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Titular film character who lives in a swamp / TUES 10-29-24 / Name shared by two of King Henry VIII's wives / Sitcom extraterrestrial / "Of course!," in Spanish
Tuesday, October 29, 2024
Hello, everyone, it’s Clare for the last Tuesday of Spooktober! Hope everyone has been having a good spooky season and enjoys their Halloweek. The weather has been getting a bit chillier here in D.C., leading me to break out my ear warmers and thicker gloves so I can bike when it’s in the 30s. (Though it might be 80 degrees the next day, so that’s… fun.) I watched my Steelers win (!!!) as I did this write-up. They had me stressed until the end, but they pulled it off and managed to extend their streak of winning home games on Monday Night Football to a truly crazy 22 games.
Anywho, on to the puzzle...
Constructor: Kathy Lowden
Relative difficulty: Easy
THEME: Rhyming expressions describing an amount of something
Relative difficulty: Easy
THEME: Rhyming expressions describing an amount of something
Theme answers:
- DOZENS OF COUSINS (17A: Whole bunch at a family reunion?)
- SCORES OF DRAWERS (25A: Large array for a desk?)
- OODLES OF POODLES (46A: Big group in a dog show?)
- OCEANS OF POTIONS (61A: Massive collection for an alchemist?)
Pippin is a 1972 musical with music and lyrics by Stephen Schwartz and book by Roger O. Hirson. Bob Fosse, who directed the original Broadway production, also contributed to the libretto. The musical uses the premise of a mysterious performance troupe, led by the Leading Player, to tell the story of Pippin, a young prince on his search for meaning and significance. The 'fourth wall' is broken numerous times during most traditional productions. (Wiki)
• • •
Meh. I suppose the theme was cute, and the construction seems impressive because the theme answers cross the entire puzzle. But it felt like the rest of the puzzle was sacrificed to make this rhyming scheme work, and I couldn’t muster more than a shrug when I realized what the theme was doing. Usually, if there’s a gimmick like this with the theme answers, without a revealer, there’s a payoff elsewhere, like with long downs or interesting clues or something. Instead, we got a lot of crosswordese and then didn’t get many fun answers. The construction meant the longest non-theme answer was seven letters, and I didn’t particularly love either of those answers.
My favorite of the non-themers would have to be LIZARD brain (47D: (source of our primal instincts, it's said)), and BLOTTO (6D: Drunk as a skunk) is a good one. On the other hand, I hated PEP BAND (39A: Performing group at a homecoming game) (even if it’s apparently a thing, according to Wikipedia). I didn’t understand the three clues/answers revolving around numbers (14A, 42A, and 18D) and why they were done like that (Spanish, French, and Italian, with seemingly no rhyme or reason as to why). 24D: Rear end, in London's West End is a weirdly specific clue with a rhyme scheme all to tee up the word ARSE. BZZT (3D: [Wrong answer!]) strikes me as a particularly ugly word and not a common way of describing a buzzer. And that’s not to be confused with PSST (60D: Vowelless attention-getter), which also made an appearance. We even had THAT (10A: "I'll drink to ___!") as an answer, which I think sums up the boring fill.
I swear I’m in a better mood than I seem to be as I describe this puzzle! I mean, my Steelers are 6-2 going into their bye week. I just don’t think the theme was cute or clever enough to justify the rest of the puzzle falling somewhat flat.
Misc.:
Signed, Clare Carroll, a not-so-spooked (right now) Steelers fan
[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]
Misc.:
- ANNE Boleyn and ANNE of Cleves (12D: Name shared by two of King Henry VIII's wives) — I solved this clue/answer especially quickly because I’ve listened to (and hope to one day see!) the musical “Six,” which is an absolutely incredible telling of history that shows the depth to each of the six women who happened to be married to Henry VIII. (Henry VII was also married to three Catherines — Catherine of Aragon, Catherine Howard, and Catherine Parr — only one of whom was executed!)
- MII (35A: Customizable Nintendo avatar) reminds me of the many, many hours I spent playing the Wii growing up. I was especially good at Wii tennis. And then the heading-the-soccer-ball one (once Wii Fit came out). But, then again, there was the time I was trying to smack a ball on a par five while playing Wii golf, and the little wristbands weren’t especially well made at the time, so the controller slipped out of my hand, and I… broke my aunt’s TV. Oooops!
- I may not have DOZENS OF COUSINS (17A), but my dad is one of eight kids, so I have 15 just on his side of the family. We have a family reunion every other year on the New Jersey shore, and there are so many people we once had to charter a bus to get somewhere. And our family keeps growing, too, as my cousins keep getting married and having kids!
- I took ECON (48D: Supply-and-demand subj.) in college (as a history major), and basically the only thing I remember was the supply and demand curves we had to draw and analyze.
- “Agatha All Along” is my favorite TV SHOW (10D) right now and has a character who’s a SEER (4D: Oracle) — and she’s played by Patti LuPone. (Yes, it’s a tenuous connection, but I wanted to talk about this show.) It’s absolutely incredible, and I highly recommend it! The premise is a coven of witches who have to walk a dangerous road together to each get what they most desire at the end (if they make it).
And that’s all from me! See you all in November.
[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]
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82 comments:
I liked the puzzle quite a lot. 61A Oceans of potions was my favorite of the theme answers oodles of poodles the easiest .
Agree with late re blotto, not so fond of lizard brain.
Don't understand why she did not like pep band. Kind of a fun thing to think of on a snowy October day. Could not think of Mezzo until I got the z in zeal. I knew I knew it because mezzo soprano has long been one of my favorite voice ranges.
I liked buzz as the answer the clue. "Sounded" right to me.
Good Tuesday puzzle.
Hi Clare! One complaint I'd like to add to your list is that in 3 of the 4 themers, the rhyming words were spelled differently; however OODLES / POODLES didn't even try. But aside from that I thought the theme was okay.
Re ECON you said: "in college... the only thing I remember was the supply and demand curves". Me too! That was the worst, least rewarding elective I ever took. (The best was German; seriously.)
Again I tried solving down clues only, but ended up with OODLES OF NOODLES crossing NIPPIN because I couldn't look at the clue for 46 across. NIPPIN, PIPPIN, Unknown Names tra-la, no memory of ever seeing that musical's name at all. And don't chide me for not thinking of POODLES, there were just so many dodgy looking acrosses today I had my hands full: ONZE, VENA, ALGER (which could have been AUGER because it crossed an unknown Spanish word), MII, TRE, and EGOT crossing an unknown man's first name so thank gof it's in the puzzle almost daily. (Speaking of which, PIPED UP crossed two Unknown Names so it was RIPEN UP for a while.)
Oh well, that's what I get for the downs only gambit. Back to normal tomorrow.
(PS: the annoyingly short comment box is bad enough; now after I tidy up a typo it suddenly has two vertical scroll bars! Gimme a break why dontcha.)
Easy. No erasures and no WOEs.
Smooth, cute, amusing and simple, liked it a bit more than @Clare did.
Easy. Solved without reading the across clues. Two overwrites: worK before TASK at 13D and I guessed OODLES OF nOODLES at 46A before I went to the dogs.
Monday-level easy, but fun to solve. One theme answer led to another because of the rhyming factor, yet the rhymes didn't necessarily come with spelling that matched the rhyming sounds. Well done.
Huge meh. I can’t believe this was accepted. This is not a theme.
I liked it a lot more than you did, Clare. I was a little disappointed in OODLES of POODLES (which I originally put in as OODLES OF dOODLES, but realized quickly that the clue on 49D wasn't "____ Dots" and changed it) for the same reason as @okanaganer--I was looking for different letters to make the rhyme. But overall I thought it was quite enjoyable and the theme answers brought a smile to my face, so there's that.
I put in BZZT with no crosses and PSST with just the P; I've seen BZZT lots of times to indicate a buzzer. Almost beat my personal best time for a Tuesday.
What a dud. It’s a Tuesday grid and you have three nonsensical crosses (BZZT x ONZE, ALGER x CLARO and MEZZO x MOCS). If you have to resort to filling up your grid with junk like that, it’s time to get a new theme.
If you have to resort to publishing a puzzle with that much mush in it, it’s time to get a new editor.
It played old, even though the editors tried to dress it up with more modern clueing. Must have used an ancient word list.
BZZT? C'mon, try harder. that's crap
Yes, Claire, PEP BAND is definitely a thing. I’m surprised someone as sporty as yourself would find that term unfamiliar. Pep bands are part of the fun.
Never a fan of rhymes in my puzzles, although in this case three of them are spot on for me, with only DRAWERS/SCORES not fully rhyming.
I've never actually heard the term PEP BAND, but that appears to be on me (and Claire) as it Googles well.
You can't make PIPPIN the word of the day and not post Ben Vereen. https://youtu.be/ADeU6qz37B4?si=-QA04CFFY20o2GSZ
The problem with rhyming themes is that you open up the can of worms of regional differences in pronunciation. There are large swaths of the United States where 25A does not at all work as a rhyme. I would expect a constructer (and, especially, an editor) to be more attentive to such clear differences.
Regarding intrapuzzle connections, there's one you've missed in connection to "Agatha All Along." As you note, that show features Patti LuPone, and she recently won a Tony Award for singing "Here's to the Ladies Who Lunch" in the Broadway revival of "Company." The signature refrain in that song is "I'll drink to that."
After filling in DOZENS OF COUSINS, I broke into a smile. One of my happy buttons is wordplay based on how the words sound.
That smile remained throughout the solve, and there was serious fun in trying to guess the remaining theme answers with as few crosses as possible.
And after solving, alternate answers popped into my head – FLOODS OF DUDS, MASSES OF GLASSES. Even opposite-type answers for a companion puzzle – FAMINE OF SALMON, LACK OF PLAQUE, SPARSITY OF VARSITY.
This puzzle reminded me of the classic wordplay moment from the movie “The Court Jester” (1955): “The pellet with the poison’s in the vessel with the pestle. The chalice from the palace has the brew that is true.”
So, no dearth of mirth today – smiles all around – and that’s a gift. Thank you for this, Kathy!
I never like saying this, but the puzzle was way too easy.
BZZT is not a word.
I also felt that the puzzle skewed old but because I’m also old it wasn’t a problem for me. I wonder what some of the younger solvers would think?
Hey All !
Seem Joel likes rhyming Themers. I know Will didn't. For those wanting Will to come back, I don't think he will. The torch has been passed.
Forgot today was Clare day, but I'm thinking Rex would've called out OODLES OF POODLES as the outlier, as the other three change the spelling of the rhymers, but that one is the same.
All the OFs boost the F count, though! And they are all lined up in the Center Down column.
Two sets of double Z's, that's unusual. One set of double F's. Nice.
Quite an easy TuesPuz. Nothing wrong with that!
Have a great day.
Six F's
RooMonster
DarrinV
I liked the theme and the rhyming theme answers. Otherwise found it a bit dull and very easy, even for a Tuesday.
It's psst
Once I had DOZENS OF COUSINS, I tried to make this interesting for myself by guessing the other theme answers with few, or better yet, no crosses. Here are my results:
SCORES OF DRAWERS off just the SC.
OCEANS OF POTIONS off just the first O and the P.
OODLES OF POODLES with no crosses at all.
Impressed? I thought not. But I did make this puzzle a bit more diverting for myself, so there's that.
BZZT????
About as basic as a Tuesday can get, and that's saying something. I will confess to liking it more than Clare did -- not the theme so much, but the fill. I never thought "Ugh, this is really bad." Four Zs -- don't see that very often.
As for the theme...yep, it's quite thin. But that's fine; we get thin themes fairly often. My real gripe is the one raised by @okanaganer -- that three of the themers use different spellings to make the rhyme, but OODLESOFNOODLES does not. The fact that three of @Lewis's five alternates (no doubt thought up by him pretty quickly) also use different spellings tells me that the bar should have been raised before accepting this one.
Light fun theme , very easy, a few fresh answers and clues thrown in - what's not to like for early week puzzle?
To echo a few others , its hard to believe there are high schools/colleges without pep bands. When my offspring were in high school 10 -15 yrs ago, the huge controversy centered around the big pep band presence at boys basketball games, but not at the girls games
When was the last time someone had a Waldorf salad. Have not seen that on a menu or eaten it for 50 years. A very antique clue (36A)
Both 18D and 42A are Italian, actually. I thought that part was sort of cute, though it would have been nicer without the extraneous French "onze".
After DOZENSPFCOUSINS the other themers basically filled themselves in, except for SCORESOFDRAWERS. Do these words rhyme somewhere? Not around here.
The only no-know in this one was MII. I know about WII but spent most of my sporting life actually playing, you know, sports.
Otherwise pre-Monday level and since I prefer something a little more challenging on a Tuesday I'm with Clare on the "meh" assessment.
OK Tuesdecito KL but I Kept Looking for a little more zip. Thanks for a fair amount of fun.
I know it's an easy fill, but I've seen STP in more puzzles in the last week than bottles I've seen on the shelves.
Will Shortz was credited with last Friday’s Brain Tickler next to the puzzle.
Hi, @kitshef. Hi, @ pabloinnh. It's your resident poet and lyricist chiming in on the DRAWERS/SCORES rhyme. So is it egregiously wrong?
I'd say no. At least not in NYC. DRAWERS -- at least when it's the things that get pulled out of bureaus -- is pronounced in 1-syllable: DRAWRS. When it refers to the people sketching things, it's pronounced in two syllables: DRAW-ers.
I wouldn't hesitate to unblushingly use this rhyme when presenting at the BMI Musical Theater Workshop, a place where your knuckles would get rapped if you dared to use an imperfect rhyme. I never did because I had cut my teeth on the lyricists of the American Songbook: Larry Hart, Hammerstein, Cole Porter, Alan Jay Lerner, Ira Gershwin, and Sondheim. But the very young Workshop members who had cut their teeth on sloppily written pop music lyrics, would often make that mistake in early presentations. They were unlikely to make it more than once or twice.
Anne Bolyeln also given a nod to in the song by Blues Traveler, "Hook". Suck it in if you're Anne Bolyeln or Rin Tin Tin. I was told the sixth one is NIN, so I'm hoping for a quick free weeks til the next full moon, so we can get that sixth one made. Wouldn't want the guy toe fawk
Go SteelersđŸ˜€. Made it more enjoyable today.
I make it every year for Thanksgiving dinner.
Agree with PEP BAND. Unless she's not American (which I doubt because Steelers fan), you'd think she'd've heard of a PEP BAND, as they're...well, everywhere. That's the name of the in-stands band at high school football/basketball games. Feels weird to not have heard of it.
I agree with your observation BUT I live in the Midwest and SCORES pronounce it “drohres” around here. On the other hand, many also pronounce it “drahres” here too. For whatever reason, that particular definition of DRAWERS tends to have a wide range of pronunciations including the two-syllable variants…go figure.
Good comment Nancy and my attempt to phonetically spell (drahres) is incorrect and should be your “drawrs”
Perfectly serviceable Tuesday with a cute theme. The fill was fine, but didn’t have a lot of sparkly clues/answers. I’m aok with the themers and don’t tend to notice things like OODLESOFPOODLES being an outlier, nor does it weigh in to my enjoyment.
I will say that while BZZT was inferable, I tend to thing of the noise/word for wrong answer as something I can’t actually represent, but it involves changing one’s voice to a low pitch and voicing a noise like “ehnngh.” I told you I can’t spell it!
Interesting. I think I'm much more familiar with the two-syllable approach for bureaus and artists, but I'm sure different strokes, etc.
That was quite a rabbit hole you sent me down there, Clare, by giving the background of that musical. The only PIPPIN I knew was Charlemagne's father, PIPPIN the Short, not his son, so I started looking things up. An initial search for the name gave me a page about the musical, then another half-page before a reference to Peregrine "PIPPIN" Took in LOTR. So I changed my search terms to Pippin the Short, and it turns out he is now called "Pepin," the son of Charles Martel and father of Charlemagne. But Charlemagne himself had at least two sons by that name, Pepin the Hunchback and Pepin of Italy. Wiki (doesn't even know how many sons he had all told). Then I looked at the musical where a brief plot summary says PIPPIN is just back from university--and odd detail, since Charlemagne's sons lived in the 9th Century CE, while the oldest university, Bologna, started teaching in the 11th. None of which has any relevance for the puzzle, but once I started it was hard to stop.
Only yesterday I was yearning for rhyming theme answers, and here they are today! Probably it had been accepted already, but o doubt rescheduled after Joel Fagliano saw my comment. But as Clare said, it needed a revealer to make it something more than a set of two-word poems. Not that I could think of.
I had 32 cousins growing up, I guess that would count as "dozens," but I didn't know many of them, and many others I met only once. It didn't seem like a lot at the time, but my kids have only 13. My wife grew up having two.
Clare, I don't think any of the number clues are Spanish; one English and two Italian (due rather than dos in the clues). I have trouble with that sort of thing myself. Knowing a little Spanish makes it easier to understand Italian, but harder to actually learn it!
Lots of competing groups of players.
A ton of suspicions.
Part of the million man March.
(answers below).
You've gotta like having DRAWERS crossing ARSE. I'm also curious whether Arse Is used outside of London's West End. Or is the West End part of the clue to emphasize the "end" aspect?
I never META social media company that I liked.
They should make a superhero movie about the two EGOT winners in the 70A clue. Working title: The Elton John Legend.
A bit meh for me, but thanks, Kathy Lowden.
Reams of teams.
Bunches of hunches.
Scads of dads.
Hi Clare!
Montones de caniches.
I guess that means a golden doodle is a dorado doniche? Google says garabato dorado, but that's going too hard on doodle. I also thought oro perro from the crosswording vocab might fit the bill but that'd be a statue probably.
We know our mountains of doodles from the farmer's market. We can't take our reservation-born cattle dog into society because she is poorly trained and at 14 she's only getting more stubborn. And she sheds like crazy.
Most of my cousins are in jail. I don't come from high quality stock. If I got dozens of them together we'd probably knock off a liquor store and get drunk as a skunk.
My scores of drawers are still in stackses of boxes in my garages because the new house is smaller than the old house. I apparently don't need whatever is in them.
Every time I hear the word potions I'm reminded how much I love those Harry Potter movies and how unfortunate it is the author turned out to be such a tool.
This is a good puzzle. BZZT and PSST combine as a cacophonous cocktail.
Speaking of LIC. I turned in my Colorado lic. to get a New Mexico lic. so I could vote against the lizard brained p.o.s., and they issued me a temporary lic. (a paper copy of my future real lic.) which is fine to fly with and rent a car with, but you can NOT, capital NOT, rent a Budget truck to move your last oodles of crapola and so you end up flying back home in exhaustion at life all because you're trying to vote and empty out a storage unit.
Propers: 6
Places: 1
Products: 6
Partials: 7
Foreignisms: 6
--
Gary's Grid Gunk Gauge: 26 of 76 (34%)
Funnyisms: 2 đŸ˜•
Tee-Hee: ARSE (welcome home buddy)
Uniclues:
1 Ask an ogre to babysit.
2 The Rex Parker blog.
3 Harmonious salad enthusiasts.
4 Breaking Bad, inc.
5 ... and yet she missed the high notes.
6 Komodo swami.
7 It's murdered and probably won't kill anybody, so you're good to ship it out.
1 ENTRUST SHREK
2 META ADO
3 WALDORF PEP BAND
4 ICE FIRM
5 MEZZO PIPED UP
6 RED LIZARD SEER
7 USDA PROMPT
My Fascinating Crossword Uniclue Keepsake from Last Year: Gramma's architectural planning. GINGERBREAD BINGE READ.
¯\_(ăƒ„)_/¯
Piles of smiles for the themers, at our house.
Don't see 4 grid-spanners in a TuesPuz, all that often.
Also got a buzz from BZZT. Not a debut word, btw -- this is its fourth rodeo.
Hard to beat a puz that has LIZARD & BLOTTO in it. Best of millions of fillins.
staff weeject pick: TRE. One of them cute foreign lingo units. Along today with: ONZE. VENA. MEZZO. PENNE. NUMERO. CLARO. BZZT.
Thanx, Ms. Lowden darlin. Nice puzzin.
Thanx, Ms. Carroll darlin. Nice last Tuesday postin.
Masked & Anonymo4Us
p.s. Startin to really look forward to a great Halloween ThursPuz. [If they don't, the runtz still will, tho.]
**gruntz**
Not egregiously wrong, no. But enough off to get the side-eye.
If it provided any resistance at all the fill might have made it a slog, but occasionally on a Monday or Tuesday I enjoy a puzzle that provides no friction and I can just speed solve, and this was that puzzle.
Agree with other commenters that Pep Band is a thing and I quite liked it as an answer.
Agree with Clare that Agatha All Along is truly fantastic. Good writing, great cast , good production values. Just …. Good TV.
Also, I’d love to see a revival of Pippin with Patti Lupone as Berthe.
This one was too much—beyond belief that it was accepted. Time to try another daily puzzle.
@andrew not everyone attends large highschools and colleges with football teams. Some, myself included, attended smaller schools without sports programs requiring pep bands. The world is a large mosaic Andrew nothing weird about it.
Always brings to mind the Fawlty Towers episode
You are on your game today mister! Delightfully funny. And yes. Downsizing results in a lot of purging of things that you thought you need, but really don’t. My husband is much more sentimental than me, and I ALWAYS have to say…”are you keeping this for the Smithsonian collection or do you think our adult children want this…because I assure you they do not.” Sounds harsh, but I haven’t listed some of the stuff he keeps in boxes. It would be too embarrassing.
Hi Clare,
Even easier & faster than yesterday - & yesterday was Monday.
Well, it's Monday.
Oh! Tuesday! Well, maybe next week will begin with two Tuesday puzzles. Ah! Twos days. There's a theme.
The puzzle needs work, but Agatha All Along is amazing. Finale tomorrow!
I'm back to stand again for BZZT.
It is a word. *
It's great onomotopeia.
* Even tho the auto correct mis-spelled in my first post and I didn't see it before publishing.
It also changed Clare's name to late. I do make typing errors but I could not have made that one.
She's talking about an answer to another clue.
checking in for data collection on PEP BAND. it was inferable but i had never heard of it either. born and raised in new england. 40. i've heard of pep rally, but the band was just...the band. but then again, i did not attend sporting events in grade school [and then i went to art school for college so no such things existed]. and bands played before the sporting event, i think? we never had any band in the stands.
-stephanie.
interesting point on the rhyming scheme! you are correct that here [MA/RI] it wouldn't rhyme. esp in RI. "scores of draws" is what it would sound like if i said it out loud.
-stephanie.
i agree, BZZT was a gimme for me and the sound a buzzer makes. i wasn't bowled over by it but it didn't register as something that would even make the writeup or comments. but, that's what makes the blog interesting to me to read i guess!
-stephanie.
I'll stand with you! I wrote BZZT in immediately. But after doing so, realized I've only heard it said, never actually seen it written. But that's how I imagined it would be spelled.
Three standard online dictionaries omit the word. But Wiktionary defines it as "(onomatopoeia) The sound of a buzzer or of electricity. Often used as a reaction to a wrong answer." Perfect! (Wiki also offers "bzzzt" as an alternate spelling).
Urban Dictionary, OTOH, has a completely different definition.
It seems like every time you have a problem with an entry, it’s a word of foreign origin. One day you might just have to accept that these “nonsensical” words have some sense to them after all.
FYI: Once again, Google ripped my ID name of the above msg.
M&A
Great line. I'll use it on my wife. She usually says, "We may need it someday."
I think maybe it's a generational thing. We definitely had pep bands -- do they still?
Somehow my reply to YOU was posted as a general comment. Gah. Probably because you were the last commenter at that time….
Another one chiming in to say I’ve never heard this term either. When I was in high school we had “pep rallies” before football and basketball games but the HS band was never called a pep band
BLOTTO? huh? Go away with your fake words.
@Beezer 11:52 AM
Aw, thanks. I can't admit to how many extension cords I've found after the move. I must be preparing for a Griswold Christmas.
About pep band
Sharon AK et al.
Never heard those 2 words together. I think Claire never did either and thought the constructor was putting them together arbitrarily. Until I read these comments, I thought so too. Andrew, I actually played (badly) in such a band at my high school football games. Maybe a regional term. I am from New England also. We were called the band.
Okanaganer
Horatio Alger
For most Americans doing the puzzle in both directions, 33 across was a gimme. Just wondering if that is true in Canada. Couldn’t tell from your comment.
Casimir
I don’t think it’s generational. I think the TERM pep band is regional. I am in my 70’s. School band I have heard. Pep band never.
LitCrit
The rhyme issue is almost unavoidable for this type of theme It is not an editing error. This issue has come up on many occasions in this blog. Many like this type so the Times allows them in. I actually pronounce draw & drawer differently. But I understand many don’t. Close enough for crosswords
Anonymous 8:35 AM
BZZT not a word. Well as someone said above it it written a lot. It is a type of onomatopoeia. Therefore it is a word.
Stephanie
About Scores of Drawers
I am a Rhode Islander and I would pronounce score as scaw. So I say scaws of draws. I do that with virtually any word ending in an r. ( eg local supermarket named Shore’s and the supermarket chain, Shaws It frequently causes confusion because they are pronounced the same).
I played in the PEPBAND at many basketball games in high school, but for the record it would always be a MARCHINGBAND at a homecoming game … for football.
Claro isn’t a word of foreign origin that’s been adopted into English, like Mezzo, it’s just a foreign word. Crossing Alger with it was a bit much.
@dgd... yes I've heard the phrase "Horatio Alger" story so the clue would have given it to me!
Stumbled on "CAS" because it just doesn't sound right, probably due to my resistance to the decades-long creep of the efficient but sterile NATO phonetic alphabet.
As I remember it, it was always "A as in apple"; "B as in boy"; "C as in cat" (or car); "D as in dog"...these are as old as the ages, at least in plain-folk speak.
Well, "blotto" as in "obliterated" is a very very well-worn term, believe you me. For those of us who inadvisedly over-indulged in the 70's and 80's it was the nom de rigueur to describe the incoherent end stages of inebriation. Usage dates back to early 20th Century as it turns out.
Got to like it when arse appears in the NYT as a quaint humorous Briticism. I'm Canadian and I grew up with arse at home. My father, an Italian immigrant, was an auto-worker who car pooled with a guy from Liverpool and picked up British expressions.
Bzzt is the all time lamest word I ever saw in the NYT.
Yeah, OODLESOFPOODLES is the obvious outlier here; the others all create rhymes even though the words are spelled differently. 3 good, 1 spoiler. BZZT and PSST in the same grid? Frowny face. Par.
Wordle par.
Numerous incoming staff at the White House? SCADSOFCADS
I found a bazillion references to bzzt, even an Oxford reference, but not in the dictionary itself. But my father was an electrician, so I have heard many a bzzt in real life.
I think Clare was in a bad mood, those number answers were gimmes, except for the Z in the French one, and that was just a minor pause.
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