THURSDAY, Jun. 19, 2008 - Joe Krozel (GOLF GREAT ANDRE / TENNIS CHAMP ERNIE)

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: LIES - TEN clues are inaccurate, which the puzzle tells you in two ways - first, with the letters spelled out by the black squares, and second by 56A: Number of clues in this puzzle that contain factual inaccuracies (ten)

This is the best puzzle of the year so far. In fact, I'm not sure it's even close. By year's end, I may have revised or recalibrated my opinion, but for now, O My God. I was tipped off by Merl Reagle (whose newly debugged puzzle site you can access from my sidebar) that today's puzzle would be a doozy, but I had no way of knowing just how original it would be. The miracle of the thing is - it's pitched at a perfect Thursday level. With TEN lies and highly IRRegularly-shaped grid, this should have been brutal, but it was just slightly tough. And best of all, it's roiling with entertaining answers. A+. Nice job, Krozzy (I've given you a nickname, whether you like it or not - you're welcome!)

LIES:

• 1A: France's _____ von Bismarck (Otto) - it was very nice of Joe and Will to tip us to the theme right off the bat. I could see the big black LIES, but didn't know how it would be relevant until ... well, the first clue I looked at. This one.
• 14A: Chemical element with the symbol Fe (Neon) - FE = iron
• 19A: Former pharmaceutical giant (GTE) - they were a telecom giant
• 24A: Father of Jacob (Esau) - actual father of Jacob = Isaac
• 8D: Golf great Andre (Agassi) - he's tennis
• 47D: Tennis champ Ernie (Els) - he's golf
• 27D: It's more than 90 degrees (acute angle) - that's obtuse
• 9D: Standard office-closing time (nine a.m.) - that's an opening time
• 49D: Currency of China (yen) - that's the currency of Japan
• 50D: Summer hrs. in N.Y.C. (EST) - those are winter hours

Thank god for little gimmes today, because I think the Eastern seaboard would have been a hell of a lot harder without them. ERI (36D: Verdi's "_____ tu"), EPI (38D: Prefix with center), and RRS (25A: Monopoly quartet: Abbr.) were enough to crack open the whole thing, and in pretty short order. I figured out ARTURO TOSCANINI (12D: Who quipped "God tells me how the music should sound, but you stand in the way") just by glancing at the letters I already had in place - never looked at the clue until the puzzle was done. Not sure I've ever done that with a 15-letter answer. Felt good. I should note, however, that ARTURO TOSCANINI is about the most popular 15-letter answer there is lately. I think I've seen it three times since I started blogging. Cruciverb.com is telling me RUSSIAN ROULETTE is the most popular, but I don't think it's completely up-to-date, and at any rate, with this appearance, TOSCANINI at least makes it onto the Top Ten. [HA ha, I just found my last write-up of ARTURO TOSCANINI - Feb. 15 of this year - and I declared him over-exposed and officially retired back then!]

Good stuff:

• 39A: Possible name for the first decade of the century (oughts) - had AUGHTS, which is true enough, but gave me LAG for 33D: Mill input (log)
• 42A: Former Romanian leader Ion _____ (Iliescu) - this one was rough, but I got the first part from crosses and the second part by adding on a common Romanian name-ending series of letters (-SCU). Interestingly ILIE Nastase is also Romanian. ILIE Nastase + Nikolai CeauseSCU = ILIESCU.
• 43A: One step from the majors (AAA) - nice clue for this otherwise unremarkable answer
• 44A: Nickname on the Houston Rockets starting in 2004 (T-Mac) - wow, that's rough for non-basketball fans (i.e. a Huge percentage of NYT solvers). PS Congratulations to my once beloved Celtics for winning the NBA championship. I was a Huge fan back in the 80s when the Lakers/Celtics rivalry meant something. My H.S. yearbooks are filled with trash talk - and trash drawings - from "friends" who hated the Celtics. As a Celtics fan in California, I was an anomaly to say the least. I may have been unique to my high school (in that respect, if not others).
• 57A: Dwarf planet larger than Pluto (Eris) - I'd like to thank the puzzle for teaching my brain the instinctive dwarf planet - ERIS reaction.
• 45A: Kind of dog (seeing eye) - allow me to point out that if you have all the middle letters in this answer from the Downs, which I did, the only "dog" that wants to go in this space - perfectly - is PEKINGESE. All those E's fit perfectly into place. Ugh. This was the only part of the puzzle that I truly had to wrestle with.
• 52A: Road access regulators (toll gates) - I don't know that I've seen this phrase before, but I like it. Is the "gate" the actual piece of wood that descends and blocks your entry/egress?
• 53A: Sooner (Okie) - simply ... awesome...
• 2D: Mother of Calcutta (Teresa) - blessed gimme. I got OTTO, ONESEC (1D: "I'll be with you shortly ..."), and TERESA in rat-a-tat fashion.
• 32A: Suffix with palm (-etto) - A Woody Harrelson / Elisabeth Shue movie...
  
• 5D: Silverstein who wrote and illustrated "The Giving Tree" (Shel) - you could have stopped this clue at "Silverstein" and the answer would have been obvious.
• 11D: One who exhibits a pack mentality? (cigarette smoker) - most excellent. Cigarettes now cost $300 / pack in NY, so with gas at $750 / gallon ... how can anyone afford to smoke any more? When I see someone smoking in his/her car, all I can think of is "what are you, a Rockefeller?" Usually, the person is manifestly not a Rockefeller.
• 13D: Job seeker's fashion advice (dress for success) - I assume that the job-seeker is the recipient of this advice; the clue is not clearly worded. [Fashion advice for a job-seeker], maybe?
• 35D: Turkish pooh-bah (Aga) - today's winner in the eternal AGA v. DEY v. BEY struggle.
• 37D: Th.D. subj. (Rel.) - I had DIV., but fixed it reasonably quickly. At least I was in the ballpark.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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WEDNESDAY, Jun. 18, 2008 - Adam Fromm (LA GIOCONDA, FAMILIARLY)

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium

THEME: add L to make adverbs ...

I am not a fan of this theme at all. That is about all I have to say about that. The phrases that result from the added "L" can't stand alone. Noun feels completely disconnected from the adverb that follows. I just don't get it. I mean, I get it, but ... seems like a "theme" for a much less reputable puzzle. And I say this as someone who would love to see THOMAS HARDY in the puzzle much more often, in general:

Theme answers:

• 24A: Appetizer, entree or dessert? (dinner, partly)
• 38A: Bonbon and how it should be divvied up? (sugar plum, fairly)
• 51A: Doubting apostle? Not by a long shot! (Thomas? Hardly)

The non-theme fill is often fabulous, however, so the day was not a total loss. Not by a long shot! I have no idea who BOB AND RAY are (4D: Old spoofing duo) - I thought maybe the "Car Talk" guys, but no. They make a nice long answer, whoever they are, as does FISH SOUP (I had fish STEW - 41D: Bouillabaisse). I have smiley faces and / or "hee hee"s written next to the clues for WELK (18A: Lawrence of the North Dakota Hall of Fame), VELMA (7D: The nerdier of the "Scooby-Doo" girls), and MACARENA (22A: Dance craze of the mid-'90s). Initial thoughts about these clues, in order, were: "Lawrence WELK played football?" "I guess 'nerdier' is nicer than 'homelier'" and "The mid-90s were like a horrible nightmare, a cultural cesspool ... not sure why I think this decade's any better, but I do."

Biggest trouble came in the NW, where I did not know MINIM at all (9A: 1/60 of a fluid dram) - to me, a MINIM is a particular kind of stroke a scribe makes in a medieval manuscript. Even after I guessed MINIM, MONA LISA (9D: La Gioconda, familiarly) remained invisible to me; the letters I had made me want to guess MONALITH here for a few seconds. Then I remembered how to spell MONOLITH. I didn't know this TONY fellow (63A: "West Side Story" fellow), nor did I know the Disneyesque nickname of TONGA (51D: Archipelago known as the Friendly Islands). Other than that, a pretty easy puzzle.

Salmagundi!

• 1A: "Ishtar" or "Heaven's Gate," famously (bomb) - Horrible feeling to get something this easy and blow it. I instantly (and accurately) wrote in FLOP.
• 26A: Reuben server (deli) - why this clue was so thorny for me, I don't know. I was imagining a waiter or a serving dish of some kind ...
• 64A: Popular block game requiring nimble fingers (Jenga!) - It's fun to shout for no reason. Like "Yahtzee!"
• 65A: Caesar's almost last words ("Et tu") - I just did a very awesome drawing of Caesar uttering these almost last words, but it's part of a book project and so you'll have to wait to see it. Actually, as I am a comically terrible artist, the drawing will never be in any book. So what the hell - here's a set of three notecards I constructed to help me organize my thoughts about crossword words:

• 10D: White key, informally (ivory) - at one time, this could have been clued [White key, actually], right?
• 28D: Picador's opponent (toro) - today was a good day for you if you love picadors: 57D: Cheers for picadores (oles)
• 29D: Traveler's alternative to De Gaulle (Orly) - most important non-US airport in CrossWorld
• 30D: 2001 Oscar nominee for Best Original Song, "May It Be" (Enya) - she's everywhere you want to be, sadly. Make her stop!
• 47D: Big bird of myth (Roc) - I'm trying to imagine Big Bird flying down and carrying off Sinbad in his talons.
• 33D: S-curve (ogee) - wow, the OGEEs I've seen don't look like esses. They look like this:

But I appear to be conflating OGEE with OGEE arch (two OGEE shapes that meet in a peak in the middle). Interesting.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

PS Hey, I'm in "MUG - Manhattan User's Guide" today. I don't know what that is, but it sounds good. Thanks to Ellen R. for notifying me about it.

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