Condo honcho, casually / MON 11-10-25 / Mentions directly on X / Blog commenter who is best ignored / Possible outcome of a bad sprain / People spouting zealous rhetoric / Roman Forum greeting / Old-time anestetic

Constructor: Zhouqin Burnikel

Relative difficulty: Medium (normal Monday, solved Downs-only)

THEME: "I'VE GOT YOU COVERED" (39A: "Leave it to me" ... and a hint to the circled letters in this puzzle) — the "covering" (i.e. outer squares, indicated today by circles) of four answers is something that "has you covered" if you are one of various kinds of animal:

Theme answers:

• HAIL, CAESAR (18A: Roman Forum greeting)
• SCALP MASSAGES (23A: Head rubs that relieve tension)
• FIRE BREATHERS (51A: People spouting zealous rhetoric)
• SHORT SPELL (63A: Brief period of time)

Word of the Day: SHEA butter (15D: ___ butter (lotion ingredient)) —

 

Shea butter (/ʃiː/ SHEE, /ˈʃiːə/ SHEE-ə, or /ʃeɪ/ SHAY; Bambara: ߛߌ߮ߕߎߟߎ, romanized: sìtulu) is a fat (triglyceride; mainly oleic acid and stearic acid) extracted from the nut of the African shea tree (Vitellaria paradoxa). It is ivory in color when raw and commonly dyed yellow with borututu root or palm oil. It is widely used in cosmetics as a moisturizer or lotion. It is edible and is used in food preparation in some African countries. It is occasionally mixed with other oils as a substitute for cocoa butter, although the taste is noticeably different.

The English word "shea" comes from sǐ, the tree's name in Bambara. It is known by many local names, such as kpakahili in the Dagbani language, taama in the Wali language, nkuto in Twi, kaɗe or kaɗanya in Hausa, òkwùmá in the Igbo language, òrí in the Yoruba language, and karité in the Wolof language of Senegal. It is also known as Moo-yaa in the Acholi language. (wikipedia)

• • •

This theme could've used more. Another level. Why are all the coverings the surfaces of animals? Nothing about the revealer is particularly animalish. It's interesting that the "coverings" have a kind of coherence, but it's weird that the revealer doesn't make any reference to that at all. Worse, the "coverings" don't really "cover" anything. They are just the outer letters of the answers. What's *inside* those letters is ... gibberish. I've got you covered? Sure, if "you" are named PMASSAG or ORTSP, I guess. Lastly, I don't think I've ever seen anyone referred to as a FIREBREATHER who wasn't a dragon. A firebrand, sure. But I don't love FIREBREATHERS as an answer. The dictionary has it as a word, though, so I don't have much more than my own aversion to justify my objection to that answer. There's an inventiveness and cleverness on display here, I just don't think the whole thing really works. Gotta stick the landing, and this the landing here feels unstuck. 

Pretty easy Downs-only solve, with the only tricky parts coming (very predictably) with the longest of the Downs. I had "WHAT-" and absolutely no idea what was supposed to follow (3D: "Isn't this pleasant!"). The first guess I ventured was "WHAT A DREAM!" (which, as you can say, is right in the vast majority of its particulars). Paula DEEN is somebody, so that "D" didn't seem obviously wrong. But then came SMOLI, which is most decidedly not a thing, so I had put in STOLI, and that helped me see TREAT. TEEN >>>>> Paula DEEN, so I was happy with how that turned out. I was less happy in the SE, where I had to wrestle not only with a pesky long Down (TORN TENDON), but had to deal with an adjacent short answer that I botched: I had 65D: Mentions directly on X as RTS, not ATS. Aside from the fact that I would prefer never to see any references to that murderous racist's website ("X") ever again, thanks ...

... I don't think ATS is great fill. I definitely am familiar with "at" as a verb meaning "mention/tag in a social media post," but it's ugly fill. Anyway, with RTS in there, I had RU-IO, as one of the Acrosses, and I'm pretty sure you can see why *that* was looking awfully unpleasant. Only one plausible letter could go in RU-IO, and it wasn't one I was looking forward to writing in. Not sure how I finally got around to changing RTS to ATS. Or how I saw TORN TENDON, which seems like its own, very severe thing, and not the result of a mere sprain (28D: Possible outcome of a bad sprain). The only thing I wanted for the longest time at SAU-E was SAUCE, which put a "C" at the beginning of TORN TENDON. Finally seeing that "T" might also work there must've been what tipped me in the right direction. "T" to TORN TENDON to AUDIO (not RUBIO) to ATS. Not the most fun I've ever had Downs-only solving. But like I said, it was one of only two places that caused any trouble. Everything else was straightforward.

Not sure why you need so many cheater squares* in a simple Monday puzzle (four of them: before RAS/after SMS, and before STOLI/after SAUTE). I suppose if the quality of the fill is really suffering, then adding a handful of cheaters is a fine way to clean things up. Fill gets shorter and (usually) more boring / dull / crosswordesey, but that's better than awkward and strained ... though the very presence of RAS and SMS next to those cheater squares sort of suggests that those extra black squares didn't really buy that much in the way of sparkle. 

Bullets:

• 17A: 6'4", 186 lbs. and others (STATS) — er, I guess. They're measurements, which are a kind of stat. But then any fact can be a stat if you wish hard enough. I think of STATS as numbers related to sports performance.
• 20A: "Santa Baby" singer Eartha (KITT) — too soon, puzzle. Too soon. Please wait til after Thanksgiving before you start throwing the Christmas music at me.

• 68A: Blog commenter who is best ignored (TROLL) — yes. Good advice, puzzle. Good, sane advice.
• 25D: Condo honcho, casually (SUPE) — short for "superintendent." "Condo honcho," aside from being patently ridiculous as a phrase (not convinced anyone has ever put those words next to each other before today), already feels pretty "casual." Not sure you need that "casually" there.
• 11D: Lhasa ___ (dog) (APSO) — I've seen this dog's name in crosswords forever, and yet I always experience a little hesitation when spelling it—either part of it. I always want the two parts to "agree" as to their endings, so I'm like "LHASO APSO? LHASA APSA?" Also, I frequently forget which highly unusual letter combination LHASA begins with, which is to say I kinda want to spell it LLASA (like LLAMA or Mario Vargas LLOSA). The double "L" is a completely different pronunciation from the "LH" ("LL" = more like the "Y" in "young" or "yurt"), and it's specifically Spanish, which "Lhasa" obviously isn't, so you'd think I wouldn't make this particular spelling mistake. You'd think.

See you next time.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

P.S. yesterday's Phoodle answer was hilariously obscure, but I'm not playing that particular game to "win," I'm playing to learn (about food and food-related terms). Today's answer, you'll be happy to know (or won't care about at all, whatever), is much easier. I'm told weekend answers are typically much tougher. I checked the NYTXW database to see if yesterday's Phoodle answer had ever been used, and ... sure enough. There it is. Or was. A single appearance 44 years ago. Crosswordese so pure it barely exists. It's like experimental crosswordese. Theoretical crosswordese. But I still like knowing it!

[ASHET!]

*"cheater squares" are black squares that do not add to the overall word count of a puzzle. They are added to a grid solely to make it easier to fill.  

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