NYT 6:03
Tausig 4:38
Onion 4:30
LAT 4:something
NYS 4:18
CS 3:50
I am operating at a double handicap tonight—not only have I just returned home after pub trivia, but I'm using a new keyboard. It's darling, really—this wee, wispy wireless Apple keyboard is about a quarter inch thick, and the arrow keys are in an altogether new location, and the keys are spaced a little differently. So I thought I'd go ahead and try the new keyboard on the NYT applet and see how it works. Not so hot, I think! Will just have to get used to it. I lost under a minute searching for a typo, so the rest of the supra-Wednesday time factor may accrue to the keyboard. Or the pub. Or both.
The Wednesday New York Times crossword is by John Farmer, and there aren't really any theme entries per se—the theme is the abbreviations for the DAYs of the week, spaced out at the beginning, exact middle, and end of seven differnt entries. Monday lurks in MAJOR IN, TUE in TV GUIDE, and so forth. The days are given in order from Sunday to Saturday. Favorite entries: Rebecca ROMIJN; TV GUIDE; THE HUTU; WHOLE WHEAT BREAD; and Susan SONTAG (Sonntag is German for Sunday, in a nice bit of synchronicity). Those are just a few highlights—really some terrif fill, just marvy (to use two laudatory words from crosswords). IRISH is parked atop the CELTS of basketball—more synchronicity. Toughest clues for me: the neighbor on Mama's Family was named IOLA; [Intrigue] is AMOUR; and right under that, [Wry faces] is POUTS. Now, I've pouted, and I've made wry faces, and I don't think they're the same at all. The Mac widget dictionary doesn't seem to think they're the same, either. What say you?
Updated:
Still getting used to the new keyboard this morning—I keep finding the caps-lock key by mistake, pressing the wrong arrow key, or pressing the shift key above the up-arrow key.
Patrick Blindauer's CrosSynergy puzzle, "C-SPAN," has 61 theme squares spread over five entries, each a phrase or word that starts and ends with C. CHENIN BLANC and CREATE HAVOC are particularly nice. It would appear that Patrick's tugging the CrosSynergy team one notch towards the new-generation crosswords (e.g., Onion, Ben Tausig's Ink Well, Jonesin')—the fill includes EEDIOT with a Ren & Stimpy clue. ALFRED U. also takes a somewhat unexpected form here. I hope to see more such tidbits of freshness.
Paul Guttormsson'a LA Times crossword has three 15-letter theme answers crossed by three other shorter theme entries, for a total of 65(ish) theme squares. FLASH crosses the middle and is the word that can precede the starts of the other five. Gotta love DANCE MOVE yielding Flashdance, which evokes that Kia commercial with "Maniac." The theme isn't the most exciting type of theme, but it's deftly managed here.
Edgar Fontaine's New York Sun puzzle, "I-Catching Names," assembles five people with *I*I first names, of varying degrees of fame. I'd never heard of French dancer ZIZI JEAN MAIRE, and cartoon skunk FIFI LA FUME's last name didn't come to mind. Poor Didi Conn gets left out (and if you don't know the name, then maybe your mom wasn't taking you to see romantic comedies when you were 11 in 1977). Rather tricky to clue KIKI DEE as [Music partner of Carmelo Luggeri] when we all know her from that '70s duet with Elton John, no? I didn't know OMAR [Metwally of "Rendition"], but for a movie about the Middle East, an OMAR isn't too far-fetched a guess.
Matt Jones's Onion A.V. Club crossword adds an -ER to the end of four phrases to turn them into dogs (e.g., a HOT SPRINGER spaniel, a SUGGESTION BOXER). Favorite clue: [Piña colada garnish?] for TILDE (!). Best fill: TRES CHIC, BROADSWORD, a LIP RING, PIDGIN, and Scrabbly SKI WAXES. I also like the pop-culture literacy of clues like [Monk's affliction: Abbr.] for OCD, cartoon dog Scrappy DOO, and American Gladiators' ELIMINATOR round.
Ben Tausig's Chicago Reader/Ink Well puzzle is called "Playing With Fire." Why? I don't know. Ah! I see it now. The theme entries teach rudimentary fire safety at the beginnings of STOP SNITCHIN', DROP YOUR WEAPONS, and ROLL INTO TOWN. Good to see NGO clued as [Designation for private global grps. since 1945)—a discussion on the Cruciverb-L mailing list revealed that a lot of crossword folks weren't familiar with NGO meaning "nongovernmental organization," but it seems to come up plenty on NPR and in the NYT. Is the clue for SIMI wrong? [Sonoma wine valley] is SIMI? There's a Simi Winery in Sonoma County, I think, but Simi Valley is in the LA area, whereas Sonoma is north of San Francisco. Favorite clue/answer: [Reverse gear?] for CROSS-DRESS. Other excellent fill includes MT. FUJI, NO U-TURN, GOSSAMER, ASCETICS, and VOODOO economics.
January 09, 2008
Wednesday, 1/9
November 15, 2007
Friday, 11/16
NYS untimed
NYT 5:09
Jonesin' 4:36
LAT 3:50
CHE 3:23
CS 2:32
WSJ 7:49
Have I got any QUIBBLES ([Nitpicking]) with Chuck Deodene's New York Times puzzle? Not really. Here's what I liked: CADBURY, the [Creme Egg maker], even though those taste icky. A football conference clue for AFC that starts with a misleadingly mandatory capital letter, [Bills are in it: Abbr.]. SYLLABI, [First-class handouts?], because who doesn't like non-S plurals in a themeless puzzle? [Poses in a studio?] are YOGA. The [Town on the Long Island Rail Road] for SYOSSET, because Long Island's got so many fun town names that pop up in NYC-based crosswords. I like [Colloquial] and IDIOMATIC content in crosswords, so that's an apt pairing. [Logic's counterpart] is SENTIMENT, and that one kept me guessing. For [Trunk accumulation], I was picturing the heaps of stuff that pile up in a car trunk rather than TREE RINGS. There's a fresh clue for TAI, [Mount ___, sacred Chinese site] (read about Mount Tai if you like China, geography, or ancient temples). [Green stinger] sounds like it has to do with, I dunno, the Green Hornet—but it's simply the stinging NETTLE that's intended. There's a ROAD TEST that's a [Cavalier evaluation?]—referring to the Chevy Cavalier. (Another hidden-capital-letter mislead—I like those clues!) The fact that [Seeing the sites] had sites rather than sights didn't shout ONLINE at me—I like that clue. There's an occupational vibe here, too, with ENGINEER (clued as the verb, though: [Bring about with some effort]), STEERSMAN, a corporate RAIDER, an IRONER (bleh), a REP ([Mouthpiece]), Mafia DONS ([Underbosses' bosses]), a cattle RUSTLER ([Herd-thinning menace?]), a STEERSMAN ([One at the helm]), and some ASSTS to help them all.
Aw, drat. Across Lite used to open almost everything with the timer automatically starting, and when I opened the Friday New York Sun "Weekend Warrior" by Mark Diehl, I didn't notice that the timer was off. No idea how long it took me—sevenish minutes, maybe? There were plenty of things that didn't come easily. With a few crossings, tasty AGLIO E OLIO (garlic and olive oil) popped in. That and the hard-to-get USB PORT were my favorite entries. My son's favorite would have to be the [Mustang rival], CAMARO—he's a fan of muscle cars. (He also likes Mack trucks, but MACK is clued with the contemporary slang, [Hit (on)].) (Punctuation party!) Strangest-looking answer: DOAJOBON, or DO A JOB ON. FONTANA is the [City that's home to the California Speedway]? Let us study up on this town: The Wikipedia entry says the Hells Angels hail from there originally, toon Speed Racer was from Fontana, and Whitman Mayo, Grady on Sanford and Son, lived there as an adult.
Matt Jones's Jonesin' puzzle is called "The Second Half," and the second half of each theme entry's repeated. Thus, a DARWIN WIN, a KIDMAN MAN, and so on. Fresh fill—REDIP (clued as [DO a party no-no at the snack table], which puts me in mind of the Seinfeld "double-dipper" episode even if it looks like a roll-your-own word) crossing Michael Jackson's I'M BAD; Ian MCKELLEN; MUDFLAPS; SUBARU and IRABU; "WORD UP"; and a tasty SKOR bar. And I always welcome a reference to early Saturday Night Live, here represented by Father GUIDO Sarducci. And who doesn't like a little ARSE? That's [___ over teakettle (upside-down, to Brits)].
Updated:
Harvey Estes' Wall Street Journal crossword is called "Queue & A," and each queue of letters in a theme entry is followed by an A. The first one is BEVERLY HILLS COPA, and that is all the justification I need to once again link to this "Copacabana" video that plays with words and graphics to entertaining effect. Among the other six theme entries, I like the [Concluding words from a Samos temple attendee?] best: AND I LOVE HERA. This whole puzzle was fun—good fill, clues that are light and fun but not too easy.
Martin Ashwood-Smith's Monday-easy CrosSynergy puzzle, "Familiar Threesome," has a TOM, DICK, and HARRY. Despite the title, there is no implication that Messrs. Stoppard, Van Patten, and Truman are engaged in a ménage à trois.
Alan Olschwang's 11/2 Chronicle of Higher Education puzzle, "Wondrous Sites," quizzes the solver on the sites of the Seven Wonders of the World—a smart little trivia test. But just knowing this classical knowledge won't get you through the puzzle—there's also [Pop singer Basil] for TONI (Toni Basil had that '80s one-hit wonder, "Mickey," with the insane cheerleading music video) and ["Invincible" singer Pat] for BENATAR (I preferred her song, "Heartbreaker"—go ahead, go rock out for a minute with that one).
Paul Guttormsson's LA Times puzzle features a quip: YOU CAN PUSH / THE ENVELOPE / BUT IT / WILL STILL BE / STATIONERY. Hmm. Not quite funny, nor educational, nor inspirational. My appetite for quote/quip themes is sated by about three zippy ones a year—the rest I could do without.
February 03, 2007
Sunday, 2/4
NYT 8:34
LAT 7:48
WaPo 7:45
BG 7:37
CS 4:01
(post updated at 11:30 a.m. Sunday)
I believe this was Paul Guttormsson's debut for a Sunday puzzle in the NYT. And hooray! because I really enjoyed it. This puzzle had me at HUBBA HUBBA. The theme entries are shorter than usual, and 14 of them occupy the outer perimeter of the grid; the defining entry, INITIAL INITIALS, also crosses the 15th theme entry, B-GIRL, in the center (the 15 starred clues all split like that—e.g., V-NECK, eBAY, T. REX). Given the relatively small footprint of the theme, there was plenty of room in the grid for expanses of white space, with an intriguing and lively batch of longer entries: APERITIFS, aptly, is opposite TIES ONE ON (while appetizers and aperitifs both precede a meal, I just now satisfied my curiosity about their etymologies—they're unrelated); I also liked STRIKE ONE, WHAT IS IT?!?, WHEATIES, THE STICKS, ERECTOR SET, CARRIES ON, AFTERTASTE (though I swear to you that Diet Coke sweetened with Nutrasweet does not have an aftertaste like old saccharin-sweetened pop did), and KICKSTAND. In addition to being 1,000 years, MILLENNIUM is also defined as "a hoped-for period of joy, serenity, prosperity, and justice." My favorite clue, because it kept me guessing and led to a fun word, was [Pats on the back?]. With all the pat-related clues for OLEO, BURPS made for a refreshing twist.
Updated:
Great batch of crosswords today! Nothing struck me as too hard, but I enjoyed all of these.
If you thought Rich Norris's Saturday NYT was too tough, his themeless CrosSynergy puzzle offers a more easy-going challenge.
Jesse Goldberg's Washington Post puzzle, "Washroom Woes," is not about constipation. Rather, in four 21-letter entries and one 19, five bathroom items whine about their woes—cute, actually. My favorite clue was [Item in a chest] for...LUNG.
Henry Hook's Boston Globe crossword ("Who R U?") features an ennead of noted people whose names start with RU-. One of the theme people, ["Rose-Marie" composer] RUDOLF FRIML, was unfamiliar to me—Rose-Marie was a 1924 operetta. Several other words came out of left field—REAVE is an archaic word meaning [Plunder]; [Waltons creator Earl] HAMNER, Jr.; and [Postiches] are TOUPEES or wigs.
It took me until near the end to grasp the theme in Patrick Jordan's LA Times syndicated puzzle, "Bug Infestation." The word "infestation" had me looking for hidden arthropods embedded within the theme entries. Eventually I figured out that each of the eight theme entries ended with words that could be followed by "bug," such as OYSTER BED (bedbug) and LEADING LADY (ladybug).
