Wrestling's Flair / TUE 6-5-12 / Brooklynese pronoun / Memory trace / Liqueur similar to Sambuca / Opposite of old in Germany / Blistex target

Constructor: Sharon Delorme

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: I to U — vowel change creates wackiness

Word of the Day: ENGRAM (45D: Memory trace) —

Engrams are a hypothetical means by which memory traces are stored as biophysical or biochemical changes in the brain (and other neural tissue) in response to external stimuli.

They are also sometimes thought of as a neural network or fragment of memory, sometimes using a hologram analogy to describe its action in light of results showing that memory appears not to be localized in the brain. The existence of engrams is posited by some scientific theories to explain the persistence of memory and how memories are stored in the brain. The existence of neurologically defined engrams is not significantly disputed, though their exact mechanism and location has been a focus of persistent research for many decades. (wikipedia)

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Unless I'm missing some clever aspect of this theme, the only thing going on is a vowel change: I to U. Not only does this seem like it could render infinite* possible answers, it seems like one could get infinite possible answers with any two vowels. A to E. O to U. Etc. There needs to be some other kind of delimitation. Or the resulting "wacky" answers need to be Superfantastic. Neither is true today. But, it is what it is, and what it is isn't totally broken, so things are looking ... up? Sure.


Theme answers:

• 17A: Boring predicaments? (DULL PICKLES) — makes no sense, on any level
• 28A: Tulip planters, perhaps? (DUTCH DIGGERS) — the persistence of short "I"s in the second word is somehow distracting
• 35A: Strong advocates of margarine? (BUTTER ENEMIES)
• 43A: Bring Ebert and Moore together? (MUSTER ROGERS) — there's 'wacky' and then there's absurd
• 59A: Expert ladder climbers? (RUNG MASTERS) — believe it or not, I had No idea what the theme was until I was all the way down here. Nah, just believe it, 'cause it's true.

Long Downs in the NE and SW give this puzzle some much-needed zing. Very nice. I also like THREW ON, in the middle. Beyond that, the fill is pretty average. Not great, not BAD (11A: Deserving detention, say). Got held up at several points, mostly because of vague or misdirectional cluing. Needed every cross to get DISBAR and only then understood what "practicing" meant in 21A: Keep from practicing. Only island off Australia I could think of was TASMAN (didn't fit). TIMOR took a while (6A: Island north of Australia). Still not that clear on what ENGRAM means even after reading definition, so ... yeah, no (45D: Memory trace). GASMAN seems a fine enough word (so close to TASMAN ...), but it somehow wasn't hovering in an accessible place of my vocabulary (46D: Certain meter reader). I also had DEM for DAT at first (28D: Brooklynese pronoun). Oh, and despite having been to Greece and knowing full well the liqueur in question, I needed the "Z" before I remembered OUZO (54D: Liqueur similar to Sambuca). If I could recommend one bit of crosswordese to you today, it's STU Ungar. He's the go-to non-Disco STU (50A: Poker champ Ungar).

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

*plus or minus

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