Word of the Day: AMEDEO Modigliani (40A: Painter Modigliani) —
Amedeo Clemente Modigliani (US: /ˌmoʊdiːlˈjɑːni/, Italian: [ameˈdɛːo modiʎˈʎaːni]; 12 July 1884 – 24 January 1920) was an Italianpainter and sculptor who worked mainly in France. He is known for portraits and nudes in a modern style characterized by a surreal elongation of faces, necks, and figures that were not received well during his lifetime, but later became much sought-after. Modigliani spent his youth in Italy, where he studied the art of antiquity and the Renaissance. In 1906, he moved to Paris, where he came into contact with such artists as Pablo Picasso and Constantin Brâncuși. By 1912, Modigliani was exhibiting highly stylized sculptures with Cubists of the Section d'Or group at the Salon d'Automne.
Modigliani's oeuvre includes paintings and drawings. From 1909 to 1914, he devoted himself mainly to sculpture. His main subject was portraits and full figures, both in the images and in the sculptures. Modigliani had little success while alive, but after his death achieved great popularity. He died of tubercular meningitis, at the age of 35, in Paris.
• • •
Lots to do today—including participate in an online round-table discussion at the opening of the Finger Lakes Crossword Competition (enrollment still open)—so I'm going to *try* to keep this fairly brief. This puzzle felt like the antithesis of yesterday's puzzle in many ways, by which I don't mean that it was bad, just that it played very traditional and very old (to be clear, I count myself among the olds now—lots of this grid was right in my wheelhouse). It was reliant on names of yore maybe once too often. I love COUNT BASIE and AMEDEO Modigliani, so no problem there, but it would be great if you balanced them by moving the needle a little forward in time, but that is decidedly not where the needle goes (p.s. don't ask me re: needle, I don't know what the metaphor is exactly, but it feels right, just go with it). I don't think we ever make it out of the '70s (god bless the late great James CAAN) (25D: James of 1974's "The Gambler"). I had to deal with Matthew ARNOLD at the beginning (not exactly what the kids, or anyone, is reading these days), and then I went headlong into Gordon MACRAE, whoever that is (24A: Gordon ___, co-star of 1955's "Oklahoma!"). And later, just as I was thinking the puzzle was feeling pretty dated, who decides to show up and prove me right? The LENNON Sisters. On the "Lawrence Welk Show" no less. The grid is very sturdy and professionally made, so basic craft is not really at issue. But this puzzle feels much narrower in its socio-cultural bent than yesterday's did. It's one for the old-schoolers, of which I am one. But I could feel how limited this puzzle's imagined audience seemed to be. For me, with a crossword's cultural center of gravity, it's not a matter of old v. new. It's a matter of genuine variety.
It was a properly tough Saturday, though, I'll give it that. And I did enjoy solving it. Got started by working the short answers in the NW. Was very lucky that even though I only picked up a couple on my first pass, that was enough to get me going:
That nail polish brand is *everywhere* these days, so if you haven't memorized it by now, what are you waiting for?! It's not going anywhere soon, I promise you. And it was a real help today, for sure. I blanked on who wrote "Dover Beach"—even with the "A" in place. Couldn't get my brain off AUDEN, who wouldn't fit. I threw STORM CENTER down into the middle of the grid, to no effect. Then I threw PIÑATA down into the middle of the grid. This also had no effect, initially, but was right *enough* that it actually helped me pick up some of those central Acrosses later on. But at first, I was stuck, and had to go down to SAND and AMEDEO and build back up from the SW:
As you can see, PIÑATA (wrong) helped me get COUNT BASIE (right). It also helped me get SERATONIN, which is for real how I thought you spelled it (32A: Neurotransmitter targeted by Prozac) (SEROTONIN). Only later was I forced to change the cocktail from PIÑATA to PANAMA ... and then, a bit later, PALOMA. By far the hardest thing in the grid for me (and I love cocktails!). Oh, STATE MOTTO was also brutally hard for me (33A: There is one each in French, Spanish, Italian, Greek, Hawaiian and Chinook). I don't want to tell you how much of that answer I had in place before I actually saw the answer, but it was a lot (and PIÑATA *definitely* hurt me there). It's so weird how much of a gimme, how completely Monday the SCOTIA is, given the otherwise tough quality of this center (29D: Nova ___). Very out of place. But I suppose it was supposed to be a kind of life preserver thrown to the desperate and floundering, which is thoughtful. Overall, it's a very drunk puzzle (a PALOMA and TITO'S and BACARDI!?), and a very sturdy, clean puzzle. There weren't many thrills, but it gave me an enjoyable workout nonetheless. See you tomorrow.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
P.S. for your "Don't Believe Everything You Read Online" files, I offer you this gem, an apparently bot-written bio of me that gets several things wrong. Among other things, it briefly but jarringly confuses me with Will Shortz.
Word of the Day:GLISSANDI (50A: Dramatic musical effects)—
Per Wikipedia, this is a GLISSAND[O]
In music, a glissando (Italian: [ɡlisˈsando]; plural: glissandi, abbreviated gliss.) is a glide from one pitch to another (Play (help·info)). It is an Italianized musical term derived from the French glisser, "to glide". In some contexts, it is distinguished from the continuousportamento.
• • •
Hi all, Rachel Fabi filling in for Rex tonight.
Oh man, this puzzle was so not my speed (which is not to say that I didn't enjoy it!). Between the comedians I was only passingly familiar with (MEARA, BRENNAN), the weirdly Louisiana-specific trivia through the middle (DIXIELANDJAZZ, MOBILEALABAMA), the retro office equipment (DOTMATRIX, apparently a kind of printer?), and the 20th century athletes (DIZ, EDBERG), I really struggled with this one. I also have some serious gripes with the fill.
The puzzle definitely skewed older; in addition to the DOTMATRIX printer, we had a 1929 Gershwin title girl (LIZA), a play from an obscure card game that is related to another obscure card game that is maybe related to Pinochle? (MELD - 23A: Combination in the card game bezique), and plenty of other things that were just so far beyond my own cultural universe that I really struggled to unravel them. Which is fine! Possibly even the point of crossword puzzles! I do not begrudge the constructor his less-than-current fill, any more than other solvers in whose wheelhouse this puzzle comfortably fit might resent a puzzle filled with the neologisms characteristic of younger constructors. Speaking for myself, I do crossword puzzles to learn new (or old) things, so I am definitely not irritated by the things I didn't know. What I cannot forgive, however, is sticking those things together with the fill we have here.
Moe does not approve of your fill
The most egregious of the fill is DERE (38A: In dat place). Absolutely. Not. If you get to a place where you are making up words to put in the clue for a made up word, you need to reevaluate your grid and tear some things out. There will just never be a time when you should be filling your puzzle with non-words (and/or potentially offensive riffs on accents). Also terrible: RIS, an obscure partial from the name of a French dish that really does not google in English; MOE, as in eeny-meeny-miny-moe; LAE (32D: Ka ___ (southernmost point of Hawaii)); the aforementioned DIZ; and DAH, which is a morse code noise.
I appreciated the challenge of this puzzle, and I think the stair-step grid design is funky and interesting with those little YES/MOE cutouts. While the content often escaped me, I don't think anything in the puzzle was unfair; everything I struggled with had reasonable crosses, and I was able to finish only slightly above my average Friday time. Overall, despite my gripes with the fill, I enjoyed it.
Bullets:
OATEN (42D: Like some straw)— It seems that OATEN is the adjective form of oat, so OATEN straw is straw from oats? Learning new things about agriculture!
DIXIELANDJAZZ (31A: New Orleans entertainment) — Have to admire the constructor for really going for it with the X, J, and double Z here.
Thanks to Rex for letting me stop by!
Signed, Rachel Fabi, Queen-for-a-Day of CrossWorld
Whole lot of nothin' at first, and then I went on this weird loping excursion across the grid (unusual—very unusual on a Saturday):
[note the humiliating misspelling of ABATTOIR]
Aside from that cluster in the North, the first answer I was sure of was ABATTOIR, which luckily I at least partially spelled correctly. Filled some stuff in around its tail end, and bing bam boom I'm way down in the SE corner. From this point on, I generally had enough leverage to work my way through the grid without much trouble. SE corner filled up pretty fast, and once DEAD GIVEAWAY (21D: It's pretty obvious) floated up, that fat, open center became far more tractable, far less daunting. Took me a while to get MARILYN MONROE (15D: Famed Pop Art subject) because I (very) wrongly assumed 13A: Hannibal's men ended in an "S," which gave me the wrong initial letter for the MARILYN answer. I knew -SMILEY (read "Smiley's People" a couple years back) but totally forgot his first name, so getting into the SW corner was a little tricky. Had SUMMERED for WINTERED at 11D: Spent a season in the sun? for a bit, and needed nearly ever cross for NATANT (18A: Swimming), an actual word that I've never seen used anywhere. Biggest problem spot of the day was easily the NW, where [Hannibal's men] ("THE A-TEAM") just destroyed me, and --ART- sent my pattern recognition program straight to ECARTE (3D: Trick-taking card game). Like HEARTS, ECARTE is Also A Trick-Taking Game. Ugh. But at the end of the solve, I was a little bit under 9 minutes—very average for a Saturday. Maybe even a hair's breadth faster than usual. I quite liked this one. The center came out really very good. Connective tissue is mostly strong, with DURA/ITSA being the only weak spot.
I think I mentioned that erstwhile crossword plagiarist Timothy Parker was back publishing puzzles for Universal (a widely syndicated crossword). I thought you'd like to see his latest creation, which is ... notable? ... for two things. One, its theme—the title is "Initial Sandwich"; see if you can figure out why. And while you're at it, please admire the second notable feature—a truly stellar clue (in the blue strip, up top) for SNOB:
SPECIAL MESSAGE for Solvers in Syndication(for the week of January 15-January 22, 2017)
Hello, solvers. A new year has begun, and that means it's time for my week-long, once-a-year pitch for financial contributions to the blog. The idea is very simple: if you read the blog regularly (or even semi-regularly), please consider what it's worth to you on an annual basis and give accordingly. In making this pitch, I'm pledging that the blog will continue to be here for you to read / enjoy / grimace at for at least another calendar year, with a new post up by 9:00am (usually by 12:01am) every day, as usual. Despite my regular grumbling about puzzle quality, constructor pay, and other things that should be better in the world of crosswords, I still love solving, I still love writing about puzzles, and I love love love the people I meet and interact with because of this blog. Well, most of them. Some I mute on Twitter, but mostly: there is love. The blog turned 10 in September, and despite the day-in, day-out nature of the job, I can't foresee stopping any time soon. The community of friends and fellow enthusiasts are all just too dear to me. You can expect me to be here every day, praising / yelling at the puzzle—independent and ad-free. Some people refuse to pay for what they can get for free. Others just don't have money to spare. All are welcome to read the blog—the site will always be open and free. But if you are able to express your appreciation monetarily, here are two options. First, a Paypal button (which you can also find in the blog sidebar):
Second, a mailing address:
Rex Parker c/o Michael Sharp
54 Matthews St
Binghamton, NY 13905
All Paypal contributions will be gratefully acknowledged by email. All snail mail contributions (I. Love. Snail mail!) will be gratefully acknowledged with hand-written postcards. This year's cards are "Cookery Postcards from Penguin"—beautifully designed covers of vintage cookbooks, with provocative titles like "Cookery For Men Only " (!) or "Good Meals from Tinned Foods" (!?). Please note: I don't keep a "mailing list" and don't share my contributor info with anyone. And if you give by snail mail and (for some reason) don't want a thank-you card, just say NO CARD. As I say in every thank-you card (and email), I'm so grateful for your readership and support.
Now on to the puzzle!
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YEOH is right. Actually, I'm pronouncing that "yeow" in my head, which is undoubtedly wrong. Still, my point stands, which is this one was rough—not in a tough way, but in an ouchy way. The top and bottom parts, despite being (apparently) far less demanding to fill well, are somehow filled 4x worse than the quadstack area (which itself isn't nearly as interesting as most recent stacks from Mr. Ashwood-Smith). I have no idea what's happening up top and below. Boatloads of subpar-to-bad-fill, inexplicable Scrabble-f*cking with "X"s, crosswordese galore incl. ADAIR, ORR, ODEON, NISAN, and the inexplicable revival of TOSSPOTS. And yet the only real groany stuff in the middle section is ORARE and HEA. Baffling. Since the quadstack itself isn't scintillating today, its basic solidity does not do nearly enough to undo the top/bottom garbagefest. Shout-out to HAD A HAND IN and COPACETIC, which are pleasant diversions. And shout-out to ELVIN BISHOP(25D: "Fooled Around and Fell in Love" hitmaker of 1976), whose name I couldn't remember, but whose song I sure do:
The NYT has to stop this gratuitous use of the near-future President's family, and the ALT-right in general, in its puzzles. OBAMA (and MALIA) appeared a lot because his letter pattern is so grid-friendly. 60% vowels, terminal A—both useful features. And you can clue OBAMA only one way. Nowhere else to go. ERIC, however, has a near-infinity of other clues ... and yet you go to this smug fascist halfwit ... twice in one week!? I'm in no way saying the puzzle has a rightward tilt (that's absurd, just as absurd as the opposite claim). I'm saying the incoming administration is repugnant on every level and casual references to them (and their Nazi, sorry, ALT-right supporters) in crossword puzzles normalizes them. It's the most normalizing thing ever, actually. The banal neutrality of a crossword clue. Fuck all that. All of it. Also, I happen to know that in this case, the ERIC clue was an editorial decision, and one that did Not sit well with at least one of the constructors. I'd be furious too if someone rubbed that shit on my puzzle. Even if you're trying to draw some vague connection to Mussolini's right-hand man there at 45D: ___ Balbo, right-hand man to Mussolini (ITALO) ... no.
OK, so, the thing about these stack puzzles (triples, quads, whatever) is that they all feel the same. This is not to say that they are all of the same quality—MAS here does them as well if not better than anyone else (among constructors who bother to make stackers, he mostly has imitators, not equals). It's just that the experience of solving them is the same: hack away at the short Downs and then use pattern recognition (and, uh, your general knowledge base, I guess) to get the long Acrosses. Usually one Across tips things pretty hard your way (esp. in a triple-stack situation; quads might be a little peskier). The grid-spanners often come in dull or forced, or at any rate not scintillating. This is where good separates itself from not-good: the quality of the stack components. Getting a stack to work is one thing. Getting one to work and by majority-cool, that's tougher. Oh, the good also separates itself from the not-good in the tolerability of those short Downs. No one expects gold, but the less cringing, the better. I would put this puzzle on the higher end of stack-based puzzles. That center stack, in particular, is very solid, very nice. I might even be more impressed by the general smoothness of the short Downs. I doubt most solvers note this kind of stuff, but as someone who has a low tolerance for wincing and a huge appreciation for craftsmanship, the exactness of the little details pleases me. Still, solving this type of puzzle always feels like a by-the-numbers exercise. No real sparkle or surprises, and not much room for interesting answers anywhere *besides* the long Acrosses.
Didn't get 1A straight off ([Ones making the rules?]) but figured it had something to do with lines (like ruled paper?), so it wasn't too hard, after my first pass at the Downs, to pick up MEASURING STICKS. Having MESSINA at the back end of an entry had me thinking Loggins, but instead I get STRAIT OF MESSINA—new to me (17A: Passage between Sicily and the toe of Italy). Manage to get out of N without much trouble. Tried to make Shirley BASS(E)Y work at 2D: Shirley of "Goldfinger" (EATON). Didn't she sing one of the Bond theme songs. Yes! In fact, she sang "Goldfinger," just as I suspected. 10 points to Gryffindor!
Hardest part of puzzle for me was SEIDEL (what?) next to ALL UP (who?) two doors down from OCULI (really?) (30D: Round openings in domes). Otherwise, nothing too tough. That middle has a rather ugly east end (ISSET MERS), and also AHAIR, which would've been not so big a deal if it hadn't been followed shortly thereafter by AWIRE. Still, as I say, short fill stays pretty dang clean. Overall, a fine Friday outing.
Constructor:Martin Ashwood-Smith and George Barany
Relative difficulty:Medium
THEME:none
Word of the Day:DANAIDES(36D: Eternal water-pourers in Hades) —
In Greek mythology, the Daughters of Danaus (/dəˈneɪɪdiːz/; Greek: Δαναΐδες), also Danaids, Danaides or Danaïdes, were the fifty daughters of Danaus. They were to marry the fifty sons of Danaus's twin brother Aegyptus, a mythical king of Egypt. In the most common version of the myth, all but one of them killed their husbands on their wedding night, and are condemned to spend eternity carrying water in a sieve or perforated device. In the classical tradition, they come to represent the futility of a repetitive task that can never be completed (see also Sisyphus). (wikipedia)
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The 15s / 16s hold up pretty well; the rest ... doesn't. The top and the bottom are full of gunk that made this puzzle icky to move through. Improbably, the quadstack felt like the smoothest part of the grid. Sure, it has a few predictably less-than-ideal crosses (I see you, ECASH), but there's not nearly as much bad short stuff in the middle as there is everywhere else. This makes almost no sense, as one would expect the reverse to be true. Quadstacks put strain on a grid, so that should be where the strain should show. Instead, ADM REA ELENI (!?) DENTE chunk is up top, in the place where the puzzle should be cleanest. And the bottom is even rougher, with PAREE MERLE AAS AREOLA NO FEES AERO being a cavalcade of blah, and ERY APEAR EAPOE (all up against the very tough DANAIDES) is a flat-out disaster. It's as if two different people made this puzzle. Oh ... look at that. I wonder if that had anything to do with this. I won't speculate. Martin's not usually so careless with the tops and bottoms of his centered quadstacks, is all I'm saying. The three 16-letter Downs do add perhaps somewhat more strain to the grid than one might otherwise see in a quadstack. Still...
JAPAN was wickedly clued (1D: Follower of a diet system), especially crossing JAGS, which for some reason I don't think of as [Sharp projections]. They're cats, for short, or they're crying spells, or maybe some kind of generically handsome TV military lawyers, I'm not sure. What "Gear" does OIL protect? Oh, the actual gear of a car? One of many gears? OK. I had many different answers where AHASH (blargh) is supposed to go. Started with A MESS, then went to A MASH, which worked swimmingly ... for a while. I've read a lot of classical literature, but the DANAIDES somehow got by me. Virtually no part of that answer (except the terminal "S") was inferrable to me—this made the (ugly) southern section by far the hardest. Oh, except for the [___ College] / [Cannery row?] crossing. I wrote in COE College, which is a place, and it worked, except ... CARS? Are there rows of CARS at a cannery? Turns out, there are not. JOE College, 20x ugh, who says that anymore? That's some '50s-era stuff. And again down there with the EGRET and ESTE and ORES—really weak fill where it shouldn't be. I did enjoy the longer stuff. I just don't get the quality discrepancy.
Word of the Day:Gabriel FAURÉ(31D: Debussy contemporary) —
Gabriel Urbain Fauré (French: [ɡabʁiɛl yʁbɛ̃ fɔʁe]; 12 May 1845 – 4 November 1924) was a French composer, organist, pianist and teacher. He was one of the foremost French composers of his generation, and his musical style influenced many 20th-century composers. Among his best-known works are his Pavane, Requiem, nocturnes for piano and the songs "Après un rêve" and "Clair de lune". Although his best-known and most accessible compositions are generally his earlier ones, Fauré composed many of his most highly regarded works in his later years, in a more harmonically and melodically complex style. (wikipedia)
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Solved this one on paper, and was stunned at how quickly it fell, especially considering how much white space there is in the middle. I think having a massive, huge, neon, flashing gimme at 1A: Phylicia of stage and screen (RASHAD) can make a huge difference for a puzzle's overall difficulty. With RASHAD in place, most of those short Downs were a cinch, which then meant that I had the front ends of the two 15s. So I was forced to linger up there for something close to zero amount of time. The only issue was what the hell came after EZ PASS .... the only thing I could think of was LANES, but obviously I needed more letters. So I just followed HEAVY CASUALTIES over to the NE, worked the short Downs over there, and then eventually worked my way into the center of the top section, revealing *TOLL* to be the missing crucial ingredient in the EZ PASS stew. I don't love that answer. EZ PASS TOLL LANES doesn't hang together that neatly. Doesn't pop. Doesn't feel coherent. It's hard to argue against the actual existence of such lanes, but I'd just call them EZ PASS LANES, the whole "toll" business being implied.
So, Much too easy up top. But then a little resistance: Who (the &&$^%!@#!...) is TAB BENOIT (16D: Grammy-nominated blues guitarist in the Louisiana Music Hall of Fame)? I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that neither being "Grammy-nominated" nor being in the "Louisiana Music Hall of Fame" makes you crossworthy. In fact, being both those things might actually work against you. Wow. He seems very talented, but in this puzzle, he's the outlyinglest thing by far, familiarity-wise. Well, luckily, every cross was solid and gettable, so no harm done there. LOSS OF INNOCENCE went easily down the center and then PLAY FOR A FOOL went in at 25A: Deem to be dumb. I immediately thought "Hmm, that could be TAKE FOR A FOOL," then saw the clue at 21D: Husky cousins, and knew it was, indeed, TAKE (and AKITAS). And so, though the center was harder than the top, it wasn't that hard at all. I've seen that "Fine" misdirection at 34A: Fine source of humor, with "the"? (THREE STOOGES) a lot, including once recently, so the trick missed me. I didn't know AL'S Toy Barn or TERNE, but it didn't matter—all the other answers just washed right over the little things I didn't know.
AboutFEMININE WILES (31A: Quaint means of manipulation): is the term itself quaint? Are the wiles quaint? Is the notion that women use such wiles quaint? I'm not quite sure what's quaint here. It literally says "quaint means," but … so … women DO use them to manipulate? … and it's quaint? When you use your wiles, are you being quaint? And does the etymology of the word "quaint" play any role in this answer (just google [quaint Middle English] and see what comes up). Let's just say I'm making all kinds of uncertain, skeptical faces at this answer. The phrase is certainly valid—I'm just not sure about the clue. I used to call my cat WILES. His name was Wiley. It made a kind of sense.
["I'm suspicious and keeping notes..."]
ONE BOTTLE also has me looking skeptically at it, but for different reasons (27D: Order to a sommelier, maybe). I would look similarly at ONE WALL or THREE CANS or EIGHT VOLVOS. 47D: Kid's cry (MAA) is pretty cute, in that at first I thought it was a human kid crying, protractedly, for his MAA (MAA). But of course a kid is a baby goat. And MAA is the goat cry, just as surely as BAA is the sheep cry. I thought that as stack-oriented themelesses go, this one held up OK. Lots of long answers, and nary a "ONE'S" in sight. Unless you count BARIT ONE'S AXES, which you probably shouldn't, as BARIT is not a word. That I know of.
In Egyptian mythology, Apis or Hapis (alternatively spelled Hapi-ankh) is a bull-deity that was worshipped in the Memphis region. "Apis served as an intermediary between humans and an all-powerful god (originally Ptah, later Osiris, then Atum)." [quote: Virtual Egyptian Museum] // Apis was the most important of all the sacred animals in Egypt, and, as with the others, its importance increased as time went on. Greek and Roman authors have much to say about Apis, the marks by which the black bull-calf was recognized, the manner of his conception by a ray from heaven, his house at Memphis with court for disporting himself, the mode of prognostication from his actions, the mourning at his death, his costly burial, and the rejoicings throughout the country when a new Apis was found. Auguste Mariette's excavation of the Serapeum at Memphis revealed the tombs of over sixty animals, ranging from the time of Amenophis III to that of Ptolemy Alexander. At first each animal was buried in a separate tomb with a chapel built above it. (wikipedia)
• • •
15x16 to accommodate that central quad-stack. Super-segmented grid typical of grids like this, where you gotta keep a majority of those quad crosses pretty short; thus the top and bottom tend to play like completely separate (and usually much easier) puzzles. So structure-wise it's a fairly typical specimen. Fill-wise, given the severe limitations imposed by quad-stacking, I'd say it comes out OK. You've got the Egyptian bull gods and hare constellations and minor Homeric characters that inevitably congregate around this kind of puzzle, but they certain don't overwhelm the grid. I'd argue that COMPUTER MONITOR and OPERATING SYSTEM and APPLIED RESEARCH are really, severely, aggressively, perversely dull 15s—all straight out of some nondescript building in some office park in suburban D.C. But the other 15s are pretty interesting, as are the longer answers that shoot through the quad-stack.
I had zero luck starting out in the NW, and so ended up getting traction in what felt like a weird place—first with ROM, then ODOM, then MGS, then IRISH SHA APRILS. Thus:
Felt like I was clinging to the rock with my fingertips. Also felt like I was starting on the wrong end of the puzzle. Working right-to-left-always feels slightly backwards to me, so it was especially odd to find myself, not much later, with the east side of the grid filled in, but totally unable to make any of the 15s shoot back across the grid:
Actually, at this point, I probably looked back up and realized that the Who title was "I CAN SEE FOR MILES" (37A: The Who's only U.S. top 10 hit). Earlier, I was thinking it was MILES AND MILES or "FOR MILES AND MILES" ... whatever I was thinking, it wasn't working. I also have never ever head of DAYTON, TENNESSEE, so front end of that was tough ... especially when I threw down MISSISSIPPI at 24D: Their state song is a waltz (MISSOURIANS). In my defense ... I don't know. It fit? Anyway, that gave me DAYTIN, which ... really looks (and is) wrong. No idea who that RAFE dude is. He was RENÉ for a hot second somewhere in there. Aren't THREE TENS actually better than a [Pretty good poker hand]. Wouldn't you win most of the time with that hand? Three of a kind, esp. THREE TENS ... I don't know, "pretty good" seems insufficient. I had no idea that you could use PAX without following it with "Romana" (54D: Time of wide-ranging stability). It literally means "peace," but I guess that since the Romans committed some amazing atrocities during their PAX, maybe the clue definition is, in fact, more accurate. I discovered today that I hate guns so much that I don't even want to see them in my crosswords any more. I didn't find the ARMED clue funny (48D: Piece-keeping?). This is not the fault of the constructor or editor. It's a matter of personal taste. I've just had it. [Note: Martin tells me clue was not his—again, not mad at anyone here...]
Word of the Day: BREST (51D: French shipyard city) —
Brest (French pronunciation: [bʁɛst]; Breton: [bʀest]) is a city in the Finistèredépartement in Brittany in northwestern France. Located in a sheltered position not far from the western tip of the Breton peninsula, and the western extremity of metropolitan France, Brest is an important harbour and the second French military port after Toulon. The city is located on the western edge of continental Europe. With 142,722 inhabitants in a 2007 census, Brest is at the centre of Western Brittany's largest metropolitan area (with a population of 300,300 in total), ranking third behind only Nantes and Rennes in the whole of historic Brittany, and the 22nd most populous city in France; moreover, Brest provides services to the one million inhabitants of Western Brittany. Although Brest is by far the largest city in Finistère, the préfecture (regional capital) of the department is the much smaller Quimper. (wikipedia)
• • •
A summer cold has made its way through our entire house. I am its ultimate victim. Because I would not stop for the cold, it kindly stopped for me. I'm awkwardly alluding to Dickinson, so you know something's wrong. Anyway, summer colds suck (Yeah, I know it's not "summer" yet, but give it a minute). So I did this puzzle after waking from a three-hour nap—gotta love those naps you have *right* before bedtime; exquisite timing. Still, I walked right through this thing, even with foggy post-nap summer cold head, so it must've been easy. What are my thoughts? Well, there's weirdly a lot of crosswordese, and not only where you'd expect it (i.e. crossing that quad stack). OISE ADANO ARPEL REPOS ERTE KNAR. All quite familiar, none hard to get. Just felt throwbacky, and not in a great way. But the marquee event up top is the double-author stack, which is pretty sweet. I also love the repackaging of vintage crosswordese ARLENE Dahl as full-named ARLENEDAHL. Somehow that uncrosswordeses (™) her name. Eventually it came time to do the stack at the bottom and it wasn't hard. Also, that's an excellent stack. The crosses, predictably, hurt a little, but there aren't any howlers. So, mixed feelings.
[from "SATCHMO Serenades"]
Things got off to a fast start—CHOCOHOLIC off a single letter (and I'm not sure I even needed that)—the clue was transparent to me) (4D: One who might steal a kiss).
From here I pounded into the center of the grid pretty easily, but had weird bit of trouble trying to get JOHN STEINBECK, even after I had JOHN STE- … I think JON (no "H") Stewart was running interference in my head. But I dropped OPALESCENT like it was hot.
ANGELINA was a total gimme (8D: Brad's partner in 2005's "Mr. & Mrs. Smith"), so JOHN STEINBECK and then the rest of the top of the grid fell into place pretty easily. I emerged from the top via ARLENE DAHL and then set to work on the quadstack.
I got the back ends of the quad first, but they didn't do much for me, so I went after other Downs, and found RAMIS AREI and COWGIRL just waiting for me. Made the stack very easy to see and take down.
About five seconds after this, I was done. I ended in the iffiest part of the grid (i.e. the no-"UE" MONOLOG MISADAPTed INAPEN), which often happens, actually—you end up at the place that you've been consciously or unconsciously avoiding, often for good reason. And so to bed. Or, rather, to Jon Stewart, which is apparently remarkable tonight—or so Twitter tells me. It's been a pretty terrible day, nationally, historically … I STILL DON'T GET IT seems apt, somehow.
[You can see where I wrote "CARAN…, up top, in my bid to parse CAR ANTENNA (5D: One getting the show on the road?) … you can also see that I wrote "Wow!" for that clue, as well as for 25D: Fitting entertainment at an arcade? (TETRIS)]
THEME: none
Word of the Day: Bandar SERI Begawan (35D: Bandar ___ Begawan (Brunei's capital)) —
[Not sure what red line indicates—cruise? pirate adventure?]
• • •
I always (and I mean Always) forget where Brunei is. So the map is for me than it is for you. I mean, you can look at it if you want, but my principal edification target is me. I solved on paper today for some reason. I think I just got sick of screens. Sometimes it's nice to be able to look back over a grid and really See where you screwed up (erasures, write-overs, etc.). Or where you got annoyed / aggrieved (note all the little :( faces and "?"s and what not on my grid). I missed the ACPT this year, so I haven't had to solve on paper in a long time, but I'm headed to The Indie 500 Tournament in D.C. on May 30, and since tournament solving is always done on paper, I kind of need to get back into paper-solving shape. It really is a different beast in a lot of ways, though the harder the puzzle gets, the less important the difference is between on-screen and paper—on-screen is much faster when you're dealing with easy puzzles. But ANYway… paper! I like making little marginal annotations as I go. I usually do this after I print out a completed puzzle, but it's kind of nice to record my notes as I solve, rather than retrospectively; more … authentic, somehow.
[18A: Like many 911 calls]
I thought this puzzle was fine. As quadstacks go, totally average. It has all the usual infelicities in the short fill, but somehow today these are not offset by charming / interesting stack-answers. BEATING A RETREAT has a bit of life, but the rest are common-letter-heavy snoozers. I thought SALES ASSISTANTS was a joke among constructors, as it is oft-used and saturated in 1-pt Scrabble tiles. Maybe I'm thinking of a different phrase, but SALES ASSISTANTS is close. *All* those "S"s enable soooo many plurals. Makes filling a grid like this soooo much easier (not easy—but easier). ALTERNATE ROUTES has about as much charm. NO INTEREST LOANS. Seriously, these are all phrases from a tedious business meeting where people sit around a conference table and vie to impress the CEO w/ business speak jargon. What did we NET? How do we lower our TAX liability? Do we still have that fleet of SSTS in Bandar SERI Begawan or did we sell those? CAN TEEN consumers get their parents to say YES to buying them this year's hottest fashion, "UTE RAGS"? Where's PAT? Get PAT in here. She'll want in on this." ETC.
Here's a recent New Yorker cartoon with (yet another) bullshit grid.
Have you noticed how incapable advertisers / cartoonists / all humans are of depicting American crossword grids accurately? Dear editors: here are the Basics: 1. all-over interlock (i.e. no unchecked squares) 2. no answers of fewer than three letters 3. rotational symmetry (or some kind of symmetry). Please share with any friends you have who are or might some day be responsible for the visual representation of American crossword grids. Thanks!
Here's another bad one:
["MYSTERY" is right …]
And another:
[Now *that* is a terrible theme]
So at this point, it looks like I'm a collector.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
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A long time ago, I was solving this puzzle and got stuck at an unguessable (to me) crossing: N. C. WYETH crossing NATICK at the "N"—I knew WYETH but forgot his initials, and NATICK ... is a suburb of Boston that I had no hope of knowing. It was clued as someplace the Boston Marathon runs through (???). Anyway, NATICK— the more obscure name in that crossing—became shorthand for an unguessable cross, esp. where the cross involves two proper nouns, neither of which is exceedingly well known. NATICK took hold as crossword slang, and the term can now be both noun ("I had a NATICK in the SW corner...") or verb ("I got NATICKED by 50A / 34D!")
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