"20 Years of Detention" — A Perfectly Cromulent Puzzle

It was 20 years ago today ... that a certain TV show had its full-length, prime-time debut. Patrick Blindauer and I offer the following puzzle as a tribute. Enjoy.

As usual, click on "Print" on the image below, or go here (to the crosswordfiend.com forum) to get a .puz / AcrossLite version of the puzzle. Thanks to Patrick Blindauer for doing this with me. It was a blast. If you get stumped, you can find the solution here.

Brief write-up of the puzzle after the kitten, below ...

20 Years of Detention



I first thought about writing a puzzle to commemorate the 20th anniversary of "The Simpsons" some time last year. But as with most things I think of, I did nothing about it. Time passed. Then I was having dinner in Queens with Patrick Blindauer and and a few other folks after Ryan and Brian's Crossword Tournament in August, and I mentioned the idea to Patrick. I mentioned some possible theme ideas, but none seemed terribly feasible. Too obvious, or too elaborate. To my surprise, shortly thereafter, Patrick emailed me with a giant list of Bart's chalkboard scrawlings, each one beginning "I will not..." and each one paired with another of equal length. At first I thought ... I don't know. I wasn't sure. But then the more I thought on it, the more I liked it. It would be like a giant quote puzzle, so crosses would have to be super fair, but the theme phrases themselves (unlike most quote puzzles) are actually funny (TEASE FATTY makes me laugh every time I look at it).


We had enough material to do a Sunday-sized puzzle, but I wanted it to come out on the anniversary itself (today, Dec. 17), so we pared it down to six (still a Hell of a lot to cram into a 15x15 grid, esp. with the Xs and Ks and Vs and what not, plus BART). I built a grid. Got it rolling, then realized that fill would be a little ugly in and around the XEROX region. So Patrick tweaked the grid slightly and that opened things right up. We could have gone with a few other things besides OSAMU at 25A, but there was NO way I was giving it up. He's about as big a figure as there is in (non-Western) comics, and is a household name in Japan, and he's not in the cruciverb.com database, so I was prepared to fight for him. In that section, INI is really painful, but I was happy enough to get out of that XEROX section with OSAMU, ARTICHOKES, and PECKISH in place (all of which I love). MOE (like ABE) was an accident. But once I saw I had both of those guys, I intentionally put LISA in the NW.

Without a doubt, the western seaboard of the puzzle, from OSAMU to the far SW, took the most time to construct. And reconstruct. And reconstruct. I wanted PECKISH, which limited what we could do coming down off the "K" into the SW. In the end, we had the option of KAREEM or KARENS, neither of which is exciting (tho' the former beats the latter), and both of which were going to leave us with more partial / abbrev. action than we wanted in the surrounding fill. Then on a lark I proposed KAREN O to Patrick. She's the lead singer of the YEAH YEAH YEAHs (see 34D to see why we could *not* cue her that way). She was in the (hipster music) news as we were writing the puzzle, since "Where The Wild Things Are" was about to be released into theaters. I knew she was really famous in the rock music world, but for a mainstream audience ... I wasn't sure. Ran it by Patrick, thinking for sure he'd say "no way," but he liked it. Thought it was fresh and valid. So we went with her, and the SW is way, way better for having her.

Once Patrick got the grid issues sorted out (the really hard work), I filled most of the grid. At the end, Patrick got in and suggested modifications up top and in the SW (specifically, he picked up that IDEE, which used to be in the SW, and IDEAL, up top, are etymologically related and should therefore not appear in same grid together — that's an eagle eye). I clued Acrosses and he clued Downs, and then went through like a good editor and polished / modified *all* the clues. His technical skillz and editorial skillz are pretty mad. Some last minute back-and-forth on exactly how to clue the theme answers, and there we were. Done.

We submitted it to Will, but he rejected it, believing the theme had only niche appeal. Also, he seemed not to get the humor in many of the theme answers (e.g. "Am I supposed to know who FATTY is?"). If he felt that way, I'm sure he won't be alone. He knows what he's doing. So we're releasing it directly to you, for you to adore, vilify, or shrug at, as you see fit. Thank you.

~RP

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter]

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SUNDAY, Nov. 16, 2008 - Merl Reagle (Meshed foundation in lace / "Song of the Islands" co-star Jack / Iron Man co-creator Larry / "Loverboy" actress)

Relative difficulty: Medium-Challenging

THEME: "Sounds Like Somebody I Know" - puns on the names of famous people

This puzzle will be featured - in some fashion - in tonight's all-new episode of "The Simpsons," which is all about crosswords (FOX, 8pm). Read more about it here. [There's lots of talk of a "hidden message" in the puzzle ... I just learned that there are actually two of them, which almost certainly explains why the puzzle feels so wonky in places ... anyway, watch the show tonight!]



Well, this has Merl Reagle written all over it. Feels like Will really handed over the reins on this one, because there is an insane playfulness that NYT puzzles normally don't have - and as is typical with actual insane playfulness, the results are both exhilarating and disastrous. Nobody can run two long theme answers right alongside each other like Merl Reagle - I feel like this is a signature move of his. His Philadelphia Inquirer Sunday puzzles are often full of long, gutsy, punning answers that stretch the limits of the imagination (and, occasionally, good taste). The man is an artist, and I take the good with the bad happily. I wish more people wrote puzzles with the verve, panache, and some other fancy noun that Merl does. (Which reminds me - be sure to check out today's Philadelphia Inquirer puzzle - another Merl creation, and another "Simpsons"-themed puzzle; if you solve with Across Lite software - which you can download for free via the NYT Premium Puzzles site - you can access Merl's puzzle from here)

The punny theme answers are almost uniformly fantastic, and as we all know, I'm not a pun fan. I learned a new word today: PTOMAINE (!?) (from MARISA PTOMAINE) - I could barely bring myself to fill in the letters, so strange does the word look. Botched RAYMOND CHANNELER at first because I thought it was supposed to be CHANDELIER and then because it wouldn't fit I figured I just screwed up the spelling of CHANDELIER. My favorite theme moment is NIKITA CRUISE CHEF over LINDSAY LOW HAND. Painful yet gorgeous. I have not read much of anything about tonight's episode of "The Simpsons," so I'm not sure how all this is supposed to play out. I'll just wait and see. But kudos to Merl for working both D'OH! (35A: Exclamation from a blockhead) and BART (115A: Driving alternative in S.F.) into the puzzle.

Theme answers:

• 17A: "Loverboy" actress who made the cast sick? (Marisa Ptomaine)
• 21A: Seance-loving crime writer? (Raymond Channeler)
• 40A: Hall of Fame golfer who invented the all-plastic club? (Arnold Polymer) - it only just occurred to me that "club" here refers to a golf club. I was thinking "Who or what would belong to an all-plastic club?"
• 53A: All-telling gossip queen who repeats everything she says? (Rona Parrot)
• 72A: Avant-garde composer who sat around a lot? (Erik Settee)
• 82A: Passionate tennis star? (Monica Zealous)
• 105A: Moscow V.I.P. who like to cook on a ship? (Nikita Cruise Chef)
• 111A: "I have no face cards" actress? (Lindsay Low Hand)

There were some moments that made me wince, though, I have to say. First of all, there were just a Lot of words I'd never heard of - I probably should know PTOMAINE, but RESEAU (33A: Meshed foundation in lace)!?!?! That seems arcane and technical beyond belief. Beyond tolerance, even. I read comics, but who the hell is this LIEBER guy (90D: Iron Man co-creator Larry). Besides the co-creator of Iron Man, I mean. How many people besides hardcore comics nerds know that? That (rough) SE corner brings me to another gripe I have: OH HELL (88A: "Rats!")? First, that seems awfully close to profanity for a NYT puzzle. It does not offend my sensibilities at All, but I was Not expecting it and went with OH HECK and stayed with OH HECK for quite some time. I had another good reason for going with OH HECK, besides prudishness: "HELL" is in one of the clues - 106D: Hell _____ handbasket (in a). That makes "HELL" what we call a "dupe" and dupes are NONOS (86A: Some etiquette rules).

More gripes: two horrible crossings. I am four square against crossing foreign words unless one or both are super common. Thus the SEHR (103D: Ilse's "very") / SOTTO (103A: Lower than: It.) crossing irked me. I inferred it from the SOTTO in the phrase SOTTO VOCE, but SEHR I did not know (no German, sorry Ulrich et al.). Not cool. No crossing foreign words. The other crossing that blew (for me) was ROOTED (85D: Rummaged) / ROLL (85A: Yaw relative, on an aircraft). I had LOOTED / LOLL, not knowing what the hell the "Yaw" clue was going for. It never occurred to me that "LOOTED" was not the absolute right answer, though clearly, in retrospect, it's a bit off, given the clue. Stop yaw and roll? And what's with SML (65A: Letters of sizes). That feels awfully made-up. I would have tripped all over the obscure OAKIE (93D: "Song of the Islands" co-star Jack) if I hadn't already tripped all over him earlier this month. ROMANA took forever, but that's my own damned fault (45A: Alla _____ (pasta style)).

Variety Pack:

• 10A: Attorney's favorite sweets? (tortes) - there seemed to be more of these cutesy "?"-clues than we normally see from Will. I'm guessing most of the clues here are Merl's originals. He's a seasoned editor - he knows what he's doing.
• 28A: Abbr. after Ted Kennedy's name (D-Mass) - nice to give the ailing legendary senator a shout-out
• 39A: "O.S.S." star, 1946 (Ladd) - he was just in a puzzle, and that double-D ending can't be many other folks, so I got this easily despite having no idea what "O.S.S." is.
• 48A: Planned site of the Geo. W. Bush Presidential Library (SMU) - I guessed WACO but it wouldn't fit.
• 50A: Young wife (age 18) of Charlie Chaplin (age 54) (Oona) - once a crossword staple, now an odd curiosity, like ADIT. This clue is not typical Shortz stuff - this is a trivia / story clue, giving you way more info than you need for the sole point of dispensing curious information. See also 67A: Yul Brynner died the same day as _____ Welles (odd fact) (Orson) - I cannot recall seeing a Shortz clue like this before, where a non-quotation complete sentence has a fill-in-the-blank answer. It just feels weird. "(odd fact)" is right. I love how we apparently need to be told that it's an odd fact. "Oh, odd fact ... I see ... now."
• 55A: Letters of commerce (GATT) - a treaty. Took me a while.
• 56A: Laying-on of hands? (back rub) - Also took me a while, primarily because of a pair of kooky krosses - BONEMAN (56D: Guy who digs fossils) and ROSE SLUG (57D: American Beauty pest) - both of which took a while to come and felt iffy when they did.
• 69A: Relatives of TV host Tom (Snyders) - another one that took some patience, because of the evasive CHOIR BOY (30D: Tenor, perhaps) - I had CHOIR and then No Idea what came next.
• 81A: Prima donna Norman (Jessye) - at first I was thinking "they call men 'prima donnas?'" Hey look, it's Jessye Norman singing ERIK SETTEE:
  

• 104A: Disney pirate, 1953 (Smee) - thought it was a gimme (and it was) but ran into all kinds of trouble in the SW corner that made me second-guess even this.
• 110A: Eban of Israel (Abba) - ditto
• 6D: Noriega's weapons (armas) - why even bother changing the name for the next Across clue, 7D: Delgado's rivers (rios)? I feel almost the same way about back-to-back foreign words from the same language as I do about intersecting foreign words generally.
• 4D: Hall of Fame coach Ewbank (Weeb) - aargh. I wrote in WEBB, forgetting about this guy's phenomenally weird name.
• 17A: Freeboot (maraud) - OK, that is awesome (see yesterday's puzzle, which featured this clue/answer pair in reverse)
• 29D: Teutonic name part (von) - this puzzle is sure in love with foreign languages. I ridiculously had "SON" here (where was I, Sweden?)
• 18D: Old IBM offering (PC, Jr.) - HA ha, was this a real thing? I love this answer: PCJR looks All Kinds of Krazy in the grid.
• 31D: Enos Slaughter's team for 13 yrs. (STL) - had the "S" and couldn't think of a three-letter abbrev. to save my life.
• 32D: Roo's donkey friend (Eeyore) - I assume this is a gimme for everyone, but you neeeever know.
• 35D: "Wagon Master" actress Joanne (Dru) - no clue. She and OAKIE may have starred in pictures together, for all I know.
• 45D: Patrick Macnee's 1960s TV co-star Diana (Rigg) - funnily enough, wife and I both blanked on her name the other night, and then later both remembered it. So this was a gimme.
• 37D: Assigner of G's and R's: Abbr. (MPAA) - Motion Picture Association of America
• 46D: Opus with singing (oratorio) - Opus reminds me of the cartoon penguin of the same name (that's what happens when you read comics voraciously before you learn Anything about music).
• 70D: Gallantry-in-war medals: Abbr. (DFCs) - no idea. I'm guessing it's way better than a KFC. Let's see ... Distinguished Flying Cross. Looks like this:

• 63D: Old aviation magazine _____ Digest (Aero) - saw the four letters, wrote in AERO on a hunch. Bingo.
• 91D: Mythical piper (pan) - true enough
• 107D: Y.A. Tittle scores (TDs) - His name makes me laugh.
• 77D: Vacation destination for sandwich lovers? (Delhi) - HA ha. Inventive...
  
• 108D: Org. with a five-ring logo (IOC) - International Olympic Committee; wow, in addition to lots of foreign words, there appear to be LOTS of Abbreviations. Price you pay for magical theme answers, I guess.
• 73D: Big name in tea (Tazo) - cool. Corporate, but cool. Fresh. Current.

OK, I think I'm done. This episode of "The Simpsons" better rule. Crossword puzzles and "The Simpsons" ... My two great passions in life ... colliding? O god, the results can only be disappointing ... no, I must keep hope alive. Yes I Can!

See you later.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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SUNDAY, Mar. 4, 2007 - Randolph Ross

Solving time: untimed - but like every puzzle this week, it seems, this one was on the easy side
THEME: "You Can Look It Up" - 63A: Dictionary source for each asterisked clue in this puzzle (Random House Unabridged)

I feel as if I am tempting fate by remarking on the easiness of recent puzzles. I'm sure this means that I'll get eaten alive by the Wednesday puzzle this week. Still, things have been pretty smooth sailing lately. Maybe I'm just getting better and the puzzle difficulty doesn't really need tweaking. I should develop a difficulty level rating system, ranging from PWN3D (easiest) to NO MAS (hardest). I guess these are based on things one might exclaim on completing (or, perhaps, in the case of NO MAS, not completing) the puzzle. I need words for levels of difficulty in between. Suggestions appreciated.

This theme ruled, IMOO. Oh, in case it's not clear, all clues have answers that relate to the placement of the clue's word or phrase in the RANDOM HOUSE UNABRIDGED dictionary, and those answers are themselves familiar phrases. The first theme clue sets this up - 23A: *Where to find para in the dictionary (one below par) - and subsequent themed clues just have ellipses, implying an extension of the 23A "para" question to later words, e.g. 46A: *... Hancock ... (beforehand). Just the sight of RANDOM HOUSE UNABRIDGED running across the length of the middle of the puzzle give me happy feelings. It is true that once you got the theme, you could at least get the beginning part of most of the asterisked clues pretty easily - and yet the cleverness of the whole endeavor, complete with 180-degree rotational symmetry for all asterisked answers, made solving the puzzle a pleasure.

[took a two-hour break for pancakes and for showing a couple of first-graders who's the boss of Crazy 8's]

58A: "The Man Who Knew Too Much" actress, 1934 (Edna Best)

This puzzle got a little sticky at the end, and this answer was one of the reasons. I had EDNA B-S-, and thought it could be BUSH or BEST. Even the "S" was tentative because I didn't really like WHISH (43D: Rustling sound) - SWISH or WHOOSH seemed more appropriate answers. Further, if it was BEST, which it was, the E gave me EMS for 60D: Modem termini? which I did not understand, primarily because the clue appeared (on paper) to be [Modern termini?]. In case you don't understand the clue/answer, "termini" are end points, and "modem" begins and ends with the letter "m" - thus "modem termini" are m's, written out here as EMS. To add to my problems in the Utah region of this puzzle, I did not know who 70A: Actress Kimberly of "Close to Home" (Elise) was - I don't even know what "Close to Home" is (a newish TV drama?). All of these problems might have been taken care of sooner than later if I'd only been able to see 44D: Broad, in a way (ear-to-ear)! When you are thinking a one- or two-word answer, EAR-TO-EAR is quite inscrutable, I assure you.

More stuff I didn't know

57D: Mallard cousins (widgeons)

A widget crossed with a pigeon gets you ... these birds! The word "mallard" always makes me think of this guy, so divorced from nature and immersed in the world of comics am I. I had a little trouble in this little puzzle thoroughfare - the one connecting Virginia with western Tennesse - because of both this answer and the parallel 56D: Take _____ (swing hard) [a rip], which I had as A CUT. It took me far too long to put in FRI for 62A: When "Dallas" aired for most of its run: Abbr. because the "C" from A CUT was where the "R" from A RIP should have been. For a while, I thought the "Dallas" clue might be referring to a time of day ... (9pm?).

76A: Volga feeder (Oka)

Aargh, Revenge of the European Rivers!

77A: Fashion designer Saab (Elie)

Memo to self - commit this dude's name to memory, as you have been busted by him before, and his name is so crossword-friendly that is bound to appear again and again.

11A: _____ II razor (Trac)

OK, I shave, with a razor, and I watch TV, so between the two of those activities, why did I not get this instantly. I blithely wrote in MACH. Then when that proved untenable, TECH. Stupid made-up hard-C advertising names.

109D: Kind of lane (HOV)

Heard of these, but we didn't have them in CA when I was growing up, or if we did, I didn't know. We had diamond / carpool lanes. There is a Jay-Z song (perhaps many) wherein he refers to himself as HOV. I can't explain, but this guy can. Officially, the term refers to "High-Occupancy Vehicle." I would like to add to my street cred by name-dropping not only Jay-Z but DRU Hill (78A: _____ Hill, R&B group), which was a gimme for me. I may even have a DRU Hill song on my iTunes, on one of my MTV dance compilations. Perhaps I should stop now before this gets any more embarrassing. OK, I just changed the music on iTunes from the very hip Decembrists to the very rump-shaking DRU Hill, specifically "In My Bed." I believe the chorus references "Goldilocks and the 3 Bears": "Somebody's sleepin' in my bed / Messin' with my head..."

Literary Training Pays Off (somewhat)

47D: Old mythological work (Edda)
53A: Like some Keats works (odic)

OK, that second one is an adjectival groaner, but I like that these answers are both quaintly literary and intersecting. I had EPOS for EDDA at first. That clue in four letters could also accommodate SAGA.

62D: Monastic title (Fra)

Know this only from the Robert Browning poem "Fra Lippo Lippi," which is also the name of a Norwegian synth/pop band.

55A: Rival of Cassio (Iago)

Ooh I sadly tanked this one. I was thinking of watch brands (or keyboard brands), not Shakespeare characters. Turns out that CASIO the electronics brand is spelled, well, like that.

Final Thoughts

"I ain't fer it, I'm AGIN it!" (50D: Votin' no on) - I just like quoting Abraham Simpson any chance I get, even if it means repeating the same quote I used last time AGIN was in the puzzle. Some answers I admire include:

DAS BOOT (84A: 1981 German-language hit film)
CRAP GAME (71A: Shooting match?)
DOOFUS (1D: Pinhead) - I can't see this answer enough; really really love all the words my sister might have called me when I was a teenager (or ... now, I guess)
BRALESS (85D: Without support, in a way) - [!]
LESAGE (24D: Writer of "Gil Blas") - OK, I don't exactly like this, I'm just dead curious about who the hell this guy is, as he's been in many of my puzzles lately; whoa, 18th century! Old School.

OK, must lunch, then walk in woods (as it's FINALLY warm enough to do so without physical pain), then prep for my teaching week.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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MONDAY, Feb. 19, 2007 - Andrea C. Michaels

Solving time: 3:51

THEME: X-Y-X - three-word phrases, wherein the third word is a repetition of the first word, e.g. 20A: 007's introduction (Bond, James Bond)

An easy and rather listless theme, though I do like BOND, JAMES BOND as an answer. Did I mention how great the new Bond is? A very bad HOMBRE (1D: Man of La Mancha). The other two theme answers are:

36A: Embroidered sampler phrase (Home Sweet Home)
54A: Repeatedly (time after time)

For the record, these two answers could have been clued in a way far more entertaining to yours truly, which is to say, via 1980's pop music. Let's see, for 36A, how 'bout [Motley Crüe anthem] and for 54A, [Cyndi Lauper ballad]. If only some some novelty act had recorded a song in the 80's about James Bond, I could have hit the recluing Jackpot.

1A: "Survivor" shelter (hut)

Two things. First of all, I wouldn't call what most of them live in HUTs - HUT implies a far more completed and somewhat less porous structure than anything I've seen on "Survivor." Second, my wife can tell you if I'm correct about HUTS because she is a ... devotee ... of the show. Every season I vow not to get dragged back in to "Survivor" drama, but then inevitably, about mid-season, I'm getting roped in. So far, in this new season, I'm staying strong. But it's probably just a matter of time before it sucks me in and TAINTS (3D: Contaminates) my very soul, once more.

12A: October birthstone (Opal)

Here's something weird. I know this answer because my stepsister's birthday is in October, and for some reason the fact that OPAL was her birthstone has somehow stuck in my head. I could not tell you the birthstone of anyone else in my family. In fact, I'm hard pressed to name any other birthstones. Oooh, I think TOPAZ is one. BERYL? SARD? Seriously, I know birthstones like I know European rivers.

23A: Dustin's role in "Midnight Cowboy"

Really wish I'd actually seen this clue, as I love this movie. I like to say variations on "Hey, I'm walkin' here!" when crossing the street in front of impatient cars, or just generally walking around, anywhere, to whoever will listen. There's a nice little movie pile-up going in the NW, with RATSO just underneath BOND, JAMES BOND and intersecting JODIE (21D: "Panic Room" actress Foster). Speaking of Panic Room, I am very excited to see the new movie by "Panic Room" director [insert name here]: Zodiac. I normally hate serial killer movies, but this one has three great actors in it (Robert Downey, Jr., Jake Gyllenhaal, and Mark Ruffalo), and the movie seems to have a sense of humor, so I'm in. Other "actors" in the puzzle include Britney Spears (10D: Britney Spears's "_____ Slave 4 U" (I'm a) - one of the least savory clues of all time), Gwyneth Paltrow (56D: Gwyneth Paltrow title role (Emma)) and HOMER Simpson (39D: "The Simpsons" dad), star of the upcoming The Simpsons Movie, opening this July. WILLARD was a movie about a creepy rat guy - who is actually much more pleasant to think about than the guy this clue actually references: 38D: Weatherman Scott.

A few more notes before I leave this one alone: 17A: The year 1052 (MLII) is one of the laziest, weakest clues ever. Couldn't you have found some pope or emperor or something to clue it to. It's like you just gave up. I've actually never seen a Roman numeral clued so literally and directly. The Northeast, or "Bangor," section of the grid gave me much grief for a Monday. First of all, AMBIT!?! (7A: Circumference) - that's some fancy fill for a Monday. Had to get several letter from crosses before it ever occurred to me. Second, TOM!?!?! (11D: Mr. Turkey). TOM intersects AMBIT at the "T," so you can see my dilemma. When I saw [Mr. Turkey], my mind went to two places - first, advertising: I thought maybe there was a "Mr. Turkey" the same way there was a "Mr. Coffee" or "Mr. Clean." Second - Bodybuilding! Is there a "Mr. Turkey" the way there's a "Mr. Universe" or whatever? Who is from Turkey who is famous enough to be in a Monday puzzle? Answer: nobody. You call a male turkey a TOM. I am pretty sure that unless you are high or writing a children's book, you do not call him "mister." Hey, speaking of bodybuilding, wasn't Charles ATLAS (50A: Map book) a bodybuilder? Score, nice segue, Rex. The word AURAL (61A: Hearing-related) appears in the advertising literature for an on-campus talk today. Despite the fact that the talk somehow involves the awesome Stevie Wonder song "Livin' for the City," I am not going. That's just the kind of colleague I am: lazy. Actually, when people start subjecting Stevie to the deadening, dehumanizing, and smugly posturing language of contemporary theory ... well that is the kind of BAD DREAM (9D: Nightmare) I could do without. I'm gonna put Stevie on right now, and pay him proper reverence: awed silence, with occasional bouncing to the rhythm. After that, some Dr. DRE (29A: Hip-hop doc?), then maybe a Beethoven OVERTURE (37D: Orchestral intro) just to cool things down, and then full day's work (write read write read write etc.).

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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FRIDAY, Feb. 16, 2007 - Charles Barasch

Solving time: unknown

THEME: none

Home with Sahra today, so a very, very short entry, comprised entirely of things I didn't know.

• 1A: Bristly (setose)
• 4D: 1937 Oscar role for Luise Rainer (Olan)

My one screw-up: had an "A" where the "O" should have been in these intersecting words. My gut told me the word was SETOSE, but then OLAN seemed ridiculous, and ALAN - well, that's at least a recognizable name. Everything about 4D is absolutely nuts. Super arcane. Just 'cause someone won an Oscar doesn't make him/her memorable or interesting. This puzzle was KRAMMED with pop culture arcana. For instance:

• 40D: Brian of "Juarez," 1939 (Aherne) - again, what? Never heard of him, never heard of the movie, nothing. Sadly (for me), AHERNE sat right next to another answer I didn't know: 39D: The "blood" in bloodstone (jasper) - I know a JASPER. One JASPER. And he looks like this:

• 54A: Classic 1894 swashbuckler, with "The" ("Prisoner of Zenda") - a familiar title - I own an early paperback version (buried somewhere in my collection) - but it took me a while to piece together. Why? First, its first two letters intersected 39D and 40D, respectively (see above). Second, I thought the Spanish word for "bears" was OROS, then ORAS - that stupid, wrong "R" was where the "S" should have been in "PRISONER."
• 12A: Henry Clay's estate in Lexington, Ky. (Ashland) - ASHLAND, OR, yes. Every other ASHLAND, no.
• 43A: 18-Across feeder (Aube) - well, I got 18A: Quai d'Orsay setting (Seine), but when we get down to feeders ... well, you know my feelings about European rivers: too many, and too ridiculously-named. Can't keep 'em straight. Must do some river research before tournament.
• 45A: Footballer Haynes (Abner) - an AFL running back from the 1960's who played eight seasons with five different teams! Tell me more! [yes, that was sarcasm]
• 3D: HBO showing of 1975 (Thrilla in Manila) - I didn't know HBO existed back then. I had THRILL and thought briefly that it had something to do with the making of Michael Jackson's video for "Thriller," but that was 8 years later.
• 9D: Epic achievement? (Cast of thousands) - a good clue, but I spent way too long trying to think of an epic that started CAST OF THE ... CART OF THE ...
• 25: Two-time A.L. home run champ Tony (Armas) - another sports obscurity. Well, not really. He was a pretty good player in the 80's, but for the life of me I can't remember him, anything about him, his baseball card, nothing. And his career was in my baseball-card collecting sweet spot. His son (Jr.) is a big league player today, currently for the Washington Senators. I mean Nationals.
• 14D: Carroll creatures (Toves) - I'm embarrassed to say I did not know this, though I recognize it now that I see it. Vaguely.
• 51D: Glass finish (-ine) - what is glassINE? I guessed this answer, but I don't think I know what entity it refers to. Answers.com says:

A nearly transparent, resilient glazed paper resistant to the passage of air and grease.

When would I use this?

Must go be a decent father (figure).

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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THURSDAY, Feb. 15, 2007 - Elizabeth Rehfeld

Solving time: 7:30 (give or take a few seconds)

THEME: Broken words - common phrases are clued as if one of their words were in fact two words, e.g. 53A: Bit of mischief that won't be noticed for years? (long-term imp act)

I hope that explanation of the theme is sufficiently clear. It was hard to make it succinct.

This puzzle was Super Easy - usually at least some of the Thursday fill seems to come from outer space, or at least from outside my ken, and yet there is literally nothing troubling or unusual about the non-theme fill today. Maybe a couple of SAT words or AP History terms, but really, all the difficulty (such as there was) was in the theme answers, which took some teasing out, even after I semi-deduced the theme. I did the puzzle in pencil, and I'm pretty sure that's how I'm going to be doing all puzzles from now until the tournament - must hone my paper technique. I timed myself with a bedside digital clock, hence the lack of pinpoint accuracy on my time. But it was 10:29 when I started and 10:36 when I was done, so I figured 7:30 is a reasonable ballpark figure - I started Exactly at 10:29, but I have no idea how long the clock had said 10:36 when I finished. Looking at the times at the applet (NYT website), I did pretty well. Take that, gilknipe and susanlaws! (my imaginary enemies - if you belong to one of these handles, please don't take my taunting seriously. Not very seriously, anyway. I'm sure you are very nice people whom I would like in real life. PS In your face!).

Today's entry will be short - must teach soon. So I will sip my HOT TEA (5D: Traditional cold remedy) - which is now a bit tepid, actually - and make a few observations. If all goes well, some of those observations will be SMART (38D: Clever), or possess some WIT (39D: Cleverness). There are very few clues that I DEEM (43D: Judge) to be ENIGMAS (42D: Knots), but I also didn't hate the puzzle, so at least after reading today's entry (unlike on other days), you won't be able to say "NO MORE (46D: Gone), I'm NEVER (16A: On the 31st of February) going to read that EVIL (14A: Dark side) jerk again. It's all VENOM (58A: Gila monster's defense?) with him. Once again, he had hardly anything nice to say - he just GRIPED (47D: Bellyached)."

21A: Neighbor of Hi and Lois, in the funnies (Irma) - it's one thing to expect me to know who Hi and Lois are, or who their creator is, but it is quite another to expect me to be familiar with their neighborhood. IRMA? Is she friends with CORA Dithers from "Blondie?" The crossword fan in me does not like such relative obscurity - the comics fan in me, on the other hand, loves it. More tertiary characters! This is how I feel about "Simpsons" clues too - stuff involving the core family is good, Apu and Moe are a little better, Disco Stu even better ... but trust me, you can go deeper. LIONEL HUTZ and TROY McCLURE (voiced by the late, great Phil Hartman) beg for greater use.

61A: Gillette of stage and screen (Anita) - how in the World did I know this. I had Only the "T" and, though I wouldn't write it in at first, my first thought was ANITA, and every subsequent cross bore that out. So weird. I swear that as of this moment, I have no idea who she is and could not pick her out of a line-up. Whoa - she's been on "Sex and the City," "C.S.I.," "Trapper John, M.D," and "Quincy." How many people can say that!? Also, she was apparently an occasional panelist on "Match Game"! The nadir of her career appears to be her time as part of the cast of "Normal, OH," a very short-lived (and so-called) comedy about a big fat gay guy, played by John Goodman. Oh, FOX. Will your good ideas never stop...?

Olde Tyme Literature

• 60A: When the shipwreck occurs in "The Tempest" (Act I) - While it took me too long to realize the nature of the answer (I was thinking "Springtime? ... Morn?..."), I remember this shipwreck very, very well. "The Tempest" was one of two Shakespeare plays I read in high school. My teacher was Very old school: we read them so slowly, and so closely, and were held responsible for the smallest details. The exams were legendary, arduous affairs - and I loved them! Nothing like a primarily objective exam to demonstrate your intellectual superiority, I always say. We also got to go to Ashland, OR for their annual Shakespeare festival, where we saw "The Tempest" (and other plays) performed. Mr. Berglund was a fabulous teacher. I just heard that he died a few years back. I heard about this because a high school friend of mine just contacted me to ask if I might possibly be coming to my 20th Reunion! After I cleaned up the tea I spit all over my computer screen on hearing the news that I'd been out of high school that long, I emailed her back and said that in order to get me back to Fresno, Literally Everyone I knew and liked (yes, all four of them) would have to be going. I doubt this will happen. We'll see.
• 52D: Vantage point of Zeus, in Homer (Mt. Ida) - this answer intersects ACT I (above). I thought it was going to be some Greek term I'd never heard of or couldn't remember, because I didn't know any words that ended -IDA. I then remembered that there is a Mount IDA, and that "Mount" could be abbreviated MT. And that was that. Exciting!
• 55D: "Behold," to Cicero ("Ecce") - ECCE HOMO! I just like saying that phrase - I so rarely have occasion to do so.

I should use the appearance of REO (24A: _____ Speedwagon) to tell you all about one of my greatest misheard lyrics (or "mondegreen") experiences of all time. Right up there with "I quest the rains down in Africa!" (by the way, if you Google ["I quest the rains"], the only hit you get is me! Awesome!). From "Keep on Lovin' You," by REO Speedwagon - here are the actual lyrics:

Instead you lay still in the grass
All coiled up and hissing.

And here is what I genuinely believed the lyrics were:

Instead she laid still in the dress,
All coiled up in Houston.

If you go here (and just scroll down, or do a screen search for "hissing") there are many examples of other mishearings of these very lyrics, though I have to say, my mondegreen is best. By the way, in a few days, if you Google ["coiled up in Houston"], you will get two hits - today's entry, and a page from a while back, when my friend Shaun taunted me with the phrase in the Comments section. Rex Parker - bringing the best misheard 80s lyrics to the world. Gotta run - gotta long day ahead of me, including teaching, parent-teacher conference, and then "The Office" and "30 Rock" on the television SKED (63A: Piece of Variety news) tonight.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

PS I forgot to pay respect to ASTA (66A: Film dog), former Pantheon President, who is just back from helping judge the Westminster Eugenics Compet... I mean the Westminster Dog Show, and making one of his occasional puzzle appearances, as he likes to do. For olde tyme's sake.

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MONDAY, Feb. 12, 2007 - Lynn Lempel

Solving time: 3:50

THEME: "LAST DANCE" (64A: 1978 Donna Summer hit ... or a hint to 18-, 25-, 39- and 56-Across)

Today is officially my fastest solving time ever for an NYT puzzle. I shattered my previous record by something like 30 seconds. The top part of the puzzle felt a little creaky as I was doing it - I was having to jump around a lot, and a number of answers didn't come to me quickly. But by the time I hit the middle of the puzzle, I could do no wrong. I don't think I had to backtrack or correct anything in the bottom half of the puzzle. It felt magical. As I look at the puzzle now, I realized that there are several clues I never saw - thankfully, as they would have slowed me right down. They include 68D: Vardalos of "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" (Nia) [ick, even typing that title makes me cringe] and especially 46D: Navy building crew (seabees) - an answer I recognize but could not define. For some reason COPYEDIT (3D: Tweak, as magazine text) gave me a little trouble, despite that it's an activity I have engaged in frequently in my life. The answer that gave me the most trouble was 29D: Ohio college named for a biblical city (Antioch). ANTIOCH was pretty much the turning point, the line in the sand, the beginning of the end, whatever metaphor fits - once it fell, the rest of the puzzle didn't stand a chance.

This is a great Monday puzzle, and not just 'cause I smoked it. The theme is genuinely clever and elegantly expressed. The theme answers all feature DANCEs as their LAST element, though not only do the dances appear in non-dance contexts, but they are buried inside other words. Here they are:

18A: Sharp-toothed Atlantic swimmer (conger eel) => REEL
25A: Overabundance (plethora) => HORA
39A: Doohickey (thingamajig) => JIG
56A: All-time winningest N.F.L. coach (Don Shula) => HULA

If you look closely, you can see other dance words throughout the grid. ROUND (a form of dancing) can be found in GROUNDER (42D: Alternative to a fly ball), and one might dance in a HALL, which can be found in SHALLOW (2D: Not deep). The best non-theme dance answer, though, is surely A TEASE (11D: Relaxed).


Here's a subtheme: Japanese corporations!

9D: Big video game maker (Sega)
31A: Toyota rival (Honda)
26D: Tokyo electronics giant (Toshiba)

Random Thoughts

Lots of olde-timey movie answers in this one, including 17A: Film director Frank (Capra) - that did not come to me instantly, as it should have - 20A: Ron of Tarzan fame (Ely) - never saw it, which is good, because I blank on that guy's name like I blank on the Cowardly Lion actor guy's name - and 24A: Actress Gardner (Ava), who is ubiquitous. I was grateful for the "Simpsons" clue, 36D: Lisa, to Bart Simpson (sis), especially since you could have gone a million other ways on that clue. I don't think I've seen GAY clued as 41D: Not straight before. I mean, it's perfect, but I thought puzzles were iffy on direct references to homosexuality. Glad to see that's not (entirely) true. I can tell you that no one has ever called me TEACH (5D: Class instructor, informally) before; I'm not sure anyone has been called TEACH since "Welcome Back, Kotter" went off the air. It's very surprising that my time was so good (for me) considering I completely muffed the very first clue I looked at: 1A: "My Fair Lady" horse race (Ascot). I know nothing about "My Fair Lady" except 'enry 'iggins and "The Rain in Spain." Am I even thinking about the right movie? Anyway, I always get ASCOT confused with another super-common British horse racing answer: EPSOM.

Double Your Pleasure

67A: Tennis's Agassi (Andre)
57D: Huge hit (smash)

I just like that these intersect. I also like the Double Wonder-ness of these clues:

22D: Cry of wonder (Ooh)
12D: Musical Wonder (Stevie)

The music of Stevie WONDER (and Donna Summer, for that matter - love her!) will make you dance for sure, though probably not any of the dances featured in this puzzle. Hard to HULA to "Superstition," though "I Just Called to Say 'I Love You'" might work, I suppose.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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FRIDAY, Feb. 9, 2007 - Eric Berlin

Solving time: 16:50

THEME: none

What a horrible, horrible feeling. I ran through this puzzle like a hot knife through butter ... until I hit the NW, and then I went into what felt like an eternal free-fall. Nothing. I couldn't get a damn thing. Well, that's not true. I would get something, and then it wouldn't work, so I'd erase it - over and over and over. There were two major problems that prevented my getting into that NW quadrant (besides an ignorance of "country" music - who the !@#@ is Joe ELY? (1D: Country rocker Joe and others (ELYS)). And those problems were:

9D: Masters topics (sex lives) - I had the LIVES part and had no idea what this could be. Didn't know if LIVES was its own word, or part of a longer word, or what. Knew that the "Masters" in question wasn't "Master's exams" - that has an apostrophe in it - but the only other Masters I could think of was the golf tournament. What ends in -LIVES and concerns championship golf? Answer: NOTHING. Turns out the question refers to ancient sexperts Masters & Johnson. Here is something I didn't know (from "Discovery Health" website):

Masters and Johnson initiated a project that ultimately included direct laboratory observation and measurement of 700 men and women while they were having intercourse or masturbating.

Wow. Who volunteered for that? Maybe they paid well. Did they ever consider that people doing it at home, or wherever, might be quite different from people doing it in a lab, knowing they're being watched. This is like having cameras in the courtroom (which I'm against) - no one can be completely unselfconscious with a camera trained on him. Then there's the inevitable probes or cathodes or who knows what other Clockwork Orange-type gadgets. Maybe their interest was more purely physiological than sociological. This is way too much space to devote to this damn answer, which thwarted my entry (!) to the great Northwest. Oh, and the other roadblock?

22A: A, B or C, often: Abbr. (Ans.) - such a little answer! How could it possibly cause any harm? Well, I'll tell you. I did not have ANS. I had the good, perhaps better, ANSwer: APT. That's right APT! As in "Apartment," not the word APT, though my ANSwer was, in fact, APT, dammit. APT! And then that gave me a "P" at the end of 5D: Admit, which I was sure would have to be OWN UP, despite the fact that OWN UP was very discordant with its parallel neighbor, AVE MARIAS (4D: Parts of some services). So what did I do? Naturally, I erased AVE MARIAS (or, more precisely, I erased the AVE M- part). In the end, though, I have to give ANS. all the credit for my being able to solve this puzzle at all. After many, many minutes spent completely blanking out on everything in the NW, I finally saw that APT. could be ANS., I changed it, and the puzzle, including the very APT answer AH YES (6D: "I understand now"), was done inside of a minute. Oh, so 5D: Admit was not OWN UP, but LET IN (which, for the record, I botched again before getting it right, thinking the answer was SEE IN, ugh). In the end, if I only could have remembered the name of the very memorable tune, YAKETY SAX (17A: Polka heard frequently on "The Benny Hill Show"), all those Scrabbly letters would have helped me knock the NW out quite quickly (see 20A: 1950's political slogan ("I Like Ike"), which has the Scrabbly "K"s and which I got right away). But no. No no no.

Gimme gimme gimme

God bless the following answers, for giving me precious life when all the other answers were playing hard to get:

18A: Part of a chronicle (annal) - I've dated more than one historian in my lifetime. Well, no, just the one, actually. Anyway, this is a fairly common term, especially in medieval and early modern history. I also once read a dreadfully boring book called Annals of the Parish when I was in Scotland. It was written by a man named John Galt (1821). When I returned to the states, I would occasionally see these bumper stickers that read "Who is John Galt?" and I couldn't figure out why people wanted to know about a 19th-century Scottish novelist. Turns out the question is from Atlas Shrugged, which I have never read, but which my mother owns a signed copy of, for some reason. Who is John Galt? Here is John Galt.
27A: Hunter of literature (Evan) - second time he's been in the puzzle since September. I know because he's a name I remember. He is better known as the best-selling crime writer Ed McBain. Here is one of his 50's paperbacks (I've shown this before, but it's been over four months, so who's gonna remember?):
30D: Actress Sobieski (Leelee) - this girl is giving TERI POLO a run for her money as the (so-called) Actress clue of the 21st century. She was in another puzzle I did in just the past couple of days. Expect to see more of her. Coincidence: the last message I received in my email inbox was from a former student named, I kid you not, Li Li.
58A: "He seemed like such ____ boy" (a nice) - super-gimme for all! And right on top of another gimme: 60A: When to see la luna (noche)!
53D: Cartoonist Walker (Mort) - "Are you the creator of 'Hi & Lois,' because you are making me laugh." - Comic Book Guy, "The Simpsons" [note: this quote must be uttered with deadpan sarcasm]. See also: "If you are waiting for the 'Hi and Lois' signing, you are too late. It has been moved to the Springfield Colosseum."
36A: Doesn't puff idly (inhales) - piece of cake! Thanks, Clinton (god I irrationally love that man)
37D: TV witch (Samantha) - are you kidding? My cat is named for her evil cousin! Hey, somebody stole my idea!

What I Didn't Know

• 38A: Subject of the biography "All or Nothing at All" (Sinatra) - well, I know who SINATRA is, just not in reference to this particular book. Is the title a lyric from "My Way"? No, it's an actual song title. Sadly (very sadly) "All or Nothing at All" makes me think not of Sinatra but of O-Town. Have they been crossword fill? Because OTOWN looks like it could come in quite handy in a pinch.
• 29D: Bearer of catkins (alder tree) - first of all, I have NO idea what a "catkin" is. Is it anything like a kitten? No, they're just these sort of cone-y, fuzzy, probably seed-bearing thingamajigs. Isn't the addition of TREE here a bit ... superflous. I mean, I've seen the answer ALDER a few times, I'm pretty sure. Of course it's an ALDER TREE. Is there an ALDER FOX? ALDER DOLPHIN? ALDER BUS? What other kinds of ALDER are there?
• 49D: Like some stocks (no par) - again, if you need financial advice, please look elsewhere. Business and commerce-related fill stumps me almost as much as the damned Bible (although, today, I owned the Bible! Take that, ENOCH (47D: Methuselah's father)!
• 45D: Heavens: Prefix (Urano-) - inferrable, in a way, but outside my ken (not my CATKIN).
• 46D: Nervine, for one (tonic) - once again, inferred, not known. TONIC is also a terrible, terrible band. One of those generic white guy bands from the 90s whose name you know and whose songs are bland but very, very familiar, in a generic kind of way. Warning: you will find yourself humming and / or tapping your feet if you are not very careful. Infectious, in the way that pernicious diseases are infectious.

I like that OUTEREAR (44A: One end of a canal) and FRONT END (50A: Frequent area of auto damage) sit one atop the other, as it gives your REAR and FRONT in close proximity to one another. My favorite fill from this puzzle is all kind of negative, if not outright morbid. 21D: How a snake may be caught? had me thinking IN A PIT (too literal), but the real answer, IN A LIE, was so much better. I did not know what "anacusis" was in 39A: Develops anacusis, but with the last three letters in place I was pleasantly (?) surprised to see that the answer was GOES DEAF. ("Anacusis" reminds me of "ailurophobia" for some reason - perhaps because they are both disorders that start with "A," and I learned them both from crosswords: "ailurophobia" = fear of cats, which I do not have. See Serena, above). Lastly I enjoyed the frankness of 40D: A bad way to be left (for dead), which is how the puzzle nearly left me. But I had an AWAKENING (10D: Realization) and persevered.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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SATURDAY, Feb. 3, 2007 - Rich Norris

Solving time: untimed, but quite fast for a Saturday - circa 15 min.?

THEME: none

I am starting to feel like the puzzle-solving practice is beginning to pay off - Saturdays do not usually come together in one rolling, uninterrupted flow the way this puzzle did today. At no point did I have my very common Saturday experience of being Stopped - absolutely hung up, biting my pencil, trying and retrying answers in my head (and on the page) to get a section to fall. My success results partly from the fact that the puzzle is, in fact, easy (-ish) in parts - see especially the SE, with the Nabokov gimme PNIN (54A: Nabokov novel) - this was in a very recent Fri or Sat puzzle - which led easily to LENTIL 44D: Protein source - another common clue/answer pairing - followed by ERN (49A: Seaside flier) - "They're back!" - then TRISTE (45D: Sad) - also in a recent puzzle - then, if you didn't have it already, ALTA (43A: Banff Natl. Park locale), and from there the whole SE just topples, with those longer crosses at the bottom being very easy to pick up (though I at first thought tigers had TENACITY and not the proper FEROCITY (59A: Tiger's quality)). But besides easiness, another reason this puzzle went down in short order was my weird, seemingly uncanny ability to pick answers out of thin air. The two most notable examples are KEENED (60A: Wailed), which isn't a hard word, per se, but with an empty grid, it's a killer first guess: gave me the "K" that allowed me to see that FOOTNOTE was not FOOTNOTE but in fact ASTERISK (33D: Indication to look down), which gave me the first letters for all the SW Acrosses. The other word that came to me out of the blue was OSAKAN (3D: One of 2.7 million Japanese), again, with no letters (except possibly the final "N" from 26A: Whips (tans), which at that point I was Not sure about). I know squat about Japan, but I knew that the answer, given the odd clue, must be the name of a particular city dweller, and OSAKAN was the first thing that popped into my head; and like KEENED, it gave me a helpful "K" and I was off and running in the NW - the last part of the puzzle to fall. For some reason I was also able to get the two 11-letter answers, 7D: Bow-making time (curtain call) and 24D: Knot (brain teaser) - with only a small handful of crosses in each case. CURTAIN CALL was made slightly easier by the fact that we watched the conductor of the BBC National Orchestra of Wales make several of them at the end of last night's concert (which was recorded and will be featured on NPR's "Performance Today" ... someday ... probably not "today"). During one of the CURTAIN CALLs, a grown woman dressed as what we imagined to be a girl in "traditional" Welsh costume presented the conductor with flowers, and I turned around to notice that in the center of a far back row, spectators had unfurled a Welsh flag and were waving it proudly, getting waves in return from some of the orchestra members. It was like a soccer match in there. Very cute, actually. The pianist for Bartók's Piano Concerto No. 3 looked like ... who was George Jefferson's neighbor? The British guy? Huge jaw, kind of slow-looking? Winston? No BENTLEY! Yes. Well, this guy looked a bit like him, and he listed like I've never seen a pianist list - to his right, constantly, as if he couldn't stand to be too close to the orchestra. He was just fine, but the Bartók was probably the least exciting of the four pieces. Night ended on Benjamin Britten's "Four Sea Interludes" from the opera Peter Grimes. The program notes told the story of the opera, which is Horrendously depressing, and ends with a fisherman taking his boat out to sea and sinking his boat, with himself in it, after having not one but two young boys die while in apprenticeship to him, thus incurring the wrath of the townsfolk. The music was genuinely sad and moving, which is good because, with an angry mob and a very tragic figure named Grimes, it seemed dangerously close to becoming an episode of "The Simpsons."

Stuff I Didn't Know

• 1A: Faucet with a rotating plug (stopcock) - I'm just gonna let that one sit there
• 2D: Ballerina Karsavina (Tamara) - if you say so...
• 14D: Conjoined area (tristate) - pieced this together letter by letter - Holy @#$#, I just this second realized that there is a hyphen in this word: TRI-STATE. HA ha. I thought perhaps this was a medical term. Wow. OK, good thing it didn't matter. Side note: not that thrilled about having TRISTATE and TRISTE in the puzzle together. I have this weird thing about repeated letter combinations of five or more letters.
• 29A: Rig-_____, Hindu sacred book (Veda) - VEDA just sounded right, but I could very easily have botched this, as the "A" here intersects with the formerly mysterious TRISTATE, which I briefly considered making TRISTITE.
• 29D: Actress Bloom of "High Plains Drifter" (Verna) - I was close: I had VELMA at first; I did, however, get Richard CRENNA (30A: "The Sand Pebbles" actor, 1966) almost immediately, with very few crosses.
• 39A: Embryonic sac (amnion) - thankfully, this was highly inferrable since I am familiar with the phrase "amniotic fluid."
• 41A: Air _____, discount carrier (Tran) - again, inferrable, but Never heard of it.
• 33A: Lacking light (aphotic) - thank god I knew PHOT = light or I don't know what I'd have done. Never heard or seen this word before, that I can recall.
• 58A: Form of boxing using both the hands and feet (savate) - the one answer I was most unsure about, given that it crossed a Hebrew name at a vowel, ugh: I was very unsure about the "A" in 51D: "Voice of Israel" author (Eban), thinking it might be EBEN, but SAVATE just looked / sounded better than SAVETE, and so I went with my gut, and my gut was right. No errors on this puzzle! Woo hoo!
• 9D: Angle symbols, in geometry (thetas) - didn't know, but it's easy enough to piece together. I feel as if Andrew has used this term in conversation with me. How is that possible?
• 8D: Gas in fluorescent lamps (krypton) - always surprises me that this is a real substance. Sahra is a regular reader of the comic book KRYPTO, about Superman's dog. She is currently in the middle of producing a special KRYPTO comic just for me. I will surely share it with you as it becomes available, assuming I can clear copyrights.

Best Fill

A raft of fabulous colloquial answers, all of them starting with the letter "I":

36A: "Speaking personally ..." ("I for one...")
56A: "Really?!" ("Is that so?!")
12D: Enthusiastic response ("I'd love to!")
55A: Soon (in a bit)

And next, a veritable triumvirate of fresh fill clogging up the NW. In addition to the aforementioned STOPCOCK ("tehee!"), we have:


15A: Convenient, in a way (easy pour) - may be my favorite answer of the day
17A: Kids (small fry) - way to hide the plural in a singular!

I like TALONS (21A: Curved nails) because it's what the ERN (49A: Seaside flier) will use to SET AT you (10D: Go after), especially if you are a paraglider in New Zealand ("Where's your SAVATE now, human!?").

Lastly, MIDRIFF (40D: Area under a halter) just looks very cool in the grid. I'm not really a fan of the exposed MIDRIFF, but here: very nice. Not cheap-looking at all.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

PS - after reading and commenting on Crossword Fiend's blog entry for today (see sidebar for link, as always), I was reminded (or reminded myself, more accurately) of three more answers that warrant comment. The first is EST (47A: It's in the neighborhood), which, like TRISTATE, I got but did not understand - I was thinking it stood for ESTABLISHMENT, but of course it's short for ESTIMATE. Duh. Next we have T-SHIRT (9A: Top with a quip, maybe), which came to me instantly and was my entrée to the grid. TSHIRT is commonish fill that you can dress up or down in so many ways, and this clue is great. Next, FISTED (42D: Two-_____ (strong)). That's right, FISTED. See also STOPCOCK. Throw in the very great OOFS (6D: Punch lines?) and you are a heartbeat away from a gay porn script. The presence of Oscar WILDE (48A: He wrote "A man cannot be too careful in the choice of his enemies") isn't helping. Notice that I haven't even mentioned GOO (32D: "Ick!" evoker) ... or TRAN ... I have to stop now.

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Friday, Feb. 2, 2007 - David J. Kahn

Solving time: untimed, but slow, then fast (!)

THEME: RAINING / [CAT]S AND [DOG]S - rebus puzzle where words CAT and DOG fit into squares throughout the puzzle, e.g. 54A: Place of disgrace ([DOG]house)

First - Happy birthday to my father, Dr. Rex, Sr.! I don't know what he has to do, directly, with my puzzle-solving passion, but he has Everything to do with whatever sense of humor I have. Please see Night Shift and Elephant Parts and Serial, definitive comedy experiences I would never have had without dad.

Today's puzzle is the first non-themeless Friday puzzle since I began my blog lo these 4+ months ago. Needless to say I was Not expecting it. And a rebus puzzle to boot - yikes! At first this puzzle stomped me - I had literally every square filled in in the NW and N except the DOG/CAT ones. But when the two squares in the far NW wouldn't come together (oh "Seattle," why won't you ever behave!?), two thoughts crossed my mind nearly simultaneously.

1. Something is wrong with this grid - it's not Nearly as wide open as most Fridays. It's fussy, with lots of nooks and crannies, and looks more like a Thursday grid ...
2. There's no Way I should be This stuck, This early on a Friday ... something is going on ...

I remained stuck for a tiny bit, but once I changed the very wrong PRIMAL to ANIMAL (3D: Inner selves, to Jung), I then had _ON for 14A: Start of a Tennessee Williams title, and once I started running Tennessee Williams's plays through my head, that missing CAT showed up - a @#$#-ing rebus!? - and THEN the puzzle got very easy. Far NW has two rebus squares abutting one another, with 1D: Lowly post ([DOG][CAT]cher) intersecting both the Tennessee Williams clue and 1A: Basic teaching ([DOG]ma). Wicked. But cool. Once I adjusted my expectations for this puzzle, I got very, very good traction. For a brief moment, I had the fanciful hope that the rebus squares would have rotational symmetry. Uh, no. It is Friday, after all. The NW had one other tricky clue: 17A: _____ de guerre - "tricky" in the sense that it is in three letters and therefore wants to be NOM as much, if not more, than it wants to be the (in this case) correct answer, CRI. Oh, and eventually I caught on that the "Jung" answer wasn't ANIMAL at all, but ANIMAS.

Home with my little girl today - her hippie school has all kinds of weird days off - so I can't write much without being neglectful, and you wouldn't want that ... would you? Sahra has already made a list (complete with boxes to check) of the things we are going to do today - with an "M" next to items that are a "Maybe," e.g. "Buy the cats collars" (!?!?!). I told her the cats might not like a bell following them everywhere they go, 24/7. She seemed to agree, but wasn't ready to give the idea up completely. Hence, "M" for Maybe. We will, however, be going to Pizzeria Uno for lunch and Barnes & Noble for hot chocolate. But first I'm supposed to convert a bookmark-sized calendar into a full-sized, wall-hanging calendar by scanning it into my computer, blowing up the images of the individual months, printing them out, and then stapling them together. The fact that we have no fewer than three wall calendars hanging in the house already means nothing to Sahra. "Your point...?" She's industrious, this kid. Allow me to share with you the birthday card she made for my dad ("Pappy") this morning:

I'm told that's a cake on a table being shared by my dad and stepmom. Hope my dad doesn't mind that you all now know how old he is.

Hot Fill

• 35A: Hotter than hot (torrid) - this fill is literally hot. Hotter than hot.
• 5D: Apollo 13 astronauts, e.g. (aborters)
• 50A: Drug used to treat poisoning (ipecac) - these last two really push the breakfast-table-test envelope, as far as I'm concerned. Do I really want to contemplate abortions and barfing over my morning eggs and ham or whatever it is you people eat? Still, as fill, goes, eeeeexcellent.
• 18A: Whip on the high seas ([CAT] o' nine tails) - my weapon of choice! Man, this answer had me stymied for way, WAY longer than it should have because of a little, little error I had in one of the crosses; I had STA for 8D: Stop: Abbr., and while that was the right idea, it was the wrong abbreviation - "I'm sorry, we were looking for STN." So I had [CAT]ONIAE----- and thought, "whoa, there's some two word nautical term that starts with the word CATONIA, and I don't even know what CATONIA means... what will I do?" I'm not kidding when I say I contemplated CATONIA ENSIGN. "That could be ... something. Maybe he's the ENSIGN who whips ... the crew ... into shape?"
• 53D: Mathematical groups (cosets) - a little math shout-out to my boyyeeee in Santa Monica (and any other West Coast Mathematicians that might be out there: Represent!)
• 42D: Ones going home after dinner? ([DOG]gie bags) - most of the rebus answers weren't terribly sparkly, but I really liked this one, mainly for the clue. Oh, and I also liked ...
• 62A: Unplanned ([CAT]ch as [CAT]ch can) - double-CAT, plus the letters C-A-T are used in a non-feline expression. Nice.

There was very little that was new to me in this puzzle. I had never heard the expression [CAT]'S PAW for 37A: Stooge before, but (peeking at another blog) I see that I am not alone in this. I don't eat meat (unless I'm in NZ, where the world is upside-down and I become exclusively carnivorous) so I didn't really "know" ROULADE (45D: Meat dish with a filling), but it's a French word I've heard before so it was easy enough to piece together. Considering the only "fillings" that are coming to mind at the moment are those of the Hostess Fruit Pie variety, ROULADE sounds like it's about the grossest comestible on the planet. I assume that AAU (32A: Org. with the annual Junior Olympic games) stands for something like the Assoc. of American Universities... hmmm, yes and no. It does stand for that, in another context, but as far as this clue is concerned, it stands for the Amateur Athletic Union. I want to thank Ken Jennings for his awesome beatdown of rude know-it-alls at his blog a couple months back - first, because it was a great and necessary piece of writing, and second, because the bit of trivia he discussed in that posting was the history of the name of O'HARE airport, making 44A: Orchard Field, today a virtual gimme for me. Lastly, I was grateful for the answer [CAT]SUP (37D: Burger topper) because the word inevitably makes me think of a befuddled Mr. Burns, shopping in a supermarket for the first time in his life. Standing in the condiments aisle, he holds two bottles, and, in agonizing over which one to buy, repeatedly reads their labels out loud, slowly: "Ketchup ... Catsup ... Ketchup ... Catsup." I can't remember if this is before or after he somehow gets himself "locked" in one of the large freezers in the frozen foods aisle.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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