0:20:22
A very nice Thursday with a clever twist.
Having become familiar, now, with the "-" type of clue, I understood quickly that certain clues would span more than one answer space. The first one I got was COLLEGETOWNS (50A: Amherst and Orono, for two ["Get up!"]), but I did not immediately see that "GET" was split out and going "up." I ended up with ABRIDOOFAR (61A: 1977 W.W. II film ["Get lost!"]) by getting all the crosses, but I kept looking for the missing letters nearby. "Get gone!" might have been clearer to me, but luckily, Frannie quickly figured out what was going on. The trickiest one, I think, was PATEGURNER (18A: Gripping read ["Get back!"]), and it was a little odd pushing the "check puzzle" button, even though we got the trick, with that looking the way it does.
Haven't seen TIGE (68A: Buster Brown's dog) for a while, but Frannie remembered it from previous fill. Also in the "know it from crossword puzzles" is ALEX (14A: "A Clockwork Orange" protagonist). Sure, I saw the movie 30 years ago, but my memory has at least been reinforced by the puzzles.
Nice central crossing of first words with YOU (39A: First word of "Huckleberry Finn") and NOW (34D: First word of "Richard III"). I like that flourish.
We know SKUNK (29D: Leave scoreless) as a cribbage term, where no one is ever left truly scoreless, but we suppose it must be used elsewhere as well, with the stated meaning. And SKI (40A: One passing a gate) seems a little much. "Skier" would have been better, no? "One going through a toll booth" could be "tire," but would it be? I don't know… maybe I'm quibbling. I liked the puzzle a lot. Let's not spoil it this way.
I'll end on a happy note and say that Frannie got GAZEBO (52A: Where Maria and the Captain have their first kiss in "The Sound of Music") after I simply read the clue to her aloud. No crosses, no number of spaces, no nothing. Gotta love that.
- Horace
26:32
ReplyDeleteI had to get most of the crosses for GAZEBO. (BTW, "ABRIDOOFAR.") I thought that the clue for ACDC (10A Young brothers' band) was great, although it didn't stump me at all. For blue fill, I enjoyed the pairing of TUB/BARE down in the south, but the clue for the former (57A Economy-size container) wasn't at all sexy. I didn't star anything because I solved in Across Lite, which is one of the drawbacks of doing so.
Right. Thanks. I fixed that now. The content of the post is editable, thank goodness. The comments are not. I haven't found any way to change that, either. I've tried.
ReplyDeleteAnd yeah.. TUB = not sexy. It does make me think of the Simpsons, however, which is always good. I think one time when Homer is shopping in the grocery store there is a big tub of something named, simply, "TUBB." It might be when he's shopping while trying to gain weight to go on disability. Hahahhahaaa… what a great show.
Also, Frannie got ACDC very quickly. I had no idea, but see now that it is a very nice hidden capital!
ReplyDelete13:43. This was a heck of a lot of fun. I got the idea after PATEGURNER, but didn't see the connected clues for a while. Lots of great answers here: ADRENAL, GAZEBO, EXTORTS, WRITLARGE, JEZEBEL, SQUAB. Very chunky Scrabble-heavy words. "Cleveland was one in Buffalo" is a nice piece of trivia. And I too like the crossing of the three letter first-word answers. Really nothing to complain about at all!
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