Plein-air prop / THU 2-22-24 / Puckish sort / What some are dyeing to be? / Issuance from an American embassy, in brief / Formosa barrier island system of Portugal / Hot topping for a cone?

Constructor: Dan Schoenholz

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium

THEME: To the letter... — themer clues are regular words that have to be reparsed (and repronounced) in order to be understood; specifically, the theme clues have to be broken in two, with the second part being the clue and the first part being the letter of the alphabet that the answer starts with. Thus:

Theme answers:

• NO PARKING (17A: *Ensign) (i.e. type of "sign" that starts with "N")
• MAD AS HELL (25A: *Emirate) (i.e. word meaning "irate" starting with "M")
• RATTLER (39A: *Arbiter) (i.e. a "biter" that starts with "R")
• DUTCH OVEN (50A: *Depot) (i.e. a "pot" that starts with "D")
• BEEFEATER (61A: *Begin) (i.e. a "gin" that starts with "B")

Word of the Day: RIA Formosa (56A: ___ Formosa (barrier island system of Portugal)) —

The Ria Formosa lagoon, located in the Algarve, in southern Portugal, is a system of barrier islands that connects to the sea through six inlets. Five of these inlets are natural and have mobility characteristics. The sixth is an artificial inlet that was opened with the purpose of allowing easier access to the port of Faro. In 2010, the lagoon was recognised as one of the country’s seven natural wonders. Following a public vote in which 656,356 voted, the Ria Formosa was announced the winner of the Marine Area category of the ‘7 Maravilhas Naturais de Portugal’. [...] Little villages and towns in the area, such as Cabanas de Tavira, have a large number of bars, cafés and restaurants which are located along the riverfront and are also dotted around a couple of blocks inland. Annually, about 30,000 birds can be observed from Ria Formosa, since the region serves as a migratory corridor and contains some [of] the last remaining nesting grounds in Europe for some bird species. (wikipedia)

• • •

This seemed both clever and forced to me. You have to fudge the letter stuff. En, Em, and Ar are the actual spelled-out versions of those letters, but neither Be nor De are. And if you go by pronunciation, the first four work OK, but I don't pronounce "begin" with a long "E" sound in the first syllable ("BEE-gin"), so that doesn't quite work. But it's not like this mild inconsistency really wrecks the basic idea. For me, the tricky part was getting my brain *all* the way around the concept as I progressed. I started in the far north (as opposed to northwest, where I couldn't get LAVA right away (1A: Hot topping for a cone?) and so skipped to the next section), and from there backed into the first themer pretty easily:

And then somehow I convinced myself that this meant that the NO PARKING sign actually had an "N" on it, and that there would be similar ... signs? I don't know. The fact that the first part of the theme clue (Em, Ar, etc.) was going to refer solely to the first letter of the answer, that took some time for me to fully grasp. I wanted the letter to be more ... integral. Which is why I (mis-)imagined that the NO PARKING sign featured an "N." So the connection between the "letter" and the answer was much looser than I supposed. I found two of these themers pretty hard to get. DUTCH OVEN was probably the toughest to parse, even with multiple letters in place. I had the -CHOVE- part and could not see how to make anything out of it. I put the "D" up front and ... nope, still lost. My brain just never wants to allow that something called an "oven" can be a "pot." So I had to work for that one. But weirdly RATTLER was probably the hardest of the themers for me, for two reasons. One, if it had been RATTLESNAKE, I think I would've picked it up quickly, but as for the slangy RATTLER—there's no way for the clue to indicate that the answer is slang, so it just never occurred to me. Answer started RAT, I figured the RAT was the "biter" and I'd just have to figure out what *kind* of rat I was dealing with in those last four letters. Which brings us to problem number Two, which is that I absolutely could not get SLAIN from that clue (35D: Cut down), and so one of RATTLER's key letters (the "L") stayed hidden a long time. But these problems were not monumental. Just speedbumps. Overall, the puzzle played a little on the easy side for me.

The non-theme stuff that held me up today is all very innocuous. I already told you about SLAIN. Looking at my puzzle, I have also circled SWORD, AROSE, LITUP, and RIA. Taking these in reverse order: I just never heard of RIA Formosa. It sounds Gorgeous (and birdy!) (see Word of the Day, above). LITUP was tough because you just don't expect a two-word phrase to fit in a five-letter answer, so I had the "L" and went looking for ... well, one word. Needed crosses to figure it out. AROSE ... now this one bugs me. AROSE means [Came up]. It doesn't mean "happened" (i.e. [Came to pass]). There's a sense of completion to "came to pass" that there is not with AROSE. The connection between clue and answer feels forced to my ears. And as for SWORD, I probably knew the meaning of "ensiform" at some point in my life, but at this point in my life: nope. That's about it for difficulty today. 

I had Bon MOT before Bon AMI at 6D: Bon ___ but no other writeovers ... whoops, no, spoke too soon. I did, in fact, have another writeover, and oof it was unpleasant. I think I didn't mention it earlier because I'd repressed it—it's the ugliest part of the grid, which, unfortunately, was where I finished. Faced with the clue 9D: Launches an attack, and with -ES -AR already in place, I went with the very real and actual phrase, WAGES WAR. And this worked for a couple of the crosses, most notably AKITA, but for the others ... well, I was left wondering how GALES managed to deliver beta carotene to the body. "Wow, that's one strong wind! Just jams that beta carotene right through our pores, I guess!" But there was no way to rationalize WASSE at 9A: Tricky billiard shot, and it was then, realizing it had to be MASSE, that I realized also it had to be MAKES WAR, which is ... a phrase, but a much worse one that WAGES WAR. Worse, much worse: going with MAKES WAR meant I had to accede to plural (?!) KALES, oof. Some things don't want to be plurals, and KALE is one of them. So I had a double-ugh, right at the finish. That really took the quality level down a notch there at the end, but overall, I thought the puzzle was fine. Uneven, maybe, but conceptually clever, at least.

Notes:

• 1A: Hot topping for a cone? (LAVA) — so ... the "cone" of a volcano
• 23A: Migration pattern? (VEE) — for geese
• 47D: Big star, in Spain (SOL) — the "big star" here is the sun

• 29D: Stole from a burlesque act (BOA) — Cute but transparent trickery. I wrote in BOA without blinking ("Stole" is a noun here, not a verb, obviously)
• 13A: Plein-air prop (EASEL) — "Plein-air" refers to painting done "en plein air," or outdoors. It's a 19th-century artistic development, and is characteristic of a number of schools of painting, most notably Impressionism. I like that "prop" in this clue has two meanings—the EASEL is simply an item that you would use (like a "prop" in a play), but it also literally "props" up the painting.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld 

P.S. The Boswords Themeless League is about to start again. Here's League co-director John Lieb with the deets:

Registration for the Boswords 2024 Spring Themeless League is now open! This 10-week event starts with a Preseason puzzle on Monday, February 26 and features weekly themeless puzzles -- clued at three levels of difficulty -- from an all-star roster of constructors and are edited by Brad Wilber. To register, to solve a practice puzzle, to view the constructor line-up, and to learn more, go to www.boswords.org. 

Note the "three levels of difficulty"—this means that even if you're a relatively inexperienced solver, or you just prefer an easier solving experience, there's a place for you. Definitely check out the website if you're even a little curious.

P.P.S. I thought those of you who solved yesterday's puzzle might appreciate this definition of "tautology," which comes from the OED. Love to see a lexicographer having fun like this ...

 

[Thanks to Reis White for calling this to my attention]

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1953 title role for John Wayne / TUE 10-18-22 / Starfish or sea urchin in a biology text / New-Agey slangily / Louis XIV par exemple / biloba ornamental tree with a widely used extract

Constructor: Dan Schoenholz

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium ("Medium" due almost entirely to ECHINODERM)

THEME: Abbrs. "hidden" inside phrases with which they are roughly synonymous — theme answers are phrases that contain synonymous initialisms (inside circled squares):

Theme answers:

• "IF I'M BEING HONEST..." (17A: "Truthfully...")
• RESERVE ONE'S SPOT (36A: Secure a seat at the table, say)
• "... AND MAKE IT SNAPPY" (54A: "Hurry up!")

Word of the Day: ECHINODERM (9D: Starfish or sea urchin, in a biology text) —

An echinoderm (/ɪˈkaɪnəˌdɜːrm, ˈɛkə-/) is any member of the phylumEchinodermata (/ɪˌkaɪnoʊˈdɜːrmətə/). The adults are recognisable by their (usually five-point) radial symmetry, and include starfish, brittle stars, sea urchins, sand dollars, and sea cucumbers as well as the sea lilies [...] Adult echinoderms are found on the sea bed at every ocean depth, from the intertidal zone to the abyssal zone. The phylum contains about 7,000 living species, making it the second-largest grouping of deuterostomes, after the chordates. Echinoderms are the largest entirely marine phylum. The first definitive echinoderms appeared near the start of the Cambrian. (wikipedia)

• • •

This is one of those clever ideas that doesn't come off quite as well on the page. Non-consecutive circled squares have always been one of the most unappealing crossword tropes for me, and so the concept and execution have to be really good for me to overcome that initial aversion. Here, the potential theme set seems very, very narrow, and given that restriction, I have to say the theme set works very well. All those initialisms are very close matches for the answers they appear inside of. Of course some people (way way more than I would have thought, based on a recent Twitter poll I saw) believe that the "H" in IMHO actually *means* "HONEST," and if that were the case, then the initial "H" would be duping a word in the answer, and that would be a flaw. But since, as I think this puzzle definitively establishes, the "H" emphatically stands for "HUMBLE," the theme answer works just fine. Still, RESERVE ONE'S SPOT was an awkward, unpleasant, not-really-gridworthy answer to have to write in. The 15 that has ONE'S in it was, for a time, a kind of crossword cliché (A LOT ON ONE'S PLATE being an answer you would see ... well, more than once is the point). RESERVE ONE'S SPOT is kind of unimaginable as a standalone answer in, say, a themeless crossword, and it's not any more appealing in a thematic context. It's more explicable, it's here for a reason, but you have to have a really forgiving heart to let RESERVE ONE'S SPOT get a pass. RESERVE A SPOT almost seems like a standalone thing. The ONE'S really brings it down somehow. The "AND" part of "AND MAKE IT SNAPPY" also seems a bit contrived, but if you think of "ASAP" as something you've tacked on to the end of a demand, the "AND" bit, i.e. starting with a conjunction, makes total sense. "Come get me, ASAP!" "Come get me, AND MAKE IT SNAPPY!" Sure. Just fine. Technically you could've pulled off the ASAP embedding without the AND (there's an "A" in MAKE), but then you've got symmetry problems. Plus the "AND" just makes it more ... fun, somehow. More colloquialish. So conceptually, this is very cool. I just didn't care at all for that middle themer.

The fill was a little heavy on some crosswordesey names like MRT and MORT Sahl and ALEK Wek and AHAB and B'NAI B'rith, and then ASP EPEE EERIER OLEO ... there's more of that short repeater gunk than I would've liked to see, especially in a grid that isn't thematically dense. I liked LAID EYES ON and GIGGED and (weirdly) BOYO, but HOVERBIKES somehow left me cold. I should like it, but it felt like forced whimsy to me. Strange how some answers just rub you wrong. Rubbing me really wrong today was HIPPY-DIPPY—really not into these insulting phrases. We're making fun of people's ears yesterday, we're insulting their alleged "New Agey"-ness today. Bah. The clue on GO BALD is also kind of insulting. Like, Mr. Clean? Did he GO BALD? Is that part of his back story? Are there pictures of a lushly maned Mr. Clean somewhere? Also, his pate looks shiny in a way that suggests craft, care, and polish. If he had like a receding hairline or a bald patch at the back, then yeah, OK, I could maybe agree that he had "gone bald," but he doesn't, so he's not at all an appropriate example for GO BALD. [Lose hair] or [Emulate old tires] or something like that works better (and seems less "tee hee" / jokey as well). You've already got one (balding?) "MR." in the grid (MR. T!), do you really need another? Also, still not into SOT. Never gonna be into SOT. Not into making people with alcohol use disorder into figures of derision. SOT is crosswordese—that should be enough of a reason to try not to use it any more. On the other hand, I would use BARFLY, but I'd clue it as the movie of the same name, and anyway, BARFLY sounds whimsical and not necessarily bad. Whereas SOT ... it's hard to dress that one up. Anyway, no excuse for ALEK OLEO SOT all hanging out in one teeny tiny corner. Grid should be (Mr.) cleaner, for sure.  

The clue on PAIL was terrrrrrible (1D: Item on a bucket list?). The "list" part makes absolutely no sense. PAIL is synonymous with "bucket." What's is this "list" stuff?! Is it "a list of synonyms"? Truly ill-advised attempt at wackiness there. ECHINODERM seems like a cool word but yeesh it is technical in a way that put it way, way off of Tuesday-level difficulty for me. If you give me ECHIN-, I've got ECHINACEA and then I'm all out of ideas. Nothing wrong with it, but it stood out starkly against the backdrop of otherwise broadly familiar terms and names. I don't think I've got anything else to say this morning, except that I guarantee you that "GENES" is an exceedingly uncute response to "Why are you so cute?" Just say "aw thanks" and move on. Anyway, you'd probably actually say "Good GENES." Otherwise, it will sound like you're attributing your cuteness to your pants.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld 

P.S. Did no one on the editorial team see the TOW dupe (it's in the grid *and* in the clue for GARAGE—4A: Tow truck destination)? Easy enough to rewrite that GARAGE clue. It's easy to have dupes like this when you're constructing. You go blind after a while and can't really see your own grid straight. That's What Editors Are For.

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Necklace that can be made with kukui nuts / TUE 4-12-22 / Reddish-purple salad ingredient / Old-fashioned message carriers / Sch system with campuses in Buffalo and Binghamton

Constructor: Dan Schoenholz

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: jobs? — Job categories are taken literally, as if they referred to specific jobs. It's wacky.

Theme answers:

• METEOROLOGIST (19A: Temp job?)
• WEDDING PLANNER (27A: Union job?)
• YOGA INSTRUCTOR (44A: Flex job?)
• PSYCHOANALYST (51A: Dream job?)

Word of the Day: Alice MUNRO (15A: Literature Nobelist Alice) —

Alice Ann Munro (/mənˈroʊ/; née Laidlaw /ˈleɪdlɔː/; born 10 July 1931) is a Canadian short story writer who won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2013. Munro's work has been described as revolutionizing the architecture of short stories, especially in its tendency to move forward and backward in time. Her stories have been said to "embed more than announce, reveal more than parade."

Munro's fiction is most often set in her native Huron County in southwestern Ontario. Her stories explore human complexities in an uncomplicated prose style. Munro's writing has established her as "one of our greatest contemporary writers of fiction", or, as Cynthia Ozick put it, "our Chekhov." Munro has received many literary accolades, including the 2013 Nobel Prize in Literature for her work as "master of the contemporary short story", and the 2009 Man Booker International Prize for her lifetime body of work. She is also a three-time winner of Canada's Governor General's Award for fiction, and received the Writers' Trust of Canada's 1996 Marian Engel Award and the 2004 Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize for Runaway. (wikipedia)

• • •

This one never really came together for me. I didn't even really grok the concept until I was three themers deep, and by that point the concept had atrophied a bit, which is to say the best clue/answer pair is at the top, and then they get weaker as the puzzle goes on. Actually, the first two are fine. I guess the third is fine too, but I hadn't heard of a "flex job" until just now. I know what "flextime" is, but I had not heard a job referred to as a "flex" job, so when I saw "flex" here I interpreted it as a really impressive job that is likely to intimidate other people—*that* meaning of "flex." But no, a "flex job" is just any job that allows you to be more "flexible" with your time than a standard (and mythical) 9-to-5 job would. And OK, you have to be "flexible" to be a YOGA INSTRUCTOR, that seems reasonable. What doesn't seem as reasonable is the clue on PSYCHOANALYST (51A: Dream job?). I know that Freud wrote "Interpretation of Dreams" but this does not seem to me to be definitively what PSYCHOANALYSTs do. Is it? Still? I'm reading definitions of "psychoanalysis" and sure enough, talking about dreams seems to be part of it ... This seems primitive and strange to me, but I've never been in "analysis" or known anyone who was. Therapy, sure. Like, 80% of people I know. But proper "analysis," no. Feels like a '70s phenomenon. Dreams, you say? OK. I see now that this theme felt tepid to me primarily because I didn't know "flex job" was a thing, and I didn't fully understand what PSYCHOANALYSTs (apparently) ... do. Anyway, I half liked it. The top half.

The grid was loaded with repeaters (PSAT IAGO AGAR ... and that's just one interlocking section) and didn't have any oomph in the longer answers besides OLD MEDIA, which is, ironically, fresh. Harder to get excited about TOFOLLOW and ARALSEA. Actually, HIT IT BIG is also strong, so that's at least two solid long Downs giving the grid a little bit of life. I think I'm realizing as I write that the puzzle is fine, structurally, but just not that interesting *to me*. 

I do have one question, though, about the grid construction. And it's a question I wouldn't have thought to ask if I hadn't run into the truly horrid, I-can't-believe-we're-still-doing-this answer NOT PC (30D: Likely to offend, in brief). The question is: why, when the grid was being built, didn't WEDDING PLANNER and YOGA INSTRUCTOR swap positions? When you make a grid for a themed puzzle, the themers are the first thing that go in and you build the grid around them. So why would you put yourself in a N---C position as opposed to (if you swap the theme answer positions) a T---N position? So many more possible answers, good solid answers, that you can get out of T---N. Whereas N---C leaves you with NYSNC and NOTPC and not a hell of a lot else. The same goes for D---G vs. A---D. I think DEFOG is a fine answer, which is why it didn't jar me and make me wonder about core construction principles the way NOTPC did. But D---G can't do nearly as many things as A---D can do. It all comes back to ... flex! Swapping these two answers would give a constructor more flexibility. Now, I said it was a question because it is. I mean, there must've been a reason not to swap these answers. You'd get T---G for that center Down, which is definitely *less* flexible than the current P---S. Anyway, these are the kinds of choices you have to make early on. The point is, I wouldn't put NOT PC or UNPC in my grid for any reason; they both reek of a kind of cruel, bigoted, "sorry you were offended" attitude (stop blaming people for not enjoying your racism). And NOT PC is particularly clunky-sounding to boot. I hate UNPC too, but at least it sounds like a coherent standalone answer. So ... I'd've swapped WEDDING PLANNER and YOGA INSTRUCTOR or gone with NSYNC at 30-Down. Either way, I'm saying bye (bye bye) to NOT PC.

See you tomorrow.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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Floral archway / SUN 5-2-21 / Classical poem form / Fast-food chain with Famous Star burgers / Aesthetically pretentious informally / Actor whose breakout role came as a shirtless cowboy in Thelma & Louise

Constructor: Dan Schoenholz

Relative difficulty: Easy (8:30, under the influence of a reasonably strong mint julep)

THEME: "Initial Impressions" — All clues are [some letter] + [hyphen] + [some word]; all answers are punny two-word representations of the clue, where the first ("Initial") word of the answer begins with the first letter of the clue and the second word of the answer is a synonym of, or otherwise represents a quality of, the post-hyphen part of the clue.

Theme answers:

• COVERED BRIDGE (23A: C-Span?) ("C" is for COVERED, and a BRIDGE is ... a? ... span? Or it spans ... a river or whatever?)
• POTTY MOUTH (40A: P-trap?) ("P" is for POTTY, and "trap" can mean MOUTH)
• GERMAN ARMY (44A: G-force?) ("G" is for GERMAN, and an ARMY is a kind of "force")
• GARDEN APARTMENT (65A: G-flat?) ("G" is for GARDEN, an APARTMENT is a "flat")
• DIRTY TRICK (91A: D-Con?) ("D" is for DIRTY, a "con" is a TRICK)
• ELMER'S GLUE (94A: E-bond?) ("E" is for ELMER'S, and GLUE is a "bond" ... -ing agent? Forms a bond?)
• COMPASS NEEDLE (113A: C-sharp?) ("C" is for COMPASS, a NEEDLE is "sharp")

Word of the Day: PERGOLA (5D: Floral archway) —

1: ARBOR, TRELLIS

2: a structure usually consisting of parallel colonnades supporting an open roof of girders and cross rafters (merriam-webster.com)

• • •

Pretty tepid on this one. The theme ... you can see in the description that it just isn't as consistent as it thinks it is. Most of the post-hyphen clue words are fitting clue words for the second word in the theme answer (e.g. "trap" = MOUTH, "flat" = APARTMENT), but with COVERED BRIDGE, "span" ... yeah, I guess in some attenuated way, a BRIDGE is *a* span ... like, you could force me to believe there's some noun-for-noun equivalency going on. but I * think* the clue / answer just wants you to be satisfied with the fact that a bridge is something that "spans" ... something. But let's say you think, no, BRIDGE and "span" are absolutely synonyms, "span" can be a noun, this is totally consistent ... well, then, OK, what are you doing with COMPASS NEEDLE as [C-sharp?]? Because there's no way that NEEDLE = "sharp." Noun cannot clue adjective. Needles *are* sharp, yes, but you can't clue NEEDLE as "Sharp." That is a massive violation of crossword rules, where clue and answer have to be the same parts of speech. And *that* means that part of speech *never* mattered for this theme. That second word only has to be vaguely associated with its clue word. And *that* means that the theme is just ... really loose. Too loose to be very impressive. Also, totally arbitrary. You can do this forever, with a bunch of letter-hyphen-word things. I mean, [C-section?] could be, uh, CANTALOUPE SLICE? CENTERPIECE? CODPIECE? CONCERT PIECE? CHESS PIECE? [J-pop?] could be JOLT COLA ... [T-top?] could be TIN ROOF *or* TUXEDO SHIRT *or* god knows what else. A-team B-movie C-clamp D-list E-card F-Troop G-string etc. I'm sure brighter minds than mine can come up with plausible answers for all these. So why not make the letters *mean* something ... *spell* something or just *do* something? Why go to the "G" well twice? (G-flat, G-force). Why go to the music well twice? (G-flat, C-sharp). Feels slapdash and just not ... ambitious enough. 

It was easy, though, and the grid was reasonably clean, so I didn't have a terrible time solving it. It was just disappointing to realize, at the end, how poorly the whole theme held together, conceptually. The grid drifts into old-school crosswordese on occasion (EPODE, ERAT, ROLEO), but not so much that it gets annoying. I forgot what a PERGOLA was, so that was one of the tougher parts. I also don't really know what a GARDEN APARTMENT is. Appears to have a couple meanings:

noun

an apartment on the ground floor of an apartment building having direct access to a backyard or garden.

a low-level apartment building or building complex surrounded by lawns and trees, shrubbery, or gardens. (dictionary.com)

PERFIDY is a great word but I don't think I knew it specifically meant betrayal. I thought it was just "a really bad deed" (although if I follow Dante, and I always do, then the worst "really bad deed" is, in fact, betrayal). Thought the clue for PERIL was pretty tenuous. Specific-for-general is often dicey, and in this case, yikes (70D: Climate change, e.g.). I thought the brawlers at 25A: Start brawling were going to GET AT IT instead of GET IT ON, which is weird, as I've had "GET IT ON (Bang a Gong)" in my head for much of the day. 

My last and most emphatic point is that it's "artsy-fartsy," not ARTY-FARTY. Just checked, and when I google ["ARTY-FARTY"] in quotation marks like that, what comes up immediately is a definition for ... [drum roll] ... "artsy-fartsy." Once again, the prosecution rests. Sad when you botch the most creative element of your grid. Ah well. Enjoy your Sunday.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld 

P.S. apparently a "sharp" is a sewing needle, and in medical terminology a "sharp" is any instrument that is sharp, including syringe needles. My dad was a doctor and my mom, stepmom, sister, all nurses, I've never heard "sharp" used to mean simply "needle," so I still say it's weak, and I know "span" is not a noun meaning simply BRIDGE, so the theme remains wobbly for all the many reasons stated above.

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Neurotic condition for short / TUE 3-23-21 / dye chemical coloring / Letter-shaped girder / Cosmetician Lauder / One side in a college football rivalry since 1890

Constructor: Dan Schoenholz

Relative difficulty: No idea (co-solved it on Zoom in a pretty leisurely fashion)

THEME: EXTRA CHARGE (60A: Unwelcome sight on a bill ... or a clue to 16-, 34- and 41-Across) — themers are ordinary phrases that have had ION added to the end, creating wacky phrases, clued wackily (i.e. "?"-style):

Theme answers:

• IRS AUDITION (16A: Job interview for a wannabe tax collector?)
• BOARDING PASSION (34A: What the surfing enthusiast has?)
• RUN OF THE MILLION (41A: Name for a huge marathon?)

Word of the Day: ION —

1: an atom or group of atoms that carries a positive or negative electric charge as a result of having lost or gained one or more electrons

2: a charged subatomic particle (such as a free electron) (merriam-webster.com)

• • •

Quick write-up today because I'm unusually pressed for time and also there's a Zoom recording and if you really want to know my thoughts In Depth you can always watch that. Long story short: it's fine. Certainly the idea is ambitious, or well-meaning, or ... you know, it's trying, and there's definitely a cleverness there. The execution felt mildly clunky to me as I was solving, as it seemed like an add-a-sound puzzle (which is often depressing, and on the heels of Sunday, potentially Very depressing—too soon!). I thought "hmmm ... something about ... shunning." After getting the second themer, Rachel and I tried to guess what the revealer phrase would be, and I jokingly suggested IONIZING, which obviously doesn't fit, but which in the end was basically right, or in the ballpark of right. But EXTRA CHARGE is better. There's no charge to start with, so it doesn't Quite quite work, but there is an "extra" bunch of letters that spell out a thing that carries a "charge," so, fine. Didn't like that two of the sounds were "shun" and the third wasn't. Didn't like that two themers steered you way away from the meaning of the base phrase, but the IRS one didn't / couldn't (hard to have IRS in your answer and not have it be tax-related). But there is a solid concept here, consistently executed at the most elemental level (it doesn't promise to do anything more than add the letters "ION" and it delivers on that promise). So there you go. A Tuesday that isn't a terrible disappointment. You should always be happy to take that.

Fill-wise, it's just OK. The worst part by far was the Scrabble-f***ing in the SW. If you can put a "Z" (or "J" or "X" or whatever rarer letter you want) in a corner and have it come out clean, great, but AZO is not not Not clean (64A: ___ dye (chemical coloring)). It's absolute crosswordese, and makes your "Z" utterly unworth it. And in such a small corner, you could've done ... literally anything. You could probably get a "Q" and a "J" in there and still have it come out better than this current corner if you tried hard enough. Here:

Also, the clue on OCD is gross. "Neurotic" has strongly negative connotations. You'd never tell someone with OCD that they're "neurotic." Connotation matters and "neurotic" just doesn't work for what can be a genuinely debilitating condition. Also, re: TYE—are people really named that? With an "E"? OK. But re: the TYE clue (43D: Actor Sheridan who co-starred in "Ready Player One"): having been conned into reading "Ready Player One" the book, I have no interest in "Ready Player One" the movie or any future Ready Player incarnations. Apologies to all who are named TYE, but consider TY. It's nicer. Good day. Oh, right, here's the ZOOM solve. Peace!

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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Relative of weasel / MON 9-9-19 / Neckwear with letters A B C D

Constructor: Dan Schoenholz

Relative difficulty: Ha ha ha ha I have no idea. It was my slowest Monday ever, but don't mind me, I'm kind of out of it tonight (4:15 LOLOL 30 seconds slower than my slowest Monday, wheeeeee!)

THEME: LION EYES — -ize words imagined as two-word phrases

Theme answers:

• TENDER RYES (17A: Very soft loaves of bread?)
• ALPHABET TIES (26A: Neckwear with the letters, A, B, C, D, etc.?)
• STANDARD DYES (44A: Indigo, henna, etc.?)
• SOCIAL LIES (57A: "You haven't aged a bit" and "I love that jacket you're wearing"?)

Word of the Day: RUMBA (18D: Cuban ballroom dance) —

Rumba is a secular genre of Cuban music involving dance, percussion, and song. It originated in the northern regions of Cuba, mainly in urban Havana and Matanzas, during the late 19th century. It is based on African music and dance traditions, namely Abakuá and yuka, as well as the Spanish-based coros de clave. According to Argeliers León, rumba is one of the major "genre complexes" of Cuban music, and the term rumba complex is now commonly used by musicologists. This complex encompasses the three traditional forms of rumba (yambú, guaguancó and columbia), as well as their contemporary derivatives and other minor styles.

Traditionally performed by poor workers of African descent in streets and solares (courtyards), rumba remains one of Cuba's most characteristic forms of music and dance. Vocal improvisation, elaborate dancing and polyrhythmic drumming are the key components of all rumba styles. Cajones(wooden boxes) were used as drums until the early 20th century, when they were replaced by tumbadoras (conga drums). During the genre's recorded history, which began in the 1940s, there have been numerous successful rumba bands such as Los Papines, Los Muñequitos de Matanzas, Clave y Guaguancó, AfroCuba de Matanzas and Yoruba Andabo.

Since its early days, the genre's popularity has been largely confined to Cuba, although its legacy has reached well beyond the island. In the United States it gave its name to the so-called "ballroom rumba" or rhumba, and in Africa soukous is commonly referred to as "Congolese rumba" (despite being actually based on son cubano). Its influence in Spain is testified by rumba flamencaand derivatives such as Catalan rumba. (wikipedia)

• • •

Wow, just not my night. Couldn't make any sense of this theme At All, and, to make matters much worse, I also couldn't type accurately, or even semi-accurately. I mean, I had ONE drink. It was strong, but still, it shouldn't have thrown me this bad. I had MOLE at 3D: Relative of a weasel (is it, tho? I feel like the MOLE must at least be a distant cousin of the weasel...) and had something OROIN at 14A: The Hunter constellation. At one point I put in AFFIRM (45D: State as fact), and then took it out because the letter combinations (possibly in the themer???) seemed impossible ... but then it *was* right? Ugh. Had -UM-- staring at me at the Cuban dance clue (18D: Cuban ballroom dance) and my brain delivered precisely zero information to my ... brain, I guess. Just zip. Seriously thought "is MUMBA a dance?" But the real issue was the themers, which are all wacky and "?"'d and I had zero, nada, no idea what they were supposed to mean until after I was done. Everyone was a baffling struggle. ALPHA BETTIES??? Like, when BETTY dominates Veronica? TENDER RYES, I mean ... I got that last and could barely wrap my head around it. Are the double-letters supposed to be part of the theme. Like, the second word in each themer is not just a word that rhymes with '-ize' but a word that begins with the same letter that the first word in the phrase ends with? Pfft, man I do not care. This felt like a Tuesday, and a not-too-pleasant one, at that. The wacky was not Wacky Enough. Just flat. Not the right day of the week, not the right level of wacky.


Had PANG for WANT (32A: Desire). Had no idea about NOTED until I had almost every cross (13D: Eminent). Not much else to say about this one. The fill is pretty boring. Very disappointing when the Monday is not on point. Oh well. See you tomorrow.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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1961 Literature Nobelist Andric / THU 12-7-17 / Express train from Delhi to Agra / Occurrences during half moons / Perpetual period in Narnia

Constructor: Dan Schoenholz

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: GOLLY GEE! — theme answers are phrases where last word is a homophone of the first letter of the first word. The "note" tells you to look for an "exclamation" that fits the theme pattern:

That exclamation is "GOLLY GEE!"

Theme answers:

• JOHN JAY (17A: *First Supreme Court chief justice)
• CHINA SEA (21A: *It's west of Okinawa)
• BUSY BEE (35A: *Sort with a full schedule)
• TEXAS TEA (48A: *Oil, jocularly)
• UP TO YOU (51A: *"I don't care either way")

Word of the Day: IVO Andric (15A: 1961 Literature Nobelist Andric) —

Ivo Andrić (Serbian Cyrillic: Иво Андрић, pronounced [ǐːʋɔ ǎːndritɕ]; born Ivan Andrić; 9 October 1892 – 13 March 1975) was a Yugoslav novelist, poet and short story writer who won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1961. His writings dealt mainly with life in his native Bosnia under Ottoman rule. (wikipedia)

• • •

Though I resent being told to do stupid pet tricks upon completion of the puzzle (if I get the Happy Pencil, I am done, peace out, good night), I still thought this was pretty cute. Simple idea, with a ... well, not a "revealer," exactly, but a kind of a punchline, I suppose. I didn't pay attention to the starred clues at all while I was solving, so it felt very much like a themeless. I had a horrible time getting started, as AMO was the only answer I got on my first pass through the NW. Then I went with AVERT at 9D: Circumvent (AVOID). That was rough. I don't really know the term LOSS LEADERS that well, so that answer took forever to come together. K STATE (which I *do* know), also rough. Oh, and I stupidly (and repeatedly) misread 10D: Hypothetical settlement as "Hypothetical statement" (perhaps because my way is a pretty common phrase and the clue's way is nuts). I don't know the term "Bluejacket"—I now assume it means "sailor" (i.e. TAR). Blargh. But then the whole west and south came together very quickly, so despite the deathly start, I ended up with a pretty average time.


NEAPS? Like ... the tides? The plural there is so rough. Also, the TAJ Express, yikes, no idea. I knew 1A: 1, for 45º (TANGENT) was gonna be one of them sine secant cosecant etc things, but I didn't know which (trig was a long time ago for me). So, yeah, the NW brutalized me to start. Oh, and again with the ORG. chart. I think you need to be more BIZ-nessy to enjoy this puzzle, what with its ORG charts and LOSS LEADERS and what not. Why would you clue TRIPLE AXELS in a way that focuses on women *not* attempting them?! Bizarre. Puzzle already light (like, very very light) on women or woman-oriented content, why use a non-gendered answer to highlight gender division in this negative way? I really don't like how the grid is so radically segmented, with the NW and SE corners offering no connection with rest of grid except all the way toward the center. East and west of puzzle are just walled off from one another at top and bottom of grid. Makes for a kind of icky solving experience. But as I say, the theme is cute and the (apt) exclamation (indicated by the note) was easy enough to work out. So I FEEL OK about it all. On to the next.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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