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Urban area associated with gaming / THU 3-20-25 / Sites for saltwater soaks / Green-skinned Marvel hero / Covered with a green growth / Restaurant chain acronym / Former world capital that's an anagram of its country's current capital
Thursday, March 20, 2025
Constructor: Daniel Grinberg
Relative difficulty: Very easy to solve (somewhat less easy to understand, at a thematic level)
Theme answers:
Word of the Day: SHE-HULK (27A) —
From a pure solving perspective, this was like an anti-Thursday, in that there is absolutely nothing tricky about the solve itself. Zero. You don't need to understand the theme at all in order to solve it. But if you do happen to pick up the theme along the way, then the puzzle gets even easier, as you now have two different ways to come at the circle-containing long answers—plug one of the relevant letters in ("___ OR ___") or, if that isn't working, plug the other one in. I didn't time myself, but at speed this would probably have been about a 3 or 4-minute puzzle, so ... like a Tuesday. It was slower than that a. because I wasn't speeding and b. I actually tried to figure out what the hell was going on with the theme as I was solving, which took me an embarrassingly long time. I first thought that the circled letter was a kind of hologram / now-you-see-it / now-you-don't sort of thing, in that I knew JOAN CUSACK was in Say Anything, which starred her brother, so I thought "well, if I remove the 'A' then I get JON CUSACK ... weird, I didn't know he spelled his name like that." Turns out, he doesn't. Later, I got THE HULK and thought "ok if I take the 'T' away then ... who the hell is HE-HULK!? I thought THE HULK already was a HE-HULK!? I know there's a SHE-HULK, but ... oh, wait ... [looks at adjacent SORT ... 'S' OR 'T' ...] ... ohhhhhhhhhh." That was the AHA moment that allowed me to see that AHA could also be AHH ... and I'm only actually noticing just now (literally, right now) that the Downs all work with either letter in place, because of course they do, if they didn't, that would be awful. [I'm weirdly writing the body of this blog post before doing any of the preliminary stuff up top like the theme explanation and Word of the Day—this is not normal]. Genuine AHA, cute gimmick. I've seen puzzles that have this gimmick before—a revealer word that requires you to reparse it as multiple words in order to understand the theme (FISH becomes "F" IS "H" or ATOM becomes "A" TO "M" or something like that), but this one is like an intensified 4x version of that, with a new "revealer" on each themer line. Conceptually enjoyable, if (as I say) waaaay too easy.
- HORA (i.e. "H" or "A") / JOHN (or JOAN) CUSACK (16A: Jewish wedding staple ... and a clue to the circled square in this row / 17A: Actor in "Say Anything ..." and "High Fidelity")
- SORT (i.e. "S" or "T") / SHE- (or THE) HULK (27A: Word processing function ... and a clue to the circled square in this row / 24A: Green-skinned Marvel hero)
- MORN (i.e. "M" or "N") / SIM (or SIN) CITY (44A: Poetic time of day ... and a clue to the circled square in this row / 45A: Urban area associated with gaming)
- PORE (i.e. "P" or "E") / PLASTICITY (or ELASTICITY) (57A: Skin feature ... and a clue to the circled square in this row / 55A: Capability of being pulled and stretched)
- AHH (or AHA) (6D: "Yes, that's it!")
- TAKE (or SAKE) (24D: Hot ___)
- MET (or NET) (46D: New York pro athlete)
- SPAS (or SEAS) (50D: Sites for saltwater soaks)
She-Hulk (Jennifer Susan Walters) is a character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. Created by writer Stan Lee and artist John Buscema, the character first appeared in The Savage She-Hulk #1 (November 1979). Walters is a lawyer who, after an assassination attempt, received an emergency blood transfusion from her cousin, Bruce Banner, and acquired a milder version of his Hulk condition. As such, Walters becomes a large, powerful, green-hued version of herself. Unlike Banner in his Hulk form, Walters largely retains her normal personality in her She-Hulk form, in particular the majority of her intelligence and emotional control. Furthermore, though she's much taller in her She-Hulk form, Walters's body mass is just as dense as that of her normal human self. In any case, like Hulk, She-Hulk is still susceptible to outbursts of anger and becomes much stronger when enraged. In later series, her transformation is permanent, and she often breaks the fourth wall for humorous effect and running gags, as the first major Marvel character to do so frequently, ahead of the more famous fourth wall breaker Deadpool. (wikipedia)
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• • •
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| [Omitted from the JOHN and JOAN CUSACK clue: Sixteen Candles] |
[40A: Singer Ric of the Cars]
Less welcome was the 2005 Crosswordese Class Reunion, what the hell!? When JET LI showed up with Queen NOOR I was like "wow, haven't seen those two in a while, I guess they still hang out..." but then Monica SELES showed up and I was like "OK now this is an official gathering." A gathering that's probably destined to end at the IHOP (where all the crossword kids hung out 20 years ago). Anyway, starting with NTHS (😕), the fill felt a little stale there for a bit. On the whole, though, the short fill was probably no worse than average, as short fill goes. And we get the debut of future crosswordese name Travis KELCE. Three Super Bowl rings, 10 Pro Bowl selections, and, as far as I know, he's still seeing Taylor Swift, so ... pretty sure this won't be the last time you see his name in the grid.
More:
- 12D: Group that once included the members Babe Ruth and Harry Houdini (ELKS) — the plural of ELK is ELK unless you are dealing with the B.P.O.E., where the "E" definitively stands for ELKS.
- 25D: When doubled, comment made with a wink ("HINT") — cute way to come at this, though if I've ever said "HINT HINT" I've certainly never winked (!). Surely your tone of voice and the repetition itself is enough to convey that you're trying to get someone to take the HINT. Because of Monty Python, I can't see "HINT HINT" without thinking of "NUDGE NUDGE" ("WINK WINK"):
- 37A: Something that may be drawn at night (DRAPE) — you draw the DRAPES, plural. No one draws a single DRAPE at night. Predictive text confirms:
- 44D: Covered with a green growth (MOSSED) — really? Like MORN, moreso than MORN, this sounds "poetic" Or a good term for what happens to opposing teams when wide receiver Randy scores on them—"You got MOSSED!"
See you next time.
P.S. I expressed mock indignation yesterday that I was not featured on the wikipedia page of "People from Fresno" and of course one of you hilarious people immediately fixed that. Thanks?!
P.P.S. today's constructor has a podcast about crossword construction called "Crosstalk," and it is very much worth your attention if you are a constructor, aspiring constructor, or just a curious dork. There are two episodes out so far, both of them featuring interviews with people I (and possibly you) know: Rachel Fabi, a prolific constructor and a former writer for the NYT's "Wordplay" blog; and Rafael Musa, whom you may know from his frequent turns writing this here blog for me when I'm away. Check it out.
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108 comments:
I solved this quickly, but found the theme too obscure.
NTHS is inexcusable, it makes literally no sense as a plural noun.
The app is telling me that over a fairly large sample size this is my fastest.Thursday.ever. The big guy nailed the critique here - neatly packaged but beyond easy and with a trick that was irrelevant to the solve.
The Pogues
Figured the trick with CUSACK - was hoping for something more complex to evolve but not to be. Overall fill was fine - SWATCHES, CROWING, RECEIPTS all good stuff. Had a delicious blueberry cheese KNISH at Schimmel’s a few weeks ago - always highly recommended.
Enjoyable Thursday morning solve.
INN Town
Does the “breakfast test” apply to this blog? Because I’m not sure I needed to think about cat barf this early in the morning(or ever really) and while I’m having my coffee and donut no less…
I saw "I am Curious, Dork" when it came out in the 70s.
Finished it with one cheat, to get THEHULK (I had 'the hunk"). Never caught on to the theme until reading Rex's column, and it wouldn't have mattered if I had, because I never would have known there was a SHEHULK, and the word PLASTICITY wouldn't have occurred to me (ELASTICITY was obvious).
Didn’t pick up on the theme while solving (in fact I had to read Rex’s explanation twice before the light bulb went off). BASALT was new, and I thought KORAN was not the proper spelling (probably multiple spellings in general usage?).
Proud of my self for sniffing out SIN CITY and for dropping ELASTICITY right in without looking at the crosses.
I played PLASTICITY/SPAS without noticing the theme, which eluded me entirely until I read Rex. The alternatives didn’t even occur to me. Ignoring the theme made this a very fast solve for me, shaving more than five minutes off my average time for a near personal best.
Congratulations, Rex, on making the list of famous Fresnoans. (Fresnans? Fresnonians?) And right next to Dave Seville. Creator of Alvin and the Chipmunks! Singer/songwriter of “Witch Doctor”! Fun fact I didn’t know until today: he’s the songwriter guy that Jimmy Stewart spies on in “Rear Window.” How cool is that?
I thought the theme was brilliant and cool and really hard to pull off, especially cleanly! (Some junk fill aside.) Thought for sure i’d come here and see a rave review.
Had SHEHAWK/THEHAWK for a moment there. lol
I doubt I'll ever solve another Thursday this quickly. I also hope I don't.
Rewatched High Fidelity recently. Still hghly entertaining.
Yes, a very clever construction. The only donwside with Schroedinger puzzles is you don't need to get the theme to solve it. I had JOHN CUSACK, SHE-HULK and SIM CITY before I realized the theme.
In every case I happened to choose the first letter option: H, S, M, P.
It would have been so easy to get rid of NTHS just by eliminating the square with the S. NTH and PATTER then work fine in the NW. In the SE, ATTIRE is fine as is, and the resulting 'elt' you'd change to ELM/STEM. Getting rid of MOSSED, on the other hand ... might require somthing more drastic. I do like Rex's take on MOSSED, though.
PS. Travis Kelce appeared in the NYTCW before although it was his full name.
Can someone help me understand 38 down? I got it on crossed but don't get it.
Said another way, you didn’t need to discern the theme to solve the puzzle.
John Cusack
About half my average Thursday time. Tight theme, enjoyable puzzle, but the awfulness of NTHS may explain why I dreamed of being an OTR truck driver explaining to my friend that the training materials at my new employer expressly forbade talking to authorities after an accident and I spelled out NHTSA. (I don’t think NHTSA even investigates accidents, do they? But in my dream I wasn’t a super knowledgeable or competent truck driver).
Or Joan. I put John. I got the Congratulations thing. Then after reading this Blog, I tried to change the H to an A. No luck.
OK so I had a de jure personal best for a Thursday since I got the happy music but I’m giving myself a de facto DNF. Didn’t realize it was a Schrödinger puzzle until I went to Xword info. My answers were AHH, JOHNCUSACK, SHEHULK,SAKE, SINCITY, NET, SPAS, PLASTICITY and it was accepted. Very clever and would have been proper Thursday difficulty had it required the rebuses.
I solved in the app by putting a rebus like H/A in each circle because both letters worked both across and down. I was surprised that Rex's solution only had one letter.
Unfortunately I solved it one way thinking I'd work on understanding the theme thereafter, but then the online version filled it in for me. Had the puzzle not been of early week difficulty maybe the solving experience would have been more challenging, requiring some thought. A required use of the rebus would have been an asset.
personal best time for a thursday.
Well, this is a feat par excellence.
First, sure, it’s easy to come up with pairs of words that have only a one letter difference. But to Schrödingerize them, you have to come up with a clue that naturally works for both, that doesn’t sound strained. Here, try coming up with a clue that works with FISH and FIST, and sounds natural for both. Take a moment, give it a stab.
It can be a challenge, no? (Here’s how constructor Andrew Reynolds clued them in a puzzle a year ago: “It may be landed with a hook”.)
Trust me, the Times team are sticklers about this. If it sounds strained, they will not publish it. And today, Daniel passed that bar eight times.
That is impressive enough, but other difficult elements – such as the layer involving the “_or_” words (like HORA) and the requirements of symmetry – made this puzzle’s build a very tall hill to climb. Truly, a beauteous bow-down-to feat.
I wish I had solved this on paper. The Schrödinger answer popped in the grid as soon as I typed in the last letter, and I didn’t get a chance to crack the theme on my own and experience the huge OMG rush I know would have followed.
But when I did see the solution, I was so staggered by what you did, Daniel, so enveloped in wow, that the payoff was more than sufficient. Thank you for that and for all you put into this. I’ll remember this one for a long time!
Am I the only one who had SNAS crossing NLASTICITY for a minute? I mean, the clue for 57 Across ("Skin feature") was clearly meant to be a misdirection of sorts, no?
Yep, super easy solve, but I could not figure out the theme till I came here.
Is today Thursday?
NTHS? Yikes. Lots of irritating fill, and I did not catch the theme at all. Strangely. I should have because I thought it was “oh the first letter of this four letter word is in the circled square” but then for one of them, I had the last letter in the circled square which definitely confused me but not enough to really think it over. Anyhoo, also did not understand how the clue Gate gets you to RECEIPTS, I’m sure I’m just being dimwitted here but can someone clarify that? Thanks
Holy f***ing cow! What a feat to pull this off and to do it so very cleanly. It even contains my four favorite cities ((SIN, SIM, PLASTI and ELASTI)! Of course, like most solvers, I never could get the "k" or a "n" thing at 26D.
As the aspiring doc who didn't know who was hosting the exam or where it was being held asked, "Where's the MCAT?"
My sincere highest compliments to Daniel Grinberg for making Schrödinger proud!
I kept on hesitating because I thought the obvious answers couldn't be right, it supposedly being a tricky Thursday and all. Turns out there was no knot at all to untie. Very disappointing IMO.
Another day, another fun to construct no fun to solve. As Rex said, a Tuesday on a Thursday. Sure it has a Thursday gimmick but it lacks any resistance. At some point the editors need to focus on the solving experience, not the animations or novelty.
Hey All !
Har, same thought as Rex on the HINT clue, calling Monty Python to mind. "You're wife, uh, she's a goer, eh?"
Put in JOHN CUSACK, then got HORA, and was wondering what in tarhooties the connection was. Wasn't until getting the second set, SORT, and having THE HULK in, I saw what was happening. "AHA, SHE HULK is also green, so the circled letter is either S OR T!" Looked back at my JOHN, seeing it could've been JOAN, and the ruse was up. Then noticed the Downs also worked as clued, with either AHH or AHA. Neat. Great find of ELASTICITY/PLASTICITY.
Quite a funky looking grid, too.
A Schrodinger-like puz today. Not technically a Rebus, but not technically a Schrodinger? Or is it? You decide.
Cool puz, Daniel.
OH NO, my MORN KNISH SPATTERed over my CROWING KITTY. I HOP away. /Scene
😁
Have a Great Thursday!
One F
RooMonster
DarrinV
Iodine is no longer a common antiseptic
Wow. Clever theme, but I filled in the grid so fast I didn’t really care about the circles…got my congratulations message and since I’m lazy, came to the blog to find out what the circles were all about. The proper names might have caused heartburn for some but I knew them all (yay me) Who here is old enough to remember Queen NOOR’s name pre-marriage? Answer:Lisa Hallaby. I really DO need to clean out my memory file cabinet because I could replace it with retention of tech device trouble-shooting knowledge.
Even though I tried both JOHN and JOAN, I did not pick up on the theme.
While it is clever and I can admire it, I still feel cheated of a Thursday solve. My time came in a full 15 minutes (or 50%) of my regular time.
Sometimes I give the side eye when people say “I solved without seeing the theme” when you clearly need to see the theme in order to complete (like, how can you solve it if you didn’t see the rebus). Today, I did not see the theme. Never factored in the “or” part. NAIF / NOOR was difficult for me, but still finished way under my average Thursday time.
I had BARN for BALE. Loved my answer so much I sacrificed the solve for it.
That's one of my favorite movies so I love knowing this bit of trivia!
Tickets / Gate / Receipts
My first comment didn’t post, so apologies if this is a duplicate. I never understand when people say they solved the puzzle without seeing the theme when there is a rebus or an obvious trick needed to solve the puzzle. Today, I didn’t see the trick at all but still solved way under my average time. Didn’t like NAIF/NOOR though
A nice variation on the "either-or" theme - "nice" in my case meaning not catching on right away but able to figure it out half-way through. For the first two theme answers, I forgot there were two Cusacks and didn't know there was a SHE-HULK; I'd noticed the rhyming HOR- and SOR- but could do nothing with them. It was with MORN that I saw the crucial interior OR that allowed for two kinds of cities. I finished with the satisfaction of using the theme to guess E/PLASTICITY and PORE. I appreciated how well disguised the theme was (at least for me), with those ORs so easy to overlook.
Aquí gatito gatito.
Pretty cool theme and it helped me unknot the names crammed in around NOOR. I wish we could trade our ruling couple for Jordan's ruling couple.
❤️ LOCUS FOCUS.
People: 7
Places: 4
Products: 6
Partials: 5
Foreignisms: 1
--
Gary's Grid Gunk Gauge: 23 of 74 (31%)
Funnyisms: 4 🙂
Uniclues:
1 Throw hot grease on Foresters.
2 One who smashes.
3 When the power washers arrive to clear the sidewalks of vomit.
4 Trendy time pieces left in the jungle.
5 Narrow crime scene investigation to notorious gravity tester.
1 SPATTER SUBARUS
2 THE HULK SORT
3 SIN CITY MORN (~)
4 SWATCHES MOSSED
5 FOCUS ON KITTY
My Fascinating Crossword Uniclue Keepsake from Last Year: Buzz buzzed camelids. BOO NUMB LLAMAS.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Reaction to Rex’s write-up: Say no more, say no more.
I thought it was an easy Thursday, except I had to figure out the correct way to get the software to automagically tell me it was the right solution. Originally had the "or" included in the rebus - i.e. JO(HORA)NCUSACK. Turns out I had to MIND/E the rebus to get the OR out...
My only nit is that SORT is not a “word processor” function. Spreadsheet? Yes. Database? Yes. What would it even mean to “SORT” a document you’re writing? Put all the words in alphabetical order?
NTHS??? Sorry, that's just awful. Can't even imagine how to use that in a sentence. "Hey, we finished all the calculations, but we had to take them all to the NTHS."
And I'm not a fan of a Thursday puzzle that can be solved in under Tuesday time without grokking the theme, which I did not. Thanks @Rex for the explainer. *And* how can you have a theme like that and allow a solve with a single letter in each relevant square?? Which is (one reason) why I didn't get the theme. It's nice that it works both ways, but really both letters should be required. I solve on the website on weekdays, not in the app.
Editing: do we still use the spelling KORAN? Seems very... last century.
I have spent more time writing this comment than I did on the puzzle...
UBERED? Really? So -- if I took a train, I AMTRACKED? If I took a taxi, I YELLOWED? If I rode a bus, I GREYHOUNDED? Where does this verbification of brand names end??
Yes, yes, it is a Schrodinger. Been so long since one rolled around, didn't recognize it.
RooMonster Silly Brain Guy
Not being that familiar with JOHN/JOAN, SHEHULK, or SIMCITY and proudly entering PLASTICITY because I had SPAS, the either/or nature of this one eluded me, which is unfortunate, because it's a very cool trick. Should have know there was more going on on a Thursday. Once again, speed kills.
I still remember the first time I saw the name Queen NOOR in print and thinking really? That's a real name? That's wonderful.
NTHS didn't bother me nearly as much as MOSSED, which sounds like a desperation replacement for MOSSY. I mean really.
Thought the Tokyo/ KYOTO factoid was neat.
Very impressive construction, DG, and my fault that I Didn't Get it. Thanks for a lot of fun and I should have had more.
Nice theme, but at sub-5 minutes, this barely lasted longer than a commercial break.
Came here with this question and it just dawned on me: the intake (money) from the price of admission.
Agreed.
I agree with @Dr A about NTHS. That was the first thing in the grid for me and I thought I may be in for a grim experience. Luckily I was wrong. Agree with @Greg also. Nothing wrong with SORT, but that clue is clueless.
I came here to learn the theme. Very impressive after the fact!
Even though I cringed when I saw circles for the second day in a row, this turned out to be quite different and another clever theme. I like that both the downs and crosses worked and made sense. Agree with RP though, it was very easy for a Thurzday. I love both Cusacks and either name is enough to get me to watch. Both have singular acting talent but seems JOHN sometimes takes dramatic roles while JOAN really shines in the funnier parts. She was priceless as the psychotic baby sitter in Adams Family Values.
I solved the puzzle as a themeless -- without the foggiest idea of what the circles were about. I went to Rex to find out. I had a very strong feeling that I wouldn't care in the least.
But actually I do care. Because it gives me the chance to pinpoint exactly why some puzzles work for me and some don't. This theme is so incredibly clever and so incredibly wasted!!
And I have the perfect contrasting puzzle to point out why.
The trick is the same as the "A STAR IS BORN" puzzle of 4/18/24 by David Kwan. That was my favorite puzzle of 2024. But in that puzzle, the trick was in the clues. The challenge to the solver: "Figure out the trick or you most likely can't solve this!" But here the trick is ignorable -- and in the case of most solvers, may not be noticed at all. Such incredible cleverness in coming up with these amazing double-possibility theme answers and, right next door, the
?OR? word to clue them! And then...your solver misses the whole thing until after it's over. And, if your solver isn't on a blog like this one, he may go straight to the end of his days and never ever know about the wonders you have wrought.
Such a pity! Such an absolute waste!
You’re aquí gatito gatito reminded me of a time at a restaurant in Puerto Vallarta. There was a stray cat and me being me, I started trying to lure it over with some food. As I called “here kitty kitty,” my husband said, don’t be silly that cat doesn’t understand English. At first it just seemed funny, but then after I got to thinking about it, I realized he might’ve been right.
The Thursday puzzles have gone from bad to worse. I didn't even notice the "theme." It was too easy, that's for sure. Here's a thought. Move the Thursday puzzles to Wednesday (this was a Wed level puzzle) and give us TH-FR-SA themeless.
Yep, easy. I zipped through this one without reading several clues which meant I had to go back and fix some stuff and yet it was still easy.
I didn’t did not know that JOAN was also in “Say Anything” which is crossword famous for starring IONE SKYE. I also did not know that those guys were ELKS.
Costly spelling problems - OCASEK and KELCE (I needed three tries for each).
Reasonably smooth with a very clever theme, liked it.
Had to finally cheat on my personal Natick of NOOR/NAIF. Never heard either of those words in my life. Curious if anyone else had that issue?
Also I still don’t get how “gate” = RECEIPTS?
The monetary take from an event (concert, sporting event, etc) is called the gate. Also called the receipts from the show. Sometimes performers receive the gate as their pay.
I wondered the same. I just went to my Word program to see if there was a sort function. Indeed, there is. But to me, it seems like a little-used feature, which from what I can tell, its main use is to sort a word list into alphabetical order. But really, that's something I can't see really needing to ever do in a word processing doc. On the other hand, I do use the SORT feature in Excel or Google Sheets all the time. Now that's a very useful and common feature!
Uh…. Monday again?
I loved this puzzle! My favorite of the year so far!
GATE: the total admission receipts or the number of spectators (as at a sports event)
Rex was spot on today and kudos for any guy leaving his blog to attend to a KITTY. Now about that litter box…….
🙏Puzzle 95% completed before SPAS/SEAS let the KITTY outa the box and I almost choked on my scone—sadly the KNISH like Sasquatch is not seen in Idaho
"The Gate" is lingo for the amount of ticket sales at an event, so it is also the receipts of the ticket sales
Oh....it's an either this or that puzzle. Hmmmm, is it JOAN or JOHN CUSACK....Is it THE HULK? Oh, wait! SHE can be a HULK as well.
Teeter totter, flip a coin, stick with SPAS/PLASTICITY and so on. Neither NOOR?
Interesting puzzle and fairly easy to solve but yet it wasn't. The teeter totter syndrome got me in some places. I like that I learned that aquarium has LATIN ROOTS. I'm going to tell all my friends.
In fact, the term MOSSED has come to mean any player, not just Randy, going up and over an opponent to make a catch. Hope we’ll see it clued that way sometime.
Pretty easy for a Thursday & a quick solve. Don''t know why but I appreciate not having to labor over typos, squeezing words into squares (although I know there has to be one (or more) here. May be crazy, but free from my usual Thursday misery :)
After the show in the Box Office - how did we do tonight - what did we take in?
Clever after the fact but I solved it as a themeless and didn’t grok the gimmick until after the very easy solve was complete
So much LSD in the crossword these days. Not a fan.
Fun puztheme. Easy ThursPuz... U had two right choices for each themer *and* themer crosser, too boot [which M&A didn't fully realize, until about finished with the solvequest]. Darn near easier-than-snot level.
staff weeject picks [of only 8 choices]: AHH & MET. No, wait ... AHA & NET. No, wait ... of 10 choices.
fave stuff: LATINROOT [=Cheer for the cans in the city of angels?]. SUBARUS. GRAD clue. Maybe that sorta owie SCAR clue?
Thanx, Mr. Grinberg dude. Lotsa neat [h/p]airs to split, in that puztheme. Liked.
Masked & Anonymo4Us
... and, happily ever after ...
"Afterwords" - 7x7 themed runt puzzle:
**gruntz**
M&A
Re: Greg and Dennis on SORT - I used the SORT function of MSWord on a weekly basis in my old job as a technical writer, mostly when alphabetizing table contents and/or lists of terms.
Didn’t find it nearly as easy. Some of it my faulty guesses like AWay for AWOL, some of it my lack of knowledge of names like SELES and NOOR that are likely absolutely fair on a Thursday. But some of it was the fact that, while Rex is likely right that the theme made it easier for someone who got it relatively early on, it made it harder by creating naticks when you didn’t. JOhN before JOAN, SImCITY before SINCITY, mET before NET, SpAS before SEAS, pLASTICITY before ELASTICITY. I didn’t figure out the theme until after I had solved it, so the “aha” was more of a “grr.” Presumably not the puzzle’s fault but the fact that I was solving on a train on the way to a conference while feeling guilty about not having written my paper—not a puzzle for me with only half my brain.
I was so busy typing in answers and thinking "this is going to be record fast" but I had no idea what the theme was up to. Then I didn't get the Happy Pencil at the end and spent about 5 minutes trying to find my error. Finally gave up and selected "Check all letters" which flagged two of the circled squares. Turns out Across Lite only accepts the first letter of each pair, and I had THE HULK and SIN CITY. I was briefly annoyed, thinking "but I'm right!", but then I got the trick and was very impressed.
What a constructing feat! Finding two answers which differ by only one letter and can be clued the same, and crossing them all with downs that do the same. Wow!
I got delayed a bit by having PLIABILITY instead of PLASTICITY since they're totally synonyms and share a lot of letters.
So you use a facial tissue instead of Kleenex and have never Xeroxed but always photocopied. Sometimes brand names become the generic name. Around me people use Uber for all ride share companies.
This would've easily been my fastest Thursday on record if I'd been on a computer instead of a phone. Tremendously simple, and like Rex said, the theme was wholly unnecessary (I didn't even care to figure it out).
My kids (early 30s t0 early 40s) say UBERED all the time.
Was SHE-HULK a DEI hire? Whizzed through the puzzle (on paper) then wondered for a while what the heck the trick was. Did figure it out before opening up Rex, so I guess I'm impressed?
Thank you!!
I, like a few commenters before me, was somewhat distracted while solving this morning. I'm in the process of moving and had to oversee deliveries (appliances today) and tried to solve between consultations with the not-quite-competent-in-english delivery and installation guys. I'm guessing the recently relocated @GaryJugert might sympathize. So I kept returning to the grid thinking that those circles must be important, scratching my head, and deciding to go themeless.
Didn't know there was a SHEHULK. Entered the N of SINCITY only because the cross worked for NETS. SINCITY sounds vaguely familiar. Is it from Grand Theft Auto? I'm not a gamer, but my kids were. I should have got the John/Joan thing but I've never seen Say Anything.
@Carola 9:35 am nailed the craftiness of this puzzle when she pointed out how easy it is to ignore the substantial presence of OR in all those simple, common four letter words. Very clever.
NTHS!!!!! Please don't do that again.
Oh yeah, MOSSED is pretty awful, too.
Many a word in English has a 31D LATIN ROOT whose meaning can illuminate how that English word came to be. That's kind of obvious for the clued "aquarium" from LATIN aqua meaning "water". So good choice there, right?
Another word seen often in Crosslandia (™
@Lewis) also has a LATIN ROOT. Here, however, the LATIN meaning doesn't seem to match how it's used for crossword puzzles. That word is "rebus" and is used to describe a grid where multiple letters appear in single squares. But the LATIN meaning of rebus is "with or by way of things". How or why "rebus" came to be the word used for "with or by way of multiple letters" is not clear. No one seems to know. More on this at The Rebus Principle.
An alternative for the illegal drug people are objecting to comes from the old money across the pond: LSD. "The abbreviation originates from the Latin currency denominations librae, solidi, and denarii" - Wikipedia.
We've moved twice in the last three years. You have my deepest sympathy.
Re: ELKS: The Canadian Football club in Edmonton changed names to ELKS a couple years ago. Much discussion ensued as to the plural of ELK. Oxford, Merriam-Webster, Cambridge and Brittanica all agree that either ELK or ELKS is acceptable.
Surely there's a JargonFile / UrbanDictionary ( / Snigglet, anyone?) term for the act of coyly encouraging others to add your name to a section of a Wikipedia page if not a page itself, but hell if I can find it. Of course, the "page itself" option has been accomplished already, and a quick scan of the days preceding the initial entry don't reveal a similarly WHO ME? MOI??? type Rex post wondering why he didn't have his own page, so... Innocent! There is insufficient evidence of wanton Wiki-paigning -- campaign-a-pedia-peeding? I'm was never one to actually submit my own Snigglets to Rich Hall, as you can see --to warrant further prosecution.
Ah, I KID ol' Rex, I KID. The wikipedia page and hometown entry is well deserved. And how to I know that? One need look no further than the sparse initial entry for his page on October 4, 2023. Under the section "Reception" is the unadorned, uncapitalized, but curiously punctuated descriptor beloved with an attending footnote to a citation for the Pultizer-Prize-winning book Good Prose: The Art of Non-Fiction. Can't DENY the RECEIPTS, folks.
As for today's puzzle, I am a slow-ish solver and, at this point, only capable of enjoying second-by-second time improvements to my daily averages. So "Very easy to solve" was an understatement for me as I shaved off double digit seconds on my Thu average with a nearly 4-minute drop in my best to 9:26. Good lord on tuna toast, that's a humdinger right there, ya betcha, am-i-right? Banner day!
But honestly, folks... no need to add an entire section to Rex's wiki page to highlight this stunning achievement, really.... I mean, you know... unless you're like super wanting to do so or something... after all, its a free countr-- er... you aren't presently preventing from doing so....
Surprisingly easy to solve for a Thursday but the theme escaped me.
Doesn't have to be hard to be good, at least not on Thursday, imho. The trick wasn't tricky but it was tight and well-executed, and made me appreciate the language.
Enjoyed the solve, grasped the theme with my partner as we were looking at the AHA/AHH cross with JOHNCUSACK/JOANCUSACK. While understanding the theme wasn't a strict necessity (even though knowing what's happening helps disambiguate intentionally ambiguous answers), I still liked it.
I mostly come out from my lurking cave to give an extra factoid on 47A: KYOTO. Kyoto and Tokyo are only anagrams when Romanized under a specific system, which is a variation of the Hepburn romanization system. This is because in reality the two names are written differently in Japanese.
"Kyoto" = 京都 = きょうと = Kyo-u-to
"Tokyo" = 東京 = とうきょう = To-u-kyo-u
Even if you don't know a lick of Japanese, you can see that in terms of the syllables (which is what I wrote on the right), there's a different amount between them. That's because the "to" in Kyoto is a short vowel (just と) while the "to" in Tokyo is a long "ou" vowel (とう).
The Hepburn romanization system normally makes this distinction with long vowels, typically with a macron (and sometimes with a circumflex, which is a borrowed element from the Nihon-shiki romanization system). So, the cities would accurately be rendered as Kyōto and Tōkyō. However, very often with Japanese words and names that have become very commonplace in English, the rendering of the long vowel kinda goes by the wayside. Hence, why you always see Kyoto and Tokyo, and not Kyōto, Kyouto, Tōkyō, Toukyou, or any other version that more accurately represents the phonology.
I hope nobody takes this as me being pedantic and saying the clue is wrong. While I *am* being pedantic, it's mostly just to share this fact that I think is pretty interesting.
Earnings at the box office.
There are some complaints about NTHS but did anyone not go there right away? I thought THEHULK was too easy and first wanted glamora but that didn’t fit in any way. SHEHULK at least had the same gender. By far my fastest Thursday ever even without getting the theme until I came here. NOOR came to mind out of nowhere, then had Nerd across for a bit until crosses came to the rescue. Keep in mind the Tokyo/Kyoto anagram is in English—no idea what the spellings are in the original Japanese…well, enough aimless musings for today…
Such an easy solve and despite my study post-solve (before coming here), I never figured out the theme! Came here to see what’s up and did a giant head smack. . . doh!!! I do not recall in my entire solving life of 60+ years not figuring out a theme. Wowzer.
My difficulty stems from my unfamiliarity with the movies. I vaguely recall sitting through “Say Anything” with my granddaughter, but I was most likely reading while she watched.
I almost got it at SE/PAS but thought that pLASTICITY was, if you pardon the deliberate pun, too big a stretch given the specific words of the clue. Obviously I am incorrect.
Does anyone recall the ancient “Happy Days” episode in which Fonzie needed to way he was “wrong” and just couldn’t get it out? That’s me today. I am feeling like a dufus, but it took me way too long to accept that I am in fact . . . wrong.
This was a well crafted theme with a surprisingly easy (for a Thursday) solve. I liked it more than @Rex and others, but truly enjoyed being fooled by the theme. I also enjoyed my giant AHH/AHA when I dropped in here.
Until tomorrow, smile, it’s free and easily shared.
YUP....@Nancy 10:46 and her "but here the trick is ignorable - and in the case of most solvers, may not be noticed at all." But my favorite of yours today..."he may go straight to the end of his days and never ever know about the wonders you have wrought." (insert a smile here).....
Agreed. But this happens often. If Rex says a puzzle is the easiest puzzle to ever exist, it is usually a good sign that I will struggle. Different wheelhouses, I guess.
Also interesting that Kyoto means "capital city" while Tokyo means "eastern capital", so the Kanji character 京 ("kyo") is the same.
Oh interesting! Thank you! Never heard “gate” as a noun before.
I usually find the Thursday puzzles too difficult so I enjoyed this one though did not get the theme
@Whatsername 10:53 AM
🤣 There's a comedian that does a bit about not meowing at her cat because you don't really know what you're saying in cat language.
@Les S. More 2:35 PM
@pabloinnh 3:16 PM
Oh gosh, all of us who've endured a relocation (willing or unwilling) can relate. It really does get in the way of crosswording.
Because it doesn't work. The same reason it has to be SHE HULK, SIM CITY and PLASTICITY. The first letter of the four letter word HAS TO BE the circled letter in the line, or else it is not "a clue to the circled square" in that row.
@anon 7:36pm You're confused, the circled letter has TWO options, both across and down, for every themer. Try re-reading Rex's explanation in his blog post.
Not even NTHS could stop me from being impressed with this puzzle to the nth degree! While I could not for the life of me figure out the theme - solved it as a very easy Thursday while scratching my head trying to get my arms around the circled squares, when I came here and read @Rex's write up - mind blown! And the downs also work both ways, come on - you can't not like this! As @Lewis pointed out, just try coming up with good cluing for those entries! Hats off to Daniel!
I do see @Nancy's point, - of course I would have gotten more of a kick out of this if the theme wasn't so "ignorable", but for whatever reason, having it explained to me here is almost as fun.
While there wasn't a lot of the kind of mis-directs and clever cluing that I usually like, that is fully forgiven for coming up with a clue fitting both SAKE and TAKE. Not quite as great as the clue for FIST and FISH that @Lewis mentioned, but noteworthy nonetheless.
I've only owned SUBARUS and only now do I know what that symbol represents - as always, love learning cool stuff here.
Sometimes (like today) there’s a big difference between solving via app/online vs. on paper. Rex and others posting here have complained that the puzzle was too easy for a Thursday—in many cases because they were congratulated for finishing it without actually having to fully solve it. Solving on paper, I filled in all the uncircled squares correctly and filled in one of the possible letters for each circled square, but I didn’t feel I’d really solved the puzzle till I figured out what “and a clue to the circled squares in this row” meant. That took some pondering and adds to the difficulty level. IMHO the puzzle isn’t completely solved till the circled squares are filled in with both possible letters, exactly as in the solution on the website and accompanying Friday's newspaper version.
When the app says you’ve successfully completed the puzzle, it’s hard to see why you should not think you have successfully completed the puzzle. Your “opinion” doesn’t really matter in this case.
@anon 8:47am Iodine is absolutely still widely used as an antiseptic - Betadine, for example. Perhaps try a quick Google search before making proclamations in the future?
I found the puzzle surprisingly easy for a Friday. But then, I got LATIN ROOTS almost immediately. And I'm always glad to see our old friend Yogi BERRA. He said many memorable things. Now I am a creature of habit and pretty much go back to the same places for meals. Good places all, and I seldom can resist repeating my favorite Yogiism: "Nobody goes there anymore. It's too crowded."
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