Colonial-era Indian soldier / SUN 11-8-26 / Attempt at a royal flush? / Yemeni port with a namesake beverage / Meme throwing shade on seemingly attractive boyfriend candidates / Wipe from visual memory, facetiously / Device in a hydrogen atomic clock / Bean or gourd / Petty cash holder? / "Bumping," as a party / 2013 Eminem hit that tops out at 9.5 syllables per second

Constructor: Simeon Seigel

Relative difficulty: Medium-Challenging

THEME: "Mixed Results" — six lines of the puzzle function somewhat like equations, where the black space between two answers has an equals sign ("=") in it; on one side of the "=" sign is an answer that ends up being the clue for the answer on the other side of the "=" sign. The clue answer is made up of circled and uncircled squares that spell out completely different things, and is clued as [one thing] + [another thing]. So ... [One thing} + [another thing] gives you an (actually unclued) answer, which then functions as a clue for the answer on the other side of the equals sign. 

Theme answers:

• ZEALOTS = TRUE BELIEVERS (TUBERS + RELIEVE) (27A: Potatoes, e.g. + Soothe)
• QUIT IN PROTEST (QUINTET + I.T. PROS) (33A: The Great Lakes, e.g. + Computer gurus) = WALK OUT
• SUCK-UPS = COMPLIMENTERS (COMMENT + PLIERS) (58A: Remark + Gripping tool)
• SOUND ONE'S HORN (SO DONE + UNSHORN) (66A: Totally over it + Still woolly) = SHOW OFF
• BULGING = BARREL-BELLIED (BARBELL + RELIED) (90A: Gym weight + Counted (on))
• SPA TREATMENTS (STREAMS + PATENT) (96A: Online broadcasts + Obvious) = FACIALS 

Word of the Day: SEPOY (94A: Colonial-era Indian soldier) —

A sepoy (/ˈsiːpɔɪ/) is a South Asian soldier. Originating from the Persian word sepāhī (سپاهی), the term was anglicised to "sepoy" by the British. In the army of the Mughal Empire sepāhī referred to a type of infantryman, while in colonial India it was used as a term for native troops in European service. During the early modern era European colonial authorities in India, most prominently those of the British East India Company, raised units of sepoys for service against native states or other European powers. The term is used today as the equivalent rank of private in the Indian, Pakistani and Nepalese armies. (wikipedia)

• • •

OK, where have all these "Sarah, but call me SAL" people been living literally all my life that I have never, not once, heard of such a thing? SAL!?!?!?! Where is the "L" coming from???! My mom is named Sarah, lol calling her Sal. Although ... her birth name was Sally, so maybe she's not the best example. Anyway, SAL was a shocker. Not just a shocker, a complete WTF? The "S" was the last thing I filled in. I've known dozens of Sarahs. Not a one of them has ever gone by SAL. Is this regional? What is this? Seriously, what? 

I know I say "it's gonna have to be a short write-up today..." a lot and then I go on to not do a short write-up but today I really do feel like I have to keep this short because I viscerally disliked this puzzle—solving it, trying to describe the theme, the works. It was a type of puzzle I have never been able to enjoy, i.e. "watch me do this very complex architectural thing that is indeed very impressive, architecturally, but is actually an incredible drag to solve." I don't know what kind of code it is that allowed for these kinds of "discoveries" (i.e. circled squares + uncircled squares = some third unclued thing), but it's making me regret that computers and crosswords ever met. COMPLIMENTERS is not a word anyone would use and even if it were, it's miles, light-years from SUCKUPS. SOUND ONE'S HORN is one of the worst "one's" phrases I've ever seen in crosswords, and anyway, it's "toot one's own horn." I've heard of "beer-bellied" but not "BARREL-BELLIED." Barrel-chested, yes. BARREL-BELLIED, uh uh, not until just now. In addition to the overly fussy (for my tastes) theme and the frequently off-seeming theme answers, the puzzle was just Harder than usual for whatever reason, so I had to spend longer doing it, pfffft. And then, cherry on top, I had a typo that I had to spend minutes hunting down (I'd written in CAR instead of CAB at 72D: Elevator unit and never checked the cross (RULGING = not a word ... that I know of). So people who love this sort of thing should chime in with their love. I am going to do some bullet points and then sign off.

I will say that PALACE COUP is a great answer with an inspired clue (103A: Attempt at a royal flush?). Hard as hell, but very good. Would've loved it on, like, a nice Saturday themeless puzzle.

Bullets:

• 104A: Meme throwing shade on seemingly attractive boyfriend candidates ("HE'S A TEN BUT...") — I'm sure this will thrill the meme-lovers out there. Me, despite the fact that it rings a faint bell, I couldn't parse it to save my life. The "S" in SAL is the "S" in this answer, so of course it was my last square.

["He's a 7 but he cuts his hair with a chainsaw" "He's a 9 but his eyes are actually tiny muffins" "He's a 12 but I'm a manatee"—hey, this is fun]

• 21A: "Bumping," as a party (ALIVE) — lol, this clue / answer reeks of "Hello, fellow youths, this party is really 'bumping,' isn't it? Yes yes, very ... ALIVE." 

• 50A: Petty cash holder? (MISER) — "?" clues were murder today. This one was in a whole nexus of ??? stuff like MOW (46A: Take an inch from a yard, say) and MELON (46D: Bean or gourd) and MASER-not-LASER (59D: Device in a hydrogen atomic clock) and ONION (54D: Main ingredient in a German Zwiebelkuchen cake). The dreaded SESHES (plural, ugh) is also in there, but that was actually easy (53D: Get-togethers). Unfortunate, but easy.
• 69A: Pro tip? (NOD) — the murderiest of the "?" clues, for me, in that I had no idea what it meant even after I got it. I believe the idea is that if you are a "pro" something (i.e. you approve of it), then you might "tip" your head, or ... NOD.
• 94A: Colonial-era Indian soldier (SEPOY) — yeeeeikes. Blast from the past. Thought I'd seen my last SEPOY, but apparently not. It's been a while—nearly 13 years, to be exact. So long that I forgot the term. "Oh, oh, it's that ... thing ... that I used to know ... because crossword fill used to be much worse." A few crosses got me there.
• 50D: Yemeni port with a namesake beverage (MOCHA) — Me: "How am I supposed to know some Yemeni bev- ... oh, right."
• 65A: Chart showing almost a third of the world's land (ASIA MAP) — here, try this: AFRICA MAP. EUROPE MAP. Do you hear it? Do you hear how it's bad? I feel like if you tried to pull off EUROPE MAP you'd get booed so hard. (this is, to no one's surprise, the first [CONTINENT]MAP answer ever to appear in the NYTXW)

• 86D: Golfing boo-boo (SLICE) — what's with the goo-goo baby talk here? I think of "boo-boos" as owies—you know, scrapes or bruises you get When You Are A Child. But "boo-boo" can also be simply a mistake or error. It's still baby talk, though.
• 99D: Field of inquiry that so far has not had any provable success (SETI)— Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence
• 82D: Wipe from visual memory, facetiously (UNSEE) — gonna go try to UNSEE this puzzle now. Hope your experience was much more enjoyable than mine. 

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

(That was short, right?)

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Letterboxd]
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