BEQ 5:24
LAT 3:12
NYT 2:51
CS 4:57 (J—paper)
Sorry to be late (and brief) with the writeup—am visiting with an old friend. Her brother, by the way, had the best reaction of anyone to seeing my July 5 NYT crossword (co-written with Tony Orbach)—there was exuberance and there were swear words. It was richly rewarding. People should swear aptly more often.
Andrea Carla Michaels and Ashish Vengsarkar's New York Times crossword
Andrea and Ashish's joint byline is so long, what I see on the applet is that the puzzle's editor is "Will Sho." Still, Ashish's previous byline with his friend Narayan Venkatasubramanyan still wins for longest. A&A's theme includes GO FISH, TAKE THE BAIT, OPEN A CAN OF WORMS, GET REELED IN, and [Hook, line and ___] SINKER. I can't quite decide if the long Down answers are definitely thematic or just quasi-thematic: UNDER THE SEA sounds good, but MARINE GREEN as the [Algae color] seems less fishing-centric. (Marine green is a color?) If they are part of the theme, it's a ginormous amount of theme material for a Monday puzzle.
Super-smooth fill and light clues abounded. Favorite bits: [Instill with the three R's] for EDUCATE (my son returns to school on Tuesday); adjacent Simpsons characters APU and NED; and BLAH directly opposite an ETUI (editorializing?). The closest thing to a rough spot is COR as an abbreviation for corner ([Where streets meet: Abbr.]).
That's all for now. Thanks for an entertaining Monday puzzle, A&A.
Updated Monday morning:
Sarah Keller's CrosSynergy/Washington Post puzzle, "Chips Ahoy!"—Janie's review
Can't remember how long it's been since I breezed through a puzzle the way I breezed through this one. Certainly my time was a personal best, but even if it hadn't been, I'd still have had the pleasure of the smooth solve this puzzle provided. Not unlike a Wheel of Fortune "Before and After" puzzle where two phrases may be blended into one, here the word chips follows the last word of each theme phrase, yielding two phrases for the price of one and a fine choice of chips in the process. And so, in the example:
If we DELVE further into the puzzle, we come across some more excellent fill in the descriptive if somewhat disparaging DWEEBISH for [Nerdy]. The SUPERHERO [Captain Marvel or Batman] definitely has the UPPERHAND [Controlling position] here—but what I like best is the way these longer words words INTERACT [Work together].
I semi-question the clue [Brilliantly colored fish] for OPAH. Take a look at that baby. While there're those red-orange fins, that is one shiny, metallic-looking body. It's not a "terrible" clue, but some of the fish on this page (the angelfish or the tigerfish, e.g.) better conform to my idea of being "brilliantly colored."
And in the almost-totally-useless-information department, take a look at the two names in the SW: there's ANNE ["Green Gables" girl] atop TODD [Broadway's "Sweeney ___"]. A search of the internet and IMDb turned up not only Ann Todd, an actress and third wife of director David Lean, but also 1940s child star Ann E. Todd.
Finally, if you're ever at a loss to know just where you are, I can tell you with certainty, ["You are ___] HERE."
Los Angeles Times crossword by "Teri Smalley"
"Teri Smalley" anagrams to "it's really me," a.k.a. editor Rich Norris.
The theme is about things done in the NFL (61D: [Org where you can see the first words of 20-, 38- and 55-Across]). You PASS the ball, RUN with it, and KICK it, and those words begin PASS JUDGMENT ([Give one's verdict]), RUN INTERFERENCE ([Create a distraction]), and KICK UPSTAIRS ([Get rid of by promoting, as an employee]). What's sticking in my craw here is that the word INTERFERENCE is used in football, but it's not part of the theme because JUDGMENT and UPSTAIRS aren't thematic. It would've been good to have a RUN ___ phrase that didn't mix in another football term.
Brendan Quigley's blog crossword, "Themeless Monday"
Hey, you've got until midnight Tuesday to enter Brendan's crossword contest.
Lots of Scrabbly stuff (ALEX COMFORT, QUARTZ CLOCK, FUZZIER, BON JOVI, CHEEK BY JOWL, JOB BOARD), but more small pieces of awkward fill than you might expect in a 72-worder (ENLS, SDA, U NU, CERT, plural ORZOS). The last square I filled in was the I in AIGLET (33A: [Decorative bow]) and LOUIS II (2D: [Holy Roman Emperor known "The Younger"]). I know the spelling teasel, but not TEAZLE (21D: [Plant with lavender flowers]); the dictionary tells me teazel is also legit.
September 06, 2009
Monday, 9/7/09
August 29, 2009
Sunday, 8/30/09
NYT 9:39
PI 7:27
LAT 7:16
BG 7:03
CS 4:13
Ashish Vengsarkar and Narayan Venkatasubramanyan's New York Times crossword, "Literally So"
Whoa. I'm not sure I understand how all the theme entries work here. Let's walk through them one by one:
So, the theme can be described as (mostly) familiar phrases from which a word has been excised, and the concept of that X-less Y then clues the theme answer you write in the boxes. Does that sound about right? I didn't love every part of the theme, but I appreciated the mental exertion required to wrap my head around each theme entry. I also like the way the theme answers wield seven different ways of phrasing the concept of omission: OUT OF, -LESS, MISSING, WITHOUT, NO, LEAVES, and DROPS.
There is some insanely tough fill in this puzzle. "What are you talking about, Amy? This was a breeze," you say. Oh, yeah? Here are the things that slowed me down:
There are a couple cute wordplay clues. 34D: AVIS is clued as a [Company name that becomes another company name if you move its first letter to the end], Visa. This is the Unkind Donuts trick in reverse, of course. It's hard to come up with a clue for 103D: ARLO that is entertaining, but this one is [Man's name that's an anagram of 108-Down], which is the ORAL [Exam format].
This was a pretty tough Sunday puzzle, wasn't it? At this writing, one person in the NYT applet standings trounced me by two minutes (hi, Barry!), so I figure there'll be others who claim it wasn't so hard at all. But I know the truth.
Updated Sunday morning
Dan Naddor's syndicated Los Angeles Times crossword, "Organ Transplants"
This puzzle has a theme similar to another one I recently did; that one had a "transfer" theme that was fresh in my head so I knew how the theme was going to work once I had FELT CONDOLENCES filled in (24A: [Pool hall "Better luck next time"?]). An assortment of body parts are resected from one phrase and transplanted into another, with the phrases clued to reflect their changed wording. Organ donor theme entries 1, 2, 3, and 4 partner with organ recipients 8, 7, 6, and 5, their symmetrical partners.
In each case, the organ is cut out of a compound word/phrase and is then compounded with another word in its new home (heartfelt/heartbreak, Buckeyes/eyelashes, brainstorming/brainchild, ear-splitting/dog-ear). This looks like ironclad thematic consistency to me—elegant. (PuzzleGirl calls it "elegant" too.) Here's how the transplants were performed:
The original with- and without-organ phrases the theme entries are based on are all very much in-the-language entities. A Google search suggests that both 40 and 50 lashes are common counts (and that too many countries still use this barbaric punishment). FELT CONDOLENCES is perhaps the weakest of the eight theme answers, because we don't much refer to pool halls with a metonymic "felt," I don't think. But everything else is so smooth I'm willing to take one B- answer amid the solid A's.
In the fill, I didn't hit any potholes—nothing too stretchy or obscure. The highlights are the longer answers:
Merl Reagle's Sunday crossword, "Gosh!" (Philadelphia Inquirer et al.)
The term 4G refers to the fourth generation of wireless cell phone technology, the theme entries in "Gosh!" gush with at least four G's. There's not much inherent humor in the theme aside from some of the phrases being fun to say aloud:
Toughest word in the fill: 56D: STADES, or [Straight tracks for footraces].
Most insidery clue/answer: 41D: [The other Will who was New York Times crossword editor] was Will WENG. He's the editor Will Shortz is quoting when he says, "It's your puzzle. Solve it any way you want." (With references/Google or without. Alone or with a friend. In pen or pencil or glue stick or online. Slow or fast. With morning coffee or evening bourbon.)
I like AQUILA, the 18A: [Constellation that means "eagle"]; someone with an aquiline nose has a beak that's curved or hooked like an eagle's beak.
All right, how many of you found 11D: [Savonarola's first name] to be a gimme? I think I've seen this one before, but I still needed an awful lot of crossings to get to GIROLAMO. Various baby name websites tell me it means "sacred name" and is essentially the same as Jerome and Hieronymus.
Emily Cox and Henry Rathvon's Boston Globe crossword, "All Wet"
Anyone know if the Across Lite Globe puzzle has caught up to the Sunday paper? Bostonians, is this puzzle over a month old, or is it this weekend's?
The theme is embedded bodies of water (which I've spotlighted with circled squares) split among the words in various concocted phrases. BROOK sits in CUB ROOKIES, which almost sounds in-the-language but isn't ("Cubs rookie" is the commoner formation). The other theme entries don't even have the pretense of being in-the-language phrases. For example, CAPON DANCE, clued as [The Funky Chicken?], is just silly. Then there's OSLO CHA-CHA, or [Steps in a Norwegian ballroom?], the goofiest answer in the puzzle. Aww, too bad the rest of the theme couldn't be about dancing, too, or at least be assertively silly. The FAST REAMER drill just isn't silly.
Least familiar word in the answers: ZOUAVE, or 89A: [French soldier from Algeria].
Patrick Jordan's themeless CrosSynergy "Sunday Challenge"
JOHN LEGUIZAMO stars in the middle of the grid. He is, among other things, a ["Carlito's Way" actor]. I like him. Something about his face reminds me of Gilbert Gottfried, only Leguizamo is a talented actor and not incessantly annoying.
Hey, look! It's AQUILINE! I was just telling you about this word, clued as [Adjective for some noses].
Ten other clues/answers:
July 29, 2009
Thursday, 7/30
NYT 4:55
LAT 3:38
CS 7:37 (J—paper)
Tausig untimed
Ashish Vengsarkar's New York Times crossword
Ashish repurposes the term FOUR-LETTER WORDS by representing eight words with four identical letters that sound alike if pronounced in the plural. Oh, dear. That doesn't make a lick of sense, does it? Demonstration will help:
What, no seize/CCCC, use/UUUU, or pees/PPPP?
Having a stretch of consecutive vowels or consecutive consonants can make it harder to fill a grid. So can planting a couple 15s in the grid—FOUR-LETTER WORDS are [Profanities (and a hint to this puzzle's anomalies)], and REPEAT OFFENDERS are [Record holders? (and a punny hint to this puzzle's anomalies)]. The eight short theme entries, the anomalies, are 4-letter repeat offenders...and they are offenders in that things like GGGG and OOOO make for ugly fill and can't be clued in ordinary fashion. I hereby sentence the constructor to five years of hard labor...making more Thursday through Sunday crosswords.
Highlights in the fill and clues:
Updated Thursday morning:
Donna S. Levin's CrosSynergy/Washington Post puzzle, "I Love a Parade!"—Janie's review
And really, don't a lot of us? Whether it's something ginormous, like the Macy's Thanksgiving affair or something on a smaller, more human scale, like your local Memorial Day or Independence Day tribute, there's usually something in the event itself and/or its effect on you that's made it memorable. At least that's the hope!! In her puzzle, Donna has given us four theme-phrases, each of which begins with a word that is also something you're likely to see at a parade. All but the last look to be making major-puzzle bows, and that last one looks to be a CS-first. Nice to have the fresh 'n' lively theme-fill!
To complement the stirring theme-fill, Donna has filled the grid with little that is SO-SO [Middling] and much that is A-OK [Hunky dory]. There's first-timer OPEN-MINDED; and PAPER TRAIL, ODD LOTS, HYBRID and LEEWAY. Did you know that a [Journey in Swahili] is a SAFARI? I love getting tidbits like that from the puzzles. Ditto [Maximum number of marbles at play in a Chinese checkers game] for SIXTY or [Sheep species originating in Siberia] for BIG HORN or being reminded that the [Sides of a pie slice, geometrically] are RADII.
Some nicely related clue/fill pairs: a [Seer] is a SIBYL, someone who may have [Peered, as at a crystal ball] GAZED; [Like the 1890s, supposedly], the GAY '90s was a specific [Period of time], just after the Gilded AGE (1878-1889); and make sure everything's in order with your ERISA [Pension legislation acronym] or you may have the T-MAN [Revenuer, for short] after you!
And to bring it all back to the beginning, here's a link to picture of a Willy WONKA theme-FLOAT. YEOW!
Fred Jackson's Los Angeles Times crossword
The LAT puzzle pokes around the same region as the NYT puzzle: the Land of Letters Replacing Words That Sound Alike. This time, it's the beginning of a compound word or phrase that's changed from a short word to the single letter it sounds like. And then it's clued as if it has nothing to do with the original phrase. To wit: A pea-shooter becomes P SHOOTER, or [Photographer of a letter?]. An eyedropper turns into I DROPPER, or [One who can't hold a letter?]. The [Letter out for a stroll?] is a J WALKING (jaywalking). "Tea break" is the least in-the-language base phrase; it transforms into T BREAK, or [Letter's rest period?]. The [Undercover operation to trap a letter?] is the dreaded B STING (bee sting). And a sea captain becomes C CAPTAIN, or [Official in charge of a letter?].
I have to dock Jackson a couple points for including D-DAYS ([Times to attack]) in the fill—it looks like another of the theme entries, but "dee-days" means nothing. Maybe dee-days could be like months with an R—the rest of you maybe eat oysters only in the months that have an R, and I won't eat oysters on any day that has a D.
For more on today's crossword, see PuzzleGirl's L.A.C.C. post. She's got a photo that proves Scottish men are way better at the CURTSY ([Respectful gesture]) than I am.
Ben Tausig's Ink Well/Chicago Reader crossword, "Adenine"
Pronounce that title as "add a nine," convert into Roman numerals, and that's your theme: an added IX inserted into four familiar words or phrases to change 'em completely. Here are the theme entries:
Favorite clues and answers:
July 08, 2009
Thursday, 7/9
LAT 3:46
NYT 3:35
CS 7:46 (J—paper)
Tausig (untimed)
I was just looking up the Hex Atlantic cryptics book on Amazon, and the first thing a haphazard Google delivered was their previous collection...along with this note:
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At first I thought Amazon's bots believed cryptics fans to be quite elderly, but then the crypt/cryptic connection hit.
What I was looking for was this book, The Atlantic Cryptic Crosswords from Sterling's Puzzlewright imprint. My copy arrived today, and I was delighted to see from the intro that this is old material. Sweet! I think it said the book contains Emily Cox and Henry Rathvon's favorites from the 1986 to 1997 span of the Atlantic Monthly. Usually I prefer new-new-new puzzles, but I've done a bunch of the Atlantic puzzles from the last couple years so these ones are guaranteed to be new to me.
Buy this book! Do not be afraid. The intro outlines how cryptic clues work, so you can have a little coaching if you want it—and if you don't, just plunge right in and give your brain a gnarly workout. You know who else likes this book? Brendan Quigley, that's who. See? The movers and shakers in the crossword business recommend this book.
(If you're still too afraid of cryptics but like your crosswords challenging, you can't go wrong bending your brain with Patrick Berry's Puzzle Masterpieces, either.
Ashish Vengsarkar's New York Times crossword
Ahhh, that's more like it. This is just the sort of daily crossword I relish. A cool theme that expands the anagram concept into something bigger, plus fill and clues that sing.
Yes, I know some people don't cotton to anagrams, and I know some of the fill isn't as broadly accessible as in yesterday's puzzle—but hey, it's Thursday, and the fill is supposed to be harder.
So. The theme: the clues are all-caps, question-marked words. Anagram them, combine them with another word that could serve as a cryptic signal for anagramming, and marvel at the in-the-language phrases that result. To wit:
♻ 19A. [TROT?] is a TORT REFORM. By the way, I was working the first Hex puzzle in the book touted above just before I did Ashish's puzzle. Half the answers had to be anagrammed before going into the grid. Good practice for this puzzle.
♻ 21A. [HATER?] is a HEART TRANSPLANT.
♻ 36A. [RIFTS?] is a FIRST AMENDMENT.
♻ 52A. [GATES?] is a STAGE ADAPTATION of a sort.
♻ 56A. [HOSE?] is a SHOE REPAIR.
Twitter tells me that the nexus between 6A [Debra of "The Ten Commandments"] and 8D [First senator in space] has vexed some solvers. Nope, I don't know Debra PAGET—but I do know Senator Jake GARN. And why do I know that 58A CERN is the name of the [World's largest particle physics lab]? It might be from crosswords.
What were my favorite non-thematic parts of this puzzle? I liked the three-part common-cold action—40A [Cold shower?] is the RED NOSE that shows that you've got a cold. (Not crazy about the answer in isolation.) 42D [Cold response?] is a SNEEZE. And then a CASHEW is 1D [Snack item whose name suggests a 42-Down?]. Cute. When you're iller (!) than that, you may exhibit 10D [Lethargy], or TORPOR—I've mentioned before my fondness for the -or nouns/-id adjectives (stupor, rigor, turgid, horrid). PATROL CARS looks good in the grid; they're 6D [Cruisers]. Ditto for TENNIS PROS, or 30D [Racket makers?]. There's a tropical party in the lower right corner, with a MAI TAI (44D [Drink at Trader Vic's]) and ALOHAS (45D [Hello and goodbye]) with a MENSCH (46D [Good guy]). RICAN isn't such common fill—that's 39A [San Juan native, slangily]; I read something about Sonia Sotomayor that said she was "New York Rican," but I think they meant "Nuyorican," no? And MAM is cute—44A [Mother, in British dialect]. DONUT gets a cute clue: 38D [Coffee mate?]. Heck, there are two other question-marked clues I haven't even mentioned. The two-word partial A PIP is clued 55D ["You're ___, ya know that?": Archie Bunker]. And there's also a STASH, which is a 51D [Store that's hard to find].
Granted, this puzzle was nowhere near as challenging to construct as yesterday's NYT—but I had more fun with this one.
Updated Thursday morning:
Tony Orbach's CrosSynergy/Washington Post puzzle, "Getting a Foothold"—Janie's review
For the second day running, we have a gimmick that requires us to insert a two-letter abbreviation into a well-known phrase—to most amusing effect. It actually took me the entire puzzle to figure out exactly what was going on, and then of course I responded with a resounding "doh!" Because for the second day running, there's no marker in the title to clue us in to the "abbreviation" component, which I like. One of things I actively admire in the CS puzzles is the titles—which are just cryptic enough to pique my interest and which don't completely tip the constructor's hand.
So today's two-letter abbreviation is ft. for foot and here's what Tony's done with it:
I hope no one SWOONED to see that this puzzle contains a major movie spoiler. Yes, [Kane's dying word in "Citizen Kane"] is ROSEBUD. Going from the sublime to, well, the uh, less sublime, other large screen references are to be found in "MARS [___ Attacks!" (1996 Tim Burton movie)], "PEE [___-wee's Big Adventure"], everybody's favorite movie lab-assistant IGOR, and in stars MAE [West of "My Little Chickadee"] and the (sadly) over-exposed LOHAN, [Actress Lindsay of "Freaky Friday"]. The small screen gets its due, too, with mention of ERICA ["All My Children" vixen], OPRAH [First name in talk TV] and ["Two and Half ___] MEN." The clue for KOREA, ["M*A*S*H" setting], belongs to both.
Loved seeing CAL [Ripken of the Orioles], PFFT [Sound of something going kaput], and DIAL clued as [Use a rotary phone]. "Does anyone still..." use a rotary phone?
Dan Naddor's Los Angeles Times crossword
I'm having trouble getting back into the crossword swing of things. My IHOP breakfast today was too satisfying and I'd really like to lie down for a bit. But I won't because I'm congenitally indisposed to being able to nap. So on with the puzzle! Dan's theme is realtors' euphemistic lies, trying to spin a piece-of-crap property as something more charming:
• 17A. [Realtor's "lavish landscaping"? Frankly, there are ___] WEEDS EVERYWHERE.
• 24A. [[Realtor's "charming"? Actually, it's ___] REALLY TINY. The most "charming" houses are less than 1,000 square feet.
• 35A. [Realtor's "expansive backyard"? Honestly, there's ___] NO POOL OR SPA. This must be a California/Florida sort of thing. You don't really expect a pool in the Midwest.
• 45A. [Realtor's "needs TLC"? Candidly, ___] IT'S A PIGSTY. A mere coat of paint will not help much here.
• 53A. [Realtor's "quiet setting"? Truthfully, it's ___] IN THE BOONIES. Yeah, I'll have to pass on that. I like city life.
Most of these theme entries aren't stand-alone sentences, but I could envision someone telling a friend about the horrible house they just saw and using these phrases without the "Frankly, there are..." intros.
More on today's puzzle from PuzzleGirl next door at L.A. Crossword Confidential. She really is the PuzzleGirl next door, isn't she?
Ben Tausig's Ink Well/Chicago Reader crossword, "Boosting the Base"
That's "Boosting the Base," not "bass"—a higher pH turns something more base, less acidic. Each theme entry has an inserted PH:
• 17A. [Hybrid last name of Liz and Michael's kid?] might be PHAIR-JORDAN, building on the Air Jordan Nike brand name. Liz Phair and Michael Jordan, not Liz Taylor and Michael Jackson. You thought of them first too, didn't you?
• 29A. A one-night stand becomes a PHONE NIGHTSTAND, or a [Place to set your cell while you sleep?].
• 47A. [Pest working for the feds?] is a GOVERNMENT APHID (aid). Cute. I'm picturing a small green bug with Secret Service agent sunglasses and a dark suit.
• 59A. Deli meats are transformed into DELPHI MEATS, [Kebabs and souvlaki sold outside a noted historical site?].
Highlights:
• ASHTRAYS are [Rare sights in bars nowadays]. I saw a "free trivia" sign at a neighborhood bar the other day and my 9-year-old son said, "You don't need a trivia night. You'll come home smelling like cigarettes." And then he remembered that Illinois has a smoking ban. I'm of an age to remember when people smoked in bank waiting lines and the rear of an airplane, and if my kid were just a little younger, he'd have no idea that people could ever smoke in bars. (Whether my son benefits from knowing things about bars is another issue.)
• SAT PREP is a [Junior's course, perhaps]. At my high school, nobody ever thought to spend money studying for standardized tests. What is this, Amy's Nostalgia Tour?
• Gotta love a 1-Across like ORGASM, or [Peak moment]. It boldly announced right off the bat, "This is not your grandma's crossword puzzle."
• The ["Only You" band] is YAZ with Alison Moyet. I loved that song in college. That Z is one of three in this grid, which also has a Scrabbly J and an X.
May 19, 2009
Wednesday, 5/20
Onion 4:16
BEQ 3:56
NYT 3:45
LAT 3:02
CS 10:41 (J—paper)
I'll be later than usual with the morning updates for the other crosswords. The director of the indie kids' movie Labou will be making puppets with my son's class, and I have been conscripted to help out. I shall return after my Hollywood adventure.
Ashish Vengsarkar's New York Times crossword
Ashish's theme entries and fill sprawl all over the place—it takes a 16x15 grid to accommodate a 15/13/14/13/15 theme (that's a whopping 70 squares there), and while you're at it, why not let fly with a couple 12's in the fill? The theme entries are phrases that begin with academic years, joined together by COLLEGE STATION, a [Texas city...and a hint to the starts of] the other four theme answers:
Favorite clues and fill:
It's only Wednesday, but there's some tough stuff:
Updated Wednesday morning:
Rich Norris's CrosSynergy puzzle, "P & L Statement"—Janie's review
You may have known right off the bat that the statement in the title is a document of "Profit & Loss," but that was one of the first things I had to look up after I'd solved this one. It should come as no surprise that Rich does not mean to be literal in his title, merely to hint at today's gimmick. And it's another good one. Four familiar phrases whose second word begins with "L" are amusingly adjusted, as those "L" words profit from the up-front addition of the letter "P." In the process, we get a healthy 56 blocks of theme-fill, in two 15s and two 13s:
- 17A: Instead of "seasoned lumber," we get SEASONED PLUMBER [Pipe fixer who's seen it all]. Cute. Especially nice that the pronunciation of the new word doesn't rhyme with the base word. This puts a whole new spin on the phrase.
- 25A: Not "runnng late," but RUNNING PLATE [Spoon's nursery rhyme cohort, essentially?]. Why "essentially"? Because as we all know, "the dish ran away with the spoon." But any way ya look at it, "plate" is another word for "dish," so even if it's a stretch, it does work.
- 48A: Here we eschew "passing lane" for PASSING PLANE [Jet that's gone out of style?] Not the strongest entry, but it'll fly...
- 64A: This is where "down on one's luck" cedes to DOWN ON ONE'S PLUCK [Feeling less resolute lately?] A fine way to tie things up—and ties into [Moxie] (for GUTS), too.
There are two excellent 10-letter words in the grid: EGOCENTRIC and (making its CS debut) the piquant ORANGE ZEST. BLUE LAW adds to the puzzle's overall vividness as well.
Elsewhere in the fill, we get a trio of actors: TAYE Diggs (who not only appeared in both the stage and screen versions of Rent and helped Stella "get her groove back," but has also appeared in three episodes of GREY'S); UMA Thurman; and JOANN Pflug, who played Lt. Maria "Dish" Schneider in MASH (1970). Oh—there's the "dish"!
Fill that takes us globe-trotting: RIGA, LIDO; IRANI; RIEL [Cambodian cash]; ÉTAT, MERCI. A word about the indirect way RIGA was clued, [Capital where Lettish is spoken]. I had to break this one down in order to solve it: Who speaks Lettish? Latvians. What's the capital of Latvia? RIGA. And I also had to think about [South Dakota, to Pierre]. Pierre's the capital of South Dakota, right? But Pierre is also a man's name in French, and in French, South Dakota (a state) is an ÉTAT. Oh, he's tricky, that Rich!
We also get an automotive trio in the fill: the NISSAN Z, a [Japanese sports car], which cleverly crosses [Rodeo producer] ISUZU (Japanese as well, but a mid-size SUV); and ENZO [Automaker Ferrari]. Italian! I think I'm more automotively challenged than any other area of everyday knowledge. Thank goodness for the crosses!
Some clues that caught my attention:
- [Tears for fears, maybe?] Not these guys, but a dandy clue for TYPO. We've seen this before and we'll see it again. Trust me on this.
- [League or degree] for UNIT. Yet again I was grateful for the crosses. I think this is a tough clue.
- [Big brass] for TUBA, the misdirection of which just makes me smile. No GENERAL or ADMIRAL (too long by three letters anyway...), but the orchestra's oft-neglected TUBA, most certainly a big brass instrument.
Though every part of this puzzle is a GEM, my favorite area of the grid is at south-center, where ENZO, ZOOM, ENNE and SEEN (going down) are crossed by ...NONE..., ZONE and OMEN.
Rumor has it that Mr. Norris may be curtailing his CS activities. If that's so, it looks like the L.A Times will profit even more by CS's loss... Still better a curtailed Norris than no Norris at all!
Bonnie Gentry's L.A. Times crossword
I liked this puzzle a lot. The theme consists of three phrases that contain the hidden word UP, broken in half across words, unified by a fourth BREAKING UP theme entry. As I said over at L.A. Crossword Confidential—and it's not plagiarism if you wrote the words you copied and identified their source—There've been plenty of crossword themes involving hidden words split among the words in a phrase, but how many of them mandate phrases that include words ending in U? Not so many. And how often is the first square in the puzzle filled with a V? Not much of the time, so crossing VALID (1A: Still in force) with VAMP (1D: Seductress) felt fresh. The theme contains just two 10's and two 13's, leaving wiggle room for Bonnie to include a cool dozen 7- and 8-letter answers in the fill.Updated Wednesday afternoon:
Brendan Quigley's blog puzzle, "Eff This"
You know that TV commercial where the guy says "Dude" to his roommate with many different intonations, thereby communicating awe, disappointment, anger, etc.? (Is it a successful advertisement if I love it but don't know what product is being marketed? I suspect it's one of the mass-produced domestic beers I tend not to drink.) The clues for all five of Brendan's theme entries include the F-bomb, and the exact wording and punctuation suggest the meaning. For instance, ["The fuck?"] can convey ARE YOU KIDDING ME, and ["Fuuuuuuck"] is the hopeless WE'RE ALL SCREWED. There are those who think use of the F-word reflects laziness and inelegance in communication but really, it can be an eloquent word.Crikey, 30 3-letter words in this grid? They're not terrible as 3's go, but there sure are a lot of 'em. The three X's and a Q offset that a bit. Also in the fill: The PINE TAR GAME is the [Infamous 1983 Royals/Yankees contest where a George Brett home run was nullified]. Never heard of it. Sam RAIMI apparently was also ["Drag Me to Hell" director]—never heard of the movie.
Francis Heaney's Onion A.V. Club Crossword
Each theme entry's got an added SCH at the start, radically changing the meaning of the phrase. My favorites were the ones that you'd never see in the NYT crossword. Long Beach is a place in California, but SCHLONG BEACH is an [All-male nude seaside resort?]. Muckraking is one thing, but SCHMUCK RAKING is an [Asshat doing an autumn chore?]. The theme's rounded out with two other answers, including a SCHLOCK OF HAIR, or [Cheesiness experienced at a revived James Rado musical?]—boy, it would have been helpful if I recognized that name. Is this the "Age of Aquarius" musical? That would have pointed me towards Hair. The fourth theme entry is SCHTICK BITES, or [Headline about a comedian's awful routine?]. Very few newspapers are likely to use that form of "bites" in a headline.Never heard of KLF, or ["What Time Is Love?" band, with "the"], or the FIERY [___ Furnaces, "I'm Going Away" band]. Alas, DON HO was a gimme.
December 05, 2008
Saturday, 12/6
Newsday 7:34
LAT 7:26
NYT 6:03
CS 2:57
(updated at 9:40 Saturday morning)
Ashish Vengsarkar has teamed up with Narayan Venkatasubramanyan to craft the New York Times crossword. It's a themed puzzle, and a themed Saturday NYT seems to pop up only once or twice a year. I love themeless puzzles, I do, but twisty and tough themed puzzles definitely scratch an itch too. The gimmick's explained in the clue for TENORS, or TEN OR'S: [Choir section...or what are missing from the starred clues]. Few crosswords plant the trick in the clues rather than the grid—fun to change it up, no? Here are the theme clues and the +OR words that make them add up:
The theme answers are placed symmetrically and...I think this theme just might be a perfect one. Interesting long answers, and a twist that requires an extra level of thinking while solving.
Hey, Ashish and Narayan: Tell us how you developed this theme. I want to learn about the "making of."
More on the non-theme fill in a bit.
...The kid's asleep, I've had some kettle corn, Letterman's on (a rerun, but with Obama), and I'm back.
A friend e-mailed me that it was a shame each theme clue was marked by an asterisk, as that greatly simplified the task of finding the ten OR's. Mind you, it comes in at roughly a Saturday difficulty with the asterisks, so I suspect there'd have been much wailing and gnashing of teeth without 'em. (The puzzle would've made a terrific Friday Sun puzzle sans asterisks.)
All righty. Other stuff in the puzzle that I liked:
Proper nouns abound, some tougher than others:
Updated:
Things I learned from elsewhere in the blogosphere this morning: The grid is 15x16 to accommodate the centering of the 6-letter TENORS. I hadn't noticed this (d'oh!), but Ryan and Brian did. R&B also linked to Jim Horne's interview with Ashish Vengsarkar. Turns out Ashish and Narayan were school friends in India in the '80s and reunited to make a puzzle together. Ashish details the development of their crossword in the interview. Interesting tidbit:This puzzle was rejected twice and both times I sent it back to Will with more explanations and pleas that he take a second (and third) look at it! It is finally being published with some clue changes nearly two years after it was first submitted.
I'm so glad Ashish was persistent! Memo to Will Shortz: We like puzzles with clever ideas or impressive structure. Only if the rest of the fill is smooth (i.e., isn't blighted by clunky abbreviations, obscurities, or heavily prefixed/suffixed words) do our feelings turn to love. I love this puzzle. More like this, please!
Sarah Keller's CrosSynergy puzzle, "Money, Money, Money," has three theme entries that begin with "___ money" words, just as the title suggests. [Tailor's accessory] is a PIN CUSHION, and "pin money" is one of those retro phrases that I've never once uttered. POCKET BILLIARDS is a [Game with a cue ball]; pocket money is always good. [Documentation that often uncovers fraud] is a PAPER TRAIL; paper money is a little drier than the other two phrases. Erle Stanley Gardner is left out of this puzzle, but his first name appears in two answers: MERLE [Haggard or Oberon] and EDERLE, the [Gertrude who swam the English Channel]. Whoever the first man to swim the Channel was, I don't know—but the first woman has such a crossword-friendly name that her fame lives on.
I made one reasonable wrong turn on a 3-letter answer in Timothy Meaker's themeless LA Times crossword, and it got me mired in the northeast corner for what felt like an eon. For [ISP option], I went with MSN because of the S in the middle. Alas, the answer is DSL, which meant I tried to make [Zip] be STEAM instead of SPEED. The same corner also had some clues that I couldn't parse correctly for the longest time—
Here are some tricky clues from other areas:
Today's Newsday "Saturday Stumper" is by Stanley Newman, using his "S.N." byline. (PDF solution here.) Byron Walden said this one took him about 3 minutes less than it took me, so it might not be the day's hardest themeless. (Which was the toughest one for you?) The NE and SW corners of the grid look great, with the stacks of four 8's. The place I got bogged down was in the middle left. [Getty Oil once controlled it], ES**? Must be ESSO, of course. But no! It's ESPN. [Put another way] must be RESTATED, right? No? How about REPEATED or ITERATED? No, it's REROUTED. [Minks, to weasels] are a SUBSET and not cousins, friends, or mortal enemies. [They're sort of pointless] clues EPEES; the clue is spot-on, as the epee has a point, but it's been blunted. To [Ice] something is to SEW it UP, but [Ice] can mean many other things; so can [Clear], which clues the verb ERASE but is also an adjective with a variety of senses. [Dig into] is PROBE, but I wanted DELVE there. [Ancient mariners] is a plural, but the answer doesn't end in S; it's the NORSE.
I wasn't crazy about TEN STONE as an answer; clued as [It's almost 150 pounds in England], this 140-lb. measure seems arbitrary as a crossword entry. If TEN STONE is OK, that opens the door to FIVEPOUNDS, THREETONS, SIXOUNCES, TWOTABLESPOONS...
HOTFOOT IT is a much better entry. It's clued simply as [Run]. MEAT AND POTATOES are [Roast needs], but as an alternative [..."For the Real Meat Lover in the Family!"], may I suggest ALPO? Oh, wait—[Roast needs] are EMCEES. MEAT AND POTATOES means [Not fancy]. ["Raton" chaser] is el GATO, Spanish for "cat"; I'm sure the clue tricked a few people into writing the Raton preceder BOCA. ESSEN, Germany, will be the [European Capital of Culture for 2010]; how much do you wanna bet we'll see this factoid in other clues over the next couple years? A [Short-range missile] is a ROTTEN EGG. Duck!
June 05, 2008
Friday, 6/6
NYT 8:42
NYS untimed (5:00-ish?)
LAT 4:something
CHE 3:something
CS 2:53
WSJ 6:30
Hey, remember that Starbucks crossword contest two or three years ago? It had excellent puzzles by Patrick Berry (edited by Will Shortz), and an endgame that allowed a lucky guesser to skip the ultra-challenging final puzzle altogether but call in with the correct answer...which was..."Starbuck(s)." So that was disappointing. But now there's a new advertisement-based "Crossword Challenge Series" from a financial company I've never heard of. I saw a 13x13 crossword in the latest New Yorker, apparently the second of six crosswords. The "theme" is books, but instead of having a set of symmetrically placed theme entries, a bunch of answers have fill-in-the-blank book title clues. And not famous books, no. For example, there's ["Lake ___ Stories: Struggle and Survival on a Freshwater Ocean], 4 letters, common crossword fill. There are also some obscurities, like [Ancient Rome's bronze money]. But the real highlights? Oh, they're doozies. I'm gonna go ahead and give away a couple more answers, just to give you a taste. There's [Books such __ "___ of Green Gables," celebrating 100th this year], which clues the two-word non-phrase AS ANNE, and my personal favorite, [Peach-like fruit...partially eaten here?]. That last one's got 4 letters. Go ahead and guess the answer. (You can go http://www.futuresweeps.com/">here to solve it yourself and enter the contest (one randomly drawn entrant with a correct puzzle gets a camera; among the entrants for all six puzzles, one grand prize winner gets an Italy vacation).
Peter Collins' New York Sun puzzle, "Thinkin' Inside the Box," toys with the convention that punctuation is ignored when entering one's answers into the grid. Here, you need to be thinkin' about the apostrophe, as each theme entry has two of them, and they need to occupy their own squares (if you're using Across Lite, the letter A for apostrophe works). [Fire starter of legend] is MRS O'LEARY'S COW (the period after MRS is still omitted), with the key crossings being WE'RE (["#1" follows it]) and "IT'S NO USE" (["I give up!"]). [Perplexed] means AT ONE'S WITS' END, crossing the [Lego alternative] K'NEX and C'MON ([When doubled, a 2002 Sheryl Crow album]). At the bottom, a [Calculus topic] I don't know anything about is L'HOPITAL'S RULE, crossing O'ER and MA'AM. What good is the apostrophe? As my eight-year-old explained, "You use it, or it doesn't make any sense." Indeed! Favorite nonthematic fill: BAD SANTA and SLOUCHED. Favorite clues: [Vincent's successor] is Bud SELIG, MLB commissioner; the word TACO means [Literally, "wadding"]. I wish I'd noticed that the Across Lite timer wasn't starting automatically, because the puzzle felt pretty fast for a Friday Sun.
Ashish Vengsarkar has ventured away from themed crosswords for the first time with the Friday New York Times puzzle. The grid features five 15-letter entries traveling across, intersecting two more 15s going down.
There's nothing like plugging in an incorrect letter and failing to see that it makes no sense in the crossing, and spending a good three minutes or more looking for it, is there? I had RUNS IS THE FAMILY crossing SARD, which is a red-orange chalcedony, rather than IN crossing NARD, an [Olden ointment]. SARD and NARD are both words I never see outside of a crossword grid. Anyone else muddle those two together?
The marquee answer is TRY GOOGLING THIS, [Mean crossword clue writer's challenge to solvers]. In this puzzle, the solver might well be able to Google the tough stuff. For example:
Moving past the exploration of how "TRY GOOGLING THIS" applies to this puzzle, here are some assorted clues and answers I liked:
CREAM PIE, the [Boston specialty].
[Zeroes], the verb, for RESETS, as an odometer.
[Something about Mary?] is a HALO of holiness. Cute.
The Jerry Maguire line "YOU HAD ME AT 'HELLO.'" I like to parse that as "YOU HAD MEAT? HELLO!"
BEIJING OLYMPICS, clued as [Event starting on 08/08/08 at 08:08:08 p.m.]. I'm sure one of you can tell me why all the 8's.
[Inspire] for AROUSE. Spot-on, but in a roundabout way.
To be BEYOND SUSPICION is to be [Unimpeachable].
A [Spit, e.g.] of land might be a SHOAL.
ABDULLAH looks good in the grid. He is [Fahd's successor in Saudi Arabia]. I wonder how he's making out with the sky-high oil prices these days.
[Kind of band], 3 letters starting with J? Must be JAM band, right? Nope. It's a JUG band this time.
Punctuation counts. [One driving a bus.?] has that period for a reason: it's a CEO running a business.
ETHNIC CLEANSING is indeed a 15-letter phrase, and it's got a lot of common letters so it fit right in as a [Heinous war crime]. Does anyone want the term in their crossword, though?
Updated:
Alas! Ah, me! Alack! Nerts! (And other woeful expressions found in crosswords.) I had solved the Chronicle of Higher Education, CrosSynergy, and Los Angeles Times crosswords and blogged about them, and had one more puzzle to go before clicking "publish post"...and the browser and Across Lite both froze on me. Well, I didn't really have much to say about those puzzles aside from describing the themes, and I'm in no mood to recreate what I'd written. If you have questions or remarks about those puzzles, don't hesitate to share them in the comments parlor.
Post-restart, I found the Wall Street Journal crossword, "Ballot Boxers," to be strikingly easy for a WSJ puzzle. Randy Ross's theme is boxing phrases that are often applied to the political campaign setting—CAME OUT SWINGING, PULLED NO PUNCHES, WENT THE DISTANCE, etc. Favorite clue: [Saint of "Exodus"] for EVA MARIE Saint, not a canonized saint. Lots of good fill—MAELSTROM opposite MILESTONE, TEMPURA and CIMARRON stacked nicely atop a theme entry, EVIL EYES.
October 17, 2007
Thursday, 10/18
NYS 5:33
NYT 4:35
LAT 3:37
CS 3:13
The sleep I missed last night owing to trivia night asserted itself tonight, and I just had a two-hour nap that has left me woozy. So we'll see how lucid a post I am able to cobble together before I go back to bed.
Lucy Gardner Anderson's New York Times crossword includes a 13-letter title for the puzzle across the middle of the grid, SIDE-SPLITTING, explaining the splitting of the side dishes throughout the grid: FRENCH and FRIES, BAKED and POTATO, COLE and SLAW, ONION and RINGS. (FETID and MEAL are not clued in relation to the theme, fortunately.) Sorta lively twist on theme layout here. Highlights in the fill: our TOP STORY tonight, IN SECRET, and HERCULES (I Netflixed the animated Hercules for my kid, who never wanted to watch it. I put the DVD on this afternoon, he paid it no mind, and the songs got on my nerves. Yoink! Back in the red envelope it goes.) BION, [One of a series of joint Soviet/U.S. space satellites], leapt out at me as a possibly obscure word I did not know. Why not swap out the O for and E and make it BIEN crossing ENT? Because then that ENT would cross a crossing ENT, and that's too many ENTs for one crossword. Tight spot, what with two theme entries involved. Surprising to have a rap song, the crunk tune GET LOW, in the grid (clued as [2003 #2 hit for Lil Jon and the East Side Boyz]); I'd link to the video but I don't care for its objectification of women. Plus, what he's had his dentist do alarms me.
Ashish Vengsarkar once again one-ups the quote theme concept. Last year, he made one of my favorite Sunday puzzles, in which [Part 3 of quote] clued a phrase synonymous with the third letter of the word quote (O, or OPRAH WINFREY'S MAGAZINE). His Thursday New York Sun crossword, "A Solution to the Question," spells out "an easy question" in the theme quote: FROM ONE TO / NINE HUNDRED / NINETY-NINE, WHICH / VOWEL IS USED / ZERO TIMES? The answer is right there in the title, as A is the answer to the question. (I did not know this trivia factoid! Those pub quiz people should ask this one now that I know it.) What elevates this quote theme is that the letter A is also used zero times in the grid. (In fact, every letter of the alphabet save A makes an appearance.) Favorite clues: [Winning word at the 1984 National Spelling Bee] for LUGE (were all the winning words that easy back in the '80s, or was that one an exception from the norm?); [Dove home] for both the noun NEST and the baseball verb SLID; [Ends of some close NFL games] for both OTS (overtimes) and FGS (field goals); and [Stable fellows?] for LIVERY MEN (my grandmother's grandfather ran a livery stable back in Chicago's horse-and-carriage days)
The NYT clued CLEAN as [Drug-free], and the Sun has [Not clean] cluing DOPED (hello, Tour de France!). I did not know that OBP means on base percentage (hence [OBP part] is PCT). I also didn't know that ZEN was a [Movement with mondos.
Updated:
Rich Norris's themed CrosSynergy puzzle, "Gorillas in the Midst," has a vaguely themeless vibe, even in the theme entries. The phrases that contain a hidden APE would all be at home in a themeless puzzle, and would stand out to me as good entries: "NOT A PEEP," RHEA PERLMAN and the fictional EMMA PEEL, IN A PERFECT WORLD and ON A PEDESTAL. The freshness is further...freshened by the inclusion of 16 longish (6 to 8 letters) answers in the non-theme fill. Fill highlights: ST NICK, RUNS AMOK, HIAWATHA.
David Kahn's LA Times crossword is loaded with theme squares: the uniifying THINGS WITH HOLES along with pairs of 13- and 9-letter entries. In each case, the things with holes are literal reinterpretations of the last word of each phrase—RIGHT ON THE NOSE doesn't refer to a particular nose, you can't wear the WHEAT BELT, you tipple rather than tootling on a CHAMPAGNE FLUTE, and a HOT-BUTTON issue won't fit into any buttonhole. Favorite clues and answers: HOLY GRAIL and ILL-SUITED; [Kind of dog] for the non-canine CHILI dog; [Keeping quiet] in a transitive-verb sense, SEDATING; and [Oldman or Newman] for ACTOR.
September 22, 2007
Sunday, 9/23
LAT 9:05
NYT 8:25
WaPo 7:55
BG 7:28
PI 7:08
CS 5:28
Must be comparatively brief in my blogging tonight, as I am trying to summon up the willpower to continue working on a freelance project when I would really like to retire to the sofa and veg out. My procrastinatorial skills are the stuff of legend, however, so we'll see how the evening plays out.
The New York Times crossword by David Levinson Wilk, "Flip-Flops," is not about footwear. Rather, the nine theme entries all take "X for Y" phrases and invert the X and Y. Thus, "bob for apples" becomes APPLES FOR BOB, [Dylan not liking Dell computers?]. [What scientists working for Gatorade have?] is a KNOWLEDGE FOR THIRST. Plenty of good fill seasons the grid: JUMBO-SIZE, UNKEMPT, JUGGLE, HENRY I, APARTHEID, and OOMPAH. Didn't really know that a PARTERRE is a [Rear seating section in a theater], or that PANAM was the airline involved in [The Beatles arrived in New York in 1964 on this]. [Develop anacusis] means GO DEAF. Did you know that [A bird flying by on the right, to the Greeks] was a GOOD OMEN? I didn't. DEBRIS is clued as [Ruins]; how come I never see it clued in relation to Mother's biscuits and debris?
Merl Reagle's Philadelphia Inquirer puzzle, "Pre-K Class," tacks a K onto the end of each theme entry. The funniest of these is ATTILA THE HUNK: [Story of a famous conqueror, Hollywood-style?]. Other morsels I enjoyed: STAN LEE, the U.S.S. IOWA, TAKE ILL, and a GAS BILL; the Charles in Charge two-fer of Willie AAMES and Scott BAIO; [The common type?] for ROMAN (as in not bold, not italics); and [Some kind of nerve] for OPTIC.
Jim Page's Washington Post crossword, "For the Birds," is laden with bird-related puns. Favorite bits: J.C. WATTS and BRUCE LEE as full-name entries; [Port, e.g.] for RED WINE; [Pontificate], the noun, for HOLY SEE; and the quaint DESCRIED ([Caught sight of]). Most confusing and then most alarming: [Like some ants] for ALATE. When I didn't have all the letters yet, I just couldn't see what it wanted to be. Then the crossings told me it was ALATE. ALATE? Oh, alate, as in "having wings." Ew! Flying ants! Hate those things.
Henry Hook's Boston Globe puzzle, "Mouthing Off," has a bunch of theme entries that pertain to smiles, with the :-D emoticon included in each of those clues. I don't quite know how I finished the puzzle as quickly as I did, given the number of letters I just plain guessed on. [Author de la Roche] is MAZO? Okay. [Spiritual powers] are CHARISMATA, crossing the COCOS, an [Indian Ocean island group] whose name wasn't coming readily to mind. OSH is a [Kyrgyzstan city]? Okay. That one's crossing the [Provincial ruler], an ETHNARCH, also not a word I've seen. [Plants adorning Corinthian columns] are ACANTHI; I've seen the singular acanthus, and didn't know of the plant's classical connection. [Louis' "That Old Black Magic" partner] is KEELY? Is that a first or last name? (One of the E's crosses the very small [Minnesota city], ELY, and the K crosses FSK, Francis Scott Key's initials). And there's a [River near Nairobi] called the ATHI? All righty. I'd Google these mystery words and provide links, but I'm trying not to procrastinate too much. In any event, the act of writing these down helps them find a crack in my brain to sneak into, so if they show up on a tournament crossword, I may be ready.
Updated:
Ashish Vengsarkar shows that he's not limiting himself to making Sunday puzzles with never-before-seen themes, and he's willing to also make a crossword with an add-a-letter theme. In today's syndicated LA Times crossword, "Tee Time," he adds a T to the end of the first word in each multi-word phrase. Boy, I hope there was an alternate clue for CLOSET ENCOUNTERS, because [Fashion designers' secret meetings?] doesn't let that answer reach its full potential. I liked the [Eft?] graduating from fill to clue, for NEWT BEGINNING (efts being wee young salamanders, basically). Speaking of wee young things, the RUNT OF THE MILL is a [Tiny factory mascot?]. My enjoyment of the puzzle was dampened somewhat by a few out-there entries, but you know me—I see something that seems obscure, I make a note of it and try to remember it for future use. [One 60-trillionth of a minute] is a PSEC, presumably picosecond, displacing the more commonly seen (in crosswords) NSEC or nanosecond. I don't care for that one picowhit. ALOW sits atop NEVE, the granular snow, both crossing NOVI Sad. ORNITHIC ([Avian]) is inferrable, but not a form of the word I encounter. It crosses a T-SLOT, [Letter-shaped opening]. Throw in an ECU and AZO and ULLA, and...eh. On the bright side, [What cheese has that pâté doesn't?] actually managed to stump me for a bit—it's a SILENT E. And there's BONSOIR, THE STREET, the RAT PACK—good stuff.
Paula Gamache's themeless CrosSynergy doesn't have the funny/twisty sort of clues I love so much, but it does have terrific fill. Two long answers stacked atop DERANGEMENT are GENTLEMAN'S C (with that tricky ending) and "I'LL BE DAMNED," and that's a beautiful corner. The lower left corner has a BANANA SEAT. (Remember the Schwinns that were hot in the '70s? The Stingray for boys, the Fair Lady for my big sister, the Lil Chik for me—there's a secondhand bike shop in my neighborhood that specializes in vintage Schwinns, and I slow down and gaze every time I walk past the window.) At the lower right, a [Las Vegas winner] is MISS AMERICA, who's having ENDIVE SALAD and DESSERT WINE (I recommend a nice Moscato, personally). The upper right features the GLITTERATI and SWEETIE PIE crossing a POWER TIE. Good stuff.
