THEME:Silver Silver ... I honestly don't know —themers contain two "AG" squares apiece. Maybe ORE is supposed to be the revealer? (28D: Silver ___)
Theme answers:
BAGGAGE CLAIM (17A: Carousel locale)
ON AGAIN, OFF AGAIN (27A: Sporadic)
AGREE TO DISAGREE (43A: Leave a dispute unsettled)
STAGE MANAGER (58A: Role in "Our Town")
Word of the Day:"Vissi D'ARTE"(32A: "Vissi ___" (Puccini aria)) —
"Vissi d'arte" is a soprano aria from act 2 of the operaTosca by Giacomo Puccini. It is sung by Floria Tosca as she thinks of her fate, how the life of her beloved, Mario Cavaradossi, is at the mercy of Baron Scarpia and why God has seemingly abandoned her. The vocal range is E♭4 to B♭5. (wikipedia)
• • •
I'm worried about the puzzle. It's not ... doing ... well. It's not even really trying. This is creaky and not very coherent work. Two "AG" squares ... why? Because silver ... silver? Silvers! Is the meta "Phil SILVERS!?" What is happening? Mothball fill. Sad Scrabble-f*cking in the SW corner. A cultural frame of reference that excludes almost entirely the last 30 years (except HASHTAG—the best answer in this thing by far). Oh, right, there's crowd favorite clue [Rapper's headwear]. I think you can kinda sorta *feel* from this grid's overall vibe that "rappers" aren't really its thing. Are there other "silver" things besides the damn (terrible) ORE clue at 28D: Silver ___? There's an Olympics clue—did someone get a "silver" in the LUGE (3D: Olympics racer)?
ENTRAIN is in the middle of this puzzle (25D: Board, in a way). I love the "in a way" on that clue. It's like the clue itself isn't fully convinced and is kinda bailing out. "shrug idk." Oy, ENTRAIN. You ... must take the ENTRAIN ... but only if you're a FARER (more kwality fill). ABYSM!? D'ARTE? This puzzle lost me at 1A: ___-foot jelly (CALF'S), which remains totally inscrutable to me. I assume it belongs to another era somehow. Oh God, It's Food!?!?! I want to post a picture but ... I think I should tag it NSFW.
Somehow the English boil an actual CALF'S foot and the result is a dessert!? Or ... it can be if you add sugar? Wow. If you google it, you mainly get sites focusing on weird-ass foods. "Foods you've read about but never had ..." "What on earth is ...?" Etc. AG AG. AGAG, is AGAG a word? As in "This puzzle had me feeling all AGAG?" I'll stop now.
In case you're wondering what my grid looked like at the exact moment I "got" the rebus, here you go:
Oh and hey, check out the NYT earnings report, which actually separates out income from digital crossword subscriptions. Turns out it's ~$7 million / year ($6.3 in 2015, with subscriptions way up in the current year so far). Of that $7 million, about $146K goes to constructors. That's 2%. And that's just digital alone. That's not counting value of the crossword to home delivery subscriptions, and definitely not counting merch. Puzzle's overall value is really substantial, and constructor pay remains ABYSMal. The puzzles are increasingly sad/bad for a reason—no investment is being made in the product. None. Best constructors now frequently give their work to other venues or keep it for their own sites / puzzle ventures. Now, they do that for a host of reasons, but insulting pay is definitely one of them.
Word of the Day: ASCI (47D: Sacs studied by 58-Across) —
An ascus (plural asci; from Greek ἀσκός "skin bag") is the sexual spore-bearing cell produced in ascomycetefungi. On average, asci normally contain eight ascospores, produced by a meiotic cell division followed, in most species, by a mitotic cell division. However, asci in some genera or species can occur in numbers of one (e.g. Monosporascus cannonballus), two, four, or multiples of four. In a few cases, the ascospores can bud off conidia that may fill the asci (e.g. Tympanis) with hundreds of conidia, or the ascospores may fragment, e.g. some Cordyceps, also filling the asci with smaller cells. Ascospores are nonmotile, usually single celled, but not infrequently may be coenocytic (lacking a septum), and in some cases coenocytic in multiple planes. Mitotic divisions within the developing spores populate each resulting cell in septate ascospores with nuclei. (wikipedia)
• • •
I liked this puzzle way more than I thought I would. Figured Mel Rosen's sweet spot would be somewhat far afield from mine, and while perhaps on other days that has been true, today: false. Or, rather, partially true, but in a way that still allowed me a pleasurable experience. Flummoxed by PYE DOGS, ALEKSEI, ASCI and BINGHAM (this despite living in Binghamton … no connection, I presume). But everything else was either reasonably common knowledge or slightly uncommon knowledge that I also happened to share. I took one look at 1A: Popularity boost due to a certain TV endorsement and thought COLBERT BUMP. Then thought, "No way. Too show-specific." But it fit so I wrote it in and went after the crosses. Astonished/thrilled when I got a few to work. Pretty timely 1A, I gotta say, what with Colbert getting the (future) Late Show gig just yesterday. I look forward to the inevitable on-air self-celebration caused by this "honor." Anyway, longtime viewers of his Report will be very familiar with the BUMP; others … I don't know. I guess you'll just have to fight your way out of that corner with a sharp object and gumption.
I felt like I kept lucking into answers. 1A was the luckiest, but … take SAFECO. I only learned just last week that SAFECO was an insurance company. Today, that info helped a ton with getting into that SE corner. I filed my taxes today, so I think I just saw that damned IRS logo. It seemed like I was either making lucky initial guesses or having just enough crosses to be able to make sense of some of the longer answers. I got GEOCACHING off the "G," and I'm not sure I would even have needed that (27D: 21st-century treasure hunters). I spend a lot of time in the woods, and every once in a while you see people who look lost, or at least out of place. Geocachers, it turns out. This puzzle has some odd words, but overall it's pretty clean, laudably contemporary, and entertainingly varied in its range of answers. Its faults (there are a few, mainly in the short fill) are eminently forgivable.
Finished in just over 8, though I must've lost at least half a minute in pure Lionel Richie Frustration. I could not accept not knowing a 1987 Lionel Richie hit. "Truly" … "Hello" … "Dancin' on the Ceilin'" … COME ON! I do not remember SELA at all. I'm playing it now … barely registering. "Hit?" It's got a super reggae feel. I guess it beats yet another SELA Ward clue.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
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THEME: IN BUD (49D: About to bloom … or a hint to 20-, 33-, 41- and 52-Across) — four theme answers start with "BU-" and end with "-D," making … the remainder of the answer? … IN BUD?
Theme answers:
20A: Idles (BUMS AROUND)
33A: Allied supply route to China during W.W. II (BURMA ROAD)
41A: Having a rounded end, as pliers (BULL-NOSED)
52A: Sycamore tree (BUTTONWOOD)
Word of the Day: ILIA Kulik (38A: Olympic skating champ Kulik) —
1-Across says it all: STALE. This probably would've been an ordinary, run-of-the-mill early-week puzzle, say, 30 years ago. But now it just feels like a relic. So much crosswordese that you don't need me to point it out. Nothing to put it in this century except clues on TINA (22A: Fey of "30 Rock") and NBC (42D: "Parks and Recreation" network). A theme that doesn't really work with a revealer that's oddly placed. Still baffled that quality is allowed to limp along like this. There are good, fresh, thoughtful, entertaining modern puzzles out there. I solve some on a regular basis. I did a couple this past weekend. The Gold Standard should run those. And Only Those.
The grid shape is a Real problem here today, as we are given four theme answers and then, essentially, a bunch of horrible mini-grids, particularly in the corners. The highly segmented grid means that the tired shorter stuff is isolated and therefore highlighted. What's in this little corner? Oh look, ET TU and T-NOTE! How 'bout this one? ALIS and HASAT! ANIL and ILIA! And about ILIA—inexcusable. Proper noun crosswordese like that, when the grid is Not Hard To Fill, should not be tolerated. ILIA is about as welcome as yesterday's "ELENI." Now the basic old-fashionedness of the theme answers—two of which (BURMA ROAD, BUTTONWOOD) I'd never heard of—I can accept. Constructors and solvers come from all generations, and puzzles can and should reflect that. But the STALE fill, as you know by now, I just can't. Cannot. Can't.
Was going to talk about the ACPT some more today, but this puzzle has ruined the mood. Maybe tomorrow?
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
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Relative difficulty: Medium (times at the NYT site are astronomical—not sure what's happening there. Maybe people aren't reading the note....?)
THEME: "Question Box" — theme answers form a riddle, the answer to which ... oh, I'll just let the (prodigious) note explain: "When this puzzle is done, take the answers to the 10 starred clues and arrange them across and down in crossword fashion in the central 5x5 box. Due to software limitations, Across Lite and our other apps can only accept one solution, but two possibilities exist. The resulting five-letter word spelled out diagonally by the circles will answer the question asked at 23-, 34-, 91- and 107-Across."
The Riddle:IF A GIRAFFE HAS FOURTEEN / MORE THAN A WALRUS AND / A SQUIRREL HAS HALF AS / MANY AS A PIG WHAT ARE THEY?
The Answer:TEETH
Word of the Day: MALABAR Coast (67A: India's ___ Coast) —
The Malabar Coast is a long and narrow coastline on the south-western shore line of the mainland Indian subcontinent. Geographically, it comprises the wettest regions of southern India, as the Western Ghats intercept the moisture-laden monsoon rains, especially on their westward-facing mountain slopes. The term "Malabar Coast" is also sometimes used in reference to the entire Indian coast from the western coast of Konkanto the tip of the subcontinent at Kanyakumari. (wikipedia)
• • •
An interesting puzzle that feels like it came straight out of 1985. Well, I think I say that mainly based on the riddle (not a premise you see very much any more) and the fill, which is a lot of wince-y 3- and 4- and occasionally 5-letter stuff. Also ELOPERS and GIBERS and ASSYRO-, yuck. I find riddles (generally) corny and old-fashioned and not interesting/funny. I knew the answer to this one with just some of the first part of the riddle filled in. An animal has this many ... I mean, what the hell else is it going to be? I just wrote TEETH straight into the circles. Is it even a riddle? No, it's a fact. Or ... hell, I don't know. Anyway, it was easy—that part, anyway. Grid itself had some toughish moments. I wonder why the posted solving times at the NYT website are so high. Maybe people had trouble figuring out how to fill in that middle section (esp. since it can be done two ways but the applet accepts only one (!?!?!)). Whatever way I picked worked (TTOPS across instead of TTOPS down). I came in in the 13s, which would've made me #1 on the applet by several minutes, which makes noooo sense. Oh, looks like someone has posted a time in the 8s now. That's more like it.
I had a tiny scare in the NE when I couldn't find the handle on TRINARY. I had TRINITY for a bit (33A: Three-part). Scarier still was the SE, where I came to a dead stop at the junction of 104A: J.F.K.'s historic ___ Flight Center (TWA) and 104D: Old satellite-launching rocket (THOR) / 105D: Gave out (WENT). No idea on the JFK thing. USA? NSA? TSA? As you can see, I really wanted "S" in that second spot, as SENT was the answer that I came up with for [Gave out]. I eventually took it out and replaced it with what I was sure was a better answer: LENT. Only after I realized -HOR really, really couldn't be anything but THOR did I put it together. SW was the last of the tricky spots. Somebody's *name* is AGAR? (111A: Journalist/writer Herbert). I inferred the "R" because even though I've never seen "ASSYRO-" anything, I know that "Assyria" is a place name, so ... done. No, wait. I also had HOP ON / TOY and then HOP ON / POM (!) in the NW before I figured out it was HOP UP / PUG (18A: "Climb onto Papa's lap!" / 4D: Lap dog breed).
Bullets:
39A: Joint czar with Peter I (IVAN V) — no idea. Russian name + Roman numeral.
85A: Tammany Hall problem (GRAFT) — I got this easily enough, but the two Downs coming off of it—ARGUING(86D: At it) and FRINGES (87D: Features of some cowboy shirts) took many crosses to see. I'd just call it FRINGE, no matter how many individual FRINGES hung off the damned shirt.
102A: Company whose logo has a diagonal red arrow (SUNOCO) — great, more "shapes in a corporate logo" cluing. No idea.
5D: Channel starting in 2003 (SPIKE TV) — clue should've added "and ending in 2006" (it's just "Spike" now).
6D: Tennis great Tommy (HAAS) — To my credit, I remembered him this time. To my discredit, I remembered him as HAHN.
102D: "Pursuit of the Graf ___" (1956 war film)) (SPEE) — My brain was having trouble deciding which S-EE this was, SNEE or SMEE ... turns out: neither! Forgot about SPEE! (as I wish constructors would—not the best fill).
THEME: none Word of the Day: EGERIA (45A: Female adviser) —
n. A woman adviser or counselor.
[After Egeria, Roman nymph or goddess and adviser to Numa Pompilius, a legendary Roman king.] (answers.com)
• • •
Aside from EGERIA (gibberish to me—the one answer I was really uncertain of), this puzzle felt very doable. Tough, but typically tough for a Friday. Perhaps I was a little slower getting started than usual, though I feel like I say I was slow getting started All The Time now, so I don't know. I do know that I started in the NW with a colossal failure. A failure that went three answers deep before I realized something was wrong. Figured the "counter" in 1A: Counter act (SCAN) was a deli counter, or some place where things are sold (in this, I was right), so I wrote in SALE (in this, I was wrong). Off the "S" I wrote in not the correct SORES but the incorrect and much worse SKINS for 1D: Dermatology topics. Then off the "K" in SKINS I wrote in KEEP for 14A: "___ quiet!"—which, in my defense, is a very credible answer, perhaps even slightly more credible answer than the "correct" OH BE. But a candy maker that starts "EP-?" No. Couldn't think of one. And I know a little something about candy makers, I like to think. So after that initial foray into the grid, I had to abandon the NW and move on—to the NE, it turns out, where NIP AT became the first Solid answer in the grid (16A: Attack as a young boxer might). Crossed it with APT (11D: Easily taught), and sighed with relief at "finally" getting a real toehold. Sadly, this toehold would, initially, lead nowhere, largely because I wrote in SCARE instead of SNARE at 9A: Woe for the unwary. This meant CIN- as the opening for 10D: Skittles (NINE PINS). Couldn't remember exactly what skittles were, but was pretty sure they weren't CINEASTS, say, so with just the wee NE done, I again decamped and headed for greener grid pastures.
And so I arrived in the west, where having seen Johnny Depp in "Donnie Brasco" helped me get FBI (30A: "Donnie Brasco" grp.), which gave me BONGO (31D: It's not played with sticks). Tried LOLL at 35A: Eschew exertion but that ended up being weird so I eventually changed to LOAF. Wrote in ENTYM at 40A: Branch of zool. until I realized I'd conflated the study of bugs with the study of word origins—changed to ENTOM and rode FOREWORD (36D: Its page numbers are often Roman numerals) down to the bottom of the grid. Finished off the west (after braving EGERIA) and tried to ride 3D: Short-term? up to the top of the grid, but felt uncertain. Luckily, Ben VEREEN (27A: Chicken George player in "Roots") was there to help me out, giving me the "V" I needed to be certain of ABBREVIATED. Those Bs didn't look friendly at first, but they eventually made the NW behave. From there, I had serious momentum, and didn't struggle again. Rode the wave of progress in a generally southeasterly direction, eventually ending in the far SE with AROD (65A: 10-time Silver Slugger Award winner, familiarly).
[VEREEN! Goldblum!]
In the end, the puzzle seemed solid enough, though nothing was very grabby (or REGRABby, I guess) except WOOKIEEPEDIA (54A: Online reference for all things "Star Wars"), the spelling of which is very odd. What's with the unnecessary "E" in "WOOKIEE?" Never heard of: HONEY BADGER (24D: Guiness's "most fearless animal"); EGERIA (duh); MYLES (8D: Lee ___ (transmission repair chain)); HEME (62A: Myoglobin component); or INIGO López de Loyola (25D: Society of Jesus founder ___ López de Loyola). DRAYAGE was very inferrable (as I know what DRAY is), but it's at least a little icky (51A: Carting fee). Wanted NILE VALLEY or NILE BASIN before figuring out NILE DELTA (33D: Alexandria is in it). Not sure how I managed to associate an old brand of baseball card with the [Old Dubble Bubble maker], but I was: FLEER was the first thing I thought of after getting FBI. AYESHA I learned from crosswords (48D: H. Rider Haggard heroine). Dumb luck there. I can see that SE section being kind of brutal: a SNARE for the unwary.
Bullets:
23A: Cry from a stuck-up person? ("STOP HIM!") — very cute; possibly the best clue of the day.
32A: Near midnight (LATEN) — this word is like kudzu. Can we stop it now?
39A: Bearer of trumpet-shaped flowers (SEGO) — A lily, which I confuse with the SAGO palm and (for no good reason) the corn syrup KARO.
44A: "Lo! in ___ brilliant window-niche...": Poe ("YON") — YON is not in the original 1831 version of the poem ("To Helen"), but appears in the 1845 revision:
Helen, thy beauty is to me Like those Nicean barks of yore That gently, o'er a perfumed sea, The weary, way-worn wanderer bore To his own native shore.
On desperate seas long wont to roam, Thy hyacinth hair, thy classic face, Thy Naiad airs have brought me home To the glory that was Greece, And the grandeur that was Rome.
Lo, in yon brilliant window-niche How statue-like I see thee stand, The agate lamp within thy hand, Ah! Psyche, from the regions which Are Holy Land!
63A: Game with half-elves, informally (D AND D) — nice ampersandwich. Had the final two Ds and thought "Uh oh, that's not good." But it was.
5D: "Golf Begins at Forty" writer (SAM SNEAD) — forgot he wrote golf books. Was looking for somebody NEAL (?) until the obvious dawned on me.
7D: Husband of Gudrun (ATLI) — honestly, I wanted LOKI. Then later I wrote in ATRI (different crosswordese—Longfellow crosswordese).
57D: Janeane's co-star in "The Truth About Cats & Dogs" (UMA) — I saw this more than once in the mid-90s. I also own, and still listen to, the (good) soundtrack. I don't think the movie was that good. I think I was just bored. But I ended up liking the music—first time I ever heard Ben Folds. Soundtrack also features Paul Weller (erstwhile lead singer of The Jam):
THEME: "CROSS WORDS" — 9 two-word theme answers (arranged symmetrically) whose two words cross at their centers
Word of the Day: STUM (33A: Unfermented grape juice) —
# (n.) Wine revived by new fermentation, reulting from the admixture of must. # (v. t.) To renew, as wine, by mixing must with it and raising a new fermentation. # (n.) Unfermented grape juice or wine, often used to raise fermentation in dead or vapid wines; must. (thinkexist.com)
Please don't ask me to define "must," as I just don't care.
-----
Slightly tougher than usual, if only because of the corners — esp. the NE corner — which are quite wide open and somewhat tough to get into. I do not recognize — possibly because I am too young yet — either PARTIAL DENTURE or CALCIUM BLOCKER. Well, I've heard of the former, though I thought it was just called a "partial." The latter, new to me. Also never heard the term PRAIRIE PROVINCE, though it was highly inferrable. The NE was the real bear here, and not least because it contained an actual Bear — 14D: Chicago Bears coaching legend George (Halas). The Bear was actually the one gimme up there. The ambiguous "plate" clue on the DENTURE kept it invisible, and much of the rest of the stuff up there could have been Anything. Had PET for PAL (22D: Close one). Considered THONGS for SHADES (13A: Some beachwear). Did not quite trust ESTIMATED for 17D: In round figures — seems like "round" could be the condition of an *actual* figure. And STUM — yikes. I thought I had an error there. Completely new to me. ELANTRA managed to get me some traction up there, and slowly it all came together. I thought I was going to blaze through the puzzle at first, as I went from NW straight through the middle with no resistance; but the remaining corners held me up but good. As for quality — I don't know. I didn't find this terribly exciting. The theme is purely physical / spatial — answers have nothing inherently in common. Kind of a bust in that way. Theme answers don't involve memorable phrases or cleverness. Just meh for me, overall.
Theme answers:
26A: With 4-Down, alternative to free enterprise (planned / economy)
24A: With 10-Down, stopover (motor / hotel) — yeah, here in America we call them "motels."
28A: With 16-Down, certain plate (partial / denture)
55A: With 45-Down, about 29 1/2 days (lunar / month) — easiest of the bunch. Flat gimme.
67A: With 47-Down, Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta (prairie / provinces)
83A: With 70-Down, skilled lawyer (legal / eagle) — in the plural, a fine '80s movie starring Robert Redford and Debra Winger, and featuring the Rod Stewart single "Love Touch"
110A: With 91-Down, hypertension control option (calcium / blocker)
114A: With 95-Down, meteorological post (weather / station)
118A: With 104-Down, utility gauge (water / meter)
Did this puzzle during the tail end of the rather dismal Bengals / Jets games. Aside from a couple of really sweet trick plays and a great run by Bengals back Cedric Benson, the game was kind of disappointing, though I'm really happy for winning Jets quarterback Mark Sanchez, whom I like for reasons I don't quite understand. The Eagles / Cowboys game is on now, as I write this, and I'm hoping that one's more interesting. Anyway, I'm not sure if solving on the couch after a beer while a game is playing on the nearby TV has anything to do with my slightly slower-than-avg. time. Maybe. You know who really wants to be in a crossword? Jets left tackle D'BRICKASHAW Ferguson. Look at him. You better put him in your crossword. You wouldn't like him when he's angry. Either him, or the insanely named LAVERANUES (pronounced La-VERN-ee-us) Coles, wide receiver for the Bengals.
Bullets:
47A: President who took office in 1946 (Peron) — the puzzle knows that when you see "president," you assume "U.S." at first.
78A: Dulciana, for one (organ stop) — just ... a total mystery. ORGAN STOPs have names? That I'm supposed to know? OK.
96A: Leader of a musical "gang" (Kool) — had me thinking Jets / Sharks. Shouldn't Kool's Gang be capitalized?
103A: Epicurus and Democritus, philosophically (atomists) — ATOMISM is the theory that man can shrink himself to incredibly small sizes and then fight crime.
113A: Old car similar to a Malibu (Alero) — "Old" ... I don't know. "Bygone," sure.
1D: Potter professor Severus ___ (Snape) — gimme. Really surprised SNAPE doesn't appear more often, given its juicy common letters.
11D: Coats with a protective oxide (anodizes) — if you are going to shrink yourself to fight crime, this process is a must (not to be confused with #@%*ing STUM).
13D: Challenge for the wheelchair-bound (step) — this clue is odd. Seems either / or — either the step is small and you can go up / down it no problem, or it's big and someone has to help you. So not really a "challenge." Unless you mean "impediment" or "obstacle." I think I don't like how this clue is making me think of someone stuck at the base of a STEP going "WTF? Where's my damned ramp!? Little help!" Also not fond of the "-bound" part. Why not [Challenge for wheelchair user] or [... one in a wheelchair]?
35D: Gel made from seaweed (agar) — gimme.
48D: The Belvedere ___ (Vatican sculpture) (torso) — never heard of it. Looks like this:
[oddly gruesome]
62D: ___ Bobbin of the Oz books (Betsy) — again, never heard of her. I'm in the middle of Eric Shanower's marvelous adapation of "The Marvelous Land of Oz" (published by Marvel, of course) right now (two of the eight total issues have been published). His complete adaptation of "The Wizard of Oz" is in bookstores now and well worth a look.
74D: Tasted, biblically (ate of) — this clue reads dirty to me.
93D: Paul Anka or Dan Aykroyd, by birth (Ottawan) — huh. Interesting.
108D: Old "Tonight Show" starter ("Here's...") — like it.
112D: Baseball great who's Bonds's godfather (Mays) — probably should specify BARRY Bonds, as Barry's dad, Bobby Bonds, was also a great baseball player.
And now your Tweets of the Week — puzzle chatter from the Twitterverse:
AviGeeeLoss of smartphone = debilitating. Loss of constant access to nyt crossword puzzles = disabling.
RachelImogenGWawake listening to music while mother does the times crossword. how fucking middle class is that?
bennedetoTom Hammond had a crossword puzzle in front of him, in the booth there. #Bengals#Jets
CrosscanSunday NYT Crossword may cure insomnia. I almost fell asleep in the middle of solving.
lucyinglisThis the life: bed, with a large nightcap, a small dog and the crossword. Rock. And. Roll.
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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