Suffix with Sydney / WED 11-13-2024 / Cloud name prefix / What strings of random letters make / Member of the constellation Aquila

Constructor: Todd Gross

Relative difficulty: Hard (17:01)

THEME: STATE FLAG STARS — States are given reviews, with the number of stars corresponding to the number of stars that appear on their flag

Theme answers:

• ★ A big ditch in a big desert. Big deal. for ARIZONA
• RATING: ★  Sin, sun and sand … so? Not worth the gamble. for NEVADA
• RATING: ★★★ Graceland and the Great Smoky Mountains. I volunteer to visit again! for TENNESSEE
• RATING: ★★★★★★★★ Fresh salmon and spectacular scenery. Go north, young man! for ALASKA
• ★★★★★★★★★★★★★ Peaches, peanuts and pecan pie. You'll always be on my mind! for GEORGIA

Word of the Day: NYRO (Laura in the Songwriters Hall of Fame) —

Laura Nyro; born Laura Nigro; (October 18, 1947 – April 8, 1997) was an American songwriter and singer. She achieved critical acclaim with her own recordings, particularly the albums Eli and the Thirteenth Confession (1968) and New York Tendaberry (1969), and had commercial success with artists such as Barbra Streisand and the 5th Dimension recording her songs. Wider recognition for her artistry was posthumous, while her contemporaries such as Elton John idolized her. She was praised for her emotive three-octave mezzo-soprano voice.

• • •

Good morning folks! Happy off-schedule Malaika MWednesday to all who celebrate! Tonight I solved this puzzle listening to the soundtrack from Stereophonic, but particularly the song Bright. I listened to it a couple of times, since this puzzle took me longer than usual to get through. I'm excited to read every single comment as I always do and see what y'all thought!

This puzzle was hard, mainly due to the vocabulary, which is not how I like for puzzles to be hard. (Though if I'm honest, I don't like hard puzzles at all.) I figured out the theme and got every theme entry (there were eight of them!) and then had to spend seven-ish minutes guessing letters. Glancing at the puzzle now, OLIO (as clued), ALL IS, DIO, SIDER (as clued), NYRO, ASTA, NADIRS, CIRRO, POME, CEL, IN A SUIT, NAE, DONNA (as clued), ALI G, ALTAIR, CDL, and IPSO were all entries that tripped me up. Okay yikes, I didn't realize it was that many until I wrote them all out :(

My favorite TV hosts, IN A SUIT

Usually, a puzzle ends up with tough vocab like that because the theme constrains the grid in some way. In this puzzle, it was probably the fact that there were eight theme entries throughout, one of which was vertical. And there were some tough letters to work with, like the Z, V, an K. When I'm struggling through a constrained grid, I need the theme to really click with me so that I feel like the pain was worth it. Alas, this theme didn't.

I like the idea of cutesy fake reviews, but the execution on these felt off. The three star review seemed exactly as effusive as the eight and thirteen star reviews. Giving something Eight Stars Out Of Five isn't a known concept (vs "11/10" or "110%" which are both idiomatic to me), so I needed the clue to sell the above-and-beyond-ness. But they just ended up reading like regular good reviews... especially in this age of Instagram Influencers taking one bite out of a bowl of pasta and shrieking that it's the most life-changing show-stopping thing they've EVER had in their WHOLE LIVES!!!!!!! (The review for Georgia low-key felt like a 3.5 star review...)

I like to imagine that the Utz Girl is sisters with Betty Boop

The constructor clearly took care to arrange the states symmetrically in the grid and order them from fewest stars to least. Unfortunately, this type of symmetry is kind of lost on me when you end up having an asymmetric revealer. At that point, I say toss the symmetry away! That would have allowed the puzzle to include perhaps the most famous State With A Star On Its Flag-- Texas!! The theme really felt incomplete without Texas, in my opinion. The star on its flag is its whole thing!!

What did you guys think? Did the theme click with you or no? Was the vocab easy for you or hard? What would your one-star review for Texas look like? (Or maybe a four-star review for Chicago?) (I KNOW that Chicago is not a state btw!!!)

Bullets:

• [Catchphrase for Captain Underpants] for TRA LA LA — I adored these books when I was younger. My copies were in tatters. I still remember my prescribed weird name-- Pinky Wafflehead!
• [Old T-shirt, maybe] for DUST RAG — I filled this in with no problem, but when I was glancing over the grid to write this post, I kept on reading it as "Du Strag" and thinking it was someone's last name
• [Working on a board, perhaps] for IRONING — I had "planing" here at first. Cute clue!

xoxo Malaika

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Host with a microphone / MON 7-23-18 / Egyptian goddess repetitive name / Three blind creatures / West Coast NFL / California Nevada border lake / Singer 19 21 25 / Rice Burroughs / I Still Believe Vince Gill

Constructor: Todd Gross

Relative difficulty: 4:03

THEME: "OF THE" — Four expressions that have the prepositional construction "[noun] of the [time period]" in increasing order of time-period length.

Word of the Day: NAT (63D: Turner who led a slave rebellion) —

In August of 1831, seven enslaved men turned the South and the nation upside down when they engaged in a violent and historic bid to gain their freedom. Beginning before dawn on a Monday morning, a band of slaves led by Nat Turner made their way across Southampton County in southeastern Virginia. As they traveled from farm to farm, they killed every white person they encountered and picked up recruits from among the slave population. Within twenty-four hours, fifty-five white men, women, and children lay dead. By Monday afternoon, whites launched a successful attack against the rebels, capturing or killing most of them that same day. Nat Turner remained at large, and rumors spread that the rebellion had been part of a much more widespread conspiracy of slaves in Virginia and North Carolina. Over the next four months, dozens of slaves were put on trial, and more than twenty were executed, including Turner, who was captured after hiding in the area under a pile of wood for more than two months. (The Nat Turner Project)

• • •

Theme answers:

• [17A: Unplanned]: SPUR OF THE MOMENT
• [28A: Parliamentary agenda]: ORDERS OF THE DAY
• [48A: Literary club feature]: BOOK OF THE MONTH
• 62A: Annual Time issue]: PERSON OF THE YEAR

This is a nice Monday theme which does no more and no less than it needs to. I'm not super-sold on ORDERS OF THE DAY as plural, but Wikipedia confirms its use as a phrase used in the business meetings of a deliberative assembly. Apparently the Book of the Month Club is still going strong! You can get five hardcover books delivered to your door in a "fun to open box." I don't know about you, but what I find discouraging about reading is that the books are generally in a container that is such a drag to open. PERSON OF THE YEAR used to be Man (or far less often Woman) of the Year until 1999, when Time went gender-neutral. Inanimate objects have twice been Thing of the Year: The Computer in 1982 and the Endangered Earth in 1988. You were Person of the Year in 2006. Guess who was Man of the Year in 1938?

Fill-wise, we're good for a Monday with entry-level, standard stuff like ANTE ISIS MEME MAUI AFTA -- all on the NOSE, LIKE SO.

Bullets:

• [26D: TV broadcast band]: VHF — That's quite a throwback, to when there was VHF and UHF, and the channels were on a little dial that you had to turn manually, and you taped a wire hanger to the rabbit ears on top of your little tube TV. And sometimes you could get that other channel that showed Monty Python if you stood near the antenna just so. Do we even say broadcast anymore?
• [40D: N.R.A. members]: GUN USERS — I'm not convinced, from rhetoric of late, that the NRA is an organization for GUN USERS anymore, or if they just exist to intimidate people who disagree with them.
• [6D: Possibly, but unlikely]: IN THEORY — I think of IN THEORY as more, yeah, it's good on paper, but will it play in Peoria? That doesn't mean it's unlikely to happen though -- just that it might not go over as planned.

See you tomorrow.
 
Signed, Laura, Sorceress of CrossWorld

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Seuss's star-bellied creatures / THU 4-19-18 / Word before Johnny Lucy / Disney movie set in Arendelle / Chocolaty breakfast cereal

Constructor: Todd Gross

Relative difficulty: Easyish (4:48)

THEME: COUNT THE SQUARES (35A: How to find out what "this many" is in 17-, 21-, 52- and 57-Across) — themers have "this many" as part of their clues, and "this many" = number of letters in the answer:

Theme answers:

• BEETHOVEN (17A: He wrote this many symphonies)
• MISSOURI (21A: It borders this many other states)
• ARACHNID (52A: It has this many legs)
• MARK SPITZ (57A: He won this many Olympic gold medals)

Word of the Day: KEENAN Wynn (3D: Actor Wynn of "Dr. Strangelove") —

Francis Xavier Aloysius James Jeremiah Keenan Wynn (July 27, 1916 – October 14, 1986) was an American character actor. His expressive face was his stock-in-trade; and, though he rarely carried the lead role, he had prominent billing in most of his film and television roles. (wikipedia)

• • •

This feels underbaked. Four pretty short themers, and a revealer that is not ... a thing people say. Not a stand-alone phrase. Not wordplayesque. Painfully literal instructions. Just not a lot of there there. Also, the number of letters is pretty iconic for three of the themers (BEETHOVEN's symphonies, spider's legs, Spitz's medals), but number of states that MISSOURI borders? It's an interesting piece of trivia (MO is tied with TN for state that borders most other states) but when I think Missouri I do not think "Oh, sure ... eight." The whole thing just doesn't quite come together on the thematic level. There's some quite delightful fill, though. AE HOUSMAN (10D: "A Shropshire Lad" author) and CROUPIER (11D: Casino employee) in the NE, ULULATES (37D: Grieves loudly) and SNEETCHES (33D: Seuss's star-bellied creatures) in the SW. I like those. Those were by far my favorite things about this puzzle. But the theme is kinda sorta very important on Thursdays, of all days, and outside those longer Downs the rest of the fill is OK but actually a bit on the weak side, so it's hard not to feel a tad disappointed by this one.


Started stupidly slow on this one. I blame POKE, which is horribly clued (1A: Slow sort, informally). Uh, I've heard "slow POKE," but never POKE on its own. The "slow" is necessary to make POKE make any sense, and "slow" is already in the clue, so ... yuck. I'm sure there's some example somewhere of POKE standing on its own, but come on. The phrase is "slow POKE" and everyone knows that so stop getting cute. Better to have [Slow ___], honestly. Hard, and accurate. Forgot KEENAN, never considered OREO OS, and thought 1D: Classic Milwaukee brews (PABSTS) could be lotsa things. Worst of all, I dropped ELENA into 20A: First name on the Supreme Court (SONIA) without hesitation. Dead certain. Whoops. Besides SSN, I didn't get a damn thing until I picked up UNO, and then the whole north section, and then backed into BEETHOVEN (without really understanding why—just saw ----OVEN and "symphonies" and plunked down the obvious answer). I thought maybe the clue number was the "this many," and so MISSOURI was a revelation. "21 states!? Wow ... I have completely misremembered my US map." Even after COUNT THE SQUARES, I didn't really put things together (this often happens when I'm flying). It was only at ARACHNID that I was like, "OK, hey, even I know spiders don't have 52 legs..." I did (very briefly) think some creature did, though, because I just had the -NID when I read the clue. "52 legs!? What ... the hell creature ... is that?" Only *then* did the full meaning of COUNT THE SQUARES hit me. So in went ARACHNID, and that heretofore pesky SW corner folded, and I was done.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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Believer in Ethiopian Zion / THU 4-27 / First commercial film with stereophonic sound 1940 / Afghanistan's third largest city / Longtime New Yorker writer Pauline / Long-running tv drama started in 2003

Constructor: Todd Gross

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: SUDOKU PUZZLE (8A: With 67-Across, what the circled part of this crossword represents) — the CENTRAL / SQUARES (1A: With 68-Across, the circled part of this crossword) form a sudoku-type puzzle, with the letters R, A, T, and E instead of numbers.

Word of the Day: Cinnabar (27D: Cinnabar, e.g. => RED) —

noun

noun: cinnabar

1. a bright red mineral consisting of mercury sulfide. It is the only important ore of mercury and is sometimes used as a pigment. [emph. mine]

   • the bright red color of this; vermilion.

     
     

     "the blood coagulated in cinnabar threads"

• • •

"I HATE YOU, PUZZLE!" Actually, I have no such strong feelings today, but I do like that little embedded scream there in the SW corner. I have no interest in SUDOKU. Don't get it. Also, don't like the perpetuation of the idea that anyone who's into crosswords must be into SUDOKU. Like we're just pleased to be filling in boxes. SUDOKU is pure logic. The same kind of logic. Over and over and over, with no connection to culture, humanity, etc. No thanks. You guys have fun, but no. Anyway, this puzzle is what it is. Conceptually, I guess it works, but there's one thing I sincerely don't understand: what is CENTRAL / SQUARES doing in this puzzle? Like, at all. That is a whole lot of theme real estate given over to words that are completely redundant and (thus) unnecessary. I can see that the squares are central, in that ... they are circled. There. In the center. The SUDOKU / PUZZLE part tells me to look at those manifestly "central" squares, and tells me what they are. I really thought CENTRAL would tell me about the puzzle somehow. I see that the four letters are all inside the word "CENTRAL," but ... nope, I don't see a pun or trick or anything (unless... that *is* the trick?). The letters in the Sudoku grid are R A T and E. I don't know why (except those are handy letters to use if you're going to run a bunch of answers together). I do know that CENTRAL / SQUARES is not needed here, at all.


This grid was a kind of crosswordese showcase. I mean, any time you can see EIRE *and* ERSE in the same grid, that's a museum-piece puzzle you've got on your hands. Here were some lowlights:

"BACK AT YA" would make great fill. "AT YA" on its own, nope. "NUM" ugh—that bit of garbage actually ended up affecting my solve, as I went for CAP Lock (crossing PTL!?) instead of NUM / MTM, and that made the whole NE kinda hard to get into. PSSST is ridiculous, of course, unless you would also accept PSSSST, PSSSSSST, and NOOOOOOOOOOOO! Speaking of no, ONO. Hawaiian fish? Nice try. All you did was make me have to work (albeit slightly) to get the same old musician / performance artist we always see in the grid. Fun fact: the fish in question is known generally as "wahoo" (WHEE!). "Many Hispanic areas of the Caribbean and Central America refer to this fish as peto." So ... look for PETO in your grid next, I guess.

Bullets:

• 27D: Cinnabar, e.g. (RED) — total road block, this one. Had no idea what "Cinnabar" was. Could think only of Cinnabun and Edna Ferber's "Cimmaron." Even with RE- in place, I had to get that last letter from the cross. 
• 11D: Numerical prefix (OCTO-) — oy, not only is this bad fill, the clue doesn't even bother trying. It just sits there sullenly going "I don't know ... just guess ... not my problem ..."
• 52A: "Inner-city" for "black," to some people (CODE) — hey now! What's this? Hello. Looks like the puzzle woke up and found some attitude. More of this insightful sass, please. (I think "urban" is the more common CODE now, but I'll accept "Inner-city" on Marvin's behalf)

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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Liberal political activist Ralph / SAT 6-18-16 / Wendi ex-wife of Rupert Murdoch / Big comics character / Tavern assistant / application of democracy to love per HL Mencken

Constructor: Todd Gross

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium

THEME: squaresville (actually, none, I think) 

Word of the Day: RUNAGATES (3D: Fugitives) —

n.

1. A renegade or deserter.

2. A vagabond.

---

[Alteration of obsolete renegate, renegade (influenced by run and agate, on the way), from Middle English, from Medieval Latin renegātus; see renegade.] (thefreedictionary.com)

• • •

Yipes. 45 black squares is ... a lot. I'm gonna say "too many" (esp. on a Saturday). The weird floating-square pattern is not without its charm, visually, but from a solving standpoint, that swiss-cheesiness just seems like a cop-out. Give me back my Saturday white spaces! (which sounds vaguely racist, but ... you know what I mean). The fill was highly uneven and frequently ugly. So ... many ... VANESSAS. Long name plurals always seem ridiculous to me. If only we could've paired the VANESSAS with a [Sergio et al.] clue for the equally-not-good LEONES. Just look at all the plurals and otherwise "S"-ending words. I mean, how many NOONS do you need? Note how the "SS" in VANESSAS and the "SS" in HARASSES are both positioned to give us "S"-ending Downs. ITERS, god, no, make it stop (44D: Things that lead to Rome?). That one's bad enough in the singular. CLI!? Come on. And who in the what in the who is NEAS??? (29D: Liberal political activist Ralph). That's just bonkers. If that were anybody, anybody crossworthy, we'd've seen him in Countless puzzles by now. According to wikipedia, "Ralph Neas (born May, 17, 1946 in Brookline, Massachusetts) is former President and CEO of the Generic Pharmaceutical Association (GPhA), a Washington, D.C.-based trade association, representing generic drug makers and suppliers." What is happening?!?! Who? Ah, here we go:

From 1981 through 1995, he served as Executive Director of the nonpartisan Leadership Conference on Civil Rights (LCCR).^[5] At LCCR, Neas directed national civil rights campaigns including the Civil Rights Act of 1991, the 1990 Americans with Disabilities Act, the Civil Rights Restoration Act of 1988, the 1988 Fair Housing Act Amendments, the Japanese American Civil Liberties Act of 1988, and the 1982 Voting Rights Act Extension. Senator Edward Kennedy, in a 1995 Senate floor statement, described Neas as the "101st Senator for Civil Rights.

I'm sure he's a nice guy, but in a puzzle already glutted with obscuritude, and crossing the godawful LEONES, no. It's like the grid was built to accommodate a few decent longer answers, but literally nothing else. Honestly, this thing should be torn down all the way to its bones (i.e. the grid-spanners) and rebuilt. And that's only if you accept the grid design as it is, which I'm not sure I do.


This puzzle was 3/4 pretty easy and 1/4 insane—that quarter being the NW corner. The BAR part of BARBACK was easy (1A: Tavern assistant), but the rest, less so, especially considering that with __T in place at 5D: Part of the conjugation for "avoir," and *knowing French*, I went with the clear choice ... ONT. Third person plural present indicative. . . But no. Too common, I guess, because the puzzle went with third person singular present *subjunctive* AIT (hey, puzzle, you know that's an island in a stream, right? ... that is what that is). Ugh. AIT. But the big ugh, the queen bee ugh in that section, was 3D: Fugitives (RUNAGATES). It's like someone shouting at his marbles: Flee, marbles, flee!!! I have never seen that word in my life. Reaction on Twitter from serious solvers is so far similar. Run ... run ... where are we running ... somewhere ... but where? I'm guessing that a not insignificant number of people will solve this thing right down to the DENG / RUNAGATES crossing and then, just, die. Or guess, I guess. That crossing is death. Also, completely unpleasant. Luckily, I remembered that the ex Mrs. Murdoch was Asian, otherwise, lord knows what letter I'd've gone with instead of the "G."


AMII? (38D: ___ Stewart, singer of the 1979 #1 hit "Knock on Wood"). Wow. That's how you spell that? I knew it was a weird spelling of "Amy," but I didn't know it was Insane Latin Plural-looking weird. ENSE! Why won't that horrible motto part die? I'm gonna let this one go now. The only thing pleasant I'm taking away from it is the nonsense phrase "BARBACK Obama," which I hope someone turns into a wacky theme answer right quick.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

P.S. OMG, AIT is *literally* "(an island) in the stream" (i.e. it crosses the STREAM of MAINSTREAM MEDIA). How in the world do you give it the stupid French subjunctive clue, aargh?!

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]

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Bot that systematically browses internet / MON 6-29-15 / French city historically known for silk / Liesl's love in Sound of Music / Capital of Bangladesh old-style / Boo follower in triumphant shout / 1982 Harrison Ford sci-fi film

Constructor: Todd Gross and Andrea Carla Michaels

Relative difficulty: Medium-Challenging (FOR A MONDAY) (3:11)

THEME: evolutionary succession of some kind —

Theme answers:

• WEB CRAWLER (17A: Bot that systematically browses the Internet)
• ALICE WALKER (28A: "The Color Purple" novelist)
• BLADE RUNNER (48A: 1982 Harrison Ford sci-fi film)
• RADIO FLYER (64A: Classic red wagon)

Word of the Day: LYON (30D: French city historically known for silk) —

Lyon or Lyons [...] is a city in east-central France, in the Rhône-Alpes region, situated between Paris and Marseille. Lyon is located approximately 470 kilometres (292 miles) from Paris, 320 km (199 mi) from Marseille, 420 km (261 mi) from Strasbourg, 160 km (99 mi) from Geneva, 280 km (174 mi) from Turin. The residents of the city are called Lyonnais. // The small municipality (commune) of Lyon proper has a population of 491,268 (January 2011), and as such is France's third largest city after Paris and Marseille, but together with its suburbs and satellite towns Lyon forms the 2nd-largest metropolitan area in France with a population of 2,188,759 at the January 2011 census. Lyon is the capital of the Rhône-Alpes region, as well as the capital of the smaller Rhône département. // The city is known for its historical and architectural landmarks and is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Lyon was historically known as an important area for the production and weaving of silk. Since the late 20th century, it has developed a reputation as the capital of gastronomy in France and in the world. // It has a significant role in the history of cinema due to Auguste and Louis Lumière, who invented the cinematographe in Lyon. The city is also known for its famous light festival, 'Fête des Lumières,' which occurs every 8 December and lasts for four days, earning Lyon the title of Capital of Lights. (wikipedia)

• • •

OK I guess. I don't really understand the progression. That is, I see that it goes from earth to sky, but I don't know why—what is being suggested or imitated in that progression? Some vague evolutionary idea, I guess. I don't know. It's a 76-worder and felt a little heavier, a little slower than your average Monday. Fill's not great, but it's also not terrible. I mean besides XCI and YAH and ONEG and DACCA (Mondays should not have to resort to "old-style" anything). Mostly I found this one dull. Not much to say about it. What to say? YAH is not detachable from BOO, no way no how. LYON, in my mind (and in reality, too) has an "S" at the end, so that was tougher than it should've been. ROLF was unknown to me. I know about "The Sound of Music" largely by rumor. I think of "Requisite" as an adjective, so NEED was odd. This dull accretion of solving details is precisely how exciting this puzzle was to me. Adequate. That's what the puzzle is. It's adequate.

I just finished watching "From Here to Eternity" (1953), which features several of today's answers, most notably SERGEANTs and LEIs (it's set in Hawaii in late 1941, and concludes with the attack on Pearl Harbor and its immediate aftermath). The rolling-in-the-surf bit with Deborah KERR and Burt Lancaster takes all of 5 seconds, and it comes early in the movie. Given how iconic that scene is, I expected more. A lot more. More surf-rolling! Instead it was a lot of drinking and men punching each other. I liked it a lot, it's just ... my surf-rolling expectations went unmet. It did cause me to look up Jack Warden because he has one of those "wait I know that guy from everywhere!" faces. Turns out he was the president in "Being There," which I saw earlier this year, and also had Matthau's coach role in the TV version of "The Bad News Bears" (this is *surely* how his face was imprinted onto my brain). Warden used to be a boxer, and "From Here to Eternity" was a lot about boxing. Also, Lancaster's character in "From Here to Eternity" was named Warden. Frank Sinatra and Ernest Borgnine and Montgomery Clift and Donna Reed and Claude AKINS were in it too.



Maybe this theme was supposed to evoke a speech given by MLK (27A: "I have a dream" monogram) at a high school in Cleveland, OH on April 26, 1967 (text and audio here). It is, as usual, eloquent and moving, and it ends like this: "Well, life for none of us has been a crystal stair, but we must keep moving. We must keep going. And so, if you can't fly, run. If you can't run, walk. If you can't walk, crawl. But by all means, keep moving."

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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Actor David of Dark Shadows / THU 3-19-15 / Successor company to Northern Natural Gas / Republic founded in 1836 / Nestle chocolate bar since 1988 / Title ship in W.W. II film / 1979 #1 hit whose title is sung with stutter / Musicians Russell Redbone

Constructor: Todd Gross

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: imagined encyclopedia entries  — theme answers are common phrases in the pattern "___ TO ___" where the second word starts with the same letter as, and alphabetically follows, the first:

Theme answers:

• BACK TO BASICS (4D: Encyclopedia volume on education* reform?) *(EDU is in the grid (23D)—not cool)
• MADE TO MEASURE (17D: Encyclopedia volume on tailoring?)
• NEXT TO NOTHING (7D: Encyclopedia volume on poverty?) 
• RAGS TO RICHES (21D: Encyclopedia volume on wealth accumulation?)

Word of the Day: METACOMET (41A: Indian chief called King Philip) —

Metacomet was the second son of the sachem Massasoit. He became a chief in 1662 when his brother Wamsutta (or King Alexander) died shortly after his father Massasoit. Wamsutta's widow Weetamoo (d. 1676), sachem of the Pocasset, was Metacomet's ally and friend for the rest of her life. Metacom married Weetamoo's younger sister Wootonekanuske. No one knows how many children they had or what happened to them, but Wootonekanuske and one of their sons were sold to slavery in the West Indies.

At the beginning he sought to live in harmony with the colonists. As a sachem, he took the lead in much of his tribes' trade with the colonies. He adopted the European name of Philip, and bought his clothes in Boston, Massachusetts.

But the colonies continued to expand. To the west, the Iroquois Confederation also was fighting against neighboring tribes in the Beaver Wars, pushing them west and encroaching on his territory. Finally, in 1671 the colonial leaders of the Plymouth Colony forced major concessions from him. He surrendered much of his tribe's armament and ammunition, and agreed that they were subject to English law. The encroachment continued until hostilities broke out in 1675. Metacom led the opponents of the English, with the goal of stopping Puritan expansion. (wikipedia)

• • •

There's a cute idea at the core of this thing, but the execution just doesn't work. It just doesn't. Those imagined encyclopedia volumes are laughably short, and the whole point of encyclopedias is that they cover a variety of topics, in alphabetical order—and yet these imagined volumes are clued as if they are on a single topic. It all just doesn't work. On at least two levels. Nice (if possibly accidental) touch that the theme answers are themselves in alphabetical order. Also nice: some of the fill, namely JERUSALEM, "MY SHARONA," TIM BURTON. I'd add METACOMET, but honestly I've never seen that before in my life. I'm torn between calling an obscurity foul and embracing the weirdness of this new (to-me) name. It's a comet that comments on its own comet-ness. METACOMET!


The rest of the fill, however, is pretty poor. That NW corner is inexcusable, honestly. SELBY over ONEAD :( :( :( A little elbow grease and that corner could be a ton better. See also … lots of places. Yeesh, that western section. Just as the terminal "I" at 1D in the NW creates problems, so the terminal "U" starts a cascade of bad fill in the west. TABU INON ANYA BOSSA, all interlocking, none of it good. No reason these smallish areas should be so heavily laden with word parts and hackneyed fill. OHO YMA ASSNS IMET OLE OHO AHEM YMA AERO ODIE SELA TELE XII HIER … there's just a lot you have to endure in order to enjoy the good stuff.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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Ottoman inns / SUN 9-28-14 / Relative of canary / Chief Justice during Civil War / Synagogue instrument / Flowing glacial feature / Taiwanese computer giant / 2007 purchaser of Applebee's / Shelfmate of Bartlett's / English hymnist / Sparkly topper / Brand with red arrow through its logo / Pituitary gland output briefly

Constructor: Todd Gross

Relative difficulty: Easy

THEME: "Four By Four" — theme answers are phrases made out of four four-letter words

Theme answers:

• SAME TIME NEXT YEAR (23A: 1975 Tony-nominated play about an extended affair)
• SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH (46A: The Crossroads of the West)
• HOLD YOUR HEAD HIGH (16D: "Don't be ashamed")
• TEAR DOWN THIS WALL (36D: Reagan's challenge to Gorbachev)
• WITH ARMS WIDE OPEN (92A: Warm way to welcome someone)
• LESS TALK MORE ROCK (119A: Common slogan for a music radio station)

Word of the Day: Roger B. TANEY (35A: Chief Justice during the Civil War) —

Roger Brooke Taney (/ˈtɔːni/; March 17, 1777 – October 12, 1864) was the fifth Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, holding that office from 1836 until his death in 1864. He was the eleventh United States Attorney General. He is most remembered for delivering the majority opinion in Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857), that ruled, among other things, that African-Americans, having been considered inferior at the time the Constitution was drafted, were not part of the original community of citizens and, whether free or slave, could not be considered citizens of the United States. (wikipedia)

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I was getting complaints about this one before I'd even opened it, and I can see why. The theme is simply not interesting. You can go to onelook.com (as one of my friends pointed out) and do a search of 4x4 possibilities; that search gives you all these, plus many others (most of them completely unusable—my favorites are LOCK THAT SH*T DOWN, SHUT YOUR CAKE HOLE, and the truly stellar FIST F**K YOUR FACE). I'm not convinced that LESS TALK MORE ROCK is terribly legit, but even if it were, there's just a big "Who Cares?" miasma hanging over this one. There are exactly two things remarkable about this puzzle: NO-GOODNIK, and the fact that this is possibly the easiest Sunday puzzle I've ever done. Got snagged at the very end in the north—a total outlier, difficulty-wise—but still finished in under 8 (!?!?). Otherwise, everything about this puzzle is deeply forgettable. I just don't understand how this would "tickle" anyone.


I guess if I'm going to focus on any part of this grid, it should probably be that north area, which stands out only because the rest of the grid was So Dang Easy. I started entering answers and just kept going, barely even pausing, tearing up the grid until I hit the far north. There I encountered a whole bunch of things I either didn't know or couldn't see, all in one place. First, ICEFALL (9D: Flowing glacial feature). Then MAXILLA, which I sort of knew and sort of doubted—I know very well that AXILLA is armpit, so even though MAXILLA sounded right for 10D: Mandible's counterpart, I couldn't help thinking that I was confusing the real answer with axilla. MAXILLA sounds like an extreme armpit. "Take your axilla to the max, with MAXILLA!" The clue for ALT is just bizarre (11D: Not the main rte.). ALT corresponds to "main"—it's not the main rte., it's the ALT. rte. ALT by itself suggesting nothing about rtes. I know it as a prefix meaning alternative, as in "alt-country." I was half-expecting DET. (as in "detour"?). Then there was the very last thing I got—the absurd SERIN / TANEY cross. Both of those are obscure, and they cross at a not-too-guessable letter. Even if you think "those aren't obscure," they certain are compared to All The Other Answers In This Grid. Not well-known bird crossing not well-known Supreme Court Chief Justice at a Wheel-Of-Fortune letter? Odd.


Reluctant to do a Puzzle of the Week this week, for a couple of reasons. First, I didn't do as many puzzles this week as I normally do, so it's highly probable I haven't even solved some good candidates. Also, I'm still struggling with the Matt Gaffney Weekly Crossword Puzzle metapuzzle, which I'm told is great, but which I can't yet confirm (no "aha" moment for me yet). So I'll just say that the best puzzle I did this week was Patrick Berry's Friday themeless (NYT), though Byron Walden's "Mismatched Socks" (AV Club Crossword) (solution) is also worth a look. Best themed puzzle I did, for sure.

[Update: Just figured out the meta for this week's MGWCC puzzle ("Repeat Offenders," by Francis Heaney). It is indeed amazing, though I have this small quibble that I can't discuss because the contest deadline hasn't passed … gah! Anyway, the puzzle is pretty epic, and definitely POTW-worthy]

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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Indonesian currency / TUE 1-21-14 / High in German names / Magazine launch of 1933 with hyphen in its name / Times Square booth sign / Fictional Flanders Plimpton / Ski resort in Salt Lake county / 2007 documentary about health care system

Constructor: Todd Gross

Relative difficulty: Medium-Challenging

THEME: WORD / LOOP (1A: With 72-Across, what the answers on this puzzle's perimeter form) — words on perimeter form a loop, where (moving clockwise from 1A), each successive answer  represents a one-letter change from the previous one, until you end up back where you started: at WORD. [I'm told that the "O" is also part of the theme, in that it is the only vowel in the themers, and appears exclusively in themers; I can't imagine most people will notice this, or care, but in case it is thematic, I'm telling you about it]

Theme answers:

• WORD, WOOD, WOOT, TOOT, HOOT, HOOP, LOOP, LOOK, KOOK (I went for LOON here at first…), COOK, CORK, CORD

Word of the Day: RUPIAH (54A: Indonesian currency) —

n., pl., rupiah.
A basic unit of currency in Indonesia.

Read more: http://www.answers.com/topic/rupiah#ixzz2r04mVEha

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Yesterday's puzzle was gunky, but it looks squeaky clean next to this thing. First, this theme is kind of a pointless and dull trick, but let's just say it's a cute variation on the (tired) word ladder, give it some credit for its loopiness, and move on. What about the rest of the puzzle? The majority of the puzzle? The Answers You Have To Fill In To Complete The Puzzle? Well, those … yikes. At this point, I don't understand how a constructor can make a grid like this and *not* say to himself, "man, this really could be better." There is so much junk here, it's astonishing. Very few interesting, longer answers—but tons of 4- and 5-letter answers, and so many of them mediocre-to-outright-bad. The constructors whose work I (generally) love, these people would (mostly) be ashamed to have corners like that SE corner: ADRIP, ATRIP, and RUPIAH (!?!?!)? In the same tight space? And that's hardly out of the ordinary for this grid. AWEE!? UPAS? OBER? Everywhere you look, the grid's marked by an "eh, whatever, good enough" attitude. No craft. No care for the fill. Database says the answer has been used before, so, sure, go with it. No matter if it's icky or rarely used or whatever. Computer Say Good So Good. This drives me nuts. As you can see. LETA WILEE ORNE ISE. There is no good reason for fill to be this poor. And it IS poor, and even those of you who think I'm "too harsh" know that this is poor. You've been at this too long. Come on, now. This theme may require a compromise here or there (esp. in the corners), but a gajillion compromises? No.


I will give the puzzle this—it has one nice patch: the KEYWEST NEWSEEK SEXUAL CARWAX nexus. Side note: I think something marketing itself as SEXUAL CARWAX might sell very well.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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Hircosity / 1968 #1 hit for Supremes / THU 1-2-14 / Robert Frost poem good fences make good neighbors / Star Trek prosthesis / Red Sox Hall-of-Famer Bobby / Pope who declared I am sinner This is most accurate definition

Constructor: Todd Gross

Relative difficulty: Medium-Challenging

THEME: -ENDING — five answers are literal representations of phrases in which the first word follows the pattern _ENDING; first letter of each phrase is turned into the "ending" of the answers, so that, for example, VENDING MACHINE becomes MACHINEV, i.e. V ENDING MACHINE. The first letter literally "ends" the answer.

Theme answers:

• MACHINES V (17A: Food or drink dispensers)
• FOR ONESELF F (10D: Going without help)
• LITIGATION P (24D: Future court case)
• THE RULES B (51A: Taking liberties)
• WALL M (32A: Robert Frost poem that includes "Good fences make good neighbors")

Word of the Day: The Don (41D: Don's place => RUSSIA) —

The Don (Russian: Дон, IPA: [don]) is one of the major rivers of Russia. It rises in the town ofNovomoskovsk 60 kilometres southeast from Tula, southeast of Moscow, and flows for a distance of about 1,950 kilometres (1,220 mi) to the Sea of Azov.

From its source, the river first flows southeast to Voronezh, then southwest to its mouth. The main city on the river is Rostov on Don. Its main tributary is the Seversky Donets. (wikipedia)

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This is a theme that is clever conceptually, but only conceptually. That is, in practice, on the paper, from a solving standpoint, it's a bit of a drag. Comes across as precious. The "_ ENDING X" just isn't tight enough for this to pop. Is the "V" really "ending" MACHINES? It's sitting there after it, but it's not really "ending" it. I don't think I'm splitting hairs. If you have nonsense in the grid, which you do, then the concept that's undergirding that nonsense has to be rock solid, and this just feels … something short of that. A bit strained. F actually *does* end FOR ONESELF, so the extra "F" feels redundant. I mean, I see what's going on. It just doesn't quite come together for me. Also, this is in that genre (which some people admire) of stunt puzzle, where an ambitious theme is built up without much regard for the non-thematic fill, which is allowed to buckle and groan under the theme's weight. I'm happy to give allowance when the theme is truly worthy, but this one didn't quite hit for me, so stuff like ETAPE (56A: Tour de France stage) and ARACE and MOIRES and AMATIVE (!?) and ODA AND I and the hot DERR-on-DOERR action etc. rankled more than it might have.


Took me a longish time to figure out what was up. Me, upon seeing MACHINESV: "MACHINES … FIVE?" "Vending" never occurred to me. FORONESELFF also left me shrugging. Wasn't til THERULESB that I got it. Or, I guess, "got" it, since my first thought was that the "B" was for "breaking," and that that word had been "broken" … somehow. After a bit, I recalibrated, hit on "bending," and then it all made sense. A kind of sense. Toughest part for me was the center, as I could not recall the Frost poem and knew -LLM had to be wrong. Took me a while to accept that that little answer could be a themer. Also, I needed many crosses to get MOIRES (30A: Shimmery silks). Also, I don't think of "marinating" as a "softening" technique. I'm sure it's correct, on a literal level; it's just not a word I'd ever associated with the process. So this one was tough, but well within normal Thursday toughness parameters.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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Creator of first crossword / SAT 12-21-13 / Jerry Orbach role in Fantasticks / Kingdom vanquished by Hammurabi / Girl's name in #1 1973 1974 song titles / Ranch sobriquet / Neighborhood org since 1844 / Fruit whose name comes from Arawak / Morlocks enemy

Constructor: Todd Gross and David Steinberg

Relative difficulty: Easy

THEME: First crossword puzzle — today is the 100th anniversary of the crossword puzzle. The shaded area corresponds to the shape of that original puzzle, which looked like this:

Puzzle's creator (ARTHUR WYNNE) and publisher (NEW YORK / SUNDAY WORLD) both appear in the grid, as does the puzzle's publication year (MCMXIII)

Word of the Day: KREWE (12D: Mardi Gras group) —

A krewe (pronounced in the same way as "crew") is an organization that puts on a parade and/or a ball for the Carnivalseason. The term is best known for its association with New Orleans Mardi Gras, but is also used in other Carnival celebrations around the Gulf of Mexico, such as the Gasparilla Pirate Festival in Tampa, Florida, and Springtime Tallahassee as well as in La Crosse, Wisconsin and at the Saint Paul Winter Carnival.

The word is thought to have been coined in the early 19th century by an organization calling themselves Ye Mistick Krewe of Comus, as an archaic affectation; with time it became the most common term for a New Orleans Carnival organization. The Mistick Krewe of Comus itself was inspired by a Mobile mystic society, with annual parades inMobile, Alabama, called the Cowbellion de Rakin Society that dated from 1830. (wikipedia)

• • •

[SYNDICATED SOLVERS—my book review of Ben Tausig's "The Curious History of the Crossword Puzzle" appears in the Wall Street Journal today (January, 25, 2014). Here is a PDF.]

I've been seeing references to the 100th anniversary of the crossword all over the web today, so this feels rather anti-climactic. Yes, 100 years. Yes, that's the publication and the creator. Yes, that gray area is the shape of the original puzzle—though nothing about the content of that gray area (with the notable exception of FUN) corresponds to the original puzzle. If you want a FUN puzzle with which to celebrate the anniversary of the crossword, I suggest Merl Reagle's Google Doodle (if it's still up … it was on Friday). This was very easy if you were aware of the anniversary, maybe a little less so if you weren't. I've seen ARTHUR WYNNE's name so many times in the past few days that "gimme" doesn't even begin to describe it. Not sure how anyone's supposed to know what the gray area represents—did you get a note? My .pdf had no note.  It's a bit insidery, esp. the FUN bit. Maybe there's a note out there that my version just didn't have. Who can say?


I like FUNGICIDE (16A: Jojoba oil is a natural one). Otherwise, shrug, puzzle's OK. Only trouble today was spelling AMIDALA (22D: "Star Wars" queen and senator), which is not AMADALA. Nor is it AMYGDALA, though it's close. Had I SWEAR instead of IT WAS I (40D: Formal confession). No other bumps to speak of.

If you want to read a little something on the 100th anniversary, I recommend this thoughtful little piece by Ben Tausig: "The Shape of Clues to Come: The Crossword at 100."

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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