Puzzled Brit
Hampshire, UK
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Hampshire, UK
It seems a lot of people whizzed through this puzzle. I was not one of them... However (fanfare...) I did get a baseball answer right. at last! 😃
It seems many people are disappointed that this was an easy puzzle for a Saturday, but I enjoyed it. Lately Saturday puzzles have become like a research project for me as I've had to resort to looking so many things up, but not today. Happy Valentine's Day! 💖
Pinch me, I must be dreaming! For the first time ever, I've finished a Sunday puzzle without having to resort to look-ups. Admittedly some of my answers were guesses, but they were right for once. It will probably never happen again. lol...
I was getting really grumpy with this puzzle as I stared at a nearly empty grid for ages - grrr, this just too difficult, obscure, blah blah... Yet when I finally finished it most of the answers are things I am familiar with. I was undone by the clever clueing. The fault was all mine, of course. Once again I learnt some new expressions - hit me up, pinky swear, on a lark (I only know FOR a lark) and one I could've done without knowing - spitball (eww). Every day is a school day for me here!
Fabulous puzzle with a very neat trick - well done Mr Coulter! Bet I wasn't the only person to confidently enter DENIM for 1A, only to realise very soon that it couldn't be right. Took me a while to get the significance of the blank clues, but a (non-DECAF) COFFEE helped me get started! I often find Sunday puzzles a bit of a slog, but thoroughly enjoyed this one.
@Mike Do you think it might push people's buttons?
@Eoin I did a look-up to see what the difference is. It seems tartan is technically a variety of plaid (with a distinctive pattern connected to a particular clan), but plaid includes other fabrics which are not tartan. I didn't realise that the terms weren't interchangeable. Thanks for broadening my knowledge!
I usually whizz through on Mondays but the SW corner defeated me today. I'd never heard of POPO, ON A TEAR or POP FOUL and thought TOOTSY was a toe rather than a foot. I didn't know PERNICKETY could be spelt with an S in it either, so that baffled me for a while. Oh well, we live and learn!
I was surprised by the answer to 33D. Pan loaf is a type of bread in the UK? Never heard of it! A bit of research suggests it's known as a pan loaf in Scotland and Northern Ireland, which are indeed part of the UK so it's not wrong, but in most parts it would be known as a tin loaf. 🍞
@Ell Lav (which is somewhat old hat now) refers to a toilet though, and we don't call toilets bathrooms here. Bathrooms are where you take a bath (or shower). 'Divided by a common language', as the saying goes. 😏
A very enjoyable puzzle, although I shudder at the thought of putting kale in a Caesar salad - just NO!
@John Dietsch LO !!
@Helen Wright I was very surprised to see the Kate Bush track in the 'tricky clues' section of the article. Obviously not as well known in the US. When Wuthering Heights was out, I was having my lunch in the pub one day and a man came in with a yellow labrador. When that track came on the jukebox, every time she sang the dog started howling. Not sure whether that meant he was a fan or not!
Took me a long time but I enjoyed the theme. The London 1912 clue (25A) was the only one where I had a good idea what the subject might be, but It was fun finding out the answers to the others (especially the two-part one, lol). However 111A was my finest hour. I only knew LOLLYGAG because it come up as one of the possible answers on a Spelling Bee ages ago. I'd never heard of it before but the word stuck in my head and today I got a chance to use it! What a great word.
@Jonathan Baldwin That one had me baffled too. I wouldn't recommend trying to have a bath in the lav. Most unhygienic! 😄
@JT We know Parmigiano Reggiano as Parmesan where I live. It's the 'authentic' Parmesan cheese but, according to Wiki, outside the EU imitations of it are made with the same name: "The names Parmigiano Reggiano and Parmesan are protected designations of origin (PDO) for cheeses produced in these provinces [Parma and Reggio Emilia] under Italian and European law. Outside the EU, the name Parmesan is legally used for imitations..."
@Lea I've been doing crosswords for as long as I can remember but I had never come across rebuses before I started doing the NYT ones, about two years ago. I think they're rather fun and add a different element to the puzzle.
Started badly by putting freak storm for 14A, but the ubiquitous 'F1 neighbor' soon showed me the error of my ways! I enjoyed this puzzle - had to look a couple of things up but never reached the 'give up for now and come back to it later' stage, which I often do on the harder puzzles. Nice start to the day.
@jas Eww, you have my sympathy. Cleaning up snot is no fun!
@andreaoz44 That must've been really annoying, but I confess your post made me howl with laughter!
@Mike I'm stunned. Maybe I'm just going through a phase(r).
Aargh! This felt like the longest 1:20:14 of my life. My brain hurts...
Really enjoyed this puzzle. Rebuses - and a recipe thrown in too! A fun start to my day. 😊
I managed to complete the puzzle without understanding the yellow numbers or some of the answers. Didn't get the 'theme' at all until I read Deb's explanation. I thought it was quite tricky for a Wednesday - and then realised it's Thursday. Oh dear - that was a real 2-Down moment!
@Justin I confidently entered 'victory laps', which sent me totally the wrong way for the down answers. Realised my mistake eventually, after much head-scratching!
@Patrick J. I've always seen Holmes portrayed wearing a deerstalker hat, but it was only today that I realised it is a type of CAP. I mean, nobody saves money in a Tension fund do they - d'oh!
Many people seem to have found this much easier than yesterday's puzzle, but it took me 10 minutes longer! Both were done in close to my average time for the day (as was Monday's) so the sequence of difficulty has been correct for me so far this week. I entered several wrong answers on my first pass (8D Frodo, 24A moo, 58A stickiest). Realising this and correcting them held me up for a while, but overall I found it an enjoyable puzzle.
@Jane Wheelaghan I presume 'little squirt' can be used to describe a child i.e. a tot.
@Mike Made me smile a very happy smile - not a cross-beam in any way.
@Mike At least you had a bash.
@Andrzej I was lucky enough to see the Little Mermaid years before mobile phones were around. I was on a business trip in Copenhagen and went for a look around in the evening after work. It was the middle of winter, freezing cold. No tourists around!! I didn't hang around for long, thought I'd better get moving before hypothermia set in, but I was able to enjoy it in solitude. 🧜🏼♀️
The NE corner was my last fill, hampered by the fact I was sure 16D had to be BOLT (I don't think of footballers as 'athletes') and I've never heard of a CPA. The funniest part was... I do my puzzles on an out of date laptop, which cannot display some emojis correctly. Although I *now* know there was an emoji as a clue for 25A, it was completely blank on my screen. When the answer became obvious, it was also very appropriate. Doh!
@Adin Yes - very clever indeed!
@Puzzlemucker Having just come home from a funeral (feeling a bit fragile) the lovely poem you posted brought tears to my eyes, but in a good way. Thank you.
@Lpr I did the same, waited for the other answers to become clear. Impressed that Steve thought it through at the start! 👏🏼
@J Rice That's an error in the article, which someone pointed out earlier but it hasn't been corrected. It should say 117 Across.
@Liza I never read the article until I've finished the puzzle because it would give too much away. I do sometimes have to look things up if I get stuck, although as time goes on it's often just to check what I already think the answer might be. You will get to know things that crop up frequently, like OPI and SRO did today. Rather appropriate that the Thursday puzzle with the wheels drove you round the bend! 😄 Sorry, I'll get me coat...
I found this puzzle challenging, but enjoyable after yesterday's slog. I was about to embarrass myself by asking about 117A, BASE the corner of a diamond? 🤔 The penny has just dropped. Baseball strikes again! I really should remember that meaning of diamond by now. 🙄
A very enjoyable puzzle today. I had never heard of Roger Ebert but his reviews made me laugh out loud, especially the Pearl Harbor one. What a wit! I guess there must have been some movies he did like? 🤔
@Oikofuge Off topic I know (sorry), but just wanted to say thanks for your interesting comment about the term 'emu' which I asked about the other day. Comments were closed by the time I saw it, but I wanted you to know it was appreciated!
@Pani Korunova If it's any consolation, I didn't get it either. Thought it must be something to do with batteries, d'oh!
@Harri That was my favourite too - made me laugh when I got it!
@HEK Yes, I managed to do the whole thing in a personal best time, without realising there was any rebus element until the grid was completed. Sort of happy with the time, but...
@Jane Wheelaghan I've heard buy used to mean believe something that's not necessarily true, as in "Told my boss I'd be late as I had a doctor's appointment - he seemed to buy it".
Phew, I found this hard today. I needed several look-ups and was not helped by my initial wrong answers. Once I realised what 1A was about I smugly put corer instead of PARER, then I put asses instead of GEESE for 21A. Found the NE corner really hard, until my PARACHUTE rescued me, at which point I got 10D and was really cross not to have got it before because I used to go bowling all the time! I didn't understand how ETHER could be a number, until I read Deb's explanation. Aargh, of course! 48A took a while, because these were called TYPING POOLS here, but I had heard STENO in connection with law courts. Still baffled by 55A because LASH-UP is supposedly a British expression, but I've never heard it. Maybe it's a regional thing? Bodge (up) would be the only similar term I can think of. Going for a walk now to give my brain a rest!
@B I wouldn't say 'empty bags?' was a difficult clue. I'd say impossible! 😄 Please explain, I just don't get it.
Thank you Malaika! I found this a very enjoyable puzzle. The SW corner was pretty empty for a while, but I chipped away at it and got there in the end with no look-ups, which is not something I can say very often.
@Ken I finished it before I'd even started! 😄😄😄
@Mark Carlson Me too, it became more of a research project than a crossword after a while.
@festy I just did the Across rebus, assuming the Down one was implied. That worked fine too.