Monday, 5/25

BEQ 4:04
LAT 3:08
NYT 2:37
CS 6:51 (J—paper)

Peter A. Collins' New York Times crossword

The recession has hit the crossword and we must now make do with 7% fewer squares, as we've lost one column and have a 14x15 grid to contend with. On the bright side, your solving time should be 7% faster. On the other hand, you're getting 7% less entertainment value out of the puzzle. Can we refinance and get a 16x15?

The theme is spelled out clearly in the clue for 64A: [Thing hidden in each of the movie names in this puzzle]. The three circled squares in each theme entry contain short TREE names split between words:

• [1989 Sally Field/Dolly Parton/Shirley MacLaine movie] is STEEL MAGNOLIAS. Huh, I thought this was a Julia Roberts movie with Dermot Mulroney. Oddly, MAGNOLIA is a kind of tree too—but the other theme entries do not have extra trees.
  
• [2000 Martin Lawrence movie] is BIG MOMMA'S HOUSE.
  
• [1992 Alec Baldwin/Meg Ryan film] is PRELUDE TO A KISS.

I slowed myself down a bit by not bothering to refer to the cross-referenced clue when I was in the lower left corner. 51D says [See 46-Across], but 46A's clue wasn't on my screen at the moment so I just worked the crossings. Seeing [With 51-Down, John Ashcroft's predecessor as attorney general] would've made it a gimme, so I should have taken the two seconds to click on that clue. Then I had the wrong bottom half for [Hip-hop wear], opting for BAGGY PANTS in lieu of the more specific BAGGY JEANS. Up top, I had no idea what the [Classic John Lee Hooker song of 1962 was] until I had enough crossings to see BOOM BOOM emerging. I also paused at [Shots taken by some athletes], pondering shot puts and free throws until the crossings pointed towards STEROIDS.

The rest of the clues put up less of a fight. Or no fight. A handful of clues:

• LOVING CUPS are [Some trophies]. Anyone know (without looking it up) the derivation of that term?
  
• ["Star Wars" villain ___ the Hutt] is JABBA. I laughed when I saw that because my son had just put in the Empire Strikes Back DVD. And no, I have no idea whether Jabba's in that episode.
  
• [Hunk] clues both a SLAB and a HE-MAN. I dispute the accuracy of the clue for the second answer. A hunk is always good-looking, but plenty of he-men are big ugly slabs of muscle.
  
• Crossword classics! [Margarine] is OLEO and an [Earthenware pot] is an OLLA. Speaking of 4-letter words starting with OL, [Ken of "thirtysomething"] OLIN. Wow, what has he done lately? IMDb tells me he's had a role on Brothers & Sisters, that Sally Field/Calista Flockhart/Rob Lowe show I've never seen. Coincidentally, he's also a producer and director on that show. Back to 4-letter crossword classics—we also have [Jai ___] ALAI and SLOE the [Gin flavoring].

Updated Monday morning:

Patrick Jordan's CrosSynergy puzzle, "Hopper Toppers"—Janie's review

This puzzle is built on an equation we know and love—especially when it's been executed thoughtfully, mirthfully; and this one has been. Today it reads: familiar phrase/name/title + ROO ["hopper"] at the front of it ["topper"]=new whimsical phrase. Or, as the clue at 63D says: [Aussie critter at the fronts of 20-, 28-, 47-, and 56-Across]. Let's take a look:

• 20A: [Spacious skies?] MY HEAVENS + ROO at the front=ROOMY HEAVENS. A beaut from the get-go and the only one of theme fill in which the meaning of the second word is almost the same "after" as it is "before." The clue reminds me of the argument that comes up from time to time about replacing the combat-inspired "Star-Spangled Banner" with the more pastoral "America the Beautiful" as our national anthem. Something to ponder on this patriotic holiday...
  
• 28A: [Actor Romano on a perch?] STINGRAY + ROO at the front=ROOSTING RAY.
  
• 47A: [Con man's plan for producer Norman?] KING LEAR + ROO at the front=ROOKING LEAR.
  
• 56A: [Well-established dragon vanquisher] I thought this one might be related to St. George, but no...more like TED KNIGHT + ROO at the front=ROOTED KNIGHT. I find this one a little less graceful than the other three, maybe because it's kinda twisty. I think of knights as being active and describing one as ROOTED summons up a picture of a knight in a fixed, unmoving pose. What does [Amuse immensely], though, is the way KNIGHT sits atop SLAY in the grid. Now that's more like it!

Now I realize I'm skewing the cluing with this cluster of fill, but MONSIGNOR triggered a bunch of clerical/religious connections. MACE for one, isn't only a [Thief-thwarting spray]; The New Testament has the book of ACTS and I PETER (okay—I know this is an inversion of PETER I...); there's also a HALO, perhaps belonging to St. PAUL?.......And I just noticed there's even, um, A MASS. MY HEAVENS, indeed!

A pair of playful grid-bits: the crossing of OVER and DRIVE; and the crossing of [Robert De ____] NIRO with DINERO.

Why do I cite these examples? Because truth be told, I'm not in love with the debut fill LOOKERSON or even the oft-seen MISDO. Amid the more sparkling fill, they kinda SPLAT. The connections, fanciful and/or tenuous and/or genuine as they are, help keep me focused on the puzzle's real strengths—its SINEW so to speak. Like the fact that in the theme fill, the two words ending in -ING, ROOSTING and ROOTING, are sandwiched between ROOMY and ROOTED. This is a fine way to keep tight the presentation of the theme. Finally, Patrick has given us one splendid bonus clued in connection to the ROO's home: [Australia's national gem]? OPAL. I always love picking up bits of information like that!

Los Angeles Times crossword by Gia Christian, a.k.a. Rich Norris

This is the second Monday LAT this month with a Rich Norris pen name byline, so he must not be getting enough great Monday submissions. They say good Mondays are harder to make than more difficult puzzles are—and Rich has the skills to craft Mondays that are as smooth as his themelesses are impressive. In this puzzle, the six theme entries begin with a baseball umpire's calls. As [Oedipus ___] REX points out at L.A. Crossword Confidential, the calls are paired as binary options. A baserunner can be OUT or SAFE, a pitcher can throw a STRIKE or a BALL, and the hit ball can be FAIR or FOUL. The calls are in these phrases:

• [Not in working order, informally] is OUT OF WHACK. Before I'd figured out what the theme was, I filled in ON THE FRITZ, which is equally informal and colorful.
  
• [Crook who doesn't need the combination] is a SAFECRACKER.
  
• STRIKE PAY is a [Union benefit during a walkout].
  
• The whole BALL OF WAX is another slangy phrase. It means [Everything, informally]. Having lively language like this helps jazz up a Monday puzzle. It's certainly possible to construct an easy puzzle that's arid and lifeless, so the slanginess is appreciated.
  
• FAIR WEATHER is a [Promising picnic forecast]. I hope your Memorial Day ventures have suitable weather—it's on the chilly/cloudy side in Chicago.
  
• A [Tendency to anger easily] is a FOUL TEMPER.

I forgot my Melville when I read the clue [Moby Dick, notably]—I was tempted to fill in SEA CAPTAIN or WHALER-something, thinking of Captain Ahab. Moby Dick's the name of the WHITE WHALE. My English prof who taught Moby-Dick had a friend who'd paddle down the river and call out to others, "Hast seen the white whale?" Literary hilarity, I tell ya.

Brendan Quigley's blog crossword, "Boys Club"

This one's a rerun from Time Out New York, but as a non-New Yorker, I hadn't seen the puzzle before. The theme entries are made by inserting XY into a familiar phrase to give it male chromosomes:

• [The Big Bang or the Big Crunch?] is a GALAXY EVENT. Gala event + XY.
  
• Willa Cather's O Pioneers! becomes OXY PIONEERS, or [The first to use acne medicine].
  
• [Substitute decision?] clues PROXY CHOICE, which is an actual phrase as well as being pro-choice + XY. This distracted me from seeing that the theme involved the addition of XY, and at first I thought it was a lame theme of "made-up phrases that contain an XY, muddled by one phrase that's a real one."
  
• [Coach Phil who's incredibly square?] is BOXY JACKSON, which rhymes with Foxy Jackson. "Bo Knows" Bo Jackson + XY.

Scrabbly fill overall, with the four X's of the theme joined by another X and a Z, Q, J, and K. It wouldn't be kosher to clue the base phrases with an XY slant when the answers have different connotations, but it could have been fun to have clues like [Big ball for men?], [Will Cather novel?], [Supporting reproductive rights for men?], and [Football and baseball star becomes all man?].

Read More...

Summary only...

Monday, 5/4

BEQ 4:19
Jonesin' 3:08
LAT 2:59
NYT 2:28
CS 6:31 (J -- paper)

Happy 18th anniversary to my husband, who is remarkably tolerant of my crossword avocation. Thanks, hon!

Mark Milhet's New York Times crossword

Today's theme is hesitant trepidation: All three theme entries are clued with [Succumbing to second thoughts]. The answers are GETTING COLD FEET, CHICKENING OUT, and LOSING ONE'S NERVE. Some of the fill in this puppy might give a crossword newbie second thoughts, although the puzzle's an easy one for the seasoned solver. Here are some words that flirt with the "crosswordese" category:

• 46A: EMI is a [U.K. record label]. Yes, it's still a major player in the recording industry, but I suspect it gets nearly as much attention in crosswords as in the music press, and is considerably more prominent in crosswords than in everything else I read.
  
• 58A: ITERS are [Anatomical passages]. I encounter this far more in crosswords than in medical editing.
  
• 6D: ERGS are [Energy units] or units of work. Outside of physics and crosswords, I can't say this word gets much play.
  
• 38D: NIBS are [Writing points], as in the points for a fountain pen. Nibs are also those terrible cherry licorice bits that I can't get enough of. Twizzlers, you are no Nibs.
  
• 40D: FERULES are [Old schoolmasters' sticks], handy for thwacking recalcitrant pupils. This isn't common crossword, no, but neither is it usual Monday fare.
  
• 56D: ENOL is a [Certain alkene]. Not your usual [Organic compound], [Carbon compound], or [Hydroxyl compound] clue. The dictionary on my Mac doesn't include this word, so it's got no business being in a Monday crossword—except for the LEGION ([Veterans' group, informally]) of regular solvers who reflexively fill in ENOL for any 4-letter chemical-sounding clue. If you didn't know this answer, jot it down in your brain—it'll be coming back to a puzzle near you quite soon.
  

There are three Bible answers today, but luckily they're not the more arcane ones like SELAH or NEH. or TAMAR. EDEN is the [Genesis garden]. SINAI is the [Mount ___, where the Commandments were given to Moses]. And NOAH was a [Biblical captain for 40 days and 40 nights].

Milhet's three-part theme leaves plenty of room for more interesting fill in the corners. There's ["Gesundheit!"], or "BLESS YOU"; CORNPONE, or [Dixie bread]; MARVEL [___ Comics, home of Spider-Man and the Fantastic Four]; plus ICE SHEET, HARASSED, and TOTTERS.

Updated Monday morning:

Will Johnston's CrosSynergy puzzle, "Measuring Up" -- Janie's review

Nice to start the week with this puzzle by esteemed moderator of the erstwhile New York Times Puzzle Forum -- and creator of the invaluable page of Puzzle Pointers. (There's also a link in Orange's column of "Crossword Links" at right.)

And it's also nice to see the ways this puzzle lives up to its title. Will gives us three grid-spanning phrases, each of which starts with a type of "measure":

• 17A: LENGTH OF SERVICE [Factor in employee recognition awards] -- LENGTH being a unit of distance -- or, as in this case, time.
• 37A: AREA OF EXPERTISE [Professional's specialty] -- AREA, as we learned in geometry, refers to a plane's size and is determined by multiplying (class?): "length by width." Unlike the previous example (or the next...), this fill does not describe a literal measurement but gives us a strong "in the language" phrase, where "area" means "field." As the exception, it is perfectly placed at the puzzle's center.
• 59A: VOLUME OF TRAFFIC [Commuter's concern] -- VOLUME being a measure of capacity (or sound amplitude). Again -- we're talking about the amount of traffic here -- or possibly the noise generated by it. This commuter is assaulted less by the sound of above-ground traffic than by the decibel level of the subways (and confesses she carries earplugs.....).

SPEED and NANO also come from the "measure" vocabulary pool -- so Will gives us a double bonus.

Three favorite clues: [High wind?] for FIFE, [Pen name] for CROSS and [Worldly wisdom? (abbr.)] for GEOG.

And speaking of GEOG, between the fill and the clues, we get a bit of a world tour here with: SARI [Delhi wrap], NILE [Luxor's river], IRAQI [Baghdad native], USSR [Cold War inits], AMIN [Former Ugandan tyrant]; and foreign phrases [Cul-de] SAC and [Pâté de] FOIE [gras].

It's probably serendipity, but where the demise of Cleopatra is concerned, invert the clue numbers and notice that 36A [Venomous viper] ASP has a complement in 63A's [Luxor's river] NILE.

Never heard of GINO Vanelli, but the crosses allowed me to find the correct fill. Will's a Boston guy -- and it seems there's a special Celts-Gino connection! Also tripped myself up some, trying to make MINI work for NANO; then NEWBIE for NOVICE.

Has anyone ever seen TRON? Ah, well -- perhaps it'll show up on AMC. ;-)

OVER.

Los Angeles Times crossword by Rich Norris's alter ego, Gia Christian

I can't help thinking of the power ballad "Sister Christian" when I see this one of Rich's pen names. (Skip to about 4:05 in the video to see how dramatically the vocalist belts out "You're motorin'.")

Let's call this theme KABOB (41A: [Skewered meal])—each theme entry is a B-to-B kabob:

• 17A: [Excellent performance] is a BANG-UP JOB.
  
• 29A: [Sci. class where many an "Eeuw!" is heard] is BIO LAB.
  
• 46A: [Bill for what you drank] is BIXBY. No, not really. BAR TAB.
  
• 62A: A catchier name for [Satan] is BEELZEBUB.
  
• 11D: To [Betray by bad-mouthing] is to BACKSTAB.
  
• 39D: The [Angels or Dodgers] are a BALL CLUB in the L.A. area.
  

Smooth fill, as we expect from Rich, with 14 6- to 8- letter non-theme answers classing up the joint. And six theme entries! Favorite answer: KIBITZ, or [Be a nuisance at the card game], connecting two theme entries. Favorite clue: [Host who expects you to question his answer?] is Alex TREBEK. Just a few more weeks 'til my Jeopardy! audition in Chicago...

Brendan Quigley's blog crossword, "Inside Jobs"

The theme is "Inside Jobs" and one job is hidden inside each theme vertical entry in this 15x16 grid:

• 3D: ["Pan's Labyrinth" director] is GUILLERMO DEL TORO.
  
• 18D: [Plants with purple flowers] are the unknown-to-me FOXTAIL ORCHIDS. Slightly better known to me: the [South African iris cousin] called the IXIA, which I saw recently in another crossword. It's on the crosswordesey side.
  
• 8D: [SUV that was a prize during "Survivor 2005"] is the PONTIAC TORRENT.
  
• 10D: [Acts of desperation] are LAST-DITCH EFFORTS.
  

Those 11-letter answers at 17A and 62A? Not part of the theme. They're just there to interlock nicely with three theme entries apiece. Favorite fill: Where ASHKENAZ, or [Group of European Jews], meets MATZOH, or [Seder staple]. I bought that record my senior year of high school—the [1983 Huey Lewis and the News album]—and yet I blanked on the title. SPORTS!

Matt Jones's Jonesin' crossword, "Pardon My French"

Matt's theme this week is couleurs—color phrases with the colors translated into French. Like so:

• 17A: [Bugs Bunny, most notably?] clues BLANC RABBIT. He's a gray rabbit, not a white one, but (a) "White Rabbit" is a familiar phrase and (b) Mel BLANC did the voice for Bugs.
  
• 32A: [Fear that you'll smear your makeup?] is ROUGE SCARE. Brendan's puzzle has the original RED SCARE in it today.
  
• 41A: [The woman that seduces hard-boiled film detectives?] turns the equine Black Beauty into a film NOIR BEAUTY. This puts me in mind of Kim Basinger's character in L.A. Confidential and nudges me to link to L.A. Crossword Confidential (Rex covers today's puzzle).
  
• 57A: [Extreme skateboarder who shreds on the halfpipe?] clues VERT MONSTER. The Green Monster is that wall at Fenway Park in Boston. I'm guessing VERT = short for "vertical" in skateboarding argot.
  

Notable stuff in the fill: A marijuana [Joint] is a DOOBIE, but one [In need of joint relief] is ARTHRITIC. Trade names abound—we see CESSNA jets, GUMMI Worms, Mr. PIBB, KOOL-AID (a [Drink that's stirred, but not shaken]), BUGATTI (the [Sports car manufacturer now owned by Volkswagen], maker of the super-fast Bugatti Veyron), and TOFUTTI. Plus the SEATTLE P.I., or Post-Intelligencer, the [Washington newspaper that ended its printed version in March 2009, for short]. For a foreign vibe, we get FUGUS, the Japanese [Poisonous blowfishes], and PRAHA, [Czech Republic capital, to locals]—one of my dearest friends lived in Prague for a decade, so that was a gimme for me.

Read More...

Summary only...

Sunday, 3/8

LAT 8:39
PI 8:29
NYT 7:21
BG 7:05
CS 4:10

What do you write when you want to say just "One More Thing"? Zack Kushner's New York Times crossword adds a P.S. somewhere within a phrase or at the end of it to change the meaning. The hands-down winner, the theme entry that made me laugh out loud, was USE THE FORCEPS, LUKE, clued as [Advice to actor Perry when delivering a baby?]. I just picked up my son from a Star Wars: The Clone Wars-themed birthday party where there was a Yoda hippity-hop ball, so the 90210-ization of Jedi force was welcome. The other theme entries were pretty solid, but they didn't hit the funny bone like 47-Across did:

• [Rachael Ray activity eliciting oohs and aahs?] is COOKING WITH GASPS. "Now you're cooking with gas!" is not something I've ever said, but it's a phrase out there.
  
• [Prepared for heavy on/off traffic?] clues BUILT RAMPS TOUGH, playing on the Dodge ad slogan, "Built Ram Tough."
  
• [Cleopatra's last request?] might've been ASPS FOR ME (as for me...).
  
• [Travel is voted most popular?] clues GOING TOPS THE POLLS. Aw, travel? The GOING could've gone another way, absent the Sunday morning breakfast test.
  
• LONG TIME, NO SEEPS is clued as the [Result of a good basement waterproofing years ago?].
  
• [Unassailable beefs?] are BULLETPROOF CARPS.
  

We've got one of those roll-your-own words here—REGRAB, or [Get a better grip on]. There's a smidgen of blah crosswordese, like EBOLI, or [Where Christ stopped in a Carlo Levi novel] and SISALS, or [Rope fibers]. But there's also lively stuff like a PRETZEL, or [Ballpark snack]. [Steal from, as in Grand Theft Auto] clues CARJACK. There's a comedian's SCHTICK, like ["I don't get no respect," to Rodney Dangerfield]. H.G. WELLS is [The Father of Science Fiction]. Someone's HIT LIST is clued as [It's dangerous to be on this]. There's some pasta etymology: RAVIOLI means [Literally, "little turnips"]. And GEORGE is clued as [Any of boxer Foreman's five sons]; yes, George Foreman likes to name his sons after himself.

Updated:

It took me a while to find the hidden word in Merl Reagle's Philadelphia Inquirer crossword, "See the Secret Word." In Across Lite, the note explaining the theme is appended to the first theme clue, 22-Across. And that note is long. As a Mac user, I can see the full clue only in teeny print with the Across Lite window components resized and stretched fully across a 21" screen (there's no mouse-over pop-up unless you're in Windows)—I don't know why the note wasn't moved to the Across Lite Notepad, where such things usually appear. Annoying. Anyway: The note says that the same six-letter word is hidden nonconsecutively within each theme answer, and it's left to the solver to figure out that the hidden word is...hidden. To wit:

• [Really resentful] is what IN HIGH DUDGEON means.
  
• [Godforsaken place] is in THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE.
  
• [Top Ten hit of 1964] is THE LITTLE OLD / LADY FROM PASADENA. The two parts of this answer are stacked together in the grid.
  
• [Michael Collins' cause] was IRISH INDEPENDENCE.
  
• [Source of bounty] is THE GOOSE THAT LAID/ THE GOLDEN EGG, again with those two parts stacked.
  
• [Wreaths and such are HOLIDAY DECORATIONS.
  
• [Clarke classic] is CHILDHOOD'S END.
  

Rich Norris, a.k.a. Gia Christian, constructed today's syndicated Los Angeles Times Sunday crossword (which isn't the puzzle the LA Times happens to run on Sundays). In "HR Derby," an H takes the place of an R in each theme answer:

• Macroeconomics turns into MACHO ECONOMICS, or [The Governator's budget philosophy?].
  
• Crap shooting—is this the same as shooting craps?—becomes CHAP SHOOTING, or [Casual London photo session?].
  
• [Used marked cards against Godzilla?] clues CHEATED A MONSTER (created a monster). This is my favorite of the theme entries.
  
• [Bell ringer's dream?] is committing the PERFECT CHIME.
  
• [Butcher's finest?] is the CREAM OF THE CHOP.
  
• WATER CHESS is clued as a [Game on a floating board?]. I'd rather have the water chess be played out à la water polo, with the board painted on the swimming pool bottom and the players combining chess with synchronized swimming's underwater movement techniques.
  
• The old TV show Green Acres morphs into GREEN ACHES, or [Environmentalist's discomfort?].
  

The most interesting word in the fill is GYNARCHY, or [Government by women]. There is frightfully little of that to be found.

This weekend's old Boston Globe crossword in Across Lite is a savory treat from Henry Hook. In "Versatile Viands," each theme entry contains a word that's also a food. There's a HAM RADIO OPERATOR and KEVIN BACON, a Wisconsin CHEESEHEAD, and assorted veggies, like SERGEANT PEPPER, a MUSHROOM CLOUD, and the ONION NEWS NETWORK. There are two more theme answers stacked together to tie these all together—they are both OMELET FILLINGS and PIZZA TOPPINGS. Between the two-meal elegance of the theme, the stacking of theme entries, the sections of white space (look at the three sections running down the middle of the grid, with all those 6+ letter answers bunched together), and the overall smoothness of the fill, and you've got yourself a beaut of a Sunday puzzle. Really, the only thing I looked a little askance at was CAMIONS, or [Trucks]—it's a legitimate dictionary entry and all, but not a word I'd seen before. I wanted CAMINOS, as in the '70s car/truck blend, El Camino.

Bruce Venzke and Stella Daily's themeless CrosSynergy "Sunday Challenge" has an unusual-looking grid, with stacked pairs of 15-letter answers criss-crossed by single 15's going down. There are plenty of rather arid answers that look like the sort of things solvers will be Googling today:

• [Song of warning for sailors] is ASLEEP IN THE DEEP. I've never heard of this.
  
• [What it takes to make a thing go right, in a hip-hop song] clues TWO. I don't know this song either. So sea chanteys and rap, both not my forte.
  
• [Mid-10th century year] is CMLI, or 951.
  
• Never heard of [Venture capitalist John] DOERR, either.
  
• The descriptive phrase [A recessed part of] clues SET INTO. As in "the blue tile is a recessed part of the mosaic"/"the blue tile is set into the mosaic."
  
• [Extinct Indo-European language] is OSCAN.
  
• The ISAR [River of Munich] is not among the most common crossword rivers.
  
• [Where many recordings are found] is ON CD'S.
  
• [Adds more lubricant] clues RE-OILS.
  
• [Marilyn's "River of No Return" costar] is RORY Calhoun. I know Calhoun only from the cannibalism horror movie, Motel Hell, and a Simpsons reference.
  
• There's an unexpected plural of an abbreviation in the answer to [Where to write GIs]: APO'S.
  

Read More...

Summary only...

Thursday, 12/25

LAT 16:53
NYT 10:31
Sun 9:35
CS 7:09

(Updated at 10:30am Thursday)

Hey, everybody, thanks for stopping by. PuzzleGirl here hoping you're enjoying a day filled with peace and are surrounded by people you love. Whether you celebrate Christmas or not, that sounds like a good goal for today.

Are you ready for some football? Theme answers in Eric Tentarelli's New York Times puzzle mash three pro football teams' mascots into a clue-able phrase.

• [Chestnut-colored mustang offspring?] = BROWN BRONCO COLT
  
• [Main dedicatee of an Austin cathedral?] = CHIEF TEXAN SAINT
  
• [Hefty invoice for boots and spurs?] = GIANT COWBOY BILL

I'm not a big football fan — honestly, it's been so long since I've paid attention that I don't even know where half the teams are any more — but I still think the league's mascot names can make for enjoyable entries. And if you can package them up with some fun fill, well ... you've got yourself a crossword puzzle. I believe this is Eric's puzzle debut. Very nice job, Eric — congratulations!

• I was surprised to learn that SKA was pioneered by Byron Lee and the Dragonaires. I would have expected its pioneers to have a name more like Marcus Marley and the Rastaboys. Byron Lee and the Dragonaires sound like they belong on the "Grease" soundtrack to me. Not that there's anything wrong with that.
  
• Did you know that PERU's coat of arms includes a vicuña? Did you know that a vicuña is an animal similar to a llama?
  
• I always loved that Speedy Gonzales's cousin's name was SLOWPOKE Rodriguez.
  
• ALICE Walker and ALICE Cooper. Now there's an interesting pair.
  
• So, yeah, it's football season, but it's also college wrestling season. That means when I see Ness in a clue, LOCH is nowhere on my radar and Eliot doesn't even come to mind. No, I'm thinking University of Minnesota 133-pounder Jayson Ness. I'm guessing I'm the only one here who's even heard of him. And hopes our guy at the University of Iowa can pull it together enough to beat him up a little bit.
  
• ALBEDO, a [Light ratio in astronomy], is a more specific form of the term reflectivity. I just looked that up.

Daniel A. Finan's Sun crossword, "Ancient History," plays on the phrase "water under the bridge" by locating the name of a river in the grid underneath the name of a bridge. Love it!

• [1950 John Wayne film] = RIO GRANDE (the Rio Grande is known as the Río Bravo del Norte in Mexico)
  
• [Dwarf, with "over"] = TOWER (the Tower Bridge is in London and is not the same as the London Bridge)

• [Boulder's place] = COLORADO (the Colorado River flows through the Grand Canyon and is home to 14 native species of fish)
  
• [Theater district] = RIALTO (the original Rialto Bridge was built in 1255 and made of wood; the current stone bridge replaced the wooden structure in 1591)

• [Big book e-tailer] = AMAZON (the Amazon River, the largest river in the world by volume and second by length, apparently is spanned by no bridges)
  
• ["Welcome Back Kotter" setting] = BROOKLYN (the Brooklyn Bridge is in ... Brooklyn -- and it's not for sale)

Misc.:

• You know you're getting better at solving when you can fill in R AND B and A TO Z without breaking a sweat.
  
• For [Wolfgang contemporary] I was thinking Mozart and not Puck, so it took the crosses for me to finally get EMERIL Lagasse. Bam!
  
• Hey, this is interesting. Joanne DRU co-starred with John Wayne in "Red River" in 1948!
  
• Do people SIGNAL when they [Prepare to change lanes] where you live? Here, not so much.
  
• Lute OLSON was a [Longtime Arizona Wildcats basketball coach]. He was with the Wildcats for 24 seasons before retiring earlier this year. Quick note: Lute, Ted, and the Folgers coffee lady spell their last name OLSON. Mary-Kate, Ashley, Merlin, Tillie, and Jimmy spell it OLSEN.
  
• Finally, I hate to complain. I really do. But Carolyn KEENE was a pen-name. And it wasn't just a name used by one person. It was (and is) used for the stable of writers who have produced the Nancy Drew books over the years. For many years, it was widely accepted that Harriet Stratemeyer Adams was the writer behind the series, but eventually it became known that she was simply the face the publisher put in front of the camera. Maybe because she was the publisher's daughter? Who knows? Harriet Adams did write some of the early books, but Mildred Wirt Benson was responsible for 23 of the first 31 books in the series. The point is that Carolyn Keene is not the "creator" of Nancy Drew. Carolyn Keene is a pen-name used by many, many people who write books with Nancy Drew as the main character. But the character was created by Edward Stratemeyer. And he never went by the name Carolyn Keene. I feel better now.

Updated:

I had a ton of problems with Gia Christian's L.A. Times puzzle. It was totally my own fault though. The puzzle was just fine. First, let's talk about the theme. Then I'll tell you about the series of bad decisions I made while solving.

Theme answers are puns involving things you use to decorate for Christmas.

• Crash helmet ==> CRECHE HELMET
  
• Tensile strength ==> TINSEL STRENGTH
  
• Holy scripture ==> HOLLY SCRIPTURE
  
• The Three Bears ==> THE TREE BEARS

Okay. No problem with the theme. Here's where I had trouble.

• I was not going to fall for the [Fall guy] trick this time. I know damn well that's a trick clue for Adam. But no. In that case, I believe the clue would include a question mark. Here, you really just need to know another word for fall guy. That would be MARK.
  
• For ["Later"] I initially had see ya, then I'm out, and finally the correct I'M OFF.
  
• Somehow I added an H into the [1995 N.L. Rookie of the Year] clue and guessed Gordie Howe off the O. When it became clear that it wasn't Howe, I thought "Hockey player, four letters, second letter O — how can that not be Howe?" That's when I actually read the clue and saw I needed a baseball player. Of course! Hideo NOMO. That's probably a good name to know. I bet he'll come up in a puzzle again soon....
  
• I had ipso dixit, instead of IPSE.
  
• I wanted the dreaded "see me!" note instead of the defiant "SEZ me!" Man I always hated finding the "see me" note on my chair back when I worked for the ... ya know what? I'm not going to say anything mean about him today. It's Christmas after all.
  
• I'm going to declare publicly right now that my New Year's resolution is to learn the four-letter rivers of the world. This is getting ridiculous. I knew I'd have to wait for a cross on this one. And when I got the E, I confidently entered Ebro. Reasonable, right? Well sure, except that the Ebro is in Spain and the clue points to a river in Germany. The ELBE. Ach!
  
• Couldn't get the name O'Toole out of my head for the Confederacy of Dunces author. I knew I was close, knew it wasn't right, but had a really hard time coming up with the correct answer. Maybe one day I'll actually read the book and that will help.
  
• Finally, I fell for the misdirection in [Peck part], reading it as peck apart, which brought all kinds of creepy Tippi Hedren images to mind. But the answer was the benign Captain AHAB, a part Gregory Peck played in the 1956 film "Moby Dick." Hey, he also played a part in the 1998 TV production of "Moby Dick." And looky here: he was in both the original (1962) and the remake (1991) of "Cape Fear" too. Did you guys see that movie? PuzzleHusband and I were just talking about it the other day (the remake, not the original). That is a Seriously Creepy movie. I remember being disturbed for days after seeing it.
  
• Wanted basic for BASAL, but knew LANI Guinier was right.

It was just tough all the way through! Good stuff, but I was not on the wavelength At All.

In Paula Gamache's CrosSynergy crossword, "Internally Consistent," the word same is buried in the theme answers: makeS AMEnds, gosSAMEr, MrS. AMErica, seSAME seed, haS A MEal.

Quick hits:

• "Whatever you say' = I'M EASY. You can never have too many Commodores videos.
  
• The hat trick is accomplished by a hockey player when he scores three goals in one game. There are hat tricks in other sports, also referring to doing something three times, but I think this is the most common understanding of the term.
  
• So when did it become okay to spell amoeba AMEBA? I see it all the time in puzzles and it makes me pause every single time.
  
• I don't remember ever hearing of the MAYPO brand of breakfast cereal. But it's got quite a long history. Did MTV rip of—er, borrow their first catchphrase from Maypo's ad campaign?
  
• Hey look, it's Hideo NOMO! I told you he would turn up again!
  
• [Finishes second] = LOSES. Harsh.
  

Read More...

Summary only...

Monday, 8/18

Jonesin' 4:02
CS 3:42
LAT 3:13
NYS 3:02
NYT 2:34

(post updated at 8:51 p.m. Monday and 9 a.m. Thursday)

The non-NYT, non-Sun puzzle blogging will likely be delayed. Yours truly has jury duty on Monday, and has been staying up late watching the Olympics and then sleeping in each morning, so getting downtown by 8:30 is a tall order. I'd better pack my messenger bag with puzzles tonight to make sure I'm all set...

Paula Gamache is on a roll with fun early-week puzzles in the New York Times. This time, her theme is a DEADHEAD (63-Across), and dead can head each of the words in the other five theme answers:

• [1981 film starring William Hurt and Kathleen Turner] is BODY HEAT. Dead body, a dead heat.
  
• [Hoopster's complete miss] is an AIR BALL. A broadcaster's dead air, a dead ball.
  
• [Z, alphabetically] is the LAST LETTER. It's not much of a stand-alone phrase, but dead last and the dead letter office are absolutely "in the language."
  
• [Painted highway divider] is the CENTER LINE. Dead center, deadline.
  
• [Touchdown site] is the END ZONE. Dead end, dead zone or The Dead Zone.
  

Clues of note:

• [From a different perspective, in chat room lingo] is OTOH, or "on the other hand." Why do I keep seeing clues that specify chat rooms? I suspect the vast majority of OTOH usage is in blogs, e-mail, IM, text messages, and discussion boards, and much less in chat rooms.
  
• SHADOW is clued [Peter Pan lost his]. Really? Not sure I knew that.
  
• LASER TAG is a [Team game with infrared-sensitive targets]. My son loved it when he played for the first time this summer.
  
• I don't know anyone who uses the term ECOCARS to describe [High-m.p.g. vehicles], but such cars sure are getting more popular now.
  
• MR. TOAD is ["The Wind in the Willows" amphibian].
  
• [Sedated, perhaps] means ON MEDS.
  
• The [Title girl in a 1983 Kool & the Gang hit] is JOANNA.
  
• THE WAVE! It's a [Motion made by fans in a stadium], provided that those fans are a bit dorky en masse.
  

Alan Arbesfeld's New York Sun crossword, "Embodiment of Nature," uses an expanded 15x16 grid to accommodate the theme entries. The theme entries are phrases in which one word is a body part and another is a natural feature. For example, BERT PARKS includes the anatomical Bert and some state PARKS. No, just kidding. That one's not a theme entry. Neither is DOVETAIL, though tail can be considered a body part.

• RIVER MOUTH is a [Delta locale].
  
• FOOTHILLS are the [Region at the base of a mountain range].
  
• A BEACHHEAD is the [Landing spot for naval forces].
  
• [Cayuga or Seneca, e.g.] is a FINGER LAKE. 
  
• NECK OF THE WOODS, or [Neighborhood], includes two small words between the nature and body part words.
  

Updated:

Jury duty was great. Four hours to sit quietly and do puzzles, with a leisurely hour and a half for lunch? Good citizenship never felt so good.

The Across Lite version of the LA Times crossword is taking the day off, perhaps. Tuesdays are busy for me, but I hope to catch up on the LAT tomorrow.

Matt Jones's Jonesin' crossword, "Hit the Bricks," has a "Super Mario Bros." theme. Yup, a videogame I've never played features a STAR CHAMBER, MUSHROOM CLOUD, and FLOWER CHILD. All the TIRAMISU and '80s HEADBANDs in the world can't make up for a theme that is, for all the good it did me, "random phrases that fit." (Sigh.)

Randolph Ross's CrosSynergy puzzle, "Common Sense Solutions," is the second one I've done today with a five-senses theme. (The other one hasn't been published yet—I was doing a little test-solving at jury duty this morning.) The five theme entries begin with TASTE, HEAR, SMELL, TOUCH, and SEE. Tons of 7-letter answers in the fill surrounding the theme entries—and one of them made zero sense to me. PUTOUTS are [Many tag plays]? I suspect baseball, but can't say for sure because I've never heard the term.

Updated again on Thursday:

I finally got around to the previously missing LA Times crossword. It's credited to Gia Christian, an anagram of "it's Rich again," or editor Rich Norris. The five theme entries are mopey, or at least they begin with synonyms of that. There's a DEPRESSED MARKET, LOW BUDGET, SAD EXCUSE, BLUE BLOOD, and DOWN UNDER—all of which use their synonyms in non-tristesse contexts. The tricky spots for beginners tackling a Monday puzzle are clumped together in the lower right corner: [Old dagger] is SNEE; [Lyric poem] is EPODE; OLEO is a [Bread spread], and UCLAN is [USCer's rival]. Elsewhere there's also OMOO, the [Melville novel set on Tahiti].

Read More...

Summary only...

Sunday, 2/24

NYT 9:45
BG 8:44
LAT 8:30
WaPo 7:34
PI 7:24
CS 4:15
NYT diagramless untimed

I only have a few minutes before I go out for the evening, and may or may not write more about Nancy Joline's New York Times crossword later on. I'm verrrry tired today after being on the radio 'til 1 a.m. The "Winners' Circle" theme (and I assume there was an apostrophe there—it showed up as a box character on the applet for me) salutes past Oscar winners by having eight winners (movies, actresses, actors, director, song) in the long entries embracing eight more winners whose names (last name only) are included within the long names in circled squares. Thus, MARLEE MATLIN enclasps David LEAN. Yes, this is essentially another movie trivia theme, as some of you have grown weary of such themes this week. I think it's a great theme, personally, though the clues—e.g., [Actress (1986), director (1962)] for Marlee and David—usually gave me only minimal help in guessing the answers. The crossing clues/fill seemed pretty gettable, by and large, so the puzzle took a little longer than usual but not dramatically so. And I didn't mind that 1-Across, THE OSCAR, was thematic but not paired with a related entry in the opposite corner.

(An aside: This is Will Shortz's "asymmetry is OK!" weekend, with Patrick Blindauer's beautiful diagramless crossword having a soupçon of asymmetry amid its visual punch. More on that puzzle later tonight or on Sunday.)

Back to the Sunday crossword: There's an unfamiliar clue for TSE, [Philosopher Kung Fu-___]. I liked [Password, e.g.] for ENTREE. Possibly knotty crossing between Prime Suspect's Jane TENNISON (Helen Mirren, I believe) crossing the [Fish in fish and chips], PLAICE. Hmm, COD just won't fit there. [Villa in Mexico] took me a while to understand—PANCHO Villa, the name, not a villa = el pancho.

If you're wondering who the circled people are in the theme entries, we have Charlize THERON, Gregory PECK, David NIVEN, Nicolas CAGE (for Leaving Las Vegas, I presume), David LEAN, Michael CAINE, Dianne WIEST, and CHER (in...was it Mask or Silkwood?).

Gotta mosey!

Updated Sunday morning:

I went to dinner and Targét last night, came home, and was rendered unconscious by the sofa in short order. Am much refreshed this morning!

Patrick Blindauer's diagramless crossword could be entitled "Here's Looking at You": The completed grid depicts a big eye staring out of the page at the solver. (After Tyler Hinman expressed his disappointment that I was routinely using the starting square hint, I quit using the hint. Hey, that doesn't take much longer at all! Just an extra piece of paper, that's all.) The symmetry would be top/bottom and left/right were it not for one less black square in the pupil zone of the eye. I'm glad that Patrick and Will were willing to experiment with a little asymmetry, because this puzzle was a delight. The four longest Across answers contain EYE in a non-eye context, and the middle Down entry at the bottom is EYE, [Observer that's found in 8-, 31-, 48- and 66-Across]. Here, for anyone looking to check their answers, are all the Across answers, whited out (to view them, click your mouse and drag it over the white space):

1A VISTA (centered in the middle of the top row), 6A PENCILS, 8A BREYERSICECREAM, 16A PROVERB, 17A CHARMER, 19A LACES, 20A ASH, 23A GOTTI, 24A INKS, 25A POSSUMS, 29A ORTS, 30A EDY 31A HACKNEYED, 33A ALE, 34A RIVIERA, 36A STREAKER (the first letter occupies what would be a black square if the grid were symmetrical), 38A FAQS, 39A RAVI, 40A HABITUE, 43A EPITOME, 47A IRA, 48A HEYERDAHL, 52A BAR, 53A LANE, 55A TSHIRTS, 56A LTYR (light-year), 57A TBIRD, 59A SPY, 60A NEATO, 61A SISTERS, 64A TRIVIAL, 66A CHEYENNEWYOMING, 70A LANYARD, and 71A GEENA.

And now, the other crosswords:

I really don't recall a barrage of Oscar-themed puzzles in previous years. What, does it take a writer's strike and a threat that the telecast will be canceled to flush all the Oscar crosswords into the open? The syndicated LA Times crossword by Rich Norris (a.k.a. "Gia Christian"), "Screen Gems," revealed pretty quickly that the theme phrases included an Oscar winner's name, repurposed as a non-name word. But then I realized that each one included two Oscar winners! That was a lovely "aha" moment. The SWANK CAGE features Hilary Swank and Nicolas Cage, for example. I'm not sure who each winner is—PAGE and YOUNG?—but I knew enough of them for it to be fun. The clue for 78- and 79-Down explains that the nine theme entries contain 18 BEST ACTOR / OR ACTRESS winners. My favorite theme entry was [Promote hair growth?], FOSTER HANKS.

Kelsey Blakley's Washington Post crossword, "Frankenwords," presents a set of portmanteau words, such as EDUTAINMENT, LABRADOODLE, and MOCKUMENTARY. All eight of the theme words were clued straightforwardly and I've seen them before, so it seemed easy. My favorite misstep was [Shute's "A Town Like ___"]. I had the C and promptly filled in NANCY. I don't know why! It's ALICE.

Merl Reagle's Philadelphia Inquirer puzzle, "Four Little Words, The Sequel," makes use of the candidate theme answers he didn't use in another recent puzzle. Each phrase takes the form X, two little words, rhymes-with-X: for example, SHOP TILL YOU DROP and CRUISIN' FOR A BRUISIN'. Perle Mesta gets an indirect reference in HOSTESS WITH THE MOSTEST. The theme entry at the top of the puzzle is NERVOUS FROM THE SERVICE, [Shell-shocked, in WWII slang]. I was familiar with that one only because Merl was asking about it on the Cruciverb-L mailing list not long ago. I believe he was surprised to learn that it had been completely unknown to a number of people.

Emily Cox and Henry Rathvon's online Boston Globe puzzle, "No End in Sight," deviously tried to hide its theme from me for too long. Dastardly theme! Once I paid enough attention to see what the theme entries were doing, I loved the theme. Each entry's a phrase minus its last letter. So bargain basement becomes [Low-salaried infielders?], or BARGAIN BASEMEN. There's also AGENT ORANG, the FBI ape, a SEVENTH HEAVE (not clued as what follows the sixth round of retching, fortunately!), SISSY SPACE, and more. Great theme! I'll bet there are plenty of other candidates for this type of theme and I wouldn't at all mind seeing another version.

Bruce Venzke and Stella Daily's CrosSynergy themeless puzzle has four completely natural 15-letter phrases forming a frame across all four sides: I DEMAND A RECOUNT and the all-too-rare-at-O'Hare ON-TIME DEPARTURE, and the PICK OF THE LITTER who probably aren't stuck being SECOND-STRINGERS. Fairly easy for a themeless crossword, with no deadly clues or fill.

Read More...

Summary only...