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AREOLA seems a bit too loose, allowing about any other body part to be used as an answer to the clue going forward. TENDON PINKIE AXILLA could all work as well. I feel that "some" is doing very heavy lifting here. And a quick search about AREOLA vs NIPPLE piercings seems to confirm my concern. Or maybe I am missing some other obvious meaning, and someone can fill me in.
SAMOA did not fully fit in the grid. Oh well. CARAMELDELITE it is.
@Barry Ancona yep. so an errant piercing may accidentally involve the areola, increasing the risk for an infection. Not up to standards for a clue. Hard stop. Nobody is intentionally piercing there. Having a clue that references a rare protentional complication of nipple piercing is not a good clue. Say I clued ELECTRICCHAIR with "One way to perform cardioversion". Probably not okay, though technically correct. Again "some" is carrying a major load in this clue and is deceptive beyond acceptable standards.
@Barry Ancona I have been doing the NYT puzzle for enough years that I understand how clues work. In fact, I only do the Friday and Saturday puzzles at this point. This answer is wrong if it is meant as intentional piercing. It was an attempt to be cute with the misdirection. It is misguided at best. Could the answer be intuited from the Across words? Of course. It does not mean it is a good or even close to good or even factually correct clue without absolutely stretching the meaning of "some" which would then allow any body part of be included for this clue in the future. Please spend 10 seconds googling areola and nipple piercings and report back.
@ad absurdum Politeness can also get sheep to do what you want if you respectfully ask. No biting or barking needed, just respect for another species. And a phrase telling them you have been allowed into their club. Pretty sure the phrase was BaaRamEwe which sorta kinds makes sense. And we have a Border Collie in the neighborhood. My dog just nods and says "yes ma'am!" when she tells my dog to move to a different place.
User experience comment. It seems as if the electronic version highlighted the answer when the "clue" for the middle section was clicked. On paper it was highly annoying to have to go back and forth to find the answer to use as a clue. To the setters' credit, the clues were in order, so after about 30 seconds of frustrating back and forth, I realized I could just tag the 8 answers and know which central clue they corresponded to by working down the puzzle. Good work on that construction.
NEWTS was my Slumdog Millionaire-ish moment today. Last December, er, Dicemeber, I joined a challenge to play a different game with dice every day. I upped the challenge for myself requiring a different designer every day, otherwise it would be a non-stop stream of Reiner Knizia games. So I found some PnPs. One of them was called Axolotl Dice. When I saw the clue, I envisioned the fat salamander-looking hand drawn creature on the score sheet and immediately knew the answer. The game has little to do with Axolotls. The name was chosen because... let me quote. "Gain as many dice, rerolls, and multipliers as possible for the final big roll! High Score Wins! Axolotl Dice? More like that’s a lotta dice!" The scoresheet even says AXO-LOTL.
@John Daly Making it worse, one year "Santa" (aka Mrs. Claus) put a lump of KALE in my stocking. Thanks NYT for bringing back the memory. Then again, maybe that makes more sense than using it for a Caesar salad. Maybe someone can make a cruciferous jokey themed puzzle that we can all find disgusting.
This puzzles feels a little too light by about 6.7% .
The natick of RENAT_/_R_JEL/E_ZYE was just ab5urd. In defense of ORAJEL, at least when you get the answer you can recognize it as a portmanteau which might make sense. And EAZY E sounds like it could be someone's name. Better than any other letter for E_ZYE. Many other crossings gave no "Ah okay!" feeling when filled in.
@SP Silly Grey Duck sounds reasonable.
Grade Inflation? Nope Grid Deflation! I've seen plenty of 15x16 grids but how many 14x15 grids are there.
@Barry Ancona Yes, I have solved on paper for many many years (only 45, not 50) and electronically for about 15. I am back to paper for another month-ish. Often times, it is a simple (see other clue). This particular set-up, though, made it difficult to transit back and forth as many clues needed to be visualized in order to make sure the crossing worked. But as mentioned above, the clues for the middle section were in order reading top to bottom, which was a nice feat of construction and allowed a quick solve.
@SBK By the same logic (knowing the plot), it is not unreasonable to think maybe a feminine name is used by one of the characters as a stage name, since that character had a lead role. Looking it up, Zaza would be the name, but general knowledge about the plot fails in this case to differentiate between RENATO and RENATA and perhaps RENATE
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