Mexican salamander / SUN 9-2-12 / 1930s world chess champion / 1974 hit with Spanish title / Scapegoat's onus / My reputation Iago / Lake at one end of Welland Canal / 1979 #1 hit for Robert John

Constructor: Joel Fagliano

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium

THEME: "Pardon Ze Interruption" — Familiar phrases have "ZEE" sound added to them, creating all manner of wackiness and "?"-cluing

Word of the Day: Max EUWE (35D: 1930s world chess champion Max) —

Machgielis (Max) Euwe (Dutch: [ˈøːwə]) (May 20, 1901 – November 26, 1981) was a Dutch chessGrandmaster, mathematician, and author. He was the fifth player to become World Chess Champion(1935–37). Euwe also served as President of FIDE, the World Chess Federation, from 1970 to 1978. (wikipedia)

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A nice little add-a-sound puzzle, with an especially lovely middle section. Wide-open, lots of white space, but incredibly evenly and brightly filled. The clunkers (EUWE, XXO) are very few in number, and every Sunday gets a handful of passes anyway. One of the best things about *this* add-a-sound puzzles (as opposed to some others I've seen) is that the sound that's added almost ensures that the resulting changed word will be at least interesting, if not downright entertaining. The resulting phrases here are, for the most part, legitimately amusing. HOLDS SWAYZE and ASIAN FLOOZIE create great, vivid images, as does CAPITAL ONESIE, which in my head is an exclamation made by an aging British gentleman wearing a monocle. And remarking on a ONESIE, of course. Something like ZEBU RADLEY would've been funny as a phrase, but is utterly preposterous as a visual, whereas every theme answer here (however unlikely as a phrase) creates an image one can legitimately imagine.

Theme answers:

• 23A: Chihuahua that eats only the best dog food? (CHOOSY TOY)
• 25A: What Jennifer Grey does in "Dirty Dancing"? (HOLDS SWAYZE)

• 32A: Promiscuous woman of the Far East? (ASIAN FLOOZIE)
• 52A: Begin a game of "She loves me, she loves me not..."? (SEIZE THE DAISY)
• 70A: First-class piece of infant's wear? (CAPITAL ONESIE)
• 83A: Everest? (MOUNTAIN DOOZY)
• 106A: Where busybodies live? (NOSY MAN'S LAND)
• 117A: Group that regularly plays a classic dice game? (YAHTZEE CLUB)
• 119A: Drop a hip-hop star from the festival line-up? (SCRUB JAY-Z)

There is a bit of E- and S-laden crosswordese in here ("ERES TU," ESTEE, EPEEIST, etc.), but it's so spaced out that it never generates enough collective power to offend. Also, the cluing is current and clever. Nice bit of trivia on the COLBERT clue (12A: Comedian who was the only man on Maxim's 2012 Hot 100 list of most beautiful women), and while JAM and AUGHTS aren't the most scintillating answers, their clues gave them a good dose of pizzazz (120D: Basketball highlight, slangily + 95D: Period of George W. Bush's presidency). Loved the clue on DESK—totally threw me (74A: Anchor's place). SMOOT (30A: ___-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930) and AXOLOTL (3D: Mexican salamander) are slightly arcane, but I consider them very high-end crosswordese—the kind of stuff they keep behind a locked glass case at the crosswordse store (which is to say I haven't seen them often in crosswords, but I've definitely seen them, and without crosswords I wouldn't know about them).

I goofed and wrote NSA at 93A: MI5 : Britain :: ___ : U.S. (C.I.A.) and HOT SALSA at 56D: Burrito topper (HOT SAUCE). I have no idea why ["Laugher"] is in quotation marks. A ROUT is a laugher, not a "laugher." Weird. I don't think I've ever heard of the Welland Canal, which makes it a nice way to clue a very well known lake like ONTARIO (121A: Lake at one end of the Welland Canal). PSAS are public service announcements, in case you're wondering (127A: Ad Council output, for short). NBC used to have a bunch of horrible, preachy ones where, like, Ross from "Friends" would tell you not to beat your kids or whatever, and then this star with a rainbow trail would shoot across the screen followed by the words "The More You Know ..." Or maybe I'm misremembering. It was the 90s, after all. That decade's kind of a blur.

[R.I.P., Hal David]

Iago shows up in the clues today instead of his more customary location in the grid (12A: He said "My reputation, Iago, my reptuation!" => CASSIO). I like the clue on BLAME (15D: Scapegoat's onus), even though my brain keeps processing it as the nonsensical [Scopegate's anus]. "Revolutionary Road" is a great novel. Reminded me a lot of John O'Hara's "Appointment in Samarra," only I actually liked it better (59D: "Revolutionary Road" novelist Richard). I also love "Watchmen" by ALAN Moore, the importance of which, in the world of comics, cannot be overstated (84D: Moore who wrote "Watchmen"). Lastly, I got mildly mad at myself for not nailing the 1979 pop music clue right away (91A: 1979 #1 hit for Robert John => "SAD EYES"). I really, really know my Top 40 songs from 1978-80, both because I listened to the radio constantly then, and because I recently went back and compiled a massive Spotify playlist of all songs that charted in those years. Sadly, Robert John is such a dull name that I never remember who he is or what he sang. I do like the song, though, in a nostalgic kind of way.
Good day.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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Motor oil letters / SAT 9-1-12 / Big name in taco kits / 1980s Cosby co-star / Ricky Martin's springboard to fame / Gondoliers girl / Victors of 1879 Battle of Isandlwana

Constructor: Tim Croce

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: none

Word of the Day: AYR (8D: Robert Burns's birth county) —

Ayr (Scottish Gaelic: Inbhir Àir: Mouth of the River Ayr) is a town and port situated on the Firth of Clyde in south-west Scotland. With a population of around 46,000, Ayr is the largest settlement in Ayrshire, of which it is thecounty town, and has held royal burgh status since 1205. Ayr is the administrative centre of the South Ayrshire council area, which is the unitarylocal authority. (wikipedia)

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Played on the slow side for me, but then again I solved it while "watching" "Swimming to Cambodia" (1987), so ... when I adjust for distraction, my time is pretty normal. This grid is fine. Not very exciting, but mostly quite smooth. The one exception is that SW quadrant, which is noticeably uglier than the rest of the grid: ON THE, SAE (50A: Motor oil letters), ALMAPASATIASENNA (though you have to love the "PEACE OUT" / "LATER, MAN" crossing). I liked the NW the best, by far. The center is also pretty nice. Clues seemed quite tough, but it *is* Saturday, so that fact is probably not that noteworthy. Honestly, not much to say here. It's a decent Saturday puzzle.

Where was the trouble? Well, anywhere there were answers foreign or esoteric, I floundered a bit. Misread the clue for AYR, and so scrambled through my geography rolodex in search of what possible *country* he could've been born in. NORway? It's relatively close to Scotland. SYRia? Seemed unlikely. Eventually reread the clue and figured it out. TESSA = random opera woman's name (25A: "The Gondoliers" girl). Never like those.  Thought ED KOCH (24D: Subject of the musical "Mayor") was ALIOTO. Didn't know Lake TANA—that second "A" was the last letter in the grid (46A: Lake from which he Blue Nile begins). Had DETER at 51A: Avoid for an awfully long time. Convinced myself that AVEEDO and ELECTEE could be right. Never bothered to think that DETER simply isn't a synonym for [Avoid]. Somehow, the ORANG came to my rescue. An unlikely rescue, as I started out cursing the idea that I should know some random Malay word, then thought, "you know, it's probably not random..." I had CEE and CAT down there already, and when I imagined ORANG sliding in there (because I had the "R" and had seen ORANG in puzzles many times before), it really looked good next to CEE (61D: Mercury's core?) and CAT. Plausible, you know? So after a stall of some undetermined length, I moved forward and the SE corner, and thus the whole puzzle, went down from there.

Bullets:

• 11A: Co. now known as Ally Financial (GMAC) — totally fair clue / answer, but about as exciting as I generally found this puzzle. If I never see ONEO and CAT as cross-referenced answers again, it will have been a good life.
• 19A: Vision, in Vichy (VUE) — also, a Saturn model
• 53A: Scientist for whom an element is named (NOBEL) — I spent a good deal of time imagining / hoping that there was a Dr. BORON somewhere in the Science universe.
• 3D: Big name in taco kits (ORTEGA) — I just like the phrase "taco kit" for how preposterous and unappetizing it is. 
• 2D: Ricky Martin's springboard to fame (MENUDO) — a boy band with revolving members (specifically, you revolve out of the group after puberty, I think). After "LA VIDA LOCA" wouldn't fit here, I remembered MENUDO.

• 10D: Victors of the 1879 Battle of Isandlwana (ZULUS) — no idea. "ZU" made it obvious.
• 12D: Dancer known for her execution (MATA HARI) — brain kept yelling "Martha Graham" at me.
• 22D: 1980s Cosby co-star (RASHAD) — this was my first guess (kind of a gimme), but I wonder how lucky other people were here. RASHAD / TESSA seems a potentially rough cross.
• 14D: Air-breathing swimmer (CETACEAN) — took a while. I was looking for more common names of animals within this order of mammals (whales, dolphins, etc.).
• 63D: Symbol of rebellion on many T-shirts (CHE) — Ah, "symbol," metaphorically. OK. I was imagining that anarchy "A" (you know, an actual symbol).

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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