Shakespearean fencer / SAT 1-13-18 / Neighbor of Allemagne / Pertaining to colored rings / Measure of data transfer speed for short / Like eisteddfod festival / 1940 Fonda role

Constructor: Alan Derkazarian

Relative difficulty: Easy

THEME: none

Word of the Day: Charles HAID (31A: Charles of "Hill Street Blues") —

Charles Maurice Haid III (born June 2, 1943) is an American actor and director, with notable work in both movies and television. He is best known for his portrayal of Officer Andy Renko in Hill Street Blues. [...] Haid is a cousin of television talk show host and Jeopardy! creator Merv Griffin. (wikpedia)

• • •

Hello, solvers. It's early January, which means it's time for my once-a-year, week-long pitch for financial contributions to the blog. The idea is very simple: if you read the blog regularly (or even semi-regularly), please consider what it's worth to you on an annual basis and give accordingly. To be clear—there are no major expenses involved in writing a blog. There's just my time. A lot of it. Every day (well, usually night), solving, writing, hunting down pictures and videos of various degrees of relevance and usefulness, chatting with folks and answering puzzle questions via email and social media, gathering and disseminating crossword-related information of various kinds, etc. It's a second job. My making this pitch means I'm all in for another calendar year of puzzle revelry with all y'all. I'm excited about the year. I've got my own crossword construction project I want to get off the ground, and I'm hoping to take a more active role (along with some crossword friends) in recruiting and mentoring new and aspiring constructors. But the bulk of my work will be the same as ever: I'll be here with a new post every single day. Solve, write, repeat. Despite my occasional (or, OK, maybe frequent) consternation with the State of The Puzzle, the crossword community continues to give me great joy, and I'm proud to run an independent, ad-free blog where people can find someone to commiserate with, someone to yell at, or, you know, someone who'll just give them the damn answers. Some people refuse to pay for what they can get for free. Others just don't have money to spare. All are welcome to read the blog—the site will always be open and free. But if you are able to express your appreciation monetarily, here are two options. First, a Paypal button (which you can also find in the blog sidebar):

Second, a mailing address:

Rex Parker c/o Michael Sharp
54 Matthews St
Binghamton, NY 13905

All Paypal contributions will be gratefully acknowledged by email. All snail mail contributions (I. Love. Snail mail!) will be gratefully acknowledged with hand-written postcards. This year's cards are "Women In Science"—Rachel Ignotofsky's beautiful cartoon portraits of women scientists from antiquity to the present. I've heard of a few of these women (mostly crossword names like ADA Lovelace, Marie CURIE, MAE Jemison) but most of these names are entirely new to me, so I'm excited to learn about them as I write my thank-you notes. Please note: I don't keep a "mailing list" and don't share my contributor info with anyone. And if you give by snail mail and (for some reason) don't want a thank-you card, just say NO CARD.  As ever, I'm so grateful for your readership and support.

Now on to the puzzle!

• • •

Back-to-back easy themeless puzzles. Also, back-to-back puzzles with very diverse content. Old, new, black, white, queer ... not everyone may notice this, NYT, but I do, and I appreciate it. I like to see *everyone* having a good time. Thanks for listening to those of us who have raised the breadth-of-representation issue these past few years. And, you know, please continue. You could toughen up these late-week puzzles a little, though. Blew through this one in roughly the same time it took me to do yesterday's, and yesterday's was already easy. Had a roughish time in the eastern region (where I finished) because ... well, a host of reasons, which I'll get into, but otherwise, my only hesitations / hiccups were misspelling FELIZ (FELIX!) and going with IRISH at first for 53A: Like an eisteddfod festival (WELSH). 


For the most part I'M IMPRESSED with this grid, though the heavy reliance on -ERs (REARER, MAKER, FUELERS) was a notable SORE SPOT, as was whatever the hell AREOLAR is supposed to be. That answer started out as AREOLIC and then went several other ways before finally landing where it needed to land. The ending on that word was the beginning of my troubles in the east. Also couldn't fathom 29A: London or Manchester (WRITER). I know who Jack London is, but who the hell is this alleged writer, "Manchester?" I google [writer Manchester] and I just get some biographer I've never heard of. I resent this kind of trickery. I mean, I love the trickery, but the other city (besides London) should be a recognizable writer. Heading down the grid from WRITER: no idea at all who HAID is, so needed every cross there, and BIT SEC ... I mean, it's inferrable, but not a term I've heard. I stared at --TER DOG for a bit wondering "How Do You Not Know This? Is It OTTER DOG!?!?" (29D: Newfoundland or golden retriever). And then I got it, and then that area started to cave. But this was the only drama of the solve, and it didn't last long, actually. I can see how some solvers might struggle with a few of the proper nouns (HAID for sure, and possibly SOLANGE and EL DUQUE), but I'm still guessing this played far easier than average for most of you. "A Seat at the Table" is a great album, by the way. Give it a shot.


Today I remembered that there was a prime minister named EDEN. Huge win for me. Non-Churchill, pre-Thatcher PMs are like popes to me, i.e. shrug. I did learn ATTLEE at one point, though. Had to. Look at those letters. You're definitely going to see ATTLEE, if you haven't already. EDEN usually gets a much softer clue, so you don't see the PM often, but you do sometimes, and I remembered him, so so self-high-five! Favorite clue of the day was probably the deceptively simple [Field work] for "NORMA RAE" (14D). Not an easy title to parse if you're coming at it piecemeal and don't know you're looking for a movie. OK that's all for today, bye.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]

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Narnia nabob / TUE 4-12-16 / ed Euridice Gluck opera / Complete outfit for newborn / Dorkmeister

Constructor: Alan Derkazarian

Relative difficulty: Mediumish, maybe a tad tougher

THEME: HAM ON RYE (57A: Common deli order ... or a literal occurrence five times in this puzzle) — "HAM" sits directly on top of "RYE" five times in the grid

Word of the Day: ORFEO ed Euridice" (Gluck opera) (58D) —

Orfeo ed Euridice (French version: Orphée et Eurydice; English: Orpheus and Eurydice) is an opera composed by Christoph Willibald Gluck based on the myth of Orpheus, set to a libretto by Ranieri de' Calzabigi. It belongs to the genre of the azione teatrale, meaning an opera on a mythological subject with choruses and dancing.^[1] The piece was first performed at the Burgtheater in Vienna on 5 October 1762 in the presence of Empress Maria Theresa. Orfeo ed Euridice is the first of Gluck's "reform" operas, in which he attempted to replace the abstruse plots and overly complex music of opera seria with a "noble simplicity" in both the music and the drama. (wikipedia)

• • •

Short write-up today. Busy. This one played like a very rough themeless until I got to the end and hit the revealer and realized why (in part) the whole grid was so rough. Well not all the grid. Those hyper-isolated corners in the NE and SW are both pretty clean (though I don't generally enjoy corners that you can only enter through one tiny crack). But sadly the awkward and stale tone for this one was set Right off the bat with the execrable (and, if you built your grid right, totally avoidable) 'OME (4D: Kipling's "Follow Me ___"). That's the kind of a thing (an elided word in a partial title of an old poem) that should be behind glass that you break only in case of emergencies. You never break that glass on Tuesdays. Not in 2016. Just because you've seen it in a puzzle doesn't mean it's good for your easy Tuesday. Or any day, really. Puzzle already skews passé (partials Latin suffixes and an overall stuffy vocab vibe). Early on, when you see your theme is forcing you into a -ME situation, your first reaction should be Move Some Black Squares Around so you are no longer in that situation. It's not rocket science. It's Tuesday.


This type of puzzle isn't really fun from the solver's perspective, because it's not clear what the theme is, or that there even is a theme. . . and then you get to the revealer and rather than "aha" there's just "...oh." And maybe you hunt down the five sandwiches, maybe you don't. At that point it doesn't matter. I do like that the revealer is part of two sandwiches, with both the HAM and RYE parts getting the appropriate treatment. I also liked running into Jon CRYER (19A: Jon of "Two and a Half Men") since he is the guy who turned so many into criers just over a week ago at ACPT. One of the puzzles featured an especially brutal crossing that involved his name, specifically it's central letter. The cross was, weirdly and improbably, an acceptable answer for the clue whether you put an "I" or a "Y" there. So you had to be certain of how Jon spelled his name. Many were not. I once saw Jon CRYER doing a private little dance to Culture CLUB's "Do You Really Want to Hurt Me," when he thought no one was looking, in the foyer of Kate Mantilini (a Beverly Hills restaurant) (Marvin Hamlish and Mike Myers were also there that evening, all of them in separate parties; Myers had on a Maple Leafs jacket) (you can see this all made an impression on me) (it was roughly 1994 at the time) (I've probably told that story before. Don't care). Good day.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]

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Director Mack of early slapstick / SUN 1-5-14 / George's mother on Seinfeld / Cartoony clubs / Sainted archbishop of Canterbury who founded scholasticism / Bloody Mary stirrer

Constructor: Alan DerKazarian

Relative difficulty: Easy

THEME: "Clued In" — grid divided into four discrete sections (replicating, somewhat, the look of a Clue game board). Three sections contain, respectively, three answers (with circled squares) that hint at different parts of the accusation one makes to end a game of Clue: the SUSPECT, the WEAPON, and the ROOM in which the murder was committed. The fourth section contains the full accusation hinted at by the other three sections: MISS SCARLET / IN THE LOUNGE / WITH THE ROPE

Theme answers:

• The SUSPECT (1A: The "who" of a Clue accusation, whose identity is hinted at by the three circled answers in this quadrant) is Miss Scarlet, which you know because SCARLET can precede each of the circled words in that NW quadrant: FEVER, LETTER, and TANAGER
• The ROOM (11A: The "where" of a Clue accusation, whose identity is hinted at by the three circled answers in this quadrant) is the Lounge, which you know because each of the circled words in that NE quadrant is a synonym of "Lounge": RELAX, REST, and IDLE
• The WEAPON (73A: The "what" of a Clue accusation, whose identity is hinted at by the three circled answers in this quadrant) is the Rope, which you know because each of the circled answers in that SW quadrant is an anagram of "Rope": PORE, OPER., REPO

Word of the Day: ISTLE (47D: Basket fiber) —

n

1. (Textiles) a fibre obtained from various tropical American agave and yucca trees used in making carpets, cord, etc

[C19: from Mexican Spanish ixtle, from Nahuatl ichtli] (thefreedictionary.com)

• • •

[DEAR SYNDICATED SOLVERS (if you're reading this on Sunday, Jan. 12, that's you). Please listen to the following pitch. Also, feel free to write me with any comments or concerns. You're well over half my total audience, and yet I hardly ever hear from you. Thanks!]

So … it's January, the time when I make my annual pitch for financial contributions to this blog. Actually, I didn't make the pitch last year. I used last January to raise money for other causes instead (and it was my pleasure to do so). But this year I once again ask you (especially you regular readers) to consider what the blog is worth to you on an annual basis and give accordingly. As I've said before, as much as I love writing this blog, I treat it like a job— answers and commentary go up every day, without fail, usually at 12:01 am, but certainly by 9am at the very latest. This has been true for seven straight years. I know that some people are opposed to paying for what they can get for free, and still others really don't have money to spare. Both kinds of people are welcome to continue reading my blog, with my compliments. It will always be free. I have no interest in cordoning it off, nor do I have any interest in taking advertising. I value my independence too much. Anyway, if you are so moved, there is a Paypal button in the sidebar, and a mailing address here:

Rex Parker
℅ Michael Sharp
54 Matthews St
Binghamton NY 13905

Maybe I'll stick a PayPal button in here for the mobile users. Let's see...

I think that worked. Cool.

For people who send me actual honest-to-god (i.e. "snail") mail, I have this great new set of thank-you postcards that I'm hoping to burn through: "the iconic Pantone color chip design in 100 brilliant colors." Who will be the lucky person who gets … let's see … Pantone 19-2025: Red Plum? Ooooh, elegant. It could be you. Or give via PayPal and get a thank-you email. That's cool too. Anyway, whatever you choose to do, I remain most grateful for your readership. Now on to the puzzle …

***

Really liked this one. Pretty sure I've seen Clue themes done before, but nothing this intricate, with this many, let's say, layers. Lack of all-over interlock is odd, but makes sense given the grid is supposed to represent the game board. One downside was the theme was transparent—in the title, in the grid's look, everything was right on the surface. This was one of the easiest Sundays I've ever solved. By the time I hit the SE corner, I was able to just write in the entire "accusation" without a hitch. The solving experience is … well, it's like solving four 11x11 puzzles, because that's literally what you have to do. This meant that the non-theme stuff was easily dispensed with and utterly forgettable. But still, theme-wise, this thing deserves a lot of credit. I love how each element of the accusation is represented differently in each quadrant, with the circled squares performing different duties each time. Because the grids are small and undemanding, the fill remains smooth throughout. No groaners anywhere. The one odd answer was also one of my favorites: ALIEN ATTACK (45A: Early Coleco hand-held game). Never heard of it, but could infer it from crosses. I especially love it crossing PTERODACTYL (15D: Prehistoric menace). Invaders from above, both futuristic and prehistoric. Awesome.


Usually Sunday puzzles offer me something I haven't seen before, some new word or phrase or personality. But today, besides ALIEN ATTACK, everything felt eerily familiar. After a semi-slowish start in the NW, where I wanted something like "murderer" or "killer" in that 1A slot, I really got humming. I don't remember a thing about the bottom half of the grid. I don't think I've ever moved through a grid so fast. Even the proper nouns weren't slowing me down at all. ANSELM, CRENNA, EUROVAN—I got all you guys. Captain Lou ALBANO! And they said watching MTV would never pay off…

[He's the father…]

Never heard of SENNETT before becoming a crossword junkie, but now—straight into the grid off the terminal "T" (144A: Director Mack of early slapstick) The one odd word (to me) was ISTLE, but I'm pretty sure I've seen it before. Last thing that went in the grid was [Tony the Twin], which I thought I didn't know, but then I wrote in that final "O" for OLIVA and realized "oh, the baseball player kind of Twin. Sure I've heard of that guy." And that was that. A fun time, over much too quickly.

And now for a new feature: The Puzzle Of The Week, wherein I direct your attention to the best thing I saw this week in the wide world of Crossword Puzzledom. While today's NYT is a strong contender (certainly the best thing I saw in the NYT this week), my very first Puzzle of the Week goes to "What Are You Doing New Year's Eve?" by Erik Agard (ft. Andy Kravis). First, I just love the idea of a puzzle that has a "featuring" credit—makes it more like a rap song, only instead of Rihanna we get Andy Kravis. Second, this puzzle delivers a great "aha" moment. There is one potentially brutal pop culture crossing, but that does little to diminish the overall quality of the puzzle. Get it from Erik's puzzle website, "Glutton for Pun." While you're at it, get the other 71 (!) puzzles he's published there. All for free. You're unlikely to be disappointed.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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One-named rapper with hyphen in his name / SUN 12-1-13 / European capital on Svisloch River / Eponym of Warsaw's airport / German Expressionist Otto / Three-time NBA All-star williams / Yuri's peace

Constructor: Alan DerKazarian

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium

THEME: "Two Halves In One" — I have no idea what that title is supposed to mean, but the revealer, BACK IN BLACK (98A: 1980 hard rock album that went 22x platinum … or a hint to how to cross this puzzle's 27-Across), says it all: "BACK" is represented by a black square four times, dividing two phrases into two parts each time (although only twice are those parts equal, i.e. "halves"). [I have been told that the "two halves" are the two halves of the grid that are not (except by BLACK squares) connected at all. So it's two themes in one, or some kind of hybrid theme … not sure the puzzle knows. All I know is the title sucks]

The BACKs:

• "THERE AND [BACK] AGAIN" / TURNS [BACK] THE CLOCK
• HUMP[BACK] WHALE / WON'T [BACK] DOWN
• PAPER[BACK] BOOK / FEED[BACK] LOOP
• "BROKE[BACK] MOUNTAIN" / BEND OVER [BACK]WARDS

Word of the Day: T-PAIN (7A: One-named rapper with a hyphen in his name) —

Faheem Rasheed Najm (born September 30, 1985), who goes by his stage name T-Pain, is an Americansinger-songwriter, rapper, record producer, and actor. His debut album, Rappa Ternt Sanga, was released in 2005. In 2007, T-Pain released his second studio album Epiphany, which reached number one on the Billboard 200. His third studio album, Thr33 Ringz, was released in 2008. T-Pain has earned two Grammy Awards alongside artists Kanye West and Jamie Foxx.

T-Pain is the founder of the record label Nappy Boy Entertainment, established in 2005. Throughout his career as a singer, T-Pain is known for using & popularizing the Auto-Tune pitch correction effect. Throughout the years of 2006-10 T-Pain was featured on more than 50 chart topping singles, his most successful feature to date was in Flo Rida's debut single "Low" which has since been certified 6x Platinum. (wikipedia)

• • •

I'm making myself laugh by imagining the hilariously terrible (and, as yet, fictitious) crossword clue, ["___ Drank" (T-Pain song)] => "BUYUA."

The revealer on this thing is spectacular. Just a great repurposing of that song/album title. Execution of the theme is also nice—all four BLACK squares along the SW/NE axis, all theme answers symmetrical. One thing about the theme—it made the puzzle Super Easy. I was surprised I didn't break my Sunday record. I guess there were enough road bumps to keep me from tearing it up too fast. Perhaps the poor / slight interconnectedness of the "two halves" of the grid had something to do with it.

All things considered, the puzzle is solidly filled. I don't honestly believe that anything can be NUTTED, but that's the only answer that made me make my "Really?" face. Puzzle was so straightforward and so clean and so easy that I'm not sure what to say about it. I'm kind of wondering how much T-PAIN tripped you all up (by "you all" I mean the hundreds of people who have written me telling me that they don't know "rappers" but they do know [something allegedly important] and "how can you not know [something allegedly important]!?"). I know the solving audience enough to know that the bulk of solvers are going to be like "….?" I think all those crosses are fair, though the PEE DEE … I don't know (8D: The Carolinas' ___ River). I certainly never knew that river til I started doing crosswords. Hope fortune was with you on that one. Also with DERON, who pronounces his name just like "Darren" (56D: Three-time N.B.A. All-Star Williams). I've heard of him—he's a true NBA star—but had never seen his name written out. Kind of like seeing Dwyane Wade's name written out (confession: I misspelled it just now and had to look it up—that's how weirdly it's spelled). All other names in the grid seem pretty familiar. Have you seen Otto DIX's work? (83A: German Expressionist Otto) Disturbing. Great, but disturbing.

Good night.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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Japanese flower-arranging art / THU 11-7-13 / Cereal killer / Joe of NCIS / Parthian predecessor / You in you caught my eye in 1965 #1 hit / Willingly old-style

Constructor: Alan Derkazarian

Relative difficulty: Medium-Challenging

THEME: 1 2 3 4 — theme answers are theme answers that begin with "[number]-[noun]" compound adjective, e.g. "four-way"; each such adjective is represented by the [noun] appearing (rebus-style, in box by itself) as many times as the [number] indicates. Thus [WAY] [WAY] [WAY] [WAY] STOP for "four-way stop."

Theme answers:

• 18A: Casino sights ([ARMED] BANDITS)
• 24A: Small-time thieves ([BIT] [BIT] CROOKS)
• 54A: Con game ([CARD] [CARD] [CARD] MONTE)
• 62A: What an intersection may have ([WAY] [WAY] [WAY] [WAY] STOP)

Word of the Day: ERGOT (57D: Cereal killer) —

Ergot or ergot fungi refers to a group of fungi of the genus Claviceps. The most prominent member of this group isClaviceps purpurea ("rye ergot fungus"). This fungus grows on rye and related plants, and produces alkaloids that can cause ergotism in humans and other mammals who consume grains contaminated with its fruiting structure (called ergotsclerotium). Claviceps includes about 50 known species, mostly in the tropical regions. Economically significant species include C. purpurea (parasitic on grasses and cereals), C. fusiformis (on pearl millet, buffel grass), C. paspali(on dallis grass), and C. africana (on sorghum). C. purpurea most commonly affects outcrossing species such as rye(its most common host), as well as triticale, wheat and barley. It affects oats only rarely. (wikipedia)

• • •

I feel like I've seen this theme, or themes very much like it, before. Hard to pick up, but once picked up, pretty easy to solve (that is, if you can figure out the database-generated stuff like IKEBANA and OPORTO and ERGOT, at least one of which was probably tough if not outright new to many people) (I learned all three from crosswords, and couldn't remember the first one today for a good long while). Spent a lot of time getting nowhere in the NW—in retrospect, it's very clear why (the two BITs I had no hope of seeing early on). Then I got [ARMED] BANDITS and spent a good deal of time looking for other ARMs or body parts or something. Figured the conceit out after ramming my head against CARD CARD CARD for a while.


Lots of short gunk in this one sort of soured the whole experience. Uncovering the theme was a nice challenge, but otherwise it's a lot of FIVE-O this and INI that and RIATAS aplenty and whoever the hell SPANO is (6D: Joe of "NCIS"). Quite an OLIO of yuck. Ridiculous double cheater squares in SW/NE, but they are understandable given how hard those WAYs must've been to accommodate. A TOUCH OVER is an interesting improvisational answer, and RETURN FIRE has some spark. The crosses on the rebus squares are fairly skillfully handled.


I call complete B.S. on 4D: + 6 (TEN). At a minimum, you'd think there'd be a question mark, since the clue number is never (ever ever ever, except in certain rare, specially designed themes) a component of the clue itself. 4+6 = TEN? Am I even interpreting that right? Is there another scenario where "+ 6" means TEN? I don't think so. That is some miswit, right there. Also off: [One usually buys a round one] for TRIP. No. You don't buy a TRIP. You might buy a round-TRIP *ticket*. But the phrasing here is deathly. And again, no "?" Sloppy (or lazy, or surprisingly imprecise) editing.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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