoneros. Several other emerging international artists are seeing success in the genre as well, including Catalán-Spanish singer Bad Gyal (from Barcelona) and trilingual Brazilian star Anitta (from Rio de Janeiro). Mexican-American singer Becky G (from Los Angeles, California) has experienced huge success in recent years, as a Latino American artist in the reggaetón genre. In 2004, Daddy Yankee released his smash single “Gasolina”, regarded by many as the first globally-successful reggaetón song; Daddy Yankee is credited with bringing the style to western pop music listeners.
• • •
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| [21D: Setting for the classic film line "I don't have to show you any stinkin' badges!"] |
I got ASCII easily but can never remember what it stands for (American Standard Code for Information Interchange, wow, yeah, stick with ASCII). Wait, was King MIDAS real? The "everything I touch turns to gold" one, I mean. I think that I did not know that. I assume the gold thing was a myth. Looks like the famous Midas was a probably real king to whom legendary powers were ascribed (thanks, Ovid and Nathaniel Hawthorne and others!). You gotta ascribe *most* things about a king when he reigned in the 2nd millennium B.C.E, before the (putative) Trojan War! Anyway, Midas's dad was Gordias, of "Gordian Knot" fame. Must've been awesome to live in magical times. Unless you accidentally turned your daughter into gold, that would suck. But we don't live in magical times—we live in the age of ASSHAT, it seems (would love to see this term disappear from my crossword forever instead of seeing it seemingly every other week) (I've actually only seen it four times in the NYTXW ... but twice in six days now!). Put ASSHAT on HIATUS! Also would love never to see TASE, which for me is irrevocably associated with police violence. It was my final word today, and a real downer of a way to end an otherwise joyful solving experience.
Notes:
- 1A: Old currency of Massachusetts (WAMPUM) — first thought: SALEMS, which is making me cough-laugh at my computer right now. "'Gimme five SALEMS for a quarter,' we'd say!" WAMPUM were of course beads used as a kind of currency by certain northeastern Native American tribes, though it had other functions as well ("storytelling, ceremonial gifts, and recording important treaties and historical events").
- 12D: Sub stack? (SALAMI) — sub sandwich. I was imagining a stack of papers for the substitute teacher to grade, and thought "you'd have to make me a longterm sub to get me to do any damn grading, that's for sure."
- 14D: Drag through Hollywood (SUNSET STRIP) — I liked the way it felt for my brain to cycle through the "drag" meanings, from drag show, to the act of physically dragging something/someone, to metaphorically dragging someone, i.e. subjecting them to harsh but deserved criticism ("drag him!") (see Gen Z slang word No. 35, here), to finally the correct meaning, drag as slang for street or road.
- 39D: Shot with English (MASSÉ) — this is a billiards term. "English" is also a billiards term (sidespin applied to the cue ball). So is "shot," I guess. Anyway, billiards is the context. MASSÉ = "a shot in billiards or pool made by hitting the cue ball vertically or nearly vertically on the side to drive it around one ball in order to strike another" (merriam-webster.com).
[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]
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101 comments:
Nice puzzle. My favorite entry was FESTIVUS.
In the movie, the bandido curiously says "any" stinkin' badges. In riffs off that line it's usually "no" stinkin' badges, including in Blazing Saddles.
Could someone explain Bea as an apt name for a spelling champ?
My Saturday average is just over 38 minutes - I don't try for speed, but that's the time shown in my stats. Today, still not trying for speed, I finished in 7:40.
All the longs that I guessed were correct and it was over in a flash. I'll go back to the archives for a challenge.
Spelling bee
could someone explain 'bargain hunters of a sort' as a clue for 'unions'? Labor unions seek bargains, I guess?
Fun easy Saturday! My only gripe is that Tom Cruise’s character is Maverick, not Mav. And “nickname” doesn’t work as clued cause Maverick is already a nickname. I ran through all their call signs (Maverick, Goose, Merlin, Iceman…) and couldn’t get it til the crosses put it in.
Of the four times ASSHAT has appeared in the NYT Crossword Joel Fagliano was the editor twice and the constructor once. I guess he thinks it’s edgy.
The clue for OCTETS (Big bands) seems “off” to me, and at the very least, excessively arbitrary. What constitutes a “big” band ? Is an orchestra not a “big band” of sorts? How many members to they have - 25, 50? Were the Beatles a “band”, or maybe a “small band” ? The clue seems lazy and the editors may want to nosh on that one a bit.
Agree with OFL - way too many appearances by ASS and its relatives such as ASSHAT. We’ve used up our quota for all of 2024 and it’s not even Memorial Day.
I wonder how many people are still alive today because they were TASED instead of being shot.
One of the primary jobs of labor unions is “collective bargaining,” a niche term for hammering out a contract with the employer.
I feel for anyone not familiar with ASCII or MARTI today, as really any vowel but U looks reasonable for the down, and any letter at all looks good for the across.
Went to Kenya earlier this year, mostly looking for snakes. Saw some great stuff - rhinoceros vipers, boomslang, rough-scaled bush viper (much more interesting than it sounds), but no MAMBAS.
King MIDAS in Reverse
Maverick is his call sign. Mav is a nickname, used all the time in the movie.
Union contracts are often known as collective bargaining agreements.
Easiest Saturday in a while or easiest Saturday ever? I started WAMPUM>WIFFLE>FOIST and barely slowed down after that. Like OFL's description of hitting all the green lights, which I do occasionally on the nearby "strip" where all supermarkets and chain stores are. Fun when that happens.
Speaking of strip, I bet some of us started humming the theme to 77 SUNSETSTRIP and asking Kookie to lend us his comb after that answer. Apologies to all the youngsters out there. You also missed seeing Willie Mays make a BASKETCATCH in real time. Those were the days, my friend.
I would rather run into ASSHAT, which always makes me giggle, than ASCII, which I can never remember. Maybe next time.
Well done you, DPW. Double Plus Whooshes all over the place, and thanks for all the fun.
@SouthsideJohnny: I tried nonETS first because I knew that that’s the largest standard “-et” term for a musical ensemble. When that didn’t work, I toyed with the semi-serious jazz term tenTETS, which of course didn’t fit. I also felt somewhat let down when the big bands turned out to be mere OCTETS.
Otherwise, total agreement with OFL. A breezy Friday puzzle, finished in half my usual Saturday time.
Once again – this if four times in a row, now – David has filled in this elegant uber-low 66-word grid design cleanly. Spotlessly, actually. That’s tough enough to accomplish once – try it sometime! – and here it seems habitual. Wow!
Not only spotless, but gorgeous answers all around, a grid bathed in beauty: WAMPUM, FOIST, PULL STRINGS, BASKET CATCH, HIATUS, AGE OUT, PACK IT IN, GAUCHE, BOO BIRDS, ALL EARS, and WIFFLE.
WIFFLE! Who can’t smile at WIFFLE?
Not only gorgeous answers, but pop spread all over – especially in the grid’s major bones, the six answers of the crossing triple stacks, none of which has appeared in the 80 years of Times puzzles more than three times before. Again, wow!
That pop, for me, was boosted with lots of yippee in the solve, sweet splat-fill thrills; yet, for me, enough bite to keep things honest, a most lovely combination. To add to the good vibes, the rebel in me liked seeing GAUCHE on the right, and I enjoyed seeing HACKS show up, a series I’ve adored, including the current season.
Thus, beauty and bounty in the box, and my day is so much richer for having done your puzzle, David. Thank you so much for making this!
I enjoyed this one a lot. It helped hugely that I knew MARTI.
There were various slow-downs ( I wanted wedge for “piece of the pie”) and re-writes and clues that initially seemed unknowable but became clear - so satisfying!
Lovely fun lively puzzle! The fact that it was “easy for a Saturday” bothers me not a whit. I had always thought it was a WhIFFLE ball, but there you go.
The NW was the only section that had any late week resistance. The rest of the puzzle went in at early week speed. In the SE I never read the clues for GAP, TASE or OCTETS. Nice looking puzzle but out of place on a Saturday.
MAMBA and CIRRI are SB classics. Speaking of which....
yd -0. QB41, @Okanaganer thanks for the congrats but you were a day early I hit 40 back in early March. That steak was ended by ARRANCINI
Easy until the SE corner, which made it Medium for me.
At 28D, I confused Spanish with French and tried to get CINq to stretch to five letters.
32A: circus CATCH before BASKET (fixed quickly, because 14D had to be SUNSET STRIP)
35D: loUCHE before GAUCHE, leading to lAg before GAP at 35A
37D: scentS before PETALS
43A: slice before CRUST
I agree with OFL and several posters: enjoyable Friday-on-Saturday.
FH
Very easy - - even if it had been a Friday. More like a Wednesday. I finished in a tad over 8 minutes which, for me, is very quick on a Saturday, which normally averages more like 25. Did the whole NW in about 90 seconds.
After struggling yesterday where many of you didn't, I whooshed through this one at breakneck speed. Every answer turned out to be exactly what I thought it would be when I read the clue and when I didn't know immediately, like with WAMPUM, the right crosses were immediately available to help me. There was no junk; the entries felt lively; and I found it quite enjoyable.
Some thoughts:
I always thought FESTIVUS was a made-up holiday invented by George Costanza's father on "Seinfeld." It's a real holiday?
Can we please lose ASSHAT? I'd never heard the expression ever -- and now I've seen it twice in less than a month in the NYTXW. Once was already too much.
The History of Baseball According to Nancy:
The BASKET CATCH was invented by Willie Mays of the New York Giants. (Don't let it be forgot that once there was a team called the New York Giants that was not a football team.) No one had ever caught a ball in such a manner before. Willie's most famous BASKET CATCH was off of Vic Wertz in a World Series game. But it was the throw from center field afterwards that made everyone ooh and ahh. You should Google the play.
In 1957, the evil owner Horace Stoneham whisked the Giants off to San Francisco, never to be seen IRL again. And no one other than Willie Mays ever made a BASKET CATCH after that. Don't tell me that they did, because if I never saw it, it doesn't count. After the evil Horace Stoneham took my team away from me, I stopped watching baseball entirely. Well, I did make a brief attempt to switch my allegiance to the hapless Mets, but it was unsuccessful and very short-lived.
And that, Dear Reader, is my very brief history of the BASKET CATCH.
Too hard in the NW and SE for me to finish. I wanted 'solstice" instead of FESTIVUS and "epicera" instead of EPOCHAL. No clue about MAV, I guess because I don't watch nighttime TV.
Very frustrating, because I got the long stuff in the middle (SECRETCODES and SIERRAMADRE).
How do spies use SECRET CODES for disguise?
I can't go as far as 'easy' but if it took a half hour and a couple 'not quite cheating' lookarounds it must be. 'slice' on top of 'marinara' when it was CRUST on top of SRIRACHA reminded me what day of the week it was. Complete slowdown in the SW too. Know no MASSE and couldn't unpack UNIONS and HIATUS. Only beef: didnt like REROLL. That's what you do when your roll is cockeyed or out of bounds, different from playing your roll and taking another one. But this was pure joy all around, for all the reasons Rex already mentioned. And one he didn't. AREOLA.
@kitshef am intrigued you went to Kenya for the snakes. I go for the birds. I heard many snakes had escaped the reptile zoo there in Nairobi during the recent floods, causing a fair amount of alarm.
I had some trouble in the NW corner for sure. I could not remember LUCY, even though Anne of Green Gables was one my favs so that made me sad. I had IGUANAS and ETA or D but that was it until I looked up LUCY. But i agree with Rex, this one made me smile! So many great answers. Nice work.
@Rick collective Bargaining I assume.
I see that Rex posted Willie Mays's BASKET CATCH at the top of his column. Well done, Rex!! And Rex, who probably wouldn't have even been born when the catch was made, almost certainly wouldn't have watched it in real time as I did. Making his tribute to Willie even more notable and praise-worthy.
Hey All !
I have a good friend named David William. It was Williams, but somewhere along the way, the S was deleted by the DMV, or someone, accidentally. So, he went the easy way and just dropped the S off everything. Otherwise, what a hassle to try to get it changed. This constructor is not him, BTW. I believe my fridge middle initial is even P.
Ended up as an easy puz. Did get stuck in a few spots, but the ole brain decided it would help me today and I managed to gain ground quickly. Final timer says 16:06, which for me is like flames coming from my tracks, I e. Quite fast.
Another grid similar to YesterPuz. I agree with Rex, the FriPuz and SatPuz were switched. But, the easiness makes me feel smart this morning!
CIRRI, one of the three five-letter C words I have memorized for the SB. Speaking of which, missed quite a few normal/regular words YesterBee. Going over the list, it amazes me how I can miss such easy words! Ah, so it goes. Silly brain.
Anyway, enjoy your Saturday, and Memorial Day Weekend!
Two F's
RooMonster
DarrinV
There's a Saturday. Stymied at every turn. Answers I shrugged at going, "Well, I guess that's it. I'll check with 🦖 to find out what that means." Looking at you MASSE. And a complete sigh of relief when the finished sign popped up.
Overall, I found it fine, but not wonderful. The longer fill isn't glittery enough to overcome the irksomeness of the obscure proper nouns and a foreign language math puzzle.
FESTIVUS is hilarious. My favorite part of the celebration is the airing of grievances.
Propers: 6
Places: 5
Products: 3
Partials: 2
Foreignisms: 3
--
Gary's Grid Gunk Gauge: 19 (29%)
Tee-Hee: ASSHAT is having a good week. Maybe Joel is helping with the slush pile since the crossword staff is likely starting to take vacations from not editing the puzzles. AREOLA crossing BOOB is like a fingerprint left by the 5th grader in charge. I did put in DOUCHE before GAUCHE having more faith in the tee-hee-iness of the NYTXW team than I should.
Uniclues:
1 Snakes on retainer.
2 Lizard knocker.
3 Climbs up the wall trellis.
4 Antony and Cleopatra, Diana and Charles, Henry VIII and The Six, and, of course, me and my wife.
5 Banana splits times 2.666667.
6 Warming the bench after the plastic bat incident.
7 Haters referencing your mom's weight.
8 One who never listens listening.
1 WAMPUM MAMBAS
2 IGUANA'S AREOLA
3 HACKS ROMEO GAP
4 EPOCHAL UNIONS (~)
5 SUNDAE OCTETS
6 WIFFLE HIATUS
7 GAUCHE BOO BIRDS (~)
8 ALL EARS ASSHAT
My Fascinating Crossword Uniclue Keepsake from Last Year: Result of the Downton Abbey staff walkout. LORD IRONED.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
SUNSETSTRIP is in West Hollywood, not Hollywood.
Not the same place. Not even the same city.
This was more like a Thursday for me — just two minutes away from my fastest Saturday. And what is it with ASSHAT? Seems like it’s in every puzzle now.
Yup. Easy and breezy, but in a fun way that didn't just spoon-feed the answers.
I will happily welcome ASSHAT in future puzzles; it's not outdated, not terribly offensive, and most importantly, hilarious. It's a fantastic term. I would also welcome "douche canoe".
Third Eye
(This one's not for the weak-hearted)
Ahh of course, thank you
@Alice Scott 7:04 AM
On his tombstone they'll remember him as the man who put the Tee-(hee) in the NYT.
Take a look at who just popped up here -- and after all this time -- at 9:14!!!
My “Drag through Hollywood” was confidently put in as the “pride parade”
Like @puzzlehoarder, NW was the trickiest, but I loved it when I finished: FESTIVUS for the rest of us, WIFFLE, Fun facts about IGUANAS FOISTed on us, WAMPUM the really old currency.
OCTET/nonET a kind of KEALOA. @Southside, this would be more for a jazz band than a rock band or classical orchestra. These appear frequently, surprised they even register with a long time solver such as yourself.
Thanks mathgent for reminding me that my lowbrow tastes knew about Stinkin Badges from Blazing Saddles, rather than the Bogart film.
MASSE: the least used pool shot IRL is the most used in crosswords:)
Big bands are usually at least 17 people. An octet is a singer, a rhythm section and three or four soloists.
I whooshed out WALK OF STARS for the Hollywood drag early on... but after recovering from that stumble I found this fast, breezy and fun. @John X: I spent many happy hours of my youth going to great shows at The Whiskey and The Roxy (saw Genesis at the Roxy in 1973, when Phil Collins still had hair), and everyone I knew in Orange County referred to The Strip as Hollywood. Incorrectly, apparently. Is geography, like language, defined by usage?
In Monopoly, rolling doubles requires you to roll again, vs a REROLL which implies something went wrong with the original roll (such as a die falling to the floor).
Gotta agree with OFL. Lately, I’ve been DNFing the Fridays and solving the Saturdays. Weird.
Mayday, mayday, Mav's in trouble. He's in a flat spin, he's heading out to sea.
SIAM was the k to answer I had after my first pass at acrosses. That god me BOOBIRDS but nothing else. My first pass at downs was better. SIERRA MADRE, a classic film I’ve been meaning to rewatch. That got me a few crosses that then allowed for SUNSET STRIP, MASTERMINDS and BASKET CATCH. Pi quickly had the entire middle done except for ASCII and BIERE. I fell for the misdirect on ASCII and thought a Brasserie was a bakery.
Those corners killed me today. Every one of them felt impenetrable to me. I wound up having to reveal a word for each corner to get me any traction. I smiled at FESTIVUS. Jerry Stiller RIP. I chuckled at SALAMI. my only real bone of contention is MAV. I haven’t seen too gun since I was about 12 and saw it in the theater but MAVERICK is the nickname, right?
Alright, fair! And you’d know Goose!
Festivus is a made up holiday from Seinfeld, but still due to the lore it is a holiday celebrated on Christmas Eve Eve. And some people actually do celebrate it in real life now! I see it all over social media every December 23rd.
My canine rearing advice to @Andrew: When the dog commands, the MASTERMINDS.
What AMI, SALAMI? YeSIAM. But it's better than Groucho, who was a GAUCHE gaucho.
If you remember when Willie Mays played in SF, you may know that after practicing his patented BASKETCATCH, he used to relax, swim, BASK ETC AT CHina Beach.
It's great to be an "It Girl" until you're UNIT.
I'm floored by how easy this was. Monday on Saturday. A nice Monday, though. Thanks, David P.Williams.
P.S. Nice to see that @John X has returned. Please hang around this time.
One of the definitions of disguise is “to obscure the existence or true state or character of : CONCEAL.”
Easy peasy. Loved FESTIVUS! Although, I needed a few crosses to get that one. Forgot the specifics of that Seinfeld episode. Also loved BASKET CATCH. Reminded me of the Say Hey Kid, Willie Mays, who was known for it.
I love reptiles, and always have at least a few as pets, so IGUANAS snd MAMBAS were fun to see (at least in the puzzle). I have no interest seeing a mamba face-to-face. But I am reminded of a time I was in Aruba. At breakfast on the hotel veranda, the island’s large IGUANAS would come around looking for scraps, to the chagrin of many guests. I, on the other hand, loved to feed these cute little dinosaurs by hand, to the chagrin of the guests (again). My daughter took a picture of me hand-feeding a piece of melon to one of the more gregarious lizards, while in front of the sign that said, "Please don’t feed the animals". Made for a nice picture. Fun times!
I didn't feel the same wooshy-woosh as Rex did, but that's OK. I still finished with a faster-than-average time (for me, anyway), so the woosh must have been there. I just never felt it.
For the life of me, I'll never remember how to spell SRIRAwhateverthelettersareCHACHACHA. But I'll put some on my scrambled eggs this morning.
This! When you roll doubles in Monopoly, you move your dog or top hat or iron that many spaces, then ROLL AGAIN. “Reroll” implies that you forfeit your original doubles roll and roll the dice again before moving.
Shout out to @egs!
Not only is your implied puppywhipped observation at 10:23 as to who owns whom APT (or UNIT, in real estate lingo), your puns are consistently the best on this site.
Though the Bask Etc at China Beach was the most tortured since the George W. Bush administration…
Yup, very easy and easier than yesterday’s which, in retrospect, I should have rated easy-medium. No erasures and no WOEs and a boat load of whoosh.
Tons of sparkle…FESTIVUS, SRIRACHA…liked it a bunch. This would have been a fine mid week themeless.
@Nancy @egs Thanks for the greetings. The rumors of my death were only slightly exaggerated.
@Megafrim 9:44 AM West Hollywood has always been a separate entity from Hollywood. Originally, West Hollywood was a section of unincorporated Los Angeles County that was not within the Los Angeles city limits; therefore, it was not under the jurisdiction of the LAPD. Gambling was illegal in LA City but legal in LA County, so casinos flourished there. County sheriffs were the police (then and now) and they were much more easily bribed (then and now) so a nightclub scene also flourished there (then and now). This is what is known as the SUNSETSTRIP and it is entirely in West Hollywood for those reasons, between Crescent Heights and Doheny.
In 1984 West Hollywood incorporated as its own city, with a mayor, city council, etc. They still contract LA County Sheriffs and LA County Fire Department for services. So it is an actual city that is not City of Los Angeles. There no more casinos (or are there?) but there's still a strong nightclub scene. But now even that's being lost to redevelopment; the Viper Room, which has been a club under several names (my favorite was "Filthy McNasty's") is scheduled for demolition, to be replaced by another ugly condo.
Hollywood, on the other hand, is a district entirely within the City of Los Angeles, generally the postal zip code 90038 (the Hollywood Post Office is a historic building, unchanged since 1937). Hollywood has no government other than LA City, uses LAPD for police, and LA City Fire Department. The only major film studio complex actually in Hollywood is Paramount Pictures, although there are several independent production facilities, such as Raleigh Studios, Sunset Las Palmas Studios, Sunset Gower, RED, Sunset Bronson, etc.
This has been your Hollywood/West Hollywood history and geography lesson. The test will be on Wednesday at 1 PM in the study hall. I'm not going to make any Orange County jokes.
Wow. It just goes to show how wavelength/wheelhouse can affect your solve. I felt the whoosh yesterday but today it was a “faith solve” since my first pass at across only gave me IGUANAS, FESTIVUS, and SRIRACHA, whence I went into criss-cross solving slowly working my through. Anyway, it did play like Saturday for me, so I got my money’s worth.
I’m not a language prude but for whatever reason I find the term ASSHAT to be particularly vulgar, so I join in the chorus of voices against its use in puzzles.
Oddly, I had just recently learned that if one changes to the Sikh religion (let’s say Hindu to Sikh) you must change your last name to SINGH. I THINK it is due to its rejection of the “caste” system, because Hindu last names reveal your caste.
Yes … quite easy, but ultimately satisfying. Even if an octet is not a particularly “big” band.
Toughest Tuesday I've done all year.
SUNSET STRIP...Bam!...followed by MARTI.... Just in case this name ever comes up in conversation, you just might tell everyone that the Havana airport name was once called El Rancho Boyeros. Hah! But of course, they wanted a hero's names and so we got MARTI. We had to memorize his poems when in school. "Cultivo una rosa blanca, en junio como enero......."
Back to puzzle. 1D. Of course it has to be PICKLE ball, no? No. Damn....How do you spell WIFFLE? WAMPUM,,,,of course! That entire NW corner was really smile inducing. On to the East....Wow was I on a roll. I spelled BIERE at 27A correctly and all those long downs got in so fast I almost chocked. Wow again as I patted my back. An look! I even spelled SRIRACHA and SUNDAE correctly! I'm a genius.
Yes, this was the Friday disguise. I am crowing about having finished a Saturday all by myself .
GAUCHE...How do YOU pronounce it??
I had a very hard time getting started. Shamefully Eurocentric as I am, I assumed the Massachusetts currency was something the colonists had brought from England. Sigh. Eventually FOIST got me WIFFLE and then the "D'oh!" of WAMPUM. After that, yes, one sweet treat after another. More a "medium" than "easy" for me, but lots of fun, with MAMBAS and IGUANAS, MASTERMINDS with SECRET CODES who PULL STRINGS, and the storied ROMEO and MIDAS.
Was zipping along at maybe Wednesday-easy level in the top third or so of the grid - not without an error or two, though. Had Slices instead of SALAMI while building my sub. And resisted MAV, but couldn't come up with anything else there.
Paused the puzzle for a bit after FESTIVUS. Had watched recording a couple days ago of video for memorial for person I knew in the mid-to-late '80s, before "Seinfeld." Learned from the video that he was a fan of the show, and of Festivus.
After emailing someone from our group of friends/colleagues of that era about Festivus' appearance, went back to the puzzle. Rest seemed a bit more difficult - more like Friday easy-medium, say. Particularly the SE - didn't see GAP at first, had slice at 43A (again with slice(s); was wrong at 12D, but not giving up on it yet!). As others have noted, OCTETS seemed too small for big bands.
Finished in about half usual time for Saturday, so fairly easy overall. But fun.
Wanted DIVING CATCH. A BASKET CATCH in general is not flashy, like most of Willie’s routine catches. THE CATCH was so brilliant because he had his back to the infield and caught the ball over his head/shoulder.
Overwhelmingly easy weekend, considering that normally grids with crossing triple stacks tend to be harder than average purely because of the grid design. I did the Friday in Wednesday time, and today's puzzle in below-average Friday time. May has been an easy month of puzzles overall, but ALL the May themelesses have an "Easy" or "Very Easy" rating on XWStats, which is very unusual.
Unlike Rex, I had to get three corners done before putting in a single 11-letter answer, but after I got SECRETCODES the whole middle fell into place very quickly. Then SR- instantly got me SRIRACHA and the SE was easy to wrap up.
Not EASY at all for me. Had to cheat too much.
Not a fan of ASSHAT. It's been showing up pretty regularly so, unfortunately, I'd better remember it.
@JOHN X 11:03 AM
Thanks. I've always thought the only thing in California was Disneyland.
Nancy's loss (The Giants) was my family's gain. Not only fans of Willie Mays, but of two other Willies: McCovey and Kirkland which made an incredible outfield. And Alous, Marichal, Cepeda. Wonderful times in the coldest, windiest stadium ever. Years ago, as an adult, I had the delight of a meeting that included Willie Mays. Sharp, smart which helped make him such an incredible athlete. And a wonderful man.
Should of. Watched Seinfeld only cheat sub stack is also blogging term
Say, now. Four Jaws of Themelessness in the puzgrid, for the second day in a row. New themeless puz standard, at the NYT?!? Yeah … didn't think so.
staff weeject pick, of a mere 8 choices: BEA. Liked its clue a lot.
I'd hafta say this puz was ever-so-slightly harder for m&e, than yesterday's. Mighta been the no-knows such as: LUCY. MUSICA. MARTI. BIERE. SINGH. Maybe, but they was certainly work-aroundable.
some fave stuff: FESTIVUS. BOOBIRDS. ASSHAT's triumphant return. Pretty much every longball in the middle.
SIERRAMADRE clue was kinda interestin, as I had trouble figurin out what flick the puz was talkin about. Thought maybe it was from "Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid", for some vague reason…
Thanx for the fun, Mr. Williams dude. Real nice puzgrid.
Masked & Anonymo8Us
**gruntz**
Now . . .
A little more SUNSETSTRIP (and related topics) lore:
Sunset Boulevard runs from the Pacific Ocean (or Santa Monica Bay if you want to get all technical-like) all the way to Figueroa Street in Downtown L.A., where its name changes to Cesar Chavez Avenue. Cesar Chavez Ave continues through East L.A. and into the separate city of Monterey Park, where its name again changes to Riggin Street. It ends in a cul-de-sac in a residential neighborhood. Straight line distance from the ocean to the cul-de-sac is 22.1 miles or 31.4 miles actual driving distance.
From the Pacific Ocean moving east, Sunset goes past the very cool Self Realization Lake Shrine, Pacific Palisades, Will Rogers Ranch (I used to live right off of here), Riviera Country Club, Brentwood, Westwood, Dead Man's Curve (gone now) UCLA, Holmby Hills (former Playboy mansion!), Beverly Hills, West Hollywood (the only SUNSETSTRIP), Hollywood, Little Armenia (home of the original Zankou Chicken!), brushes against Los Feliz before continuing on into Silver Lake, then Echo Park, Dodger Stadium, Angelino Heights (loaded with vintage Victorian houses that have been in hundreds of TV shows and movies), Chinatown, and then the name changes to César Chávez Ave.
César Chávez continues east through Chinatown, a block or two from Philippe The Original (home of the French Dip sandwich), past Union Station and the big Post Office terminal, across the mighty Los Angeles River (normally a trickle in a concrete channel, during heavy rains the L.A. River downtown has a flow equal to the average flow of the Mississippi River at St. Louis; it is raging and would kill the best kayakers), into Boyle Heights and East L.A., and then finally leaving L.A. City proper and entering neighboring Monterey Park, where there's, like, a Taco Bell on that one corner.
Going back to the Self Realization Lake Shrine near the ocean (it's in my old neighborhood). It was founded in 1950 by a yogi named Paramahansa Yogananda, and is dedicated to all religions and is a place for meditation. The land was originally a movie studio owned by Thomas Ince in the silent picture days. Later, it became a quarry site, and they used hydraulic mining techniques (washing away soft hillsides with powerful jets of water) which formed a lake after mining was abandoned. The lake is spring fed, so it's the only natural lake in Los Angeles, even though it's kind of man-made, sort of. In the 40s it was again a movie lot, and that's why there's a Dutch windmill sitting on the lake. Then it became the shrine, and it's a very cool place. You used to be able to just go in there but now you need reservations. It's the only place outside of India where a portion of Mahatma Gandhi's ashes are placed.
The main Self Realization "compound" (if you will) is up on Mount Washington, which is another very cool neighborhood Northeast of Dodger Stadium that not many Angelenos and almost no tourists even know about. But now you know.
This material will also be on Wednesday's test.
EXTRA CREDIT: A resident of Los Angeles is an "Angeleno" spelled with an "e" while the Victorian neighborhood of "Angelino Heights" is spelled with an "i".
/Michael Caine voice: "Not many people know that"
All the MAV people:
Maverick is the call designation/name of pilot Pete Mitchell. When flying, you don't call him Pete, Peter, or even Lieutenant. It's Maverick, which is his "nickname". Now, as we all know, every name gets shortened for various reasons, easier to say, more friendly. So Mavericks nickname is MAV.
Simple. 😁
RooMonster Call Me Roo Anytime Guy
Like the basket catch tv shows are not "taped" any longer they are "recorded" cardboard boxes still taped!!
@Gary Jugert 12:02 PM.
There's also terrific cemeteries! I grew up right next to Arlington Cemetery (it's was practically my back yard) so I'm quite the afficiando.
East L.A. has all the great vintage cemeteries, and I really love those. But the king of all cemeteries is Forest Lawn Glendale. Evelyn Waugh even wrote a novel about it called "The Loved One" which was made into a terrific 1965 movie. Liberace's scene as the casket salesman is worth the price of admission alone:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5meyAvvjhyU
Forest Lawn Glendale is the Disneyland of cemeteries; Forest Lawn Hollywood Hills is the Knott's Berry Farm of cemeteries; Forest Lawn Covina is the Legoland of cemeteries; Hollywood Forever is the Universal Studios Tram Tour of cemeteries; Disneyland Anaheim is the Arlington Cemetery of theme parks.
EXTRA CREDIT: The Liberace casket salesman clip linked above was filmed at the historic Greystone Mansion in Beverly Hills, which was built in 1928 by oil baron Edward Doheny and ceded to Beverly Hills as a park in 1965. About a thousand movies and TV shows have been filmed here, and you can usually recognize the black & white tiled floors.
Movies include The Loved One (1965), The Big Lebowski (1998), There Will Be Blood (2007), Eraserhead (1977), all 20 Spiderman movies; etc etc
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greystone_Mansion
It's an easy Saturday when I only have one write-over - reeKS before MUSKS. I read the clue for 1A and went looking for greener pastures, i.e. TINA Brown crossing TAPED. Clockwise from there until the SE where there was finally a bit of resistance, due to the tricky IPO clue.
I did eye my unfinished 48A and wonder if oNIONS had anything to do with bargains. Never mind.
Thanks, David P. Williams!
I feel vindicated. Some time ago someone here remarked that nothing started with SR, whereupon I predicted that we would start to see SRIRACHA more often - and here it is! Aside from that, any puzzle with FOIST in it has got me, and the crossing triple stacks were beautiful.
Still, I have to complain about CIRRI. It is a word, but not as defined. The dictionary even agrees with me, for a change. CIRRI is the plural of cirrus in botany and zoology, but not in meteorology, where it is cirrus. (Really, it's an adjective for the type of cloud, so it's "cloud" that gets the plural ending.)
By 10 minutes I had everything complete except the upper left and thought woohoo!... new record coming up. But no, I was stuck with NINNY for PATSY, FLAT for UNIT, and for the Top Gun nickname ICE instead of MAV. And while I thought of WHIFFLE ball, I really resisted trying it without that H. So 16 minutes; really smooth except that upper left. And as Rex said, some great answers.
[Spelling Bee: Fri currently -1 missing a 7. puzzlehoarder congrats again!... beats heck out of my record of 23.]
From @Nancy's post of 8:31: In 1957, the evil owner Horace Stoneham whisked the Giants off to San Francisco...
Coincidentally, since you mentioned the name Stoneham, Buffy Sainte-Marie was born and raised in Stoneham, Massachusetts. As a child she tried to use wampum to pay for her school lunches.
hey look ! its nice to see LMS back !
7:40!!! That is absurd.
Easy-Medium, with a few hang-ups. Annoyed at myself for not remembering LUCY off the bat. WAMPUM took a few crossings, so NW was the last to fall.
Some fun crosses: BASKETCATCH/BALKS, PACKITIN/TETRIS, AREOLA/BOOBIRDS.
Interesting clue for SINGH instead of golfer Vijay.
I'm neutral to ASSHAT, but I thought it was amusing the first time, and I don't think it's particularly offensive. See: brown-noser, or "sucks"
Two breezily fast and easy Saturday solves in a row.
Although his eyesight is severely compromised, Willie Mays at 93 is the oldest living Hall of Famer. We have lost several greats over the past few years among them: Brooks and Frank Robinson, Tom Seaver, Hank Aaron, Warren Spahn, Tommy Lasorda and most recently Whitey Herzog.
Fun puzzle with good cluing and interesting wordplay. In my view, just a fine fit for a Saturday.
@mack - I didn’t expect Tool quoting Bill Hicks, but it makes perfect sense. Thanks for the link.
Easy? This one took an hour to suss out. Pretty hard in my book.
I have a problem with re-roll...re implies there was something wrong with your roll...as one die fell on the floor
Oh yeah? Well just wait til we have a clue that refers to good ol Jersey City!
@RAD - when I was in 3rd grade, got to watch a Wheaties photo shoot at the high school’s adjacent baseball field. Got autographs from the very good-looking Bobby Richardson, the average-looking but hometown hero Harmon Killebrew, and Warren Spahn, who despite his pitching greatness (and a friendly demeanor), struck me as the ugliest player I had ever seen.
Then, among my baseball cards, I saw Don Mossi.
Ugliest baseball player ever?
Why am I posting this? At the end of the day, when nobody reads the comments?
Hoping, by throwing various names out there, it gets the algorithms at Google/YT to quit flooding me with recommended ALOERTER videos!
@RAD2626 - and yet curiously, Mays is not the living player who has been in the Hall of Fame the longest. That would be another New York - California player, Sandy Koufax, elected in 1972. He and Mays (1979) are the only players elected before 1980 still alive.
Cheryl Crow led me astray. I dropped in SaNtamonica very confidently. Tearing that out was key to finally breaking through.
I first learned about Sunset Boulevard was from the old TV show 77 SUNSET STRIP. I checked with wiki to refresh my memory and read that it was a private detective drama series that was very popular in its day. It ran from 1958 to 1964 for 206 episodes. The detectives had offices on 77 Sunset Boulevard.
I also went to You Tube to do a littler more reminiscing and came across this 11:00 video. The first three minutes are definitely worth a look. I didn't remember it being film noir but the opening lighting and camera angles are classic of that, right? I thought Efrem Zimbalist, Jr. sounded a lot like the star of 21D SIERRA MADRE Humphrey Bogart. The opening scenes have a very young William Shatner looking very Marlon Brando-esque.
So much to like in this puzzle. Starting with the choice of words: WAMPUM, FOIST, BOOBIRDS, MASTERMINDS, TETRIS as a verb (that's how I feel when I'm packing the car for a holiday; I'm TETRISing), SRIRACHA (kids used to put it on everything and I would have to ask them why, why would you destroy this good food I've made for you), GAUCHE is a great word and who doesn't love ASSHAT? A lot of you, apparently, but I think it's great.
A couple of things I plopped in with no crosses because they show up in the news more than occasionally: AGEOUT; kids in care reach a certain age and are dumped out on the street to manage on their own. Some don't do very well, some even worse, and some meet tragic ends. And SINGH because we have in our area a large South Asian population, both Hindi and Sikh. recently a Sikh leader, Hardeep SINGH Nijjar was gunned down in the parking lot of his gudwara and the Canadian government claims the hit was orchestrated by the government of India under instructions from Narendra Modi. Does that make him the MASTERMIND(S)?
And, in other news, ASSHAT is still a great word.
Southside Johnny
About TASE
People have died from being tased. It is not as benign as people think. Another problem with tasers is that they may be used unnecessarily,, too quickly, because they are supposedly not lethal. Also, based on some videos they have been used as punishment for resisting arrest.
Still , no reason not to be in the puzzle.
About OCTET
The clue is a riff off of the old Big Band Era which lasted from the 30’s through the 40’s.
Personally, I think the clue is fair. Because 8 would be big for rock or classical music groups.
"Uber low word count" ... right, because so many of the squares are black. So tired of every Fri and Sat having "stairsteps" ... design a grid, maybe.
It has 99% nothing to do with this puzzle, but any time I hear about how some reptiles and amphibians have a third eye, I imagine them singing that song, and it makes me chuckle.
I felt I had to post it because I knew Rex wouldn't (and probably rightly so).
I also recommend checking out the live version from their Salival album -- it features Timothy Leary quotes instead of Bill Hicks.
Solved while preparing a BBQ dinner for guests, during which my grill ran out of gas and required a re-up.
Had to come back after dinner to complete the South. I had PUNCH OUT to end the day, so that took some sorting out. Then there was the one holey shoe in the SE, which I stepped into on the 2nd look.
Very nice puzzle. The only thing I have to complain about is that there's nothing to complain about.
Woo-hoo-hoo. Check out the big brain on John X. You a smart mother f@$ker.
Roo 😁
Good satpuz
I, too, loved SUNSET STRIP, for many personal reasons. In my high school years (I'm now age 81), I was an aspiring actor, and in those days there was a summer drama workshop at Hollywood High School, taught by the great John Ingle. (More on him below.) I lived in Westwood (the neighborhood of UCLA, where I later spent my freshman year). It was also common in those days to hitchhike, and I lived one long block from Sunset Blvd. So, I soon got into the habit of walking to Sunset and Veteran Ave., where I stuck out my thumb and nine miles eastward was Hollywood High, at Sunset and Highland Ave.
The summer workshop was spectacular, and a friend from it, David Giler (later a screenwriter and producer, best known for giving us the movie "Alien") talked me into changing high schools. That was a chore--it involved diplomacy at both ends, but I got permission both from my mom and H'wood High's principlal. NO ONE, for sure, would have permitted it had they known I hitchhiked in both directions down legendary Sunset Boulevard. Fortunately, nobody ever asked.
Midway along that route was the legendary Sunset Strip, best known for its gay community, but it was also a place with fine cafés where folks of all sexualities (including heteros like me) could meet for food or coffee, which I did with many friends, both from both West L.A. and Hollywood. I was especially fond of an open-air café called Cyrano's, and later another, called Swingers Diner, now defunct. On my present trips to L.A., I frequent the bookstore Book Soup.
In high school, on most mornings, I got a ride with a kindly middle-age man named Al Smith, traveling his way to work downtown, but in the reverse direction, it usually took more than one ride. VERY fortunately, I never got picked up by anyone dangerous (though I got propositioned twice, which I politely declined.) Thrice I got rides from people well-known or related thereto--once, the son of John Ford; another time Jim Backus; another time, Richard Boone. In my final semester, I got my first car--a hand-me-down from my sister, and gas was about 21 cents a gallon.
About drama teacher John Ingle: At Hollywood High, he mentored luminaries like Linda Evans, Stephanie Powers, Swoosie Kurtz, and Jena Engstrom (the last three were classmates of mine, and Jena, in those days called Liana, had been my girlfriend in West L. A., and later a good friend at H'wood High and beyond--soon after high school, she acted prominently in TV series Westerns, until a serious mental breakdown forced her retirement, a matter that saddens me to the present), and, after us, Barbara Hershey. When Ingle moved on to Beverly Hills High, his students included Richard Dreyfuss, Albert Brooks, Nicholas Cage, David Schwimmer, Jonathan Silverman, and Julie Kavner. Ingle later became well-known acting on TV soap "General Hospital" as Edward Quartermaine, but was also (in local L. A. productions, including, at his alma mater Occidental College), a fine Shakespearean actor of nuance and wit, and was memorable as the Preacher in a musical number in David Byrne's movie "True Stories." What I remember most vividly about him as teacher was his emphasis on self-discipline, mindfulness, and and a shipshape life.
Those are my memories of Sunset Boulevard and Sunset Strip. My only reservation about the nytxword is that SUNSET STRIP is shown running north to south, whereas, although Sunset winds all over the place between the Strip and Pacific Ocean, it's quintessentially and mythologicaly an East-West road. That's how it sits in my psyche and nostalgia, where it evermore remains luminous.
Same in UHF - “we don’t need no stinkin’ badgers!” I think that was on Wheel of Fish
As someone who plays a lot of tabletop games, re-roll and roll again are two entirely different things.
Eerie that this appeared so shortly BEFORE Willie's demise. BASKETCATCH was one of several gimmes that helped today's solve along. Fact, I had more trouble with the corners than with that super-smooth center. Still, easy for the day.
I groaned when FESTIVUS appeared. Thought they were talking about a real holiday.
Time to PACKITIN. Birdie.
Wordle par.
A good solid puzzle with very little junk. More like this one please.
There are some puzzles that at first glance could be a giant question mark - like a trick clue.
Then, bit by bit, they fall into place. Each answer led to another, until it was all filled in. I remember getting SUNDAEs with my mom when I was little and we'd go shopping - those glass bowls came back to me. Yum.
Enjoyable puzzle - more like this please!
Diana, Lady-in-Waiting for Crosswords
Sadly, here in syndication land Willie Mays is no longer the oldest living Hall of Famer. In fact the Giants have now lost two legends in the past couple of weeks, with Orlando "Cha-Cha" Cepeda passing on Friday. We had a CHA-CHA reference in the puzzle that day to go along with Saturday's BASKET CATCH. Thanks for the unintentional tribute, NYT.
All but one of our statues are now dead. Pray for Juan Marichal.
What Rex said...breezy, fun today! Don't solve enough to know that AHAT shows up all the time...had a tough time thinking it was OK...and the M in MARTI/MAMBAS is a potential NATICK for some...four stars!
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