Egypt's third-largest city / WED 4-7-10 / Destination for ferry from Livorno / Follower who does dirty work / In arms of Morpheus

Constructor: Richard Silvestri

Relative difficulty: Challenging

THEME: RAT (58D: Chinese calendar animal ... or the key to this puzzle's theme) — "RAT" is added familiar phrases to get wacky phrases, clued wackily ("?"-style)


Word of the Day: JACKAL (5D: Follower who does the dirty work) —

2 a : a person who tends to the routine needs of or performs menial tasks for another: DRUDGE b: an individual who for mercenary or self-seeking ends serves or collaborates with another esp. in the commission of base or sordid acts (Webster's 3rd Int'l Dictionary)

• • •

Toughest Wednesday of the year for me (high 6's). Never ever could get a real rhythm going, and most all of the cluing had this weird, ickily off feeling to it. Like ... just past its sell-by date. Probably edible, but not appetizing. MEANT clued as [Had in view]? In America, we'd say [Had in mind], "view" being used here solely to try to trip you. That intentional trip-you vibe ran through a lot of clues. I don't mind trippiness if it's clever, but today it felt forced. If it's got nothing to modify, LOCAL (to me) is a train, not a bar (10D: Neighborhood pub). I would call a LOCAL pub a "LOCAL pub." Need the "pub." Maybe this stand-alone usage of LOCAL is British. EDIT gives you the old "verb for adjective" switcheroo with 11D: Ready for release. EMIT gets you in mind of guns with 53D: Shoot out. Was all this forced cleverness an attempt to distract from the really awkward theme? Add-a-"RAT?" Adding-a-whatever is fine when the phrases work, and two are OK, but ERRATIC THE RED makes no sense on any level. The "nickname" part of ERIC THE RED is "THE RED" .... so ... if you call this hypothetical person ERRATIC THE RED, is his "real" name ERRATIC ... and then THE RED is the part signifying his Communism? So he's sort of *all* nickname? THE ERRATIC RED might be someone's nickname. But ERRATIC THE RED is just glop. At 78 words and (thus) with no non-theme answers longer than 6 letters (!?!), the grid doesn't hold much interest. My favorite part was probably the clue on TANKER (45A: Ship of fuels). That's a joke that comes off. The rest of this, fill-wise, feels just ordinary, and the cluing feels like its trying too hard to compensate for that ordinariness.







Theme answers:

• 20A: One who plunders boatloads of jack-o'-lanterns (PUMPKIN PIRATE)
  
• 37A: First-rate chastisement? (SUPREME BERATING)
  
• 48A: Nickname of an unpredictable Communist? (ERRATIC THE RED)
  

I'm not sure I understand why, when there are only three theme answers of 13, 15, and 13, the grid isn't much more interesting, with fewer, but more interesting words. Why do you make a 78-worder (the upper limit), when you have So Much Non-Theme Space to work with?

Bullets:

• 5D: Follower who does the dirty work (JACKAL) — this killed me. First, I had no idea this was a meaning of JACKAL. Second, I had -ACK- and wrote in LACKEY, without blinking. I feel this had to be intentional (cluing that suggests LACKEY and, apparently, JACKAL). Again, didn't feel clever. Just annoying.
  
• 14A: Ward who played Robin (BURT) — First, instinctively wrote in SELA. Second, changed SELA to BERT.
  
• 41A: Destination for a ferry from Livorno (ELBA) — ELBA and ELBE (48D: Hamburg's river) in the same gird. I'd have tried like hell to keep that kind of near-twin crosswordese nightmare from happening.
  
• 46A: "The tongue of the mind": Cervantes (PEN) — even with the "N" this didn't come easily. Whole SW was a disaster until I stopped reading the end of 48A as -TCHERED, changed AS TO to IS TO (50D: Part of an analogy), and finally figured out the ghastly ERRATIC THE RED.
  
• 61A: Egypt's third-largest city (GIZA) — a city that I always want to call either GAZA or AGRA.
  
• 45D: Home of the Azadi Tower (TEHRAN) — interesting, and new to me. Is this a building I should know for some reason? Ooh, yeah, it's super-cool looking. Like a giant alien craft. According to wikipedia, it's the symbol of TEHRAN, and marks the entrance to TEHRAN.
  
• 9A: Was in the arms of Morpheus (SLEPT) — nicely complemented by WOKE (35A: Shook out of dreamland)
  

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter]

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WEDNESDAY, Oct. 14 2009 — Gallows-shaped letter / Univac's predecessor / Perle who inspired Call me Madam / Scepter toppers / Wise old Greek

Constructor: Richard Silvestri

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium

THEME: PUBLIC EDUCATION (36A: What this puzzle's four missing clues spell, in order) —

• 20A: - (BRITISH ALE HOUSE) => i.e. PUB
• 25A: - (COOTIES) => i.e. LICE
• 46A: - (OLD COIN) => i.e. DUCAT
• 52A: - (CHARGED PARTICLE) => i.e. ION

PUB + LICE + DUCAT + ION = PUBLIC EDUCATION

Word of the Day: ONAGER (46D: Wild ass) — n.

1. A fast-running wild ass (Equus hemionus subsp. onager) of central Asia, having an erect mane and a broad black stripe along its back.
2. An ancient and medieval stone-propelling siege engine.

[Middle English, from Late Latin, from Latin, wild ass, from Greek onagros : onos, ass + agrios, wild.]

-----

This one was crazy and odd enough that I actually liked it despite the fact that it didn't really feel like a crossword. More like a hybrid of crossword and loopy word game. Made for a weird solving experience where theme answers in top half required many, many crosses (essentially clueless answers will do that), while theme answers in bottom half were effectively clued, as PUBLIC EDUCATION was already in place and I could infer the two clue words (DUCAT and ION) from the letters that remained after PUB and LICE were taken. Could have been a very hard puzzle, but the Downs were clued So easily that picking up the long, unclued answers up top didn't take too much time. The crucial part of the puzzle — the tipping point — it seems to me, is the far west. If you could get in there, and had any success up top, you could bring the puzzle down, but it's a Little hard to get in there as two of the four Acrosses are unclued. Thankfully, most of those short Downs in that section went down quickly, the most important being CAPE (25D: Massachusetts getaway, with "the"), which gave first letters to the unclued answers. From there I got out as far as PUBLIC E ... and then made a guess as to the rest of it, which was quickly confirmed off Downs.

Didn't know that COOTIES were LICE. Thought they were imaginary thing that boys / girls had around age 6. Not thrilled that both PUBLIC and HOUSE are in puzzle, since PUB (the first part of our main theme answer) is, by definition, short for PUBLIC HOUSE. Other than that, no complaints. Nice to see Rex (19A: Alternative to Rover or Rex => SPORT) and PARKER (44D: Sarah Jessica of "Sex and the City") in the puzzle together again today (as they were on Sunday)

Bullets:

• 1A: Gallows-shaped letter (gamma) — had No idea. I've clearly never looked at the letter gamma before. Someone should tell gamma it looks like a plain old lowercase "r."
• 24A: Wise old Greek (Nestor) — he's the dude in the Iliad that no one wants to listen to at first.
• 51A: Atom _____, 1960s cartoon superhero (Ant) — never seen it. How is that possible? Guess it didn't get rerun in the '70s.

• 22D: Univac's predecessor (Eniac) — once again, I have to say that "Univac" sounds like a word that should be clued [Dustbuster competitor]. How is it *not* a small vacuum?
• 9A: Perle who inspired "Call Me Madam" (Mesta) — Perle MESTA has one of the crosswordesiest names of all time, in that first and last names appear in puzzles AND (like the finest crosswordese) her currency / popularity in the general culture has nearly completely faded, and yet she haunts the grid for eternity.
• 27D: Scepter toppers (orbs) — "toppers" is pretty informal for something so ... regal.
• 33D: Founder and first queen of Carthage (Dido) — oh, the antics and capers and escapades she would have. Why, one time, she and Aeneas went into this cave during a rain storm ...

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to bake a cake. Today is my wife's birthday.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter]

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Cousin of a camel — WEDNESDAY, Jun 10 2009 — Locale of famous playing fields / Euro predecessor / Old Dead Sea kingdom / Obsessed mariner

Constructor: Richard Silvestri

Relative difficulty: Challenging (took me Well over my normal Wednesday time)

THEME: FORTY-FOUR (55A: See 18-, 23-, 35- and 49-Across) — four theme answers are all in some way associated with the number "44" (except SUPER BOWL, which has the number 44 only on the date mentioned in the clue)

Word of the Day: ROSEATE (30A: Promising) — adj.

1. Rose-colored: the roseate glow of dawn.
2. Cheerful or bright; optimistic: a roseate outlook.

[From Latin roseus, rosy, from rosa, rose.]

A mostly joyless experience today. The mutually referential theme clues meant that you could get none of the theme answers without crosses. OK, maybe you could infer HANK AARON (what other truly famous Atlanta Braves are there) or SUPER BOWL (the date mentioned in the clue is a hint), but when all the theme answers want you to see 55-Across, and 55-Across says "see the theme answers" ... well, I lose interest slightly and start in on the non-theme fill. And today, for whatever reason, a lot of it seemed very vaguely or trickily clued, such that ... well, virtually everything N and NW of ROSEATE (30A: Promising) was patchy-to-empty for a while. Never heard of RUTHENIUM, so that was never going to come on its own, or with help from 55-Across. Can't think of a use for TAURO- (7D: Bullish beginning?) as a prefix (though that answer, I got), didn't know ETON had "playing fields" that were at all well known (6A: Locale of famous playing fields), OFTEN got a tricky clue that looked more noun than adverb (8D: A lot), RAFT got a similar (and similarly vague) clue (15A: Whole lot), and NTH got a great but very tricky clue as well (9D: Nonacademic degree). The NW was a disaster too until I finally saw the clue for TIN EAR (2D: Musical liability), which is practically crosswordese it's so common, and then it opened up. This is all to say that the puzzle felt more Thursday or Friday than Wednesday, especially in these northern climes.

But difficulty is not a knock against the puzzle. My main complaint is about the theme. First, why is FORTY-FOUR interesting? Should I look forward to puzzles just like this with other numbers in there. THIRTY-TWO? EIGHTY-EIGHT? Seems a very loose theme, especially with SUPER BOWL in there, which is a terrible answer. All the other theme answers are genuine "44"s. SUPER BOWL is not "44". It's just not. Next year's SUPER BOWL is 44 (or XLIV). So three theme answers are definitively "44," while one is "44" only with a qualifier found off-grid (i.e. in the clue). Bah. Publishing this puzzle during the run-up to next year's SUPER BOWL might have saved this answer. Might have. Even then, though, this answer would have been the ugly, clunky, misshapen duckling. Not sure what makes FORTY-FOUR an interesting theme. Maybe if the core answers were really fascinating and provocative. But when RUTHENIUM and SUPER BOWL are half your arsenal ...

Theme answers:

• 18A: Element number 55-Across (Ruthenium)
• 23A: Atlanta Brave who wore the number 55-Across (Hank Aaron)
• 35A: President number 55-Across (Barack Obama) — had the terminal "A" in place and that was enough; one of the few answers that went down quickly today
• 49A: Feb. 7, 2010, the date of this event's number 55-Across (Super Bowl) — clue is oddly phrased, as if the date were the clue. Feels like there should be an "is" after 2010.

The grid is otherwise reasonably filled, with more stumpers than I'm used to on a Wednesday. Didn't know RUTHENIUM or GUANACO (40A: Cousin of a camel) or BORMAN (45D: Apollo astronaut Frank). Had GUANACA right to the bitter end, when I realized MAAB was probably not the [Old Dead Sea kingdom] in question. So sad, considering GUANACOS was my "Word of the Day" a while back! So overall, solving was slow-going, without much pleasure in the process. I simply wasn't on this puzzle's wavelength (despite the "American Idol" bone it tossed me — 24D: "American Idol" judge DioGuardi).


Bullets:

• 16A: Obsessed mariner (Ahab) — possibly the first thing I put in the grid. Nope, I take that back. First thing was the delightful MCCI (10A: Start of the 13th century). Shortly thereafter, I filed in the equally delightful ENE / NNE crossing (ENE tries, and fails, to pretend that it is not also a direction)
• 31D: Euro predecessor (écu) — by a couple centuries, yes. The ECU ceased being an official currency unit during the French Revolution.
  
• 20A: Bygone compact (Geo) — had nothing here. Wasn't GEO the make (not model)? Were all GEOs "compacts?"

• 10D: Capital founded by Spanish invaders, 1571 (Manila) — nice Pacific Rim mini-theme up there in the NE.
• 21D: Music section (passage) — another good example of late-week cluing. This killed me, as I was looking for something like BRASS or WOODWINDS or STRINGS.
• 32D: Abbr. on a blotter (AKA) — took me a while to process "blotter"
• 43D: Tony winner Tyne (Daly) — best known to me as Mary Beth Lacey on "Cagney and Lacey"
• 56D: Term of a address in a monastery (Fra) — FRA Angelico was an Italian Renaissance painter, while FRA Diavolo was a "guerrila leader who resisted the French occupation of Naples" in the early 19th century (wikipedia). He also lent his name to a spicy pasta sauce.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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WEDNESDAY, Feb. 11, 2009 - R Silvestri (U follower / Irene's counterpart in Roman myth / Bit of a limerick / Sight from Taormina)

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: No-K - four different familiar phrases containing a word ending in "CK" have the "K" removed to create wacky new phrases, which are clued "?"-style

Word of the Day: ANAPEST - a metrical foot of three syllables the first two being unstressed and the last being stressed (as in Lord Byron's "and his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold") or the first two being short and the last being long (as in classical prosody); a trisyllabic rising cadence

The opposite of an ANAPEST (i.e. stressed, unstressed, unstressed, or long, short, short) is a DACTYL, FYI

Solving time (on paper): 7:20

Wow, it's a good thing I'm getting used to seeing my times for paper-solving now (in preparation for the tournament in two+ weeks) - they're running, on average, a good minute behind my AcrossLite / applet times. I don't think I was aware of how significant the disparity would be. No matter. The real key to tournament solving (for the vast majority of participants) is not to worry about time at all. Keep moving forward and focus on accuracy. Today, accuracy was nearly compromised when I ended up at my final square: the KEMAL (52D: _____ Ataturk, founder of modern Turkey) / ELY (60A: English cathedral city) crossing. I'm sure I've seen both (particularly the latter) before, but intersecting at a vowel as they do here, they both may as well have been Klingon. Nothing I put in the space felt right, and I finally went with "E" because out of all my options, ELY was the least silly, most plausible-sounding place name.

I'm not sure how I feel about a theme where Ks are taken away. I normally like the puzzle to be driving in the opposite direction. There are still three Ks left in this puzzle, but somehow that's small consolation.

I have one major criticism of the theme, specifically of the clue/answer at 62A: Bruin, Golden Bear or Wildcat? (PAC animal): as far as college athletics goes, PAC is not a thing. There is the PAC-10, but there is no PAC. No one says "PAC." Never. It's the PAC-10. The official website says so. A PAC is a Political Action Committee. It is true that the athletic conferecnce in question is called the Pacific Athletic Conference, and you would think that that then entitles you to call it "PAC." But no. It's PAC-10. It really is.

Theme answers:

• 17A: Comment at the reptile exhibition? ("What a croc!")
• 10D: Command to a photog? ("Take your pic!")
• 24D: Horse vet? (Doc of the bay) - by far the best of the bunch
• 62A: Bruin, Golden Bear or Wildcat? (PAC animal)

Lots of speedbumps today. I blanked on ANAPEST. Or, rather, I hadn't thought of ANAPEST (5D: Bit of a limerick) as a constituent part of a limerick before, so was not searching for a fancy poetic term. I wrote in SNEAKY for SLEAZY (22A: Underhanded) and HEROISM for HEROICS (29A: Daring actions). I completely blanked on the super-duper annoyingly crosswordesey ABOU (35D: "_____ Ben Adhem" (Leigh Hunt poem)). EBEN? EZER? ABBA? I consider ABOU desperate stuff, however well attested it is in crossword history. "Leigh Hunt?" Really? I also had NO- or NON- at the beginning of the answer that ended up being NEUTRAL (45A: Not taking sides), and I had no idea who preceded Polk and had to infer it from crosses. Turns out it's TYLER (54D: Polk's predecessor).

Bullets:

• 9A: Parties where dresses are rarely seen (stags) - "Rarely," HA ha. "But sometimes..."
• 65A: Rumble in the Jungle victor (Ali) - I've plugged it before, but the documentary film about this fight, "When We Were Kings," is really worth watching.
• 9D: Non-vector (scalar) - the non-vector in the Rumble in the Jungle was George Foreman.
• 69A: Conger catcher (eeler) - Does the puzzle have some deal with the EELERS' Union? It seems like the only place I've ever even seen the alleged profession of EELER mentioned is in the grid. Every other week.
• 30D: Prince of opera (Igor) - I always forget this opera (Borodin's "Prince Igor"). Little matter, as I never even saw this clue today.

• 40D: U follower (Thant) - former Secretary-General of the U.N. Did not know (til just now) that THANT was his only name, and that "U" is simply an honorific in Burmese, roughly equivalent to "Mister." I wonder if anyone got very bold and entered VWXYZ for this clue.
• 48D: Sight from Taormina (Etna) - no idea what "Taormina" is, which I suspect was the point.
• 56D: Tiger Beat cover subject (idol) - I can't believe they still publish Tiger Beat. It's sooooooo Shaun Cassidy-era.
• 62D: Irene's counterpart in Roman myth (Pax) - as in the Pax Romana. It means "peace."

Many thanks to everyone who helped me fix the "objectionable content" flag problem yesterday, and to everyone who simply expressed sympathy or support. Turns out I have some very well-connected readers (including several inside of Google) and the problem was eliminated with relative speed. I even got to talk about John Lennon's penis in both of my classes - win win!

Please don't flag me for "penis."

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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SUNDAY, Nov. 30, 2008 - Richard Silvestri ("Also Sprach Zarathustra" hitmaker, 1973 / Herringlike fish / Darius the Scamp? / Endor inhabitants)

Relative difficulty: Medium-Challenging

THEME: "Uh-Oh" - "UH" sound is changed to "OH" sound in several common (or at least vaguely familiar) phrases, resulting in wacky phrases, which are clued with "?" clues



Rough. That is my word for this puzzle. The theme was humdrum. Basic. Bland. Unmemorable. As much bad stuff (LOAM AND ABNER, really? - 52A: Dirty radio sitcom?) as good stuff (PEACH FOES - 47A: Fruit flies?). It's got what feels like a remarkably low theme density. Only seven theme answers, and two of those are remarkably short. "ARE WE HAVING PHONE YET?" is godawful, especially for a central answer - the longest in the puzzle. The other wacky phrases are at least phrases that make a kind of literal sense. OK, maybe not the krappy LOAM AND ABNER, but the others at least seem imaginable, envisionable. "ARE WE HAVING PHONE YET?" has the unfortunate effect of both sounding like something uttered comically by a non-native speaker and evoking the torturous Verizon catchphrase, "CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW?" Ugh.

But the real story of this puzzle is the Bizarro fill, esp. in the N by NW section of the puzzle. The hardest section for me, by far, was the NW, where I had to endure a phrase no one has used since 1975 ("NO JIVE" - 19A: "Honestly, man" - which I was Sure was "NO JOKE," a much more current and in-the-language phrase) and a word no one has ever used (GNAR - 1D: Sound like an angry dog) . Then there's the seemingly invented ATONIC (23A: Not accented) and the never- before- seen- by- me DECEM (6D: X). If I hadn't known RAMIS (32A: "Stripes" actor, 1981) - and even that one took a second to come to me - I'd still be working on the NW. Never mind that everything else up there besides "Get A JOB" (3D: "Get _____" (doo-wop classic)) is clued in some weird, slightly off way. Not a pleasant experience.



A very close second on the lunacy scale is the MENHADEN (9D: Herringlike fish) / DEODATO (39A: "Also Sprach Zarathustra" hitmaker, 1973) crossing. I've never heard of either. If I hadn't known some Latin, I'd still be staring at a blank space where these words collide. I believe I might have seen DEODATO in a puzzle or clue, maybe once before. I have Never seen MENHADEN Anywhere ever. I'm still shocked that these two obscurities were allowed to collide. OK, not ASEC/PSEC shocked, but shocked nonetheless. The SHAVUOT (62D: Spring Jewish holiday) / LANARK (63D: Historical Scottish county) pairing gave me some grief in the Colorado region of the puzzle. I think I'd heard of the Jewish holiday before, but probably never seen it spelled. LANARK is a book I know, but I don't know what "historical" is supposed to mean in relation to a county. It existed in "history," yes. Lastly, in the gripe department, there's IANA (120A: Suffix for a collection) and CYTE (124A: Cell suffix) involved in some ugly suffix mating ritual down there in Louisiana.

Theme answers:

• 29A: Helpful comment to a judge? ("There's the ROBE")
• 47A: Fruit flies? (peach FOES)
• 52A: Dirty radio sitcom? ("LOAM and Abner")
• 67A: Jokey question to a Verizon technician? ("Are we having PHONE yet?")
• 82A: Darius the scamp? (Persian ROGUE)
• 88A: Pot-smoking cleric? (Friar TOKE) - two pot references this weekend! I had PRIEST ---- here for a bit. That damn "-RI-" suckered me in.
• 105A: Result of excessive rowing (pain in the BOAT) - I really don't want "butt" in my puzzle, however disguised.

Last of the leftovers:

• 7A: Web programmer's medium (HTML) - OK, so now it's a "medium." I can live with that. I remember there was some controversy over labeling a while back.
• 21A: Economist Janeway (Eliot) - ELIOT reminds me of T.S.... or "Phone Home." Haven't heard of this economist.
• 44D: Turkish inns (imarets) - thankfully, I'd seen in before. Otherwise - ouch.
  
• 58A: Polonius's hiding place (arras) - aw yeah. Turns out they are not sword-proof.
• 61A: Do some grapplin' (rassle) - turns out there's one thing I really like about this puzzle: this answer! I try to get my dogs to "RASSLE" every morning. They usually oblige.
• 66A: Weapon in the Charge of the Light Brigade (lance) - ah, the Crimean War. Never goes out of style, somehow.
• 75A: Cowgirl Dale (Evans) - a flat-out gimme. Huzzah! She is in good company. One of my other flat-out gimmes was ... COATI! (91A: Raccoon relative). $100 to anyone who can produce a picture of Dale EVANS with a COATI. No photoshopping!
• 80A: Output of une legislature (loi) - for our Canadian solvers.
• 93A: The story of the aftermath of Oceanic Flight 815 ("Lost") - I just spend several minutes looking for this "story" ... only to realize that the "LOST" in question is the TV show. Until just a few minutes ago, I was thinking that "LOST" was that movie about plane wreck survivors who eat each other. That's "Alive."
• 92A: Endor inhabitants (Ewoks) - Endor is a forest moon. Like Oceanic Flight 815, it is also fictional (part of the "Star Wars" universe)
• 113A: Hairy TV cousin (Itt) - easy enough. Most "cousins" are ITT in the puzzle.
• 115A: _____ Torrence, American sprinter who won three gold medals at the 1992 and 1996 Olympics (Gwen) - came to me instantly, for reasons I don't understand. I don't follow track and field at all.
• 121A: Henry Fielding novel and heroine (Amelia) - never read (or heard of) it, but I have friends who undoubtedly have. They make you do crazy !@#@# in grad school.
• 5D: 1979 Broadway hit with the song "On This Night of a Thousand Stars" ("Evita") - luckily the answer is familiar, because the clue means nothing. In other musical news, I watched "Guys and Dolls" yesterday. Yes, I voluntarily watched a musical. And loved it (but I love hard-boiled fiction, and so the style and lingo and dames and what not were right up my alley). About halfway through, daughter came in the room: "What are you watching?" So she watched the rest with me. Is it wrong that I went back and specifically made her watch "Pet Me, Papa"? I thought she would love the cat suits (and she did).
  

• I'm just hoping the whole ... metaphor of that song was utterly lost on her. We watched "Arsenic and Old Lace" on Friday. She Loved that. "I think those ladies are going to kill him (Cary Grant)" - "Uh, no honey, that's their nephew. He's going to be O.K."
• 8D: Home-run run (trot) - love this. My littlest dog TROTs everywhere she goes. Sometimes we even call her "TROT-TROT."
• 12D: Celebs as a group (A List) - Interesting counterpart to LINE A (123A: Form beginning). You know what word I don't like: "Celebs."
• 18D: Plant circulatory tissue (xylem) - interesting X-cross with SAX (16A: Adolphe _____, musical instrument inventor)
• 36D: "True blue" and gold team (U.C.L.A.) - That's "light blue" to you and me.
• 66D: Poe poem that ends "From grief and groan to a golden throne beside the King of Heaven" ("Lenore") - Also contains the line "Peccavimus; but rave not thus!"
• 89D: Mathematician Turing (Alan) - hey, I remembered his name! Now if I could just remember why he's famous ...
• 90D: Miss Havisham's ward in "Great Expectations" (Estella) - just read this (well, part of this) this past summer. Forgot this was her name.
• 100D: Fossil-yielding rock (shale) - Washington Post TV critic Tom SHALEs had been around a while, but is not yet a fossil.
• 107D: 1982 Disney film ("Tron") - this should be automatic. If it says "Disney" or "1982" and it's in four letters - TRON.
• 111D: War of 1812 battle site (Erie) - ah, my least-understood American war. And yet another way to clue ERIE.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

I'm in my local paper today. Man, my head is huge.

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THURSDAY, May 22, 2008 - Richard Silvestri (HARPERS FERRY RAIDER)

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium

THEME: O-MEN (38D: Sign ... or a description of the answers to the six starred clues?) - 6 guys with O's - and no other vowels - in their names

This theme raised from ho-hum to semi-interesting by the sheer number of O-MEN that get crammed into the grid. I'm imagining the master list contained a good deal more than 6 names - it's hard to get the whole intersecting theme answer thing to work out just right. The MEN in question vary in popularity, from the marginal TOM POSTON and ROB MORROW ("Numb3rs," ugh) to the legendary DON KNOTTS and BJORN BORG, giving the grid a quirky overall personality that's actually kind of charming. I finished this one quickly, and was irked, if not ired, to see the heretofore unknown to me COTS UP at 50D: Misbehaves. I'd already had to suffer through one word I didn't now - PALTER (44A: Be deceitful) - so COTS UP really stuck in my craw ... until I changed it to CUTS UP, which makes much more (i.e. some) sense. I had no idea that a TUN (57A: 252-gallon unit) was a specific unit of measure. I thought it was just, like, a giant URN for wine.

Theme answers:

• 17A: *Five-time Wimbledon winner (Bjorn Borg)
• 24A: *"Numb3rs star" (Rob Morrow)
• 51A: *Harpers Ferry raider (John Brown)
• 64A: *"Newhart" actor (Tom Poston)
• 3D: *Famed restaurateur (Toots Shor) - one of my very favorite xword names. I was born too late for his name to mean anything to me, but I learned of him in a puzzle a little over a year ago, and I've loved him ever since.
• 36D: *Co-star of "The Andy Griffith Show" (Don Knotts)

Any theme-heavy puzzle is going to have a few groaners. I'll point them out without castigation. First, ESTAB. (15A: Founded: Abbr.). You see ESTD. a lot in puzzles, clued often as an abbrev. on building cornerstones. ESTAB ... is a bit long and ugly for an abbrev. Then there's EMER (67A: Part of E.M.T.), which is acceptable, though you'd steer around this kind of thing if you had any choice. NEGEB (8D: Region of Israel: Var.) is one of the more painful Var.iants I've run across. Are there other V-to-B Var.iants? Maybe NEGEB is a common spelling to some, but I've only ever seen NEGEV. The answer that hurt the most was probably UTWO (68A: Classic spy plane), which took me many seconds just to parse correctly. U2. I'm really against spelling out numbers in a letter+number phrase when you'd never (outside the grid) see it written that way. The GEIGHT? UBFORTY? I don't know... Finally there's KNOT (62D: Speed unit). In a puzzle with - and right next to - KNOTTS. . . . [cough]

Misc.:

• 9A: Party to a Highland fling? (lass) - had no idea what this clue was about, or why it was trying to be so fancy. Is a "Highland fling" something that has a specific meaning? Is it a whiskey drink? Hmmm, it's just a dance ... which makes me wonder why the clue is question-mark-worthy.
• 23A: Reggae relative (ska) - I love SKA almost as much as SHOR. I think I love all three-letter words with K's in them: AUK, ASK, KEA, etc.
• 29A: Card game whose name is called out during play (Uno) - was I supposed to guess GIN here? I didn't.
• 47A: Howard in shorts (Moe) - too clever. Creepy clever. Please don't force me to contemplate the Three Stooges in their underwear.
• 7D: Silent film star (Harpo) - Marx Bros. and Three Stooges in same puzzle. This puzzle screams "lonely man over 50." (I kid ...)
• 69A: Catfish Row denizen (Bess) - mmm, denizen ... from the musical (Wikipedia says "opera") "Porgy & Bess." I don't know it well. But one thing I do know: Nina Simone rules.
• 11D: "The _____ Report" (1998 reading) (Starr) - wanted HITE but it wouldn't fit. Not sure which "Report" has more sex.
• 25D: Haircut that's short on the top and sides and long in back (mullet) - I believe the phrase is "Business up front, party in the back."
• 27D: Orly : Paris :: Gardermoen : _____ (Oslo) - piece of cake. Even if you don't know it, you really only need one cross or so to eliminate most plausible 4-letter European cities.
• 53D: "Sun Valley Serenade" star, 1941 (Henie) - the ice-skater? This one was a total mystery to me.
• 54D: One of an old drive-in double feature, maybe (oater) - Can't get enough of this word. OATERs were popular in TOOTS SHOR's day.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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WEDNESDAY, May 7, 2008 - Richard Silvestri (RATHSKELLER DECORATIONS)

Relative difficulty: Medium-Easy

THEME: Baseball wordplay, I guess - non-baseball phrases clued in a wacky baseball manner. Huzzah.

Two words: ALOES (22A: Bitter drug) and SEDALIA (25D: City in central Missouri). Why anyone thought this crossing was acceptable is beyond me. ALOES is a word that should be seen maybe once a year tops, and then only because the rest of your puzzle is Fantastic and you have to make the sacrifice, and THEN only if you clue it via the Athol Fugard play "A Lesson from ALOES." And SEDALIA, if you do not live in MO, is nowhere. Barely more than 20K people huddled in the middle of nowhere, and it's somehow puzzle-worthy? VISALIA is more of a place name than SEDALIA, and I wouldn't foist VISALIA on you despite the fact that I grew up one hour from there and it would be a gimme for me. Or, I might force it on you, if I were sure that all the crosses were gettable. An obscure non-plural s-ending word crossing an obscure proper noun? Yeah, good idea. I finished this puzzle last night and had a blank at this crossing. I decided I didn't care what the answer was and went to sleep.

Theme answers:

• 17A: Musial's 6 and Gibson's 45? (Cardinal numbers) - cute. I almost like this one.
• 27A: Pregame practice in Cincinnati? (Red pepper) - "Pepper?" I only vaguely know this "practice." Here's a definition I yanked off of ask.com: "A warm-up exercise in which players standing a short distance from a batter field the ball and toss it to the batter, who hits each toss back to the fielders." This sounds like a good way to get your nose broken if you are one of the fielders.
• 48A: AT&T Park standout? (Giant star) - would have liked a Barry Bonds clue here (even though he's no longer a Giant). Something more colorful than [Corporate name Park bland word]
• 62A: Prospects for a New York pennant? (Met expectations) - this is horribly bland. In fact, all of these except for CARDINAL NUMBERS are pretty pathetic.

The grid shape here is also torturous (and tortuous) with that horrible intestine-like middle section completely separated from far east and far west. All in all an unpleasant, if ultimately harmless and forgettable, experience.

There have been some disappointing puzzles in the paper lately, but I want to step back for a second and make something very clear to readers who think I grouse too much. The NYT puzzle, for all its occasional faults, is really rivaled by only one other puzzle in the US: The NY Sun. If you want to see how consistently Good the NYT is, how high Will and constructors have set the bar, just try doing this widely syndicated daily puzzle - specifically the Saturday, May 3 edition (you can choose the date from a menu in the upper right corner). When you're done, you can check out my tirade in the comments section here, or (completely unrelated, uncoordinated, and coincidental) Tyler Hinman's semi-tirade here. Sometimes it's good to remember just how good Times solvers have it (puzzles like this one notwithstanding).

Today was a good day for trotting out your xword knowledge. There were at least four answers today that I would have struggled with in the not-too-distant past - and they're all super-familiar to me now, thanks to xwords:

• IGOR (66A: Operatic prince) - put this in without blinking, with no crosses in place. Before crosswords, IGOR was only a creepy lab assistant.
• INEZ (11D: Don Juan's mother) - also Rex Parker's grandmother, who turns 88 next week. Happy birthday, grandma. I love you. As many of you already know, my first crossword memory involves watching my grandma work a puzzle at my mom's kitchen table when I was about 12. Didn't start solving til about 8 years later, but clearly that moment made a big impression.
• ELIAS (28D: Inventor Howe) - can't even remember what he invented, but I know his name cold. Ooh, he patented the first American-made sewing machine. Innnnnteresting.
• STEAMERS (39D: Clambake fare) - there are no clams where I grew up. Just ... raisins. And relentless dry heat for four months out of the year - the kind that makes the metal parts of seatbelts potentially lethal weapons if your car has been parked in the sun for any length of time. But I digress.

Interesting and/or tough stuff:

• 10A: Author O'Flaherty (Liam) - part of the Celtic Revival of the late 19c. and early 20c. The only name you know from the list of authors involved in this movement is William Butler Yeats. You wouldn't know LIAM were it not for xwords. Oh, stop, you would not. You know LIAM Neeson and maybe that guy named LIAM from Oasis (if you are British), and that's it.
• 36A: Beach washer (tide) - what a weird clue ... I like it. You can't really "wash" the beach, can you? It's made of dirt, isn't it? TIDE is EDIT backwards.
• 47A: Earl in the court of Elizabeth I (Essex) - learned a lot about this guy after reading James Shapiro's fascinating 1599: A Year in the Life of Shakespeare this past year.
• 51A: Music booster (amp) - this is like [Tide washer], in a way. -ER noun misdirects you a bit.
• 67A: Perrier alternative (Evian) - stop drinking bottled water right now. Really. Come on. I mean, sure, set some aside in case of natural disaster, but otherwise ...
• 71A: Revue segment (skit) - this one's pretty good.
• 2D: One of TV's "Two and a Half Men" (Alan) - whatever you say.
• 8D: End of some company names (Sons) - had SON- and thought "???? ... SONY?"
• 29D: Indoor game much seen on English TV (darts) - TV? Wow, that's ... sad. How is that anything less than dull?
• 50D: Rathskeller decorations (steins) - Here is Wikipedia's definition of "Rathskeller" ... hey, my university's mysteriously in this write-up. Weird. The only "Rathskeller" I know of is not on or even near campus, as the write-up implies. It's a downtown bar. If you Google [rathskeller binghamton], you can see, without even clicking on any of the hits, the phrases "impending change in ownership" and "recent stabbing" ... I like when my city is comically depressing, as opposed to just plain old depressing.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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SUNDAY, May 4, 2008 - Richard Silvestri (SPRAY WITHDRAWN IN 1989)

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: "Poplar Music" - musical tree puns

Mmm, puns. OK, here's the thing about me and puns. I don't actually hate them categorically. It's just that for a pun to work, it has to be ON. If it's even a bit off, then it's a groaner, which I do not appreciate or find cute, the way some do. Some people enjoy groaners ("oh, how droll"). Not me. If you're going to pun, then hit the nail on the head. Today's puns were so-so. About half hit, half miss, but even the ones that hit didn't sparkle or make me laugh or even smile much. Sadly, hardly any of the pun phrases made any sense in re-written form. I can see a GREAT BALSA FIRE, but FIR YOUR LOVE makes no sense no matter how you say it or punctuate it. I had never heard of two of the "Poplar Songs" in question, and so working those out only made me wince and/or grimace and/or make a questioning face. The lack of humor in the theme phrases and the frequent jarring slant rhymes in the puns kept this from being truly enjoyable.

Still, there was some fun to be had in the non-theme answers. I got wickedly slapped around in the NE, where two words I'd never heard of crossed one I'd barely heard of, resulting in at least one out-and-out guess (which turned out to be right). CORDILLERA (21A: Mountain chain) has to be the longest never-heard-of-it word I've encountered in a Long time. I'll add it to ARETE under the category "Mountain-related words I learned from xwords." Then there's BREVET (29A: Nominal promotion of a military officer) - that "B" was the biggest guess of the day, as it could very easily (to my ear) have been a "P." Then there's the colorful cascading percussion of Tito Puente: TIMBALES (14D: Tito Puente played them). If I hadn't seen Tito Puente in concert once in the mid-90s (during which concert he repeatedly and not very good-naturedly mocked the Ann Arbor audience for what he believed was musical ignorance and general lack of soul - he may not have been wrong), I don't know that I would have guessed correctly here. Early on, I thought "TIMPANIS ... did he really play the TIMPANIS?" No, he did not. Tito Puente, like all self-respecting famous people, was once featured on "The Simpsons." Enjoy.

Theme answers:

• 24A: 1977 Dolly Parton song for tree fanciers? ("Here You Gum Again") - also known as "Song for the Toothless." Had the HERE and thought "where's the tree pun in 'Here You Come Again?' Aha! 'HERE YEW COME...' Hey, that doesn't fit!"
• 50A: 1957 Jerry Lee Lewis song for tree fanciers? ("Great Balsa Fire") - the more I see the phrase "tree fanciers," the more disturbed I get.
• 61A: 1964 Bobby Goldsboro song for tree fanciers? ("Cedar Funny Little Clown") - what? Who? What? That's your marquee answer!? Is there no better title featuring the phrase "see the" in all of songdom? (here's the song in question: oh man, those album covers are Choice!)
• 79A: 1982 Joan Jett and the Blackhearts song for tree fanciers? ("Olive Rock 'n' Roll") - one of the most important songs of my 'tween-hood, so it pains me to see it tricked out in this Horrible pun.
• 90A: 1959 Chuck Berry song for tree fanciers? ("Elmost Grown") - the very worst of the day, by far. Never heard of the song, AND the tree pun creates a Frankenstein's monster of a word: "ELMOST!?!" Just terrible. (the song, however, is hot, it turns out)
• 107A: 1978 Linda Ronstadt song for tree fanciers? ("Pawpaw Pitiful Me") - ["More cowbell!"] - if I hadn't written a very memorable early post where I talked at length about, and featured a picture of, PAWPAWS, I'd have been in a lot of trouble here, despite knowing (and loving) the song in question. My childhood was filled with 70s Linda Ronstadt turned up rather loud. My mom must have owned "Living in the U.S.A.," because that image of L.R. on roller skates is indelible (though to be truthful, before I looked it up just now, I imagined it as far sexier ... and that she was a car hop at a 50s diner).

In the "Stuff I Didn't Know" category, we can add KLAN (101D: Kind of meeting in "O Brother, Where Art Thou?"). Is this KLAN as in KU KLUX!?!? I was not aware that they were allowed into the puzzle. Hmmm. Also did not know the nearby LIAM (100D: "The Informer" author O'Flaherty), though instinctively my brain wanted LIAM. No idea why, as I couldn't pick him or his work out of a line-up. I often teach 16th century English drama and still blanked on PEELE (113A: 16th-century English dramatist). He's ... not popular. LIL Jon (67D: Rap star _____ Jon) is probably going to hurt some people today. I love how deep Will is Willing to go into the rap music goody bag. The world of rap music has, in general, been poorly tapped, crossword-wise. This is likely a solver demographic issue. But ... there's a wealth of insanely spelled names just waiting for you ... O well. For now, I'm just happy that ICE-T and Dr. DRE have some company from time to time.

Other stuff:

• 1A: Craving, slangily (jones) - Matt Jones write a good weekly puzzle called "Jonesin'." You can get it via Will Johnston's Puzzle Pointers (see sidebar).
• 6A: Creche figures (magi) - what else could it be?
• 10A: Impromptu Halloween costume (sheet) - great clue.
• 15A: Spray withdrawn in 1989 (Alar) - a pesticide. Pantheonic crossword fill.
• 26A: Bridal collection (trousseau) - love this word, and it goes great with the other flashy French word in the grid: ATELIER (51D: Place for an easel).
• 30A: Sugar substitute? (Hon) - another great clue. Reminds me of 'Flo from "Alice".
• 42A: World capital founded in 1538, formerly known as Chuquisaca (Sucre) - South American capitals in five ... QUITO, LA PAZ, SUCRE ...
• 53A: Outer limits (ends) - wanted EDGE.
• 58A: One trillionth: Prefix (pico-) - didn't know, but it seemed right once it was there.
• 68A: It's spotted in the wild (ocelot) - this cat gets an extraordinary amount of action for a six-letter word, which is cool, because OCELOT is easily the best-named cat there is.
• 72A: Tippy transport (canoe) - TIPPYCANOE! (and Tyler too?)
• 82A: Jazzy Nina (Simone) - loooooooooove her. She and Mr. Rogers both died at around the same time, and I've never been so sad for celebrity deaths (except maybe Phil Hartman's).
• 86A: Beaufort scale category (gale) - Some day I will remember that Beaufort = wind.
• 92A: Source for some coffee (Arabia) - is Arabia a real place? It's not a country? Is it just the whole ArabiaN Peninsula?
• 96A: Italian bread (pane) - looking for EURO...
• 32D: _____ Jr., West Coast hamburger chain (Carl's) - in my carnivorous days (college), I used to go here all the time. So good. Eventually I learned that In 'N' Out was better, but I still have a fondness for CARL's Jr. (weirdly, coincidentally, I finished the puzzle and then came across a reference to CARL's Jr. in a book I'm reading: Money Shot by Christa Faust. It's good ... and filled with vengeance. That statement may have been redundant.)
• 98A: Source of creosote (tar) - factoid from Wikipedia: "The prevailing use of creosote in the United States is to preserve wooden utilities/telephone poles, railroad cross ties, switch ties and bridge timbers from decay."
• 111A: Sing "Bye Bye Birdie," e.g. (alliterate) - uh ... I guess. Very slippery clue.
• 2D: "A Jug of Wine..." poet (Omar) - KHAYYAM is way more interesting in the grid.
• 8D: Ashram leader (guru) - well, if you didn't get [Guru residences] yesterday (ASHRAMS), you damned sure should have gotten this clue today.
• 15D: "Sink or Swim" author (Alger) - i.e. Horatio. He of the "Pull yourself up by your own bootstraps" mentality.
• 22D: _____ Lad, doughnut shop on "The Simpsons" (Lard) - single best "Simpsons" clue of all-time. Sahra has a Lard Lad baseball cap, and I own this:

• 31D: "A Letter for _____" (Hume Cronyn film) ("Evie") - whoa. Never heard of it. Have heard of this Evie, but only because of the puzzle...
• 43D: Nut holder (U-bolt) - this clue makes me laugh.
• 45D: _____ Systems, networking giant (Cisco) - not to be confused with Sisqo.
• 58D: Purple stuff, perhaps (prose) - good clue.
• 61D: Play-by-play partner (color) - a very hard skill, COLOR commentary. Just ask Tim McCarver.
• 62D: Theodor Escherich's discovery (e-coli) - could he, I don't know, UNdiscover it? That would be great.
• 66D: 1970s-'80s All-Star Manny (Trillo) - this is Ob-sKure, and only my baseball-collecting obsession of 1978-1983 kept me from tanking this.
• 90D: Sufficient, informally (Enuf) - my least favorite expression of all time. All Time: "'nuff said" (or any version thereof).
• 91D: Dance specialty (tap) - weak, boring clue. Come on. Try harder!
• 93D: Soul singer Lou (Rawls) - "You'll never find ..." Deep, distinctive voice.
• 105D: Salmon tail? (-ella) - all-time best cluing of ELLA. Seriously. Genius.
• 109D: John's "Pulp Fiction" co-star (Uma) - Great movie - and here's a great scene. I would have linked to the "Girl, You'll Be a Woman Soon" scene, but it ends in a scary drug overdose, and that doesn't really feel like Sunday morning material.

Enjoy your Sunday

PS Bonus LARD Lad coverage:

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WEDNESDAY, Sep. 5, 2007 - Richard Silvestri

Relative difficulty: Easy

THEME: An "idle question" ... (?)

Well, after yesterday's befuddling theme, today we get a straightforward quip. It's sort of cute, I guess. It's just, well..

OK, first, here's the "idle question" in question:

• 21A: Start of an idle question - IF VEGETARIANS EAT
• 42A: Middle of the question - VEGETABLES WHAT DO
• 60A: End of the question - HUMANITARIANS EAT?

My answer: many humanitarians are also vegetarians. And vegetarians eat way more than just vegetables. And non-vegetarians also eat vegetables. . . I'm sorry, did you just want me to say "humans?"

The question was very easy to get, with huge chunks of it being inferrable even before the whole thing came together; the WHAT DO part of line 2, for instance, or the EAT part of line 3 - both clear once you get the phrasing of the question from the first line. VEGETABLES was pretty easy to infer as well. And since none of the non-theme fill was very tricky, this puzzle went down fast.

Looking at the rest of the puzzle, I hardly have anything to say. The most vivid answers in the grid are 27D: Language from which "safari" comes (Swahili) and 40A: Ruby's victim (Oswald), both of which are undermined somewhat by being gimmes - though I will admit that I could actually hear my brain churning on the Ruby clue - "... searching for people named Ruby ... OK ... know it has something to do with JFK ... OK ... assassin's name was what now? ... Oh yeah, right." Whole process probably took three seconds, but I could feel myself, physically, thinking about it. It was like I was waiting for some fortune-telling machine at the fair to spit out the answer.

Since when is a 5A: Bit of broccoli a SPEAR? Asparagus comes in SPEARs. Broccoli pieces = florets. I'm pretty sure. Well, about half a million Google hits tell me that "Broccoli spears" is in fact an in-the-language phrase. I concede this one.

Some familiar and not-so-familiar names in the puzzle today. Not surprisingly, I didn't know the science-related name, but got the (high-culture) art and (low-culture) music name.

• 15A: _____ Turing, the Father of Computer Science (Alan) - I like how "Father" is capitalized, like he's God. Or a god, anyway.
• 6D: Painter Mondrian (Piet) - love his aesthetic, though it looks like any fifth-grader with a steady hand could paint what he paints. I'm pretty sure that's not true.
• 74A: "Bang Bang" singer, 1966 (Cher) - yeah! That's what I'm talkin' about! Bring on the pop culture cheese. More more more.

Used to play Canasta like crazy on cross-country family vacations, so even though I haven't played in over 20 years, 25A: Canasta plays (melds) came to me pretty quickly. Love the Double-Dogness of 51A: Rover's pal (Fido) and 13D: Hammett pooch (Asta), though having ASTA and ESTA (7D: Is, to Isabella) in the same grid is, well, a bit like having ISLE (71A: Tropical spot) and AISLE (16A: Usher's domain) in the same grid. Not so pleasing. By the way, [Usher's domain] should have been MODERN R&B or SLO JAMS. Which reminds me: PHAT (14D: Excellent, slangily)?! I wonder when the NYT will realize that the term is already dated? Considering that the puzzle still gets a lot of mileage out of NEATO, my guess is: a long time from now.

I would like all four-letter eye-related clues to be IRIS. All the time. I couldn't even tell you what a UVEA is. Lastly, I have zero idea what to make of 64D: "_____ corny ..." ("I'm as..."). Change the "C" to an "H" and the phrase might start to have some sort of meaning.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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WEDNESDAY, Jun. 6, 2007 - Richard Silvestri

Relative difficulty: Easy

THEME: I to Y - common phrases have an "I" changed to a "Y" to create odd new phrases, which are then clued

Theme answers:

• 20A: Stealing some computer memory? (taking a byte)
• 54A: Always use the term "coloring agent?" (never say "dye") - best of today's theme answers by Far
• 11D: Ways to make lefts and rights? (turn styles)
• 29D: Assorted hydroxides? (a pack of lyes)

Not a lot to say today. The theme is fairly unremarkable, and the non-theme fill is, for the most part, ordinary. There are some interesting answer groupings, though, so I guess I will make those the primary subject of today's...

Featured Five

15A: Corrida creature (toro)
19A: Like unfortunate bullfighters (gored)

For a sport that doesn't exist in this country, bullfighting gets a ton of crossword action. I like that in today's puzzle, the bull gets some revenge. Speaking of revenge...

21D: "Revenge of the _____" ("Nerds")
50A: Sig Chi, e.g. (frat)

"Revenge of the NERDS" was a staple of my high-school movie-viewing experience. I think it played every day on HBO for my entire adolescence. Anyway, in the movie, after being rejected and picked on by football types, the "NERDS" start their own FRAT, Lambda Lambda Lambda, or the Tri-Lams, and then they enter the Greek Games (or some such inter-FRAT competition) and, using their collective geniuses, manage to win it all. Hence, "Revenge." I think one of the "NERDS" (possibly Anthony Edwards) also gets a pretty sorority girl in the end. It's a very dumb but strangely enjoyable movie.

4D: Come through (deliver)
38A: Narrow pieces (slivers)
30D: Don or Lena (river)

These, uh, rhyme, with RIVER and SLIVERS intersecting right at the center of the puzzle. The Don and the Lena are both in Russia, FYI.

46D: Saying grace (praying)
4D: Come through (deliver)
44A: Word of agreement ("Amen")

Nice little prayer theme going here. I threw DELIVER in here because of the phrase "... DELIVER us from evil," from the Lord's Prayer.

10D: Chinese cosmic order (Tao)
41A: Kung fu star (Lee)

LEE's fighting philosophy was heavily influenced by TAOism and Buddhism. Many pictures of him feature him in front of the TAOist yin/yang symbol. After his death, some of LEE's notes on fighting were reworked and published as a book called TAO of Jeet Kune Do.

Some unusual words:

• 16A: Pleasant Island, today (Nauru) - never heard of it
• 32D: Cordwood measure (stere) - a half-guess; I've seen it before but could not have defined it for you
• 18A: Broadway's _____ Jay Lerner (Alan) - a gimme for some, perhaps, but for me ... no. Got it from crosses.
• 61D: Faline's mother, in "Bambi" (Ena) - never seen the movie and don't care to. Again, got it from crosses.
• 57D: Sledge (dray) - good word. I think of a DRAY as a wagon or cart - is that what "sledge" means here? Probably.

That's all for today. See you tomorrow.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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WEDNESDAY, May 2, 2007 - Richard Silvestri

Relative difficulty: Easy (with a few obscure words)

THEME: New York, New York, New York - "NY" added to ends of three familiar phrases to create new, odd phrases, which are then clued

[updated 10:50 a.m.]

This has to be the least imaginative theme I've seen this year. The only reason this puzzle took me as long as it did (and it only took me about 6-7 minutes) was because I lost time imagining the theme was more complex than it was - and because a couple of the theme answer crosses are crazy, made-up looking words. The theme clues / answers are as follows:

20A: Coin thrown for good luck? (fountain penny)
38A: Result of sitting on a court bench too long? (basketball fanny)
51A: Bugged Bugs? (hot cross bunny)

For no good reason, I had FOUNTAIN PENNE for a while - I think that between the time I read the clue and filled in the answer, my mind had invented a whole new and much better theme involving pasta. The fact that the answer PASTA (57A: Edible shells) appears in the grid only confirmed the rightness of this theme in my mind. Yes, the puzzle was So Easy that I had worked my way all the way to the SW corner, with only a few bare patches left behind, before I'd even fully grasped what the alleged "theme" was. I spent many seconds wondering what kind of PASTA could be involved in BASKETBALL-ANN- (that last letter is blank because I couldn't remember how to spell SLYER (33D: Less straightforward); thought it might be SLIER). Finally got HOT CROSS BUNNY, then thought, "Well, this is stupid, BUNNY doesn't even rhyme with PENNE." That's when I reread the PENNE clue and realized that it asked for a coin, not pasta - so PENNY. Then I reread the BASKETBALL -ANN- clue, put the "Y" where it belonged, and easily got FANNY - that "F" is the first letter in the puzzle's most insane word, FICHU (40D: Woman's shoulder wrap). All that, and I was still well under 7 minutes. No real aha moment, no sense of accomplishment, nothing. And for this lame theme I had to endure some very unpretty non-theme fill, like:

12D: Taiwan Strait city (Amoy) - I'm sure I've seen this in some crossword somewhere, but as Asian cities go, this is super obscure. Speaking of Asia, we also have 34A: Kurds and Nepalis (Asians) and 36A: My _____, Vietnam (Lai).

42A: River to the Rhine (Aar) - I'm sorry, I know this is a real river and everything, but whenever I see it, I can't help but feel that the constructor just didn't try hard enough. It's like throwing in the towel, this answer. Only good thing: it sounds like the noise I make when I see it.

53A: Arctic bird (skua) - I have a feeling I've complained about this before. I'm sure it's a fine bird, and it's got a "K" in it, so it can't be all bad. Still, it reeks of desperation to me, especially when it stands out like a sore thumb against the heaps of banal fill (SAGE, NUNS, OKIE, OBESE, etc.)

43A: Feed for livestock (silage) - again, I'm sure this is very valid; I've seen it before. It's just an ugly word - or rather, it's obscure, and yet not interesting, so ... meh. If SILAGE got you something great, OK. But when SILAGE really gets you nothing but the "I" in FICHU (!?), then no. No. Actually, I blame the generally horrible BASKETBALL FANNY for the whole FICHU / SILAGE fiasco (as it will now be known). If you're going to give the grid over to a grid-traversing answer, it better be a good one, and BASKETBALL FANNY is pathetic. BASKETBALL FAN is barely a phrase. It's totally arbitrary, no more a phrase than any other fill-in-the-blank FAN would be.

And I'm not too fond of DOSING (46D: Plying with pills) or STAGER (35D: One putting on a show), either. And FLARE (30D: "Accident ahead" indicator) crossing AFIRE (29A: All lit up)? Is that supposed to be cute?

Even the subtheme didn't grab me, and normally I enjoy subthemes, especially when they are about classical literature, as this one is:

13D: Answer to the riddle of the Sphinx (man)
21D: Before Oedipus, who could answer the riddle of the Sphinx (no one)

The Riddle = What goes on four legs in the morning, on two legs at noon, and on three legs in the evening?

(morning, noon, evening = metaphors for stages in one's life, i.e. "three legs" = walking with cane ... or so I think)

Random stuff, some of which I liked OK

6D: Dudley Do-Right's home (Canada) - I got the first three across clues, bam bam bam, and then proceeded to get nearly every Down cross off those three answers, including this one, the longest of them all. A most excellent way to clue Canada - much better than [Anne Murray's home] or [Bryan Adams's home].

25D: Storybook elephant (Babar) - ah, more cartoony goodness. Sahra has some BABAR prints on her wall. We bought her a book called something like "BABAR Goes to the Museum" and there's a fabulous big poster that goes with it where all these famous paintings are redone with elephants in place of people.

44A: Neurotic TV dog (Ren) - ah, still more cartoony goodness. Actually, I never liked "REN & Stimpy" - too gross-out, too bodily-function-oriented. But in the puzzle, I like REN just fine.

48D: Cousin of a mink (otter) - very cute animals. There is a viral video going around (extremely popular) of otters holding hands ... just floating there, on their backs, holding hands. It's so cute it's disgusting.

26D: Subject of Fowler's handbook (usage) - mmm, persnickety language stuff; very exciting stuff for this OED NERD - 23A: Work started by London's Philological Soc. and 24A: Geeky guy.

I had two misfills along the way, one good and one great. First, I had NECK for 55D: Mane site (nape), and had already built ACME off the "C" before I realized NECK was wrong - ACME ended up being 63A: Pinnacle (apex). Second, bigger mistake was entering BIANNUAL for BIENNIAL (8D: Like House elections) and never ever catching it, even though it left me with INRU for 18A: Concerning (In re:) and AFURE for AFIRE.

Wow, I finished my blog entry the night before the puzzle's publication date. Must not be that tired. I'm still abuzz over the performances on "American Idol" earlier tonight. It was, no joke, Bon Jovi night. Painful as that may sound, there was some decent singing to be heard. Tonight was the first time I voted all season long: for Lakisha (finally singing well again), Melinda (duh, she rules) and my new boyfriend, Blake, who totally dismantled and reassembled "You Give Love a Bad Name" and made it sound like something it has never been: a good song.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

PS I meant to comment on 48A: Scott Turow work set at Harvard ("One L") because its history in the grid is interesting ... to me. I feel like I used to see ONE L all the time. It was borderline Pantheon material. But I don't think I've seen it much, if at all, in the entire time I've been blogging about the NYT puzzle. Has its shelf life expired?

PPS The first time I saw TRIO (1A: Rock's Green Day, for one) clued via the band Green Day, I liked it. Today, I tolerated it. Next time ... who knows? What about Dixie Chicks? Stray Cats? Dolly Parton, Linda Rondstadt and Emmylou Harris had an album called "Trio" - see, even within the world of music, there are so many other ways to go. Mix it up!

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