Sunday, November 17, 2013

Sunday, November 17, 2013, Julian Lim

1:04:24

VOWEL PLAY

Only Old McDonald could have enjoyed the theme of this puzzle more than I did. I love that Mr. Lim thought of the idea at all and executed it so thoroughly. My favorite theme answer might have been ROUEAIRLINES (28A: Carrier for Cassanovas?), although MAUIOENOPHILE (82A: Hawaiian wine lover?) is also nice. So many vowels and such great words. OUIJA, ADIEU, CHATEAU, AIOLI. It may be that a surfeit of vowels makes creating a crossword easier because I didn't find much not to like. Here are a few of my non-theme favorites.

I enjoyed the juxtaposition of 72A: Like cutting in line (RUDE) with 73A: Savoir-faire (TACT). I thought 110D: Quit lying (RISE) was a nice clue/answer pair, and I always enjoy NOG (47D: Seasonal beverage) the word much more than I enjoy the beverage itself. 98A: Substantial shoe spec (EEE) made me think of my in-laws. :) And what's not to love about 49D: Girl's name meaning "loved" (AIMEE)?

I just ran through the puzzle again and found very few clues and answers I didn't like. There was really just this one:76D: "Almighty" item: Abbr. (DOL) - who abbreviates dollar like that, or at all, for that matter?

As I was doing the puzzle, I must have said aloud to Horace at least twice, '"sometimes you have to think about the clue words in a different way to get the answer." While I'm sure you'll all saying to yourselves, "totes obvi," it is always more obvious in principle than in particular cases. For example, it took me forever to solve, 32D: Extremely sharp (HAIRPIN), even when I had most of the letters. Go figure.

~Frannie

3 comments:

  1. Always lovely to hear from Frannie. I very much enjoyed the theme of this puzzle, although the rest of the fill wasn't much to write home about in my view. MAUIOENOPHILE was my fave. Since I filled this one out pen and paper while watching the football game, I can't give a true time, but it was finished some 2 hours after starting, with many interruptions.

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  2. I started at around 7:50 AM, ten minutes prior to boarding our flight from Orlando to Hartford on Sunday morning and finished just after crossing the state line into Georgia, which I think is around 200 miles or so, so with a takeoff time of 8:30 AM (on-time) and 200 miles at 500 mph (0.4 X 60 = 24 minutes), that puts my solve time at around 104 minutes, or 1h44m or so. Of course, there was quite a bit of anxious looking about as well as drinking a few ounces (3.4) of vodka in orange juice in preparation for takeoff.
    I enjoyed 111A "Stay cool!" (DONTPANIC) since that phrase was so central to THGTTG. As far as the rest of the puzzle goes, I didn't star anything and only had to write over two or three boxes, so it was pretty easy for the most part.

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  3. Aimeee, I'm touched. I truly am. However, for some reason--maybe it's just a down week (I haven't been getting enough sleep and my weight was up to 225 this morning. Don't worry, though. Thanks to my daily weigh-ins, I was able to catch and rectify the blip before it becomes a trend: I rode the bike for 40 minutes tonight while watching first part of NCIS: LA, then a scintillating city council session on community access TV. An application for a new liquor store in STLP was denied!)--- I found this puzzle a little harder than you and the rest of the gang. My favorite theme answer was going to be "Adieu, oarsmen" until I got a tip at recess that it was in fact ADIEUOARSMAN. Much less elegant, so I switched my fav themer over to Frannie's ROUEAIRLINES. I've always had a softspot for roues. And cads. Cool to see Hammerin' Hank clued as the all-time RBI leader. And here's a couple you don't see exchanging Cs every day: ALICIA Keys and Cavemen SCALIA. With that, I'm off to FINDPEACE.

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