Disney villain with a pet parrot / TUES 12-31-24 / Singer Bega a.k.a. "The King of Mambo" / Adjective in the theme of "The Addams Family" / Alternative to "Hasta la vista" / Boy king of Egypt

Hi, everyone, it’s Clare for the last Tuesday of the month and the last crossword of the year! I hope everyone is having a happy holiday season. I went home to California for the first time in a couple of years, which was lovely. I packed a full suitcase and then proceeded to wear the same, like, three outfits the entire time (read: sweats). I also had my hands very, very full… ’cause I got a puppy!! I picked her up (along with her brother for my mom) and took her to California, then brought her back to D.C., so Christmas was full of “Oh, no’s” and “Awws” and “I’m tired’s” and lots of puppy cuddles (and nips). I’m now back in D.C. trying to get my puppy used to the loud noises and people and sirens and a new place with my sister’s dog, who’s 14 and doesn’t really play the same way as my puppy's brother. But my dog, Red, is super adorable, and I’m just trying to be a good puppy mom to her! 

Anywho, I’ll shut up about puppy stuff (maybe, at least until the end) and get on to the puzzle…

Constructor: Michael Lieberman

Relative difficulty: Medium-ish

THEME: A pair of words that clue phrases that incorporate a word that means (or is) two

Theme answers:

• POWER COUPLE (17A: VOLT, AMP) 
• PAIR OF SOCKS (32A: PUNCH, WALLOP) 
• DOUBLE DIGIT (40A: FINGER, TOE) 
• TWO POINTERS (59A: HINT, TIP)

Word of the Day: CHINA (18D: "Nixon in ___" (John Adams opera) —

Nixon in China is an opera in three acts by John Adams with a libretto by Alice Goodman. Adams's first opera, it was inspired by U.S. president Richard Nixon's 1972 visit to the People's Republic of China. The work premiered at the Houston Grand Opera on October 22, 1987, in a production by Peter Sellars with choreography by Mark Morris. When Sellars approached Adams with the idea for the opera in 1983, Adams was initially reluctant, but eventually decided that the work could be a study in how myths come to be, and accepted the project. Goodman's libretto was the result of considerable research into Nixon's visit, though she disregarded most sources published after the 1972 trip. (Wiki)

• • •

That was a solid puzzle to end the year. It was a cute theme (even if I do have some nits). And it has a lot of nice, uncommon fill (even if there was some typical crosswordese). 

There wasn’t a revealer, which didn’t affect the solve but which (selfishly speaking) left it much harder for me to try to accurately describe the theme! Like, how do you say the theme is words synonymous with “two” when one of the actual words is TWO? But that description was the best I could come up with. 

The idea of having two words in the clue lead to answers that involve pairings worked. And I liked the theme phrases, my favorite being POWER COUPLE (17A). But I kept finding nits with the theme (maybe blame my lack of sleep because of the puppy). Why are PAIR, DOUBLE, and TWO at the start for the three of the answers but COUPLE is at the end of one of the theme answers? And the answers being plural or singular felt arbitrary to me. My main issue is with DOUBLE DIGIT (40D), which I think should have been made plural. It just doesn’t make sense to have that one singular while also having TWO POINTERS. 

After my original annoyance, as I kept looking at the puzzle, I found more and more that I liked. There were a lot of words that are uncommon in puzzles that zhuzhed this one up. You don’t see COFFEE CAKE (11D), SPOOKY (46A), TOPSY (15A), KIWI (3D), DEXTER (48D), ADIÓS AMIGO (28D), SHIVA (14A), JAFAR (22A), etc. in a crossword every day. And then there was LORETTA Lynn (41D: Country legend), who’s amazing. The aforementioned POWER COUPLE (17A) is a fun phrase. CLEAR SKIES (12D) and IT’S UP TO YOU (29D) also work well. 

The punny clue/answers were also good. 54: Present day, in brief as XMAS got me for a while before it hit me that it meant the day for, well, opening presents. I was all set to rail against this clue/answer being in the puzzle on New Year’s Eve instead of Christmas and then had to backtrack. 26A: Apple gadgets as CORERS confused me so much at first, but that was clever — I’m just so used to seeing products made by Apple in the puzzle. 6A: Drive crazy? as SPEED felt straightforward to me, so I did originally wonder about there being a question mark. My biggest “aha” moment was well after I’d completed the puzzle and just couldn’t figure out why 30D: Police work? was SONG, and then it hit me that the clue was referring to the band. 

I’ve been playing gin rummy (or, more often in my household, gin 500) for most of my life, and I’ve somehow never heard of MELD (27D: Gin rummy combo) before. You learn something new every day! 49D: Gold, silver, or bronze got me when I typed in “metal” instead of MEDAL. 18D: “Nixon in ___" (John Adams opera) with CHINA wasn’t overly familiar to me, especially not in relation to John Adams. For 36A: Member of K-pop’s Blackpink, I originally typed in ROSÉ, the other member of Blackpink with four letters in her name (and with an “s” as the third letter, to add to my confusion) instead of LISA. I wonder if this gave some people pause, as those of you who aren’t as familiar with K-pop and Blackpink probably don’t know the names of the individual members (though they all have launched solo careers). And if we want to get technical, TUT (44D: Boy king of Egypt) is actually a nickname (full name is Tutankhamun), so the clue could indicate that (even if the name commonly used is King Tut). Anyway, that answer did play off nicely with ROI (34A: French king). 

There was some mundane crosswordese thrown in the puzzle, of course. But overall, the puzzle was a good one to end the year on. Now on to another year of crosswords (and write-ups)!

Misc.:

• To quote the iconic Edna Mode in response to 50D: Certain superhero accessories as CAPES — 
• Pshhh, a game of WAR is never “simple” (5D: Simple two-player card game). These can last hours — and obviously require intense skill and focus! 
• I would like to use this opportunity presented to me by 13D: Fortunetellers to plug the show “Agatha All Along.” It’s absolutely incredible, and one of the characters is a SEER (technically a divination witch) played by Patti LuPone. She’s fantastic in the show, and the show itself is unique and incredible. I’ve now run out of adjectives. 
• My DYE JOBS (10D: Certain salon offerings) don’t involve going to a salon but instead involve me using a box dye over my sink. It kinda sorta works. 
• So sorry to my sister, who didn’t win the MEGA Millions (55D) (and share it with me, of course) pot of something like $1.2 billion. It went to some other person in Northern California. Ugh.

Finally, in keeping with Rex, here’s my own version of Holiday Pet Pics, where it’s just my new puppy, Red! When I grew up skiing in Lake Tahoe, my home mountain had a chairlift that was one of my favorites and was memorable in other ways, too. My races were often held there. While on that lift, my dad got a call from a soccer coach saying that I’d made a team that was quite important to me. I watched a World Cup race there, and Mikaela Shiffrin and I practically became BFFs at the bottom. (I swear she smiled into the crowd while looking straight at me.) Anyway, the lift is called Red Dog. So I now have a Red dog! 

I’ve been having fun with puns now. My pup is black and white and “Red” all over. My dad told me that when I was close to getting her, he was issuing a “Red” alert. My sister and I love books, so she’ll be a well-“Red” dog… etc.

Here’s Red trying to eat the holiday decor as we were taking it down. 

Red took a pause from eating the nice tree to pose for this pic. 

Here’s Red lazily chewing on a bone in the airport on our Red-eye back to D.C. 

And finally, here's Red intently planning how she would get from the bench to chew my phone (again).

And that's all from me. Have a Happy New Year! 

Signed, Clare Carroll, Red-y to be a puppy mom

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook]

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Wish for a romantic pairing between, in modern parlance / MON 12-30-24 / Purple yam common in Filipino cooking / Flower that reflects yellow when held under one's chin / Snakelike fish / Cry made while pointing / Waiter's imperative after bringing food

Constructor: Hannah Binney

Relative difficulty: Challenging (as a Downs-only solve)

THEME: HOLD WATER (61A: Make logical sense ... or what the ends of 18-, 23-, 38- and 51-Across do) — last words of themers are all things that can, indeed, HOLD WATER:

Theme answers:

• BUTTERCUP (18A: Flower that reflects yellow when held under one's chin)
• HOURGLASS (23A: Primitive timer)
• PRO BOWL (38A: N.F.L. all-star game)
• THINK TANK (51A: Place for policy wonks)

Word of the Day: UBE (63D: Purple yam common in Filipino cooking) —

Dioscorea alata – also called ube (/ˈuːbɛ, -beɪ/), ubi, purple yam, or greater yam, among many other names – is a species of yam (a tuber). The tubers are usually a vivid violet-purple to bright lavender in color (hence the common name), but some range in color from cream to plain white. It is sometimes confused with taro and the Okinawa sweet potato beniimo (紅芋) (Ipomoea batatas cv. Ayamurasaki), however D. alata is also grown in Okinawa. With its origins in the Asian and Oceanian tropics, D. alata has been known to humans since ancient times. // Because it has become naturalized following its origins in Asia, specifically the Philippines, through tropical South America, and the southeastern U.S., D. alata is referred to by many different names in these regions. In English alone, aside from purple yam, other common names include ten-months yam, water yam, white yam, winged yam, violet yam, Guyana arrowroot, or simply yam. (wikipedia)

• • •

Gah, I got done in by UBE, which is a bummer, because I have actually eaten UBE very recently. Well, UBE flavored chocolates, anyway. Our daughter recently brought home delicious chocolates from chocolatier Daniel Corpuz. I think she got them from the Union Square Holiday Market. I might have that part wrong. Looks like his regular location is on Canal Street. Annnnnnyway, fancy chocolates, I've had fancy chocolates before, they're generally fine, OK, but this guy's chocolates—his flavors—really stopped us in our tracks. Very special, subtle, beautiful. How does this relate to crosswords!? Well, Daniel Corpuz is Filipino-American, and one of his signature creations is [drumroll] the UBE bon-bon. Look at these babies!

UBE is just one of the many unconventional (to my palate) flavors he uses in his chocolates. Delicious. And yet today, I totally forgot UBE. I see "yam" in a clue and three letters, I go straight for OCA (it's a crossword thing—also a delicious thing, a very New Zealand thing, but that's another story). And remember I'm doing this Downs-only, so I'm getting no help from crosses. I can see OCA is wrong, and I get the answer down to -BE, but ... I go with OSAGE rather than USAGE, leaving me with OBE instead of UBE. And that was that. Downs-only failure. And that was after really struggling all over the place, in ways that I am not used to. Real real trouble parsing SO-AND-SO, made worse by the fact that, faced with HOL-WATER, can you guess what letter I assumed went there!?!? Yeah, you see it, I know you see it: I went with HOLY WATER. I mean, I was *super* confident about HOLY WATER. So that's one wrong letter in SO-AND-SO, and I only had two other letters that I was confident about (luckily those were correct). Lots of pulling letters and trying new letters, trial and error, before I got the huge "AHA" of SO-AND-SO ... only to have my elation come crashing down when I did not get the "Congratulations" message for successful completion. Had to check the Acrosses to see where I'd f'd up. UBE seems hard for a Monday. It's appeared only one other time in the Modern Era, and that was on a Saturday. But I'm not mad at the puzzle, I'm mad at me for enjoying delicious UBE chocolates and then totally blanking on UBE when I needed it. Real humbling experience today. But for real, if you're in the NYC area, you need to go get some Daniel Corpuz chocolates, ASAP. Phenomenal. 

The theme felt just SO-SO (side note: having both SO-SO and SO-AND-SO in the same grid feels not so good). Lots of vessels HOLD WATER. The progression here makes no logical sense to me. I guess they get ... what, bigger? ... as they go along, but CUP and GLASS are basically the same thing, and then BOWL? I guess if you're a dog, sure, water BOWL. And then TANK. I dunno. These vessels seem arbitrary. Also, these vessels hold lots of things besides water. The whole thing just didn't feel that tight. The grid as a whole, though, has a pretty springy, youthful feel, a fresh, up-to-date vibe that I kinda liked. I'm basically just proud that I nailed SHIP with no crosses, despite the fact that that bit of slang is not native to me At All (56D: Wish for a romantic pairing between, in modern parlance). I know it from my daughter and my students and, like, the air. The ambient digital world that surrounds me. I also loved MOCKTAILS and ROOTROT (I know, weird to love ROOTROT, but it's just a great-sounding term) (for context: my favorite word as a child was "mediocre"). And SO-AND-SO, despite being hard as hell to parse, is still a fun bit of euphemistic slang (43D: No-goodnik). I've got no complaints about the fill on this one. It's more challenging fare than you find in most Mondays, but it's also got more character than most Monday fill does.

There were a couple of clues, though, that just meant absolutely nothing to me. Why are you holding a BUTTERCUP (or any flower) under your chin? Like, why that location, specifically? Huge shrug there. Also, even huger shrug on the alleged expression, "All you need is love and a CAT." Uh, what? Who said that, when? It's an "old saying?" I'm old. And I have cats. Why haven't I heard it? Look, here's one of my cats now:

That's Alfie. Alfie hasn't heard this "old saying" either. It's not even a good saying. Where's the surprise, the twist, the wordplay? I just don't know why we're holding flowers under our chins and saying banal things about cats today. 

Bullets:

• 21D: Canadian province that's home to the Head-Smashed-In-Buffalo Jump World Heritage Site (ALBERTA) — I almost made "Head-Smashed-In-Buffalo Jump World Heritage Site" my Word of the Day today. I can't begin to imagine what that is. Ah, I should've guessed. Indigenous people used to kill bison by basically driving them off a cliff. So "jump" is maybe a little bit of a misnomer. 
• 57D: Pepsi or Coke (COLA) — man that SODA / COLA kealoa* really hits hard when you're solving Downs-only. Luckily, the adjacent answers eventually made it clear which one was correct today.
• 6D: Creatures that are actually black with white stripes (ZEBRAS) — so ... not PANDAS, then? No, I know PANDAS aren't really striped, or striped at all, I was just kidding, of course I didn't write in PANDAS, shut up.
• 10D: Advances (INROADS) — another one that was super-tough from a Downs-only perspective. Think of all the things that "Advances" can mean, and think how many of those you'd list before you got to INROADS.
• 13D: "I understand you" ("COPY") — again, wicked with no help from crosses. "I SEE"? No, the clue's got "I" in it, so that's not right. OK, I see it ends in "Y" so ... ---Y? ---Y? "OH MY!"? Was not aware we were on walkie-talkies. 
• 29D: Units of force (NEWTONS) — ah, Physics. The only thing I won a prize for in college! (bizarre fact—I had to take a science course to fulfill my Gen Ed requirements, so I went with Physics I my senior year and the homework was soooooooo much different from my regular humanities courses—a lot less reading, a lot more problem-solving—that I "procrastinated" from my "real" homework by doing my Physics homework and ended up with the highest grade in the class and they somehow gave a cash prize for that at graduation?? Did I fever-dream this? (I did not). Anyway, I managed to retain the fact that NEWTONS are a thing, though I did not remember it until I got that "W" from PRO BOWL.

• 40D: Cry made while pointing ("LOOK!") — more Downs-only trouble. I had the "K" but I thought the first letter was "O" because I had inferred 38-Across not as PRO BOWL but as PRO BONO (argh). So instead of pointing and going "LOOK!" I was pointing and going "OH, OK!" and go ahead, try it, it doesn't make much sense. I did it just now and laughed out loud. It's like you're making fun and / or complimenting someone's outfit. "OH, OK! Wow. Yeah, I see you! That is ... something!"
• 53D: "The early bird gets the worm," for one (ADAGE) — in which I discover a new kealoa*: the ADAGE / AXIOM kealoa*. As you can see, Downs-only was a struggle for me today.
• 31D: Snakelike fish (EELS) — a disguised plural? On top of everything else, Monday? Come on, man. 

On to the Holiday Pet Pics now (I opened up submissions again briefly yesterday but they're closed again now—y'all are enthusiastic about your pet pics!). 

Latte is a recent adoptee spending her first Holiday season in her new home. Have you ever tried gift-wrapping a cat? It's very tricky.

[Thanks, John]

Felix the Somnolent (a properly imperial title) enjoys reigning from underneath the tree, from which his ornament minions do his bidding.

[Thanks, Roger]

Lola has already been in Holiday Pet Pics this year, but she's cute, she can get away with it.

[Thanks, Mimi]

Bunny! Bunny is a recent rescue, and he is on a "serious weight reduction diet." Here's a picture of him *not* getting the "good treats." (He will remember this indignity for years to come)

[Thanks Joe (and Emily)]

Our last two goofy furballs are Winnie and Rocky. They are brother and sister. I'm told Winnie wanted to be on the blog, but her older brother Rocky did not give a damn. "I ain't waking up to pose for no damn 'blog'! Who even reads 'blogs' anymore? You people are weird. Just take your picture and leave me alone." Winnie says he doesn't really mean it, but I think he might.

[Thanks, Ben]

See you next time.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

P.S. BIG IF TRUE !! —

*kealoa = a pair of words (normally short, common answers) that can be clued identically and that share at least one letter in common (in the same position). These are answers you can't just fill in quickly because two or more answers are viable, Even With One or More Letters In Place. From the classic [Mauna ___] KEA/LOA conundrum. See also, e.g. [Heaps] => ATON or ALOT, ["Git!"] => "SHOO" or "SCAT," etc.   

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook]

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McEvoy of cosmetics / SUN 12-29-24 / Graphics that show trends / Language from which "curry" comes / Green with bowdlerized hit "Forget You" / They might make you jump / Jamie who pitched on eight major-league teams over his 25-year career / Emmy-winning drama series set in the midwest / Bill, folk hero who is said to have ridden a tornado like a bucking bronco / Early phase of software development

Constructor: Harry Zheng

Relative difficulty: Easy

THEME: "Multi-Hyphenates" — in familiar phrases, "LINE" is replaced by dashes, which form a literal DASHED LINE (112A: Indication of where to cut ... or something written five times in this puzzle?). In the Down crosses, those "dashes" magically turn into "hyphens"

Theme answers:

• [LINE] WORKER (22A: Electrician who might put in overtime after a bad storm)
• hyphenated crosses: UH-UH / NO-NO / TO-DO / OP-ED
• [LINE] CHARTS (28A: Graphics that show trends)
• hyphenated crosses: LIP-READ / AGE-OLD / GET-GO / RE-UP
• [LINE] DRIVES (59A: Hard hits off the bat)
• hyphenated crosses: TA-DA / KAL-EL / EMO-POP / TIN-POT
• [LINE] DANCES (72A: The Macarena and Cha Cha Slide, for two)
• hyphenated crosses: TV-MA / PRE-OP / CHIN-UPS / MUST-READ
• [LINE]BACKER (109A: Defensive position)
• hyphenated crosses: DO-RAG / MID-AIR / ORE-IDA / YES-MEN

Word of the Day: Jamie MOYER (83A: Jamie who pitched on eight major-league teams over his 25-year career) —

Jamie Moyer (born November 18, 1962) is an American former professional baseball pitcher. Over his 25-year career in Major League Baseball (MLB), Moyer pitched for the Chicago Cubs, Texas Rangers, St. Louis Cardinals, Baltimore Orioles, Boston Red Sox, Seattle Mariners, Philadelphia Phillies, and Colorado Rockies.

At the time of his final game, he was the oldest player in the major leagues and had the most wins, losses, and strikeouts of any active MLB pitcher. He was likened to Phil Niekro due to his long career and relatively old age upon retirement. On April 17, 2012, Moyer became the oldest pitcher in MLB history to win a game. On May 16, 2012, he broke his own winning-pitcher record and also set the record for the oldest MLB player to record a run batted in (RBI). He also holds the major league record for most home runs allowed with 522.

Moyer made the All-Star team in 2003, while with the Mariners. (wikipedia)

• • •

True confession: the first time I ever heard the term DASHED LINE was ... today. Just now. Total news to me, this term. I know the term "dotted line," of course. You sign on it, famously. The thing is—and I never thought of this before today—"dotted line" is kind of a misnomer, because most of the so-called "dotted lines" I've seen in my life have, in fact, been composed of *dashes.* I just found out that if you look up the term, "dotted line," you will see many dictionaries acknowledging that even though we're saying "dot," we mean "dash." A dotted line is "a line of dots or dashes on a form or document" per Collins Dictionary, for example. And even though the clue refers to a line that indicates where you're supposed to cut (with scissors), not where you're supposed to sign, I don't know that I would've called that line anything else but a "dotted line." I certainly wouldn't have called it a "DASHED LINE," for reasons established in the first sentence of this paragraph. So the basic terminology in this one—the core concept, the revealer itself—was alien to me today. So that was weird. Also weird: calling your "dash" puzzle "Multi-Hyphenates," as hyphens ... are not ... the same ... as dashes. Yes, a hyphen looks kind of like an en dash, but "dash" and "hyphen" are not equivalent and there are any number of sites on the internet that are more than happy to explain the difference to you. 

So terminological issues are distracting me today, making it hard to appreciate what the puzzle's trying to do. The puzzle needs the line to be DASHED and not DOTTED today, because the whole point of the theme (wordplay-wise) is that the word "LINE" is "DASHED," i.e. turned into dashes, so that those (en) dashes can then function as "hyphens" in the crosses. The fact that the "dash" becomes a "hyphen" in the crosses is actually really nifty. I totally missed this aspect of the theme until I started describing the theme in this write-up. I thought those Downs that ran through "LINE" were just skipping over a missing "LINE"—I didn't see that the "LINE" needed to be made of "-"s, that all the Down answers *featured* "-"s as part of their make-up. I've spent a solving lifetime studiously ignoring hyphens. I've entered OPED in the grid a million times over the years, but OP [hyphen] ED? Never, that I can recall. The fact that the puzzle got *all* the words crossing "LINE"s to be hyphenated answers—that's pretty impressive. It didn't make the solve itself very exciting, but it definitely made me respect the intricacy of the construction. 

The fact that LINE was in every theme answer helped make this puzzle very easy. It also meant that the theme answer set was repetitive and somewhat bland. Further, there just wasn't a lot of other marquee fill to liven things up. Only a small handful of answers outside the theme are seven letters or longer, and most of those are pretty ordinary. Perfectly solid, but not exactly scintillating. So I wish there'd been more oomph and sparkle in the grid overall. Still, there were a couple of moments that really made me light up. The first was running into the book I Know a RHINO (102D: "I Know a ___" (rhyming children's book)). We read this to / with our daughter All The Time when she was little. It was a bedtime story that was actually fun to read. The kind you hope they'll ask for ("oh god please don't let her pick [long boring story, title redacted]!"). The illustrations are lovely and incongruous and silly in that way that little kids love. In short, good memories, especially as earlier today, that same daughter (now 24) was sending me selfies from in front of the Louvre and the Eiffel Tower (stuck in Paris on her way to Venice for work, but making the most of it). Anyway, the puzzle gave me fond memories of the girl, and I'm grateful for that. I literally exclaimed "Aw..." mid-solve. 

[FUGE (4)]

The other moment that made me smile was when Jamie MOYER showed up (. I thought "Oh, lots of people are not going to know him. I don't think he's been in the grid since ... since ... wait a minute ..." And sure enough, this is just the second appearance of MOYER—the first since I debuted him in one of my NYTXW puzzles back in 2012. 

I'm not saying his name is good fill, exactly—despite his many accomplishments, Jamie MOYER is a pretty obscure name, especially to casual (or non-) baseball fans. But I took a weird baseball-fan pride in giving the old guy his due back in 2012, and I was weirdly happy to see his name again today. "Good for him!" Kinda weird to have MOYER *and* MAYER in the same grid, but ... they *are* different names, so ... judges say: no foul!

No struggles today. Only one write-over, but it was a doozy. I had the ANT- at 37A: Lion's prey and without much hesitation wrote in ... ANTEATER. Which fit! I did think "huh, never saw that on Wild Kingdom," but I also thought "sure, why not, I can see a lion eating one of those." But no, yeah, ANTELOPE, way more iconic. And I've learned (in about two minutes of cursory online searching) that ANTEATERs are not actually a part of the average lion diet.

Further notes:

• 18A: Emmy-winning drama series set in the midwest (FARGO) — still not totally on board with calling North Dakota "the midwest"—all those northern and central states just to the west of the Mississippi are "Plains States" (part of the Great Plains), and should be classified separately from the "midwest," imho—but the Census Bureau says NDAK is in the "midwest," so I guess it just is.

[The Census Bureau's idea of the "midwest"]

• 47A: Language from which "curry" comes (TAMIL) — hesitated at TAM-L between "I" and "A." I blame "tamale."
• 55A: Dien Bien ___, 1954 battle site in Vietnam (PHU) — thank you, Billy Joel

["Dien Bien PHU falls / Rock around the clock"]

• 61A: McEvoy of cosmetics (TRISH) — no idea. You wanna stump me, give me "cosmetics" names. Anything beyond ESTEE Lauder or OPI nail polish (or ULTA Beauty, or L'OREAL) and I'm done for.
• 76A: "The Simpsons" character who says "I've done everything the Bible says! Even the stuff that contradicts the other stuff!" (NED) — Flanders! 

• 90A: They might make you jump (UP ARROWS) — I know I said I had no sticking points today, but I forgot about this answer, which I could Not parse for the longest time (that is, some small amount of time). I had the whole front end (UPARR-) and still: no idea. I was trying to make it be one word. Rookie mistake. UP ARROWS make you jump ... up ... one row ... in whatever text you are working on. (Sorry, I’m being told this is about video games. [Shrug].)
• 91D: ___ Bill, folk hero who is said to have ridden a tornado like a bucking bronco (PECOS) — it's weird, I know the name PECOS Bill, but I could not have told you one thing about him. 

Pecos Bill (/ˈpeɪkəs/ PAY-kəs) is a fictional cowboy and folk hero in stories set during American westward expansion into the Southwest of Texas, New Mexico, Southern California, and Arizona. These narratives were invented as short stories in a book by Tex O'Reilly in the early 20th century and are an example of American "fakelore". Pecos Bill was a late addition to the larger-than-life characters, such as Paul Bunyan or John Henry. (wikipedia)

"Fakelore"! What a great term. Someone should cover Taylor Swift's Folklore in its entirety and call it Fakelore. Weird Al? No, that would probably be Folklore (Weird Al's Version). Would listen.

We're nearing the end of Holiday Pet Pics, as the "Holiday" season winds down. I know I said "no more submissions," but I might have room for a few more on New Year's Day, so if you wanna send me Fido in a Santa suit or Fluffy sleeping under the increasingly brittle Christmas tree or Dino eating a dreidel dog treat, go ahead. 

This is Miss Frida Flirt Hyman-Taylor, who (in typical Schnauzer fashion) likes to celebrate the holidays by being imperious and territorial. Also cute.

[Thanks, Steve]

Here we see Queso as he tries and fails to string the lights on the tree. "Why do these get so tangled?! Why don't I have opposable thumbs?!" Also pictured: Wolfy, who is absolutely no help.

[Thanks, Robert]

Penny and Merle like to solve together. Here, Penny throws down her pencil in disgust: "ASTA ... TOTO ... ODIE ... this dog bias is bull***." Merle doesn't notice or care. He's still working on 8-Down: "PURR! Is it PURR! Write in PURR! No, MEOW! MEW! No, TUNA! Write in TUNA!" Penny: "It's eight letters, dummy." Merle: "TUUUUUNA!"

[Thanks, Barak]

For the first time in three years, Qwerty came out of hiding when guests came over to the house (true story). It's a Chanukah miracle!

[Thanks, Deborah]

And lastly today, here's Felix and Chester, the Siberian Forest Cats, looking dubious about their Christmas gift. "Is that ... a book? That looks like a book. You ... shouldn't have. No, seriously."

[Thanks, Liam]

See you next time.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook]

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Infamous bushranger Kelly / SAT 12-28-24 / Beverage that begins with a bee? / Fans flip for it / What's left of F1 / Feature of English, but not Chinese / Sesquipedalia / Classic rubber dog toy / Singer in the family? / First trimester woe, informally / Jenkins known as "The First Lady of Children's Music"

Constructor: Sam Berriman

Relative difficulty: Easy

THEME: not really, no — there's some Arthur Conan Doyle stuff, but I wouldn't call it a "theme"

Word of the Day: NED Kelly (17A: Infamous bushranger Kelly) —

Edward Kelly (December 1854 – 11 November 1880) was an Australian bushranger, outlaw, gang leader and convicted police-murderer. One of the last bushrangers, he is known for wearing a suit of bulletproof armour during his final shootout with the police. [...] Historian Geoffrey Serle called Kelly and his gang "the last expression of the lawless frontier in what was becoming a highly organised and educated society, the last protest of the mighty bush now tethered with iron rails to Melbourne and the world". In the century after his death, Kelly became a cultural icon, inspiring numerous works in the arts and popular culture, and is the subject of more biographies than any other Australian. Kelly continues to cause division in his homeland: he is variously considered a Robin Hood-like folk hero and crusader against oppression, and a murderous villain and terrorist. Journalist Martin Flanagan wrote: "What makes Ned a legend is not that everyone sees him the same—it's that everyone sees him. Like a bushfire on the horizon casting its red glow into the night." (wikipedia)

• • •

Couple problems here. One is this no-man's land theme/non-theme. When a puzzle cross-references, and crosses, two marquee answers like SHERLOCK HOLMES (1D: Guinness's second-most-portrayed literary character in film, after Dracula) and DEERSTALKER CAP (13A: Iconic accessory worn by 1-Down), you expect it to ... go somewhere. I was like "oh we're doing a theme on a Saturday, are we? That sucks." And then it turns out we were not, in fact, doing a theme on Saturday, and that also, somehow sucked. There's just not enough marquee material in this thing to start with—I figured what little there is would end up being all SHERLOCK HOLMES-related. Maybe one long Across or Down on each side of the puzzle. But no, just the two. Just the two sides. Went to the other sides hoping to find some rationale for the Holmes crossing, but all I found was a Michael Jackson song ("MAN IN THE MIRROR") (12D: One asked to "change his ways," per a 1988 hit), and a bunch of TEN-DOLLAR WORDS (45A: Sesquipedalia). Ten dollars!? Wow, inflation has really done a number on the price of those words—my high school English teacher used to say "don't use a twenty-five cent word when a nickel word will do." And now the half-dollar word is worth ten dollars. Crazy. (Apparently "twenty-five cent word" is also an acceptable term—wiktionary has several denominations listed, including "two-dollar" and "five-dollar," with the antonym to all those being "ten-cent" ... even the cheap words have doubled in price since I was in high school)

[two Michael Jackson songs! (28A: Get lost)]

So the non-theme theme was one problem. The other was the layout, which drives the number of 3-4-5-letter words sky high. There are ten longer answers, and that sounds like a lot, but they somehow get overwhelmed by all the short stuff, which includes virtually every answer *crossing* the longer answers, and then *all* the answers toward the middle. This dilutes the power of the longer stuff, which wasn't terribly strong to begin with, though I will say, I did love WHATABOUTISM (fresh) (11A: Deflection technique), and "WE'RE FRESH OUT" (also fresh [!] ... colloquial and fun) (11D: "Sorry, that's the last one"). But there's just too much OTS TBA EKEOUT ENT EIRE TSPS ATEAT CFO NIH-type stuff gumming up the grid. The SE corner is particularly gummy. All three answers under ENT are just letters: MFA IUD MRNA. If ENT had been clued as the doctor instead of the tree creature (34A: Tree creature of fiction), that would've created even more of a letter landslide. And all those all-initial answers are crossing TADAS, which is still the worst plural I've ever seen—and we've seen it three times this year, making 2024 the biggest year ever for TADAS. I hope the NYTXW resolves to bring that number down in 2025. I feel like I need a sign: "___ Days Since Last TADAS." Yeah, here we go.

No real difficulty today, especially considering it's Saturday. Had trouble with the PAGE part of SPORTS PAGE (1A: Fans flip for it) because I thought they flipped (as in "went crazy") for their favorite SPORTS TEAM, and anyway most fans don't read dead-tree newspapers anymore, so the "PAGE" part feels a bit last-century. Good clue, with a nice misdirection on "flip," but ... slightly dated. Also had some trouble up there because of PUKING (7D: First trimester woe, informally), which ... "informally?" LOL, yeah, I guess so. But what's the "formal" term? EMESIS? I was really looking for something much more pregnancy-specific. PUKING feels way more post-kegger than morning sickness, though I guess barfing is barfing is barfing. Speaking of, I'd rather not have barf in my puzzle at all. That is one element of the "breakfast test" that I can get behind: a barf ban. The only other sticking point for me today came at the end, in the SONGS BENDS ELLA section, largely because I had no idea who that ELLA was (43A: Jenkins known as "The First Lady of Children's Music"), but also because SONGS (37A: Singles, say) and BENDS (40A: Compromises) had tough / ambiguous clues. Otherwise, super-easy all around (for a Saturday).

Bullets:

• 23A: One for the books, in brief? (CFO) — "books" as in financial records; CFO = Chief Financial Officer.
• 25A: Feature of English, but not Chinese (TENSE) — Verb TENSE. I forgot this was true. I also forgot that TENSE had any homophones—literally said the word aloud to myself several times before hitting on TENTS, LOL (25D: Gear that's a homophone of 25-Across).
• 22D: Beverage that begins with a bee? (MEAD) — because MEAD is made by fermenting honey.
• 27A: Classic rubber dog toy (KONG) — this made me miss my dogs (d. 2019 and 2020, respectively). We still have their KONG toy around here somewhere.
• 4D: Singer in the family? (RAT) — the "family" here is the mafia, and a "singer" is one who violates omerta, who talks, who ... "sings."

• 10D: What's left of F1 (ESC) — I'll admit to cheating here. That is, I looked down at my keyboard. I never use my "F" keys (except the ones that control volume, which I identify by icon and not "F" number). 
• 14D: Sources of retirement income (PENSION FUNDS) — definitely had PENSION PLANS in here at first.
• 18D: Paleolithic, for example (DIET) — technically true, though I've never heard the diet referred to as anything but "Paleo."
• 33D: World's highest-paid athlete in 2024 (RONALDO) — this blows my mind, as I associate him with football (i.e. soccer) of yesteryear. Kids were wearing his jersey around here back in the mid-'00s. (He'll turn 40 in February).
• 47D: Clock, e.g. (APP) — I ... guess so? Is the clock on my phone an APP? I just think of it as a full-time feature. Maybe there's a special "Clock" APP that I just don't know about. Yes, a proprietary Google APP called "Clock." Huh. Well. Alrighty. Super-ambiguous clue, but since I already had -PP in place before I ever looked at the clue, it didn't give me any trouble.

More Holiday Pet Pics now...

This is Winter, chief ornament inspector. She shuns the limelight. Her work is her reward.

[Thanks, John]

This is Hazel, solver of crosswords, friend to even the tiniest Christmas tree.

[Thanks, Loraine]

This is Cooper and Ella ("The Three-Legged Menace"). They are twins. I know it looks like they are different breeds, and very different sizes, but they insist: twins. Brave, handsome twins who deserve treats right now.

[Thanks, Lisa]

Winston's like, "Really? We're doing this again? [Sigh] Whatever. Take your picture so I can go back to sleep." That's the spirit, Winnie!

Finally, here's Scruffy. She showed up today because I showcased another dog named Scruffy earlier in the month, and that made this Scruffy cry "Impostor!" and "Doppelganger!" and so forth. So Burt sent her picture in so she could feel seen. Poor Scruffy, so sensitive. We see you, Scruffy!

[Thanks, Burt]

See you next time.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook]

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