Gregory Melahn

Yes! I successfully identified it’s a giraffe, not a tiger or an elephant which means I passed my cognitive test!!! Nothing I can’t do.

I was the unfortunate owner of a used 73 Pinto for a while. On the day the stick shift came off in my hand while driving (just one of many problems) I remember thinking I could sell it and imply it was an automatic. “NO STICK!”

Nice to see a mention of Unicode, one of the technology underpinnings used to preserve and share information. I still can’t throw away my hardcopy of 1.0.0, now over thirty years old!

I’m sorry but despite many years of instruction in German, I am sad to admit that the first thing that comes to my mind now when “DIE” appears in the crossword is Sideshow Bob’s explanation to the parole board for his “DIE BART, DIE” chest tattoo as the more innocent “No, that’s German for THE BART, THE”. Parole granted.

It was like an executive summary of that wonderful little poem prepared for a CEO without (ironically) a minute to lose. … and GIDDYUP was perfect.

My Dad used to tell me that he tried to get the circus to take me on as a human cannonball but they said I wasn’t the right caliber for the job.

I didn’t realize until googling that the actor who played Charlie Bucket, Peter Ostrum, ended up as a veterinarian which makes the clue doubly good.

I always appreciate a puzzle that I can learn a new word from, and still solve from the crosses.

Good one. I especially liked the fact that 54 across provided a sly hint to the rebus theme itself employing two rebuses.

I was listening to chapter 66 of Isaac Asimov’s memoir ‘I,Asimov’ just this morning. The chapter is entitled ‘Prolificity’ so 40D came naturally!

Wow I’m an old programmer and never thought I would get to use IDEMPOTENT and EVICTS (as from a cache) in a crossword! :-)

I’ve spent so much time working closely with Brits over the years that I had come to UTILIZE UTILISE as natural, so I had to stare at 42D for a long time before swapping in the Z to hear the music.

You could have at least thrown PLUTO a bone. Maybe including him with a Disney character clue?

Three cheers for the inverse trig functions!

Just yesterday onomatopoeia happened to have been an answer (question) on Jeopardy in the 12-letter word category so I actually had a shot at the spelling

I was really hoping for FOSTERBEAGLE.

When we lived in NY, our neighbors the Bravos lived just below and introduced us to flautas. A nice memory and happy surprise to see it mentioned in the puzzle!

Keep hoping one of these days to see ASU as the Mountaineers school answer instead of WVU. Go Yosef!

I caddied for three years in the 69’s and never heard the term LOOPERS until now. My first guess was LOAFERS, which sounded more like something the golfers would call us. I see now there’s several movies with that term in the title. One is a documentary about caddies. The other is a Bruce Willis SF about time traveling hit men.

Stuck with BUTTERFLY for Monarchs for too long and even tried to somehow wedge in MERCURIEx but eventually the downs straightened me out

When I got the happy music today the app told me I solved in 6:06 which is a HIGHSCORE for me. I should have screen captured it because a minute later it adjusted it to a more believable 30:11.

Excellent Saturday puzzle which I solved only after trying to cram Turkey in the Straw into 39A and now I can’t stop the tune playing in my head and I want ice cream.

Surprised and happy to see RSS make a guest appearance! Now looking for a simple RSS feed parser I wrote decades ago. I still have it around someplace. I think.

Welp, happy to learn a new word on a Monday. Can’t remember when that last happened. Wouldn’t have gotten CHIGNON but for the cross!

I had to stare at the fourth letter of 31A for a long time before some vague memory of the origin of the name of Albemarle, NC drifted up and I guessed L to hear the music. That then lead me to a Wikipedia article about the Duke of Albemarle and then to Alba Marla and so on (or YADDA YADDA YADDA) 🤓 My Dad probably would have known this right away as he was the only homeowner I knew who owned his own motorized cement mixer and seem to use it every weekend.

I thought I was being clever in deducing that Mario with a head mirror would be a doctor but then I thought doctors work in a ER so I arrived at ERMARIO for an answer which kinda fit with BLOWERBAR since I was in the mood to allow anything there and it took me literally hours after walking away before seeing it was the more sensible DRMARIO and BLOWDRYBAR. And I learned a new word. At least I remember Galois from calculus days so that part wasn’t too bad.

Of all things to hold me up for over 45 minutes was ENS instead of END for 25 across. 🤦‍♂️ I was skeptical of several of my other answers and was staring them down instead of checking the rest of the puzzle.

Block by block. Really enjoyed this one.

I am old enough to remember hearing HOLYMOSES but not old enough to have actually said it. I think I’ll start saying it now. Plenty of chances.

Crunchy!

Great puzzle, though it would have even better if MANIOC had been crossed with MANIAC.

Very nice and tricky. 34 minutes slower than average for me plus a third cup of afternoon coffee. I got stuck with PADS instead of PODS for 51-A of all things ( I was thinking of a pad of butter I guess). I always appreciate learning a new word thanks to the cross answers, in this case ZARFS. It helped that know my periodic table so I had the Z. I also got EPT only thanks to the cross and I’m still not 100% sure which of the meanings I looked up later was the meaning here lol. I suppose I can read the comments but I’m tired now.

At least the puzzle included only one SET today

Nine minutes longer than usual. But I learned a new word, SMEW, which, according to Wikipedia, is derived from SMEE, ‘a dialectal term for a wild duck’. Of course, we will all recognize SMEE as a perennial favorite in crosswords and I now expect SMEW to make regular appearances too.

I just finished reading “The Whys of a Philosophical Scrivener” by Martin Gardner and I was long a fan of his Mathematical Games column so I was glad to see a reference to him! Was that his first mention in the crossword?

I have Morton’s Toe like my Dad and I did not know until 11D today that Lady Liberty also has that. Makes me want to wear sandals now.

Following the butt theme, I see a missed chance to use PITA as in ‘an acronym for a difficult task or person’ to provide one of the hidden A’s.

Finished in the nick of time tonight, 2x average, in-between ACC football play. Learned a few new words and names in the process. Really appreciated the clues for ADDS, SCHULZ, FAMOUSPOTATOES, among others.

wow