WEDNESDAY, May 21, 2008 - Dave Mackey (BAND WITH THE 1987 SINGLE "DEAR GOD")

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: Make-up - five theme answers feature cosmetics-related words used in non-cosmetics-related context

First, BLUSH and ROUGE are the same thing. I repeat - same thing. Further - same thing.

Second, OAK TAG (66A: Poster stock)??? I think you have to troll A.C. Moore or Michael's or some other artsy craftsy store a lot to know WTF this is. I'm surprised this passed the sniff test. I see that it's been used in at least two puzzles in recent years. That does not mean it should ever be used again.

Third, TAG is in the clue for AS IS (40D: Tag sale proviso)

Third, this puzzle needed a [6-letter word] SHADOW answer. Weird to have 2 words begin with makeup words and then three words end with it. ROUGE would have been easy in the same amount of space: MOULIN ROUGE. SHADOW ... a lot tougher.

So despite an impressive number of theme squares, this puzzle felt really rough to me. I have to say, however, that I am very sympathetic to the roughness. The difficulty level for filling a puzzle rises exponentially when you have so many long theme answers. Some day I will illustrate this by showing you two different grids I did for a puzzle - one with four long theme answers and a short central fifth, the other (same theme, basically) with five long theme answers. I am partial to the latter, as completing it felt like a greater accomplishment, but objectively, the fill in the former is smoother overall.

Theme answers:

• 17A: Solitaire card game (rouge et noir) - I didn't know this. I know this phrase from the Stendhal novel, and possibly from roulette.
• 24A: Pugs in gyms, at times (shadow boxers) - "Pugs" is one of my least favorite slang terms. Pugs are dogs. Pugilists are boxers.
• 37A: Good thing to build on (solid foundation)
• 50A: Initially (at first blush)
• 59A: Cunard fleet member (luxury liner) - no idea what "Cunard fleet" is. I'm just out of sync with this puzzle today. Completely.

I had one mistake in this puzzle, which was kind of funny. Without even blinking I put in ARCH for 68A: Kind of support. This gave me UAR for 60D: Mideast federation: Abbr. - which, by the way, is not wrong. UAR is reasonably common crossword fill. So I was irked at the stupid answer ARMLEA for 47D: Decorative band. "It's a meadow ... for your arm!" Not sure what finally clued me in, but I fixed it before I went desperately looking for ARMLEAs on the internets.

More:

• 19A: Sapphic work (ode) - You're never going to get to use her to clue LESBIAN, so why not bring her out for ODE. You could get LESBOS into a puzzle, though, I'm pretty sure (cruciverb says 'yes'). Maybe I'll try that.
• 28A: Forcefully, in music (furioso) - shouldn't there be a rule about how many times you can go to musical score terminology in one puzzle? We already have LENTO (7D: Slowly, on a score). FURIOSO could have been clued via Ariosto's 16th-century epic "Orlando FURIOSO."
• 44A: Gentle opening? (soft G) - I am soooo on the lookout for this kind of crap that I didn't hesitate for one second here.
• 45D: Quebec's southern neighbors (états) - I thought they were called "les ETATS Unis."
• 53A: 1983 Keaton comedy ("Mr. Mom") - Mmm, Teri Garr. The Laura Linney of my youth.
• 58A: Word repeated in the "Whiffenpoof Song" refrain (baa) - no idea. Again, this puzzle and I are from different planets. Again, I have to ask, why is a puzzler required to know so damned much about Yale? It's kind of sickening.
• 12D: Good Samaritan (aider) - I kill words like this. Maybe I'd get more grids done if I let in words that hurt my ears. I would let in AIDER if it got me, say, KATZENJAMMER crossing ELVGREN. Otherwise, no.
• 28D: Something to kick up (fuss) - I know this is picky, but you kick up "A" FUSS. Just reads wrong without the indefinite article.
• 35D: Off-Broadway's "_____ Baltimore" (Hot L) - total, complete, utter crutch word. Again, notice how provincial the puzzle is. It is completely regionally self-indulgent. HOT L is the new new RELO.
• 36D: "A Loss of Roses" playwright (Inge) - I see "playwright" in four letters and it's AGEE or INGE. I like the idea that millions of people know these guys' names from crosswords, and yet hardly any of said people could name more than one play by either. INGE and AGEE and ODETS will live forever on the strength of their particular vowel/consonant configurations. At least I can name a play by Odets ("Waiting for Lefty"). I had a teacher once who looked eerily like Clifford ODETS.
• 48D: Astigmatic's view (blur) - I forget if the thing I have is an astigmatism or some other anomaly. I just know that one of my lenses is TORIC! (awesome crossword word)
• 61D: Band with the 1987 single "Dear God" (XTC) - the one part of this puzzle that hits me where I live. This song is off the album "Skylarking," which is one of the most important albums of my life - on my personal Top Ten list, easy. "Dear God" is about the least interesting thing on it (too caught up in juvenile cynicism), despite being the only song on the album that anyone's likely to know. I love that the puzzle included "Dear God," however, because I'm pretty sure it would not pass the breakfast test for some readers (unless you like a wholesale denunciation of God with your cereal). Ready? 1-2-3 ... Culture War! (just kidding):

Dear god,
Hope you got the letter,
And I pray you can make it better down here.
I don't mean a big reduction in the price of beer,
But all the people that you made in your image,
See them starving on their feet,
cause they dont get enough to eat

From god,
I can't believe in you.

Dear god,
Sorry to disturb you,
But I feel that I should be heard loud and clear.
We all need a big reduction in amount of tears,
And all the people that you made in your image,
See them fighting in the street,
cause they cant make opinions meet,
About god,
I can't believe in you.

Did you make disease, and the diamond blue?
Did you make mankind after we made you?
And the devil too!

Dear god,
Don't know if you noticed,
But your name is on a lot of quotes in this book.
Us crazy humans wrote it, you should take a look,
And all the people that you made in your image,
Still believing that junk is true.
Well I know it ain't and so do you,
Dear god,
I can't believe in,
I don't believe in,

I won't believe in heaven and hell.
No saints, no sinners,
No devil as well.
No pearly gates, no thorny crown.
Youre always letting us humans down.
The wars you bring, the babes you drown.
Those lost at sea and never found,
And its the same the whole world round.
The hurt I see helps to compound,
That the father, son and holy ghost,
Is just somebodys unholy hoax,
And if youre up there youll perceive,
That my heart's here upon my sleeve.
If there's one thing I don't believe in...

Its you,
Dear god.

Did I mention that a child sings the opening part? It's a nice touch.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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TUESDAY, Apr. 8, 2008 - Dave Mackey (SUBJECT OF A 1976 FILM "ODE")

Relative difficulty: Easy

THEME: Sleepy time - four theme answers begin with words (or phrases) related to going to bed

Tuesdays. My most hated of puzzle days. This puzzle actually held together pretty well, despite a few clunks and creaks here and there. Started out like a Monday, with a super-easy NW corner leading right into the easy theme answer BEDTIME FOR BONZO (easy if you lived through the Reagan era, I should say). The ENE (that's "East-Northeast," not the chemical suffix) had some oddness: unusual adjective crossing TV "star" you (I) have never heard of. While this part of the puzzle caused me to screw up my face (as if to say "Really...?") it did not slow me down much. The strangest part of the puzzle for me was coming to 30A: Doris Day movie, with "The" and being able to think of only one movie, the only Doris Day movie I've seen: PILLOW TALK. Only I knew it wasn't "The PILLOW TALK," so I had to wait for some crosses. This was all before I knew what the theme was. So to have PILLOW TALK turn up as an actual answer only a minute or so later was very, very weird. This is one of only two small quibbles I have with the theme: over-reliance on Doris Day movies (to the point that you are forced to pretend that she is not in one of them). The other quibble: I DREAM OF JEANNIE does not begin with a sleep-related word. DREAM is word 2. As I say, these are very, very small quibbles that I'm not actually holding against the puzzle. Ooh, wait, one more: three movies ... and a TV show? Be consistent or mix it up. Choose one.

P.S. PILLOW TALK is a Great movie, if only for the amazing Tony Randall.
P.P.S. Doris Day is my parents' neighbor. I think she lives just off a golf course close to their home. She may own a (very pet-friendly) hotel in town. My info has not been fact-checked at all.

Theme answers:

17A: Ronald Reagan movie ("Bedtime for Bonzo")
30A: Doris Day movie, with "The" ("Pajama Game")
48A: Rock Hudson movie ("Pillow Talk")
63A: Barbara Eden TV series ("I Dream of Jeannie")

Lots of crosswordian vocabulary today - little words that need to be in the solver's pocket, like OMNI (11D: First Dodge with front-wheel drive) (up there with EDSEL, ALERO, and - apparently - CIVIC (38A: Honda with a palindromic name) as the car makes most worth knowing); AGORA (32D: Ancient meeting place); ENIAC (34D: Pioneering 1940s computer); AFTS (58D: P.M. periods - one of my most hated abbreviations); ROTOS (67A: Old newspaper sections) and, of course, ERNS (56D: Coastal raptors). There's also REA, clued here in its rarely seen cartoonist form (47A: _____ Irvin, longtime cartoonist for The New Yorker).

Tons of pop culture today, from Annabella SCIORRA (36D: Annabella of "The Sopranos") and JABBA the Hutt (31D: _____ the Hutt of "Star Wars") to a host of other modern songs and movies and related answers:

• 28D: "Spider-Man" director Sam (Raimi) - very crossworthy name.
• 46D: "Flying Down to Rio" Studio (RKO)
• 41D: Subject of a 1976 film "ode" (Billy Joe) - this is very nice, very original. Is this related to the "Billy Joe McAllister jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge" song? I think so. (This song has "CHOCTAW" in it)
• 43A: 2001 title role for Audrey Tautou ("Amélie") - never seen it. The movie poster / DVD cover freaks me out.
• 12D: Minnelli of "Arthur" (Liza)
• 1A: Kaplan of "Welcome Back, Kotter" (Gabe)
• 37A: Greg of "My Two Dads" (Evigan) - wow. This is super duper marginal. I can barely believe this made it into a Tuesday puzzle. This is the answer I blinked at the most - double-checked all the crosses - the only odd one was ZOOLOGIC (10D: Of the animal kingdom), but that was pretty solid. So I left it. This may not be the first time I've seen this guy in a puzzle, but it feels like it. This show is Soooo 80s. EVIGAN's co-star: a pre-"Mad About You" Paul Reiser. "... And Greg EVIGAN as Joey," HA ha. He's the second-most memorable TV Joey of the 20th century!

There's also a bevy of literary answers in the puzzle, perhaps to offset the pop-culturiness of the puzzle in general:

• 26D: Flaubert's Bovary, e.g.: Abbr. (Mme.)
• 10A: Emile who wrote "Truth in on the march" (Zola)
• 66A: _____ St. Vincent Millay (Edna)
• 29D: It's no short story (novel)

I never read the clue for I'LL TREAT (39D: "It's on me!") and only just this second realized that the answer wasn't ILL TREAT (as in [Handle roughly]).

Remainder:

• 22A: Cuban boy in 2000 news (Elian) - ugh. I will admit that the news, post-9/11, has been frightening and horrific and designed to scare you / lull you into a consumeristic stupor, but ... do you remember pre-9/11 news? It wasn't a lot better. I'm surprised some station didn't spin-off an all-ELIAN network during this "saga."
• 25A: Chat room shorthand for "Here's what I think" (IMHO) - In My Humble Opinion. Rarely ever Humble. This is why I like to use the Rex Parker original IMOO - In My Obnoxious Opinion (TM). It's more honest.
• 33D: Maxim's target audience (males) - have I mentioned my extreme dislike for MALE and FEMALE as substantive adjectives (unless the subject is, say, livestock). I guess you have to use MALES if the group to which you are referring includes guys under 18??? Still, it's icky to me. As is "Maxim." As Jon Stewart once so eloquently put it, "Maxim" (and similar mags) are basically "porn for guys who are too scared to buy porn."
• 51A: Deuce beater (trey) - I do not like "beater" at all here.
• 52A: Bonkers (loco) - I would like LOCO, SANE, and especially SANO to take a few months off.
• 1D: Mongolian expanse (Gobi) - like "beater," "expanse" is weird to me here. Apt, but ... odd.
• 3D: "Venerable" monk (Bede) - being a medievalist occasionally comes in handy.
• 5D: Colgate competitor (Aim) - first thought the clue meant Colgate University.
• 6D: Equestrian competition (dressage) - I think I had this answer in a puzzle yesterday. I forget which one. Weird word to see twice in two days.
• 71A: Have-_____ (lower economic group) (nots)
• 8D: A world without 71-Across (Utopia) - a UTOPIA is a world without NOTS?
• 50D: Informal greeting at a breakfast shop (mornin') - I love this answer, though I'm trying desperately to think of something better than "breakfast shop" for the clue. I would never ever ever say "I'm going to the breakfast shop." I would say "I'm going to IHOP."

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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MONDAY, Feb. 4, 2008 - Dave and Tracy Mackey (CLINTON CABINET MEMBER HAZEL)

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium

Theme: "See you again!" - three long theme answers are all forms of invitation (back) to one's home

Here's a coincidence for your Monday morning: yesterday I discovered that reader Wendy now has a blog devoted to discussing records of the baby boomer generation. I am familiar with many of these records from my pop music boycott of the mid-80s, when all I did was listen to "Classic Rock" and oldies stations, but she covers some songs I didn't know or had only barely heard of. One of those songs, to which I listened repeatedly yesterday, was "Eli's Coming" by Three Dog Night. The coincidence, in case it's not obvious, is that not three hours after I made this "discovery," ELI Manning led the NY Giants to a shocking Super Bowl upset of the New England Patriots. Even better, "Eli's Coming" was released in 1969, the year I was born. Other notable event of that year - Joe Namath led the NY Jets to a shocking Super Bowl upset of the then Baltimore Colts. In fact, the 1969 and 2008 Super Bowls are eerily comparable. So ... me ... 1969 ... ELI Manning ... Three Dog Night ... the moon landing ... it's all related, man.

This puzzle was OK. I like the long theme phrases, though two of them seem specifically to be phrases said at parting, while the last ("DROP IN ANY TIME") seems like something you might say at any point in any conversation, not necessarily one you happen to be having on your front doorstep as your guest leaves. I set another record time today, despite slipping up all over the place with typos and horrible cursor control. I think it actually took me something like 20 strokes of the keyboard to get ODIN (57A: Chief Norse deity) correctly into place. It's like I was having a fit. Anyway, this is a good sign, as it means that I can realistically still shave many, many seconds off my time and Finally get under 3 minutes (today: 3:08).

Theme answers:

• 17A: "See you again!" ("Don't be a stranger") - why can't I stop reading this as "Don't be a strangler," or hearing it to the tune of "Billy, Don't Be a Hero?"
• 37A: "See you again!" ("Drop in any time")
• 59A: "See you again!" ("Y'all come back now") - can't see / hear this phrase without wanting to add "ya hear?"

If this puzzle gave you any trouble, or slowed you down at all, I'm going to guess it was in one of two places - somewhere in the vicinity of Roger MUDD (20A: Longtime CBS and NBC newsman Roger) or somewhere in the vicinity of Hazel O'LEARY (45D: Clinton cabinet member Hazel). Ms. O'LEARY was another obstacle standing between me and a sub-3 minute time. I wanted to do those three 6-letter Downs in the SW 1-2-3, off of just their first letters, but had to settle for 1-[rejection buzzer]-3. Then I had to hack at the crosses to get a name to come into view. My wife (who finished in around 7 minutes on paper, which is Massive improvement on her part in just the past month), had OLEARA, as (bless her Kiwi heart) she had never heard of RYNE Sandberg (67A: Former Cub _____ Sandberg). Baseball fans and longtime crossword solvers should all know RYNE's name, but I'm sure my wife was not alone in booting that one. I mean, if Mark O'MEARA can be a name (he's a reasonably famous golfer), why not Hazel O'LEARA?

Assorted observations:

• 5D: Steamed (ired) - I really dislike this word. Really really. IRE is great as a noun, atrocious as a verb, in that no one uses it ever, never ever. Makes me IRED just to see it. Hey, take the "SEE" out of "I SEE RED" (a great Split Enz song, btw) and you get "IRED." Cool.
• 5A: Like a score of 10 out of 10 (ideal) - took me a ridiculous amount of time (relatively speaking) to get this. You score a "Perfect 10." That's the phrase. IDEAL is true enough, on a literal level, but feels off to me, in this "10 out of 10" context. Maybe if you were ogling women and rated one a "10," that would mean she's "ideal" ... but I'd rather imagine that the intended frame of reference here was gymnastics or some other athletic event.
• 31A: "Veni, vidi, vici" speaker (Caesar) - just finished the play yesterday. Spoiler alert: CAESAR dies.
• 8D: Kind of well (artesian) - which beer was it that promoted itself by claiming that it used water exclusively from ARTESIAN wells ...? I have such a strong memory of this from my childhood. Maybe lots of them did this. I feel like the beer was made in Oregon, which sounds impossible.
• 10D: "Happy Days" cool cat, with "the" (Fonz) - ehhhhhhhh!
• 47A: "_____ Green" (Kermit the Frog song) ("Bein'") - I should add this to the "You Might Have Stumbled Here." Both wife and I had to make several stabs at this, though I know the song well. Stupid hick contraction!
• 54D: Perfectly pitched (on key) - nice, but looks ridiculous in the grid. Like a racial slur delivered in a Cockney accent.
• 11D: Country north of Namibia (Angola) - had the "A," threw in the first African "A" country that came to me, and it was right, hurrah.
• 44D: Perry Mason, e.g. (lawyer) - even when he's not in the grid, ERLE Stanley Gardner is never very far away.
• 35D: Actress Cannon (Dyan) - Crosswordese 101
• 60D: Actress Mendes (Eva) - Crosswordese 102 (whoa, breaking news - she just checked into rehab)
  
• 42A: Many IM recipients (AOL'ers) - Crosswordese 103 (IM = instant messaging)
  

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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TUESDAY, Jan. 16, 2007 - Dave Mackey

Solving time: 5:13

THEME: Family REUNION - three long theme answers (one of which is impossibly good) describe sets of relatives, such as one might find at a REUNION (40A: Celebration that may involve the people in 20-, 42- and 56-Across)

These are your theme answers, listed here, in order, from good to mind-blowing.

• 56A: 2005 Mark Wahlberg movie ("Four Brothers")
• 20A: Chekhov play, with "The" ("Three Sisters")
• 35A: With 42-Across, Lesléa Newman book ("Heather Has / Two Mommies")

I solved this puzzle so quickly (for me), that I didn't not notice HEATHER HAS TWO MOMMIES as the answer until it was 80% filled in. This book was legendary when I was in college (originally self-published in 1989) for being one of, if not the, first children's books to depict a lesbian household. I have said that everything about pop music, from the years I was in college, sucks. Well, one of the better - or at least more interesting - developments of my time in college was that it was a time of increased visibility of gay people in literature and movies. Or maybe it's just that I finally met some gay people when I was in college and then noticed they were everywhere and, it turns out, as messed up as everybody else I knew. Hurray for equality. Anyway, this book, as well as Annie on My Mind, got talked about (usually jokingly, even among the most politically sympathetic, i.e. gayest, of us) a lot in my latter college years. I won't even tell you the alternative (i.e. totally made-up) titles we had for some of these. Let's just say that "My Mind" was not what Annie was "on."

Yesterday I announced a moratorium on guys named Dave/David authoring puzzles. I then grandfathered a bunch of Davids, but forgot to grandfather Dave Mackey (I did it in Comments). And then voila, here he is. So, he's legal, but seriously, don't push me. Oh, I also forgot to grandfather Dave Tuller. I wonder what the record is for using "grandfather" as a verb in a single day. Single paragraph?

14A: Followers of so (la ti)
2D: Nobel-winning Nelly (Sachs)

How many times will I be suckered in by the damned "notes on a scale" trick, where SO or DO are used in a clue as if they are words, but then it turns out they are part of that damned Sound of Music song!? Do you know any effeminate homosexual men who have won the Nobel prize in anything? I don't. Wait, did Auden win? The only Sachs I know is Oliver, and I don't really know him except by name. LATI looks incredibly stupid and wrong when written into the grid. These two answers, up in the always slippery "Seattle" section of the puzzle, gave me my only real solving challenge of this puzzle. Everything else more or less fell together without much pause (for once).

25D: Actor Milo (O'Shea)

So I posted the new 2007 Pantheon line-up yesterday, and immediately second-guessed myself like crazy. I'm already considering new words for next year, and this puzzle makes a good case for O'SHEA, who comes up a lot for a dead Irishman. O, my bad, he's not dead. He was the friar in Zefferelli's Romeo and Juliet (pictured). He was also somehow involved in the Janeane Garofalo movie The MatchMaker. Guy's gotta eat. Actually ... I saw that movie in the theater. What's more, I didn't ... hate it. Might have ... liked it. Enough movie confession. O'SHEA is a worthy Pantheon candidate ... for another year. See also 53D: Home on high (aerie) and 55D: Perfume compound (ester) - which reminds me, I really really want to see Perfume; the novel was amazing, especially at the end when ... well, you'll see.

24A: "Hamlet" setting (Elsinore)
48A: Five Nations tribe (Onondaga)

So much colorful symmetrical goodness here. ONONDAGA live nearby, so I'm familiar with their name. ELSINORE took a little cajoling to come out into the light (DENMARK being the only "setting" that came to mind at first glance), but a couple of crosses made the answer obvious. This is one of the best Tuesday puzzles in a long time - between the beautifully structured and highly original theme, and the super-fresh fill in the non-themed answers. I am putting this one into the "Puzzle Awards 2007" folder I have on my desktop - it'll probably get nominated for best theme answer and best Tuesday. But who knows - there are still 11.5 months to go, and anything can happen.

4D: Musical liabilities (tin ears)
44D: Pizza slices, usually (eighths)

More hot symmetry. These answers are both musical, if you hold them in the right light. I love that EIGHTHS has five consonants in a row (one of the few words in English that can claim that). I also love that apparently I can't spell "consonant" (keeps coming out "consanant").

10D: Pale lager (pilsner)
43D: _____ Mann of 1960's pop (Manfred)

OK, I swear, this is the last pair of symmetrical answers I will shower with adulation. I just love it when these long connectors are something other than workmanlike. PILSNER isn't astounding, but it's sort of jaunty, and MANFRED Mann is a crazy blast from the past. "Blinded by the Light!" - Springsteen did a version of this song, but I prefer MANFRED's. Has the greatest misunderstood (by me) lyric in the history of song. But I am too modest to write it down; the line starts "Wrapped up..." That's all I'll say. Did you know that a PILSNER glass is FOOTED - It's true. How do I know. A little puzzle told me so - about 2-3 months ago.

62A: 1986 Indy winner Bobby (Rahal)

I have yelled at ESPN more times than I can count for its decision to count NASCAR and other auto-racing events as "sports." The machine does the work: NOT A SPORT. And yet, I must have absorbed something while ignoring the screen during the NASCAR coverage, because RAHAL was a gimme. I didn't know my gimmes went beyond Jeff Gordon, but apparently they do. So bring on the NASCAR, if you must. I am no longer afraid.

19A: Sue of "Lolita" (Lyon)

If I haven't said it before, I'll say it now: Kubrick's is the only "Lolita" you want to see. Doesn't matter that Sue LYON is way too old. Peter Sellers is some kind of genius in that movie (as is Shelley Winters), and the Jeremy Irons version is Pitifully lame and unfunny. No Sense of Humor. Nabokov would have retched. If I have performed this tirade before, my apologies.


33D: Steve the late Crocodile Hunter (Irwin)

This clue sounds more like a children's book title than a clue about a recently dead guy. "Steve hunted crocodiles, but he could never seem to get to work on time..." His death is sad, of course, in the way that all unnecessary deaths are sad. Did no one learn anything from Grizzly Man?!?! Let's leave the lethal animals alone, as God intended.

40D: Sonata ending, often (rondo)

I am running out of steam this morning. Andrew, what does this mean? And does anyone else remember a refreshing soft drink from the late-70s that went by the name of "Rondo?" HA ha, the (musical) RONDO entry at Wikipedia begins with an advisory: "For the former U.S. soft drink, please see Rondo (soft drink)." Only when you go there, you just get redirected to a generic "Citrus Drink" page, where RONDO is described very briefly. Answers.com tells me that two of its slogans were:

* "Rondo - The Thirst Crusher!"
* "Lightly carbonated, so you can slam it down fast!"

I want a picture of the can!!!! There don't appear to be any in existence (on the whole internet!? how is that possible?). Free "Rex Parker" T-shirt to the first person who can provide me with a pic. That is, when I actually get around to having the T-Shirts made. Or even designed.

Speaking of which, I received a "scholarship" to Stamford from my Aunt Nancy, which was very thoughtful. I am clearly going to have to set up something in the sidebar that acknowledges my benefactors; something like "Brought to you by ... IHOP ... the Letter 'K' ... and the Nancy McNichols Foundation for Better Blogging."

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

PS I love that OLEO gets elected Pantheon President on a Monday, and then turns around and makes a puzzle appearance on a Tuesday. She's a man of the people.

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FRIDAY, Nov. 24, 2006 - Dave Mackey

Solving time: approx. 17 minutes

THEME: none

Did this puzzle fairly quickly last night while sitting in "bed" [reader Andrew would have you know I don't sleep in an actual bed, but on a futon on the floor like some kind of 90's college student], after having eaten Thanksgiving dinner ... twice: once with wife and our friends around 3-4 pm, and then again right before Survivor (which I am somehow watching again after a multi-season boycott). Not sure if the Thanksgiving fullness helped or hurt. Seemed like it had no effect. The puzzle had an eerily Maleskan feel to it - some weird (to me) words and phrases that felt like they came from a land I'd never heard of, let alone been to. 36A: Olivine variety (Peridot) is a very good example, as I have no idea what OLIVINE or PERIDOT is, though I feel as if I've heard of the latter, at least. Had to guess a letter in the NW (guessed right). Had to suffer the ignominy of being caught in baseball ignorance yet again (feels like it's happening all the time lately). Learned a couple of things about major pop culture figures who appear frequently in puzzles. Overall, an OK experience. I take back the "Maleskan" part, actually, upon further review. Not enough back-breaking arcana to merit that distinction. But this was definitely a puzzle where my solving skills, and not my general fund of knowledge, was largely responsible for successful completion. Nice to see two guys named "Sal" in the puzzle: MINEO (19A) is angling for Pantheon status, while BANDO (18D) is just happy to get out of the house (notice how he doesn't even care that his clue was really pointing to a railroad name, and not to him at all).

1A: Some Italian baby food (pastina)
3D: Former "60 Minutes" debater Alexander (Shana)

Here is where I guessed a letter ("S"), though really what else could it have been? I inferred PASTINA from PASTA, but what the hell do I know about Italian babies? And though SHANA sounded far too ... unnewsworthy a name to be the right answer to 3D, I had to go with it. Honestly, until I looked it up, I didn't know if the clue referred to a SHANA Alexander or an Alexander SHANA. Shana Alexander was a successful female journalist back when there weren't that many of them. She provided the "liberal" viewpoint in debates with "conservative" James J. Kilpatrick at the end of "60 Minutes" episodes in the late 1970s. She died in June of last year. And yet Andy Rooney lives on. Where is the justice in that?

8A: Company that owns the brands Playtex, Kiwi and Hillshire Farm (Sara Lee)

Hmmm, Playtex, Kiwi, and Hillshire Farm. That's quite a hand you're holding, Ms. Lee. Three-of-a-...kind? "Forget snack treats. I have seen the future, and it is, in order: tampons, shoe polish, and sausage." That has to represent the highest level of difficulty for an ad exec charged with creating synergy among a company's products.

PS somebody tell SARA LEE that despite the fact that she has appeared in the grid, in her entirety, at least twice in the past couple of months, 7-letter words are simply not allowed in the Pantheon.

25A: _____ Ray of the Indigo Girls (Amy)
52A: "_____ to recall..." (I seem)

Thank god for fill-in-the-blank clues like these, or I don't know where my toehold(s) would have come from. I SEEM to recall that I briefly dated the sister of one of the Indigo Girls (Emily's sister, not AMY's). I just like to drop that odd bit of information into conversation whenever I have the chance, even though it's the saddest claim to celebrity proximity ever made by a grown man. The Indigo Girls are of course famous (now) for their crossword fondness. Of all their albums, I am most fond of the oddly titled "Come On Now Social."

39A: Baseball Hall-of-Famer Tim (Keefe)

Uh, who? I've got RAINES and MCCARVER and then I'm tapped out. Holy Moly - I'm going to have to bring the "Maleskan" designation back, as this answer is Old-Timey ... to the Xtreme! Tim KEEFE was a massive baseball star ... in the 19th century. He was a submarine pitcher (HA ha, I didn't know those existed until the days of Kent Tekulve and Dan Quisenberry) who won an astonishing number of games and struck out thousands. If I'd been born in 1869 and not 1969, I'd have known this.

12D: Put in abeyance (laid aside)
13D: One who's not being precise (estimator)
14D: Some bloggers (essayists)

I found these parallel long answers in the NE corner of the puzzle kind of icky and off for some reason. 12D's cluing just sounds clunky, despite being reasonably correct on a definitional level. I guessed ESTIMATOR with just the "M" - my long answer coup of the day. ESTIMATOR as a noun ... hrrmph. Yes, it's a word. As for "some bloggers" - I got ESSAYISTS in fairly short order, but ... what do you mean by "some?" Moreover, what do you mean by "ESSAY?" Again, the answer is not untrue, but the connection between the world of blogging and the world of ESSAYs does not seem very tight. The very word "ESSAYIST" smacks of a world that would sneer at the practice of blogging. POLITICOS would have fit. EGOMANIACS is too long, but would have worked nicely in the singular. This corner is so boring that I can't even think of a good picture to go with it. Here is Henry David Thoreau. He was an actual ESSAYIST.

24D: Sophisticated (smart)

We were watching the British version of "What Not To Wear" just prior to bedtime, so this one came quite easily. Whether most of the fashion on that show could be said to be SMART, however, is debatable.

30D: Quaker product (Rice-a-Roni)

I have no real commentary to offer on this one. I just like the (apparent) incongruity of clue and answer. RICE-A-RONI is very good long fill. It's the San Franscisco treat that was often given away in large quantities as the consolation prize on game shows in the 1970's. Its cable car ads remind me, not surprisingly, of S.F., where I was born.

38D: Fish basket (creel)
44D: Prospect (vista)

I pick these two for different but related reasons: I got them both almost immediately, and I don't know why. I mean I pulled CREEL out of my ... brain - out of the deep, deep recesses. I think I startled the word as it slept, unused and un-thought-of for years. As I wrote it in, I was deeply suspicious, but it panned out. As for VISTA, it's a fairly easy word, but I had only the "I," and I just knew somehow that the answer must be VISTA. I can't explain. It was this weird peek into how top solvers' minds must work all the time. Something weirdly Rain-Man-ish takes over and you see things that reasonable, intelligent people would not see, or not see so quickly. Sadly, this kind of instant divination happens to me far too infrequently to have a huge impact on my overall solving times. But it feels oddly magical when it does happen.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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