Work parodied by Umberto Eco's "Granita" / SUN 8-16-26 / Member of the N.F.L.'s "Big Blue," in brief / Astonished, informally / Place for a sailor's anchor, informally / Fiber also knowns as viscose / Title that becomes loftier when an E is added / "Diminutive" Greek letter / Dizzying gallery works / Invention originally developed as a yellow dye / Infraction at an arcade

Constructor: Sam Brody

Relative difficulty: Easy

[33D: Ewoks' home moon]

THEME: "Take the Edge Off" — theme clues are words that are missing their "edges" (i.e. their first, or last, or first and last, letters); answers are familiar phrases that act as punny representations of those "edgeless" words:

Theme answers:

• DOCTORS WITHOUT BORDERS (23A: _ATSO_ and _EKYL_) ("Watson" and "Jekyll," both famous fictional "doctors," lack "borders" (i.e. first and last letters))
• NEEDS NO INTRODUCTION (36A: _RAVES) (the word "craves," which (kinda) means "needs," has "no introduction," i.e. no first letter)
• NEVERENDING STORY (56A: SAG_) (the word "saga," which is a kind of "story," never ends—because it lacks its last letter)
• HEADLESS HORSEMAN (79A: _NIGHT) (the word "knight," which is a kind of "horseman," is lacking its first letters, or "head")
• NOT COMPLETELY HONEST (99A: FRAN_) (the word "frank," which means "honest," is not complete)
• UNLIMITED TALK AND TEXTS (116A: _IALO_) (the word "dialog," a term which indicates either "talking" or "texting," has no "limits" (i.e first and last letters))

Word of the Day: Granita (1A: Work parodied by Umberto Eco's "Granita" = LOLITA) —

[man, I have no idea—when you search [Eco granita], mostly what you get is automated crossword answer sites, giving you the answer to this clue. There's hardly anything online about this ... looks like a short story, or a sketch of some time, written in the '50s in Italian but published in English in the '90s ... all the references to it (and there are hardly any) are from, like, somebody's private Tumblr accounts. There are a couple of very brief references to it in the NYT and Guardian—it appears to be a story about one "Umberto Umberto" (playing on the name of LOLITA's protagonist, Humbert Humbert) who develops a thing for geriatric women, whom he calls "Nornettes" (playing on Humbert's term for the young girls he's sexually attracted to, "nymphets"). Anyway, I think it's fair to say that this "work" of Eco's is very obscure—here's the summary from one of those aforementioned Tumblr accounts (it squares with what google's A.I. is trying to tell me): "Umberto Eco wrote a hilarious parody of Lolita that he called Granita. In his version of the story, a young man falls in love with an old lady. It would seem that the sight of her marbled flesh, glimpsed through a window as she removed her stockings, drove him wild with uncontrollable lust. When he runs away with her, he has to travel by bicycle (he doesn’t have a driver’s license yet) and pedals away with “Granita” holding on for dear life. The story appears in Eco’s anthology Misreadings." ]

• • •

I've seen this kind of thing before. A bunch. Basically a reverse cryptic, where the answer is the clue and the clue is the answer. It's a giant shrug from me. Not very clever. Pretty rudimentary stuff, as cryptic clues go. Ugly gibberish for theme clues. OK but unremarkable theme answers. UNLIMITED TALK AND TEXTS is just wrong, though. The pluralized TEXTS, specifically. There are "unlimited talk & text" plans, for sure, but they are most definitely "talk & text" plans, not "talk & texts." It's not just that the theme was dull—it's that it was almost beside the point. I got the first themer without even looking at the clue:

After getting it, I looked up, saw the clue, knew instantly what the conceit was, and decided the only way this solve was going to be anything close to interesting was if I challenged myself not to look at any of the theme clues ever again. And I didn't. And it didn't make a bit of difference. Maybe it added a minute or so to my solve, I don't know, but I did not miss those clues. You can write them yourself once you get the answer. Nothing special about them. The whole thing was fantastically dull. And the fill didn't do much to liven things up. This was just one big 21x21 SLAB of a puzzle; there was some cleverness in the cluing, it turns out (the doctors clue, for instance), but for the most part the puzzle doesn't really have much to recommend it. I'm kind of surprised it was accepted. I PLODded through, but it never once gave me a reason to smile or wonder or struggle or ... anything. It's just there. Taking up space.

["Maybe another drink will take the edge off!"]

Does anything even need explaining, beyond the theme? The clues and answers all felt so straightforward. "Granita" was the only thing in the whole dang puzzle that made me go "huh?," that made me curious, that seemed to be trying to stretch the boundaries of the Totally Ordinary. I did laugh once, but that's only because I tried to give that wrestler guy ONE ARM instead of ONE LEG (100D: Feature of Anthony Robles, a 2011 N.C.A.A. national champion wrestler). Guy's only got one leg and now here I am trying to take his arm away as well? Not cool. Are there one-armed wrestlers? There was a one-handed Major League pitcher once, and a good one (Jim Abbott), so why not? I guess it would be especially hard to grapple with one arm, but wrestling with just the ONE LEG, that also seems impressive. I'm looking around this grid and trying to find anything, literally anything worth remarking on, and fran-ly I'm not having much success. It's all so, so plain. I think two stars might be too generous, but I'm just gonna leave it; perhaps it has virtues I just can't appreciate, for some reason.

Bullets:

• 27A: Astonished, informally (SHOOK) — this was the one moment where the puzzle seemed to be alive and living in the 21st century. This slangy use of SHOOK already seems to be on the wane, but it's at least familiar as a recentish expression. Anything with some life in it was welcome today.
• 53D: London park (HYDE) — this seems like a little NOD AT Dr. Jekyll (or Dr. -EKYL-, I guess).
• 64A: Place for a sailor's anchor, informally (BICEP) — hey, a bit of misdirection! Not a lot of misdirection, but some. Sometimes I think puzzles are trying too hard with the cluing, but hoo boy today is not one of those days. Speaking of sailors, I finally saw The Odyssey today. There was a SCYLLA, as I predicted (see yesterday's puzzle). But no anchor tattoos for Odysseus (that I could see). I think that's strictly a Popeye thing ... although no ... Popeye's anchor tattoo is on his forearm, not his BICEP:

• 118D: Park place? (LOT) — because you park ... your car ... there.
• 49D: Female rapper with a longtime feud with Foxy Brown (LIL KIM) — OK, this probably should've been my "Word of the Day." I know LIL KIM from ... the '90s? Can't say I've seen her name or thought about her for decades. Here is a long and embarrassing description of said feud., which started sometime in ... yep, the '90s. The last relevant incident in this recap happened in 2013, so I don't know what the state of their relationship is now. Nor do I care. There has to be a better, more dignified way to clue LIL KIM. How about this team-up? This was fun:

Sorry I don't have more to say about this puzzle. It's not giving me much to work with. I really hope you enjoyed it more than I did. For those of you who struggle on Sundays, this one should've been pretty doable, at least. Maybe you broke your Sunday speed record? If it made you happy, then as they say (or Sheryl Crow says), it can't be that bad. All it did for me, though, was make me wish I were reading a book, so I'm gonna go do that now. See you next time.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook and Letterboxd]
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Fabulous collection / SAT 8-15-26 / Dressing group / Leftmost star of the Summer Triangle / One from "Japan's kitchen" / Challenged on X, say / Cut out the middleman, for delivery / Patient privacy law, in brief / Gamgee player in "Lord of the Rings" / French Baroque artist Nicolas / Classic 1926 novel often published with a bull and a matador on its cover / French Baroque artist Nicolas / Charybdis's man-eating opposite, in myth

Constructor: Blake Slonecker

Relative difficulty: Medium (Easyish except for the NW corner)

THEME: none 

Word of the Day: DROP-SHIP (1D: Cut out the middleman, for delivery) —

Drop shipping is a form of retail business in which the seller accepts customer orders without keeping stock on hand. Instead, the seller transfers the orders and their shipment details either to the manufacturer, a wholesaler, another retailer, or a fulfillment house, which then ships the goods directly to the customer.

The seller is responsible for marketing and selling the product, but has limited control over product quality, storage, inventory management, or shipping. It avoids the costs of maintaining warehouses or even a storefront, purchasing and storing inventory, and employing necessary staff for such functions.

Drop shipping has become a popular business model as it requires minimal initial investment and overhead costs. A drop shipping operation can be managed from any location with an internet connection. However, drop shipping also has its drawbacks, including lower profit margins, less control over the quality of the products sold and an increased risk of shipping delays or supply chain issues.

• • •

This puzzle started out very unpromisingly. ERAS, NIK, DENEB, OSAKAN ... I'd barely gotten off the ground and already I was laden with the kind of crosswordese I associate with puzzles from 30+ years ago. And then, just when I thought I was going to pick up speed and escape that NW corner ... nope. I whiffed on every. Single. Down. Let's start with DROP-SHIP. OK, that's enough about DROP-SHIP. I've never heard this term. I'm not mad about it. I'm not thrilled about it. It's a bland retail term that I just didn't know. So there's that. Then there's "WHAT A PAL!"—I kinda wanted it to be that, but for some reason the phrase "WHAT A GUY!" seemed more in the language. "BE A PAL," "WHAT A GUY!," that's how the phrases wanted to go, in my brain. As for the [Patient privacy law, in brief], I was (kinda) saying it right on my head, but turns out I was confusing it with another "health" acronym: HEPA. You know, from HEPA filters (High Efficiency Particulate Air filters). So the sound of HIPAA was in my head, but the spelling, yeesh, no. And I can't remember what it stands for, hang on ... Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. Oof. No wonder it's an acronym. If you like retail jargon and dealing with health insurance, you'll love the NW corner of this puzzle. But we've yet to mention the coup de grâce up there, the answer that held me up more than any other, the truly Outer Space-ian piece of niche vocab. I've heard of Aesop's Fables, we've all heard of Aesop's Fables, but ... AESOPICA!? Um ... what? What completely uncurated construction software wordlist coughed that thing up? If Mike Lupica were suffering from alopecia while reading Milton's Areopagitica, I'd still never in a million years have dreamed that AESOPICA was a word. I thought -ANA was the suffix for "collection." AESOPIANA (which also looks insane) is something I might at least have pieced together. But AESOPICA. That one really sticks in my AESOPIGUS. Gruesome. Oh, and I forgot the extremely online term ATTED (@'d) a horrid-looking "word" that drags an Elon Musk property into the mix. A repulsion twofer. I don't know how you go to press with this NW corner. It's a real tear-it-down-start-over situation.

[54A: Classical figure in an 1898 Gustav Klimt oil]

There were other things happening in this puzzle besides the NW corner, but I kinda forget them. Oh, right, those long answers through the middle were pretty interesting. TEXAS TWO-STEP, "I CAN'T HEAR YOU," good stuff. Since I got the NE corner early (following the NW corner debacle), those long Downs fell very easily, one two three. Might've gotten THE SUN ALSO RISES with no help at all, but as it was I had THE SU- in place (7D: Classic 1926 novel often published with a bull and matador on its cover). VINAIGRETTES is a lot easier to see when you've already got the VIN- part locked down (8D: Dressing group). The whole puzzle, outside the NW, was smooth and familiar. Not exciting, but very much up my alley. I've taught Hemingway, and Mickey SPILLANE, and Homer (finally going to see The Odyssey today—I'm assuming SCYLLA will be in it somewhere) (14D: Charybdis's man-eating opposite, in myth). I just saw Christina RICCI in 200 Cigarettes, a 1999 movie about New Year's Eve of 1981 starring so many still-famous people it will make your head spin. Paul Rudd and Courtney Love!? Together!? I was like "why didn't this happen more often?" They're fun together. Also appearing: Martha Plimpton, Dave Chappelle, Ben and Casey Affleck, Janeane Garofalo, Gaby Hoffmann, Kate Hudson, and Elvis Costello, who drops in for a cameo out of nowhere, as if he just materialized out of his music (there's a lot of it). The movie got bad reviews but I really enjoyed it. RICCI and Hoffmann play friends with amazing, exaggerated, borderline comical Long Island accents. I'm telling you, it's a good time. A hangout movie. A nostalgia movie. I saw it on Criterion Channel. Maybe it's still there?

Bullets:

• 41D: French soccer superstar Kylian (MBAPPÉ) — perfect timing for this debut, as MBAPPÉ just won the Golden Boot (most goals scored) at the 2026 World Cup. That's back-to-back Golden Boots (he also won in Qatar in 2022, when France won it all) [correction: France won in 2018; Argentina won in 2022]. There is arguably a lot of proper noun trivia in this grid, including two World Cup answers (this and ENG) (29A: World Cup team nicknamed "The Three Lions": Abbr.), but none of it seemed "obscure." Maybe POUSSIN qualifies??? (26D: French Baroque artist Nicolas). But MBAPPÉ does not qualify. He's one of the most famous football players in the world and arguably one of the greatest of all time. If you call MBAPPÉ "obscure," that's a red card, goodbye.
• 45A: Oil wells? (PORES) — jeez, how oily are your PORES? 

[Your PORES]

• 22A: 7/ (JUL) — that’s the month of July, frequently written “7” slash whatever day it is (e.g. 7/4 = Independence Day)
• 34A: Intermezzo and trou normand dishes, essentially (PALATE CLEANSERS) — nice answer. I don't know what "trou normand" means. I know that "trou" means "hole." Let's see what the [squints] Normandy Tourism website has to say:

Originating from the verdant countryside of Normandy, le Trou Normand (literally, “a Norman hole”) is a delightful custom that embodies the rich cultural heritage and gastronomic pleasures that France is renowned for! This french culinary tradition involves serving a small glass of Calvados, local apple brandy, or Calvados-soaked apple sorbet between courses. More than a refreshing and invigorating pause in the meal, the “trou normand” is an art of living.

Well, I do like Calvados. I had a Diamondback cocktail just last night. 

• 39D: Prince of Monaco beginning in 2005 (ALBERT) — I should not be required to know princes in the 21st century, ffs. OK, William and Harry, but that's it. Monaco? Be serious. So many good ALBERTs out there and this is what you give me? Bah.

That's all for today. See you next time.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook and Letterboxd]
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Monodrama that debuted in 1989 / FRI 8-14-26 / Average Joe, in modern slang / Couple's last coupling, perhaps / Shimmer colorfully / Purple drink ingredient at a boba tea shop / Mounted warrior skilled in martial arts / Costco competitor, informally / Issue in a modern remote work setting / Enthusiastic cry when one's favorite song comes on the radio

Constructor: Zhou Zhang

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium

THEME: none 

Word of the Day: King Khufu (1A: ___ Plateau, home to the tomb of King Khufu) —

Khufu, or Cheops, was the second pharaoh of the Fourth Dynasty of Egypt, reigning during the 26th century BC in the early Old Kingdom period. Khufu succeeded his father, Sneferu, as king. He is generally accepted as having commissioned the Great Pyramid of Giza, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, but many other aspects of his reign are poorly documented. Khufu is also the main character noted in the Westcar Papyrus from the 13th dynasty.

The only completely preserved portrait of the king is a small ivory figurine found in a temple ruin of a later period at Abydos in 1903. All other reliefs and statues were found in fragments, and many buildings of Khufu are lost. Khufu has a conflicting legacy: while the king enjoyed a long-lasting cultural heritage preservation during the period of the Old Kingdom and the New Kingdom, the ancient historians Manetho, Diodorus and Herodotus hand down a very negative depiction of Khufu's character. As a result, an obscure and critical picture of Khufu's personality persists. (wikipedia)

• • •

This was delightful ... mostly. GO SPLAT really went splat, mostly because it doubles up the "GO" from GO LOCO—which also went splat, at least in my ear (really wanted "NUTS," which sounds more ... I dunno, right) (29A: Completely lose it). Not sure why the three "ON"s ("I MEAN, COME ON!," TRY ON, "I'M ON!") don't bother me nearly as much as the two "GO"s. I think it's because the "GO"s occupy the same place in their phrase structures, so the duplication really stands out ... but then the "ON"s all come at the end of their respective phrases, so maybe it's just being up front that makes the "GO"s stand out (badly). Anyway, the dupes were the one technical thing that seemed off today. Otherwise, I found the puzzle overwhelmingly enjoyable. There was something funny about the exasperation on display in the NW. "Another online meeting!? Seriously?! I MEAN, COME ON! I have ZOOM FATIGUE!" I haven't had ZOOM FATIGUE since I was teaching completely online during the pandemic. Nothing made me miss physically going to work like infinite Zoom. I appreciate the juxtaposition of long answers in that corner. ZOOM FATIGUE is real and it sucks, and the adjacent answer knows it. 

[Michigan's own Bob SEGER]

I'm always embarrassed when my first foothold in a puzzle is some piece of crosswordese that comes to me instinctively solely because I've been solving crosswords for a million years. As I've said before, feels like cheating. Today, it happened again, this time with CASCA (30D: "Julius Caesar" role). I've read Julius Caesar a few times, but if it weren't for crosswords, I don't think the name CASCA would've stuck, and now it's a reflex. TRU is another good example of ye olde fill that is often a reflex, but today it was hidden (to me) behind a word I don't really know: "Monodrama" (52D: Monodrama that debuted in 1989). Does this mean it has just one actor? A one-word title? One act? That it's one extended mono-logue? A monotonous drama? A drama about mononucleosis? [Consults dictionary] Ah, I see. My first guess was correct: "a drama acted or designed to be acted by a single person" (merriam-webster.com). TRU used to appear all the time in drama form. Now it's also a TV channel, or part of one (TRUTV). It's also a nickname for Truman Capote (whom the play TRU is about), and (apparently) a hotel chain. If the clue had mentioned Capote, I'd've gotten it instantly. As it was, I needed an assist from crosses. 

Always nice when you throw down a great long answer off of very little evidence and it ends up being right! Today, that answer was ...

BREAK-UP SEX! (17A: Couple's last coupling, perhaps). Perfect. Fresh and, uh, vivid, and very much in-the-language. I wanna say "that answer did not GO SPLAT," but in order to avoid all potential sexual implications, I'm not going to. I love CONFABULATE even though ... I swear, if you'd asked me before I started this puzzle if CONFABULATE was a real word, I'd've said "um ... maybe?" (24D: Shoot the breeze). Sounds kinda made up. like FRABJOUS, which I just now learned is considered a real word, even though Lewis Carroll did, in fact, make it up. CONFABULATE gives some real colloquial zing to the puzzle, and then we get to end with some sweet tunes: "THAT'S MY JAM!" (52A: Enthusiastic cry when one's favorite song comes on the radio). My only objection to this answer is really an objection to the clue, which more strongly suggests the answer "THIS IS MY JAM!" If I imagine someone in the car or in the club hearing a song they love, I imagine them saying "This!" This here song, the one we are currently hearing. If you're talking about a song, then sure, "That." But this is a technicality. The point is, everyone loves to hear their jam. Let's hear a jam now.

Bullets:

• 37A: Mom-and-pop group (FAM) — so ... not PTA then? Got it.
• 60D: Of an indefinitely large number (UMPTEENTH) — like CONFABULATE, this seemingly improvised fantasy word adds an enjoyable fizz to the grid.
• 6D: 365th out of 365, in brief (NYE) — every fourth year would like a word! (that word is "leap")
• 12D: Purple drink ingredient at a boba tea shop (UBE) — I first encountered UBE in some fancy chocolates. Thought, "that would make a good crossword word." And here we are: UBE's sixth appearance (as a yam) since 2023. Actually, it's the seventh appearance overall. UBE appeared as a [Philippine yam] in 1954, but then for 36 years (after one attempt to pass it off as a "var." of the Latin UBI (!?)), it was solely a Japanese seaport. Then, for 32 years, it disappeared from the grid entirely. But with the popularization of Asian food ingredients in America, it's back! Purple as ever!

[in ice cream form!]

• 43D: Average Joe, in modern slang (NORMIE) — I love this word, though I hear it most often used adjectivally, usually of someone's opinions. Sometimes, of my own opinions. It's got a slight pejorative tinge to it, but I just think of it as a cozy, slangy way of referring to general ordinariness.
• 32D: Plot device? (HOSE) — the one answer that didn't really make sense to me. You HOSE down ... a "plot" of land? Only when I thought of the phrase "garden plot" did the clue suddenly make (a kind of) sense.
• 35A: Huddling, as teammates (IN CLOSE) — can't say as I've ever heard this in a sports context, but physically, it makes sense. Still, it makes much more sense as a name for a talk show hosted by Glenn Close. Forget Charlie Rose—it's time for In Close with Glenn Close! Think about it, Glenn!

That's all for today. See you next time.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook and Letterboxd]
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Casual gaming site? / THU 8-13-26 / "Gold" of the 21st century / Query for Claude, e.g. / Verbalized shivers / A.I. that has been trained with massive amounts of text, in brief / Cough drop brand whose name is yodeled in its commercials / Epitome of a hot place / Kind of bean used in Egyptian falafel

Constructor: Killian Olson

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium

[35A: "Light" weapon]

THEME: SIZING UP (66A: Evaluating, as an opponent ... or a hint to "fitting"the answers to the italicized clues into the grid) —you must move certain letters "up a size" in order to fit them in the grid, e,g. change an S (small) to an M (medium), or a L (large) is to an XL (extra large); this results in new words that don't seem to match the clues:

Theme answers:

• LOBSTERS (from "Mobsters") (17A: Mafia members, e.g.) (M to L) 
• ESPOUSES (from "Ex-spouses") (26A: Alimony recipients, say) (XS to S)
• AXLES (from "Ales") (41A: Drinks at a pub) (L to XL)
• AQUARIUM (from "Aquarius") (53A: 11th of a noted 12) (S to M)

Word of the Day: LLM (34D: A.I. that has been trained with massive amounts of text, in brief) —

A large language model (LLM) is an AI model (typically a neural network) trained on a vast amount of text for natural language processing tasks, especially language generation. LLMs can typically generate, summarize, translate, and analyze text in many contexts, and are a foundational technology behind modern chatbots. Biased or inaccurate training data can make an LLM's output less reliable.

LLMs are typically based on transformer architecture. Generative pre-trained transformers (GPTs) are a type of LLM that is pre-trained to predict the next word. GPTs are then often fine-tuned to follow instructions and to behave as assistants.

Benchmark evaluations for LLMs attempt to measure model reasoning, factual accuracy, alignment, and safety. (wikipedia)

• • •

This one EKEs out three stars because the theme is genuinely interesting and clever, although ... I assume someone's just going to put this thing in reverse and do a DOWNSIZING puzzle now (that's a snappier revealer, I think—can't believe it hasn't been done, at least not in the NYT). Outside the theme, the puzzle is obnoxiously tech-obsessed, with a fondness for A.I. that made it completely repulsive to me. I want to see Claude and LLM in my puzzle about as much as I want to see anything related to Harry ****ing Potter. Maybe less so. It's a scourge on so many levels that I get exhausted just thinking about explaining why. "But it's the world we live in, get used to it." No. You get used it, you be the accommodationists. It's crap (the forward facing LLMs, for sure). Also, many of the clues today are truly awkward, as opposed to cleverly misdirective, which made the solving experience frequently unpleasant. [Casual gaming site?] for SOFA? What, is there a formal gaming site? Monaco? What are you, James Bond? I've never seen anyone "gaming" who wasn't beyond casual. Completely casual. Where are these tuxedo'd gamers you posit? How is your SOFA any more "casual" than, say, an arcade? Then there's the wording in 9D: Apple accessory announced alongside the removal of the iPhone's headphone jack (AIRPODS). I just keep looking at "announced alongside the removal" and my head hurts every time. "Announced alongside" ... is the removal also being announced? Yes? No? "Announced alongside" seems to imply that you're removing the headphone jack as you're announcing the AIRPODS. Maybe "in response to the removal" or "following the removal," but "alongside" implies a strange simultaneity of words (announcement) and action (removal) that's hard to visualize and just sounds ugly as written. Also, "boil" and "steam" or two different things. Also, snow is normal-wintry, not "especially wintry" (57A: Was especially wintry = SNOWED). Again, I liked the theme concept. I just didn't like much else. Structurally, the puzzle seems reasonably well made, but content and cluing were on the displeasing side, for sure.

Back to the theme—it was tricky for many reasons. The answers are "wrong" for their clues, so you have to figure out why, great, this happens not infrequently on Thursdays. But today, even after I saw the "gimmick" (LOBSTERS is obv. a one-letter change of MOBSTERS), I did not see it at all. This is because that letter change in LOBSTERS/MOBSTERS involves consecutive letters, so I figured we were just dropping the letter down one place in the alphabet. That is, I didn't see Medium changed to Large, I saw the letter "M" dropped back one space in the alphabet to the letter "L." Things didn't exactly get clearer with the other themers. I got AXLES and wondered why we were now adding a letter instead of changing a letter. The puzzle now seemed to have two different conceits. What the hell? And ESPOUSES also looked like an add-a-letter situation, since I thought the base answer was just "spouses" (26A: Alimony recipients, say). Even after I got SIZING UP and figured out why most of the changes were happening, I was stuck on ESPOUSES. I still thought we were changing "spouses," so "S" appeared to have been changed to "ES," and I was like "ES!?!?! That is not how you write "extra small" ... also ... wait, Small to Extra Small would be sizing down, not sizing up ..." Finally dawned on me that the base answer was EX-SPOUSES, not just "spouses." Let's just say XS is not a size I think about often, and definitely not in the standard size range (SML + XL). So even though the themers were easy enough to get, completely grasping the theme took some time.

Bullets:

• 8A: One who's definitely not being invited to the party (PARIAH) — another example of cluing being "????" Like, I wanted there to be wordplay, like maybe "party" was being used in a political way, something like that. But instead it's just ... literal. Yeah, I guess you would not invite a social outcast to your party. "Hey, you know who we're definitely not inviting to this party? Hitler." The answer seems too extreme or contextually wrong for the clue. Looked at another way, there's something sort of snotty and snobby and mean-girls (or boys) exclusionary about the way this clue is phrased. Clue could be shorter and clearer and better.
• 25D: "Gold" of the 21st century (DATA) — ugh, shut up. The big tech boosterism here is barfsome.
• 49A: Collect over and over, as resources in a video game (FARM) — we get it, you're on the computer a lot, yeesh. Give it a rest.

• 55D: Allow to post on a forum again, e.g. (UNBAN) — they finally UNBANned me from QUORA after I agreed to stop answering user questions with Yeti conspiracy theories (54D: Website that describes itself as "a place to share knowledge and better understand the world").
• 8D: Query for Claude, e.g. (PROMPT) — in the future, there will be no writers. Just PROMPTers. (In case you've been living under a rock, the "Claude" here is one of the better known LLMs (or "series of LLMs," per wikipedia).
• 44A: ___ Ingebrigtsen, track gold medalist at the 2020 and 2024 Olympics (JAKOB) — come on, if you're gonna throw some obscure Olympian name at me, at least tell me what he got his medals for. "Track" doesn't cut it (he won the 1500 meters in 2020 and the 5000 meters in 2024)
• 39A: Verbalized shivers (BRRS) — has never and will never be a thing. The stupidest plural I've ever seen in my life. And it turns out this is, in fact, the first time I'm seeing it in my life: its last appearance in the NYTXW was 1967. They were much more desperate for fill back then. Something about the Cold War ... rationing ... I forget, but clearly times were bad.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook and Letterboxd]
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Where Docs and Sheets are stored / WED 8-12-26 / Throw, for instance / Jordan joined it in 1984, for short / 2024 film that won Best Picture / Nickname for MLB's Angels / Greek letter representing elasticity in economics / "Battles" of those busting moves / Mentions by user name on social media

Constructor: Adrianne Baik

Relative difficulty: Easy

THEME: INTERNET TRAFFIC (38A: Web volume measured in hits ... or a hint to 17-, 23-, 49- and 61-Across) — internet-related terms that contain (street) traffic-related terms:

Theme answers:

• GOOGLE DRIVE (17A: Where Docs and Sheets are stored)
• NETWORK SPEEDS (23A: Measurements of Wi-Fi performance)
• COMPUTER CRASH (49A: Major consequence of a virus, perhaps)
• SERVER DELAY (61A: Cause of some slow data transfers)

Word of the Day: ANORA (42A: 2024 film that won Best Picture) —

Anora is a 2024 American romantic comedy-drama film written, directed, produced, and edited by Sean Baker. It stars Mikey Madison as Anora "Ani" Mikheeva, a lap dancer from New York who marries the wealthy son of a Russian oligarch played by Mark Eydelshteyn. The supporting cast includes Yura Borisov, Karren Karagulian, Vache Tovmasyan, Darya Ekamasova, and Aleksei Serebryakov.

Anora premiered at the 77th Cannes Film Festival on May 21, 2024, where it received critical acclaim and won the Palme d'Or. It was released theatrically on October 18, 2024, by Neon, with Focus Features releasing in other territories. It grossed $59.3 million worldwide against a $6 million budget, making it Baker's highest-grossing film.

Anora received numerous accolades and was named one of the top ten films of 2024 by the National Board of Review and the American Film Institute. It received six nominations at the 97th Academy Awards, winning five for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actress (Madison), Best Original Screenplay, and Best Film Editing. It is one of only four films to win both the Palme d'Or and the Academy Award for Best Picture. (wikipedia)

• • •

Didn't notice the theme until I was nearly completely done. I just thought it was a bunch of dreary computer-related terms. Couldn't see how they fit together. I wish I could say the "aha" moments saved it, but it just wasn't big enough. Connecting car traffic to computer traffic is vaguely interesting, but it's been a central metaphor of the internet forever—remember the "Information Superhighway"?—so it's not like there's a real Revelation here, and several of these terms feel a little wonky. "SITE TRAFFIC" is the "traffic" term I hear the most—it outgoogles "INTERNET TRAFFIC" by twenty-fold. Similarly, SERVER CRASH seems like a more common term than SERVER DELAY (again google agrees). "Delay" is the weakest link of the day by far. It just doesn't evoke either world (digital, automotive) very strongly. And then NETWORK SPEEDS seems strange in the plural, when none of the other theme answers are in the plural. Plus, again, the term I think of is "INTERNET SPEED(S)," not "NETWORK SPEED(S)" (and again, google agrees). So the terms just don't land as perfectly as they ought to. But maybe, the whole topic is kind of dreary. No one likes traffic or crashes or delays. I appreciate the parallel here, but it's just not playful or surprising enough. 

The fill isn't helping matters much. Lots of ultra-common 3-4-5s, with very little in the way of bounce or pop. DANCE-OFFS (11D: "Battles" of those busting moves) and STORMS OUT (31D: Leaves in a huff) give the grid some life, but otherwise, it's just loaded with abbrevs. (LOTR CIA SCI TIK ICU TSPS ARO NBA PARA DMS) and foreign words (OTRA, ÉTÉ, HAI) and a lot of nondescript crosswordese (ALEC, OWLET, LAMA, etc.). We do get a nice cameo from WESLEY Snipes, and the first ever appearance of ANORA, a film title that, given its size and letter combinations, seems like it should've appeared a long time ago (months ago, anyway). A five-letter movie with an alternating V-C-V-C-V pattern sweeps the Oscars—that seems like it would create conditions for a new crossword staple. ANORA is a movie with "Future Crosswordese" written all over it. But for now—it's new. A debut! Let's enjoy the novelty while it lasts. 

I don't see any real difficulty in this grid. HARROW was weird, in that you mostly encounter that word in the adjectival form ("harrowing") (15A: Torment). You very rarely hear about how a monster or serial killer or yeti or whatever "harrowed" the inhabitants of an old house or the kids at sleepaway camp or whatever. I know HARROW as a part of a plow. Actually, no, the plow is a different agricultural instrument. The HARROW is dragged over plowed land to break up and smooth the soil surface.

Bullets:

• 29A: Identity prefix (CIS) — this is a pretty bare-bones, nondescript clue. "Identity" doesn't tell you much. Doesn't make much difference to puzzle difficulty—I don't even remember seeing this clue while solving—but it's strange to follow up an ORNATE clue for ARO (28A: Feeling little to no amorous attraction, in L.G.B.T.Q.+ lingo) with this oddly plain one. 
• 45A: Throw, for instance (RUG) — one of the few times today where the puzzle seemed to try to get a little tricky, playing on the ambiguity of "Throw" (here, a noun, not a verb). I think of standalone "throw" as being more of a woman's garment, a light wrap or scarf, or else a light cover for a bedspread. I know the term "Throw RUG," of course, but this clue seems to imply that "Throw" on its own can mean RUG. Not sure about that.
• 60A: "Sorry, it's ___ from me" ("A 'NO'") — this is one way to get around the Spanish anus problem. The other is by cluing it as a Wheel of Fortune purchase: "I'd like to buy a vowel ... may I have AN 'O,' please?"
• 3D: Bad thing to pull while running (GROIN) — ouch. This answer took me longer than most of the answers in this puzzle because I was looking for a muscle like hamstring (HAMMY?), or else I thought "pull" was maybe being used in some metaphorical / tricky way, the way you "pull" a stunt ... but no. It's GROIN, everyone's favorite-sounding body part. The "moist" of anatomical terms. No one says GROIN or even thinks about the GROIN unless something has gone horribly wrong. 

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook and Letterboxd]
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❤️ Support this blog ❤️: 

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✏️Upcoming Crossword Tournaments✏️:

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📘 My other blog 📘:

• Pop Sensation (vintage paperbacks)

Read more...