Sunday, 10/19

LAT 8:30
PI 7:55
NYT 7:47
BG 7:12
CS 3:50

Split Decisions, Second Sunday NYT puzzle 9:27

(updated at 9:25 a.m. Sunday)

I only saw half of the theme in Joe DiPietro's New York Times crossword, "Perjury." I saw the hidden OATH tucked inside all the long entries, but it wasn't until I reached 112-Across that I learned of the other half: [Perjure oneself ... or what can be found six times in this puzzle] clues LIE UNDER OATH, and below each of those five hidden OATHs, the word LIE appears.
CAN'T DO A THING, or [Is completely hamstrung], sits above LIE OVER, or [Completely cover]. The LIE portion is under OATH.

• MY THROAT HURTS is a [Cold sufferer's complaint] (yep, I'm there), and the OATH is above BELIE, or [Contradict].
  
• SEMI-PRO ATHLETES are [Part-time players], and that answer is paired with PURLIEU, or [Confines].
  
• THE ROAD TO ATHENS, or [Title of some 2004 Summer Olympics preview shows], is partnered with LIENS, or [Security agreements].
  
• OAT HAYS, [Certain feeds for horses], sits atop the LIE in explanatory theme entry, LIE UNDER OATH—and it took me a while to see that OATH.
  
• The SHOWBOAT HOTEL, an [Atlantic City casino], appears above FLIED OUT, or [Batted the ball too high, perhaps].
  

The visual rebus aspect of the theme is cool—"lie under oath" is represented by LIE beneath the word OATH, making it a far more intricate theme than one with just an embedded word.

Here's today's assortment of answers and clues:

• LECTIN is a [Carbohydrate-binding protein]. Did anyone get that answer with fewer than three crossings?
  
• [Stream bank sliders] are OTTERS. Doesn't that clue sound like it should be sports jargon? "Ripken's specialty, of course, is the stream bank slider."
  
• [Stomach section] is the PIT. Anatomically, I'm not so sure this is a thing, but metaphorically and emotionally, sure, it works.
  
• [Ballet's Markova or Alonso] is ALICIA. ALICIA doesn't sound like it matches the Russian-seeming Markova. Ah, because it doesn't. She was English, born Lilian Alicia Marks.
  
• [IV to III, maybe] is a SON. I know a guy whose wife is pregnant with a boy, and he's excited because the kid'll be Henry VI or XXIII or something. A long line of Henrys in the family...
  
• [Not quite boiling] means the pot is ON SIMMER.
  
• SOW'S EAR is a weird entry. It's gettable with its clue, [It's not a silk purse source, it's said].
  
• [High society] is BON TON. That's a department store somewhere, isn't it?
  
• RETEST is an [Opportunity to go beyond the first grade?], as in getting a new grade on the same exam.
  
• [Child's attention-getting call to a parent] is HEY, MOM. Yep, I hear that one a lot.
  
• WRAP PARTIES, or [Cast events after filming is done], is a lovely entry to grace the middle of the puzzle, crossing two of the theme entries.
  
• We get the three-word crossword answer TO A T fairly often. Here, FIT TO A TEE expands on that. It means to [Be perfect] for its purpose.
  
• A SLUG [doesn't really represent change], as it's a fake coin.
  
• [New York City racetrack, informally] is BIG A. I don't know a thing about this.
  
• [Concerned wife's question in the E.R., maybe] is HOW IS HE?
  
• BOLO TIES are [Western wear].
  
• [Soap-making solution] is SODA LYE. Is that available in a diet version?
  
• [Longtime Philippine archbishop ___ Sin] is named JAIME. That one was a gimme for me—who can forget a prelate named Sin?
  

Updated:

This weekend's second Sunday puzzle in the New York Times is another "Split Decisions" by George Bredehorn. I found the upper right corner to be kinda tough, and the lower left corner to be much knottier than the opposite side. From top to bottom, left to right, here are my answer pairs (use your mouse to highlight the white text to see the answers):

Across: THUS/TOSS, CHAPEAU/CHAPELS, CANTATA/CANASTA, STRAINER/STRANGER, RACKETS/RACISTS, ANVIL/ANGEL, DISASTER/DISPUTER, ISOBARS/ISOMERS, CADMIUM/CALCIUM, INSOMNIA/INSIGNIA, SCANT/SPENT, BASSOON/BALLOON, HEADLESS/HELPLESS, LEISURE/LECTURE, HONESTY/AMNESTY, RAPT/RIOT
Down: GRIDDLE/TWIDDLE, UPS/BUS, SUITORS/EDITORS, BURST/FIRST, HUMANLY/UNMANLY, FOLKS/FOCUS, SCRAWNY/SCRAWLS, BLATHER/FEATHER, LATCH/LYNCH, CARDIAC/CARDING, SWEPT/SWELL, ANCHORS/ANCHOVY, SPA/SAW, TRANSIT/TRANSOM

This kind of puzzle's good training for looking at spaces in a crossword and thinking about what words could fit there, narrowing down the list of options as you read the clue.

Merl Reagle's Philadelphia Inquirer crossword, "The NASA Gift Shop," marks the 50th birthday of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration with a batch of NASA-related puns. The ones I liked best were GEMINI CRICKET, the [NASA doll that sings "When You Wish Upon a Star"], playing on Jiminy Cricket, and ORBITAL REDENBACHER'S, [NASA's special-edition popcorn?], citing Orville Redenbacher. I liked the puzzle just fine, but find myself having nothing much to say about it. (This coughing, sneezing, and sniffling business is distracting.)

Pamela Amick Klawitter's syndicated Los Angeles Times Sunday crossword, "All Is Lost," dumps an ALL from eight phrases to change the meaning. The most amusing theme entries were:

• DAS COWBOYS (Dallas Cowboys), or [Rodeo competitors, in ungrammatical German?].
  
• A HOLE IN THE W (a hole in the wall), or [Result of pranksters shooting at Wal-Mart's sign?].
  
• ABSENTEE BOT (absentee ballot), or [Automaton gone missing?].
  

My favorite bit of fill here is CAMP IT UP, clued as [Act in an amusingly affected way].

Liz Gorski's Boston Globe crossword in Across Lite, "I'll Pencil U In," inserts a U into eight phrases to change the meaning. I had a little trouble with one crossing, where a ["TV Guide" acronym] that's really an abbreviation (acronyms are pronounceable words) crosses a [Baroque dance]. There are four time zones in the U.S., but apparently the one TV Guide mentions is Central, or CST (the other time zones' TV shows are scheduled an hour off from when they air in the Midwest, where prime-time shows run from 7 to 10 p.m.). The dance is CHACONNE, and I'll bet not many people know that word. I'd have clued CST more specifically to unknot that square. My favorite theme entries are CARPENTER AUNT (ant), or [Kin seen sawing?], and LOBSTER FRAU DIABLO (Fra), or [Mrs. Freud's spicy seafood recipe?]. That last one's just plain nuts, but it goes for broke so I like it. Highlights in the fill include GLASNOST, THINK BIG, LAKE ONTARIO, USER'S MANUAL, and SPY RING.

Patrick Jordan's themeless CrosSynergy "Sunday Challenge" is the week's easiest themeless puzzle. Patrick is perhaps more drawn to pangrams than any other constructor, and he did manage to get all 26 letters of the alphabet into this grid without having any horrid abbreviations or woebegone obscurities. He did trick me with [Pina colada ingredient], 3 letters—not rum but ICE. [Engages in logrolling] is BIRLS—this lumberjack sport is sometimes called roleo, which is another word that seems to pop up more in crosswords than in day-to-day living.

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Sunday, 5/4

NYT 9:01
PI 8:35
LAT 8:07
BG 7:15
CS 4:00
NYT Second Sunday "Split Decisions" 4 minutes or so

The New York Times' second Sunday offering is another "Split Decisions" puzzle by George Bredehorn. The link above is for the PDF that Will Johnston prepared, which should print out better than the JPEG the NYT site posted. No spoilers or answers here, and this kind of puzzle has no clues to discuss. All I've got to say is: This was one of the easiest "Split Decisions" puzzles I've seen. Usually there's a knotty spot or two that take a while to unravel, but this one? I zipped through it at bedtime, which is normally a time that I can't finish puzzles before I begin to doze off. So if you haven't tried one of these critters before, try this one! (But don't expect the next one some months hence to be this easy.)

You know how many of us grumble if we encounter unfamiliar crossword entries? It's particularly true when we deem the shortcoming not to be one of our own inadequacy—a regrettable lacuna in our knowledge—but rather, one of the puzzle itself. "Who the hell knows a word like that?!? Nobody!" someone may grouse. And more seasoned solvers will pooh-pooh that: "What, you don't know EROSE? That one's been in crosswords for ages. Total gimme." There are some crosswords out there, though, that would irk even the best solver. Case in point: Today's Tribune Media Services crossword. Blogger C.C. gives the lowdown. How would you describe a daily newspaper crossword that included the following answers: CYCADS, NIPA, INTI, CRUZEIRO, AZAN, ANAEMIA without a [Brit.] tag, SGD as an abbreviation for "signed," TIFT County (it's in Georgia), GALIPOT (an impure resin of turpentine—do not confuse this with those pure resins of turpentine, my friends!), LER, IRO, and POMOS (a California tribe). Might the word abomination come to mind? I'd be all right with LER (a Celtic god; have seen it in crosswords on rare occasion) or POMOS with reasonable crossings in a hard puzzle. But most of these words would be edited out by the crossword editor, or be just cause for rejecting the puzzle—particularly if the whole grid was riddled with them. (P.S. No, I don't solve the TMS puzzle, and no, I won't be blogging about it.)

The regular New York Times crossword does not contain AZAN or INTI. You may not be familiar with every word in the grid, but they're pretty much all words that have appeared in good-quality crosswords a number of times. They're fair game. Richard Silvestri's theme is "Poplar Music," or song titles modified in punny fashion to include a kind of tree. I've heard of all the trees (though the classics like the oak and maple are absent), but two of the song titles are ones I've never heard of. I suspect it's an age thing—the [1964 Bobby Goldsboro song for tree fanciers?], CEDAR FUNNY LITTLE CLOWN, was before my time. Google tells me the real title is "See the Funny Little Clown." The other song I don't know is the [1959 Chuck Berry song for tree fanciers?], ELMOST GROWN, which presumably puns on "Almost Grown." I don't get why ELMOST is kosher here, given that it's not a word, just a longer word with a short tree name spliced into it—the other theme entries use the tree name separate from other words. The trees replace all sorts of different parts of speech—verb, preposition, repeated adjective, two words ("see the," "balls of," "I love"), and half of "almost." Ultimately not a very satisfying theme for this solver.

Unusual fill and tough answers/clues:

• BREVET = [Nominal promotion of a military officer]
  
• TIMBALES = [Tito Puente played them]
  
• SUCRE = [World capital, founded in 1538, formerly known as Chuquisaca]
  
• BLAT = [Be noisy] ("Sheesh! The neighbors were blatting half the night."
  

Clues/answers I liked:

• [It's spotted in the wild] for OCELOT
  
• [Craving, slangily] for JONES
  
• [Theodor Escherich's discovery] for E COLI (Escherichia coli)
  
• IN-GROUPS are [Cliques]
  

Updated:

Paula Gamache's themeless CrosSynergy "Sunday Challenge" echoes the NYT crossword with TIMBAL, or [Kettledrum]. Tito Puente played Cuban timbales, while the TIMBAL appears to be a Brazilian drum of a different shape. My favorite clue here is [After all?] for DEAD LAST. I also appreciated the duplicity of [Businessmen can be vested in them] for THREE-PIECE SUITS—vesting in stock options was the first thing I thought of. There are three Shakespearean characters in the grid: IAGO, the [Villain who said "I am not what I am"] in Othello (in contradistinction to Popeye the Sailor Man, who was wont to say "I yam what I yam"); OPHELIA, [Daughter of Polonius] in Hamlet; and CASCA, though [He was the first to strike Caesar] in history as well as in Julius Caesar. ELG is clued as ["Les Girls" actress Taina]; that was a 1957 movie and she is Finnish by birth. I don't recall seeing the name before, though it would appear that her first or last name could bail a constructor out of a tight spot.

I loved Merl Reagle's Philadelphia Inquirer puzzle today. "It's Not What It Looks Like" is a twist on his "If I Wrote the Dictionary" themes—this one is what meanings are not correct, even though they may sound that way. The theme clues and answers are just plain fun, if you ask me. Merl had me at "hello," with ALBUMEN being clued [It's not German for "long-playing records"]. My other favorite theme entries: [He's not "the father of electricity"] for VOLTAIRE; [It doesn't mean "subtracted"] for NONPLUSSED; [It's not a fraction of a penny] for MILLICENT; [It's not a type of ore] for REIGNITE (rhymes with lignite!); and [It's not French for "husband-to-be"] for LEGROOM. The nonthematic action was fun, too. Favorite morsels: ["Sister Ree," really] for ARETHA Franklin; [Red river?] for LAVA; [B.B. King's thing] for the BLUES; and—best of all—[Mid-Atlantic state?] for seasick NAUSEA. (Editor's note: Lloyd Mazer, who converts Merl's crosswords into Across Lite for us, extracts them from the LA Times online magazine. What's in print in the Philadelphia Inquirer and Washington Post, however, is a puzzle called "The Secret Forest." So it's better to go by the puzzle title than the newspaper name for Merl's puzzles when the publications get out of sync. In any event, I loved the one we had today!)

Emily Cox and Henry Rathvon's Across Lite Boston Globe puzzle (as a reminder, what's available to us in Across Lite—and we are grateful for that!—is a few weeks old, so Bostonians will have seen this crossword weeks ago) is called "A Matter of Time," and the theme entries are phrases that include units of time, in ascending order from IN A SPLIT SECOND to the THIRTY YEARS WAR. The intervening steps are Bannister's FOUR-MINUTE MILE, CANONICAL HOURS, the Beatles' EIGHT DAYS A WEEK (covering two units of time, in order!), and BOOK OF THE MONTH. They've clued CHIMERA as the [Lion-headed monster] with a capital C, whereas Merl Reagle used little-C chimera in his crossword today ([Foolish fancy]).

Ray Hamel's syndicated LA Times crossword, "Horseheads," bundles together a bunch of phrases that begin with "___ horse" words. The card game CRAZY EIGHTS, for example, ponies up Crazy Horse. The TROJAN WAR gives the closely allied Trojan horse. CHARLEY WEAVER, charley horse (ow!)—and also phrases with HIGH, DARK, QUARTER, HOBBY, SAW (7-letter SAWDUST is in the middle at 51-Down), and ROCKING. The theme entries aren't highlighted by asterisks or anything, so the puzzle sort of unspooled like a plus-sized themeless crossword—which is a pleasant thing in my book. (Figuratively speaking.) One complete mystery entry for me: KAPP is [The Searchers' record label]. I know nothing about that, but like to think that it has to do with an epic Western...

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