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Hero's partner in myth / SUN 8-31-25 / Williamson who played Merlin in "Excalibur" / New Zealand parrot that can solve logic puzzles / Nipsey Russell's role in 1978's "The Wiz" / Device for cutting bangs? / Greaves and cuisses, but not gauntlets and helmets / Part of a personal air filtration system / Maximum extent, in an idiom / Greatest potential accomplishment, metaphorically / Win for an away team
Sunday, August 31, 2025
Constructor: Danny J. Rooney
Relative difficulty: Easy (yet again)
Theme anshers:
Is that how he talks? I guess sho. Anyway, the sound switch yields some mildly funny wacky phrases, with the central answer being suitably flashy (double sound change!), so I liked that aspect of the theme fine. The double-"O" thing is less successful. It's harmless ... but actually, no, I'm not sure it is. I see now that early on, when I recoiled at the subpar fill (namely my OMOO / TO ERR opening), I was recoiling at subpar fill that wouldn't have been there at all if it weren't for this whole "OO" angle. No big fan of PATOOT or OOHS, either. But you gotta do what you gotta do to make your little picture come off. Seems super-awkward to have DOUBLE O as an answer all by its lonesome. I know the giant picture of a "7" is supposed to provide the "7" in JAMES BOND's code number, but the picture actually contains the whole code number within it, making DOUBLE O entirely unnecessary *except* as a means for telling people to connect those DOUBLE "O"s. Awkward to draw a diagonal line through "OO"s that are not oriented on a diagonal, but since the computer did it for me, I can't really complain. Is the "7" really a "single line"? I would've described it as two lines—a horizontal line and a diagonal line (when I write a "7", I add a little bar across the downstroke, but that's neither here nor there). Both JAMES BOND and SEAN CONNERY came as anticlimaxes—well, JAMES BOND did, for sure. I could tell by then (from MARTINI, actually) where the puzzle was going, though I didn't take the time to think about the pictorial element, so that was something of a surprise. Not particularly thrilling overall, but better than most Sundays I've done of late. Lots and lots of theme material, all of it reasonably well executed, and no real cringe in the grid. A fine NYTXW debut for this constructor.
- MOVE YOUR ASH (22A: "Don't flick that cigarette over here!")
- WHAT A MESH (24A: "Incredible! This mosquito net didn't let in even one bug!")
- GOD SHAVE THE KING (52A: "Dear Lord! His Majesty's beard is out of control!")
- SHINED SHIELD DELIVERED (63A: "Just dropped off some of your newly buffed knight's protection!")
- "COULD I HAVE A SHIP?" (74A: "Can you offer me anything bigger than skiffs, dinghies and pontoons?")
Hero and Leander (/ˈhiːroʊ/, /liːˈændər/) is the Greek myth relating the story of Hero (Ancient Greek: Ἡρώ, Hērṓ; [hɛː.rɔ̌ː]), a priestess of Aphrodite (Venus in Roman mythology) who dwelt in a tower in Sestos on the European side of the Hellespont, and Leander (Ancient Greek: Λέανδρος, Léandros; [lé.an.dros] or Λείανδρος), a young man from Abydos on the opposite side of the strait. // Leander falls in love with Hero and swims every night across the Hellespont to spend time with her. Hero lights a lamp at the top of her tower to guide his way. Leander's soft words and charms—and his argument that Aphrodite, as the goddess of love and sex, would scorn the worship of a virgin—convince Hero, and they make love. Their secret love affair lasts through a warm summer, but when winter and its rougher weather looms, they agree to part for the season and resume in the spring. One stormy winter night, however, Leander sees the torch at the top of Hero's tower. He attempts to go to her, but halfway through his swim, a strong winter wind blows out Hero's light, and Leander loses his way and drowns. When Hero sees his dead body, she throws herself off the tower to join him in death. Their bodies wash up on shore together, locked in embrace, and are then subsequently buried in a lovers’ tomb.
• • •
One other nice touch: no stray (uncircled) "OO"s. In a Sunday-sized puzzle, a certain number of "OO"s are going to be naturally occurring (I have no stats on this, I'm just guessing), but not today, because it would interfere with the theme. Actually, it wouldn't interfere that much with the theme, since the relevant "OO"s are circled, but there's a certain elegance to having the only "OO"s in this puzzle be thematic. There's also a decent amount of longer non-theme fill to give the grid added color. Banks of 8s in the corners, all of them solid, and then IDEAL MATE (nice) right down the middle. "THAT'S ME!" and "SADLY, YES" and "I'M OVER IT" and "IT'LL DO" and "YOU SURE?" give the grid a chatty, colloquial tone. As for trouble spots, I don't see many. I forgot NICOL Williamson's name (despite knowing very well who he is) and tried ... maybe NILES? And NIGEL? ... before crosses led me to NICOL (Williamson who played Merlin in "Excalibur"). NICOL next to EDOM (which I initially spelled like the wax-covered cheese) was a little bit of a choke point. LEANDER is another proper noun that might've been unknown to people—I had to read Marlowe's "Hero and LEANDER" in college, in my British Literature I course, and then I went on to study medieval and early modern literature in grad school, so Hero and LEANDER are old pals of mine. Really liked the clues on both SILENCER (42A: Device for cutting bangs?) and NOSE HAIR (16D: Part of a personal air filtration system). I mean, it's a little gross to find a NOSE HAIR in your puzzle, but I thought the puzzle handled it with APLOMB, giving it a whimsical little "?" clue as a way of slightly mitigating the potential yuck factor. (In case the wordplay on the SILENCER clue wasn't clear, "bangs" are "cut" because a SILENCER muffles (or "cuts") the sound of the report (the "bang") when a gun is fired)
What else?:
- 1D: Win for an away team (HOME LOSS) — did not like. "For an away team," a win is a win is a win. It's never a loss. The clue tells us to see the clue from the away team's perspective, and then gives us HOME LOSS, which is something that happens to the home team. A win for an away team is a HOME LOSS for the other team. That clue isn't tricky, it's just busted.
- 1A: Maximum extent, in an idiom (HILT) — I like how the puzzle went for the idiom here, and then stayed idiomatic for the other (nearby) "maximum" answer: EVEREST (26A: Greatest potential accomplishment, metaphorically). Imagining these familiar terms as idioms, and then practically juxtaposing them, made them more interesting than they would likely have been otherwise.
- 37A: Nipsey Russell's role in 1978's "The Wiz" (TIN MAN) — ah, I forgot that was Nipsey Russell. All I remember is Diana Ross as Dorothy and Michael Jackson as the Scarecrow. Ted Ross played the Cowardly Lion. He's the least famous name of the bunch, but he was a really accomplished actor who won a Tony (!) for playing the Lion in the original 1975 Broadway production. He was also a mainstay of '70s/'80s TV, and played Bitterman (Arthur's chauffeur) in Arthur (1981) (which is probably how I know him best). As for Nipsey Russell, I know him from Match Game and I don't know what else. He was just ... in the air in the '70s. Ambient celebrity. Seems like he was mostly famous for being a game show panelist, and reciting short funny poems, which (I'm told) earned him his nickname, the "poet laureate of television."
- 71A: Green gemstone (PERIDOT) — don't think I ever even heard of this "gemstone" until I was well into adulthood. It's the August birthstone, so nice job getting it into the puzzle just under the wire.
- 61A: New Zealand parrot that can solve logic puzzles (KEA) — always thrilled to see the NZ parrot, mainly because I have literally seen the New Zealand parrot (they're pretty common in parts of the South Island) and kinda love what mischievous assholes they can be. Imagine pigeons if they were very smart and prone to stealing your food, your camera, whatever.
- 92D: Grounder to second, often (EASY OUT) — true enough, though I semi-mindlessly typed in EASY ONE.
- 84D: Greaves and cuisses, but not gauntlets and helmets (LEG ARMOR) — another clue where having some background in early English literature (as well as childhood experience playing D&D) came in handy. I thought this answer might be a debut, but it's actually the fourth appearance, all of them fairly recent (Kameron Austin Collins debuted the term back in 2017)
That's all. See you next time.
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97 comments:
Easy. Liked it less than OFL did. Like @Rex, I got the theme with MARTINI at 33D because not many characters have signature drinks that start with M.
Overwrites:
8D: I LOllED before I LOAFED
35A: When I went from 0 to 60 I spED before I AGED
75D: My non-bright was Dull before it was DRAB
77D: Obergefell v. lOving before HODGES (wrong civil rights case)
109A: My unruly beard was SCRAwnY before it was SCRAGGY (shouldn't that be scraggly?)
One WOE, the HASS avocado at 79D. Come to think of it, I have seen them in supermarkets but it didn't stick to the synapses.
Another small theme related item is the clue Aston Martin, as that is the make of car Bond drove in several of the films, most notably Goldfinger
The puzzle did nothing to stir me. Indeed, upon finishing, I just felt shaken.
Not much to add - the big guy summarizes this somewhat goofy-themed large grid pretty well. MOVE YOUR ASH is cute - they’re all just funny enough to keep it interesting.
Waylon
PERMEATE, LEG ARMOR, FORAGERS, EVIL GRIN etc. - most of the long fill here hits. Not a lot of pushback - most of the holdup for me was the short stuff that straddled the line between glue and useless trivia.
PEDRO the Lion
Pleasant enough Sunday morning solve. Wake up to 51 today - a little chilly as I go to surf the last remnants of Erin.
The Fall - PEEL Session 1987
It’s a little-known fact, but James Bond prefers playing badminton to tennis; it has something to do with the feel of thwacking the object in the game. It may only be a shuttle difference, but to James, it’s everything.
For all the money NYTimes has spent on technology and staff to include clever animation, did no one think that the color of the animated "7" ought to be something other than the same light blue that highlights the most recent down or across that you worked on and where your cursor now sits? Upon completion, I wasted several minutes trying to suss out the meaning that extra line attached to the "7" before light dawned on Marblehead.
Anyone else have saVE YOUR ASH? Held me up in the NW for a while. Also had NOSE Hose. Never heard of such a thing, but thought it might be a nickname for those CPAP devices – I think it should be – and didn't expect NOSE HAIR somehow
Danny juggled three theme elements, and all three – the connect-the-dots seven, the s-to-sh sentences, and the four JAMES BOND factoids – nestled comfortably in the box. Impressive.
I love that the only double-O’s in the Sunday sized puzzle are the circled letters. Elegant. (Hi, @Rex!)
And SHINED SHIELD DELIVERED? Mwah!
Oh, all those many years ago, I couldn’t wait for the next Bond picture. I knew his quirks, loved his quick thinking and suaveness, relished the evil of his enemies, and clenched inside through all the hairy moments he faced.
My tastes have changed, but it was fun today to relive what it felt like to be me then.
A trio of pairs to note:
• Two debuts in a row, yesterday and today, by people who have been making puzzles for less than two years.
• The consecutive uber-memorable puzzles this week, one by a wife and the other by her husband.
• The gorgeous crossing answers today of APLOMB and PERMEATE.
Congratulations on your debut, Danny. Thank you for a very sweet outing!
Another James Bond puzzle with a connect-the-dots image – not of a seven, but of another object in today’s puzzle – was made by Elizabetth Gorski, Sunday, 5/25/2008. You can see the completed grid showing the image here: https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=5/25/2008 .
(Thanks to Jim Horne for mentioning this at XwordInfo today.)
I’m kind of torn. The puzzle was too easy for a Sunday , played more like a larger Tuesday / Wednesday , but there was enough clever cluing to make it kind of fun. If I was grading it , it would be a B-/B.
As one of the many folks here who lament the passing of sufficiently challenging late-week puzzles, I would like to speak up in favor of easy(ish) Sundays. The grid is so big, and the humor so Dadlike, that I’m perfectly content with a puzzle that offers just a tad of resistance and a theme that provokes a mild chuckle or two. Today’s puzzle did exactly that. The long central answer was a bit hard for me to see, and imagining the sound of the themers in Sean Connery’s voice was fun. Just what I hope to encounter on a Sunday. Thanks, Danny, and congratulations on acing what for me would be an EVEREST of imagination and execution!
I thought the puzzle was a bit over-busy, doing too many things at once, but it did have some nice elements.
Thanks for the Nipsey Russell compilation, Rex, that was terrific! I knew who he was but had forgotten how awful/wonderful his little poems were.
Best Sunday puzzle in months, I'd say. Loved the SH puns, even though I never knew Sean Connery spoke that way. SHINEDSHIELDDELIVERED is brilliant. The constructor shows a wonderful imagination. Come back again, please.
I agree with Rex that "7" isn't a straight line, at least not geometrically.
Hey All !
Congrats on a SunPuz debut, Danny. Good for you.
Finally, an OMOO sighting! It used to be more common, but has fallen off the radar for a bit. I once made a puz using O's as the only vowel in the puz (pre-internet construction software days, I took a dictionary, and went through most of it looking for words that only had O's in them. Time consuming, but eventually found OMOO somehow [through a search engine of some sort, I'm sure {early computer days}] and just thought it was a neat title.) That puz wasn't that good, with compromising fill to make it work, but still a neat thing. I've never submitted in anywhere, it's not really publishable. All that to explain that I like seeing OMOO!
Was wondering why the second row had almost all the OO's. Then got to Revealer clue, and saw you'd need to draw a big 7 to connect them, and let out an Aha.
Good fill, started on the difficult side, but steady flow happened, ended up relatively easy-medium. I'm betting the 21 letter center Themer was the catalyst for this Theme. It is the best one.
@pablo, a PEDRO sighting, does that count?
SRAGGY seems to be missing an L, no? SCRAGGLY. Plus, that made two beard clues. Had APLUMB first, but had to give up the U for APLOMB. Sorry @M&A. 😁
I AM, I TOO, OMOO, OOHS. Neat little words.
Anyway, have a great Sunday!
Two F's
RooMonster
DarrinV
There are seven circled pairs in all, so Double O Seven is not only a visual thing. Another nice touch.
A fun puzzle blending digital tech with a humorous homage to SEANCONNERY. I completely missed the play on his pronunciation, so until I came to Rex’s blog was puzzled(!) by the connection of the punny themers to the 007 theme. Anyway, I remain a 007 fan even tho the sardonic humor has been greatly downplayed in more recent films. My only instinctive frustration was the absence of “and” in SHINEDSHIELDDELIVERED, but that’s just a mental nit.
Hubby looked at me in horror as I guffawed at the JC puns! I needed a laugh this morning and the puzzle delivered!
As I was solving, I was already anticipating the howls of discontent regarding yet another “too easy” puzzle - fortunately, I had fun with it. The theme answers were reasonably straightforward and the SEAN CONNERY reveal was a gem.
One area where I wholeheartedly agree with Rex is regarding the double “zeros” strewn throughout the grid to give us a totally unnecessary giant 7 post solve. The puzzle would have been superior without the gimmick and the associated substandard fill (like OMOO) that it necessitated. It’s a shame that WS continues to embrace style over substance, but complaining about it is not going to prove fruitful - I’ve been whining about PPP for close to a decade now and day in and day out it’s going to be one out of three answers until the day I die. I also suspect that these kind of needless stunts are not going away anytime soon - and the NYT puzzles will be worse off for it.
I actually laughed out loud at GOD SHAVE THE KING. Fun puzzle!
Very easy Sunday. Knowing quickly all the circles would have Os certainly helped, but also the cluing was pretty straightforward.
Lots of bonus material not clued with any specific reference to the theme: SILENCER, APLOMB, EVIL GRIN, CASANOVA, and DOVER.
Liked: CLEO and the ASP.
Disliked: JAMES crossing JIM. They could at least use a JIM that is not specifically a shortening of James, like Slim Jim.
Between playing Kingdom of Loathing (where there's a Peridot of Peril) and having a daughter who watched Steven Universe (where there's a character named Peridot), PERIDOT was a pretty quick get, and definitely one I seem to keep running into.
Overall, definitely easy (I set my Sunday record, noting I'm nowhere in Rex's league), but a fun puzzle.
Great catch
waryoptimist
Good one Lewis!
Great Sunday puzzle, thanks Rooney! Sure, pretty easy, but I think you should either make Sunday with a great theme or more challenge, so I'll take the well done theme(s) here.
My weekend brain was slow enough that I didn't get the "7" and double 0 connection until I saw it at the end, but that cinched it for me.
If you win a bet on when a star is going to explode, do you then CASHANOVA?!
Another "oh oh" start in the NW, no instant fill, but after a slight delay things went fast enough, with allowance made for reading tiny numbers again (still faster than on line, for me). I was happy enough not to have to squint any more that I didn't bother to go back and connect the O's to make the 7, which is a nice touch and an impressive feat of construction, but I don't feel like I missed too much.
Last to fall was the SHINEDSHIELDDELIVERED, obviously the best one, but my bank security feature was a LEVER for too long--maybe something you'd need to open a safe? Anyway, fixing that led to an even better aha!
I'm with @Roo on celebrating the return of OMOO. I've also missed KEA and ERN. Welcome back everybody. No points for PEDRO, I'm afraid, as he is my brother, and no, there's no Maria.
Most enjoyable Sunday in a while, DJR. Congrats on the debut, and Don't Just Run off and not do any more. Do lots more, please, and thanks for all the fun.
Overwrought
Does anyone else think it’s weird to base a whole theme on someone’s speech impediment? I guess I’m the only wacko here.
Easy, but fun, cause I like Sean and I liked the theme. It did feel as though there was an awful lot of short vertical fill. But what a nice first puzzle, so congrats to Danny Rooney!
Solid Sunday and the fact it’s a debut makes it even better. Bravo, Danny Rooney! Looking forward to your next one.
Good one! :-D
I agree! This one was easy but had so many clever parts to it, and nothing felt strained. Just smiles all around. Perfect way to start Sunday morning.
There were seven double oo’s
Maybe I'm easy to please ... but this deserves 2 awards - one for Best Sunday of the Year & one for Best Debut by a Constructor (on a Sunday) of the Year. Loved it.
Have I gushed enough?
Great Sunday, Danny & congrats!
Let's see more of you!! :)
What does "OFL" stand for?
Please shay it isn't sho.....He most certainly does NOT speak like that. If he did, he would order a martini shaken not shirred
I agree too! Some, if not most, will complain (as usual) that it was too easy. I thought it was a delight - creative, fun & a terrific debut by the constructor.
Lovely to remember the voice of one of my favorite actors. I checked, and not only did PERIDOT barely slip into timely relevance as the August birthstone, but it would have been SEAN CONNERY’s birthstone since his 95th birthday would have been this past Monday. Might have made sense to run this one a week earlier, but close enough. Happy birthday, rest in peace, and GOD SHAVE THE KING!
The puzzle was already exceptionally easy without the added help of the two circled "O"s. Still, I guess you have to have them to make it possible to draw that big, big 7 -- which of course I didn't draw.
Still punch-drunk from the difficult and unpleasant trivia-fests of the last two days, I was relieved to have a puzzle that had minimal trivia and an emphasis on wordplay instead. There wasn't much challenge, but it was mildly amusing. I don't remember SEAN CONNERY speaking with a lisp or whatever that speech peculiarity is called, though. To me that's a Humphrey Bogart thing.
I see that Danny is a musical theater writer. Must take a quick peek to see if he came out of the BMI Workshop. (He would have been there long after me, though.) Then I'll go listen to some of his songs. There has been such a strong tie between theater songwriting and crossword puzzles over the years, I suspect it's the same gene -- yet to be identified.
Easy. I know the giant picture of a "7" is supposed to provide the "7" in JAMES BOND's code number, but the picture actually contains the whole code number within it, making DOUBLE O entirely unnecessary *except* as a means for telling people to connect those DOUBLE "O"s. Awkward to draw a diagonal line through "OO"s that are not oriented on a diagonal, but since the computer did it for me, I can't really complain. Is the "7" really a "single line"? I would've described it as two lines—a horizontal line and a diagonal line (when I write a "7", I add a little bar across the downstroke, but that's neither here nor there).
Totally agree. Turned me off to entire effort.
Our Fearless Leader, ie Rex. The person who writes this blog that we read every day
Yep, easy. I caught the theme almost immediately and filled in the OOs and the BOND clues.
No costly erasures and HODGES and ARENA were it for WOEs.
Cute, mildly amusing, and breezy, liked it.
Not a fan of this one. Have never, ever, heard of PENIDOT so the crossing with RHE was an unforgivable natick IMHO. Fie on naticks, fie!
A Sunday puzzle after my own heart - one of my favorite main characters supported by a strong set of wacky phrases and a grid BEDECKed with DOUBLE Os that make a seven. CASANOVA was also a nice Bond complement. At the start, lucky crosses got me the SH idea with ASH, and I had fun guessing the rest: GOD SHAVE THE KING was the easiest; SHINED SHIELD DELIVERED the best surprise. Sunday smiles here.
Yeah, the palatalization is pretty iconic Sean Connery—if you do a Google image search for Sean Connery memes, you’ll see a ton of them. It’s a Scottish working class thing (he grew up working class in Edinburgh—it’s also been noted in areas around Glasgow), so most of the Scottish actors we as American are exposed to don’t have it. I love that he held onto it throughout his illustrious career.
@Nancy I don't think he was lisping - I think he was just slurring his words from the Martinis - just my take :)
Our fearless leader, or Rex
I seem to be swimming against the current today.
What have we here? A giant semi-trailer full of discounted Monday level stuff on its way for final sale at the Dollar Store crashes into a handful of silly digs at SEAN CONNERY’s accent. Throw in a MARTINI, a bunch of double Os, a ginormous 7 and what have we got? An overly theatrical mess. Or mesh, if you want to go there.
74A was really awful, both clue and answer. Clues for these kind of groaners should be short and crisp. More like the one for 22A MOVE YOUR ASH.
Must add that I did like some of the clue/answer combos today, especially 16D NOSE HAIR. That was actually kind of funny.
Maybe just a wheelhouse thing, but I just cruised through this with hardly any stops. Toughest area for me was the PERIDOT, EDOM, APLOMB (nice word, btw) section, but that was maybe Wednesday hard.
I kinda wanna like it but it’s just too all-over-the-place for me.
@Anonymous (10:11 am) Some (not all) refer to Michael aka Rex as Our Fearless Leader (OFL). You are not obliged to do so.
ANTLInE before ANTLIKE. Never heard of the parrot. KEA/LOA irony?
@jb129 I'm not sure why you diminish - or, perhaps, even dismiss - legitimate concerns expressed by commenters and experienced solvers in this forum with the qualifier "as usual." It's fine to disagree, but why disrespect?
c00l puzzle, impressive debut. A lot going on but well executed.
Similar theme: Thursday, April 22, 2021.
Kind of a behind-the-scenes Old Testament mini theme going on here. Like one day, Eve decided to take it easy and Adam insisted she go pick some HASS avocados or something. If he had just let EVEREST, us humans might have turned out better. Instead we have to love Cain and HATEABLE.
I got suckered into a word processing app that charges per character. I'm now paying a fortune PERIDOT and T-cross.
Congrats on a great debut, Danny J. Rooney. I bet you were s*itting on pins and needles waiting for this to appear.
Él es un verdadero mujeriego.
I enjoyed working on this one. It started off slow and the lugubious theme -- move your ash -- meant waiting for crosses as usual, but there were enough cute clues to keep me intrigued. In the end the humor won me over.
I've never read a James Bond book, and the few movies I've endured have been sooooo dumb they might have been directed by George Lucas, so the enduring fascination with this topic is beyond my ability to grasp. I understand the publishers are in the process of rewriting these books to deal with some of Fleming's racist, sexist, and homophobic language. Probably not surprising. Books written by a rich white man in the mid-20th century about a rich white man running around the globe acting like a cad seems like the sort of material that'll need a regular rewrite.
I don't think I knew PERIDOT. I think it's a SCRAGGLY beard. That Hero and Leander story is heartbreaking. I wanted to give double credit for the hilarity behind NOSE HAIR, but I maintained the integrity of the Funny Factor count.
❤️ SMOOCH. SILENCER clue. LINTIER. SAYS ME. CASANOVA.
People: 12
Places: 7
Products: 9
Partials: 13
Foreignisms: 2
--
Gary's Grid Gunk Gauge: 43 of 140 (31%)
Funny Factor: 13 😂
Tee-Hee: PATOOT. DOSED.
Uniclues:
1 Practice kissing like a beloved Napoleon Dynamite character.
2 eHarmony competitors.
3 Those cruisin' for a bruisin'.
1 LEARN PEDRO SMOOCH
2 OTHER IDEAL-MATE RUSES
3 COERSIVE IRE FORAGERS
My Fascinating Crossword Uniclue Keepsake from Last Year: Neanderthal tipping, wheel inventing, and arson. CROMAGNON FAVES.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
"Nose hose" made my day - thanks for the chuckle! I would love to see that be a real answer some day.
It not a speech impediment. Connery is Scottish; this pronunciation of "s" is characteristic of a number of Scottish dialects. It's called "apical /s/" - it involves raising the tongue to the roof of the mouth so it resonates as a "sh." It is a dialectical variation - it is in no way an impediment, or understood that way.
I do find it is helpful to check facts - easily available these days with a couple keystrokes - before making conclusions, especially conclusions that can serve to disparage another human being unfairly. If you are turned off, the issue is with you, not with the constructor.
Got Naticked on IONA/LEANDER. Not exactly a fair cross in my opinion
Pretty good except for some of the small fill.
Solved as a themeless, pretty much, except for early-on inking in double ohs to the pervasive little circles.
It's unfortunate that Ian Fleming didn't know his drinks. He's responsible for several generations of drinkers who order a cocktail made with vodka, thinking it's a martini -- and shaken, for crying out loud, creating tiny little bubbles in what should be crystal-clear in the glass.
Anons @9:37 and 10:47
What speech impediment? It was described as an iconic accent, (and was indeed an accent).
@Lewis. Agree with enjoying "Shined..." It was my favorite despite feeling it should have "and" before delivered.
Had almost the opposite feeling re the James Bond films I was disappointed i the first I saw , having heardd soo many raves about it. Felt it was moderately entertaining and felt th same about other I saw (not many)
Found the books even more blah reading and have wondered how they came so popular. Coincidentally, the afternoon before this puzzle I had read a few pages of Dr. Goldfinger to see if I were still found the writing dull, as I was thinking of recommending a different "thriller" for a fun read to my book group. One I think is far more fun - a Fox and O'Hare by Evanovich and Goldberg. Similarly outrages capers and bad guys, but lots of humor.
A quick google to check informed me that it was not a speech impediment, but a strong characteristic of his native Edinburgh, Scottish accent.
The famous Motown Song by Stevie Wonder (or the TV series) doesn’t have “and” in it.
No lisp. No slurring. Sean Connery was Scottish. A number of Scottish dialects pronounce /s/ in what linguists call an "apical /s/" - by touching the roof of one's mouth with the tip of one's tongue, making the "sh" sound. It is a normal variation characteristic of a these dialects. As a proud Scot, Connery maintained his accent in every film he made, including the apical /s/, refusing to modify has accent to suit a role - so much so that, after the Bond films came out, Ian Fleming rewrote details of the Bond character to give him a Scottish background.
Forgot to mention how much I like Rex's clips today. The SNL Trebek/Connery stuff was sexist but hilarious (why did I like that but not like the ones in the puzzle? Was it because they were over-the-top raunchy? Maybe.). The Nipsy Russell ones were sexist and really dumb. And the birds were amazing.
@SonVolt - nice discussion yesterday, and all of us were simultaneously correct! You can’t win with URBANDECAY. As soon as you try to do something, gentrification accusations ensue. I see RP’s original point also.
Also, I completely forgot about that long-neglected Xword puzzle dictionary on my shelf:)
Good fun today that at least put up some resistance, if ultimately on the easy side. Was waiting for RP to wonder why we were doing a 007 themed puzzle today. He’s endlessly unpredictable, oh oh!
Mr. Bond’s drink, of course, was a vodka martini (dry, shaken, not stirred). That’s different from a martini. If you order a martini you will get gin.
har. Well, the themers featurin Bond's one-too-many-MARTINIs [shaken] accent were kinda amusin, I'd grant. Nice little OO-7 graphic embellishment, too boot. And, if only there'd been one more U in the fillins ... woulda been an Anonym -007Us trifecta.
staff weeject pick [of a mere 34 choices]: JIM -- kinda like the name and its clue, as would Mr. Bond.
some fave stuff: HOMELOSS/HILT opener clues. NOSEHAIR. PERMEATE. SCRAGGY. EVILGRIN. SADLYYES.
Thanx for the bondin, Mr. Rooney dude. Nice debut, on a Sunday no less! Congratzes.
Masked & Anonymo6Us
... and now, for the the final nostalgic(al) installment of "I want my real hard Fri/SatNYTPuzs back!" ...
Stumpy Stumper on Steroids:
"No-Know Bonanza #2" - 7x7 15 min. themeless runt puzzle:
**gruntz**
...may it give U a clam's worth of happiness, in an idiom.
M&A
Thursday, April 22, 2021 (fixed link)
@1:26 PM: James Bond drinks both vodka and gin martinis, though he is most famous for his vodka martini in the films. In the original novels, Bond's first preference was a gin martini, but this evolved over time to include vodka.
Chceck the completed puzzle. It's PERIDOT, with an R, and it crosses CHE (Che Guevara).
I don't think Sean Connery talks that way at all. As generations of comedians (and would-be comedians) have shown us, James Cagney came a lot closer. Meanwhile, although I didn't know what the "H" all those "h"s were about until I got here, I got the gimmick right away, and things fell into place pretty easily after that, but got flummoxed on that KIR / NICOL / EDOM run in the W/SW.
I still wish MOVE YOUR ASH could somehow have been SAVE YOUR ASH.
i agree - had the same issue & since i solve on the web i just ran the alphabet until it gave the happy music. i also had no clue on the D in HODGES in that same natick clusterf*** but it seemed like a nice court case sounding name among all the other possible consonants, so i guessed. but all those crosses in one little section...terrible. and for what?
enjoyed the puzzle alright but ended on a sour note.
-stephanie.
Funny -- I never thought Connery talked that way at all. He definitely had the "classic" Bond accent, but those "h"s were utterly new to me.
re: the number 7= this part of the writeup confused me. not sure what is awkward about drawing a line between two O's, regardless of orientation. the graphic illustrates how this is pretty straightforward. also, most people write the number 7 without picking their writing instrument up off the writing surface [additional adornments aside] so yes, it is one line. just as if i drew a wiggly line, you wouldn't say "that's not a single line, that's several arcs!" or maybe rex would lol, idk. ;)
-stephanie.
I enjoyed my speedy solve today and what I disliked the most is the unnecessary big blue 7 and the circles on the DOUBLE Os. But that’s just a personal (albeit admittedly large) nit from a paper and pencil devotee.
I can’t stop feeling sorry for old school solvers and those for whom paper solving is the preference or the only option. I wish I could ask my acquaintance back home in Norman (go Sooners!) whether he, upon seeing the 00s and their obvious shape made more obvious by the theme would have penciled in the 7. He refuses to solve a crossword on anything other than newsprint. Can’t fault that.
This surely was another very easy solve for a Sunday. However, this one had a legit theme that was well crafted and full of thematic material. The S to SH that so clearly points to Sir SEAN CONNERY who in my opinion is the iconic James Bond was a highlight, and the fact that the only DOUBLE 0s are thematic impressed as well, particularly for a fat Sunday grid. There was so much more.
We so had APLOMB and PERMEATE, such wonderful words. They gave a bit of polish to the otherwise colloquial feel of the puzzle with IT’LL DO, SADLY YES, I’M OVER IT. Some good clues today as well, the one for SILENCER (device for cutting bangs) being the best. I got as big a chuckle for that as I did for GOD SHAVE THE KING and SHINED SHIELD DELIVERED. Just excellent humor and plenty of entertainment today. It was a classic Sunday type puzzle. I hope lots and lots of newer solvers got their very first Sunday solve without cheats.
Also the subject of the punchline to my favourite Sean Connery joke:
What time does Sean Connery go to Wimbledon?
Tennish.
It has nothing to do with a "one-too-many Martinis...accent." Connery was Scottish, from Edinburgh. The apical /s/ is part and parcel of the dialect spoken in poorer working class communities in Edinburgh, and is also found in other Scottish dialects. Connery was proudly Scottish, and proudly working class. In all acting parts that he took, he refused to lose the dialect to suit the part, but proudly spoke it. Ian Fleming was impressed enough that he rewrote the profile on Bond to include a Scottish working-class background.
Sean Connery’s birthday was this past week, so it was a Sean Connery theme highlighting one of his most iconic roles. Thought it was appropriate, but like you I had expected Rex to do the work for me of digging that out.
I loved Bitterman. The scene where he drops off Linda at her apartment in Arthur’s limo is comedy gold. “Don’t touch it; Mrs. Nesbitt deserves the full treatment.”
Got beat at KIR/PERIDOT (never heard of either). Had ACH instead. Kept picturing SNL Jeopardy and that made me miss Norm (Burt Reynolds/Turd Ferguson) more than I already do.
I totally agree with you regarding the unnecessary grid “art”. We may be part of a dying breed though. I don’t know why Will is taking things in this direction - I mentioned in my earlier post that it seems like he is embracing style over substance. It would be wonderful if Rex and Will resolved their past differences and Rex interviewed Will here, or even better, convinced him to guest host for a day - that would be a real treat.
Only skimmed the comments, but I’m surprised that no one referenced the fantastic Sunday Bond- themed puzzle from 2008 in honor of Ian Fleming’s 100th birthday. I believe that Rec said at the time that it was the best Sunday ever.
This one just kept on giving with new layers to the theme! Kudos to the contsructor. Signed, shield delivered -- I'm yours!
Yup. SAVEYOURASH almost killed my streak. Fortunately, my wife told me I had to MOVEMYASS so we could go to dinner. Problem solved.
And I don’t recall him calling Honor Blackman’s character “Pushy Galore” (although that would have been a great theme answer)
Well, I know you all found this easy but I found this one to be an utter slog unlike any I’ve experienced on a Sunday in months. 23 minutes over my average Sunday solve. The EDOM/PERIDOT cross was a total Natick that I had to guess at. The theme was obvious immediately but the cluing I found to be just mystifying at times.
Ha!
I wonder how many got the pun. Kudos!
"In all acting parts that he took, he refused to lose the dialect to suit the part, but proudly spoke it". Not much of an actor, then?
Ok. So you/know nothing except what I shared, and you utterly disparage as an actor. Wow Pretty shallow and glib comment, I'd say.
I’m the opposite, prior to this I had ONLY seen Nipsey Russel in the Wiz, so thanks for including the compilation. Funny stuff! A nice alley-oop to Betty White at the end there.
Also, as a Stephen Universe fan I appreciated seeing Peridot featured in a puzzle.
A win for an away team IS a home loss. A logical conclusion. Ergo and all that.
Sean Connery did not speak that way in the James Bond movies. He did in his other movies though.
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