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Tonkatsu coating / THU 10-16-25 / What allows Neo to disconnect from the Matrix / Certain Windows hard drive malfunction / Horned creature in "Pan's Labyrinth" / Novelist Charles who wrote "The Cloister and the Hearth" / Prefix with botanist / Performed amazing, in slang
Thursday, October 16, 2025
Constructor: Kareem Ayas
Relative difficulty: Easy
Theme answers:
Double revealer! This one definitely got better as it rolled along. Up front, I was wading through iffy fill (IOERROR, DOASIDO, Charles READE back from the dead...) and wondering why NOTABLE was the answer to a starred clue, when there didn't seem to be anything off or weird about it. Brain: "If something is [Conspicuous], it's NOTABLE ... works for me." Even after I got BENTO, I thought the "N" stood for "NICE" somehow and was trying to figure out what letter in NOTABLE could be doing something similar: "NICE-OTABLE? Hmm. Unlikely." At some point the "missing ICE" conceit dawned on me, and the starred clues were much easier from there on out, but merely taking "ICE" out of answers didn't seem all *that* interesting. Then I got to ROCKS OUT, and thought, "well, that's a good revealer at least. It's got the punny repurposing of the phrase, and the slang of "rocks" ... cool." At that point, I was reading the "ICE" as diamonds ("rocks" is also slang for diamonds), which is what made running into the second revealer (!?!?!?) doubly cool. First, I had the "aha" of realizing that the governing metaphor was literally ice, not diamonds, and that, when viewed in that light, all of the answers are served NEAT (i.e. without ice, like some whiskey). So the whiskey lover in me and the crossword lover in me were simultaneously satisfied. I honestly didn't even see the second revealer (NEAT) until after I was done and started doing the post mortem. It was like the puzzle going "psst, hey, I'm better than you think, look!" So despite the fact that the fill felt a little rough around the edges, I liked the concept here, and I really liked the 1-2 punch of the revealers.
- BENTO (5A: *Treat with kindness) ("be nice to")
- PRY (24A: *Expensive) ("pricey")
- SLR (48A: *Deli device) ("slicer")
- DROLL (62A: *Risky endeavor, idiomatically) ("dice roll")
- NOTABLE (3D: *Conspicuous) ("noticeable")
- OFF HOURS (10D: *Chance to meet one-on-one with a professor) ("office hours")
- APPENDS (41D: *Book addenda) ("appendices")
Charles Reade (8 June 1814 – 11 April 1884) was a British novelist and dramatist, best known for the 1861 historical novel The Cloister and the Hearth. (wikipedia)The Cloister and the Hearth (1861) is an historical novel by British author Charles Reade. Set in the 15th century, it relates the travels of a young scribe and illuminator, Gerard Eliassoen, through several European countries. The Cloister and the Hearth often describes the events, people and their practices in minute detail. Its main theme is the struggle between man's obligations to family and to Church.
Based on a few lines by the humanist Erasmus about the life of his parents, the novel began as a serial in Once a Week magazine in 1859 under the title "A Good Fight", but when Reade disagreed with the proprietors of the magazine over some of the subject matter (principally the unmarried pregnancy of the heroine), he curtailed the serialisation with a false happy ending. Reade continued to work on the novel and published it in 1861, thoroughly revised and extended, as The Cloister and the Hearth. (wikipedia)
• • •
The puzzle was very easy, with only the ice-lessness posing a consistent solving challenge. I got slowed a little here and there, starting with IOERROR. I haven't used a Windows operating system in ages, but even if I used one currently, I can't imagine finding IOERROR a pleasant answer (2D: Certain Windows hard drive malfunction). I guess if you have one of those malfunctions, you could call an ITPRO (another answer I'm never that happy to see). I'm looking the grid over now and can't really see any significant sticking points. Had no idea there was such a thing as a PALEObotanist, but why not? PALEO is at least a recognizable prefix, and that's all I needed it to be. Crosses helped me figure it out. READE was not difficult for me (any very longtime solver knows his name), but I did slow down in a rubbernecking / "really?" kind of way. "We're still doing READE? And we're still cluing it via Charles? OK." No one reads Charles READE any more (put that irony in your clue!). I was an English major and then an English Ph.D. and even though the Victorian Era was not my thing, I had a passing familiarity with the period and I never once heard or saw his name during my entire formal education. I learned him from crosswords, some time in the '90s. If you want to know one of Shortz's main contributions to the NYTXW has been, it's (largely) turning off the Charles READE pipeline:
Griffith Gaunt, or Jealousy is an 1866 sensation novel by Charles Reade. A best-selling book in its day, it was thought by Reade to be his best novel, but critics and posterity have generally preferred The Cloister and the Hearth (1861).Is there a Charles READE fandom out there? Where's my Charles READE hive at? Should I bother with the guy? Lemme know.
Bullets:
- 35A: Practice chiromancy (READ PALMS) — one of the best answers in the grid. So funny to have a long answer sitting dead center and not have it be part of the theme. "Chiro" = "hand," "mancy" = divination or magic. [some fun TRIVIA: No one knows what Charles READE's palms looked like.]
- 40A: "Central Park in the Dark" composer (IVES) — I know IVES but do not know this work. Gonna listen to it today. A Charles READE novel seems like a big undertaking, but IVES I can do.
- 25D: What allows Neo to disconnect from the Matrix (RED PILL) — this term has found its (unfortunate) way into modern political discourse. "Individuals who identify as "red pilled" often espouse conspiracy theories, antisemitism, white supremacy, homophobia, and misogyny" (wikipedia)—you see, these chuds believe they're enlightened (i.e. disconnected from the oppressive and conformist "matrix" of ... I don't know, human decency, I guess), so they identify with Neo, which is a wild and flagrant misreading of the movie's politics (a movie made by two trans women), though no one ever accused these folks of being particularly literate.
- 28D: Whom you might greet with open arms, for short? (TSA) — this made me laugh a kind of grim laugh. "Well if it isn't my old friend, Big Surveillance! Give me a hug!" But yeah, you do have to hold your arms out (open) when you go through that scanner dealie, so ... nice wordplay.
- 54D: Performed amazingly, in slang (ATE) — def a younger (than me) thing. I think I learned it from crosswords. I was familiar with the term "cooking" (slang for doing a great at something); then at some point "eating" followed. Seems logical.
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100 comments:
i'm choosing to read the theme as "abolishing ICE".
A little harder for me than @REX--20 minutes. The yellow highlights in the app pointed me to the 4 letter revealer right away, and I thought, oh, it's NEAT. But then I couldn't get that corner to work--had El ninO before PASO and that screwed it up. So then I thought there must be an ICE rebus somewhere. and I just piddled around here and there all over the grid until it finally hit me at 41 down--APPENDS is a word, but not--Oh!!!!! The ICE is not to be added, it's missing, like NEAT whiskey! Then I was able to go to all the themers and solve them without ICE and see that they were real words still, just didn't fit the clues quite right. Unique puzzle in that the letter string ICE never never occurs, not even in the revealer--what a NEAT puzzle!!!! Thank you, Kareem, that was tricky and clever! Unique/innovative Thursday theme! : )
Easy-Medium. Missed the gimmick at NOT[ICE]ABLE (3D) and BE N[ICE] TO (5A), but it hit me at 10D, OFF[ICE] HOURS.
Overwrites:
At 14A I had ogre as my brute before I saw BOOR
My bugs were resolved by a mere IT guy before the IT PRO stepped in (49A)
WOEs:
Novelist Charles READE at 30D
HEGEL at 59A might have been a WOE, but I had it filled in before I read the clue
And somehow IOERROR is a themer too, right? Like when you are looking at your answers to the starred clues, looks like you didn't put something in that's needed??? "GOCOLD" also has some theme material too! Somebody ABSCONDed with my ICE! : )
My god how did I not see that one just sitting there?! Good eye 👍🏼
I, too, thought there was some NO ICE subtext here. Wait until someone explains it to them (I can’t image faux outrage folks steaming daily crosswordera)
Me, too. I loved it, even tho I messed it up.
👍
Medium at least. Certainly not 'very easy'! Some unusual words, at least as clued (ABSCOND, IOERROR) and some unfamiliar literature (READE, HEGEL). [Hegel is of course familiar, but not that title]
No ICE? I'd settle for ICE that doesn't hide behind masks, acts within the law with respect for the law and not arbitrarily, comprises neither Brutes nor BOORS, and is held accountable to the Constitution, to the rule of law, and fundamental norms of human decency. Then ICE wouldn't have to hide and cower in the dark like cowards. That would be really NEAT.
Is it really all that great of a puzzle if you can solve it completely, then look at the revealer and say, "Huh? I don't get it at all."
Finished it, the trick clues didn't make any sense to me, I had to come here to understand what it all meant. Oh well. On to Friday....
I drink Scotch on the rocks, but I did connect NEAT to "no ice" and finished the puzzle without cheating after translating BENTO to "Be nice to." Would have finished sooner, but I had "stress" before DURESS and "nino" before PASO. Enjoyed it, but disliked the reference to TRIVIA as "stupid stuff." Is remembering the date of a historical event stupid? Are obscure facts stupid?
Nice puzzle - fun theme - compound revealer and well filled. It was on the easyish side late week but whatever. I drink bourbon NEAT - Jamesons on the rocks.
The Subdudes
Rex nailed it with the crosswordese of READE - only place I’ve come across him. Stan Newman brought him out just a few weeks ago. SET IN STONE, READ PALMS, NEED A NAP are all top notch longs. Keep the MARSALA but I love CANASTA because it reminds me of my mom. THRUMS is wonderful - I’ll have to add it to my Mt Rushmore of grid words with usurp and halcyon.
STRAIT
Enjoyable Thursday morning solve.
That’s NEAT - That’s Nice
1. Still DRE came out in 1999 not 2022
2. Had WIND instead of WEND for meander which made me spend 15 minutes going over the puzzle with a magnifying glass.
That's what a Thursday should be: hard until you figure out the twist, then easier.
Misremembered chiromancy and originally put in cast boneS, which added to the difficulty (that's osteomancy).
Another Thursday where I didn’t grasp the theme (though not for a lack of trying). I even got to the first reveal, tried to get ROCKS and SLR to somehow magically morph into something deli-related - obviously no luck there.
Fortunately, I didn’t get frustrated. I did however throw in the towel on what for me was an exercise in futility and found a better use of my time.
A capital-P puzzle today.
Sunday, we had a puzzle where tiny scissors, on the line between two squares, represented the word ONCE. For example, the scissors appeared between the C and R of the answer TO WHOM IT MAY CRN – you had to imagine the ONCE there.
Today’s Puzzle is a layer more difficult. Yes, you have to imagine ICE in the answer, but there is nothing, like Sunday’s scissors, to tell you where it goes.
That’s a marvelous riddle to crack! The gimmick hit me with a delectable “Oho!”.
The Puzzle battled me on another front – no-knows – of which I ran into more than a few. They created barren white spaces that lingered until I cracked the ICE.
Along the way there was beauty: WEND, DROLL, ABSCOND, THRUMS. And lovely touches by Kareem to have the ICE-less words still be actual words, to have the theme answers be symmetrical, and to have two revealers.
Potent and Pleasing, a worthy Thursday. Thank you, Kareem!
It’s too bad that the idea or REDPILLing means all that. I consider myself REDPILLed in the same way that Truman Burbank was.
We are living in a simulated world. The politics, the news, the advertisers…they all want you to DOASIDO. They want control. It’s either power or money or some kind of god-complex, but the only way they keep it is through your conformity.
Life is much better when you live it within arm’s reach.
The French philosopher Desormeaux described trivia as the Germans’ attempt to reduce coal consumption without consciously uncoupling from the mine. I have always found it banal and more than a little confusing.
Hey All !
All the ICE-less Themers end up real words/things, which is nice. *Holds up a sign* No Gibberish In My Puzzle. Har.
Finally figured out what in tarhooties was going on at SLR. Brought out pen and paper (since the ole brain wasn't fully operating yet), and wrote down the missing letters of SLICER, which begat ICE. Looked at a couple of other Themers, and saw ICE was out of them. Aha!, declared I, and went about getting the other Themers, and solving now knowing what the Theme was. With the exception of the second Revealer, the Themers (and the longer Revealer) are symmetrical.
As Rex noted, NOTABLE threw me off a bit, because it fit the clue as is. But, you can definitely get to NOTICEABLE.
Rex didn't caw about DEL next to DELL.
Had in for the longer Revealer _OCKSOUT, and had a thought it would be something else. I would've been surprised if the NYT allowed that!
ABSCOND a fun word. Wonder where it sits on @Garys list. (It is @Gary, right ? My memory is ridiculous.)
Have a great Thursday!
Two F's
RooMonster
DarrinV
This one bothered me too so I looked it up. 2022 was the year he did the Super Bowl and that led to a big resurgence, apparently.
I had both revealers filled in and significant parts of the themers before the missing ICE finally hit me while looking at BENTO, which was (finally) obviously BENICETO Then back to find all the asterisks, which unfortunately looked too much like quotation marks. Finally got all the ICEs where they belonged, but I wouldn't say it was "easy".
IOERROR? REDPILL? I've done enough crosswords to have seen Mr. READE, but did I remember him? I did not.
CANASTA took me back to my college year in Madrid, when it was a Sunday afternoon ritual. The rules are complicated enough to have been a strain on my then still-developing Spanish, but it sure was a lot of fun.
Impressive construction, KA, and I Kept At it until it made sense, which was ultimately very rewarding. Thanks for some thorny fun.
I was also thrown off my Still DRE being clued as 2022. The best reasoning I can find for it is it re-entered the charts in 2022 after Dr Dre’s Super Bowl halftime show.
The above post is mine. Somehow I wasn’t signed in.
I also had WIND instead of WEND! And Riade seemed like a plausible last name for someone I’d never heard of.
I was trying to think of a way of parsing the Dre clue that would make it accurate…can anyone explain why it’s clued that way for a 1999 song? It was performed at the Super Bowl in 2022, but that doesn’t make it a 2022 hit.
Thought this was a Thursday gem. Wrestled with NOTABLE and OFFHOURS working without ice better than the others, but it all clicked with SLR. Also couldn't get past bread crumbs for what covers Tonkatsu so GOv/vANKO sat there keeping the chimes away, but in the end I just loved the solve. The touches on our current political morass didnt dawn on me til I got here, thankfully I think, at least when it feels like everything else does, but make today's even more interesting.
Natasha, I enjoyed the puzzle before I read your comment, and now I absolutely love it!
Ellie Sattler from Jurassic Park is a PALEObotanist!
Wow, nice puzzle! Like @Roo I was pleased that all the no ice answers are real words. Saw it at OFF___ had to be HOURS. A true Thursday, good for newbies to get the idea of a trick, not always a rebus, and since it's overall easy, a rewarding feeling when done (parent of a new solver! Who happens to be 35yo but better late than never).
Thanks, Kareem!
Yeah word choice in clue for Still DRE bugged me. I guess it’s popularity spiked post-Super Bowl performance, but to me a 1999 song recharging in 2022 is not a “2022 rap hit”
Super fast for me - 1/2 of my normal Thursday time - and got a huge “zing” of AHA! which was ineffably satisfying. Loved it.
Two things. One: I like Scotch* on the rocks too, but saying so out loud can elicit a SNEER from certain self-declared whisky aficionados, especially from single malt experts. They will tell you you are "bruising" the Scotch, or some such nonsense.
Two: the other thing I'm willing to admit is that, yeah, a lot of the TRIVIA I know is arguably stupid stuff. It's not that any one factoid taken in isolation is stupid. It's that the accumulated mass of flotsam and jetsam floating around in the skull might be at the expense of a better use of brain. Welp, too late now!
* Although I've taken a break from alcohol these past few months.
Apparently still Dre charted after the super bowl in 2022 but I was very confused by that too.
Same here! And with GOP? REDPILL? Abolish ICE!
Wonder whether, if Rex had noticed the different NO ICE theme aspect that natasha pointed out, he would have changed the theme of his write-up. That's my READE, anyway.
Yes! That 2022 really threw me off. Glad someone else noticed
Respect for the puzzle. Figured out the theme relatively quickly, I thought, and admired how taking the ROCKS OUT resulted in a grid without gibberish (I don't consider SLR "gibberish" in crosswords: it's common enough). But consumed only slightly less time than an ordinary Thursday though: I was slowed up some by wanting vaLe followed by DaLe followed by at last DELL, and then also I was staring quizzically at DOASIDO, not expecting to parse that into four words, but attempting some song-and-dance with do-si-do at first.
Nice bit of TRIVIA about the OSCAR statuette.
That's hilarious about Charles Reade's appearances in the Maleska era. I imagine the vast majority of solvers back then hadn't read a word of READE, but just tucked this stupid bit of TRIVIA (hi @Bob Mills) about Griffith Gaunt away for crossword purposes, lol. That's surely a major reason people do crosswords, the little EGO strokes that flatter the solver into thinking they're smart and all when they whoosh through the crosswordese with aplomb. Yesterday there was some discussion about how many solvers complain when the puzzle is too hard, and how probably many of those are the same people who complain that the NYTXW has gotten too easy. Well, it's really quite elementary, dear Watson: a "good" puzzle is one which makes you feel smart; make it too easy or too hard, and that feeling just isn't there.
I'm proud of Rex for breaking down "chiromancy" into its component Greek parts, to solve READ PALMS. This is the type of trivia that's actually useful on occasion. And I'm "proud" of myself, that it just occurred to me that the word PRUDES is related to the word "proud". (It's not related to the word "prudent" though! Source. I flatter myself that I'm so smart to not(ICE)! Golly, AIN'T I a smart boy, Mommy?!
This puzzle WENDS and THRUMS and is DROLL and NEAT. I liked it!
Nice puzzle. If only getting rid of ICE was as easy!
This puzzle is quite clearly political. Shocked RP did not comment on the anti-ICE sentiment. Rad puzzle!
Among the SCOTUS members, Just Thomas has been accused of serious ethical misdeeds. Not a great joke but you might use it as a breaker at your next cocktail party.
The Thin Man left me thinking CANASTA act, or what?
A pal was going to Venmo me an IOU, but he had an IOERROR.
I know a guy who's so clumsy that all he can do is make steady humming sounds. He's all THRUMS.
DOASIDO looks like an instruction from a square dance teacher.
Nice little Matrix mini theme with REDPILL and ORACLE.
I liked this puzzle and the way that Kareem Ayas shave ICE right out of it. Thanks, Kareem.
READE did me in. Got the missing “ice” theme early with BENiceTO and NOTiceABLE, but could not really get a foothold in the rest of the puzzle until I looked up READE. And wow, CANASTA, my mother’s circle game that I learned to play as a kid and never thereafter. Still remember the plastic card holders. Anyway, got a kick out of this one.
Exactly my first thought! Made the puzzle even better.
💯💯💯
Complaining about someone hiding while posting anonymously? I’m guessing you’re not familiar with the concept of irony.
With charity for all and malICE toward none-A. Lincoln (2nd inaugural I believe)
as a younger millennial who was in the chokehold of jurassic park mania in the 90s, paleobotanist was a familiar term for me. i basically wanted to be dr. ellie sattler when i grew up.
** Mild digression (off-topic). **
A couple of recent developments on the solving interface front have given me more appreciation for the NYT games app, which for me has been easy to use and navigate through the grids (I don’t blame the app for the fact that the NYT staff gunks up their puzzles with so called “grid art” and other primitive hieroglyphics).
The WSJ has recently released what appears to be a beta version of their online interface, which clearly is not ready for prime time. I haven’t tried the Pepto Debacle at the WaPo in a while (it’s really only required for Evan on Sundays, as the LAT is superior for the daily grids) - the last time I tried it there was no noticeable improvement over prior iterations. So all-in-all we’re probably pretty lucky that the Times got one right (I'm referring to the NYT app which I use on an IPad - I’d be interested in hearing from others re their experience on different platforms).
So the app is pretty good in my opinion, however the blogger software that we have to deal with here is an entirely different story. I really preferred the older version before the most recent downgrade.
Early on, I got BENTO from crosses and BE Nice TO popped out at me. Knowing I was looking for (melted, I guess) ice definitely helped speed things along. The one that slowed me down was DROLL - nicely disguised!
Huh?
Breaking down chiromancy would look like this
Cheir (Greek for hand) and Manteia (divination).
Not ICED ROLL, you dummy. DICE ROLL. Also I hadn't noticed the asterisk and was thinking that DROLL was some new youthy slang for a risky endeavor and was not happy about it.
What did I miss here? Lots and lots. Without Rex, I wouldn't have notICEd that NOTABLE seemed like a fine answer for "conspicuous." Or that why wouldn't I meet one on one with my professor during his OFF HOURS? I also failed to pick up APPEND[ICE]S -- though there's no excuse for that.
A dandy rebus -- but with enough irksome TRIVIA to make me grumble much of my way through this. Kareem warned us by putting TRIVIA in the grid with the misleading clue: "Stupid stuff it's fun to know." No, Kareem -- the accurate clue would be "Stupid stuff it's NOT fun to know." As in: "one person's fun is another person's complete and utter misery."
But a good rebus in any case -- one that fooled me in a lot of places.
Maybe I’m not remembering correctly but doesn’t Neo need to leave by a ringing landline phone?
had to start going through all the vowels on the WEND/READE cross. WiND, WaND (short for wander perhaps?), and WEND (i’d never heard of this one tbh) all seemed like plausible answers. i had WiND, which definitely does mean to “meander”, and RiADE also seemed plausible to me. not sure if you’d call it a natick, but it certainly felt like one to me.
Terrific puzzle! It's sort of a black hole rebus. Instead of some letters entering a square and clustering there, they enter a square and disappear.
I could have done without Charles READE. I consider myself well read, but I have never once heard of this obscure English author or the referenced book. I could have also done without REDPILL. Never seen The Matrix and probably never will.
Tough for me. It took me a while to get the theme and then go back and make sense of the starred clues. Plus, IOEERROR, RED. PILL (yes, I have not seen The Matrix), IVES, and HEGEL (as clued) were WOEs…and, the PRUDES/AURORA/HOISTS section required a lot of staring.
Costly erasures - Walk before WEND and tarot before PALMS
Crunchy and clever, liked it.
ABOLISH ICE
Don’t forget rocks out
Easy. I added some antifreeze and it ran just fine.
Rex, I’d love to see you write a short story set in an alternate universe in which crosswordese vocabulary plays a prominent role—where everyone reads Charles READE and eats OREOs and are of OTOE descent and go to OBOE concerts in OSLO. Such a story would only have a very niche readership, but now that I’ve joined the niche, I think it’d be hilarious.
Love that this comment was right on top to assure that I couldn’t miss it!
Rebus?
Thanks to Kareem for this “No ICE” puzzle. Abolish ICE via NYTXW!
NO ICE. Works well with NO KINGS, today.
Would be NEAT if we could do without ICE ... or at least de-Gestapo-ize it, IM&AO.
NOTABLE/NOTICEABLE didn't quite get the puztheme mcguffin exposed, at our house. BENTO's missin ICE boxes definitely nailed it for m&e, tho. Cool puztheme, so to speak.
staff weeject pick: ICE? -- no. Gotta go with ATE, cuz of its totally mysterious "modernized-beyond-all-M&A-hope" clue.
fave stuff included: As @RP said, the double revealers were NEAT, and that ROCKS OUT. SETINSTONE [ROCKSOUT cousin?]. READPALMS & its clue, crossin READE, too boot. DOASIDO clue. THRUMS [has Trump ever been accused yet of bein "all thrums"?].
Thanx for the anti-ICE puz on No Kings Day, Mr. Ayas dude. Neat job.
Masked & Anonymo5Us
... and, now for an icy example of minimal solvequest ease ...
"Minimal Personality" - 8x7 12 min. themed runt puzzle:
**gruntz**
M&A
👍
Anon 0740am EST is correct, Rex, and the Wikipedia article you are referencing is one of many that unfortunately has been captured by editors who represent the Bkuesky strain of the American Left coalition that is marked by moral absolutism, identity essentialism, and institutional enforcement and which peaked between from 2020 and 2021. Their toolkit is often blamed on postmodernism, but… meh. Unfair.
That’s true only in certain cherry-picked respects. Decoloniality thought is a far more apt explanation as its unifying notion is Western oppression vs indigenous innocence, AND it thrives by mercilessly engaging in moral sorting and debate avoidance. That is, they don’t take kindly to healthy skepticism which has ALWAYS been the primary thrust of the “red-pilling”metaphor. Among their enemies are the likes of postcolonialism and materialism-based Marxism. Hardly right-wing, but you can see the advantage to claiming that that’s what they effectively are.
Like much language, terms with broadly useful meanings get used by both left and right elements. What’s changed is that the Bluesky left uses this anodyne overlap to equate its left-side critics with the worst of the far right which, one must admit, sure is easier than having to defend your policy assertions.
Sorry for the buzzkill post but I’m not a chud, dude. And neither is John McWhorter, Catherine Liu, Coleman Hughes, Freddie de Boor, Olúfẹ́mi Táíwò, Glen Greenwald, Helen Lewis, Jonathan Haidt, Vivek Chibber, or Megan McCardle.
Slow your roll on this one. Be kind, rewind. Beware the Corrosion of Conformity. GenX represent. And a heartfelt Cheers.
You def sound redpilled bruh, “Blue Sky” lol 🙄
"The Cloister and the Hearth" was a book-of-the-month from a post-WWII classics book club that my mother belonged to. I read it twice: once when a middle school English teacher challenged our class to try it, and again in college. I didn't understand much of it on the first reading, but appreciated it considerably more the second time. It was considered somewhat scandalous at the time, due to the unwed pregnancy of the heroine, a plot point that was bowdlerized in some editions. In the 19th century century it was apparently considered a "Great Novel" but like many such works, has not aged all that well.
A good Thursday, and the double revealer was a nice touch. I too was confused by NOTABLE fitting the clue just fine without the ICE.
Typeover: ITGUY before ITPRO, id EST before EGO, and ARCANA before TRIVIA... they're pretty similar!
Ahem: the 2 down clue does not need "Windows" in it. IO ERRORs can happen in any operating system.
GOP stands for Grand Old Party; pretty sure it wasn't called that in Lincoln's day!
Aside from that, good puzzle, very hard for me to figure out what was going on because I thought the ICE was present in the acrosses. Also, OFFICE HR. fit. And AVow for AVER, bread for PANKO.
I'm running really late, so that's it from me.
Writing from the city of Chicago, all I can say is: no better time for a puzzle themed on "ice out." May it happen.
not the initial time. the phones came into play after he took the red pill to leave the matrix the first time. after that, it switched to the ringing phones.
I'm in the nICE puzzle with clever theme crowd today. There was the usual appearance of some pop culture TRIVIA here and there---RED PILL really? WELL OK---but got 'em with crosses.
I did a little side eye to the DROLL themer. The idiomatic expression for a "Risky endeavor" AINT a DICE ROLL. It's a ROLL OF THE DICE.
Is there an echo in here? READ crossing READE and DEL next to DELL.
Seinfeld's uncle LEO (45A) is one of the series' classic DROLL characters, right?
Maybe 37A GO COLD could have been worked into the theme. "What your whisky doesn't do if keep 35 Down and go 61 Across".
My wife and I got it all right without understanding the gimmick. We knew something was amiss, but the crosses bailed us out in all cases. I feel like it was a W.
I wrote to The New Yorker about a flaw in their puzzle interface. A clue becomes highlighted only if it is not completely filled in. If you want to change an answer that is already filled in in the puzzle, and you click on the anwer, the clue does not highlight! You have to go searching through the list of clues (with teeny tiny numbers!) to find the right clue. Bad, bad! I really like the NYTXW interface.
I solved the entire puzzle not understanding that the letters I was leaving out were “ice” I’m face-palming so hard. I thought the theme answers were just “neatened” like shortened and cleaned up and condensed, I didn’t understand the ice joke at all till I came here to read your blog! I’m not much of a drinker so I’m giving myself a pass 😂
I didn't care for this puzzle at all. It was so tough for me I finally lost interest. Glad you all enjoyed yourselves.
Didn’t notice it either but love “NO ICE!!!”
But almost. It aplenty emerged in the 1870s.
ETHNO before PALEO. Wasn't READE clued recently as "Duane _____"?
I thought today's mini was the worst puzzle I had ever seen. Until I got to the main event. Prime candidate for WOAT.
Treated it as a rebus (as Thursdays tend to be) and inserted ice in all appropriate boxes and included the initial letter. My iPad didn’t like that and I only got the congratulations upon removing ice.
Yes, exactly, and as reported by Rex. You can use that to solve the clue: divination by observing the hands/palms.
Anonymous 10:28 AM
Talk about a false equivalence. The vicious often illegal activities of ICE a secretive AND violent quasi fascist organization you equate to posting anonymously on this blog. (A right guaranteed in the Constitution I would think) Amazing. The real irony is you posted as Anonymous.
Bob Mills
and Anthony in TX
I also got the answer neat , then no ice then be nice to. = BENTO
Somehow it clicked right away for me
Anthony in TX
Well there are times when I fill in all the boxes correctly but don’t get the gimmick. It happened just recently. I liked that other puzzle despite my failure to grasp the theme I don’t think everyone has to get the theme for a puzzle to be a good one
Well, a Thursday that started out confusing. I saw the asterisk at 3D after I had everything except BOOR the IO of IO ERROR and DRE down the west side in the north corner. But while I thought NOTICEABLE was a better answer for “conspicuous, the grid didn’t provide enough squares. The downs fixed that; NOTABLE seemed legit - enough. I moved on.
But when I moved over to the center of the grid, I solved downs only to get BENTO, at 5A, and at that point, I knew for sure the asterisks signified the theme answers. Also knew that I had no idea what it might be. I soldiered on.
The entire E side proved surprisingly easy. In fact, the rest of the puzzle provided no real pushback. My whoosh was on and led me to WEND my way diagonally down to the SW. That’s when the clouds parted in just enough time to burn off the remaining fog, and at last, the sun shone brightly on the cleverness of the theme.
Since I drink my whisky NEAT, that answer was a gimme, and already had El PASO and ET TU. I looked over the grid and the remaining clues and I wondered (as to 35D) “Hmm, what’s ‘OUT?’” Oh, ROCKS OUT . . . AHA!! There’s “no ice” in my NEAT whiskey - or any of the other theme answers.
Easy and fun. Kind of sad that all the theme answers, though they were fine words, could have actually been plausible answers on their own as was NOTABLE.
A very fine Thursday indeed. The theme reveal was double barreled and hidden so artfully. And you have to love the clue for TSA, right? I chuckled at that one. I am always greeting the TSA with “open arms” because I have (for a person) huge amounts of metal inside my body. If I’m in a hurry and don’t see a female TSA agent, I try to warn someone well before it’s my turn that I will need to be wanded. Sometimes when the official risk is low an agent will say something like “you’ll be fine today,” meaning that the sensitivity of the machines is set somewhere below “stun.” I still set them off no matter what. Anyway, great clue. Fun puzzle. Better week thus far.
Anonymous 10:40 AM
About your unnecessary dig at tht
If I were to comment in the same way I would say you must be confused that this is a blog discussing Ancient Greek.
I will say that his comment is totally appropriate for a blog about an English language crossword He chose not to show off.
WOW!! Totally missed that, makes this an even better puzzle!
I though this one was a real gem! Double revealer with all the asterisk answers being real words - that's happy stuff!
NEAT was my first revealer and I figured it out from there - what a fun ride! My hold ups were the same as many here - READE - no clue, WEND - didn't come to mind and I thought that Bug expert for short (49A) had to be some sort of slangy term for some kind of ologist - finally getting ITPRO felt like a party.
What a hoot this was - the right amount of resistance for a Thursday that brought me great crossword joy! Thank you Kareem!
Rex, you ATE and left no crumbs.
If I think it’s easy, Rex thinks it’s hard. If I think it’s hard, Rex thinks it’s easy.
DNF. I put rebusses in for the missing ICES, e.g. TICE instead of T, RICE instead of R, etc...
Ice in whiskey is a crime
I beg to differ on Reade's palm. Given the age of the reference, it almost has to be an old date palm.
My gosh I fully had this solved as “OVER ICE” and it was super weird. So I had NOT A/ICE BLE where CRAVE hit the A but not the ICE and then the ICE you had to do in reserve for the downs. It really nearly worked all the way through but it seemed so weird and not fully consistent for across and down. So like I had SL R/ICE across and AVOICE down but that switched up the across and down usage of ice. Idk it was a mess. Had to look up Rex. Glad it was cleaner than what I had. Was also certain there was an OVER/ICE rebus for the bars/bites so I had like ICE/CR EM and that’s where it really broke down
Although the rebus entries may have been accepted this was essentially not a rebus. The whisky was NEAT and the ROCKs were OUT so I think you were intended to remove ICE to have the answers make sense.
RED PILL, GOP, SNEER, BOOR, SET IN STONE, ROE, PRUDES, and EGO. The theme can be interpreted as getting ICE out of Portland, Chicago, LA, etc. I'd speculate there's a third hidden theme here. I'll add ORACLE, with Larry Ellison being its founder and a huge donor to the GOP, and Michael DELL is another one.
Thank you! What happened to the editors? This is something that should have been caught. He hasn’t had a solo album in 26 years.
This one hit on so many levels - and then so many more I didn’t see as I read the blog and the comments. One quibble - I thought a canasta win is 8500 points, not 5000. I googled it and Mr. AI (sorry!) said the most common version uses 8500 but there’s a less commonly used version that uses 5000. My wife, who plays a lot, never heard of 5000. The clue should say 8500.
Cosas estúpidas que es divertido saber.
Writing this days after doing the puzzle. Time gets away on me sometimes and I still like writing about a puzzle even if nobody reads it.
Figured out the theme pretty early on and had fun finding the missing ICE. Took a long time to win, but I did. PANKO was super hard to remember.
Chiromancy is a scary sounding word.
❤️ DEL next to DELL.
People: 6
Places: 1
Products: 10 (no)
Partials: 9
Foreignisms: 3
--
Gary's Grid Gunk Gauge: 29 of 78 (37%)
Funny Factor: 1 🤨
Uniclues:
1 It might be Horace, but it's certainly not about lunch boxes.
2 Obsessed with men in black.
3 Those in the bayou who refuse to eat eggs no matter how small.
4 The unpleasant feeling of admitting a popover.
5 Crossword puzzle rule banning all sedimentary-related entries.
1 AIN'T BENTO ODES
2 CRAVES GOTHS
3 NOLA ROE PRUDES
4 ASK-IN DURESS
5 TRIVIA ROCKS OUT
My Fascinating Crossword Uniclue Keepsake from Last Year: When the Swedish bees rise up and take their rightful place alongside the inspired leaders of our great country. NORSE DRONE AGE .
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
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