This just in: What happened in the commments when the Saturday NYT crossword was too easy? Room boasted. Yeesh!
@JohnWM And he gets a Spoonerism in there to boot! Meta marvellous!
@JohnWM Forget Saturday. I can barely do a Wednesday these days! I had two ninety day streaks going between end of ‘23 and beginning of ‘24. Almost half a year of solves without a single look up. (I missed Dec. 12th, I believe) Huge shift in difficulty the last couple months, in my opinion. Not complaining, and I know I’m far from a great solver, but I will say, “the streak” drives engagement for me. Until recently, I would always make time for the puzzle, no matter how busy I was. Without the streak, I’m not so compelled.
Laughed out loud when, very late, I figured that the 70's Ford was GERALD rather than a car.
@Andrea L. As a child of the '70s, I was sure it would be a Ford GALAXY, because GRAN TORIBO did not fit. (The car name is actually spelled Galaxie.)
@Andrea L. I had LARIAT for a while. Best clue of the week in my opinion,
For me, this puzzle highlighted that great genre of clue – the delayed reward clue – where you don’t get it on your first visit, but you get it with a BOOM on your second or third. That brings about an exultant “Hah!”, followed often by a spate of madly thrown-in answers off of the letters you just inserted. And suddenly you have a filled-in patch that was previously desert. One of the great Crosslandia moments. Then it happens again. Each of these elevates the mood, and for me, todays puzzle had a bunch. And, as the Beatles said, I feel fine. Just as a reminder, Garret, now in his first year at the University of Chicago, had Andrew as a teacher in high school, and this is their fourth NYT collaboration. It’s a warm fuzzy backstory that makes my heart smile. That center stack pulses with fresh energy – BOOM ROASTED and CRISPY BACON are NYT puzzle debuts, and WARM FUZZIES has appeared just once before. The same holds true for that stack in the NW, where LESBIAN BARS and FRIEND DATES are debuts as well. As a result, the grid is energized, filled with perk, absent of same-old. So, an ain’t-life-grand solving experience for me today. Garret and Andrew, you’ve got a good thing going, and may it continue – please! This was sterling, and thank you so much!
@Lewis You are correct. Boy howdy, it really sizzled!
A whole puzzle centered around BOOM, ROASTED???? Who even says that?
Excellent Saturday puzzle! Today is my cooking day, pre-Passover, so I needed a challenge to wake me up, but not so difficult that it would take all day. Loved the clue: Running mate for ELOPE. But YEESH, so many complaints about Will, working on his recovery, while Joel is taking flak from people who obviously will find anything to complain about! I sure hope no one lets Will see these comments; he doesn't need the added stress. And Joel, you know it's just part of the job. You and the rest of the gang are doing a fine job. If you pleased everybody all of the time, the clock would strike midnight and your subway would be a pumpkin.
@Mar in PA: I have no insight into how the NYT crossword editing team functions. (If others do, I'd welcome their views.) However, the recent complaints about things running amok in Will's absence are pure speculation. For one thing, isn't there a huge backlog of puzzles slated for publication? Also, I assume a more collegial approach where multiple editors review each puzzle. FWIW, I haven't noticed any difference in the recent puzzles.
I’m sure I’m not the only one who started with Napoleon’s big HAT, and went marching off in the wrong direction.
@Petrol A hands up for hat here too. I felt quite sheepish when I finally filled in EGO.
I was told there'd be no meth ewoks > emus
"Don't cook breakfast anymore." "But I thought my food was eggs-cellent! Now I'm bacon aback." (I guess he's toast.)
@Mike A cookbook can always Canadian prep. 🥓🥓🥓🥓🥓 🥓 (Emus adore bacon, eggs not so much)
@Mike YEESH! My BORSCHT made them BELCH. Why? Beets me.
I am not a lesbian. I am a middle-aged gay man, who on more than one occasion has asked my middle-aged gay Partner "Who goes to gay bars anymore? and why?" Certainly not for the sybaritic reasons I did in 80's-90's, since--like the giving of gift cards--such transactions can be more efficiently handled over the internet. Back in those days, when I was coming up (and out), back in my hometown of Cleveland OH, there were two lesbian bars--Five Cent Decision (later renamed The Nickel), which didn't welcome men; and another, a dance club on W 6th St., which did--it was known to have some of the best dance music in town, and was the go-to place on Tuesday nights, back when clubs had "nights". Alas, I can't remember its name; and try finding *that* on the internet! I suppose as long as there are women with a zeal for appletinis, as well as other women, there will be lesbian bars, but they are becoming fewer and fewer in number: somewhere between 25-30 nationwide by some reckonings, but I suppose that depends on how you define the term. Does the presence of two lesbians at the same time, out on a friend-date, qualify it as a lesbian bar? Some resources: <a href="https://parade.com/living/lesbian-bars" target="_blank">https://parade.com/living/lesbian-bars</a> <a href="https://www.lesbianbarproject.com" target="_blank">https://www.lesbianbarproject.com</a>/ Well, composing this post sure elicited some autumnal WARM FUZZIES!
Bill, The two Manhattan bars in your links were founded by lesbians, but Cubbyhole, which today bills itself as "the friendly neighborhood bar," never turned men away. Henrietta Hudson was definitely for women only, and as a straight cis male I would still not be welcome there, but today it is "a queer human space built by Lesbians." And while we're in the neighborhood, let's be careful with our language: there were lesbians in that "gay bar" The Stonewall Inn.
@Bill I like a challenge and the opportunity to learn stuff so I did a deep dive into Cleveland's gay history. You're right, they don't make it easy. any chance it was The Vaults at 1281 West Sixth Street (opened in October 1975)? That's pretty much the only LGBTQ bar or club I could find on W 6th.
So much to love about this puzzle. I love a ZIPPY start like the Napoleon clue. Love the cross of COMFY and WARMFUZZIES. Love those 5 O’s clustered in the middle. Never heard of BOOMROASTED even though I’ve seen The Office, but just watched the clip—hysterical. Love the clue for RUB but I guess that’s the Hamlet lover in me. Loved that WOOKIEES was spelled right even though I forgot it. Love the clue for EROSION. Loved the pace of this puzzle. Some start slow and then fall fast, some start fast and then one corner is a grind, this just kept slowly building but I was guessing to the end (the middle for me). One of my favorite themeless puzzles in a while. My only nit—how is BAILS dips? Like bailing a boat?
@SP As someone with two boys now in their 20's, I heard "Boom, Roasted" all the time! So fun to see it in the puzzle.
@SP I had to look that one up too and it was the last square I filled in. From the dictionary. US slang : to leave especially suddenly or prematurely I didn't know anyone at the party so I dipped. So, obviously, then like bail: abandon a commitment, obligation, or activity.
@SP I'm with you on not understanding dips/BAILS (31D). I had BAINS, thinking dips could be French baths (bains). So I had Toby BENCH (36A), which seemed vaguely correct from seeing that Shakespeare play eons ago. Luckily another commenter said it was Toby BELCH, so I corrected bains to BAILS and got the happy music. But still wasn't familiar with the slang use of dips. Glad to learn new things doing the puzzles! All in all a good one. Taking hubby to Urgent Care tomorrow early for xray on a hand injury. Hopefully sprained, not broken. He tripped trying to jump over a hose at a construction site. Maybe best not to try these things in your 70s?
As a sober guy, I'm glad the only way I use METH nowadays is a an answer in a crossword puzzle! As a dog lover, I first thought "Chew the doors" would have something to do with puppy separation anxiety. And I was certain for a long while that the "Mighty" thing was a pen. Otherwise, the vibe of this puzzle felt like chatting with a good friend. A good friend who teaches me how WOOKIEES is actually spelled.
@Gregg I thought "chew the doors" was another way to characterize over-acting/emoting and didn't catch on until I had SPOO- in there.
@Gregg & @MOL I thought of both the puppy and the stage options, so waited for some crosses to see which is was. When the penny dropped it was a great forehead-smacking moment.
Like everyone else, I knew 31A thanks to the 1988 vice presidential debate. Democratic nominee Senator Lloyd Bentsen to Republican nominee Senator Dan Quayle: "Senator, I served with Jack Kennedy. I knew Jack Kennedy. Jack Kennedy was a friend of mine. Senator, you're no Jack Kennedy. Boom! Roasted!"
I was told there'd be no meth
@Becca was this one written first but held onto for several hours? I saw the one from about four hours earlier with all the white space. The struggle is real!
TIL that CRISPY BACON has the same number of letters as STRIPS OF HAM. Aye, there’s the RUB.
@SusanEM And apparently, you also learned which of the two goes into a Cobb Salad. (CRISPY seems superfluous, though; who would consider using soggy BACON?) !!!! !!!!
Well, as President Kennedy once said, 'We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things -- including the Saturday puzzle -- not because they are easy, but because they are hard...' Speaking of other things: Chewbacca had a lot of fur, but who knew about the extra E?? YEESH!
@LBG I had theewoks for the longest time because I didn’t realize WOOKIEE had that last e!
"boom roasted" I assume comes from one of the best scenes from the american version of the office, in which a rapid fire list of insults are rattled off with each followed by "boom roasted" For example: jim you're 6'11" and weigh 90lbs, Gumby has a better body than you. Boom roasted. Loved the puzzle. Five stars.
Started slow but with answers in all areas. Tying them together took, well, what’s the word for “finally clicking with the wavelength of the constructor(s)”? It should be a word. Crucivibing? I’m calling it “cruci-vibing.” So I crucivibed after about 15 minutes. Laughed when I got GERALD. Couldn’t believe when crosses got NAZCANLINES with me oblivious to the existence of them. Really liked this one. Thanks.
@CCNY NAZCAN was also unknown to me. That's why they call it a crossword! Not cross as in angry, but cross as in aha!
@CCNY Oh, no! It's NAZCANL i NES? I had an E in there. So it's a Fail for me, with one wrong letter. (And that after I had to run the alphabet with -EA- for 42A. It was a real slogfest.)
This was a great example for me of how idiosyncratic knowledge can make a puzzle that might otherwise have been hard go quickly. Seiji OZAWA is likely obscure to many, but I grew up in the Boston suburbs as the son of BSO fans during his heyday, so that was a personal gimme. That Z plus the clue led to WARM FUZZIES right away. I work on climate policy, and the main outcome of the 2014 UN climate talks in Lima, Peru involved the Non-state Actor Zone for Climate Action — a classic backronym. So with that second Z in FUZZIES, NAZCA_____ was easy enough. A Cobb salad is one of my go-to lunch items, so with AC in place I knew the ingredient we were munching on was some sort of BACON. The U above redirected me from naB to RUB, and it became clear that 31A was ____ROASTED. With most of the central stack in place, I could work out from there — and a puzzle that at first looked daunting ended up being done in well under my average time. Not that I’m complaining! Thanks Garrett and Andrew for another sparkling collaboration.
I solved this, with more help from Google than usual. Some consider lookups "cheating" but I'm learning something so I allow it.
@Chris LOL. I read that as “hookups”! Different kind of cheating!
@Chris I racked up seventeen 'cheats', but not as bad as the 26 'cheat' Saturday, or that really evil Saturday puzzle that required 31 'cheats'. I won't be able to solve the puzzle if I don't Google, so I allow it. Sometimes I learn (and retain) new things.
@Chris Ignore other people’s “rules” & do the crossword the way that works for you/you enjoy most. I’ve been doing the NYT crossword almost daily for around a decade. I still use Google or other reference works fairly regularly. I have a specific order in which I go to various reference works & techniques for searching, but I’d say most Saturdays I have to look up at least a couple things. I don’t look at search results from third-party crossword-answer websites. If I’m truly that stuck, I’ll bite the bullet & look at the answer key here. If it’s something that I really didn’t know, I’ll look up more information in hopes I’ll remember it next time. (I often do the same for answers I only got through the crosses) Sometimes I feel like the folks who refuse to look things up are actually missing out. I’ve fallen down some fascinating Wikipedia rabbit holes when trying to figure out answers.
A lot of trivia I didn’t know in this one, so I started out with a very bare grid. Then I got to Seiji OZAWA and sighed in relief that there was at least one gimme for me with some good letters. I knew APPLETINI from the description, as it used to be my drink of choice back when I occasionally used to drink cocktails, but started off spelling out martini in full and thought perhaps there was a rebus that needed to be entered somewhere in APmarTINI. Once the grid started filling in, I found myself delighted by the wordplay that had initially stumped me. Course addendum referring to food, not a class. Get set being to HARDEN and not get ready in some way. Plus words like ZIPPY are just fun to enter. Thanks for a puzzle that left me with WARMFUZZIES!
@Rachel I took an AP Martini class in high school.
Fantastic Saturday puzzle. Inroads leading to ahas and nothing developing to everything in a very satisfying way. I did remember the extra letter in Chewbacca’s species name, but didn’t remember whether it was the I or E that got doubled. I highly recommend the strategy of leaving blank squares - including whole word blanks - for later: WOOKI-ES ( i or e?) SEEM-O (s or t?) - - NS (ca or ti?) -OS (l or d?) - - PPY (zi or pe?) In other recent puzzles AMEBA- (e or s?) etc. Taking away the pressure to put _something_ in lessens the difficulties unnecessarily added by having wrong letters in place. That got me down to a single square where Boom crossed Bails, which I guessed correctly. Half my average time, twice my average enjoyment on this one.
@David Connell I confidently put in the extra 'i', fortunately it soon became clear it should be an 'e'. I had ZestY before ZIPPY. And had the same SEEMtO / SEEMSO as you, along with SEEMas. Had LAS before LOS… While I'm quite willing to leave squares or words blank when unsure— you have an excellent point about it being better not to throw a wrench into the works with a shaky wrong letter— I often use an interesting gimmick suggested by a commenter here many months ago, I don't remember her name: I use the rebus function to put alternate letters into the same square! For instance, for the literal 'kealoa' I encountered recently in an archived (June 2021) puzzle, for the clue "Mauna ___" I simply put in: [LK] [OE] [A] in the three squares. It soon became clear it was LOA. But that really helps when I'm fairly sure it could be one of two or three alternates. Of course sometimes it turns out to be none of the above! But these rebused-in multiple letters throw me off less than even a 'penciled'-in single letter because the multi letters are inherently uncertain-looking and don't tend to throw me off too badly. It's a nice little gimmick that helps in a Schrödingeresque kind of way. Is it a floor wax? Is it a dessert topping? It's a floor wax AND a dessert topping! She's her sister AND her daughter! Kealoa! Quantum superpositioning! . …Actually no it'd end up being just one of the two rebused-in alternates. Got a little carried away there Carry on
@David Connell Pen and paper.....there's always a 'margin for error'! [wink] I do leave blanks even though it's easy to erase with my FriXion pen....
Another outrageous puzzle. Brilliant. I think I must have a masochistic streak, in the way that people who love horror movies like to be scared, and people who love magic like to be fooled. I like to be toyed with, bamboozled, and mesmerized by illusion. It’s like I know the answer, but I can only find it if I can overcome the sensation caused by the dancing lights in the puzzle. Somewhere in my under-brain, I am thinking “well, I would call that WARMFUZZIES, but that’s not the answer…” After much peripatetic meandering, I come back to it, defeated like Napoleon from Moscow, and hey… that IS the answer!
@Petrol "I think I must have a masochistic streak" Me too - I have the most fun when I go through that feeling of impending failure and then somehow pull it together.
I rarely complain about the quality of cluing, but today I make an exception: The clue for 31A, giving us BOOMROASTING - Please! This is so far off the wall that the Webb Space Telescope can't spot it. Who knows this? Hip 20 year old New Yorkers who know all the latest idioms? 31D - Dips = BAILS. I grew up on small boats that needed bailing and I've read all the Melville and Hornblower books. I'm a ex-professional mariner, unlimited tonnage master with three advanced college degrees. Equating dipping with bailing is more than a stretch. Unfair clue. No, let's not mince words. t's a really BAD clue. 30D - Mysterious ancient geoglyphs = NAZCALINES. Only archeologists would know this. Arcane knowledge in the extreme. Summary: If you solved this one with no look-ups, consider yourself a CROSSWORD PUZZLE MASTER who should immediately audition for Jeopardy. Degree of difficulty is through the roof. Not fun - not fair.
Us young folks are so frequently stymied by factoids from many decades ago, so this was only fair! BOOM ROASTED and BAILS both qualify as common colloquialisms as far as I'm concerned. NAZCA LINES was a tough one though, that one was trivia in the back of my mind.
@Laura Stratton For me 30D filled in from crosses. I then searched the answer to confirm it. L
@Laura Stratton-Dip is a current slang term for leaving a social event. “Gotta dip” means the same thing as “gotta bail”.
All good, but why are there two E's in WOOKIEES?
@Alan Young. Because, apparently, that is the way it was spelled, in the original series. Got me too. Emus are not in Star Wars
@Alan Young I cheated to the extent that I looked up the spelling. I should remember it by now because I know it’s got the unnecessary second E.
@Alan Young Wookiees (with 2 Es) are from the planet Kashyyyk (with 3 Ys). "They're not the phonetics you're looking for."
If I can't solve a puzzle with no look-ups: 1. I lack the necessary knowledge, and/or; 2. The cluing is bad. This puzzle stopped me in my tracks on both counts, see numbers 1 and 2 above. To me, no look-up streaks are everything. This broke an 18 day streak. I don't mind it when it's just a lack of knowledge, but when it's the result of bad cluing, shame on the crossword writer(s). I wonder if Mr. Shortz would have allowed this one to be published as is.
Laura, Your first post said the puzzle humbled you. I see that on reflection you've decided to blame the constructors and the editors for your humbling. Now you can read responses that explain why the only problem was your point #1. I'm sorry you didn't quit while you were ahead. Emus may not like this post
@Barry Ancona IMO, look-ups are cheating, anyway!
I enjoyed this puzzle - lol’d the clever 2D ‘70s GERALD Ford. Great misdirection after the 58A had me thinking of mid 20th century cars like the GTO. The best part? Commenters noted the instances of OO, but I count 13 double and even one triple letter, like the 34A ZZ.
Ooh. I found so much to love about this one. I’ve only had an APPLETINI once, at the Aurora ice bar above the arctic circle. After you finish your drink you take the cocktail glass outside and throw it on the ground. Apparently glasses made of ice are not dishwasher safe. My neighborhood is woefully lacking in both LESBIANBARs and ice bars. Heavy sigh.
That was really hard, but fun and fair! The puzzle is supposed to puzzle.
I was told there’d be no math. A sine and a square root (in Spanish no less). YEESH! Nevertheless, I was breezing through this witty Saturday puzzle, until the SE corner proved to be a crash site. I proudly entered stageidiom for chew the doors, thinking it made sense, and figuring that would make that final corner a snap. It fit with ASA and SEEMSSO, so it must be right, right? Instead it just made it much harder for me fill in any of the rest. Only after finally recalling NAZCALINES was I persuaded to remove my errant entry, and freed from the shackles of my mistake I was able to finish. I liked the triplet Os in HADNOOOMPH, which nestled in a cluster of other O’s. Not to mention all the Os in BOOMROASTED and SPOONERISM. So I would say this puzzle was Ok.
I found it a bit more challenging than usual, though not as hard as some recent Saturdays. Sir Toby BELCH, Seiji OZAWA and WARM FUZZIES got me started and hopeful of a quick solving time. Then I got stuck around BOOM ROASTED (which goes in the “if you say so” category). The GERALD clue got me—nice one! I was interested to learn that methamphetamine is sometimes used to treat ADHD and obesity. Thanks, gents!
@Eric Hougland Oh yeah, '70s Ford was a nastily good one. Torino fit nicely but Napoleon's big ego told me to try another tack.
@Eric Hougland, GERALD got me good too! I was thinking that for once it'll be a car model I've actually heard of, and then sat there nonplussed, staring at GERA for the longest time before I finally twigged. Made me laugh out loud. Great puzzle despite quite a few things I've never heard of, but I question the ? for LESBIANBAR. Where's the wordplay? The clue seems perfectly straightforward. The editors are so inconsistent with this. I actually hesitated to fill in the obvious,thinking there must be some trick to it.
@Teresa, I had the same response at first, and then caught the double meaning of “out.”
I stumbled over ‘70s Ford, as Galaxy was far, far away from GERALD.
@John P I was going to be pretty mad if it was Galaxy. The Ford Galaxie is indeed spelled with an IE! I was looking at my 65 convertible Galaxie in the garage and hoped the NYTCW didn’t flub that clue haha.
After finishing the puzzle last night, I went to bed with Jonathan Richman’s Dancing At The Lesbian Bar running through my head. It’s still there this morning.
@Marshall Walthew One of my favorite memories of Providence in the late 70's is seeing Jonathan Richman play at the little bar under I-195. Unfortunately, my memory does not include the name of the bar!
@Marshall Walthew for that who don't have it in their heads yet <a href="https://youtu.be/XjFU98mEem4?si=37_c2dY5pPtvMn_p" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/XjFU98mEem4?si=37_c2dY5pPtvMn_p</a>
@Marshall Walthew Ooh, ooh, ooh.
So I was listening to Wait Wait Don't Tell Me just before and heard Helen Hong say Hundo. I expect at some point in the next few days, I will hear someone say BOOM, ROASTED.
This was an enjoyable challenge. One quibble: The Barracuda was a pony car whose Pontiac equivalent was the Firebird. The larger Pontiac GTO was a midsize muscle car that faced competition from Plymouth's GTX, and its slightly cheaper variant, the Road Runner.
I'm LOVING this trend of tougher Saturday puzzles. This one was just so much fun to work out. I had paDS before BEDS, SHave before SHEAR, and caNS before TINS, but it was the 2 empty boxes at the end that I feared would bring me down. _OOM ROASTED, _AI_S, BE_CH had me trying out many letter combinations in my head for quite a few minutes and I think it was pure intuition that delivered the correct letters, because I was completely unfamiliar with all three. Surprising myself, I got HAD NO OOMPH with only the first H and the P in place, but the brilliant clue for GERALD tied me in knots for a while. Garrett and Andrew do great work together, and their sense of humor permeates throughout this wonderful puzzle.
I am just not having fun with puzzles here anymore. I feel like I learned to solve Will Shortz puzzles in the pandemic, post pandemic era. And I got better at it over time. This new style is more old school like what you find in the archives. I always thought that those 10-15 year old puzzles were impossible for me. So after being able to solve Thursday to Sunday consistently for years, I can’t get anything these days. I don’t know how to tackle that. It’s like relearning the whole thing. I’m not having fun.
@Mu Stick with it, it’ll come. And when you break through it will feel great.
@Mu I actually find it rather new-school with its variant spellings and current references.
@Mu Do give it more time. If you haven't been taking breaks and putting it aside, I highly recommend doing so. If you don't have experience with the older puzzles, it's like moving to a new venue, and you have to learn how the editor thinks. Each time I add a new source for puzzles, I feel befuddled for a while, but patience and persistence always pays off.
Delightful puzzle, from SPOONERISM to Shakespeare (with Twelfth Night's Toby BELCH and Hamlet's "aye, there's the RUB). So let us eat and drink CRISPY BACON and APPLETINIS, and dance with Jonathan Richman at the LESBIAN BAR (<a href="https://youtu.be/qTLsfZk-FpE?si=GQNI0DPWyK3bMVql" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/qTLsfZk-FpE?si=GQNI0DPWyK3bMVql</a>) - a fun Saturday in all respects!
I loved this puzzle so much, that even when I got to the two parts I didn't love at all and where I had to guess wildly and, as it turns out, wrongly, I never stopped loving it. What I loved was the way in which almost all of the clues provoked curiosity. I was struggling, but I was never suffering. It was like playing detective. And then when the answers revealed themselves -- I felt so elated. SPOONERISM was a terrific surprise. I also loved LESBIAN BAR and FRIEND DATE. And I practically leaped into the air when WARM FUZZIES came in. For that one, I had to change NAB to RUB for "catch." I thought of Hamlet, natch. But what to do about NAZCAL?NES and ?OOMROASTED? I tried all the possible "dips" -- FAILS, RAILS, BAILS, HAILS, MAILS, NAILS, PAILS, SAILS, WAILS. None seemed right. I wanted ZOOM ROASTED, but ZAILS is not a word. I finally settled on RAILS (why? why?) and ROOM ROASTED. Those roasts always take place in a room, right? But what's BOOM ROASTED? And why are dips BAILS? You've got me. I did guess right on IMOVIE/NAZCALINES -- even though I'd been toying with EMOVIE/NAZCALENES. Well, at least there's that. So close to being a perfect themeless, but marred for me by those Naticky crosses. But a delightful almost-solve anyway.
@Nancy My experience was so similar, thanks for expressing it so well. This puzzle is so good that I'm not complaining about BOOMROASTED, I will not say one word about it. Thank you to the constructors, loved this puzzle so much!!
@Nancy As I just learned today---thanks to several posters---dip (out) means leave (hastily/quietly), as from a gathering. So one may dip out or one may bail.
@Nancy The only sense I could make of BAILS was that to bail is to dip. Over and over again. But it sounds as though other posters made better sense of it than that.
Worthy Saturday. I didn't know a single one of the long answers, but they all eventually fell through crosses. I really enjoyed the slow but steady solve and finished slightly under my rolling average with no lookups. Each time I was stuck in one part of the grid, there was a tiny way forward in another part. WREAKING was an unexpected delight when it finally fell, reminding me of the beauty of Albert Paley's wrought iron work. The only time things suddenly fell into place was on the very last word, SPOONERISM. As others say below, delightful.
It took me a while to crack the SE corner because I couldn’t get absinthe out of my mind and wondered if there was something called an absintini lol.
@Katie if you build it he will come. ;)
It's hard for us old people to refrain from complaining. It comes so naturally to us! This was a fun puzzle to solve. It took a while and lots of back & forth, up & down. I liked the clueing. Boom Roasted was the only one that had my head spinning.
I think puzzles with two constructors have a tendency to overdo it with arcana and seldom-used phrases, but that's just my personal taste.
"I'll take Minor Shakespearean Characters for $500, Alex." First CASSIO, now Sir Toby BELCH...will OSRIC put in an appearance tomorrow? Aye, there's the RUB.
@Grant - Having first encountered Toby in middle school (I think? could have been HS), I have never forgotten his surname. It was great fun to say his name in class, especially with the requires, um... pronunciation? I had a good English teacher who, I am now sure, anticipated and enjoyed how we played with that name.
I think the clue for 2D (‘70s Ford) for GERALD might be Clue of the Year, and it’s only April. A similar clue (Ford popular in the 1970s) was used on 9/16/03, but this one conveys the trickiness even better. Lewis, what say you?
@Steve L Fun fact about GERALD Ford: He was the only person to serve as both POTUS and VP without being elected to either office. Speaking of running mates, that was a very clever clue for ELOPES, and I hope to see that on the list come Sunday morning.
@Steve L -- There's also been [Memorable '70s Ford] in the LA Times in 2015 and a [Notable Ford of the '70s] also from the LAT (2019). I love the elegance of today's clue, but given the clue you mentioned plus these other two, especially the "Memorable" one, I think it's it would be a stretch to call it original. Your mileage may vary.
Fun puzzle... just the right amount of tough, but solvable with some fun misdirects. I especially enjoyed the following: 1A - HAT vs. EGO 45A - PEN vs. OAK 54A - CANS vs. TINS Also, TIL that WOOKIEES has a second E at the end. Always just assumed it was Wookie. Never claimed to be a Star Wars nerd, but I felt a little embarrassed as I am certain I have read and written that word a thousands times and never noticed the extra E.
@Zack In fairness, depending on where you read it it might have been misspelled. I saw all the movies, but I learned the spelling from NYTimes xword, and *still* when it shows up in the grid I think "Oh crap, there's a weird letter added... I? E? To the crosses!!"
Took me a while - what’s the catch? Aye, there’s the RUB. Superb Saturday boys.
I was chuffed to get 24A, OCHO, straight away, ( I did Spanish in the 50’s) but found today’s puzzle the most difficult one I can remember but glad so many enjoyed it.
A really tough one for me today, not so much for the clues, which were excellent, but the fact that the two long spans in the middle were utterly unknown phrases for me. It felt like I was working blind, trying to make sense of the crossing letters I managed to get. Shakespearean characters will generally be a gimme; Sir Toby Belch no exception and I surprised myself remembering OSIRIS. The rest was a slog, but TIL the name of the Peruvian ‘alien’ carvings. Shave before SHEAR held me up for too long, plus I had a real ‘doh’ moment when I got GERALD. Clever.
@Helen Wright I suspected pretty quickly which Ford they were talking about, but it took me the better part of the puzzle to remember his first name. That was humbling.