Matt Heffernan

If I can't be pedantic here, then where else? It bothers me to see TAMALE presented as an actual word, when the proper singular spelling is TAMAL. Maybe a good addition to the clue would have been "... to a gringo".

My fastest Friday ever: 8:13! Seemed a little easy for a Friday, definitely more of a Tuesday-Wednesday level, so it seems like it was placed on a Friday just for being themeless and having long (but easy) spans.

DIRNDL has to be the most obscure word I've ever seen in a Monday puzzle. And as for TILT, that is hardly a "modern" innovation on pinball machines. Most tables since the 1960s have tilt alarms. Only the very oldest extant machines can be manhandled into cheating without a tilt, and you are only likely to see those in museums, not arcades.

Hopefully this is the last appearance of AM STEREO unless it's supposed to be ironic. The AM radio band is strictly mono. Only FM stations can be in stereo. A stereo broadcast over AM would require two synchronized channels, and exactly zero news programs would ever bother with something so costly, technically difficult, and utterly esoteric.

Very surprised that this is the debut of LIGHT OPERA, as it is an artform older than the crossword itself. I almost guessed COMIC OPERA, but immediately the crossings didn't work. If that hasn't made its debut yet, it should, and maybe OPERA BUFFA later in the week!

Solved in slightly shorter than average Sunday time with no cheating, but didn't get the theme until reading this Wordplay. Luckily the puzzle was easy enough to ignore it. Seeing it now, it doesn't add much to the puzzle. Slightly clever, but not in a really satisfying way.

I would like to congratulate Deb on having the restraint not to include the phrase "very interesting, but stupid" in her appraisal of this puzzle.

Someone needs to explain OXES to me. I've never seen that as a plural for ox, nor is it a common synonym for oaf.