Utterance that's usually made in pairs / SAT 2-22-25 / Club purchase that comes with rules of etiquette / Protective hairstyle, familiarly / Loire Valley grape variety / Time to celebrate female friendship, in a neologism / Chicken ___, panko-breaded dish / Candies originally named for their imperfect shape / Zendaya's role on "Euphoria" / Great Plains aquifer that supplies over a quarter of U.S. irrigation water

Constructor: Rose Conlon

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: belated GALENTINE'S DAY (not really, but kinda felt like it) 

Word of the Day: OGALLALA (35D: Great Plains aquifer that supplies over a quarter of U.S. irrigation water) —

The Ogallala Aquifer (oh-gə-LAH-lə) is a shallow water table aquifer surrounded by sand, silt, clay, and gravel located beneath the Great Plains in the United States. As one of the world's largest aquifers, it underlies an area of approximately 174,000 sq mi (450,000 km²) in portions of eight states (South Dakota, Nebraska, Wyoming, Colorado, Kansas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, and Texas). It was named in 1898 by geologist N. H. Darton from its type locality near the town of Ogallala, Nebraska. The aquifer is part of the High Plains Aquifer System, and resides in the Ogallala Formation, which is the principal geologic unit underlying 80% of the High Plains.

Large-scale extraction for agricultural purposes started after World War II due partially to center pivot irrigation and to the adaptation of automotive engines to power groundwater wells. Today about 27% of the irrigated land in the entire United States lies over the aquifer, which yields about 30% of the ground water used for irrigation in the United States. The aquifer is at risk of over-extraction and pollution. Since 1950, agricultural irrigation has reduced the saturated volume of the aquifer by an estimated 9%. Once depleted, the aquifer will take over 6,000 years to replenish naturally through rainfall.

The aquifer system supplies drinking water to 82% of the 2.3 million people (1990 census) who live within the boundaries of the High Plains study area.

• • •

Well that was a new experience. It's one thing to come shooting out of a corner and across the grid—that great, elusive "whoosh" feeling—but quite another to come shooting out of a corner and across the grid as a literal HUMAN CANNONBALL (7D: Big shot performer?). This was easily my favorite moment of the puzzle, right here:

Full disclosure: this real-time screenshot of my solve is not "real." I was going to do the screenshot, then noticed that I had ACES where AYES was (now) clearly supposed to go (5D: Pros). So I changed it. Then put the cursor back where it was, at the end of HUMAN CANNONBALL. Yes, like Holly Hunter in Broadcast News, I hate fraud so much that I'm actually disclosing the tiny, completely insignificant way in which the above grid was doctored. Better to just leave mistakes in place. (This is the part of blogging that normally takes place solely in my head, not on the page ... not sure what's going on this morning). Anyway: Whoosh. Big Whoosh. A real feeling of breakthrough, with a little smile tacked on. Good stuff. 

Lots of other good stuff in this grid, which had a decidedly younger (than me), slightly female vibe. The latter is probably due entirely to GALENTINE'S DAY (a thing I forgot existed) (37A: Time to celebrate female friendship, in a neologism). Somehow, that one answer is coloring how I'm reading and hearing a lot of the terms in the grid, especially the colloquial stuff. I just assume a group of young women have gone out on the town, you know, "to celebrate female friendship," and so that's the context in which I hear the exclamations and slang and what not—stuff like "I HATE YOU!" (as a compliment) and "OH, DAMN" (as an expression of amazement). Maybe the ladies are at a strip club getting LAP DANCEs, I don't know—you never know what people's LOVE LANGUAGES are going to be—but whatever was going on, people seemed to be having a good time.

The difficulty level was sufficient today. It's possible that this played easier than a typical Saturday, but I got stuck enough, and had to fight enough, that I wasn't disappointed. Hardest parts for me were the NW (the "I HATE" part of "I HATE YOU" and the MATH part of MATH TEAM), and then the GREEN part of GREEN ANACONDA. Getting "I HATE YOU" gave me a good aha feeling. Getting MATH TEAM ... didn't. Do math teams "reckon"? Is "reckoning" supposed to be a synonym for "solving" ... math problems? I can see how "day of reckoning" is tempting wordplay, but that didn't quite work for me. And GREEN ANACONDA, LOL, they come in different colors? I know ANACONDA. Beyond that ... you could put any word in front of ANACONDA, tell me it was a species, and I'd believe you. A wordlist definitely barfed up that term. But whatever, it's real, I assume, and crosses exist, so no (big) problem.

I also could not remember GAMAY (45D: Loire Valley grape variety). Just blanked. Wanted GANAY at some point, why? GAMAY is a grape I've heard of but ... nope, didn't stick. Familiarish, but not familiar enough. I also couldn't spell the Great Plains aquifer, OGALLALA (are "L"s double, or single, when?, etc.). Doesn't help that the Great Plains tribe is called OGLALA (subtribe of the Lakota, actually). This particular spelling challenge had me with "L"s and "A"s in the wrong places at various points, resulting in wrong answers like AFRO instead of LOCS at 46A: Protective hairstyle, familiarly, and ... well, just that wrong answer, I guess. Also wrong down there, AISLE instead of COACH (48D: Certain airplane seating), and SEA instead of SHE (61A: ___-wolf), which I pulled quickly because I remembered that I had already played SEA (at 25D: Huge quantity, it turns out). ENDS for CADS (34D: Heels) was my only other out-and-out error.

Other things:

• 1A: Utterance that's usually made in pairs (TSK) — got it ... but then immediately doubted it, because TUT works just as well. Anyway, neither of them helped with crosses (though that "K" really should've gotten me KATSU—mad at myself for not immediately remembering KATSU) (3D: Chicken ___, panko-breaded dish)
• 6A: Classic stop on the vaudeville circuit (PEORIA) — "but will it play in PEORIA?" is a question I remember hearing ... somehow ... in the past ... when pop culture still had a memory of vaudeville. Maybe on The Love Boat?
• 18A: How criticism of a pastry chef might be delivered? (TARTLY) — good one
• 31A: Zendaya's role on "Euphoria" (RUE) — one of those answers that makes the puzzle feel like it skews younger (than me). No interest in this show, no idea what characters' names are. Last RUE I knew was in ... Hunger Games, right? Yes. Before that, it was just McClanahan. She was definitely on The Love Boat, at least once.

• 36A: Acts of service and words of affirmation, for two (LOVE LANGUAGES) — I like the answer, but the clue is dull as dishwater. I wanted more vivid or specific or relatable LOVE LANGUAGES, like ... I dunno, "Baking" or "Foot Massages" or "Sarcasm." The ones in the clue are just lifted from the standard "Five Love Languages," which comes from a book by Gary Chapman, whoever that is, yawn

• 10D: Like the exterior columns at the Parthenon (DORIC) — so ... not Corinthian, then? Got it. 
• 12D: Candies originally named for their imperfect shape (MILK DUDS) — ok so you know how most things people call "fun facts" are just "facts" and not "fun"? Well this is a fun fact. Legitimately fun. Revelatory.
• 58D: Club purchase that comes with rules of etiquette (LAP DANCE) — LOL when I finally got this, as I was picturing like a tennis or golf club, and imagining "comes with" meant that they literally handed out a booklet or whatever. Pretty sure that's not what's happening in the strip club. If it's about strip clubs and it's not in ANORA (which still somehow hasn't appeared in the NYTXW), then I don't know about it.
• 51D: Down Under wear (UGGS) — they ... they wear these all over. Famously. Everywhere. Here there everywhere. Yes, originated Down Under, but ... weird clue. Although it did lead me to this great line from wikipedia: "In Australia, [UGGS] are worn predominantly as slippers and often associated with daggy fashion sense and bogan culture." DAGGY! BOGAN! Please, can we? We've run out of good U.S. slang. Time to go ... down under.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook]

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Accept a package formally / WED 2-23-22 / Social media-induced anxiety for short / Supermodel Gigi or Bella / Letters accompanying a tip / Pirate whose hidden treasure inspired "The Gold-Bug" / An ironic punchline / Angry outburst from a bodybuilder maybe / One who recreationally explores sewers and underground tunnels

Constructor: Rose Conlon

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: SIGN FOR DELIVERY (37A: Accept a package formally ... or a hint to 17-, 29-, 45- and 62-Across) — ordinary phrases that can also be understood as punny descriptions of different phases of childbirth, if you want them to be...

Theme answers:

• GUT FEELING (17A: Sneaking suspicion)
• THE KICKER (29A: An ironic punchline)
• BUMPY RIDE (45A: Rough flight)
• WATER BREAK (62A: Reason to pause a workout)

Word of the Day: "Salt Fat ACID Heat" (7D: "Salt Fat ___ Heat" (popular cookbook)) —

Salt Fat Acid Heat: Mastering the Elements of Good Cooking is a 2017 cookbook written by American chef Samin Nosrat and illustrated by Wendy MacNaughton. The book was designed by Alvaro Villanueva. It inspired the 2018 American four-part cooking docu-series Salt Fat Acid Heat. // A reference book, the cookbook is focused on teaching techniques and structured around the four titular elements: Salt, Fat, Acid, and Heat. The book explains what they are and how to master them in your cooking in order to become a better, more intuitive cook. Nosrat explains that these are the defining factors which determine the flavor and texture of food every time you cook, calling them the "cardinal directions" of cooking. The goal of the book is for readers to leave with a new cooking philosophy. [...] Nosrat started working on the book around 2009/2010 when Michael Pollan, an author and cooking student of hers, learned about her four-part system and encouraged her to write a book about it. She developed a curriculum based on the concept and taught many classes on it to develop the material. Throughout the process, Nosrat would note which concepts were easier to convey visually and started to design diagrams to help explain them. These also formed the foundation of diagrams in the book which give an overview, for example of sources of acid or salt.

• • •

I wonder if gender had anything to do with how long it took the average solver to figure out what the theme was supposed to be. It probably didn't take me that long, in terms of actual minutes spent, but I don't think I've spent "minutes" trying to figure out a Wednesday theme in a long time, if ever. Because there's such a thing as a "water sign" (Scorpio, for one) (but not Aquarius, weirdly), and the last themer starts with "water," I thought the "sign" in the revealer had something to do with the zodiac. At first. When that didn't pan out, I thought of street signs ("Bump!"), but no. And so on. I had to exhaust the "sign" angle and move over to alternate meanings of "delivery" before the "aha" *click* finally happened. This is a very cute concept; my brain was just very slow to pick up the gag. I'm not sure what phase of childbirth BUMPY RIDE is supposed to refer to ... Is the kid still kicking, or is the ride to the hospital (!?) supposed to be bumpy. Or is this a "baby bump" reference? And the kid is just "riding" ... in the "bump"? All of the above!? That part wasn't completely clear to me. But aside from the fact that I would never formally name the time it takes me to get a drink of water during a workout a WATER BREAK, these theme answers all seem fun and fresh, and the non-theme stuff is pretty strong overall. My first word was ÉTÉ followed shortly by EKE and DELINT and ECIG, and then (improbably) a reappearance of Monday's old-school crosswordese AKELA, so I was worried the puzzle was going to be a BUMPY RIDE indeed, but then things leveled off, i.e. the fill got better. It even got a bit flashy in the longer Downs (MANSPLAINS, URBAN CAVER). So I didn't enjoy feeling like an IDIOT for the 2 to 3 minutes it took me to understand what the hell was happening with the theme, but otherwise I liked this much more than I like most Wednesdays.

["Look what I got! Now people will stop intentionally ramming our car!"]

'ROID RAGE feels oddly dated to me now. It once would've seemed like a sassy, modern expression, but now it feels weirdly '90s — like something no one says anymore. It also feels more mythical than real. I go to the gym regularly, and I've seen some bad behavior in there, for sure, but I've never seen 'ROID RAGE. My trainer is a bodybuilder—I'll ask her if it's (still) a thing the next time I'm in there (Friday). I thought TAMARI was just another word for "soy sauce," I had no idea it was uniquely "gluten-free." Allrecipes dot com talks about TAMARI and soy sauce as if they were in fact different things, but I think TAMARI's just a subset of soy sauce after all:

Tamari and soy sauce may look similar, but there are many differences between these two condiments. Soy sauce is common throughout all of Asia, but tamari is wholly Japanese. Tamari is the liquid that is pressed from fermenting miso paste, however soy sauce is made from fermenting in tanks with grains, in a method that's similar to beer making.

Cool, cool, I'm learning food things! Speaking of food things, you should definitely check out "Salt Fat ACID Heat" (the book and the Netflix documentary) if you haven't already (7D: "Salt Fat ___ Heat" (popular cookbook)). Samin Nosrat is a very engaging writer and host. She also does a really charming and informative food podcast with her friend Hrishikesh Hirway called "Home Cooking." Ooh, and I think she also made an appearance on Michelle Obama's Netflix food series, "Waffles + Mochi" (yep, first episode!). Anyway, crossword constructors, I've never seen SAMIN in the puzzle before (or NOSRAT, for that matter), so ... you know ... nudge nudge.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]

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