When I call my optometrist, I use my eye phone. (He's in my contacts.)
@Mike Or are his contacts in you?
@Mike Not iris-k to say that a pair of them lens a certain orbital view if uvea got the nerve to keep the lid on it.
@Mike I only discovered I was shortsighted when I went to a fancy French restaurant and chose tap water instead of Evian. Apparently this choice was “my eau pick”
@Mike If you'll post a full-face photo, I'd enjoy creating a cataractature that would replace that avatar.....
@Mike When I call my prosthodontist I use my Bluetooth. (We’ll cross that bridge later)
I really struggled with this one. Ready to give up, I clicked the “info” button and saw the byline: SAM EZERSKY. Big sigh. No wonder! Unwilling to let that dastardly Spelling Bee-er get the best of me (AGAIN), I went back to the puzzle and persevered. Did I resort to a couple of Google consults? Yes, of course. But did I ultimately finish with no reveals? You bet I did. HA! This Queen Bee is not afraid of you, Sam. (Much.)
Yes. Y E S. Thank you, Saturday gods, for this gift of a Sam E. puzzle. I woke up in the middle of the night (to find my husband watching TV—college football is a demanding love when the Friday night game comes at 4am), saw that the puzzle had just dropped, and thought, “Huh, why not.” And then—bliss. What a fantastic treat. Yes.
@Sam Lyons I hope you don't mind me saying so, but from your choice of location and your posts, I picture you on a yacht, well-tanned, somewhere in the Mediterranean or maybe off the coast of Portugal, in sunglasses and shorts with a pina colada in your hand. Am I close?
This felt like a good old fashioned Saturday to me. I bogged down about halfway through, and had to grind out the puzzle. I tried ore instead of ROE and led instead of LCD, which made the NE harder than it should have been. Finally giving in to my initial impulse to enter CHOCULA got me straightened out. I struggled in the SE because I had beerhall instead of BRAUHAUS. Even though I knew the answer should be in German, the B, H, and second A all fit so I clung to it like a drowning man to a life preserver. What really saved me was knowing LAMARJACKSON and TYRONE Slothrop. I knew reading Gravity’s Rainbow way back when would come in handy some day. Anyway lots of devious clues and fun answers made this one a winner in my book
@Marshall Walthew I just gotta ask...what word or words would describe your feelings about "Gravity's Rainbow"? I read it, but in needed the ending ONE and a bit of luck to remember TYRONE. I've never know anyone else to read it. I tried to read it a second time and got about 15 pages in before I decided I just couldn't do it again.
Sports figures, pedantic flexes about dead monarchs of dead monarchies, and BROEY? OH JOY. Nnnnnnot my favorite puzzle.
@Sarah It was like expecting a bobcat and getting a tiger.
@Sarah As a former fraternity member, BROEY was cringey.
Just Sam being Sam. Freshness, remarkable freshness, with 13 NYT answer debuts, including all three answers of the bottom stack and two of the three in the top stack. Junklessness, a grid scrubbed to the bone. It’s easy to take this for granted with Sam, because it’s a feature of all his puzzles. But no – it is ridiculously hard to pull this off even once, and I will never take it for granted. Sterling original clues never seen before in the major crossword outlets for common answers, such as [React to something moving, say], for CRY, and [Job done on one’s hands and feet?] for MANIPEDI. Loveliness in answer: FALSE CUT, NO TRACE, BRAUHAUS, BROEY, MIFFS. But most importantly, how was the solve? For me, fully engaging, rife with brain-happifying riddles to crack, leaving me with an “AHH, now *that* was a crossword” feeling. Once again, the art and science of crosswords showcased by you, Sam. You being you. Thank you for another jewel!
Lewis, Amen! That was a Saturday puzzle. "It's supposed to be hard." Global Stats Difficulty Very Hard Median Solve Time 21:41 Median Solver 15% slower ⚡31% of users solved faster than their Saturday average. 14% solved much faster (>20%) than their Saturday average. 🐢69% of users solved slower than their Saturday average. 43% solved much slower (>20%) than their Saturday average. <a href="https://xwstats.com" target="_blank">https://xwstats.com</a>/
@Lewis Yes, great puzzle! Too hard for me, but nevertheless, once I slowly made my way through it…I had to admire it.
OK, what have you done with the *real* Sam Ezersky? 😀 Don't get me wrong, this was not easy *at all*: but I didn't have to desperately scour the grid for anything to answer. The clues were brilliant, though; this made for a perfect Saturday puzzle. Thank you Sam (for this and for doing the Spelling Bee too, of course).
@MP Rogers Yes, unlike Sam E. puzzles of yore, this one yielded several pretty quick footholds. But, in my case anyway, it made up for it with the SE corner. I had remembered TUVALU as Tuvala, insisted on ‘as a’ rule instead of MOB rule, had lanes abbreviated to ln’s for KMs, assumed there was an AnnA Stark, didn’t know LAMAR. JACKSON or TYRONE, dithered between CRY and sob… Oof. That jigsawed portion took me twice as long as the rest of the grid to put together.
@MP Rogers @Sam Lyons Wow, I guess this is another indicator of the gulf even between people who *can* do a Saturday like this. I found no easy footholds at all, and the thought that this is an easy puzzle of his is scary, maybe even terrifying, maybe even petrifying. I wonder if I've done one of Ezersky's before. I don't pay a lot of attention to the constructor, which is another way that I'm obviously still working way into this game.
Just happen to be reading both Gravity’s Rainbow and a bit of FICHTE right now, so that helped. (Don’t ask me to elaborate on either.)
@Evan. Hmm. You favor light reading?
@Evan Yeah, Evan. I'm with Dardanus. Are you taking a break from *real* reading? 🤣
@Evan Hope that you're getting a rise out of V2. I thought it was a blast when I read it long ago when I was young(er).
Certainly my fastest ever Ezersky, by a margin of several hours.
With three potential Naticks in the SE, and another at 27D/39A, I was sure there was no way I was going to complete this puzzle without help. After a lot of walking away and returning, the crosses finally did their work. Having said that, this puzzle was a total drag for me. Obscure names (Fichte? Peter IV?) made it a complete slog. Probably the only clue I liked was the misdirect at 19A, when I finally got rid of "ore" and realized that it referred to fish. That allowed me to fill in what jumped out right away, but didn't fit, i.e. CHOCULA. Sam Ezersky may have 22 Saturday puzzles to his credit, but I can't remember having solved any of them with enjoyment or a great sense of accomplishment. Just my two cents'.
Did I finish it? Barely. Did I enjoy it? No.
That’s three TINES this week! Definitely won’t forkget that one
@Careless Just FYI - there are 86 ...TINEs that have appeared in puzzles. Though 33 of those only appeared in pre-Shortz puzzles, including QUARANTINE, CLEMENTINE and MYFUNNYVALENTINE. ....
this bronco kicked my derriere from here to...sunday? finally managed to break it after an hour and a bit. 14D almost made my coffee come out my nose. top 5 clue of the year, imo. i must say im a bit jealous of all you veteran fanboys/girls who see the puzzle creators names and immediately know not only how to gird yourselves for whats to come but also board shuttles for trips down memory lane. "i was doing my third sam ezersky puzzle back in aught 9 when i got my first bank foreclosure notice....ah, those were the days...", e.g.
@Matt "14D almost made my coffee come out my nose." What makes that especially dramatic is that you were drinking milk at the time.
@Matt 14D was a great clue, no doubt. I couldn't let go of Dracula for the longest time even though I saw it wasn't going to work for the crosses. Finally the correct answer dawned on me and a forehead slap shortly followed. Count Chocula: Cereal put out for breakfast Dracula: Count who is asleep (out) for breakfast Great clue.
OH JOY, another Sam Ezersky puzzle. HEADBUTTing a wall sounds more fun IMO
I liked this one. Solved pretty quickly for a Saturday. For me, it was one of those that seems hard at first, but somehow all of my wild guesses turned out to be correct. For example, I entered LPRECORD in 13D, hoping it would be wrong because it sounds so awkward, but it was right. For a minute, I wondered if I'd fallen asleep and was having a lucid dream (which is when you realize you're dreaming while still asleep and that therefore, anything you can think of is possible.) For example, you can fly, walk through walls, play any song on the piano. On stage and forgot your lines? No problem. It's a dream, so your lines can be whatever comes out of your mouth. Doing a tough Saturday crossword? No worries. It's a dream, so all of your guesses will be the correct answers! The dream ended when I got to Prince Rogers Nelson (RIP) because I wanted the answer to be something involving "The Artist," but I couldn't make that fit. And now I have a story about 29A. When I was little, my brother and I decided it would be fun to tear up all of our picture books. I started with just pulling on the thread holding the binding together, but he got bored with that and started ripping pages. All of a sudden, we looked up and there was our babysitter, Mrs. Carson, standing in the doorway with her hands on her cheeks (a la "The Scream"), whispering, "Oh my STARS." She's the only person I've ever heard use that expression, and I'll never forget it.
@Beth in Greenbelt 😂 That does sound a little like an over reaction. I'm reminded of the whisper of '"the horror" at the end of "Apocalypse Now".
@Beth in Greenbelt I thought the answer should have been symbol.
Made it about 90% through before I cheated and moved on with my day. Happy Friday!
@Here’s Johnny That may have been the sanest thing I've ever heard. Happy Friday to you as well!
@Here’s Johnny This is the way. Try, and if it's too hard (or the clue is out of your wheel house) cheat and try to remember it for next time.
I'm so glad to see all the positive comments today! I find it a little depressing when lots of people complain eg it's not "Thursday" enough. However, I couldn't solve some of this, too much really. The sport, the names, SCROD, CHOCULA, playing cards. I find some crosswords easier and some harder quite unconnected to the day of the week. I mostly enjoy them all.
OH JOY-- another proper noun wonderland! not to mention the benefit of knowing French, latin, AND German in order to solve the puzzle.
So satisfying to complete. Took me four different sittings, starting last night. Southeast took me the longest. I'll never understand people complaining about it being so hard they had to give up at, like, 9am. You have all day! Put it down and come back to it. It's so satisfying when it finally clicks!
Deadline showed up late in yesterday's comments. Here is a link to her post. Please come back here to reply to her! <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/shared/comment/4b3gnd?rsrc=cshare&smid=url-share" target="_blank">https://www.nytimes.com/shared/comment/4b3gnd?rsrc=cshare&smid=url-share</a>
@Barry Ancona @Deadline Deadline, So glad to see you back amongst us. You’ve been missed. Barry, Thanks for making this happen.
@Barry Ancona @Deadline We're putting the band back together. We're on a mission from God.
Deadline! Glad to hear from you. I hope kitty Lois is keeping your spirits up.
@Deadline -- My heart smiled when I saw your post. Very good to see you!
@Deadline So nice to see your name again. Do what you need to do, and we'll be waiting for you here when you're ready to be back.
I am pretty sure that was the hardest puzzle I've ever done. At least I had the most trouble with it. Over two hours, which harkens back to my solving days of yore. It took me forever to establish a beachhead, to find a section with several squares filled in that I trusted. Then I would occasionally get a flash (FROMEARTOEAR, LAMARJACKSON) and thought that would untangle it all. It didn't. I don't know how many errors I tore out.
@Francis (Accidentally hit something and submitted early.) 🤷♂️ Anyway, I tore out a ton of errors, like seedS before BULBS, and budgetS before OUTLAYS. And it never got any easier. Every time a light would come on, it didn't trigger any other lights. Right down to the end, changing BROEs into BROEY and SOAPs into SOAPY. I'm going to guess that BROEY is going to get some pushback. Any way, this was a really intense, really great puzzle, and I'm really greatful for it.
Canada before TUVALU was one of many problems I had with this fun puzzle. Also, couldn't think of a five-letter synonym for dentistry to answer Dominatrix's practice. Fun Fact: The Bra Chain is still intact, the task of disassembly having fallen to a group of men.
@ad absurdum "Fun Fact: The Bra Chain is still intact, the task of disassembly having fallen to a group of men." 😂😂😂 Hey, we do the best we can. Those things are complicated, and most of us didn't get a lot of playing time with the actual equipment.
The Dark Lord Of The Spelling Bee delivers a crunchy, chewy Saturday breakfast. What a good workout!
Absolutely no joy not even sarcastically. Whoever LAMAR JACKSON may be, he is unknown to me, as was TYRONE. Who CABSITs ? Not even a word. It’s a BRAUEREI and not BRAUHAUS not fun, not clever, not nice Glad the M contingent in 48D enjoyed it
@Ιασων I split CABSIT to "cabs it". It just made barely enough sense for me to settle on it. "Glad the M contingent in 48D enjoyed it" And the S contingent was Sam.
@Ιασων I believe it's CABS IT, where "cab" is the verb, pretty slangy. Brauhaus seems legit? For example, Bürgerliches Brauhaus München. Otherwise, I agree.
@Ιασων Eh, I found this one to be on the gentle side for a Saturday offering from Sam E. I wouldn’t say it was *easy*, but I never felt stuck, and none of the clues stand out to me as especially hard in retrospect. That said, I can definitely be counted among the M contingent you mentioned :)
@Ιασων Those of us who live in NYC, and probably those who live in other cities, would often CAB IT home after an activity that went late into the night.
Oh my gosh, huzzah!!!! I solved this one 10% faster than average! And I see that it's ranked as very hard on X Wordstats! I am definitely not saying I found it easy, and many of you, your worst times are way better than my average, but I just feel very proud of myself (in a good way).... especially once I realized it was a Sam E puzzle. At first not much was coming, but a lot of my semi-educated guesses paid off and things just started clicking. Even the things I absolutely did not know like FICHTE came when I trusted the crosses. And I've gotten so much better, more flexible, at taking out answers I feel certain about but that don't yield good crosses. I haven't had a chance to read comments yet and have to start preparing in earnest for our cruise tomorrow, but I'm just feeling over the moon about this one! Huzzah, huzzah!!
@HeathieJ 100% slower than average for me. Congratulations! L
Am I allowed to simply say that I liked this puzzle? Because *man* did I like this puzzle
SOAPY and BROEY were my downfall. I entered SOAPS and BROES. One letter, Y, broke my 14 day streak. I'm 76 and I just can't seem to stay up on all the lingo. SOAPY I get, but BROEY? Please
Caitlin writes: ...DIESEL HYBRID. They do exist, mostly outside the United States, and many trains use electric and diesel power. Caitlin, Virtually all U.S. "diesel" locomotives are diesel-electric: they have diesel engines that drive electric motors. The diesel engine is not connected to the drive wheels. Locomotives in the NYC metro area that use diesel and electric power are not hybrids: they power their electric motors from third rail or overhead wire in and near Penn Station and Grand Central, and turn on their diesel engines to power the motors when they are in non-electrified territory.
@Barry Ancona Yup, but she wasn't wrong.
@Barry Ancona The VW emissions scandal pretty much guaranteed that DIESEL HYBRID vars will never be a thing in the US. It's hard to believe that our emission standards are more strict than in the EU and UK, but apparently that's the case. Am I correct in assuming that diesel/electric trains have far looser regulations?
I let out a little yelp when I saw Sam's name up top. My (previously) sleeping husband said, "Are you ok?". More than ok, it's a Sam Ezersky puzzle! Great cluing all around, and the SE gave me the workout I wanted. BeerHAll to BRewHAll and finally to BRAUHAUS. TUVoLU and the unknown A_YA gave me LoMAn JACKSON at first, which seemed fine, but a nagging sense that the country name didn't look right made me change it to TUVALU. LAMAn? Could be, but think again! Mental alphabet run yielded LAMAR. That's better! It even sounded familiar. Crossed my fingers and handed in my paper.
@Nancy J. "..handed in my paper...."" I remember handing my paper in, usually earlier than most others, and watching the teacher as he or she graded it. It was excruciating watch each motion, wondering if that was an X of error or a check of "that's right". I was a very nervous little kid.
With NO BRA DAY on Thursday and “Longest bra chain” today, it’s been Bra Trivia week at the Times crossword.
@Lewis Nice. Would that be similar to Nub Trivia Night? /Go ahead, boo some
@Lewis, FWIW, my nerd persona looked at the clue and did some quick back-of-the-envelope mental arithmetic. Came up with each “link” in the chain being about 2 feet long. BRA was a perfect fit.
@Lewis "Dear NYT. Too many bra clues." "Fine, we'll take them off."
I just listened to the Daily interview with NYT puzzle editors. They receive upwards of 150 puzzle submissions each week. That made me feel better about my three rejections so far. Great listen, btw.
@Esmerelda - Well done! You've submitted three more puzzles than I ever could. You should feel very good about yourself!
@Esmerelda Keep at it, I so admire the effort! Awesome
@Esmerelda Keep trying! I don’t want to admit how many I had to submit before getting one published.
I loved that “what might be smelt” was not ORE, but was an anagram of it. Mwah!
My favorite part of a Sam Ezersky puzzle is that when it's over, I am as far away as can be from the next Sam Ezersky puzzle.
Solved this unaided, but took me 50 minutes. An excellent, challenging puzzle, marred only by the horrid BROEY. This one felt like a Saturday puzzle of old to me, and solving it left me with a genuine sense of satisfaction. FICHTE and TYRONE (as clued) were unknowns, but fortunately TUVALU and CHOCULA were not. Would love to see more Saturday puzzles on this level. Thank you Mr. Ezersky.
Wow, this was great. Very tough, took me almost ten minutes longer than my Saturday average, but worth it. I really, really wanted CHOCULA, but I had too many mistakes in that section to allow it--fry instead of ROE, elbow instead of PTRAP--so the Count had to wait. I also started out with BierHAll, then BierHAUS, before I could get that one and get a toehold in the bottom right. Challenges like this, and time to do them, are what Saturdays are for, right?
Sam bested me. The crossing of Hegel’s philosopher and the Iberian king was an utter natick for me. I looked up the king, and then the QB, and still couldn’t finish it. So I hit autocheck, and it turned out that uTRAP was my only error. Limped over the finish line. That’s okay, it’s Saturday. Yeesh though. Going to have to walk that one off.
Not so warmy this morning, and not as birdy as yesterday. The water is slightly white-cappy with the wind being more blowy than yesterday. I'm picturing George Carlin ranting; “Here is another pack of (string of expletives) who ought to be (something horrible done to them): People who create new adjectives by adding a "y".” Or, “People who make up words with shortened words.” Both grievances would be hilarious, sweary, but rad. I actually see the former as cute and humorous, but thank goodness it replaced “-ish.” My daughters-in-law make it sound so cute, the “y's” get a pass. I saw “fighty” yesterday, which was grinny. The latter? Def not my fav-ish. Too abbreviationy. P.S. That's one bad-(vulgar for bum) bunny! Very pecy
@Jerry You and the bunny, both! I laughed and laughed!
Oof, a Sam Ezersky puzzle for a challenging, perfect Saturday! One clue that threw me a bit so I'm open to others' thoughts was for 46D. Those are usually purchased at nurseries in fall for immediate planting to overwinter and bud/bloom in the spring. Did I miss something in the clueing or is this just a northeastern gardening phenomenon? Also, BROEY would never past muster in the Spelling Bee (or on Fraternity Row), but I'll give it a try next time when the letters present themselves!
@Kelly H This is a perfect example of how not knowing something can help. I originally had seedS for 46D, but being completely ignorant of gardening I put BULBS in without a second thought.
@Kelly H Agree with you. I put 'seeds' in initially as all the bulbs I have ever bought are for planting out Sept to Dec. They wouldn't even be as promoted in the gardening catalogues in the Spring! I keep procrastinating on dealing with bag of bulbs languishing in my garage at the moment!
@Kelly H I have given up on clues being factually correct and just expect them to be truthy.
@Kelly H We just bought our bulbs last week and drafted a grandson to assist planting over the weekend. He passed on screen time for Grandma time and both were very pleased with the results.
@Paul Perkins I thought it was quite clever and one I knew immediately.
@Kelly H Lilies, gladiolus, dahlias - all bulbs to be planted in the spring… Broey wouldn’t make the bee because e and r are never in a word.
Saw the puzzle creator. Gave it 10 minutes, made a nice dent below. But this is just gonna have to wait til I'm at my best. Too tough right now.
@David Johnson. Smart on your part - it is what you would expect from Sam - deceptive clues, obscure references and “broey”???? Doable but not much fun.
Nothing to add to the comments but "Whew! What a workout!" Thanks, Sam (I think).
Oh dang, this was hard! I enjoyed it though, even if in the end I broke down and looked up some stuff. Having spent over 30 minutes on the solve I was missing very little but no longer making progress so I looked to Google for help. I've read "The Great Gatsby", but the title character is the only one whose name I remember. With __M there for some reason I went for saM, which wreaked havoc in that corner. I googled TOM in a moment of desperation. I've seen SCROD here before, I think, but I didn't remember it today so I looked it up, too. I was stumped by the P of P TRAP. I know the thing of course, but not its English name. In Polish it's called "syfon" (your "siphon"). Why P trap if it's U-shaped? I looked up the first two letters of TYRONE, too. Other than that, it was an enjoyable, clean solve. BRAUHAUS went through so many transformations 🤣. I started with beer hall (the names of beers in the clue were German but with the English "a", so I thought the answer would be an English word), then changed that to brew hall, after that came brauhall (bear with me), and then I finally arrived at the correct answer. What a ride 🤪 Some arcana, like PETER IV and LAMAR JACKSON, I relied on crosses for. Now to read the other comments. I bet I'll learn this was a Wednesday, at best to😂🥲
@Andrzej I don't think you're going to see that it was a Wednesday at best, but ya never know. I had the HAUS part of brauhaus for the longest time, but I kept ripping it out and putting it back in again. I did that at several places in this one. I would love to know the average number of different letters each square had at various times. I thought it was magnificently difficult. Maybe that's part of why puzzles are getting easier, if they are--this one didn't have "oreo", "ono", "eke" or any of the other gimmes we are typically spotted.
@Andrzej I had BRAUHAll at first but quickly realized my mistake.
@Andrzej “Why P trap if it’s U-shaped?” It all depends on how you look at it. Straight on, it’s a U. But if you tilt your head and look at it from the side, it’s a P. (You just have to fill in the missing bit of spine.)
@Andrzej BTW, did you see my ingenious solution to your "pak choy" vs "bok choy"? <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/shared/comment/4b3109?rsrc=cshare&smid=url-share" target="_blank">https://www.nytimes.com/shared/comment/4b3109?rsrc=cshare&smid=url-share</a>
@Heidi But that's just it - without that bit a "p" is not a "p", is it? I guess some cursive variants of a lower case p have a bit of the letter open... Still, the shape of the pipe is clearly about the U in it - that's what keeps the smells away 🤷🏽. Maybe I'm just venting my frustration at being stumped by the English name of a very familiar thing. @Francis Yes, it gave me PTSD because it contained math. I hope you're happy 😢
@Andrzej Witbier is Dutch, not German, so I had brauhuis for a while ...
@Andrzej I found the brauhaus clue very confusing. To my knowledge, witbier is Belgian. I have never seen it in Germany. Brauhaus, however, isn't really a Belgian thing. I had both beerhall and brewhall before finally getting it.
@Andrzej I'm working my way through the NYT crossword archive, and the Sunday one I did yesterday happened to have PTRAP as an answer (which stumped me for a long time, it's obviously a U bend). But today it was, of course, a gimme! A few more years and there will be more gimmes than gotchas (I hope).
@Andrzej — I had U trap for the plumbing fixture and forensics swabbing for urine traces for way too long.
@Andrzej So I put in UTRAP too, had URIN_ crossing it, and said I’ve never seen this word in a puzzle before (it’s one of those that could be perfectly valid but doesn’t pass the breakfast test)—but is a perfectly reasonable example of something a forensic unit might have to analyze.
13 debut answers in this one (an appropriate number). And more than a couple that I was NEVER going to get just from the clues. Cheated more than a bit to manage to get through this one. A bit frustrating but in the end an enjoyable workout. One answer history search today was for various strings of letters in our constructors surname. Some of them didn't go anywhere. Probably the longest answer for any of the sequences was: octobERSKY That was an answer in one puzzle - a Saturday from January 4, 2020 by Adam Aaronson. That one had... eleven answers that never appeared in any other puzzle. That's... unusual. Some of those: HAMBURGLAR ABOSYSTEM CLAPOMETER LIKEBUTTON ALLABOUTME YESSIREEBOB BEGUILING WORLDWARIII Here's that link: <a href="https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=1/4/2020&g=17&d=A" target="_blank">https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=1/4/2020&g=17&d=A</a> I'll return now to my home planet. ...
OH bOY! That error, along with put on “AN Air”, knowing the names of only 2 or 3 current NFL players and nothing of “Gravity’s Rainbow”, and thinking the Formula I divisions must refer to a class of car made the SE very difficult to untangle. The good use of misdirection and clues having multiple possible legit answers made this a good difficult puzzle. I have a pretty broad knowledge base, but I always expect a few unknowns in a Saturday puzzle. I thought this puzzle might have had one or two too many esoteric or niche answers, but it was borderline. At least most of those (like PETER IV, and LAMAR JACKSON) could be competently guessed at with enough letters. Others like FICHTE and SOLI required all the crosses. I had finesse before SLAM BID. I’m not sure I would call that a “tactic”, but close enough I guess. Also thank goodness I grew up in the era of wacky sugared cereals. CHOCULA was a gimme, but I tried rHo before PHI and cOd before ROE, making that section rough as well.
@Jeb Jones 57D was a stretch, as Formula 1 circuits are divided into three sectors, of varying lengths. The FIA mandates that circuits must be at least 3.5 KMS long, by the way. The Monaco street circuit is barely over 2, but it gets a pass for historic significance.
This was a real workout. The NW came together surprisingly fast, setting me up for a record Saturday finish that never happened. COUNTCHACULA was never on my breakfast menu or TUVALU on my world atlas, and I’m sure I’ve never seen or heard of ARYA Stark. Still, I surprised myself by finishing just a couple of squares shy of a clean solve. SOLI Deo gloria, I guess. Church Latin aside, the puzzle had a kind of kinky vibe, what with MASTER(SWITCH) at the top and SUB(WAYSYSTEM) at bottom, the latter entry intersecting with SANDM. TALENT (30D) at the center of the grid seems innocuous enough, but it’s clued via a quote from Erica Jong, who courageously followed her own talent into “dark places.” I put SWITCH above in parentheses, but the crack of the whip is, after all, also part of the game. The Guinness feat in 51A – a chain of BRAs stretching 120 miles --- was news to me. The feat itself is remarkable, but so is the fact that it took place in Rhode Island. Is it even possible to go 120 miles along a straight line in our smallest state without tumbling into Narragansett Bay? Sounds to me more like a squeeze than a stretch.
In the past I found a lot of Ezersky's crosswords pedantic and self-indulgent but I think this one is peachier than those and a fair challenge. Thanks
Anyone else sing "The Philosophers Drinking Song" to themselves trying to solve 26D? 😂 Sadly it didn’t help here (although it has served me well in other instances!) Gardening nit: you buy and plant bulbs in the Fall. They come up in the Spring. I guess BULBS could refer to the flower itself but still... A fun and challenging Saturday! Thanks Sam!
@Lpr You buy and plant lilies, gladiolus and dahlias in the spring
@Graphic Well... technically glads are corms and dahlias are tubers, definitely not bulbs. I have never bought lilies as bulbs they are usually sold as plants. I stand by my nit 😁🌷
Bulbs are not really a spring purchase. They are a spring bloom.
@Brenda good news for you then! If you don't get to it in the fall, there are plenty you can plant in the spring <a href="https://www.familyhandyman.com/list/bulbs-plant-in-spring" target="_blank">https://www.familyhandyman.com/list/bulbs-plant-in-spring</a>/
@Brenda Lilies, dahlias, gladiolus are plated in spring after the last frost…
I recognized 41D (TUVALU) as the country with top-level domain .tv. Many media and entertainment companies have registered domain names ending in .tv (e.g., twitch.tv, pluto.tv) or use it as an alternate domain name (amazon.tv, youtube.tv). Leasing the domain name is a big source of revenue for a country which has limited economic opportunities. Ironically, the island nation may completely disappear due to sea-level rise brought on by climate change.
@RichardZ Great comment. I was going to say exactly the same.