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Leaf on a sushi tray / MON 1-12-26 / Source of motivation, in modern lingo / Acronym of affection in ASL / Chocolate treat designed to look like a mountaintop / Rhyming advice to a renter of VHS tapes / Rhyming advice to a spitting talker / Rhyming advice to a gym rat
Monday, January 12, 2026
Constructor: Carolyn Davies Lynch and Christina Iverson
Relative difficulty: Medium (solved Downs-only)
Theme answers:
- "SAY IT, DON'T SPRAY IT" (18A: Rhyming advice to a spitting talker)
- "NO PAIN, NO GAIN" (31A: Rhyming advice to a gym rat)
- "BE KIND, REWIND" (47A: Rhyming advice to a renter of VHS tapes)
- "YOU SNOOZE, YOU LOSE" (64A: Rhyming advice to a procrastinator)
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Perilla frutescens var. crispa, also known by its Japanese name shiso (紫蘇) from Chinese zisu, is a cultigen of Perilla frutescens, a herb in the mint family Lamiaceae. It is native to the mountainous regions of China and India, but is now found worldwide. The plant occurs in several forms, as defined by the characteristics of their leaves, including red, green, bicolor, and ruffled. Shiso is perennial and may be cultivated as an annual in temperate climates. Different parts of the plant are used in East Asian and Southeast Asian cuisine. [...]
• • •
Lots of short fill kind of weighs the grid down a little. 3-4-5s abound, and that always makes things a little leaden. But I will say that SCARY GOOD is scary good, a real high point among the non-theme answers. DELI CASES is adequate but not exciting, and nothing else really gets off the ground. The only scary (bad) moment I had while solving came in the SE, where all the Downs looked correct, but I ended up with an unrecognizable "word" in the crosses: SHISO. Took one look at SHISO and thought, "Oh crud, what did I do wrong?" Checked those Downs. Rechecked those Downs. Cannot see an error. Cannot fathom an error. Eventually I just left it in and hoped that it was, I dunno, some kind of pepper (like a shishito, maybe?). And I was close. Ballpark. SHISO is Japanese, and it is culinary, but it's not a pepper. It's a highly serrated green leaf used primarily for (sushi) garnish in east Asian cuisine. As I started to look up SHISO, I had this uneasy feeling that I had done this before (missed SHISO, looked it up). And I was right. SHISO has appeared before. Once. Back in May of last year. Here's what I had to say about it then:
As for SHISO, even looking it up didn't help much. A lot of its use in Japanese cuisine appears to be as a garnish, or a coloring agent. But it is common, so I have no complaints about its crossworthiness. Happy to learn a new culinary term (even if I'm doomed to forget it fairly quickly, probably).Good to see that I know myself so well. I did indeed forget SHISO fairly quickly. Haven't seen or heard the word since that NYTXW appearance last year. With those (common) letters, you'd expect the term to proliferate. Maybe its appearance here—on a Monday (?)—is evidence that that is in fact what's about to happen. It's easily the least Monday thing in the grid, but maybe next time I won't feel that way. Third time's the charm! (how's that for non-rhyming non-advice?).
Bullets:
- 27A: Acronym of affection in ASL (ILY) — as in "I love you." It's also an "acronym of affection" in texting. ILY will always look (to me) like an adverbial suffix pretending to be something else. This is only the third appearance of ILY all time, all of those appearances coming since 2023. All of them abbrevs. for "I love you."
- 28A: E.M.T. process often administered to the beat of "Stayin' Alive" (CPR) — I've heard this before, and it's meaningful to me because I was the right age to be engulfed overwhelmed and swallowed alive by the Saturday Night Fever Soundtrack. A musical juggernaut if there ever was one. But does the "Stayin' Alive" reference mean anything to younger people? I assume that song has a cultural afterlife, but how big, I don't know. Maybe CPR classes are single-handedly keeping that song alive for future generations.
- 6D: Chocolate treat designed to look like a mountaintop (SNO CAP) — one of the tougher downs, as I never see SNO CAPs anywhere but the candy counter at the movie theater, and I never, ever get them. I think I had them once as a kid and they must've made a bad impression on me because I love chocolate and I love mountaintops, but SNO CAPs, not so much. Not a "treat." Maybe I'll give them another try? I was imagining so many "chocolate treats." Sundaes, s'mores. If you want a candy, say "candy." "Treat" = bah!
- 37D: Where meats and cheeses are often displayed (DELI CASES) — briefly confounding, as nothing about the clue indicates a plural. "Where" tends to suggest a single specific place or a general term for a place, not multiple places. "Meats" and "cheeses" are plural, yes, but those plurals can typically be found in single DELI CASE. It's not like there's a DELI CASE out there that features just one meat and just one cheese. So I tried to think of a synonym for "case" for a little bit, before finally giving in and just attempting the plural. Which was correct.
- 66D: Initialism on a Navy carrier (U.S.S.) — first thought: "H.M.S." Then I remembered "H.M.S." stands for "Her Majesty's Ship" and thus unlikely to appear on an American seacraft. I guess the clue didn't specify American Navy, but I inferred it. So I pivoted to U.S.S. (United States Ship). But then SHISO happened, and I started wondering whether there was some other naval "initialism" I didn't know about. In the end, I stuck with U.S.S. The Correct Move.
- 46D: Source of motivation, in modern lingo (INSPO) — like "Insta," INSPO is with us to stay, apparently. Short for "inspiration," this is INSPO's sixth NYTXW appearance. As with ILY, all those appearances have been in the last three years (since 2023).
- 55D: "Get outta my hair!," in a text (MYOB) — "mind your own business." Yet another slangy, internet-inspired shortening. This puzzle is rather heavy on shortenings in general. RELO. AMNIO. It can get a little wearing.
- 40A: Garage jobs involving grease guns (LUBES) — saw LUBES in the Acrosses and thought, "Whoa, I wonder if today is the day that LUBES finally gets a sex clue." But no. Not today. Some day (I assume). But not today. We did get [Slippery stuff] back in 2023, but that's not exactly sex-specific. I'm not saying I *want* a sex clue, exactly, I'm just saying ... it's coming. While the "garage" meaning of LUBE(S) is obviously valid, I think the other meaning of LUBE is more top-of-the-brain for most people these days. I went to Merriam-Webster dot com to look at their "Recent Examples on the Web" feature for LUBE, and ... well, there are no garages in sight:
That's all for today. See you next time.
[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook and Letterboxd]
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90 comments:
Fun - early week puzzle with a little bite. Cute theme and well filled for the most part. The YOU SNOOZE spanner is the highlight.
When Will I Be Changed
The VCR reference is awkward. Liked DELI CASES and SCARY GOOD. Usually we get ERNO. NINER is temporal.
The landscape would be empty, if you were gone
Needed the crosses for SHISO. Did we need both RELO and INSPO? SNO CAPs tend to show up a lot in the grids.
Fare-thee-well now
Let your life proceed by its own design
Enjoyable Monday morning solve. Rest in power to the great one.
Go on out singing, I'll walk you in the sunshine
Not as easy as most Mondays. Modern-day initialism (MYOB, ILY, etc.) is tough for old guys like me.
NOPAINNOGAIN was familiar, but SAYITDONTSPRAYIT wasn't. No cheats, but several do-overs.
“Sometimes not reading the Across clues helps with overall enjoyment.” Amen to that. Today I enjoyed the familiar, lighthearted rhyming phrases, easy to infer from the crosses, and felt no need for further theme-y-ness to make it all work. Question for the construction-minded: Would the rhymes be enough to call this a themed puzzle even if the clues didn’t try to reinforce the theme and there was no revealer? In other words, how lightly can a theme be applied and still count as a theme?
I initially wanted USE IT OR LOSE IT for the gym rat clue, but I suppose that’s more of a mid-life health conscious person than the bro who was never at risk of losing it. When Rex mentioned it, I tried to see if I could come up with others. HASTE MAKES WASTE was the best I could muster.(also not advice). A STITCH IN TIME SAVES NINE is way too long, and then I realized it’s slant rhyme anyway, so disqualified. My google attempts to find others revealed TALK SHIT GET HIT, which is apparently 90s, even though I would have been the exact age to have heard it in high school. Like YOU SNOOZE, YOU LOSE, it’s clearly the opposite of advice.
Anyway, a fun way to start my work day on this day before classes start. I enjoy puzzles that get me thinking about things like rhyme and idiom. This was fun!
I agree, harder than usual Monday. All the theme phrases were familiar but I needed crosses to see them - they didn’t come to mind based on the clues.
I guess DELICASE is comman usage, but I think DELI Counter is much mire usual, and since that’s what I wanted in that spot, I couldn’t see CASES for a long time.
SHISO is a brand new word to me, even though I love and eat sushi quite often. I guess it’s usually represented on the sushi tray in the form of an artificial green garnish that really looks very little like a leaf.
I resisted entering in NITRO as clued. At first I thought it was referring to an icy cold beer, which didn’t make much sense since it would just freeze. I’m not a coffee drinker so that connection wasn’t obvious to me.
I also took SHISO on faith. It looks like a pretty crossword-friendly word (apparently Christina thinks so as well, since she ran it on a Monday). I’m surprised we haven’t seen more of it until today.
Asumo la responsabilidad.
Lovely puzzle. We like our platitudes to sing, don't we?
Polished grid with mostly balanced gunk, but I continue to wonder why we can't talk clue writers into having a sense of humor. People are funny on Monday too.
Speaking of funny, somebody rightly criticized our overzealous conversation around NOSE HAIR on Saturday, so I checked with my wife who is fun, but not funny, and she tended to agree that NOSE HAIRS are funny. This puzzle gives us PSYCHE, SWOOP, SO MANY, KISSED, SIT ON, YOYOS, I SAY SO, SCARY GOOD, and INANE all begging for cute clues. If it's cute, don't be a galoot, funny is money.
I'm most taken with the [phrase after a dare]: DO IT! As a bit of a wonk, I am certain I've said it a thousand times, but stuffed into squares on a puzzle it always looks so weird. Doit. I dare you -- doit. Just doit.
People: 6
Places: 3
Products: 4
Partials: 9
Foreignisms: 2
--
Gary's Grid Gunk Gauge: 24 of 81 (30%)
Funny Factor: 0 😫
Tee-Hee: LUBES.
Uniclues:
1 Tendency to have too much.
2 Line from an ode eulogizing Blockbuster's demise.
3 What happened before making fish babies.
4 Why you jumped off the roof holding an umbrella.
1 SO MANYILY
2 BE KIND REWIND O'ER
3 COD KISSED
4 POPPINS INSPO
My Fascinating Crossword Uniclue Keepsake from Last Year: What might cause alone time in the lunchroom. COOTIES SURE CAN.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Agree with medium solving downs only. Very few roadblocks on this one.
If this is an easy Monday puzzle, G-d help us for the rest of the week.
Shiso is common in lots of Asian cuisine and not just as a garnish (fantastic for making lettuce wraps with meats!). It’s delicious. And it is all over cooking TV. Every five minutes. So yes, it was a Monday-easy gimme for a lot of us.
I really don’t get ISAYSO. Shouldn’t it be ISAIDSO or have I raised three kids into adulthood with improper grammar?
Theme not bad, but the rest of it was a bit too crosswordese-y for me
Before "Stayin' Alive", (we're talkin' the '70s) CPR was taught to the tempo/rhythm of "My Melody of Love" by Bobby Vinton. Thankfully, the docs discovered the pace was too slow to revive enough patients, and we moved on from slow polka to disco!
There is an art to Monday cluing that’s hard to nail. You want it easy but not embarrassingly easy overall. I think C&C nailed it.
Look at the first two clues – [Intimidate, with “out”] for PSYCHE, and [Bird’s dramatic dive] for SWOOP. Your mileage may vary, but I had to think a moment before getting the latter, and I needed a cross or two for the former. There is enough of this type cluing -- requiring thought, but not end-of-week thought -- to make the fill-in involving.
Add to that a theme with fun rhymes and fun answers to guess at with as few crosses as possible, and this puzzle felt like a paragon Monday.
Oh, and extra credit for [Put in a good word, perhaps?] for EDIT. Here’s a word appearing more than 700 times in the NYT puzzle, and you’d think the well would have run dry on new clues. But this one is not only terrific, it’s a debut. Mwah!
A lovely collab, Carolyn and Christina. Thank you both, and please consider doing more together – go with the flow!
Agreed. I slapped down DELI right away, and when COUNTER didn’t fit I had to wait for a lot of crosses.
Agree with you here. Maybe those of us who are older were inadvertently admitting we were living in the past, and younger generations have modified it? ;) But I always hated that as a comeback and would have rather a scenario of it getting phased out.
As usual, doing the puzzle Downs only got me pretty far, but not quite far enough, and, unlike last week (but as usual), I eventually had to look at some across clues. Whatever, I enjoyed the puzzle, Really wanted 37D to be DELI Counter but the puzzle wouldn’t give it to me.
The clue is correct because I say so.
But what about those of us who don’t watch cooking TV?….
Please try cucumber; avocado; shiso roll at your favorite japanese restaurant. So good.
On balance, Medium seems about right; I might rate it as just north of that. SHISO and HOYA were unknown to me, and NITRO was unknown to me as clued, but the theme answers were fairly easy. SCARY GOOD, one of the better answers, took an ODDly long time, probably because "crAzY GOOD" was intervening in my head. ODD LOTS is not particularly in my working vocabulary. INSPO I've seen (in the crossword, where else?), but it's a coinage I'm sure I'll never use.
SAY IT, DON'T SPRAY IT (the funnest of the themers) reminds me of a story my physical trainer told me not long ago, where a performer on stage had actually warned the audience beforehand that when he sings, he tends to "spray". And apparently he wasn't kidding. There's another saying with a certain meter to it, "forewarned is forearmed", but I think it didn't apply in this case since there was no chance for anyone in the front row to turn around and grab a pancho!
My physical trainer doesn't say NO PAIN, NO GAIN (the saying is way too hackneyed to even bear saying), but we both acknowledge the concept. Instead we may refer to "good sore vs. bad sore". You could think of soreness as a PAIN of sorts, but a "good sore" is nothing to be feared or avoided; the microtears are part of a growing process and they are not at all unwelcome. You had a good workout but didn't go crazy. A "bad sore" is a result of going too far, possibly injuring one's self. (Perhaps that's what Rex meant when he says the slogan is stupid and foolhardy.) Everything in proportion. Something to remember in addition to New Year's resolutions.
Been a while since I've seen ECO clued with Umberto. Just yesterday I was reading the Wikipedia synopsis of Umberto ECO's 1995 essay Eternal Fascism: Fourteen Ways of Looking at a Blackshirt (ECO grew up in Mussolini's Italy). Also titled Ur-Fascism, it's very much worth reading today.
Hope your Monday is a good one. Don't overdo it!
Hey All !
Thanks for the advice! I'll (Rex) USE IT OR LOSE IT. FAKE IT TIL I MAKE IT.
Grid is 16 wide, in case no one else pointed it out. More puz for the money. First extra wide of the year, I believe. Neat how two of the Themers are 16's.
I liked it. Fun idea, fill decent, MonPuz easy. Did have USN first for USS, silly.
I remember getting VHS tapes from the Rental store (BlockBuster, usually), and sometimes when you took it out of the sleeve, it wasn't rewound! Used to curse out whoever it was that left it like that! I always thought the store was supposed to check, and rewind them if necessary. I guess not.
Time to SWOOP away. See ya.
Have a great Monday!
One F
RooMonster
DarrinV
I say so just doesn't cut it as a reasonable parental response.
"Use it or lose it" I say and hear mostly in relation to retaining command of a foreign language, or it could be some other subject that one used to know well but is at risk of slipping away. A common enough notion for professors and their students everywhere!
Either works for me. I've heard "because I said so" more than "because I say so", but grammatically they're both fine. A last resort for a frustrated parent.
The NOSE HAIR convo was largely MY FAULT, but yes, it was meant to be funny at the time. Sorry if some people were truly offended, although I suspect that some of the outcry was from people who chose to be offended, which is not the same thing!
I first encountered SHISO when my son was living in Japan, and I would visit him once or twice a year. Great stuff--it used to be hard to get here in the USA, but I'm starting to see if more often. Yes, it's much more than a garnish--it tastes delicious, and you can use it to pick up pieces of barbecued meat. Try it!
I had StOOP before SWOOP--a much more dramatic kind of dive, as when an osprey comes up with a fish.
In a few minutes I'm leaving to see my physical therapist, whose motto is simpler: "NO PAIN." Works for me.
Supermarket sushi uses plastic shiso
A rhyme that really is advice and, in fact, is advice that is being followed extensively these days: Fake it 'til you make it.
Anyone else tempted to put in [PHI]DINE instead of IODINE? Backing me up is 50D with ISAYSO. Welp, if I SAYS O, then I means O. I guess I'm getting lost in yesterday's puzzle, as well as a little PHInnicky.
I've participated in a lot of rental truck races but I've never been able to WINONA Ryder.
So
I can tell you this. Of the various types of parties, I'd rather go to a BYOB than an MYOB.
He was a strange guy for a CPA. His laugh was a maniacal cackle, his head was half shaven and his numbers were even ODDLOTS of the time.
Dr. Dre's Mother: C'mon, man. Be part of the family, Mr. Big-Ass rap star. You can still do a chore like getting the clock wound up.
Dr. Dre's Sister : Yeah, just like Momma said, BEKINDREWIND.
(The above play on words, or whatever it is, is about as far as anyone should push this particular type of inanity. I recognize this and I apologize).
Fun D.O. solve. Thanks and ALOHA, Carolyn Davies Lynch and Christina Iverson.
Because I’m 43 and I don’t have any personal experience needing to communicate with the deaf, I read ASL differently. C’mon…I can’t be the only 17 year old asking ASL in cartoons in 1999…
"If the glove don't fit, you must acquit!"
Any fan of The Office (lots of "young" people) will recall the Stress Relief episode where "Stayin' Alive" and CPR featured prominently. Of course Michael gets it wrong and starts singing Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive"!
MYOB has been around for almost 200 years now, but it's popularity took off with the advent of computerized communication.
H.M.S. hasn’t been Her Majesty’s Ship since Charles III was crowned. That, er, ship has sailed.
"BECAUSE I SAY SO" responds to the broad question of parental authority. "BECAUSE I SAID SO" addresses a (very recent) exercise of parental authority. Either is grammatically correct.
I finally have to get this off my chest.
RELO isn't any person RELOcating from any home to any other home for any reason.
It's a very specific industry term for a unique type of transaction where an employer is moving an employee to another city to fill a position. The terms are generally negotiated, but often include provisions such as the employer paying for moving services, commissions on the sale of the employee's existing home, etc.
Also, REALTOR is a registered trademark of the National Association of REALTORS, and when used properly is always capitalized (because that's how it's trademarked).
No one would accept a fast food clue that contained the string mc'DOnAldS.
Had a good time figuring out the rhyming phrases, hadn't heard SAYITDONTSPRAYIT since junior high school, which is about where it belongs. The other ones kicked in after the first word or so and filling them in made things pretty easy.
Don't drink any fancy coffees so NITRO took a while, and took too long trying to think of what word might start with SNOC, even though SNO as a prefix for CAPS appears all the time. Didn't know ILY as clued but did remember INSPO , although only as crosswordese. Hello to SHISO. Not sure about the pronunciation but I hope it's like "SHISO pretty!".
Hey Mel OTT! Where ya been?
Above-average Monday for me, CDL and CI. It Certainly Delivered some rhyming memories . Clever, Interesting, and likeable. Thanks for all the fun.
Back in my serious running days I read that there's a difference between pain and an injury. The trick is learning to be able to tell the difference.
Looking back at the completed puzzle I wonder why it took me longer than usual. I guess because it took a number of crosses to get PSYCH and SWOOP and SNOCAP. Particularly the latter, since I was looking for something larger and browner…Unlike Rex, have eaten too many of them at the movies…And at the end needed crosses to get MYOB and SHISO…It definitely was not the the long “advices” that snapped in quickly with a few crosses. I like Rex’s comments on the barbed advice but I took them as tongue-in-cheek “advice” rather than helpful comments. They are all pretty well time-worn.
Wow! A lot going on there!
Rex, surely you remember that, long before the internet, the advice columnist Ann Landers frequently invoked MYOB to letter-writers she considered too intrusive on the lives of others. The internet has provided many memorable acronyms, but let’s give Ann her due.
Certain Across answers seemed a bit iffy, such as those for "Lots and lots," "Acronym of affection in ASL, "Man's name that's a citrus fruit spelled backward," "Leaf on a sushi tray" (that's a Monday clue??)...and somewhere along the line I started doing Downs instead and thought those clues were easier. A little surprised, at first glance, to see Rex's "Easy-Medium rating."
Right you are I was involved in two relos both company financed. In the old days IBM was called I’ve been moved.
I've never heard the term "slant rhyme," but I get it. I like it.
Weird morning!!!
I succeed at downs only at (I would guess) about a 20-25% rate. Then today I move straight through this oversized grid, downs only, in a breeze. I don't think I had a single write-over. I even dropped in DELICASES and a dreaded text abbreviation, MYOB, right off the clue. All of those long across rhyming phrases came to me with very few letters, because SAY IT D .... was obvious and set me up to guess the others quickly, providing handy letters for the downs. Like Rex, I expected the "Nearly" message when I typed in the O of NEON in the last box, because I was convinced SHISO could not be right.
So, I came to the blog expecting every comment to be castigating the Times for yet another insultingly easy puzzle. Like I said, weird morning!
"Put in a good word, perhaps?" is a great clue for EDIT.
@egsforbreakfast 9:11 AM
The problem with you being a loser is not your fault. Ditch the Ryder. Ya need something you can whip. I promise you'll WINONA WINONA.
He rated it Medium though (Downs-only). Yesterday's was Easy-Medium; maybe that's what you were looking at.
Apologize if you must, mr. egs, but don't stop!
Didn't know SHISO. This was an easy, enjoyable Monday. "BE KIND REWIND" brought back pleasant memories of rushing to the neighborhood video store for the latest releases while my dog sniffed around for food underneath the shelves.
Thank you, Carolyn & Christina for the memory & a pleasant Monday :)
Great rhyme @Egs "Fake it ...." Thank God I never had to.
On the tough side for a Monday, more like a Tuesday for me. No costly erasures but NITRO, PAS, and SHISO were WOEs…and cross referenced clues (45a/51a) and clues like 44a are not conducive to whooshing.
Cute theme, liked it.
How about a more current clue for WINONA. I’m about half way through the final season of “Stranger Things” and it’s “edge of your seat” TV.
Croce Solvers - Croce’s Freestyle #1078 was an easy Croce for me…not much tougher than a tough NYT Saturday. Good luck!
I don't know how old you are but we used MYOB back in the '60s.
A deli counter is where you order the meats and other goodies that are kept in the DELI CASE.
A deli counter is where you order the meats and other goodies that are kept in the DELI CASE.
My five favorite original clues from last week
(in order of appearance):
1. Benefactor with a limited number of grants? (5)
2. Stealthy flier (3)(7)
3. Mars comes third in it (5)
4. Really involved (6)
5. Sound made by a toaster? (4)
GENIE
AIR MARSHAL
ANNÉE
ORNATE
TING
My favorite encore clues from last week:
[Patient watchers]
[Poles can be found next to them]
NURSES
CZECHS
I came here to say exactly the same. SHISO is delicious!
I'm in muy 8th decadentistas. MYOB has been a common and widely used expression at least since my very early elementary school days, as was SAY IT DON'T SPRAY IT .
BE KIND, REWIND OR you'll be fined and slapped on your behind was my mom's way of admonishing us before we'd return a tape to Blockbuster.
Nice bit of light entertainment. Fluffy, even. Not a bad thing on a Monday. I solved downs-only and hit very few road blocks but didn’t feel bored. I can’t say it was SCARY GOOD, but it was certainly enjoyable.
The fun part of this solve was seeing the themers emerge and wondering about the nature of their connection. Oh, some sort of rhyming admonition thing. Okay, it’s Monday.
I’d like to point out that I have never eaten, never even seen a SNOCAP. Apparently they are available here (north of the 49th) but when I go to the grocery store I rarely find myself in the candy aisle. Maybe I should go to more movie theatres. I might see them, try them. But no, I’ll probably just order my regular modestly sized popcorn and sugary soda pop (something I only ever order at the Cineplex). But who knows, maybe one day I’ll search for a bag of those crossword famous chocolate nonpareils treats or … maybe not. Probably not.
Interesting to see this as Medium. I am about the same age as Rex and this is the closest I have ever come to solving Downs Only, even with that bit of Japanese thrown in. Liked the absence of obscure names
I agree that today, solving down clues only made the theme cleaner because I didn't read those clues. It seemed a bit tougher than a normal Monday, and I finished with a bit of a mess in the lower right. I did not have the slightest idea what 61 down could be; I would never ever guess DO IT for that clue. Of course 69 across SH-SO didn't help (SHE SO?) and neither did 72 across SI-ON. 60 across E-EN looked like it was EVEN, so 61 down looked like VO--, so VOOM crossing SHOSO and SIMON! VOOM???... yikes.
SHISO presented no problems today for me; check the crosses, yup, yup, yup, I guess it's SHISO.
But SNOCAP was unknown to me. I was a theater candy expert asa a kid and I don't recall ever seeing SNOCAPs. They look like mounded nonpareils (which I like). Until NO PAIN NO GAIN filled in, S_M_NY for "Lots and lots" was a real mystery.
The theme today was fun and I didn't notice the plethora of short fill, so thanks, Carolyn and Christina!
BEKINDREWIND is a real postcard to the past, when video stores were all the rage. Do you guys remember when Netflix would mail you a DVD and you'd have to return it in a red envelope? Bygone days we thought were so cutting edge at the time
Both Anonymous 11:31 AM & 12:26 pm
I too remember MYOB in childhood (I’m in my 70’s)
So arose long before internet. Interesting. Maybe it was dying out before the internet saved it?
Gary
Very good uniclues today
Especially pled the Blockbuster one
@Lewis. I've gotta say right up front that I'm not your biggest fan. You're far too positive for an old grouch like me but today I'm all in. Thanks for being you.
Nice MonPuz rhyme schemin.
Wasn't there this famous quote from Edgar Allen Poe applicable here? Somethin like: "Don't do the crime if you can't do the rhyme"?
staff weeject pick: PAS. Primo PASS go-with, plus a crucial French lesson, too boot.
fave moo-cow eazy-E MonPuz clue: {"If all ___ fails ..."} = ELSE.
other faves: SAYITDONTSPRAYIT. SCARYGOOD. MYFAULT. RUBIK's LUBES.
Thanx for gangin up on us, Ms. Lynch & Iverson darlins. Fun stuff.
Masked & Anonymo5Us
runtpuz server lives! Seize the moment! ...
"Person To Person" - 7x7 themed runt puzzle:
**gruntz**
... and, have an extra related seizure ...
"Persona To Persona" - 7x7 12 min. themed runt puzzle:
**gruntz**
M&A
All downs so Medium seems OK. I had ISAYNO which is more declarative than ISAYSO. But TRESN didnt fit.
Wow, Eco pretty well nailed it, especially with the 13th point. I now have to go read the whole text and get completely depressed.
DELI CASES reminded me of the poor butcher who backed up into the meat grinder. He got a little behind in his work.
This old timer prefers IKO to ECO. That is, the old Louisiana song IKO IKO. Marley’s Ghost does a killer version
Sorry, but the deli counter is the person who determines exactly how many slices of the meat or cheese you get, based on whether you ordered thick, medium, thin, extra-thin, or paper-thin slices.
Kids in school read entire books, as well. Can you imagine that?
Words do expand in meaning. RELO of course started with maybe real estate people , executives and/or Human Resources departments but there is no law that you can’t use it for simply moving. I would guess some people do. Anyway close enough for crosswords.
Realtor capitalized is for the benefit of the national realtor organization. They don’t want to lose ownership of it like the owners of zipper (originally Zipper) famously did a century ago. I don’t care in the least. So realtor fine by me.
I liked this one a lot. I think Rex may be right that SHISO is on the verge of becoming crossroadese. I had no clue but the crosses were not hard.
Good catch from commenter who remembered Ann Landers used MYOB. I assume it also long predated her. Rex, not all abbreviations come from the internet!
I knew PAS (“not” in French) but I was surprised to see it on a Monday. No real complaints so far , so the crosses are fair. Of course the clue/answer simplifies things but it is also close enough for crosswords.
All I can see is "once I was afraid..."
Re Lewis' praise for the edit clue. I second that. A great clue and made me smile.
28 across was 'EMT's skill" in the paper version, and referred to Staying Alive online.
I live in a boring 80k population town in the deep south and even my local Lowe's stocks Shiso plants next to the "standard" herbs like rosemary and thyme. Take a chance on it in your next herb garden, it's easy to grow and quite versatile.
Perfectly pleasant pleasant early week solve. Any Monday that can hold my attention for the whole show is highly rated in my book. The themers were all "advicey" enough for me and I had fun working them all out (well, not that much work but still...)
Like @Lewis and others, the cluing for EDIT was the highlight. Taking an oft used entry and finding that kind of fresh and clever cluing takes talent, and it's appreciated.
Thank you Carolyn and Christina for a splendid early week outing.
And THANK YOU @Sunvolt for the Bobby Weir tunes - a sad day yesterday. Let's keep the music going for 300 years...
def more 'sayings' than advice that's for sure or 'rhyming quotes' good Monday puzzle or is 'rhyming adages' more apt hmmmm
I agree with Rex that "advice" might not be the best descriptor common to all the theme entries. I would go with "rhyming aphorism".
The theme answers were very familiar to me - most of them in junior high school. I agree that the clues weren’t in the realm of “advice,” and think there will likely be many folks who may have never heard a couple of them.
Many folks these days don’t remember the “down time weekend activity of wandering through the local Blockbuster video store to find something to rent. At the height of their brief existence, at least at my local shop, members were fined on their next rental for failing to rewind. It wasn’t hard to remember yet despite signs at the check stands and stickers on the cassettes admonishing renters to BE KIND REWIND, many folks didn’t and complained about the fees at their next rental.
Was Jane Fonda one of the people known for NO PAIN NO GAIN? That’s whose image appeared in my mind’s eye for that clue.
In my long ago youth, there were two occasions when one might hear SAY IT DON’T SPRAY IT, both usages directed at someone, usually a contemporary.
The first instance was upon an accidental soda through the nose or a very wet sneeze that accidentally tally sent liquid onto an unsuspecting someone, often (in my experience) at the school lunch table as the result of hearing something funny or being caught unexpectedly by a mighty sneeze. That would be a “Geeze, SAY IT DON’T SPRAY IT” situation.
The other, rude, pejorative, downright mean and alas, in my experience frequent usage taunts the person with a speech impediment - a lisp or similar speech difficulty. Calling this answer “advice” reminded me just how thoughtlessly mean kids can be, and inclusion of this answer in the puzzle diminished my enjoyment considerably.
One of my closest childhood friends had the obvious facial scar from repair of his congenital cleft palate. His speech was seriously impaired and despite his skill at any sport, his good humor and clever abilities to fix things, he was bullied almost constantly. I used to get very angry on Greg’s behalf whenever I heard any slight aimed at my friend. He just ignored them. I learned a lot from him about picking your battles. Greg graduated from Ohio State with double degrees in Electrical Engineering and Speech Therapy and has invented a bunch of adaptive gadgets for the speech and hearing impaired.
All in all, an average Monday,
28A in my print copy was "E.M.T.'s skill"
When I lived in Japan, for a short while, they had shiso flavored Pepsi. Yes, that’s right, “Pepsi Shiso” (Google it). Not awful, but not good either.
If you’d like to know the sole person keeping Sno Caps in business, meet my mother. Somehow she finds them outside of just the movies and I’m kicking myself for taking so long to get that clue!
30A in my paper says simply “E.M.T.s skill.” Strange that Rex‘s version showed the much longer (& more musical) clue “E.M.T. process often administered to the beat of "Stayin' Alive.”
16x16. I have this little trick I like to do to make Mondays and Tuesdays harder for me but it fails in a 16 x 16 grid and I didn’t notice that until it was too late.
Didn’t notice this until I added the same comment a little below
It’s actually 16x15 which is even worse for my little game
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