Off Topic: Yesterday I made mention of the word CLOTBUR, an infamous pangram that traumatized an earlier generation of Spelling Bee / Wordplay commenters. When I went to read comments from that time in 2018, I was surprised to see how often my name appeared in the Wordplay comments. I also remembered that I would occasionally compose silly poems and post them in the comments, and I knew that I had written one where CLOTBUR made an appearance. Well, I found it stored in the darkest reaches of my laptop, and thought it was still quite à propos, so here it is. Sung to the tune of “My Favourite Things” ENOs and ONOs and OREO cookies ORCS, ENTS, and E-TS and ALIEN Wookies. EEK, EKE, and ECO, and AAHs, OHS and OOHs, These are a few of my favourite clues. OLE ALOHA and AVE MARIA ARIA, AREA, RIO and RIA. LEIs LEAs and LEIAs, ALEEs and ALOUs. These are a few of my favourite clues. When the NAT TICKS When the CLOT BURS When I lose my way. I simply remember my favourite clues And that's when I DOOK.
@Andrew Bravo 👏🏾! It’s catchy and clever. You’re a brave person to look at old posts.
@Andrew Excellent. You also made me look up clotbur, which I had assumed you made up. ____________________ Jesse Goldberg 8/28/2024 for Puzzle of the Decade (emu filler)
@Andrew Is CLOTBUR still accepted in Spelling Bee? It seems mighty obscure compared to a lot of words that aren't accepted.
@Andrew: I hope this means you might be inclined to resurrect your end-of-year Ode to Wordplay. You have months to work on it!
@Andrew -- Oh. My. This is fabulous! Standing O!
@Andrew Yesterday I pointed out the significance of the clotbur in the development of Velcro. It has been used medicinally in many cultures and goes by many names. Be on the look out for these aliases (the first paragraph gives a list of about 40)…at least a couple might make the bee…. <a href="https://tinyurl.com/bdfrd47c" target="_blank">https://tinyurl.com/bdfrd47c</a>
@Andrew Outstanding. All the multiples of KUDO to you!
@Cat Lady Margaret Well, I am a cat lover with a fondness for Maine so I might try to take you up on it. I’m also a procrastinator though, so there’s that too…
@Andrew That is so good! I love how it scans just perfectly!
@Convoid-04 Thanks! Of course only we Wordplayers know the correct pronunciation of DOOK!
@Andrew I am so, so glad I decided to read the comments today! What a delight.
PAEAN next to UNAGI next to an unknown W.N.B.A. player next to an unknown director, with a bizarre clue for AGED = a really difficult (and impossible for me) NW corner. Otherwise, the puzzle played nice and smooth.
@Joe That was the last part of the puzzle to resolve for me, too. I've never heard of UNAGI, PAEAN was barely in mu memory banks, and I don't know much about women's sports.
@Joe Same here. Breezed through most of the puzzle but the NW remained mostly empty for some time. Had to resort to looking up LOYD to give me a leg up. Terrible crosses in that section, but the rest of the puzzle was really well done.
@Joe Obscure is always in the eyes of the beholder. Jewell Loyd was a gimme for me.
@Joe I struggled with that too. US films, TV and sports plus sushi and fashion, aargh! I had no chance without looking things up. The clue for AGED was a bit obscure, and IND puzzled me for a while, until the penny dropped.
@Joe Hope she's just unknown in the sense that you weren't aware of her--Rookie of the Year ('15), Scoring Leader ('23), All-Star, and 2x WNBA champ! She most certainly isn't "unknown" in the larger sense.
@Joe [Antediluvean] is only a “bizarre” clue for AGED if you don’t know the word. It means “from before the flood”, or very old. It’s a straight definition clue.
@Joe And PAEAN is the official NYT xword song. Store it alongside OREO ARIA EPEE AURA ACAI et al
@Puzzled Brit I forgot to go back and re-read the clue for IND, so the penny didn't drop until I read your comment. Niiiiice.
@Puzzled Brit I also had a hard time on NW, but exacerbated by INT for non-partier. I'm an INTrovert, and can do without most parties. Would rather be home with a good book.... But I'm also an IND on the voter rolls, so wasn't too surprised at the change.
Well… I wasn’t aware a fictional lion created my country.
@Melis Thanks for the BIG laugh!!!
@Melis Just in the Disney/Pixar retelling
@Melis OMG, how did I miss this??? The constructor/editors misspelled Mustafa as MUFASA? Sweet baby Judas...
@Melis Wowsers! 8 hours later, it still hasn't been corrected.
Oh, I love it here. Life has been life-ing, lately, and I’m trying to ease the burdens of people I adore that are simply too heavy for me. But I can come here. Every day. Y’all know I love me a good word. Today it’s smultronställe. Like me, it’s Swedish. A noun that means -a special place discovered, treasured, returned to for solace and relaxation; a personal idyll free from stress or sadness. ( I think it’s literally, “place of wild strawberries.”) I’m so eternally thankful to wake to this welcoming smultronställe every morning. Thank you *all* for allowing me to join you in our field of wild strawberries! 🍓
MACAROON made my day, as it reminded me of my great-grandma Annie and great-grandpa Izzie, who introduced a very young me to this delicious treat. There would always be a little plate of macaroons on a table in their apartment that I so looked forward to. Grandma Annie and Grandpa Izzie filled my being with warmth, goodness, and love, and as I look back on them, they each seem surrounded by a halo. I haven’t stopped my life and thought about them in quite a while, and MACAROON thrust me back into what it felt like to be around them, and let me tell you, going back there today melted my heart.
@Lewis MACAROON also took me back to those Seders at Grandma Mollie and Grandpa Harry's that were torture to a young, hungry kid, but now yearning to go back in time just once more. (As she tears up).
@Lewis What a nice memory! When I was grade school age, we lived about three hours from my maternal grandparents. They would visit us several times a year. At Christmas, my grandmother would always bring a roasting pan full of different kinds of cookies she had baked. No macaroons, but lots of wonderful anise cookies that I subsequently learned are a real pain to make correctly. (I haven’t tried to make them in about 10 years.)
@Lewis Straight out of Marcel Proust! French(-style) macarons--in all those brilliant colors, like little. over-priced Day-Glo hamburger buns--have become so trendy nowadays. it's nice to see (and taste) a good, old-fashioned, double-O macaroon!
@Andrzej in my experience macaroons are coconut macaroons, a soft and chewy mounded cookie with no filling. Macarons are the French almond flour with a filling. The internet does say that some macaroons are also an almond flour mounded cookie, I wonder which versions Lewis and Times Rita ate.
@Lewis When I was a kid told my mom how much I love macaroons. Throughout the years she surprised me macarons. As a kid I didn’t understand why she kept buying only me (I have 5 brothers and sisters) those weird cookies but when I finally figured it out my siblings and I cracked up. I’ve never had the heart to correct her lol.
Huh. [Currency depicting Mufasa Kemal Atatürk]: When did the Turks go and put the Lion King on the LIRA? Seems like an odd pivot away from their storied leader.
@Sam Lyons Hilarious! Yeah, that's discussed below...first name is supposed to be Mustafa, I think.
Solid. Enjoyable. Only one I didn’t love was the clue for BEANIES.
@Selective Walrus It toque you a while?
One thing I like about Michael’s puzzles is the care he puts into cluing. It feels to me like he spends time with each answer to hit on a clue with a fresh angle. Just as seldom-seen answers light up a grid, seldom-seen clues light up the brain. I saw a few stock clues for inconsequential answers (OAF, ESSO, EMO, TIL) but that’s about it. Overall, the clues brought fresh riddles, plus glints here and there of sweet wordplay. I adored the world-class [Accrue annual leaves?] for RAKE. So, freshness in clue, but freshness in answer as well. Of the 12 three-stack answers in the grid, 11 have appeared in the Times puzzle but three times or less. My favorite was the recent in-the-language PITCH CLOCK, a true debut with its first appearance in any of the major crossword outlets. I liked the touches of beauty in WRAITH and PAEAN, and I loved the grid design, never seen before in the Times, with its whopping 16 longs. Popping with freshness, excellence all around – a superb outing. Thank you so much for this, Michael!
Hi Deb, Not to be picky, but Mr. Lieberman has hit for the cycle. He had a Saturday puzzle published just last month, on January 25th, Congratulations to him on that accomplishment. Great picture choice for PEEKABOO.
@Anita I hope the smoking jacket is real and that it ships out soon!
@Anita Kinda odd, as the link in the column to the xwordinfo list of constructors hitting for the cycle includes ML. They don’t count Variety puzzles on that list, so his total is listed as twenty, not 27, but he’s there.
With the notable caveat that difficulty is tough to pin down and varies from person to person, this felt oddly easy for a Friday. Solid puzzle, though.
"Think we'll go to the pool today?" "There's a swim chance." (Dive been meaning to post this one.)
@Mike HA! I got to be the first one to recommend a Mike post!!!
There were, in fact, two Greek mythological heroes named Ajax--Ajax the Telamonian and Ajax the Locrian, or Ajax the Greater and Ajax the Lesser--which doesn't seem entirely fair to Mr. Locrian, I think. "Ajax" is, of course, the Latin form--a better transliteration of the Greek is "Aias," and when the two are referred to collectively, as they sometimes are, they're termed "the Aiantes."* But only by people who use "CIT." a lot in their writing. The clue probably refers to the former--he's the subject of an eponymous tragedy by Sophocles--after the death of Achilles, there's a dispute over who should receive the warrior's armor. Aias gets himself into a snit, and plots to murder Agamemnon, Menelaus, and Odysseus. But the gods step in, cloud his sanity, and he slaughters a couple of cattle instead (not to mention the herdsman of said cattle--but he's just a Trojan farm-worker, so doesn't really count). In any case, still believing that he had, in fact, killed his fellow Greeks, Aias is overcome with remorse, which drives him to suicide. In his poetry, Sophocles makes some rather elegant puns on "Aias, whose very name speaks mourning!" ("Ai! Ai!") So, Professor Lyons, do I pass? *ColgatePalmolive manufactures several different varieties of Ajax® cleanser: Ajax® Powder Cleanser, Ajax® Ultra Citrus Scent +Salt, etc.: a well stocked grocery or hardware store will stock many Aiantes®.
@Bill: Your comment perfectly epitomizes why I love to read the crossword comments. I inevitably learn something new and fascinating! Thank you!
@Bill You fail to mention the scene in Hades in the Odyssey, where Aias refuses to speak to Odysseus, apparently still holding a grudge. Otherwise, A+!
@Bill ...and Ajax Amsterdam is a Dutch football team, and their club badge features a helmeted profile pic of the mighty hero. They pronounce it, "Ayax."
@Bill Hehe, I was reading Malalas’s Chronographia recently, so I’ll share this. Here he is having Teucer modestly narrate his heroic feats in the Penthesileia episode of the Trojan war to Pyrrhus, so that Pyrrhus will realize that Teucer is as, er, lionhearted as Mufasa Atatürk: “And I, Teucer, killed many, so that I was praised as the most excellent. The Aiantes (Αἴαντες) knocked the hoplites on their BEANIES, entering into their midst. Your father, Achilles, who was among them, looked at Penthesileia, aiming to kill her as she fought fiercely. And reaching close to her horse and striking her with a spear, he knocked the horse down and dragged her off it, still alive.” (John Malalas, Chronographia, ed. Ludwig Dindorf (Bonn: E. Weber, 1831), 5.123) Then Teucer goes on to say, “This was no PAJAMA DAY, dear Pyrrhus. After dispatching the hoplites till the latter were screaming “I CAN’T! I CAN’T!” Achilles and the Aiantes (whom the other Greeks sometimes called The SLICERS) shook the dust off their ATHLEISURE. “ANYONE ELSE?” They growled menancingly.” (Malalas, er, loc. CIT., I’m sure…)
@Bill "which doesn't seem entirely fair to Mr. Locrian" I should add that Aias the Locrian hardly has a spotless reputation. There was that whole incident during the Sack of Troy, with Cassandra, and the defilement of the sanctuary of the Temple of Athena. For which the gods, appropriately, smote him. Made for some lovely vase-painting, but all-in-all, a pretty reprehensible action. "Sanctuary"--what a quaint notion!
Forgive me if I'm wrong, but does the clue for 45 across contain a typo? Tbh it's hard for me to discern as I'm tired at the moment 😅
@Jared E To those curious, as I was, it appears Mufasa should be Mustafa
@Jared E Thanks for the bug report! I’ve passed it on to the puzzle editors.
@Jared E I third or fourth that as well. I had no idea Lion King ruled Turkey as well 😂
Congratulations on getting the umlaut right, I suppose.
Well, they could either correct the typo or just append “in a hypothetical collaboration between C.S. Lewis and Walt Disney.”
The first name of Atatürk is Mustafa, however. Being a common first name this error coming from NYT surprises me.
@ani It was correct in the regular print version this morning. But not in the newspaper version. Or online. Odd.
PITCH CLOCK - What you might do when the alarm rings on your day off.
Hello, puzzlers! A correction was issued to the day's crossword re: the naming of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk — thank you to the eagle-eyed solvers who spotted it, and all of you who humored us with "Lion King" jokes. While the web version has been updated, there are a few steps that app users will need to go through to see the correct version of the puzzle: - Navigate to the crossword archive - Find today's puzzle - Long press - Tap Update Puzzle Let us know if you run into any issues. And happy Friday, indeed!
@Sam Corbin That does not work for me in the Android phone Games App. I can delete the puzzle if I wanted to though. I'm fine with the puzzle the way it is. What's done is done. I just feel like the Android people are once again being treated like second class citizens.
@Sam Corbin I solve in Chrome browser; I simply hit refresh, and the corrected clue showed up. Thx.
This could have been an excellent puzzle. Some of the clueing was great, but it was too easy for a Friday. Also, proper nouns should not intersect (OLSON/KORS) 6/10
@George ordinarily I'd agree with you on that, but Michael Kors as a common brand name gets an exemption IMO
@George stuck on Olson/Korea for a good 5 to 10 minutes.
@George The completion time for me was about my Wednesday average, barely half my Friday average, so yeah.
@George Just bear in mind that “proper names should not intersect” is your personal opinion, not a rule. Proper names have intersected since 1A crossed 2D in the very first NYT puzzle ever (2/15/42).
@George I like to think a puzzle’s excellence is independent of the day of the week it runs on. The clueing in this one was exceptionally good (references available upon request) so I found the solve very satisfying even if I did beat my average time.
Man, getting through the NW antediluvian me ten years! I vote yes for renaming D.C. as The Red Light District.
Nice to have a straightforward puzzle without a lot of tricks. This was a pleasure to fill.
Nice puzzle, but felt pretty easy for a Friday.
I’m not a big fan of themeless puzzles as they seem more like work than their themed counterparts. No aha moments, no enjoyment of figuring out how it all links together. Just filling in the words, one by one, until it’s complete. That said, I thought this was an excellent puzzle. We all have our preferences, and not everyone can be perfectly satisfied every day. I’m happy for the themeless lovers today, because you got a good one. I hope you’ll be just as happy for me the next time there’s a rebus.
@Heidi I wouldn't count on your last sentence.😀 But it is interesting, now that you mention it, that I may be beginning to feel a difference in those two types of puzzle, too. I hadn't really noticed it before.
A nice solid puzzle this morning. I’m always surprised when people comment (complain?) that they don’t know a word. PAEAN being today’s example. A quick search of recent news stories shows the word being used by many media outlets in all sorts of stories, including pieces on the arts, food and even gaming (although apparently none from the NYT!). After this puzzle, we’ll all be seeing it pop up all over the place.
@John Why are you surprised people comment about not knowing a word? Should nobody ever admit they didn't know something? I have an inflated opinion of myself, and a doctorate on top of it, but I am never ashamed to admit I don't know everything. I teach at Poland's best university and you would be surprised how many words the students don't know. I always encourage them to ask me about them, and I don't judge them for it. We have all led different lives, experiencing different things. We also describe the world that surrounds us differently. What's so strange about that? PAEAN is a word I know in two languages, but it looks very weird in English because of its spelling (in Polish it's just pean, but we always pronounce "ea" as two separate sounds). You do see that, don't you? How strange _AEA_ must seem? What word may people not be familiar with if not a rarely used one with unusual spelling?
@Andrzej That was not quite my point. Not knowing a word is absolutely fine and no shame in that. Rather, some recent comments seem to imply that because a word is unknown to them it’s unfair or that the puzzle is somehow not enjoyable.
@John Yes it happens all the time. You can't do anything about it so who cares. What gets me is some people take on those people over and over. That's a waste of time and just adds more negativity.
@Mr Dave Dave I agree with you about not adding negativity. The NYT x word is meant to challenge— and I’ve certainly been over the years. What I don’t like are people who say effectively that because they didn’t get a clue it’s the puzzle setter’s issue. Whether you can solve a puzzle in minutes or hours or whether you’re pleased because your streak is a week (we’ve all been there!) or a year, we’re here to be challenged and of course be entertained. And maybe, just maybe, for those minutes or hours be taken out of our non-crossword lives by a puzzle setter who gives that opportunity to be challenged and entertained.
Great puzzle! For a themeless it felt like it almost had a theme, and the theme is government. With the PUBLICPOOL and the NAYS and the VOTESYES and OUTDREW, though that last may be an inside joke. My favorite today, though, was NACRE. A word I could not have pulled up on my own but it was just on the edge of my knowledge and I was delighted to be reminded of it. May we all have an iridescent day!
@Noemi Loved seeing NACRE and seeing it made me miss Captain Quahog.
Quick and pretty easy. I got stuck in the NW corner because I didn’t know the fish for caterpillar rolls. When I CRAVE sushi, I usually scarf it down with little regard for the type of fish. Embarrassing but true. I’ve been a Kaitlin OLSON fan since “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.” She’s married to co-star Rob McElhenney who, along with Ryan Reynolds, owns Wrexham AFC, a Welsh football club. “Welcome to Wrexham,” the documentary about the process of purchasing and elevating a flagging-but-proud team, is good television. Fun fact: ATHLEISURE is not commonly worn in town in Europe, at least my part anyway. People usually dress fairly fashionably, especially by American Walmart standards. I wore my ripped jeans when I first arrived, and the scornful looks of the older ladies were downright humbling. I fix up more now, with hair, nails, makeup and decent clothes. I actually feel better than I did in the constant PAJAMADAYS that I saw while shopping back in the US. Yes, actual PAJAMAs. Are more refined fashion standards the norm in other parts of the world? Adeus, os meus amigos.
@Pani Korunova I'm old I guess. I hate ripped jeans with a passion. I hate plunging necklines that are navel lines. And I hate cleavages. I feel antediluvian.
@Pani Korunova Walmart standards are not really standards. In many Walmart stores, people dress badly on purpose or they shop to take pictures of badly dressed or strange people (kind of like a treasure hunt). Maybe this is not a thing any more. In other stores, Walmart shoppers tend to dress better than those running to the corner or hardware store. In my only-one-in-town, also-a-grocery Walmart, I see extended familes together shopping so they may be dressing for dinner or for a BBQ.
@Pani Korunova Unagi is eel. I'll bet you do recognize it because it's so distinct from other sushi fish. You just may not have known the Japanese name for it.
@Pani Korunova Athleisure is very common in Poland, among people of all walks of life - some of my students at uni, both male and female, do some really cool stuff with sneakers, tracksuit pants and the like. I guess young, fit people can pull off anything. I only put on my athleisure for dog walks and grocery shopping though.
@Pani Korunova I've never seen pyjamas worn outside the house, I think it would cause great bemusement! Ripped jeans are seen as fashion, not being a slob. Young people wear sports clothes a lot, especially boys, older people are usually fairly smart.
@Pani Korunova My husband and I were highly amused to see in the print version of the NYT Styles section on Thursday that some people are passing off as high fashion (and charging for it) sweaters with moth holes and ripped t-shirts. Now we can wear what was for at-home-only outfits everywhere!
Struggled in the NW corner (like some others) but got there with some educated guesses. Personal record streak continues. If I get past tomorrow's potentially tough one, one month could be doable. Favorite clue: accrues annual leaves. Have a good weekend everyone! Mine starts off with our weekly pub quiz.
@Harri Wishing you luck! You got this!
@Harri As the one who does the job of accruing those leaves every year, I found that clue quite humorous. But the plural “leaves” gave it away.
@Harri Thank you Hari. You do the same.
If I’m going to keep doing crosswords, I have to choose: force myself to like sushi, or subscribe to the Sushi Channel. (I know, it’s been around on menus and in puzzles since before the flood. But likely so has that Massachusetts-based Olson/Kors cross, and I got it wrong, too.)
I almost exited immediately after reading 1A. As a former federal employee, I fear that I see DOGE everywhere these days. Someone wrote a book about the 60's Civil Rights movement that included how many municipalities closed their pools rather than integrating them, thus hurting poor whites as well as blacks. Tx to @E.M. and @Tim V. and @Mean Old Lady for earlier related comments.
@RozzieGrandma Long before that, Robert Moses planned a causeway to beach/seaside parks, but designed bridges to be too low for public transit buses to pass under them, thus excluding any citizens who didn't have cars... It was not accidental.
Today was one of those days where the music scared me when I finished lol. I was sure I was going to have to go back and correct something. In the NW I had __B_ICPOOL and had a total brain f art about what that could possibly be. PAEAN plagues me in the Bee and it did the same here too, even after getting PAE. Thanks to Friends I didn’t know UNAGI was a fish lol. It’s ALL coming clear to me right now lol! I didn’t know the names in that corner and antediluvian is new to me (or never retained). Once PUBLICPOOL clicked I was able to plug in some educated guesses and they all worked out. Overall I loved this puzzle :)
@Joya I got hung up in the same corner, and didn’t know the same things as you!! And then I actually thought of you for the fill, bc i had _OY_ for the basket baller, and I remembered your name bc I always like your comments and it’s a pretty name =) I also got a toehold with PUBLICPOOL but then never changed LOYa to LOYD until I looked it up, and that was it for this one!
I cannot see the word UNAGI without thinking of Ross and the Friends episode: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A2ijjjk2kEQ" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A2ijjjk2kEQ</a>
@Nora Me too. Hai yah!
@Nora Me, neither. I'm not very knowledgeable about the names of Japanese foods, and that's how I learned UNAGI.
The iPad is having a tough time this morning, with the Comments flashing off and on, then disappearing... Plus I'm being nagged to upgrade. Geez Louise. BEANIES are an expense? Not exactly high fashion.... People are moved to take photos of SILOs? Cute clue, but really. In this part of the country, you usually find multiple SILOs near the fields of soybeans, just down the road from where the giant blocks of harvested cotton await transport to the gin. (We'll see if there's a market this year, won't we? What with all the global friends we're making...) The MISO answer came to me, so I got that section, but I am not sure if Nissan makes a VERSA or a VERSE. (Turkey didn't join in on the EURO business? Note to self: learn new way to spell Turkish country name...) Guess I'll go check the key.
@Mean Old Lady The Euro is the currency of the EU, and not even every member state uses it, for example, Poland and Czechia do not. Turkey is not in the EU.
@Mean Old Lady "Note to self: learn new way to spell Turkish country name..." A brief excerpt from Bill Wurtz' brilliant "history of the entire world i guess.": <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kOyyKKqsZKI" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kOyyKKqsZKI</a> >>>IMPORTANT!: only watch the first 7 sec. of this clip--the rest will make you want to blow your brains out! (The entire video: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xuCn8ux2gbs" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xuCn8ux2gbs</a>)
@Mean Old Lady "Note to self: learn new way to spell Turkish country name.." A brief excerpt from Bill Wurtz' brilliant "history of the entire world i guess": <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kOyyKKqsZKI" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kOyyKKqsZKI</a> WARNING! Only watch the first 7 seconds of this clip--beyond that and you will want to (emu-deleted act of self-harm)! The entire video: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xuCn8ux2gbs" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xuCn8ux2gbs</a>
Nice to get the Wednesday puzzle two days late!
Nice Friday puzzle. Typical long workout for me, and did cheat a bit in a couple of places early on, but then just had a good time working things out from the crosses. One answer history search today was inspired by previous comments: NORTHWESTPASSAGE Well... it's 16 letters, but it did appear in two puzzles. A couple of unusual (but similar) puzzle finds today. I'll put those in replies. ...
@Rich in Atlanta As threatened. Two puzzles where the trick was dividing a familiar phrase in different places. First a Saturday from June 20, 1998 by Cathy Allis. A couple of theme clue/answer examples, and I'll show the alternate parsing of the answers: "How Robin Hood won some contests?" BYANARROWMARGIN (BY AN ARROW MARGIN) "Dyed brown?" DIDANUMBERON (DID AN UMBER ON) And the other two theme answers with clues. I'll let you parse these: "Failed as a corn farmer?" HADANEARMISS "What Frosty's friends said about him?" HESSUCHANICEGUY Here's the Xword Info link: <a href="https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=6/20/1998&g=58&d=A" target="_blank">https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=6/20/1998&g=58&d=A</a> One more puzzle in another reply. ....
This was one of the rare times when I had to step away and come back to a Friday puzzle. Had everything but 1A and 15A and couldn't get a purchase. Somehow I was very reluctant to give up on 'whY' to begin 15A. I was only confident of 3D, 5D, and 7D in that quadrant, not a lot to go on. So I deleted everything else except POOL, which I was pretty sure of, and stepped away. When I came back a couple minutes later, I immediately _saw_ the answers to both 1A and 15A, and everything else filled itself in. Including the unknown names of the sports and TV stars. This is just to say that I frequently don't know the proper names other commenters complain about, but except in the case of a rare Natick, I find those to be speed bumps rather than barriers.
A lot of tricky clues today, great for a Friday challenge. I worked through the entire SE section pretty quickly, but the NW was really tough. I needed help to finish.... by help I mean Google 😄
Excellent Friday. No real hiccups but a steady challenge
Could someone explain why when I use words from the puzzle in a comment, the Emus start clutching their pearls and sit on it?
@dutchiris I tried to answer you twice, civilly commenting on the double standards employed by the "moderators," but got the red no-go pop-up both times. Ironic.
I suppose this was a fine puzzle, but I needed loads of lookups to finish it, with how many proper nouns and cultural references there were. It's quite funny how these puzzles sometimes make me feel like an ignoramus - I certainly am not one where I live, but put me in an American cultural context and suddenly I know very little about anything 🤣. My notoriously bad memory doesn't help, eirher. For example, I liked the show "Hacks" but I just can't remember any of the actors' names... I was sure about STREEP though. Please help me understand two things (I could Google this stuff but I always prefer feedback from kind, live people 🙂): "... two if BY SEA" - I keep staring at this phrase but it simply makes no sense to me. Party-eschewing type: Abbr.: IND - is this about independent as in not belonging to a political party? That must be it, right?
@Andrzej you’re doing just fine. In fact, you’re doing better than the vast majority of Americans in this regard. “…two if by sea” refers to American revolution-era figure Paul Revere. He gave a fabled horseback ride with a mission (mostly embellished) to warn colonists and militiamen that “The British are coming!!” He was to look for a light in the church steeple church steeple that shone one time if by land and two times if by sea. That’s the general idea of it. Yes, IND is for independent voters.
@Andrzej "two if by sea" is from the American Revolution - it's part of the phrase "one if by land and two if by sea", the number of lanterns that would be shown in a church steeple when it became clear what route the British would take to invade Boston. As for Ind - it's the abbreviation for Independent, an option American voters have for registering to vote but not declaring a party affiliation. Ind voters typically* aren't allowed to vote in primary elections (generally held in spring months), since the ballots provided in those elections are for party members to choose among their candidates for going to the general election (held in November). * this may vary by state, I'm not sure. Hope that helps!
@Andrzej I immediately thought of you when I saw "...two if BY SEA." I would have been astonished if you knew it.
Me again. If we just substitute "splashy" for "wasteful" 1 A would pass the test. With our new health bro, you'll be afraid to go in one anyway.
@E.M. I also thought "wasteful" and hey, BOONDOGGLE fit perfectly. I figured it was wrong when I saw the "two if ___" clue.
This puzzle was like eating saltwater taffy, sweet and a bit chewy, even a bit sticky at times, yet not too difficult for a Friday. I found the cluing solid and fun.
I had to laugh at myself because I was about to post asking for help understanding the answer to 5D (party-eschewing type: Abbr.) when the explanation came to me! I couldn’t get “party” as the “fun gathering with friends” out of my mind.
@Ludmilla I had the same issue. And I wish the fun kind were the only kind I needed to think about…
NW corner a real challenge if you weren’t clued into the proper nouns! Didn’t know KORS or OLSON. I took a wild shot that antediluvian was AGED. What’s a PAEAN? Sounds like something to be checked out by a doctor. But the sweet golden month arrived with my streak intact. Smooth Friday otherwise. Nice puzzle!
@Eyal Same here. With a region that tough, I can't really buy into the "easy" argument.
Thanks Michael, enjoyable and for me, just right for a Friday. Shout out to Deb for best column photo ever.
Doubt anyone will run out the Crossword Clock on this one. A couple curve balls but the rest mostly quick and hittable. Nice game, Michael!
That was some high speed fun for a Friday! Really enjoyed how lively the clueing was with fun jokes and misdirections, and that whenever I had an answer that I thought could go two ways there was a cross at hand to resolve the tension.