Member of the World Cup's "Tartan Army" fan base / FRI 8-7-2026 / Website associated with the domain www.news.com / "It's ___ or nothin'!" (classic kids' commercial slogan)

Constructor: Jesse Cohn

Relative difficulty: to judge this puzzle on difficulty is to imply there was anything about it that was difficult, which there wasn't

Word of the Day: LEFT TURNS [No-nos at some highway intersections] —

A Michigan left or P-turn is an at-grade intersection design that replaces each left (farside) turn at an intersection between a (major) divided roadway and a secondary (minor) roadway with the combination of a right (nearside) turn followed by a U-turn, or a U-turn followed by a right (nearside) turn, depending on the situation. It is in use in numerous countries.

This intersection design was given the name "Michigan left" due to its frequent use along roads and highways in the U.S. state of Michigan since the late 1960s. In other contexts, the intersection is called a median U‑turn crossover or median U‑turn, or restricted crossing U-turn (RCUT). The design is also sometimes referred to as a boulevard left, a boulevard turnaround, an indirect left turn, a Michigan loon, a J‑turn, P‑turn or a "ThrU Turn" intersection. (Wikipedia, on one potential way to deal with no left turns)

• • •

Hey hi howdy hello, Christopher Adams here, thankfully solving this puzzle on the ground when flight delays had me thinking I'd be blogging this six or seven miles above the surface of the earth. Honestly, delays are the real [Flight nuisance], not a GATE CHANGE, especially now that you can get notifications about said gate changes immediately when they happen, rather than schlepping all the way down to your gate only to find out that it's now a flight to an entirely different location you do not want to visit, and you have to walk twenty minutes back to a gate that always seems to be close to where you just walked from. Granted, you can also get flight delay email notifications, but you can't do anything about those except perhaps sigh and decide to spend another hour or two inside the airport lounge (which I did).

Anyway, I wish this puzzle was as lofty as my flight was; instead, I'm a certified BOOER [Vocal critic] of this puzzle. The grid is pretty defensive from the start—you can kinda see how it's almost broken up into nine smaller sections in a 3x3 grid, just with the first two and last two combined—and there's really not a lot of long entries, and no effort to make them interesting at all (either by themselves, or with interesting clues). Like, MUSIC PRODUCTION; that's a thing, but it's not an interesting use of fifteen letters; the clue at least tries to save it by giving some misdirection to athletics, but it's a minimal, half-hearted attempt that's easily seen through.

Though at least it tried to do something, which is more than I can say for most of the entries here, which are just straightforward and don't offer much resistance; even worse, they mostly don't give me a reason to care, either. A BITE TO EAT clued as [What someone might get quickly around lunchtime]—yup, that's straightforward, but not interesting. I don't know how I feel about this being a long entry starting with A (though my gut says more legit than not), but I do know I like it more than CAT'S OUT OF THE BAG, which feels like it's missing the "the" out front to me.

[Fields Medal winner Terence] TAO, here on 3Blue1Brown; part two of this is linked in the description, and this earlier talk also covers the same general ideas

I don't really have much more to say about this one, other than to note that in addition to a lot of the long entries not being interesting, they also specifically stood out to me as "things that seem to get suggested by your crossword construction program all the time because they have nice letters"; the most notable of these were I HAD NO IDEA and ARE WE A THING (which I thought might've been ...AN ITEM, ...A PAIR, other related things that may or may not have had the right letter count, but definitely had the same idea). This may very well be just me on this point, and so perhaps that's why I disliked it even more than I might've otherwise.

Olio:

• BORSCHT [One dish commonly in the 12 dish Sviata Vecheria, a traditional Ukrainian Christmas dinner] — Not hard (name a Ukrainian dish), especially if you already have the B in place, but unlike many other clues in this puzzle, it's interesting and lets you learn something new. More of this, please!
• SCOT [Member of the World Cup's "Tartan Army" fan base] — As Scots were to Boston bars, so I might have been to the airport lounges today. Also, sports! More of this, please!
• FABERGE EGG [Bejeweled target of a heist in "Ocean's Twelve"] — "Bejeweled" absolutely nerfs this clue, but still a fun movie in my opinion, especially with Julia Roberts as Tess Ocean, pretending to be Julia Roberts. When it comes to silly things like that in movies: more of this, please!
• BIG AL [Elephant mascot of the Alabama Crimson Tide] — Auburn's gonna win the football game! More of this, please!

Yours truly, Christopher Adams, Court Jester of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook and Letterboxd]
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"The Jeffersons" or "The Simpsons," notably / SAT 4-18-26 / Team with the mascot Big Al, familiarly / Blitzed / Still waffling / "Hey, no backing out now!" / Texter's affectionate sign-off / It's not fit for human consumption

Constructor: Jesse Cohn

Relative difficulty: Easy/Medium



THEME: None

Word of the Day: HASSOCKS (27D: Relatives of ottomans) —

An ottoman is a piece of furniture.^[1] Generally, ottomans have neither backs nor arms. They may be an upholstered low couch or a smaller cushioned seat used as a table, stool or footstool. The seat may have hinges and a lid for the inside hollow, which can be used for storing linen, magazines, or other items, making it a form of storage furniture.^[2][3] The smaller version is usually placed near to an armchair or sofa as part of living room decor, or may be used as a fireside seat.^[4]

Ottoman footstools are often sold as coordinating furniture with armchairs, sofas, or gliders. Other names for this piece of furniture include footstool,^[5] hassock,^[6] and pouf[fe].^[7][8]

• • •

Hi friends -- Rafa here as your Rexplacement! Hope you enjoyed Eli yesterday, but today you're stuck with me. (*shameless plug alert* I also hope you enjoyed my DOWN TO A T puzzle earlier this week. It was so much work to make, and it was lovely to see it out in the world *end shameless plug alert*)

Anyways, it's the weekend, the weather is nice (where I live, at least!), and there are no themes in sight -- life is good! This was the kind of puzzle that I didn't love at the start, but grew on me so so so much during the solve and I was totally obsessed by the end. To be fair, the first two entries I put in were ATONERS and ARLES, which are arguably the weakest entries in the whole grid. So it really was all uphill from there. And wow, did we go uphill. CROCODILE TEARS and ROOKIE MISTAKE make an incredible stack, and there's so much delightful stuff woven in: POISON DART, FRIED EGG, WE HAD A DEAL, HANG TIGHT, BAREFOOT, SAFEWORD, I'M FOR IT, PET FOOD etc. etc. It felt like I was uncovering goodies everywhere I looked.

It's ELSA!

Looking for something to nitpick ... but struggling to find anything to mention other than the two entries I talked about. (Okay, maybe I also don't love GEOS) I was very into the fresh angles for some stale pieces of fill. ORR as the Catch-22 character was particularly delightful, as I just read that relatively recently. I was always always always prefer a literature reference over a sports reference!!! ROI as return on investment was also great, but maybe I'm biased by living in Silicon Valley and being around people who use that term in conversation all the time. Oh, also, I realize I am very pro airport code as fill. DFW! Good! More airport codes please! Why do we only see LGA and ORD? Let's branch out!

It's a FRIED EGG!

Let's talk about clues. Some clever clues here. [Cutting stuff] for satire felt very satisfying to figure out. I love clues where words change part of speech. (In this case the default interpretation is "cutting" as a verb, but the clue is actually using it as an adjective.) [Cause of amusement to a vet, maybe] was also cool because the correct "vet" interpretation was the third one that came to my mind (first army veteran, then veterinarian, and only then person with experience).

It's a RAMROD

So, yeah, I really liked this. Just super solid stuff all-around, and fun vibes oozing out the grid. Could maybe have used a handful more clever clues, and this would have really been elevated. Oh, it also felt a tad too easy for a Saturday. I'd have appreciated a bit more resistance. Hope to be back soon!

Bullets:

• 18A MOD [New outfit or accessory for a character, in video game lingo] — I've been obsessively playing the beta version of Slay the Spire 2. Anyone else? Always fun to see video game lingo in a puzzle.
• 18D MALTESE [Silky-haired toy] — Took me a while to realize this meant a toy dog, and not a toy for kids to play with
• 38A MATS [Routine surfaces] — This is about gymnastics routines
• 8D BAREFOOT [How people get into a swimming pool, typically] — Such a weirdly specific clue for this ... it kinda made me giggle

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook and Letterboxd]
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1980s cartoon foe of Gargamel / FRI 8-29-25 / Eminem song that samples Dido / What fan fiction is not / Coaster, usually / Home to the torus-shaped Museum of the Future / "Seriously!," in slang / Places where it's OK to push someone at school

Constructor: Jesse Cohn

Relative difficulty: Very Easy

THEME: none 

Word of the Day: KILLER BEE (17A: Queen's guard?) —

The Africanized bee, also known as the Africanized honey bee (AHB) and colloquially as the "killer bee", is a hybrid of the western honey bee (Apis mellifera), produced originally by crossbreeding of the African honey bee (A. m. scutellata) with various European honey bee subspecies such as the Italian honey bee (A. m. ligustica) and the Iberian honey bee (A. m. iberiensis).

The African honey bee was first introduced to Brazil in 1956 in an effort to increase honey production, but 26 swarms escaped quarantine in 1957. Since then, the hybrid has spread throughout South America and arrived in North America in 1985. Hives were found in south Texas in the United States in 1990.

Africanized honey bees are typically much more defensive, react to disturbances faster, and chase people farther than other varieties of honey bees, up to 400 m (1,300 ft). They have killed some 1,000 humans, with victims receiving 10 times more stings than from European honey bees. They have also killed horses and other animals.

• • •

Welcome back to SMURF Week here at the NYTXW! (see ... yesterday). We hope you are SMURFing a SMURFy SMURF! (26D: 1980s cartoon foe of Gargamel)

It is grim how easy themeless puzzles have become. They are really, conspicuously bringing down the difficulty level of the puzzle in general, but you (I) really feel it on Friday and Saturday, because those are the days that used to have real punch. I've heard people hypothesize "well maybe you're just getting better" and lol no, I'm too old to be getting "better." I got "better" during the first 5-7 years of writing this blog. That's when I was at my fastest, that's when my regional ACPT trophies are from, that's when I placed as high as 31st (or so) overall. And back then, at the peak of my speed-solving abilities, a Friday or Saturday could still bust my lip wide open. The intervening twelve years or so have given me more experience, obviously, but they haven't made me faster, and if anything, with puzzles being made by people younger and younger than I am, with life experiences different from mine, the puzzle *should* be at least as challenging as it ever was, if not more so. And yet I burned through this puzzle today like it wasn't even there. Friday puzzles used to have at least a little fight, but now my only hope is Saturday, which every once in a while (as with Byron Walden's puzzle a couple weeks ago) can be counted on to push me around. But mostly the crossword is being made more accessible, presumably so it can be more salable in the long term. When you specialize in bite-size games, what sense does it make to continue with a product that takes a long time to learn how to do, that ends in failure for most novices for a long time? Who has the patience for that? Lower the bar so that people can get to "success" more quickly! So they don't "waste" so much of their valuable time getting up to proficiency. Time is money! Easiness is business! Have you heard of this new game PIPS!? Meanwhile, I gotta do Fireball or the Saturday Stumper (Newsday) in order to feel anything. Thank you for indulging me in this "old man yells at cloud" moment.

["I'm like young LL, / 'cause I'm hard as hell / Makin' n****s screw-face like Gargamel"]

LUNAR LAMP PIE ABODE DUBAI DISC and off to the races. If this puzzle was too easy (and it was), at least it had me careering (and possibly careening) around the grid in bizarre, seemingly reckless ways. Can't remember when I ever took quite this path through a puzzle before:

I just kept going, termite-like, not taking much time to look side-to-side. A long answer would take me to a new part of the grid and I'd just follow, not even bothering to go back and finish up the part I just came from. Down to the bottom and up past the equator again without having filled in a single answer in the middle third of the grid. So definitely lots of whoosh-whoosh today, though the marquee answers felt a little on the tepid side. The puzzle is trying hard to be FUN-FILLED, and ... well, it's not unfun, but I've done funner. The problem is that CELESTIAL EVENT is just too vague a term for me to like. And I've seen MEETCUTE too many times for it to seem like exciting marquee material any more. The 9s in the NE and SW corner are fine, but "fine" is about as high as the puzzle gets today. CREATION OF ADAM is a cool answer (I thought it was CREATION OF MAN, but when that wouldn't fit ... well, ADAM was the next logical guess). I think FUN-FILLED and (weirdly) AUTODIDACT were my favorite moments in this one. I also kinda liked the clue on SWING SETS (24A: Places where it's OK to push someone at school). Not hard, but playful and clever. 

I didn't get the clue on KILLER BEE, and still mostly don't. I put WORKER BEE in there at first, since it seemed to be asking for a subset of bees, one part of the bee org chart, not an entire subspecies of bee. If you are distinguishing the answer from the "queen," then the answer should be a different type of bee, and there are only two other types: WORKER BEES (which do, in fact, protect the hive) and DRONE BEES: "His only role is to mate with a maiden queen in nuptial flight" (wikipedia). The KILLER BEE doesn't really work as "the queen's guard" since she herself is (presumably) a KILLER BEE (even if she herself is not doing the "killing"). 

[CREATION OF ADAM]

Bullets:

• 1A: Coaster, usually (DISC) — thought this might be a roller coaster, so ... RIDE? I didn't chance it. Best to move on to something you're sure of when you're trying to get your first bit of traction, which is what I did. Tested LUNAR at 13A: Kind of rover, which gave me LAMP, then PIE, and that was that.
• 31A: Plot device in many a rom-com (MEET-CUTE) — they meet and it's cute. I recently watched While You Were Sleeping, a classic 1996 rom-com, for my Movie Club. That movie has three meets, none of them particularly cute (Peter Gallagher gives Sandra Bullock his "L" train token every day but doesn't really notice her; she pulls him off the tracks out of the way of an oncoming train; he wakes up from a coma weeks later and finally "meets" her—she's been pretending to be his fiancée ... while he was sleeping). And then a totally different guy (Bill Pullman) ends up being the love interest ... and that meet isn't particularly cute either. In fact, I don't remember it. They really don't have much chemistry. But there are lots of great actors in the movie, including Peter Boyle and Glynis Johns, and lots of Dunkin' Donuts (emphasis on the Donuts; RIP "Donuts"), so if you're nostalgic for the '90s and want something that goes down easy (some might say "blandly"), you could do worse.

• 38A: What fan fiction is not (CANON) — a nice, modern clue for CANON, which has extended its meaning from "an authorized set of books" (see, uh, the Bible?) to "an authorized fictional storyline."
• 55A: "Seriously!," in slang ("NO CAP!") — yes, you have seen this before. Yes, you have. I swear. First in 2023, and now three times this year. NO CAP!
• 1D: Home to the torus-shaped Museum of the Future (DUBAI) — mmm, torus.

• 10D: Kathryn of "Law & Order: Criminal Intent" (ERBE) — her name threatened to become established crosswordese in the late aughts, but then disappeared. This is her first NYTXW appearance since 2011! (ERBE appeared once in the intervening years as Italian for "herbs") (!).
• 32D: Dog's post-op wear (CONE) — my first and only outright mistake, and it was a glorious one. I had the "O," saw "post-op," and wrote in GOWN.

That's all. See you next time.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook and Letterboxd]
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Mortars for grinding Mexican spices / SAT 4-12-25 / Improv tenet / Wayne's co-star in 1966's "El Dorado" / Bad kind of insider / Onetime first name at Springfield Elementary / Curmudgeonly boss on TV's "Parks and Recreation" / Portrayer of a noted sitcom boss / Pool shooters / Choir supporters

Constructor: Jesse Cohn

Relative difficulty: Started very easy, ended up ... maybe Easy-Medium

THEME: none 

Word of the Day: MOLCAJETES (29D: Mortars for grinding Mexican spices) —

A molcajete (Spanish: [molkaˈxete]; Mexican Spanish, from Nahuatl molcaxitl) and tejolote (from Nahuatl texolotl) are stone tools, the traditional Mexican version of the mortar and pestle, similar to the South American batan, used for grinding various food products. // The molcajete was used by pre-Hispanic Mesoamerican cultures, including the Aztec and Maya, stretching back several thousand years. Traditionally carved out of a single block of vesicular basalt, molcajetes are typically round in shape and supported by three short legs. They are frequently decorated with the carved head of an animal on the outside edge of the bowl, giving the molcajete the appearance of a short, stout, three-legged animal. The pig is the most common animal head used for decoration of this type. [...]Molcajetes are used to crush and grind spices, and to prepare salsas and guacamole. The rough surface of the basalt stone creates a superb grinding surface that maintains itself over time as tiny bubbles in the basalt are ground down, replenishing the textured surface. // A new basalt molcajete needs to be "broken in" because small grains of basalt can be loosened from the surface when it is first used and this will give an unpleasant gritty texture to the first few items prepared in it. A simple way to do the initial "seasoning" is to grind uncooked white rice in the molcajete, a handful at a time. When the white rice flour has no visible grains of basalt in it, the molcajete is ready to use. Some rice flour may remain ground into the surface of the molcajete, but this causes no problems.

• • •

[32A: Another name for Princess
Diana of Themyscira]

Another day, another Jesse. Back-to-back constructors named Jesse. It's Jesse's turn to shine! We're in our Jesse Era. etc. Liked this puzzle somewhat better than yesterday's because the marquee answers just have a little more pop and zing. And whoosh. The grid design allows for more flow, for longer words to unfold, for more interplay among answers (or that's how it felt). Plus, I MEAN, COME ON ... that's a good answer. See also FALSE ALARM, THRONE ROOM, WONDER WOMAN, "NOT TODAY," etc. The puzzle played upside-down for me, in that normally, as on any day, particularly a Saturday, getting started is the toughest (or one of the toughest) parts, but today the start was so easy it actually freaked me out a little. "This can't be right..." I thought as I filled in answer after answer with virtually no crosses. By my rough count, I got the first 17 answers I looked at, from "IT'S A BET" up top (1A: "You're on!") to IDLY down there on the middle left (41A: How some sit by), including every single Down in the NW, in succession off just their first letters (which came from "IT'S A BET," the answer that started it all). Add in YES, AND (15D: Improv tenet) and that Down avalanche is really something.

Getting STEVE CARELL off the "S" feels impressive but it also feels supereasy (3D: Portrayer of a noted sitcom boss). He was the first "sitcom boss" I thought of, and I'd just seen him in some coffee commercial last night with John Krasinski (also of The Office). I don't know what the conceit of the commercial was, as I mute commercials. They just seemed to be sitting there, calmly drinking coffee. STEVE CARELL was on my mind, is what I'm saying, and I've watched every episode of The Office, so ... not hard. Also not hard: the other sitcom boss in this grid—the legendary RON Swanson of Parks & Rec (played by Nick Offerman) (49D: Curmudgeonly boss on TV's "Parks and Recreation"). Really needed RON, because that SW corner was way more problematic than the NW corner, or really any other part of this grid. My streak of correct answers came to a stop around "I MEAN, COME ON!" (just couldn't parse it quickly) and then absolutely stopped at MOLCAJETES, a term I've probably seen but had no recollection of. Every letter an adventure! Then because EASY WINS was also a problem (I had EASY WORK) (34D: Cakewalks), getting into that SW corner was a bear ... and yet the little answers weren't that hard, so I bailed myself out.

[oh look, there's a robot]

The other tricky part of the grid for me was a little bottleneck where the middle right flows down to the bottom right. Muffed the "I" in CIO (38A: Co. tech leader)—felt like a "T," except "tech" was in the clue ... except ... if "tech" is in the clue, then isn't that person's job "technical"? The CIO is the "Information" leader, the CTO is the "tech" leader—or should be. Y'all have too many self-important titles for yourselves. First Earl of Pushing Paper Around, Marquis de Management, Countess of Coding. Chief this, chief that. We used to just have C*E*O and we liked it that way. As for TRU, I guessed TRU, but TRU to me is a TV station or a play about Capote. Seemed more likely than CRU, that's why I picked it, but I wasn't sure of it. Was not prepared for the corniness of some guy putting a POEM in his love letter (43A: Inclusion in a love letter, maybe). I had STEM, which is bizarre, I'll grant you (what did you do with the flower itself!?), but at the time it felt right, or at least plausible. I had NET instead of GEL (I suspect that will be a common mistake) (51D: Mesh). But the worst part for me down there in the SE was a single square—had to run the alphabet to finish the puzzle. I'm talking of course about -EAL / -OLE (46A: You might want to sit down for this / 46D: Bad kind of insider). The answers seem straightforward enough when you're staring at them, but while I was solving, nothing was leaping to mind. Do you sit down ... for a DEAL (in poker)? Probably! Eventually I tested "M" and yep, that made sense. MEAL MOLE! Mmm, MOLE ... I want Mexican food now. MOLE for my MEAL! Do they make MOLE in [checks spelling] MOLCAJETES? (Traditionally, you would grind the toasted ingredients, but apparently today most recipes call for a blender.)

Bullets:

• 16A: Base ruling ("HE'S OUT!") — had "YER OUT!" in here at first. Let's go to the scoreboard now, and ... looks like "HE'S OUT!" still trails "YER OUT!" 7-3. (this is the first "HE'S OUT!" in almost eighteen years)
• 23A: Wayne's co-star in 1966's "El Dorado" (CAAN) — wow, I had no idea James CAAN's work went back that far.

• 24A: Missile type (SCUD) — you pretty much have to have lived through the Gulf War (1991) to know this. I have never heard the term in another context, but during that war, in news coverage, you heard it All The Time.
• 42A: Pool shooters (JETS) — not CUES, losers! Nice try!
• 6D: Onetime first name at Springfield Elementary (EDNA) — EDNA Krabappel. Marsha Wallace (who voiced her) died in 2013, and so EDNA was retired. Lots of sitcom characters in this puzzle, but for me, this is the most iconic.

See you next time.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook]

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Cryptaesthesia, more familiarly / FRI 10-18-24 / Accommodates, in listing-speak / Eucharist plate / Attention-grabbing visuals / Artist whose full name anagrams to A MAN DETOURED / Juice provider / First pitcher, maybe / "Star Wars" planet that's home to womp rats / "There, there" accompanier

Constructor: Jesse Cohn

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: none 

Word of the Day: É-D-O-U-A-R-D MANET (27A: Artist whose full name anagrams to A MAN DETOURED) —

Édouard Manet (UK: /ˈmæneɪ/, US: /mæˈneɪ, məˈ-/; French: [edwaʁ manɛ]; 23 January 1832 – 30 April 1883) was a French modernist painter. He was one of the first 19th-century artists to paint modern life, as well as a pivotal figure in the transition from Realism to Impressionism.

[Un bar aux Folies Bergère, 1882] 

Born into an upper-class household with strong political connections, Manet rejected the naval career originally envisioned for him; he became engrossed in the world of painting. His early masterworks, The Luncheon on the Grass (Le déjeuner sur l'herbe) or Olympia, "premiering" in 1863 and '65, respectively, caused great controversy with both critics and the Academy of Fine Arts, but soon were praised by progressive artists as the breakthrough acts to the new style, Impressionism. Today too, these works, along with others, are considered watershed paintings that mark the start of modern art. The last 20 years of Manet's life saw him form bonds with other great artists of the time; he developed his own simple and direct style that would be heralded as innovative and serve as a major influence for future painters. (wikipedia)

• • •

This one definitely got better as I went along. After that first corner, my main feelings were "RAGE ROOM? Again? Please stop" and "ESP is not real, why does it have a f***ing Greek name like it's an actual scientific phenomenon?" and "wait, not INSEAM?" (1D: Clothing line) and "really, you expect me to know the line-up of the Allman Brothers band beyond the Allman Brothers? This clue is Todd HAYNES erasure." So I was happy to get out of there. EYE CANDY is OK, but otherwise, happy to see that corner go. Then, instead of taking the obvious route (straight down the middle), I tiptoed across via ESPN (nice clue) (20A: It's often playing games), and up into the NE corner via Marc COHN, whose name I knew (though I did hesitate at COHN v. COEN) (8D: "Walking in Memphis" singer Marc). There I found Jamie Lee CURTIS starring in (well, on) a ONE-ACT play, as well as some soothing HOT TEA, a Star Wars reference I both knew and spelled correctly. Halloween (1979) and Star Wars (1977) made a perfect introduction to RETRO VIBE, which was the first answer that actually made me stop and relax and think "There we go! The Friday puzzle I've been waiting for has arrived. I don't think I actually BEAMED, but I was close. After that, I got the very quick trans-grid 1-2 whoosh-whoosh of PAINT-BY-NUMBERS* and "MYSTERY SOLVED!" which left me in a good position to polish off the remaining corners down south.

The SW corner was the one part of the puzzle that gave me real pushback. I dropped GINGER ALE in there OK, but neither AUDIENCE (33D: Market) nor POOR SOUL (32D: Sad sack) was computing—I mean, I got the POO- alright (!) but I wanted something like POOPER ("party pooper?"); even when I got the POOR part, SOUL did not follow intuitively. And I certainly didn't get CLAUSES off just the CL-. I forgot Sharon's first name (that's on me, grrr), I always suck at those "word before" clues, so USER was a bust (46A: Word before friendly or name), I thought the geometry figure was a literal figure, like a triangle or sphere or something, and, worst of all, I assumed that the [Checkout screen option] at 50D (TIP) was TAP. "Insert or TAP" [your credit card]—a very common option! All of that plus a tough (but very good) clue on SLEEPS (55A: Accommodates, in listing-speak) (as in "this Airbnb SLEEPS eight"). If I'd only remembered ARIEL, maybe this corner would've been a cinch, but as it was, it definitely leaned toward Saturday difficulty. Nothing else in the grid put up that much of a fight, but the grid was sufficiently scrappy overall to make for a very Friday-level Friday puzzle.

Please indulge me while I BOO AT some of these clues and answers... namely BOO AT, which I don't mind, or didn't, at first, until I hit POKE AT. Then I thought "too many blank-ATs!" It's appropriate, very appropriate, that BOO AT was directly underneath ROWR, because I definitely booed at that. The [Playful snarl] is RAWR. We've established this. There is ample crossword precedent for RAWR (four NYTXW appearances). Sadly, however, there is also precedent for ROWR, though not as ample (just two appearances before today). I hate that the crossword thinks you can go either way on this, when the correct spelling seems to me quite clear: RAWR is the playful snarl, ROWR is a typo. The more you bend the spelling, the more obviously you are in "playful" territory, so RAWR > ROWR by a country mile, case closed, stop using ROWR, it's ****ing awful. Another thing I would like you to NOT DO is NOT DO. Please do NOT DO that, and by "that" I mean "put NOT DO in your grid." NOT DO crossing NOVO (?) is making a mockery of the otherwise glorious NO NOTES (56A: "That was perfect—I don't have any feedback"), because notes ... I have them—for that corner, for sure. Here are some more notes:

Notes:

• 1A: Juice provider (CHARGER) — me, looking at the first clue of the puzzle at 4am: "uh ... JUICER?"
• 27A: Artist whose full name anagrams to A MAN DETOURED (MANET)  — such a bizarre way to clue him, but it's a bizarreness I like. You've gotta extract a last name from a full-name anagram. Anagram extraction! I pulled MANET out pretty easily, but then thought "wait, those other letters don't spell out CLAUDE" (that's because CLAUDE is the first name of MONET, not MANET, which I should know by now). This MANET is in my eyeline (in refrigerator magnet form) every morning as I write this blog:

[Devant la glace, 1876] 

• 12D: First pitcher, maybe (ICE WATER) — I see that you are trying to do that "identical sequential clue thing" with this clue and the next Down clue, 13D: First pitcher (STARTER), but it really only works for one of the clues (i.e. STARTER) (this is extremely typical with the "identical sequential clue thing," which is why it's a gimmick that should be used sparingly). The "First" part doesn't quite make sense for the ICE WATER pitcher. If you're talking about a pitcher of ICE WATER that might be brought out "first" at a restaurant ... I dunno ... "First" implies that there are going to be other, different pitchers to follow, and unless you are in a restaurant called "Pitchers" where all items on the menu come in pitcher form, I don't think more pitchers are likely. Do people drinking pitchers of beer typically open with a pitcher of ICE WATER? Maybe that's it. I admire the ambition and weirdness here, but when you have to lawyer your way to a defense of the clue, it's probably not a clue you should use.
• 21D: Eucharist plate (PATEN) — I knew this. How did I know this? Moreover, why has the word PYX just entered my brain? [Looks it up] Ha! PYX is the "small round container used in the Catholic, Old Catholic, Lutheran and Anglican Churches to carry the Eucharist, to the sick or those who are otherwise unable to come to a church in order to receive Holy Communion" (wikipedia). Hurray partial memory!
• 52D: This is what it sounds like when doves cry (COO) — now this is a perfect clue. Absolutely NO NOTES:

• 32A: Digital art? (PAINT-BY-NUMBERS*) — at first I was mad because I assumed the crossword was doing its whole "'digital' = related to the fingers, tee-hee, aren't we clever?" thing, and I was like "finger painting and PAINT-BY-NUMBERS* are not the same thing!" Well, of course they're not. The "digital" here refers simply to the numbers (or "digits") ... by which one ... paints. Assuming "digital" + "?" = finger-related ... that's peak crossword brain. 
• 42D: Scrolls from right to left? (TORAH) — because Hebrew is read right to left, as are Arabic and Persian. Together, these are the "most widespread RTL writing systems in modern times" (wikipedia).   
• 49A: Beethoven's "Hammerklavier," for one (SONATA) — lucked out here. I probably would've put together SONATA pretty easily anyway, but it helped that I've been listening to this specific SONATA a lot in the past month, in a new recording by Marc-André Hamelin. Enjoy.

See you next time.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld 

*oof, looks like the actual answer in the grid is PAINT-BY-NUMBER, singular, not NUMBERS. The singular feels bad / wrong. My brain was clearly protecting me by having me misread it.

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Lie, in slang / FRI 5-10-24 / Swimmer also known as a moonfish / Pop of color for an interior designer / One who can't handle their moonshine well? / Tech-savvy folks / Iroquois foe in the Beaver Wars

Constructor: Jesse Cohn

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: none 

Word of the Day: CAP (56D: Lie, in slang) —

Cap has functioned as a verb in English since the 15th century: mountains can be capped in snow, teeth can be capped with crowns, and pens and heads can be capped with, well, caps. In each of these cases cap has to do with a cover or top. But the verb cap can also be used to mean something else entirely: to lie, to boast, or to front. // Though often mistaken for new internet slang, capping (or cappin’) has been used in African American English for decades, and possibly much longer. In a Genius video featuring interviews with multiple rappers as well as a linguist, journalist Jacques Morel details the history of the term in rap music and dates the first mentions of capping in hip-hop to the mid-1980s and the phrase “high capping” to the end of that decade. The phrase no cap appears to be a newer development, becoming popularized in the 2000s and the 2010s with songs like “No Cap” by Atlanta rappers Future and Young Thug, and “Deadz” by Migos and 2 Chainz. In “Deadz,” Migos can be heard rapping the lyrics “no for real, no cap.” In Morel’s video, Migos rapper Offset defines cap as “bullshit” and “lies,” and no cap as “I’m dead serious.” (No cap is today sometimes rendered in emojis as 🚫🧢 or 🙅🏽🧢.) Willie D of Geto Boys glosses capping with multiple meanings ranging from the act of insulting someone to bragging or fronting. (merriam-webster.com)

• • •

A solid enough Friday, but the highs weren't high enough, and there were some editorial glitches that really put a few [Negative impression?]s (DENTs) in the solving experience. Speaking of highs not being high ... the word "high." It's in the grid (HIGH SCORES). And then it's in a clue (5D: High degree) ... and then it's in another clue (38A: High range). A minor issue? Possibly. But the issues continue. There's the "HEY" in the grid (15A: "Oh, why not" => "WHAT THE HEY") and then "Heyo" in the clues (46A: "Heyo" => "'SUP?") (short for "what's up?"). Only a desperate lawyer is going to claim that's not a dupe. And then there's the worst dupe of all. POWER USERS and "USE ME." That's a construction issue. Those "USE"s are pretty close to each other in the grid. And POWER USERS was probably my least favorite long answer in the grid to begin with (does merely "using" make you necessarily "Tech savvy"?). The fact that I'm noticing all these dupes means there's not enough pop and wow, not enough marquee answers in the grid. The ones that are there are mostly flat—acceptable, for sure, but definitely in need of an ACCENT WALL or two (liked that answer, btw) (1A: Pop of color for an interior designer). The NW corner had the most inventive and sparkliest longer fill, but it was also the hardest corner (because first) so I didn't feel its sparkle the way I would have if I'd hit it at a whooshier moment in the solve, but when things did get whooshier and I anticipated running into similarly sparkly fill, none of the rest of the grid would oblige me. There's nothing very wrong with this puzzle, it just didn't do the Friday Thing I like Friday puzzles to do, namely razzle (and also dazzle). It also has SMELLERS (23D: Noses). Hard to overcome SMELLERS. Really putting yourself in a hole there...

My only other significant gripe with this puzzle is the clue on AHAB (8D: Who soliloquizes "The path to my fixed purpose is laid with iron rails, whereon my soul is grooved to run"), specifically the use of the term "soliloquizes." I know you want to misdirect people, it's fun, etc., but that is a term for drama. "Hey, remember that famous AHAB soliloquy?" No, you absolutely do not, because there's no such thing. Hamlet has soliloquies, Macbeth has soliloquies, and almost certainly IAGO has soliloquies, which is what I (and, please tell me, many of you?) put in there at first. That quotation sounds very poetic, Shakespearean, even, and if you'd told me IAGO's soul was grooved to run on iron rails, I'd've said "yes" (and also "why are you talking like that?"). I love good misdirects, but that was a cheap one. On the plus side, the puzzle really nailed a couple "?" clues today, particularly the clue on WEREWOLF (7D: One who can't handle their moonshine well?). That got a definite mid-solve nod of respect from me. Same thing with the clue on NAVEL (34A: Evidence of a past personal connection?). Yes, the umbilical cord is a "past personal connection," that is undeniable. Hat tip, slight bow, kudos.

Trouble spots mostly came early, with DEL v DES (22A: "Of the," abroad), EASES v CALMS (3D: Placates), ELLA v ETTA (4D: Name that's also a suffix in Italian), and PHD v NTH (5D: High degree) confusion. Also, CHLOE was right in the middle of all that, and I have no idea who she is (2D: Actress ___ Grace Moretz) (b. 1997) (she's been in so many things and I've seen almost none of them). Oh, and as for AWARD, yikes (1D: Speech prompter, perhaps). I built it from the bottom so had an answer that looked increasingly like some kind of CARD. Sincerely thought there might be some kind of rebus going on for a second. [CUE] CARD?? The ambiguity of "prompter" made that one tough. Once I got out of that corner, far less trouble. Weirdly, the most trouble came from a name I knew (or "knew," I guess)—I watched all of Veep a few years back, and loved it, but couldn't remember (today, just now) if Julia Louis-Dreyfuss's character was a SERENA or a SELENA ... but, surprise! Turns out the answer is "neither." She's a SELINA (43D: ___ Meyer, the V.P. on "Veep"). That SE corner got harder in other ways too. While ROMA was easy to come up with, TRIESTE was less so (41D: Italian seaport that's home to Miramare Castle), in part because 45A: Some hired professionals, for short was so vague that almost any letter of the alphabet seemed plausible in the P-S slot. I exaggerate. Some. I wanted PAS (short of "personal assistants"). But no: PIS ("private investigators"). I've seen several PTS in the past couple weeks for my stupid-but-improving wrist (multiple PTS working at the same clinic, that is). Are PMs "hired professionals"? Kinda? Are POs "parole officers?" Anyway, P-S slowed me, especially insofar as it crossed that Italian (but looks French) city I never think about. 

I am quite certain that CAP will have put nails in more than a few solvers' tires today. Hard, hard generational divide there. I forget where I (recently) learned that meaning of "(No) CAP," but I know that after I learned it, I marched into class and asked my students if they knew the term, and yeah, they all knew it (and laughed at me, I presume affectionately). Meanwhile, I heard an older man (i.e. roughly my age, lol) working behind the coffee counter at school try to make a "cap" pun/joke to one of his coworkers, and then ask semi-earnestly, "isn't that what the kids say? 'No CAP!'" I told him yes, that is what they say, his pun was good and he should be proud of it. Not every "old guy looking out for old guy" situation is bad.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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