NUMBER-ONE FRIENDS
Not being much of a fan of canines, this one left me a little flat. The title is cute, and the image of the dog in the black squares is fancy, but between the very fine 1D: Give some relief (EMBOSS), and our ending at the completely unknown MARL (121A: Earthy deposit), where we guessed at the final L, also not knowing NELLIESMALL (67D: *Singer with the 1964 #2 hit "My Boy Lollipop" [the Bushes 41]), there wasn't much joy in solving. Also, the Johnsons had a dog called "Her?"
I don't know, the whole thing left me flat. I'm looking forward to tomorrow.
- Horace
Checked off a few things on this one: I liked the several answers related to the theme (ARF, BOW, WOW, CLAW). 1D was clued well with Give some relief? (EMBOSS). 68A had me stumped for a while (Max Peel, for example: ANAGRAM, very nice). I too was guessing the far SW, not knowing RAMA, MARL, or MILLIESMALL. Fortunately, I did know OREL, or it would have been a complete loss. I don't love ONELB, and there are far too many sections of all 3-letter answers, but that's what you get for seven long theme answers and a grid that looks like a dog. Not terrible, but nothing amazing either.
ReplyDelete44:32
ReplyDeleteAdd me to the list of those guessing at the last "L" of MILLIESMALL for a successful solve. Like Colum, I knew only OREL down there, and finally put in PERM when I figured out PROM. CYCLOPS was good (13D One with an eye for a storyteller?), and the theme in general was a good one IMO, since I knew of many of the First Dogs. BACH paired with ENYA was interesting, and I always like to use the word OBVIATE when possible. At first I had the nonsensical TOMATOPASTa instead of TOMATOPASTE (105A Lasagna ingredient), but luckily the cross of POEME set me straight. A good Sunday, back to normal difficulty.
43:00
ReplyDeleteJust getting to this one now as last weekend was rather hectic. But I loved the theme and actually filled in 62A from the title and a brief review of clues before getting any of the starred answers. But then it was fairly smooth sailing since I knew all of the dogs' names. Although, I will concede to needing a cross or two in EXCELLENCY to remember "HER" and the confirming ROZ to be sure of REX. I'll also concede to at first immediately putting in BEAU, the Obama's first dog, but quickly realized that the crosses weren't working and switched to SUNNY. I guess it's just as well that the over-used FALA (FRD's faithful Scotty) did not make an appearance...