Blind blues singer Paul / THU 2-13-25 / Ancient kingdom of Asia Minor / Virtual companion of the 2000s / Car brand named for a deity / Heads of ancient Rome / Pickled ginger served with sushi / State with the highest percentage of federal land / Punny reply to "What are you waiting for?" / Emmy-winning Sawai of "Shogun" / Zealous supporter, in modern lingo

Constructor: Jem Burch

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: SCRAP METAL (57A: Material in a junkyard pile ... or a hint to answering this puzzle's four asterisked clues) — you have to "scrap" (i.e. take out) a "metal" from each theme answer in order to make sense of the answer (with the "metal" in there, you get an answer that looks real but makes no sense for the clue):

Theme answers:

• GROWING OLD (17A: *Emerge, as teeth) (grow in + GOLD) 
• "THE IRONY..." (29A: *Plural personal pronoun) (they + IRON)
• LATINOS (37A: *Country where the Plain of Jars is located) (Laos + TIN) 
• PLEA DEAL (*Bell sound) (peal + LEAD)

Word of the Day: MAZDA (40A: Car brand named for a deity) —

Ahura Mazda (/əˌhʊərə ˈmæzdə/; Avestan: 𐬀𐬵𐬎𐬭𐬀 𐬨𐬀𐬰𐬛𐬁, romanized: Ahura Mazdā; Persian: اهورا مزدا, romanized: Ahurâ Mazdâ), also known as Horomazes, is the creator deity and god of the sky in the ancient Iranian religion Zoroastrianism. He is the first and most frequently invoked spirit in the Yasna. The literal meaning of the word Ahura is "lord", and that of Mazda is "wisdom". (wikipedia)

• • •

The biggest and (in retrospect only) most hilarious problem I had today was entirely (well, almost entirely) on me. That is, I forgot the state of NEVADA existed (18D: State with the highest percentage of federal land). I had the NE- and my brain went "NEBRASKA" and then it could come up with No More States. Just flat-out blanked. Had me thinking that I was not actually dealing with the United States. "Is it a state of some other country? India?" But the "federal" in the clue really suggested the U.S. ... but nothing worked. NEW ... JERSEY? Too long. NEW YORK? ... same. NEVADA just disappeared from the U.S. map of my mind. It did not help that the crosses on Nevada were some of the hardest in the whole puzzle. Could not see PAVE (24A: Make passable, in a way), partly because I thought the [___ chart] was a FEE chart. Is that a thing? (er, kinda ... it's more like "fee structure"). Could not wrangle the Roman heads—my brain got too in the weeds, trying to remember plural forms from Latin classes I took in the '90s, so instead of just grabbing CAPITA from the very basic phrase "per CAPITA," I was like "CAPUT ... so ... CAPUTS? No, not "S" ... CAPUTI? ... ugh, definitely not." Worst of all the NEVADA crosses by far, though, was DARI, what on god's green earth!?!?! Is that familiar to everyone? If so, why hasn't it appeared in the NYTXW ... ever? I mean, DARI used to appear, in the olden days of crosswordese—though not often, even then. It appeared five times, four of those under the relatively short tenure of Will Weng (ed. 1969-77), and in no case was it an Afghan language. Instead, it was a "grain sorghum?"

[xwordinfo.com]

Will “Hot-For-Sorghum” Weng, they used to call him. And now, thirty-two years later, DARI returns, in language form. While I expect no one but me forgot that NEVADA existed, I expect the majority of solvers will have had absolutely no clue about DARI (33A: One of two official languages of Afghanistan). You could've told me any letter was that first letter at -ARI, I'd've believed you. And then you go and put GARI in your grid too??? (43A: Pickled ginger served with sushi). LOL I eat that damned pickled ginger all the time and if I knew it had a name, I plum forgot. GARI has only ever appeared twice before. Not sure it's the greatest idea to dump both of these two rhyming short foreign answers in your grid at once. For me, it put all my attention where it shouldn't belong, i.e. on strange short stuff rather than the theme, which, by this time (that is, literally right now), I've almost completely forgotten. Oh, right, the metal stuff. Yeah, I picked that up right away. Some of the hidden-metal strategies were interesting (LAOS + TIN = LATINOS), some weren't (THEY + IRON = "THE IRONY..."; not loving the full answer as much as I'm clearly supposed to—you really gotta say it a certain way for it to make sense). Anyway, the theme was conceptually basic, the themers reasonably easy to suss out. The revealer works fine. But it was the strange / odd / awkward / obscure short stuff that got all my attention today. 

They wanted you to know LYDIA!? (35A: Ancient kingdom of Asia Minor). Deep cut, classical history-wise. I teach ancient literature from time to time, so I got it with a cross or two, but yikes. And this PENA person? (16A: Blind blues singer Paul). No idea. And he appears under the (to me) completely inscrutable SWUM (10A: Like some Olympic races). I had the -UM and just ... nothing. Didn't click. Beyond that, though, the puzzle was reasonably easy. All my "trouble" ink on my print-out is above the CAPITA / DARI / GARI line. Above and to the NE. Below that, a cinch. 


Bullets:

• 14A: Got a C, say (DID OK) — what year is it? No kid who "got a C" today would say that they "DID OK." It's a bad, and certainly below average, grade in most contexts (possibly there are some math/science exceptions, but ... yeah, grade inflation is real and "C" is pretty bad.
• 64A: Punny reply to "What are you waiting for?" (TIPS) — I hate myself for getting this so quickly. It doesn't even make sense. I mean, yes, waiters and waitresses "wait" for TIPS, but if you just said that phrase, randomly, not in a restaurant ... first of all, what's wrong with you? And second, it wouldn't really land. You'd need some kind of context to make it work at all. The "pun" is sub-corny. Barely even detectable by the corn-o-meter. And yet, as I say, it was transparent to me. I guess by this point in my long NYTXW solving career, I have a decent sense of the puzzle's sense of "humor," even if I don't share it.

• 30D: Volatile demolition aid, for short (NITRO) — we had this as a coffee answer a couple days ago. There, NITRO was short for "Nitrogen." Here, it's short for "Nitroglycerin."
• 56A: Emmy-winning Sawai of "Shogun" (ANNA) — thankfully, I never saw this. My ability to keep up with the names of everyone who has ever won any award has officially left me. I sort of heard that there was a new Shogun but definitely didn't care. I'll try to remember SAWAI for when it (inevitably) shows up in a grid some day.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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