44D really bugged me. Goya is a Spanish painter. "Ándale" is an expression used mostly in Mexico. From a Spanish-Spanish perspective, "ándale" doesn't even make a lot of sense, for reasons I'm not going to go into here. "Ándale" is a Mexicanism. Mexican-Spanish pins a "le" on the end of a number of verbs and words derrived from verbs to express emphasis, surprise, agreement, disapproval, etc. Cluing "ándale" with a reference to a Spanish painter is like cluing "flat," as in "apartment," with a reference to Whitman, or "lassie" with a reference to Rothko. Further, as used most often by most Mexicans, "ándale" expresses agreement. "Vale" would be how Goya might have said the same thing, assuming colloquial use was the same back then as it is now. The idea that "ándale" means "go, go, go" comes mainly from Speedy Gonzalez.... (<a href="https://rescatedelesp.com/orale-andale-hijole-errores-o-regionalismos" target="_blank">https://rescatedelesp.com/orale-andale-hijole-errores-o-regionalismos</a>/)
@anon I had the same thought. "Ándale" isn't a Castilian Spanish expression. "Ve! Ve! Ve!" could've been a possible answer, or perhaps something more fitting for his time? *shrugs* Cool to see that someone else caught the Mexican-Spanish vibe from "Ándale".
anon, "Goya" is wordplay on "Go, go, go!" and signals a language, not a country, but perhaps on a Tuesday it should have been "...to Gonzalez." emus are speedy
Anyone hear ever heard of the word ENDUE before this puzzle?
@BJ Nope. I spent a lot of time trying to reconcile imbue with ninja. Usually I like what the vocabulary-challenged call a “ crossword puzzle word”, but I’ll stick with imbue, thank you. And, to pick a nit, you don’t “rat on”, you “rat out”. I don’t, personally, but I’ve heard about it.
I remember when I turned 22. What a bust. (I'm such a card.)
@Mike "Never hit seventeen When you play against the dealer You know that the odds Won't ride with you" Ian Tyson, Summer Wages <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4srnrgIh5Y8" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4srnrgIh5Y8</a>
Mike, I guess you couldn’t stay at 17. (The croupier hit ya with 5 aces?)
@Mike I bet you whist you had stood pat.
Goya, a Spanish person, would never use "ándale", a Mexican expression. Confused me plenty as a Spanish person, and it is simply wrong. Many other clues would have made sense, and would have been culturally appropriate. Googling "ándale" quickly shows any editor that this expression is very Mexican, so I wonder how they missed it.
@Rafael Speedy Gonzales said this a lot in the old Warner cartoons. That is where I heard it, and what I associated with this clue. Today it probably isn't PC, but a ton of kids watched those cartoons. I have a watch my uncle brought back from the Battle of the Bulge. So, in honor of Esme, I think I will wear it today.
@Rafael yes this was very odd clueing. Surely something like “go go go in Guanajuato” would have conveyed the same meaning correctly.
Endue? Granted, it's a word in very thick English dictionaries, but in 60 years of reading hours every day, I've never encountered it in actual English text. Maybe if you're going to use it in a Tuesday crossword, you should expand the clue to include some hint like (in nineteenth century hymns).
@Steve Demuth Yeah, probably too obscure for a Tuesday. But I got it from the crosses pretty easily, so no complaints... and I like learning obscure words, so for me winning that brief struggle trying to solve it, and learning that word when I did, was my favorite part.
@Steve Demuth totally agree ! Endue on a Tuesday is ridiculous. In typing this comment my phone autocorrected to “ensue,” because endue is not a common usage word. And the cross was a foreign language clue!
@Steve Demuth It's familiar to many who play the Spelling Bee, although I'll admit I never really knew the definition until its appearance here today.
The expression”suck face” I first encountered in the film “On Golden Pond”, and any time I hear it I go back to that memory. Strange how things get linked in a brain. Endue is a perfectly normal word. The only thing that makes words go extinct is not using them. If we live in fear of using any words outside of a core of twenty or thirty, we kill words. Think how boring the world would be, let alone the crossword puzzles, if we struck out all the words that somebody doesn’t know yet.
I have a moderately humorous anecdote about the term SUCKING FACE. I'm ancient enough that I learned programming on a mainframe with punch cards. It was a great innovation when remote terminals came about and you could just type your programs directly into the Televideo 925. No more handing over your punch cards to the ladies at the computer center! Yay! However, this did require having a logon ID and a password. In order to make my passwords memorable, I had a habit of making them rather... spicy, shall we say? The F word was a favorite ingredient. For some reason, I had not used the mainframe in a while and when I tried to log on, I could not remember my most recent password. This meant one thing: I had to go to the window in the computer center and ask the white-haired ladies at the window to retrieve my password for me. (Password security was rather lax back in those days...) I provided my ID and answered some questions and she ran off to look up my password. I did mention to her that my passwords were sometimes a bit on the salty side. When she returned, she looked at the slip of paper on which the password was written, and said, with great disgust " You aren't kidding about having an offensive password" and clucked at me once or twice. Another white-haired old lady asked "What was it?" Not wanting to say it out loud, lady 1 showed lady 2 the slip. SUCKFACE Lady 2: Oh, that's not bad at all! Henry Fonda said that to Kate Hepburn in On Golden Pond!
@CaptainQuahog Henry Fonda was not exactly being lighthearted when he said "Suck face." he meant it to be vulgar and disgusting, which it is.
@CaptainQuahog Sadly, I’m with you on the punch cards! Nightmare class for me, COBOL. I’m definitely not a girl who codes!
Amazing theme and delightful puzzle! Unfortunately, having no idea of the game rules, the finer points got lost on me. I grokked ACE in all the answers, but none of the other cards. So here I was thinking ACE has a value of twenty-one points. Gosh, I didn't even know that TWENTYONE and Blackjack are one and the same! TIL. You see, I only know how to play Canasta, which I learned from my four Eastern European grandparents. That, and how to shuffle cards (lots of flying cards strewn everywhere until I mastered it!) Also, casinos are not my gig. The energy feels too intense for me. But back to the puzzle. It was a pleasure to solve, and I thank you, Seth and Jeff, for that and, of course, for the memories of my grandparents.
@sotto voce Agreed, had no idea that blackjack could also be called TWENTY ONE... But that was easily found through the crossings. Fortunately, I didn't need the theme to figure out the answers, since I don't play. Hope your brain is a little less fuzzy today! ☺️
@sotto voce Chiming in as a grandparent whose granddaughter has recently learned to shuffle. Very pleased with her new skill.
I learned a new word today: ENDUE. I'm used to seeing things I've never heard of in the crossword - slang, names, sports terms - and I wouldn't be surprised to see a word that's new to me on Friday or Saturday. But in a Tuesday puzzle, it was a surprise! I'm leaving my dictionary open to the endosmometer-to-enemy page in hopes it'll sink in for future retrieval. And now I've accidentally learned what endosmosis is and what the device is that you measure it with. Not bad for a Monday evening. I liked the puzzle theme; I don't know the card game but it was easy to figure out the pattern so it helped with solving.
Is the NY Times aware that Goya was Spanish and that Spaniards don't say "Andale"? Not any more than Americans say "G'Day". Sometimes the puzzle seems to think that the Spanish-speaking world is monolitic.
@David - thank you. That one bothered me. Plus, the word itself has become rather cringe in American English as people screeching ANDALEANDALE when someone isn't moving as fast as they want.
@David Bothered me too, and held me up for a while. Very popular expression in Mexico, and maybe other places in Central or S. America, but I spent a great deal of time in Mexico, so that's where I heard it nonstop.
It’s a Jeff Chen collaboration so of course it’ll be entertaining/frustrating/tricksy, even if it is only Tuesday. Fabulous. Hands up for learning ENDUE. Crossing a Spanish term didn’t help this none Spanish speaker. Ouch. There’s seems to be some question as to TYRE being the correct term; I’m no car mechanic, but whenever I hear anyone here referring to a tyre, they mean anything to do with the round things that make our vehicles connect to the road, or am I being too simplistic? Anyhoo, it was a gimme for me. Didn’t know the game blackjack was what I know as pontoon. You live and learn. Summer has finally arrived in the UK, hurrah. Though as Glastonbury starts tomorrow (it’s only a few miles from me), it’s inevitable it will rain for the next 5 days.
@Helen Wright Glastonbury usually either heralds five days of downpours or five days of scorch. Having experienced the festival in both conditions (albeit many years ago!), wet is actually marginally more bearable. Hot ones are horribly dusty and smell even worse.
Really enjoyed this one. Tumbling to the theme was a big turning point and was the key to figuring out each of the theme answers for me. That's always a nice touch. Fun puzzle find today - a Thursday from March 27, 2003 by David J. Kahn. Four theme answers in that one and all of the clues were of the form "Nicholson role in...", e.g. Nicholson role in "Chinatown." The four theme answers were: PRIVATEEYE PRESIDENT OILRIGGER BOOKEDITOR But then the really fun part was the 'reveal.' "Apt title for this puzzle." JACKOFALLTRADES 15 letters. I'm done. ..
@Rich in Atlanta that’s awesome! I might have to go back and do that one today. Too bad wordplay doesn’t go that far back. I would have loved to read everyone’s thoughts about it.
While that is the British spelling, that is not a wheel. That is, at best, a part of a wheel.
@ez They couldn't really clue it with "tires", so what were their options? Rubber things on a lorry? Circular objects on a lorry? Ground connectors on a lorry? I guess wheel coverings would have worked, but I think the clue (not definition) of "wheels" was perfectly fine for a Tuesday level puzzle.
Joining the club. ENDUE was my last word. I had blithely filled in ENDOW without even considering the crosses, so after I got the "so close", I looked and said, "Duh OCLA and WKES definitely don't cut it." TIL: "ANDALE" from the puzzle, and from the comments here. TIwillapparentlyneverL: Which Spanish word I am going to need. Esos, esta, esas, and the list goes on. Always get them from the crosses.
@Amy I did the same, saw OCLA, and for a fraction of a second thought "Huh... maybe the University of Oklahoma is really expanding." I know how to spell Oklahoma. I was born and raised there. One of those forehead-slapping moments.
"Endue"? Wha? Uh...sorry, no. Last time used was...never? "Endow" for the win, 99 times out of 99. Don't get me started.
@E Hoffman I also got caught up in the "Endow/Andale/Life Of Riley" section. Once that was figured out, I was convinced "Attica" was the correct answer up top. LOL! Until I re-read the clue and realized ONE letter had been keeping me from stopping the clock...
Because anyone, at any age, can strut on a stage... Seth never did say where he came from Jeff said "it don't matter, grid is done" While today's crossword is bright It's wearier on Thursday night No one knows, constructors come and go Goodbye, Queasy Tuesday Who'd need CPR to help solve you? Hasta luego, needy clue day Still, I'm gonna fill you Don't question why Joel edits with ease He'll tell you it's the only way to please Since Will is MIA* We're tunedin, Ole! Yea! And nothing's lost, at subcription cost Goodbye, Queasy Tuesday Who could lose a star on you? When grids change with every week day Will, we're gonna miss you * ...Just waiting on a friend...
Fun to solve, and then I had to look closely to see all the face cards in the theme answers.
@Liz B I caught the face cards right away. But didn't notice that they were all shared with ACEs 'til I read the column. Also.... ENDUE? (Had ENDow for a while.)
A breezy Tuesday but still fun! Some clever cluing. I was able to get the theme clues without understanding the revealer, YMMV if you like that sort of thing. The only one that really threw me was ENDUE
@Bee I also solved ENDUE last, and only on the crossings, after convincing myself that it had to be ENDow. Turns out that ENDUE actually does mean "endow," almost exactly -- but it's an archaic variant. Oh well, nothing to get upset about. It didn't exactly slow me down 😊
Picked up on the theme fairly quickly, was looking for blackjack as the revealer but settled for 21. I was among the folks "gotten" by the ENDUE/ow assumption, and had to correct that before getting the gold star. Also had guessed at a few entries, and had to delete most of them when the crosses wouldn't confirm. As with any Jeff Chen cooperative, this was of very high quality. Congratulations on a very nice sophomore effort, Seth, and thanks to the both of you.
“For Esme with Love and Squalor” gets my vote for best short story ever written. I reread it now and then and cry every single time.
@KLW Finally a post I can feel happy to support. "For Esme with Love and Squalor" as an unqualified masterpiece, and such a deep dive into the soul of a tortured man. Such a pleasant find, a little gem in an expanse of petty complaints about ANDALE and ENDUE.
Checking in late, but I wanted to say I enjoyed the puzzle. I'm a little surprised about the ENDUE comments. ENDUE is such a beautiful word, and to me, it seems very different from ENDow, even though they're often used interchangeably. ENDUE seems more like something that passes to someone in a more subtle way. It's as if the person being ENDUEd with a quality is absorbing it from an atmoshere permeated with said quality as opposed to having something bestowed upon them. I feel like I don't have the correct words to express what I mean, but maybe that's why we need both.
@Nancy J. I sometimes think the complainers here would prefer to go to the Newspeak of Orwell's "1984", giving us such monstrosities as "double plus ungood" instead of the word "extremely bad".
44D: Goya was Spanish indeed. But nobody in Spain says “andale”. It’s a Mexican expression. Just thought I’d mention it.
Fun to see those ACEs appearing, and especially pleased when TWENTY ONE showed up. Just right for a Tuesday IMO. Well done, Seth, ( and Jeff, of course. )
I have a $20 limit on those rare occasions when I go into a casino. It would be gone in minutes if I played the slots, so blackjack was my game. I could stretch that $20 over a couple of hours, so if I lost at the end, at least I got my money's worth in entertainment. This puzzle was my game, and worth the price of admission. :)
@Janine We’ve got a similar rule. Usually $40 each. Only slots. We leave either when it’s gone, or when one of us has doubled it. Last year I got a good machine and our birthday gambling afternoon took exactly 7 minutes.
@Janine Twenty dollars or twenty minutes, whichever comes first. Lost money or lost time -- either way, I'm headed for the door.
Quite enjoyable puzzle, thanks, guys. My only quibble is the JACKET. I know RACER is necessary for the theme, but I've never heard of a racer jacket. Leather jackets are bomber jackets or biker jackets. Is this from car racing, have NASCAR drivers affected the style of leather bomber jackets? Not emu leather, I presume.
@Linda Jo I had trouble with that too and got it from crosses. However, Google shows it's a legit thing - it's one of those simple tailored things, not like the heavier bomber or biker jackets - and bonus, that Members Only is still around. I remember that brand from my daughter's high school years when preppies were in style.
@Linda Jo This one tripped me up as well and I thought of the "cafe racer." Do an image search for "cafe racer" or "leather cafe racer." Iconic jacket, you've seen them in films! Short mock collar, tab snap closure.
I’m sure Seth and Jeff were bracing for the ENDUE comments. I have nothing to add except that my familiarity with Mexican Spanish gave me ANDALE. TIL that it is exclusive to Mexico and not Goya’s Spain. It has different connotations depending on the stress. A terse Andale (andalay) means Go! Quick! Let’s go! Come on! But with a long stress on the first syllable Aahndalé it becomes more of a slangy affirmation or acknowledgement “that’s right!” “Okay” “correct” Being British I know my Lorries and tyres but I’d distinguish tyres from wheels. Apart from that I thought it was a good theme that helped the solve and a fantastic Tuesday puzzle. Aaaaaandalé!
One about 44-down, “Ándale”. Is the Goya in this clue referring to the Spanish painter from the 19th century? If that’s the case, he spoke the Spanish language spoken in Spain. “Ándale” is a word only used in the Spanish language spoken in other countries, possibly Mexico, but it’s definitely not a word we ever use in Spain (some Spanish people might not even know what it means) so it’s a word Goya would never use or even understand back then. The equivalent in Spanish from Spain would be “Vamos” or “Venga”.
(Tyres = tires) /= wheels Right?
@Steve In England - where they have lorries instead of trucks.
SUCKINGFACE was hilarious. Can we have more childishly crude words? xD
This is my second comment because I wake up in the middle of the night with this on my mind (surely inspired by my solve close to bedtime!): <a href="https://youtu.be/NlwIDxCjL-8?feature=shared" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/NlwIDxCjL-8?feature=shared</a> How appropriate! A musical accompaniment for the puzzle, brought to you by Sting. It's also the theme song for Luc Besson's 1994 movie, The Professional (a.k.a., Léon: The Profesional.) For those who've never watched it, it's an action-thriller that's worth every minute. One of my favorites ever of the genre.
@sotto voce Sorry have to take issue with this characterisation of Léon. It’s much more complicated and emotionally nuanced than a mere action-thriller. At the centre is a relationship between Léon and Matilda that is a bit deeper than most love stories / relationship movies and the back-drop of action is just the setting for this. Gary Oldman is brilliant as the baddy.
@sotto voce Natalie Portman! Jean Reno! Gary Oldman! Did I mention Natalie Portman?? Ugh, I love this movie so much! As William James wrote, the relationship between Léon and Matilda is so nuanced, and the tension as the plot unspools is indeed thrilling. Thanks, sv, for making that musical connection -- and providing a lovely start to the day!
As with many others had to first look up ENDUE before coming here. Today makes the 70th instance but not seen since 2015. Seth, someone was sure to use it again and . . . . . . it had 2 B U. <a href="https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=1/2/2023" target="_blank">https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=1/2/2023</a> Many thanks.
The word ENDUED occurs in a hymn that we occasionally sing in church. (The Church’s One Foundation). That’s the only reason I got it. Otherwise I thought this was a bit challenging for a Tuesday. I’m not a gambler but still enjoyed the puzzle’s theme.
Sam, if we are ever together in a restaurant I will show you how to pass a sugar cube through the table. Son and I used to play SIMCITY. Usually our cities were wiped out by fire. Thank you Seth and Jeff.
@dk Hehehe. Do you think this kind of behavior made us the best or the worst dinner guests?
A casual thought on the WP pic: Ring toss anyone? Looks like two coneheads prepping for the Freakers Ball…Well played boys. Easy to dance to, balanced and smooth. I give it a solid 99…But I managed to flip-flop my facts of World History part 1, (thanks Mel Brooks.) Again I had to off Caesar, this time at 13a when crosses set me straight…David Bromberg’s “A Man Should Never Gamble” came to mind post solve…That’s it folks. I’ll beg off for the moment. ANDALE ANDALE Arriba!, Bru
@brutus Also had Caesar invading Gaul. ATILLA was a TIL. If one had known there were two choices, I guess the year was the tip-off. In addition to the Coneheads, the pic reminds me of the video for Uptown Funk.
I spent a lot of time trying to reconcile “imbue” with “ninja”. It was only the happy music that convinced me that “endue” was a word. Usually I like what the vocabulary-challenged call a “ crossword puzzle word”, but I’ll stick with imbue, thank you. And, to pick a nit, you don’t “rat on”, you “rat out”. I don’t, personally, but I’ve heard about it. Gosh, why do I sound so cross? I should be happy to learn a new word!
@Judith Nelson. I had “enbue” for a while - a new portmanteau maybe?
As I've mentioned elsewhere, I only know ENDUE from the Spelling Bee; today I learned its meaning. Completely missed that there was a winning hand in each of the theme answers, seeing only one of the two card names in each. I also misread the clue as calling for a winning hand. So I started with Full House at the revealer. D'oh. Ultimately a fun solve for me.
Great puzzle! Confidently plunking in esos (ESAS) and Yale (UCLA) really slowed me down. Bit more difficult than historical Tuesdays but I guess that’s normative now. Good to be back . . . Gold Star streak started TODAY!
Crossing a word in Spanish with an archaic or obscure word made it impossible for me to finish this puzzle without poking through the alphabet to finish. Even after I got it, I didn’t actually “get it.”
A tyre is not a wheel! Such a lack of understanding of the language. Or of mechanics. Someone should really edit these clues.
@Hugh A lorry is a British term for a semi-truck, so it follows that they used the British spelling of "tyre" As an American, I was extremely thrown off by this, beccause 49-Across didn't make any sense with an "I".
@Ziggy , the (I think, fair) point he was making, is that a tyre goes ON a wheel, it is not synonymous, as it should be for a crossword clue.
In my day, I’ve dug a bunch of 8a ditties. And I recall 8a is/was Led Zep’s platter tag…This calm, cool mid-60 degree morn in Central Jersey sports a flock of blackbirds cawing up a racket. This, as I solve away out on the porch. The oft accompanying graceful gulls must have the day off. Aw shucks, I was hoping for a duet…More to follow.
The "single line of diamonds" clue had me prepared for something like poker, with that TENNISBRACELET representing a flush. So it took me a while to figure out why TWENTYONE was materializing instead of some poker variant! And I can't be the only one here who first learned the word ENDUE today, so thanks for that!
Let's hear it for the continuing trend of Toughened Up Tuesdays. To Seth and Jeff, no thought of considering Vignt Et Un for your revealer? HASTA la Vista, babies.
Nice, easy solve for a relative beginner. I was amazed at how many downs I had filled completely with just the across clues. I didn't know (or need to know) 33D, learned ENDUE, as well as how to spell ANDALE.
@Thad Disagree that this one is beginner level / easy solve. Embue / tyres are obscure, lots of nouns. Not great Tuesday fill imo. Weird clueing for andale. I got the theme but wasn't able to work around it not being imbue and the upper noun section. Difficulty is relative of course.
From the yin and yang - the narrow, picky side of me raising a Spockian eyebrow at certain clues, and the flexible, fuller side welcoming the obvious fun - emerged a wholly engaging puzzle experience today. Nicely done!
Whoa! I would have had a new personal best for Tuesday if it weren't for the crossing of ANDALE and ENDUE. I work with endowments a lot but I did not know the word ENDUE... apparently my voice to text doesn't either because it keeps severely misspelling it. And I could only think of forms of vamos for the Goya clue. Anyhow, I had to play with that a bit but I still came in well above my average and I'm always happy to learn new things so all is well! Except that the term SUCKING FACE is about as bad to me as the term "I want to pick your brain." Eww! 😆 Here's me running away from you and your ice pick! 🏃 Today was a bit of a crabby day for me, not even a particular reason really, but I ended up doing a bunch of Monday and Tuesday archive puzzles when I needed a little 10-15 minute break from work. Ahem, I took a number of breaks from work today, it would seem. And I also knocked one off while I was waiting for them to build my Papa Murphy's pizza. Anyhow, I bring this up because it was a nice distraction and because I found a clue that I really liked in one and I was wondering how often it's been seen before. I don't know where those of you who know about these things go to look them up but it was,"They're made by doing jumping jacks lying down." I'll put the answer in the comments, so I don't spoil the early 2023 puzzles for anyone. Anyhow, I loved it and wondered if the answer to it has shown up many times before or not. Just curious!
@HeathieJ Hi emus! SNOW ANGELS Do emus do jumping jacks?
@HeathieJ SNOWANGELS - 3 times. SNOWANGEL - twice. Oddly enough, the first appearance of either of those was in a 2012 puzzle. And yeah, grew up in Michigan's Upper Peninsula and that's something we did frequently in winter time (60 plus years ago), so I'm aware that it's a very, very old term. ...
To my knowledge “Ándale” is a slang expression used in Mexico. Although Francisco Goya spoke Spanish, he was from Spain. Seems like a Mexican artist would have been a better choice for this clue.
@Shirley Olsen It seems that half the people in the comments section have made the same observation and agree with you. I'm surprised that no one in the construction or editing process caught this error, but imperfections sometimes slip through. It might be too late, but maybe they will make a slight edit to the clue.
@Shirley Olsen An astute point and, as Janine said, one that's been made by several commenters. The editors heard this feedback and intend to avoid the conflation in the future, so thank you for mentioning it!
I’d be interested if someone could share how editors, journalists, or solvers are able to search how often entries have been used in past puzzles. I’m always surprised when past frequency is mentioned because I often assume incorrectly. For example, I’d assume “SUCKING FACE” is not common but perhaps I’m wrong.
@ESB The source is xwordinfo.com. You can get basic information for free, including answer keys. But by joining for $20/year, you can check on so much more data. With a subscription, you can also play the Sunday variety puzzles, including the Acrostics.
@ESB Steve already directed you to the right place for searching for entries. Just wanted to add that a search at that site does show that this is the one and only appearance of SUCKINGFACE. ..
@ESB I had never heard of it until it was used as a line, that gained widespread exposure, in the movie "On Golden Pond". I think Henry Fonda said, "You wanna suck face?" to Kathryn Hepburn.
Can someone explain STU to me? Why is that apt for a worrier?
@Drew It’s a homophone of “stew,” as in “a state of excitement, worry, or confusion” or to be in such a state.
@Drew To "stew" is to worry about something. If you're worried about a particular topic you are "stewing" on it.