THEME:reparsed 15s — 15-letter words imagined as if they were ridiculous phrases...
Theme answers:
RECON SIDE RATION
TEMPE RAMEN TALLY
NONCOM MUNI CABLE
Word of the Day:KOOLS(20A: Smokes once touted by Willie the penguin) —
Introduced by Brown and Williamson tobacco company in 1933, as an unfiltered 70mm "regular" cigarette, Kool was the first menthol cigarette to be nationally distributed by the then burgeoning tobacco industry and thus, was the first popular menthol cigarette. Kool enjoyed continued success through the 1950s, when growing public concern about the health risks associated with smoking began take a toll on the Kool brand. Brown and Williamson responded to these concerns by releasing filtered varieties of Kool - first an 85mm "king-sized" filtered version in the 1960s that was followed by a 100mm or "long" filtered version in the 1970s. The 1980s saw the introduction of Kool lights and it was also during this decade that the Kool brand began to lose some marketshare to other menthol brands, such as Newport. In 2003, Brown and Williamson was purchased by the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, and as a result of this merger, Kool became a Reynolds brand. Soon after, Kool's iconic green and white pack, virtually unchanged for some 70 years, was overhauled and the original unfiltered Kool cigarette was discontinued around this same time. However, the changes did little to boost sales, as Kool continued to lose ground to Newport and other menthols. On June 12, 2015, the Kool brand became the property of Imperial Tobacco Company due to a merger between Reynolds American (R.J. Reynolds parent company) and the Lorillard Tobacco Company. (wikipedia)
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I once made a puzzle like this, also a Thursday NYT, where words were parsed wackily. But in that case, every word was a type of cheese (e.g. GORGON ZOLA ...) and there was a revealer (SLICED / CHEESE) and so there was ... whaddya call it? Cohesion. Tightness. A concept. This puzzle has nothing like that. It's built around three random 15-letter words. Who the hell cares? It's a Fail, thematically, right out of the box. The only reason I gave it a "C" is because the grid is well-filled. Stunned this got accepted. That it got made, even. It's not like the constructors are novices. Further, the puzzle was way too easy for a Thursday. I like Thursdays that a. have good themes, and b. have some bite. This didn't meet either criterion.
WET MARTINIS are not for me (23D: Drinks with plenty of vermouth). A waste of good gin. (I don't recognize vodka martinis as a thing—what's the point? If I had to drink vodka, I guess I might make my martini wet as hell, idk). ROSHAMBO, rosham-no. I have heard of it, though, so it didn't hold me up much. LOOK IT UP (4D: "There's this thing called Google ...") was my favorite answer / clue of the day, easy, though I also appreciated HONEYMOONED (24D: Did a tour after joining up?). Was there any resistance today? Not really. I would never have put that headline (6D: Newspaper with the headline "Mystery Hero Saves Falling Space Plane") with the DAILY PLANET. I was thinking more WEEKLY WORLD NEWS. I also wouldn't list SATIN among top five upholsterer fabrics, so that took some doing (25D: Upholsterer's fabric). I think the TALESE clue (29D: Gay who wrote "Frank Sinatra Has a Cold") probably shouldn't have had "Gay" in it, 'cause once you write "Gay who wrote..." the rest of the clue is pretty much pointless. It's TALESE. Also, I probably would've gone with his creepy motel book, "The Voyeur's Motel," as the reference in that clue. More current, topical, controversial, everything (though that Sinatra essay is classic). Most trouble I had all night was probably the CABLE part of NONCOMMUNICABLE. Short answers down in that corner weren't self-evident, so there was some minor flailing. But overall, not much fight in this one.
THEME:fractions — a fraction progression where the numerator remains "1" throughout but the denominator moves from "5" to "1"; so one FIFTH, one FOURTH, one THIRD, one HALF, and finally one WHOLE
Theme answers:
FIFTH ELEMENT (17A: 1997 Bruce Willis sci-fi film, with "The")
FOURTH ESTATE (23A: Journalistic profession)
THIRD TIMES A CHARM (38A: Saying about persistence paying off)
HALF MARATHON (48A: Race just over 13 miles long)
WHOLE SHEBANG (60A: Entirety, informally)
Word of the Day:OCULUS Rift(54A: ___ Rift (virtual reality product owned by Facebook)) —
The Rift is a virtual realityhead-mounted display developed by Oculus VR. It was initially proposed in a Kickstarter campaign, during which Oculus VR (at the time an independent company) raised US$2.5 million for the development of the product. (wikipedia)
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This theme has definitely been done over and over again where FIFTH, FOURTH etc. are ordinals, but I guess the surprise fraction twist is new. It's also mildly awkward, in that you have to imagine "a" or "one" in front of the first words for the progression to really make sense, and WHOLE is not really the correct finale. Should probably be ONE something. And why is this 16 wide—totally unnecessary. All that having THIRD TIMES A CHARM in here does is open up the classic THIRD TIME'S A CHARM vs. THIRD TIME'S THE CHARM debate, and no one wants to open up that can of worms. That controversy tends to get real ugly, real fast. I'm definitely team THE, but I've learned to live with my A neighbors. Coexist, man. But seriously, THIRD BASE? THIRD DEGREE? You're going 16 wide ... why? I'm not a fan of breaking the rules for no good and possibly even bad reasons. But I guess I did get about 20 extra seconds of Monday puzzle today. Maybe that was worth it.
Puzzle gets pretty chock full o' crosswordese at times, especially over there in the east where "ERNO and the T-MAN"® climb Mt. ETNA in search of the fabled ODEON of Apolo (Ohno). It's a pretty epic adventure—they even wrote a SESTET about it. But I guess most of the fill is OK. I messed up my Biblical verb and wrote DOEST instead of DOETH. I also totally blanked on the MASAI, even though I did this whole report on them in 7th grade Geography (27A: Native Kenyans). Actually, the report was on Tanzania, but they were in there. Sorry, Mrs. Stevens. Got very confused by [Center of a place setting], especially when I got it down to PLA-E and was like "... uh ... PLACE?" I think that's all I have to say about this puzzle.
THEME: idioms literalized — common phrases following the structure "___ IN A ___" are represented with the first part of the phrase "literally" inside the second part; thus, e.g., "Needle in a haystack" becomes HAYNEEDLESTACK
Word of the Day: MERC (11D: Chicago exchange, informally, with "the") —
The Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) (often called "the Chicago Merc," or "the Merc") is an American financial and commodity derivative exchange based in Chicago. The CME was founded in 1898 as the Chicago Butter and Egg Board. Originally, the exchange was a non-profit organization. The exchange demutualized in November 2000, went public in December 2002, and it merged with the Chicago Board of Trade in July 2007 to become a designated contract market of the CME Group Inc. The Chief Executive Officer of CME Group is Craig S. Donohue. On August 18, 2008 shareholders approved a merger with the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) and COMEX. The Merc, CBOT, NYMEX and COMEX are now markets owned by the CME Group. (wikipedia)
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A very clever theme, though more Wednesday than Thursday material. Once you pick up the gimmick, the other theme answers come very easily. There is some vagueness in the clues here and there that toughens things up slightly, but from the shape of the grid (heavily segmented, with lots of 4x4 and 4x5 sections) to its content (basic vocabulary all around), this doesn't quite have the zing or imaginative spin that we're used to in Thursdays. But that's not the puzzle's fault. It's very good for what it is. Simple, neat theme that I can't believe hasn't been done before. I had one minor and one major (stupid) misstep—the latter is one that I doubt any other solver replicated. So, I had TWERP instead of DWEEB (37A: Weenie)—TWERP is a much better answer for that clue, but whatever. I fixed it, no problem. But then I put in WALK for 35A: Promenade. No part of me ever doubted this or questioned it, even when it left me with KONGNECK (!?!?) (36D: Certain beer bottle) and IWAC (31D: Jobs plan, once). It was only after accepting that the Jobs answer had to be IMAC that I got to MALK ... and then, after checking the (ridiculous) "K" cross, to MALL (sidenote: no way on god's green earth that you can justify cluing an IMAC as a "plan"; I see that you wanted to do something cute with Jobs there ("Jobs plan," get it!?), but no. A computer is not a "plan," especially without a "?" clue. Also, playing on Jobs' name in clues is Old Hat, so if you're going to do it, it better be spot-on).
52A: Something rapidly deteriorating goes to it, literally (HANDHELLBASKET) — figured out this one without ever having to look at the clue.
Bullets:
1A: Certain lamp goo (LAVA) — Should've been a gimme. Wasn't. I wanted something sooty. I was thinking lampblack. I don't know what I was thinking.
16A: Monarch moniker, for short (QEII) — first guess. In four letters, it seemed probable. Placement of "Q" (in second position in the cross) also seemed auspicious.
26D: Wood used in Voldemort's wand (YEW) — in three letters, it could've been several woods, but I had the "E" from SEEN, and just guessed YEW. Seemed the only reasonable guess at that point.
56D: Building toy brand (K'NEX) — this brand falls into that uncanny valley of children's entertainment, between the time when kids' entertainment had fallen off my radar (college, roughly) and the time it came back on (A.D., Anno Daughter, 2000). Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are in there somewhere too.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
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THEME: SEQUENCEs (3D: Any of the clues for 17-, 34- or 57-Across) — theme answers are formulae; their clues are the SEQUENCEs that result when the VARIABLE is "replaced in turn by 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 ..." (37D: In the answers to 17-, 34- and 57-Across, it was replaced in turn by 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 ...)
Word of the Day: TSWANA (12D: A language of South Africa) —
Tswana or Setswana is a language spoken in Southern Africa by about 4.5 million people. It is a Bantu language belonging to the Niger–Congo language family, and is closely related to the Northern- and Southern Sotho languages, as well as the Kgalagadi language and the Lozi language. // Tswana is an official language and lingua franca of Botswana spoken by almost 1.1 million of its inhabitants. However, the majority of Tswana speakers are found in South Africa where 3.4 million people speak the language. Until 1994, South African Tswana people were notionally citizens of Bophuthatswana, one of the few bantustans that actually became reality as planned by the Apartheid regime. A small number of speakers are also found in Zimbabwe and Namibia, where 29,400 and 12,300 people speak the language, respectively. (wikipedia)
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This is a puzzle that is interesting to contemplate after the fact, but a terrible plodding bore to solve. A stunt puzzle that is more about showing off constructor cleverness than providing an entertaining solving experience. It's all number sequences and cross-references and arbitrary formulae. I just didn't care. Ever. I guess the formulae aren't arbitrary, exactly, in that they've been carefully chosen for their 15-letterness. Anyway, I enjoy doing math during my solving about as much as I enjoy having to draw on my puzzle to figure out some meta-baloney aspect of the theme. I think this is Parker's debut. Considering he has made the lamentable, rookie decision to go for a pangram, the fill is quite decent. BEEST is bad (49D: Ending with wilde- or harte-), and TSWANA is godawful (12D: A language of South Africa), but most of the rest is tolerable to pretty good. Parker spent a lot of time ... somewhere in Africa, if I'm remembering our conversation from ACPT correctly, so maybe TSWANA is somehow dear to him. As fill, it's garbage. Kill your darlings.
I should add that Parker is an exceedingly nice young man who gave me a rebus puzzle at this past year's American Crossword Puzzle Tournament (an actual rebus, with pictures, written out much the same way as today's theme answers): STORE + BOX - BOOTS + PAW + ROCK - COW + ZERO [written "sin (Ï€)"] - OZ = REX PARKER. It's highly adorable and I have it sitting right by my desk.
Theme answers:
17A: 3, 6, 11, 18, 27 ... (X SQUARED PLUS TWO)
34A: 4, 2, 4/3, 1, 4/5 ... (TWENTY OVER FIVE X)
57A: 8, 1, -18, -55, -116 ... (NINE MINUS X CUBED)
Here's a lesson just for me:
EPSON = printer maker (10D: Printer brand)
EPSOM = salts and race track
EBSEN = actor BUDDY of "The Beverly Hillbillies" and "Barnaby Jones"
Bullets:
5A: Princess in a Nintendo game series (ZELDA) — never played it, but guessed it correctly (after waffling for a split-second between ZELDA and ZENDA)
14A: So-called Family City, U.S.A. (OREM) — gimme! I've had to clue it before, I guess, or else I really perused OREM clues at some point. Anyway, this confirmed my first guess of ROXY at 1D: Classic theater name.
22A: Joint U.S. / Canada military org. (NORAD) — no idea about this one, though the acronym is vaguely familiar from that Santa tracker website. How you get from North American Aerospace Defense Command to NORAD, I don't know.
60A: First major publisher of board games in the U.S. (IVES) — really? Never heard of 'em. Composer Charles. Rotund singer/actor Burl. Printmaker partner of Currier. I've heard of those guys.
4D: Bird whose name is a Midwest school's initials (EMU) — that's Eastern Michigan University, which I know only because it was down the street from U. Mich., Ann Arbor.
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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Introduced by Brown and Williamson tobacco company in 1933, as an unfiltered 70mm "regular" cigarette, Kool was the first menthol cigarette to be nationally distributed by the then burgeoning tobacco industry and thus, was the first popular menthol cigarette. Kool enjoyed continued success through the 1950s, when growing public concern about the health risks associated with smoking began take a toll on the Kool brand. Brown and Williamson responded to these concerns by releasing filtered varieties of Kool - first an 85mm "king-sized" filtered version in the 1960s that was followed by a 100mm or "long" filtered version in the 1970s. The 1980s saw the introduction of Kool lights and it was also during this decade that the Kool brand began to lose some marketshare to other menthol brands, such as Newport. In 2003, Brown and Williamson was purchased by the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, and as a result of this merger, Kool became a Reynolds brand. Soon after, Kool's iconic green and white pack, virtually unchanged for some 70 years, was overhauled and the original unfiltered Kool cigarette was discontinued around this same time. However, the changes did little to boost sales, as Kool continued to lose ground to Newport and other menthols. On June 12, 2015, the Kool brand became the property of Imperial Tobacco Company due to a merger between Reynolds American (R.J. Reynolds parent company) and the Lorillard Tobacco Company. (wikipedia)
