CNB
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New York, NY
Honest question: how do you solve puzzles like this if you don't know the trivia? I didn't know ACDC was Australian (I tried "inxs"). Never heard of OLGA Tokarczuk. Never heard of PULIS. Kept switching between "spam" and "junk" for BILL, and had "amnot" for CANSO. Never heard of CRASHBLOSSOM nor DIGITALSHORTS. Never heard of COE, and had no idea BAATH was Syrian. The only two fills I had in the lower left corner were LILITH and HERO. The whole thing really made me feel bad.
I got about 80% of the puzzle done, but got completely stuck on the rebus words. I even knew what most of them were supposed to be, but couldn't figure out where the fused letters went in them. Possibly because I was spelling PALISADE with a double L and thought it had a rebus as well. It felt like it was less of a crossword puzzle and more of a "figure out the trick" puzzle to me. My major complaint is when I gave up and checked the grid to reveal my mistakes, it didn't flag any single letters I had where I needed double letters. Example: I had filled in "ISLAND__" and "PLAYED__" and it said the letters were all correct. That's just wrong. This is the first crossword in the NY Times I've completely given up on and just had the computer answer the grid for me. It felt like a complete waste of time.
Can anyone explain to me how a "no no" is a yes?
@Times Rita It's short for Doctor Octopus, on account that the character is a mad scientist with four mechanical arms. DOC OCK. It rhymes.
It was used as background music for one of the montages, sung by ... Mel Tormé.
@MB How do you know it's going to be a "tedious and tiresome" rebus before you start?
@Linda Jo That might be so, but it means if you get assistance the assistance will not tell you if you've made a mistake.
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