As grasshopper prepares / THU 4-1-10 / Old like some painted cars / Secret thieves slang / When Flower Knighthood 1922 film

Constructor: Lee Glickstein

Relative difficulty: Challenging

THEME: "Like the clues in all the words in this puzzle" — even in this clue, the words are: REARRANGED (17A), MOVED AROUND (11D), FLIP-FLOPPED (25D), and OUT OF ORDER (53A)


Word of the Day: TWO TONE (47A: Old like some painted cars) —

2 Tone (or Two Tone) is a music genre created in the United Kingdom in the late 1970s by fusing elements of ska, punk rock, rocksteady, reggae and pop. It was called 2 Tone because most of the bands were signed to the record label 2 Tone Records at some point. Other record labels associated with the 2 Tone sound were Stiff Records and Go Feet Records. Within the history of ska music, 2 Tone is classified as its second wave, the product of a time when the New Wave music of the early 1980s stirred nostalgia for vintage music.^[1] It is the musical precursor of the third wave ska scene of the 1990s. (wikipedia)

• • •

I guess this is supposed to be the puzzle equivalent of an April Fool's joke. It did not fool me. I got the joke about 20 seconds in, when I realized PUGET had to be the answer at 14A: Washington's Sound ___ and AGA the answer at 3D: Respect of Easter title. At that moment I had the horrid realization that this would continue for 70-some odd clues. What followed was a painful, tedious, soul-sapping exercise in rearranging words / filling in the grid — a far below-average grid for a Thursday, btw. Many of the clues are Tortured in order, I guess, to be clever-sounding. This is the only hypothesis I have for something like [Drive off the top?] —> [Top off the drive?], is that it? And wouldn't that be RE-PAVE? Clue to EAT INTO makes next to no sense, even REARRANGED — 40D: Part of drain —> [Drain part of]??? Again, you have to waterboard that clue to get it to give you EAT INTO. VIET is not short for anything (58A: Some served veterans there: Abbr.). It's just missing a NAM. Criminy. SADDENED doesn't even begin to describe my feelings about this one (9D: Low on the side) ... The big cherry on top of this sundae was CANTS. That's CANTS, plural. [Cough]. CANTS / POTS was my last letter. Actually ran the alphabet. I guess CANTS are secret thief languages or whatever the words in the clue can be rearranged to say (28D: Secret thieves of slang). And the "Nursery" in the POTS clue involves plants, not children. In the end, this puzzle left me feeling choked with fine sand. By which, apparently, I mean "SILTED" (27A: Fine with choked sand).


I don't really know what else to say. It hardly makes any sense to comment on the clues individually. I'm not about to explain how you are supposed to rearrange Every Clue. So ... hmmm, OK, I'll improvise.

Bullets:

• 20A: As a grasshopper prepares (MIXES) — I can only guess that a "grasshopper" is a "mixed" drink of some kind. Possibly green. Yes. Here's a recipe for you from wikipedia:

Ingredients: 1/2 oz. Crème de menthe (green) 1/2 oz. Crème de cacao (white) 1/2 oz. Fresh cream

Mixing instructions:

In a shaker filled with ice cubes, combine the crème de menthe, crème de cacao, and fresh cream. Shake well for about 6–8 seconds. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass.

• 23A: Faith without a person (INFIDEL) — no. An "INFIDEL" is a person without *your* faith.
  
• 26A: Years of plenty (DECADES) — [Plenty of years]? That's your clue for "DECADES?" Good lord. At least try ... something.
  
• 5D: Having a sound grating (STRIDENT) — botched this by putting in the "-ING" ending, a mistake made worse by the fact that the "N" was right.
  
• 36D: Drivers of love (OPEN ROAD) — another one that made little sense to me. [Love of drivers] = OPEN ROAD. Some drivers, I guess. Sometimes. Ugh. Exhaustion complete. Good night.
  

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter]

Read more...

WEDNESDAY, Feb. 27, 2008 - Lee Glickstein (CASSIDY PORTRAYER OF TV AND FILM)

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium

THEME: NUCLEAR FAMILY (36A: Members of this can be found in the centers of 17-, 24-, 51- and 60-Across)

A wonderful little puzzle. Felt like I was tripping all over myself trying to solve it last night, so when I saw my time (5:12) I was a little surprised. That's significantly faster than my average Wednesday, I think. I struggled in several different parts of the puzzle, which I'll discuss below, but apparently my struggle didn't last too long. Felt like an eternity while it was happening, though, I assure you. I tend not to solve on the NYT applet (where you can measure your times against others) because I don't like the (self-imposed) pressure, but I decided that with the tournament coming up in a few days, I should start acclimating myself to a little pressure. I'm just grateful that the tournament-solving is on paper, because I have Horrible keyboard technique. Very fast, very inaccurate. I'm especially bad at controlling the cursor. I was actually expecting a "Your puzzle is incorrect" message the first time I clicked "Done" last night, so ragged was my solving experience. Lucked out. I don't expect such luck to hold under tournament conditions. Lesson for the tournament: don't spaz out. Be methodical and calm. Good things are more likely to happen that way. Breathe. Slow down. Imagine yourself coming in 600th place. See that world does not end, sun still rises, gravity still functions, etc.

I'm going to post a message later in the day asking tournament attendees to identify themselves. Several of you have asked me to do this, so check back in if you are curious about who's going to be there.

Theme answers:

• 17A: Make tracks (skeDADdle) - what a great answer. I had SKED- before I read this clue and thought "Nothing starts with SKED-!" I was, happily, wrong.
• 24A: Sources of ready cash (pawn BROkers) - sputtered a bit here, as I could think only of the phrase PAWN SHOPS, but then the right answer broke free.
• 51A: Turkey insert (therMOMeters) - clue = gross. Thankfully, I never saw it (how is that possible?). Wife misread clue as "Turkey insect."
• 60A: Got by (on) (subSISted)

Please note the bonus thematic answer ATOM (37D: Bit to split), which intersects the NUCLEAR in NUCLEAR FAMILY. Beautifully done.

My first hold-up came right off the bat, when I could come up with none of the Acrosses at the top of the puzzle - well, I guessed ASK TO (9A: Invite for), but was not confident enough to write it in at first. I don't remember what I had at first for 14A: _____ ease, but it wasn't ILL AT and it somehow made sense. I finally got a roll going when I switched to the Downs and DIS (1D: Talk trash about) (now you're talking my language) came to me instantly, then ELK (2D: Lodge member), then BLESS YOU (3D: "Gesundheit!"), and on from there. Got slowed down right around the REPO line (34A: Defaulter's loss). Couldn't see REPO, and nothing below it or around it was falling into place (including BREF - 26D: Concise, in Cannes - which is odd, given that my 7+ years of French should have made that obvious).

Had to reboot in the SE, where I was helped considerably by having NEMEAN (42A: _____ lion, beast slain by Hercules in his first labor) be a flat-out gimme. I do love my Herculean labors. After I teased out the annoying prefix OMNI- (50A: Directional lead-in), I dropped the lovely LEMON TEA (39D: Sore throat soother) down into the SE and polished off the bottom of the puzzle fairly quickly. I went through the SW corner like a hot knife through oleo, using OSHA (44A: Dept. of Labor branch) to get every Down answer in quick succession, one right after the other. That's a lot of squares filled in a matter of seconds.

Last stand was in the Nevada section of the puzzle, where a lot of odd answers come together. Had LLB for LLD (32D: Foreign law deg.), which is mystifying, as I don't even shop at L.L. Bean and so don't have that as an excuse. The Vietnamese name was unknown to me, and I put in the "D" for DUC (28D: Vietnam's Le _____ Tho) only after I decided that the unfamiliar last name in question in the cross had to be BOYD (27A: Cassidy portrayer of TV and film). My least favorite answer of the day: I WOULD (31A: Words of willingness). These sound more like words of excuse, as in "I WOULD help you cook, but as you can see, I'm watching TV, so ... you know ... my hands are tied."

Answer sampler:

• 20A: Mead study locale (Samoa) - could make no sense of the clue until I had the answer. Margaret Mead is of course the famous anthropologist who wrote Coming of Age in SAMOA.
• 21A: Chips that one might "muncha buncha" (Fritos) - some people decry the use of commercial names in the puzzle. I, on the other hand, can't get enough of them.
• 41A: Flash drive filler (data) - the B from the erroneous "LLB" screwed me up here.
• 56A: T. Boone Pickens, for one (oilman) - all I could remember about this guy is a. he had been in the puzzle before as a 15-letter Across answer, b. he was rich for some reason, and c. he had been on the cover of Time magazine (I used that cover in my blog write-up of him). Sadly, I could remember nothing pertinent about him, but since he was an Across in the SW, it hardly mattered. Got him from crosses in no time flat.
• 6D: Time to crow (at dawn) - actually entered MIDDAY and then immediately erased it.
• 7D: "That's funny!," in an e-mail (LOL) - see also 38D: Chat room shorthand (IMO - "in my opinion"). Another great pair in the puzzle is EMS (53D: Ambulance letters) complemented - in lovely symmetrical fashion - by DOA (18D: Beyond paramedic aid, in brief). One of the few times you are ever likely to hear DOA described as "lovely," I'm sure.
• 21D: Short order cook's utensil (fry pan) - had the FRY, so wrote in the PAN, but only tentatively. Wife insists that short order cooks use large griddles, not actual FRY PANs. I suggested maybe they used to use them in the olden days. We then got into a discussion about what "olden days" meant, with her imagining ... I forget, either classical Rome or Little House on the Prairie, where I was just thinking "Your grandfather's time." Such meandering and ultimately pointless discussions are not infrequent around here.
• 8D: Antietam leader (Lee) - Wife just taught me how to pronounce this the other day. "Antietam," I mean. I know how to pronounce LEE.
• 44D: Best Actor nominee for "Venus," 2006 (O'Toole) - me: "It starts with "O," so ... O'TOOLE!" That, right there, is the key to solving crosswords reasonably. It's way more about instinct than it is about hardcore knowledge.
• 47D: Loser of 1588 (Armada) - helps that I just discussed this in class the other day. God helped Elizabeth fend off the Spanish by creating storms that wrecked much of the Spanish ARMADA all along the coast of Ireland. That's where the anthem "God Save the Queen" came from. It was originally "God Saved the Queen" (I'm not serious, so please, no letters).

Thanks for an entertaining puzzle, Lee.

Off to take Sahra to school (1-hr delay means she's still here, watching ... something brain-rotting, I'm sure ... nope, I'm being told it's "Curious George" on PBS, so that's not so bad). Oh, I forgot: wife said she's going to take Sahra to school. Sweet. OK, so I'm ... off to make coffee then.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

PS though you might not recognize it, my site has recently been updated and thus made far more easily navigable. Individual entries can now be pinpointed from the Blog Archive in my sidebar. I could not have done the updating without the industrious and virtually unpaid help of Dave Sullivan. Every annoying problem I'd had trying to update to the newest version of Blogger, he was somehow able to fix. And all I have to do is buy him breakfast in Brooklyn. That's win-win for me. Thanks, Dave.

Read more...

WEDNESDAY, Sep. 26, 2007 - Lee Glickstein and Craig Kasper

Relative difficulty: Medium-Challenging

THEME: Broadway musicals - 13 starred clues all have answers that are titles of famous Broadway musicals

Wow, this puzzle was kind of a shocker, first because of the sheer number of theme entries and their impressively symmetrical placement (including a CABARET - EVITA - CANDIDE triple-stack right in the middle of the puzzle); and second because some of the non-theme fill was really high-end, insane-looking stuff. I'm surprised that I did this puzzle as quickly as I did - the theme was easy to get (I got it off of 1A, after I realized SHARON was not the "Stone" in question), so that helped, but there's a fat handful of words I've either never heard of or never seen clued in the way they were today.

Theme answers:

• 1A: *Stone of Hollywood (Oliver)
• 7A: *Home for Will Rogers and Garth Brooks (Oklahoma)
• 16A: *What some unscrupulous e-businesses do? (spam a lot) - best clue / theme entry by far
• 19A: *Torn (rent)
• 31A: *Extremely narrow winning margin (hair)
• 35A: *Kind of club (cabaret)
• 41A: *A Peron (Evita)
• 44A: *Student of Dr. Pangloss (Candide)
• 46A: *Lover of Radames (Aida)
• 62A: *Renown (fame)
• 67A: *Site of much horsing around? (carousel)
• 69A: *Perform ostentatiously (showboat)
• 70A: *Destiny (kismet)

Now it's time for the first ever installment of "What Does That Look Like?"

Ever wonder what you'd get if you crossed a Minnie MINOSO (15A: 1950s All-Star outfielder Minnie) with a Sydney O'MARR (1D: Astrologer Sydney) [whoops, it's an apostrophe-free "OMARR" - he's not Irish, I guess]? Of course you haven't. Until today, that is. In the grid, the cross was tough (I thought) - in real life, it would not be much prettier:


OK, he's handsome enough, but ...


Uncle Fester?

Next, many of you may be thinking "Hmmm, LAVALIER sounds familiar, but I can't quite picture it..." Further, you are almost certainly thinking "What the hell is a K-PAX and why have I never heard of it?" [answer: it's a horrible movie and 99.9% of America never saw it, so you're not alone] Here are some helpful visuals. LAVALIER (18A: Bejeweled pendant):


K-PAX (8D: 2001 film set in a mental institution):




Let's see if I can knock the rest of these off in a short paragraph. I blanked on COXES (20A: Regatta crew leaders) and CARAVAN (20D: Dodge on the road - "something about a CAR..."), and had SITUATE for SET DOWN at first (30D: Lay). An ANADEM (48D: Ancient garland) is simply a "wreath or garland for the head." A DIADEM is a crown, which I'm sure you knew. I have never seen OCULAR as a noun (28D: Eyepiece), and I have never heard of ALISO Viejo (52D: _____ Viejo (California city near Laguna Beach)). I know nurseries are for taking care of babies, but NEONATAL nurseries (47A: Like some nursery care)? ... o, this must mean a hospital "nursery" - I was thinking, "Who puts their newborn in a nursery? Isn't that a little young?" Maybe I was thinking daycare. Love the FRIEZE (68A: Architectural decoration) / LAMAZE (49D: Kind of class) intersection, though was briefly unsure if the intersection was "S" or "Z." Two rarely-seen words that I got very quickly were REBEC (24D: Renaissance instrument) - from my Ph.D. training - and EVAH (57D: Cole Porter's "Well, Did You _____?") - from my love of Cole Porter, which I developed backwards, from an early 90s tribute album ("Red, Hot, and Blue"). BRINE is a very unappetizing word (29D: Curer of feta cheese), though feta is, of course, tasty (despite sounding a bit like FETID). Lastly, I love a good "Simpsons" clue - 13D: Place to which Bart Simpson makes prank calls (Moe's). Hell, I love any "Simpsons" clue, but you know that. Here is a master list of Bart's calls to Moe over the years.

Thank you all for the kind messages of congratulations yesterday. Sorry I didn't reply. I was in prison. On which, more later.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

Read more...

SUNDAY, Sep. 2, 2007 - Lee Glickstein and Nancy Salomon

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium

THEME: "Put It In Writing" - "IT" is inserted into familiar titles to create a new, silly title, which is clued

[updated / completed 11:00 a.m.]

I liked the puzzle a lot, despite the fact that the theme was Way too easy to get. Once I figured it out (early), I played a little game with myself to see how many crosses I would need to get a theme answer. So I just worked my way down the puzzle, and as soon as I had a few letters in a theme answer, I'd read the clue to see if I could get it. I never needed more than four letters to get a theme answer. Hadn't even heard of one of the authors, but the title was predictable / familiar enough that I got it quickly. Luckily, the theme answers are (mostly) funny enough that I can excuse the super-easiness.

Theme answers:

• 23A: Quentin Tarantino paperback about a minister's stories? ("Pulpit Fiction")
• 29A: Randy Shilts expose of an outlaw musician? ("And the Bandit Played On")
• 57A: Susan Howatch novel about protesting clergy? ("Sit-ins of the Fathers") - this is the author I did not know
• 82A: Marlo Thomas storybook about liberated vampires? ("Free to Bite You and Me") - by far the best fake title
• 107A: Grimm Brothers story about a sorry leader, with "The"? ("Pitied Piper of Hamelin")
• 121A: Shakespearean play about a monarch who writes bad checks? ("Kiting Henry IV")

We have breakfast guests coming over in exactly ten minutes. So I'm posting this now, and will complete it in late morning. I love you guys, but chocolate chip pancakes (and houseguests, I suppose) win out.

RP

And I'm back.

It's a very right-wing puzzle, or Republican at any rate, with Bush (27A: State where Geo. W. Bush was born) and Nixon (80A: Old presidential inits.) and former press secretary ARI Fleischer (40D: Former White House press secretary Fleischer) all making appearances in one way or another. Then there's ABU Ghraib (2D: _____ Ghraib, Iraqi prison), which puts recent Republican policy in a not-so-nice context. I don't think I've seen ABU Ghraib referenced in the puzzle before. It's not very breakfast-tabley, but it's certainly in-the-news enough to be a valid entry.

Had my greatest challenge in the "Utah" region of the puzzle, where lots of unknown names and terms went colliding into each other. I had SSGT for MSGT (52D: Certain NCO) - as of right now, I don't know what MSGT stands for - aha, Master Sergeant. Anyway, changed "S" to "M" when ALARUS made no sense at 51A: Warning signal, once (alarum). MSGT intersected the very unknown (to me) OTOMIS (67A: Mexican Indians), which I was certain was wrong when I first clicked "Done" on the applet. Thankfully, the answer clearly ended in "S," because that "S" was the first letter in a name I did not know: 70D: "Elephant Boy" boy (Sabu), which parallels yet another answer I didn't know / don't understand - 79D: Canon alternative (Mita). Oh, it's a copier brand? OK.

There are very cool vocabulary words in this puzzle, including one of my favorite words in the English language: EPIGONE (119A: Copycat). I use this word when talking about any group of slavish or unimaginative imitators (started using it to describe Chaucer's immediate poetic successors, but it works in lots of contexts). Another fabulous fancy word is PICAYUNE (89A: Piddling) - had that -YUN- run and thought "???" then saw the clue and thought "Damn ... that's hot." It sits above a less pretty word, ERGOT (95A: Rye malady), which longtime readers will recognize as a word I first learned from doing a puzzle about 6 months ago. Lastly, as far as cool vocabulary words go, there's OBLATE, which (because I'm a medievalist by training) I always associate with religious orders, but here's another meaning for my edification (20A: Squeezed at the ends, as leaves).

Clues that gave me pause, confused me, or annoyed me:

• 22A: Some unwritten rules (oral law) - I have never heard this phrase. I pieced it together from just a few letters, but it's not a term I'm familiar with.
• 53A: Triangular kerchief (fichu) - Nutso word which I've seen before. Had that final "U" and thought "uh oh," but when I got the initial "F" the word came to me instantly.
• 128A: Second _____ (banana) - yes, I suppose, though [Top _____] would have been a little more in-the-language (according to Google, almost precisely 3x more in the language).
• 4D: Red-______ sapsucker (naped) - yikes. Did not know this. NOSED? NAKED? Nope.
• 6D: Peevish (tetchy) - are you sure this isn't just a hick pronunciation of "touchy," which can also mean "peevish?"
• 8D: Believer's goal (Mecca) - I was thinking in Way more abstract terms, like NIRVANA or the equivalent.
• 24D: Bloom of Paris (fleur) - tricky cluing; it's just French for "flower"
• 86D: Leandro's love (Ero) - Italian version of "Hero and Leander," a poem I know pretty well and teach often. Lacking the initial "H," this one fooled me a bit.

Impressive clues and answers:

• 1A: Heart of a bus. district (Main St.) - I love the two-wordness, where one word is an abbr. I don't know why. I just do.
• 76A: Disney movie with a hacker hero ("Tron") - You gotta go back 25 years for this one. Raise your hand if, in desperation, you entered NEMO or LILO.
• 29D: Little League issue (age limit) - some of those kids look very very post-pubescent. It always seems like cheating when this 5'10" kid with the first traces of a mustache comes out and starts throwing heat at these 4'10" skinny kids who are swimming in their batting helmets. This is a long way of saying, yes, the AGE LIMIT is an issue.
• 65D: Hunter of literature (Thompson) - a very talented, funny writer. Slightly insane. His name really needs its middle initial to feel complete.
• 45D: Joyce Carol Oates novel ("Them") - another literary clue; also, a movie about killer ants!

That's it.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld


P.S. Congratulations to Red Sox pitcher Clay Buchholz for no-hitting the Orioles last night - in only his second major league start (!). After having their asses handed to them by the Yankees, and then losing another ugly one to the Orioles on Friday, the Red Sox really really needed this. He's only 23! Hopefully the Red Sox won't trade this great young pitcher to the Rangers for a redundant closer who screws up team chemistry and nearly single-handedly drives the season into the ground.

Read more...

THURSDAY, Jan. 11, 2007 - Lee Glickstein and Nancy Salomon

Solving time: 11:08

THEME: "ADD-ICT" - Common expressions have ICT added to them to make odd expressions, which are then clued. 62A tells you the theme: Fiend ... or a hint to this puzzle's theme (addict)

I feel very good this morning, despite an only slightly better-than-average Thursday time (I give myself a B+). After yesterday's debacle, and after doing Several Puzzles in a Row in my Shortz "Greatest Hits" puzzle book wherein I had 1-3 squares wrong in Wednesday and Thursday puzzles, it was nice to complete a puzzle, with no extended struggle, and to have the applet accept my first grid submission. The other reason I'm happy - uh, this puzzle was hard. There were multiple times when I managed to get past a really difficult part and immediately thought "man, that was rough - that's gonna trip someone up" (usually that someone is me). Examples below.

I am still waiting for confirmation from someone that yesterday's Homer quotation was in fact genuine and not an internet myth grown to stellar proportions. I wouldn't want the paper to have print another retraction - as they had to do recently when SARA LEE got clued [Company that owns the brands Playtex, Kiwi and Hillshire Farm] - doesn't own Playtex anymore, apparently - but facts are facts and I want facts. Not factiness. Speaking of "The Colbert Report" (which I just did, whether you knew it or not), I was terrifically happy yesterday when I was flipping through the latest issue of Previews - massive catalogue of upcoming comics releases .... [cough] ... ["Nerd!"] ... -
and I noticed a number of high-profile ads for the upcoming comic book adaptation of Mr. Colbert's unpublished "Tek Jansen" novel. Here is the promotional blurb:

Solar plexus! Bursting out from the hit Comedy Central show, The Colbert Report — it’s Stephen Colbert’s Tek Jansen! In this stunning continuation of Stephen Colbert’s critically acclaimed, yet unpublished prose novel, everyone’s favorite sci-fi hero must stand against the enemies of freedom, no matter what dark planet they crawl from!

I ordered the series - which won't be in stores for three months. I'll let you know how it is.

THE THORNS

31D: Glimpse (aperçu)

This clue/answer pairing is an ass-pain on many levels. First, APERÇU implies "insight" or "special understanding," where [Glimpse] just suggests "sight." Second, the clue skews more verb-ward than noun-ward, likely causing many mental forays into Useless-ville. Third, holy cow, what the hell ends in -CU??? Without the cedille on that C, that C really really wants to be hard (!). But the U comes from EMU (48A: Noted Australian sprinter), and how could EMU be wrong when it gave me the M that allowed me to get the great and manifestly correct 30D: "Rah!" (Go team!) (where formerly I had HUZZAH, which is making me laugh even as I type it)? In the end, APERÇU was about as palpably physical an "aha" moment as I've had in a while. Exhilarating.

36A (THEME): Order to act one's age? (maturity d-ICT-ate)

Was working on this before I had the theme, and the only thing that second word wanted to be was some form of DIRECT ... DIRECTIVE ... DIRECTION ... ? I had even written in DIRECT, which left me one letter shy of the end of the answer. I figured if I just let DIRECT hang out there for a while, something would happen. Strangely, though it was wrong, its "T" helped me confirm the correct GO TEAM (30D, see above). Now that I look at this whole mid-Atlantic region of the puzzle, it's very very France-circa-WWII. Two French military answers: 35D: 1944 battle site (St. Lo) and 44A: Encamp (bivouac) (the latter apparently comes from the French, via probably Swiss-German). Then APERÇU and Albert Camus, too (that's a rhyme!): 29D: Camus subject (plague). ST. LO is pure crosswordese - a very handy four-letter combo I know only from doing crosswords. I was happy to traipse through this mid-Atlantic region relatively unscathed. I had to work for it, but I could easily have fallen flat on my face, and didn't.

60A: Required (need be)

I can't tell you how befuddled I was by this. Time-wise, I didn't get chewed up too badly, but I ran into an apparent Unstoppable Force / Immovable Object problem when this answer, which I had understandably entered as NEEDED, rammed its final "D" right into the "E" of 58D: Firmed up (set), which, true to its name, would not budge. "NEEDLE? How is a NEEDLE 'Required?'" It was left for me to pick up the "B," which I did only by finally (duh) getting the gist of 57D: "The Office" address? - I had N_C, and I figured the answer was something web-related, or something having to do with business-speak or somebody's title in an office. Of course, if I'd bothered to notice the quotation marks around "The Office," it might have dawned on me sooner that the Office in question was the TV show of that name (which, semi-ironically, is one of only 4 or so shows that I actually watch). So NBC. That's the "address" of the show. OK. NEED BE. Wow. Another thorn that impeded but did not halt my forward progress.

49A: "The Odd Couple," for one (Simon P-ICT-ure)

As of right now, I have no idea what SIMON PURE is. Once you add the ICT, then I get the clue, but what is this expression that is being modified??? OK, I am calling in my resident Restoration and 18th century expert on this one. So, Shaun, when you read this, please respond. Apparently the phrase "The (real) SIMON PURE" dates from the early 18th century and comes from "The name of a Quaker in Mrs. Centlivre's comedy A bold stroke for a wife (1717), who is impersonated by another character during part of the play." So "the real SIMON PURE" is the genuine article, not a fake. At least one on-line dictionary suggests that the phrase might also be used derisively, to mean "superficially or hypocritically virtuous." Do people use this expression nowadays, or even know it? Yes, I'm talking to you.

Speaking of "Odd Couple," Christina ROSSETTI (9D: "Goblin Market" poet Christina), meet Horatio ALGER (41A: Author of "Jed, the Poor House Boy"). She writes wistful sonnets, and he exhorts boys to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps.

The SW was where I made my last stand, and after my first pass through the Across clues, it was still wide open. But 49D: Chesterfield, e.g. (sofa) - everything I know about furniture I learned from the NYT Crossword - gave me the first letters of all the longish answers down there, 51D: Bleu parts of French maps (mers) [sacré bleu, more French] gave me their third letters, and everything fell from there. Really liked Jackie Robinson's number getting the fully written-out treatment: 59A: Jackie Robinson wore it (forty-two) (which also marks the strange, strange return to the puzzle of the number "42" (see Tuesday's puzzle)).

Wrong Fill

• CALVIN for ARMANI -1A: Big name in menswear and cologne
• REVELLED (?) and then CAVILLED (!?!?!) for CAVORTED - 38D: Made merry

(More) Stuff I Didn't Know

• 12D: Son of Ramses I (Seti) - sure, OK, whatever you say
• 8D: It's to the left of # (Oper.) - this is on a telephone keypad, right? Did not know that. Kept looking at my own computer keyboard and seeing only "@" and "2"
• 37D: Group whose 1946 song "The Gypsy" was #1 for 13 weeks (Ink Spots) - not THE INK SPOTS? Worst band name ever.
• 20D: Harvard's motto (veritas) - I pieced this together easily enough, but didn't know it, exactly. Pretty pompous motto.

Hot Fill

• 16A: Fit of rage (apoplexy) - one of the greatest words to grace the grid in a while
• 5D: Not very potent potable (Near Beer) - great, Jeopardy-esque clue with super-fresh answer

Given that 7A: Sticking points (morasses) crossed with 7D: Kind of nest (mare's) in the NE, I'm really surprised I didn't have trouble there. APOPLEXY is up there too. That corner is all bark and no bite ... and 99 44/00 Awesome.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

Note on Today's NY SUN puzzle

Solving time: 14:06

This puzzle warrants mentioning for some fabulous fill, including 1A: Lila Crane portrayer in "Psycho" (Vera Miles), 32D: Alternative to Golden Crinkles (Tater Tots), 38D: She played Prue on "Charmed" (Shannen), and the very very best answer of 'em all, 14: Simpsonian institution (Kwik-E-Mart). Who Needs the Kwik-E-Mart!? I dooooooooooooo. This puzzle is also awesome because I got to use my knowledge of the fabulous but rarely seen word "ecdysiast" (41D: Is an ecdysiast (strips)) and because I got to use recently acquired obscure TV knowledge in answering 45D: Ralph of "The Waltons" (Waite). I'm also a big fan of the DIME NOVEL (17A: Early paperback) if not, at all, a big fan of REBA (20A: Sitcom title character with the last name Hart).

Read more...

WEDNESDAY, Nov. 8, 2006 - Lee Glickstein and Nancy Salomon

Solving time: 9:24 (on the NYT website - Java Applet)

THEME: "Split Ends" - Theme answers all have as their last words a word that might be preceded by "Split" in a common two-word phrase.

I learned last night that there is a reason that I don't spend my nights lying on the couch watching TV anymore. Inertia. At some point (1 a.m.) I actually thought to myself, "You've been lying here on the couch watching election coverage for two hours ... has anything important happened? Has there been any news that you know now that you didn't know at 11pm? 12am? No." It takes concerted, conscious effort to pry myself away from a TV jag (not the TV show "JAG," which I've never seen). And then my sleep cycle is screwed up (I'm very late writing this commentary today, for instance). I'm much happier when I'm in bed by 10pm. At some point last night, I had heard the same reporters and politicians and pundits say the same things so many times that the phrase "New Direction" started to sound like "Nude Erection": "We need a Nude Erection in Iraq!" Well, why not? Can't be any worse than our current policy.

Bought Wordplay yesterday and am disturbed by the gigantic pencil-like thing on top of the box. Is it a puzzle? It seems to have nothing to do with crosswords, and if the purveyors of this fine movie imagine that I like non-grid-related, non-two-dimensional puzzles, then they are mistaken. Maybe it's something Sahra will enjoy playing with. [addendum: actually, I like crazy DVD packaging gimmicks - maybe Gigantor Pencil will make sense once I finally take the plastic off the packaging.]

Slowish on puzzle again, curse the applet. To make matters worse, when I entered my final letter, I did so with a flourish and waited for the computer to do something, like say "Congratulations, the grid is now full!" But instead, Nothing Happened. So then I scanned the grid, figuring I had omitted a letter somewhere. But no. No. There is a prominent button at the top of the grid that you are supposed to click when you're "DONE." So I have no idea what my actual time was. Over 9 minutes, but under whatever the computer has listed for "longgoodbye" (my OTHER stage name).

4A: "On the Record" host Van Susteren (Greta)

Where was she last night? I know she does legal stuff, but I would have expected to see her and her tragically plastic surgerized mug on the TV last night. Wait, does she work for FOX? If so, then that explains it. I switch to FOX News only when all other news networks and Comedy Central are on commercials. Yep, she's on FOX. Good for the Times for including a FOX News, uh, Personality in the grid. Perhaps, inspired by overwhelmingly centrist election results, the Times will temper its legendary political bias, reaching across party lines and bringing a nude erection to the puzzle.

24A: Lover boy? (Amor) [NICE clue!]
39D: 4,100-mile-long river (Nile)
35A: Sectioned, as windows (paned)

AMOR and his cousin EROS are grid staples and I hereby induct them both into the Crossword Pantheon (why have I not put this up in the sidebar yet!?). "Lover boy" is a great phrase and makes me think of that song "Love is Strange" by Mickey and Sylvia, which contains the weird, spoken exchange: Mickey: "How do you call your lover boy?" Sylvia (with hungry feeling): "Come here, lover boy!" Like the damned ASPS that frolic in it, the NILE is a Pantheon member too. Can we get the hell out of the Nile basin for just one day? Just one? Egypt was just put on the "Enemies of the Internet" list yesterday, so maybe we need to send them a message: No ASPS or NILE in our puzzles until you shape up! And will somebody please tell me what PANED is doing in my puzzle for the second time in a week?

3D: People in a pool (stenos)
46D: Gentleman's companion (geisha)

There is something oddly dated about these clue/answer pairs. There has been some discussion at the NYT solvers' forum about common crossword answers that have become dated over time (e.g. CO-ED as a female college student, ), and STENOS was a word that at least one person put forth as a has-been. Do companies still have "steno pools" - do people still know how to take short-hand dictation? Don't robots convert voice signals into text instantly now? And as for GEISHA... the "Gentleman" part of the clue seems horribly euphemistic. Like calling a strip joint a "Gentlemen's Club." Seedy poker-playing loser jerks should not get to hide behind the word "gentleman." Now I know that where geishas are concerned, there is a long history of their being high-class escorts, so the "gentle-" part is apt, at least class-wise. But still. Something about this is icky. Maybe this picture will help explain. Gentleman or asshole?:
13D: Electees (ins)
59D: One of 100: Abbr. (Sen.)

The puzzle has an election-day hangover, and so here we see some residual, election-related cluing. As of right now, there are more Democratic INS in the House than Republicans, while the SENate sits at 49-49 with two races outstanding (well, 49-47-2, with Sad Sack Liebermann and that Socialist guy from Vermont being Independents). Speaking of winning Democrats, something about the middle of this puzzle, with 37A (THEME): Upbeat, outgoing sort (Mr. Personality) on top of 42A: Thick smoke? (cigar) on top of 47A: Surrender, as arms (lay down) makes me think of my hero Bill Clinton. And not because he brokered peace agreements (OK, I know that in order for the full Lewinsky-ness of this reference to work, the phrase should be LIE DOWN, but I work with what I got).

28D: Composer Rorem (Ned)

Not to be confused with NED Lamont, who got his limousine liberal ass handed to him by Sad Sack Liebermann last night.

49D: "Our Town" playwright (Wilder)

When I got to this clue, I had the "W" - now, I've seen "Our Town" performed live, both by professionals and by high-schoolers, I read Wilder's The Bridge at San Luis Rey intensively in my junior-year English course - I learned the word "gesticulating" from the phrase used to describe all the main characters in that novel plummeting to their deaths from the broken bridge: "gesticulating ants." And yet I completely FROZE. "W..." "W...." WRIGHT. WILSON. WENDT. WHAT the hell? I lost many seconds because I stubbornly refused to move on and come back to it. I completely lost sight of the big picture in order to make a point where the little picture was concerned. The puzzle burned down around me, but I sure taught that little @#$#@ Wilder a lesson about hiding from me.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

Read more...