I got OVEREASY (15A: Diner breakfast specification) (my favorite!) as my first answer, which I liked, but then off of that were AVER (2D: Not equivocate about) and ARA (4D: The Altar constellation), and I thought, really? "The Altar constellation?" I learned the Altar constellation from doing crosswords, but even if I hadn't "alter" is "ARA" in Latin. It just seemed a little too straight forward.
My attitude changed, however, when I hit HET (5D: Boiling, with "up"). Some might be annoyed by this old slang, but my sister says this all the time, and I love the expression. Then with all that in place I saw SARAH___ at "1A: Onetime debater with Joe Biden," (I'm not rating it) and it was just a matter of waiting to see what the rebus would be. And then the waiting was over when I saw 6D: Spacious and splendid ([PAL]ATIAL). Heh. SAYHELLOTOMY / LITTLEFRIEND went in without hesitation when I reached it, and then it all started to unravel quickly. It was an elegant touch to get DE[PAL]MA (54D: "Scarface" director) in with a rebus square.
I love several answers in this one. OHSNAP (9A: Response to a verbal slam) and FACE[PAL]M (51D: Gesture indicating "How stupid of me!") are great. 17A: Tests of crews' control? (REGATTAS) and 38D: Brady bunch, in headlines (PATS) took me way longer than they should have. 39D: Bond yield? (INTEL) and 24D: They may be conceived around Halloween (LEOS) were tricky, too! And maybe my favorite was the clue on the classic EIEIO (31A: Refrain from farming?). Excellent.
This would be a definite contender for "puzzle of the week," if only we handed out such an award.
I ended up in a panic needing LEHI / UTAH (59D: With 61-Down, city named for a Book of Mormon prophet), but eventually I realized that "BEERhall" was wrong, and I remembered SAMSMITH's name from the Oscars, and then things finally came together.
Very satisfying Thursday.
- Horace
41:37
ReplyDeleteI didn't even notice LEOS there. I mean, it's there, because of the crosses, but I'd read the clue and then moved on. LEHI definitely slowed me down in the SE, but I, too, eventually figured out that BEERhall wouldn't do and it slowly fell into place. The rebus became apparent for me at the NE[PAL]/[PAL]ED cross, and then things started going just fine for me. I also erred throwing in INSoleS instead of INSERTS at 25A and hbo when TCM was needed in the SE. Without those errors to slow me down, I'm sure this could have been under 20 for me, but alas. Regardless, it was a fun Thursday; just what a Thursday should be. As a side note, I got PATS and EIEIO right away. 55A Captain's logs? (RAFT) is great. Also, I just had a whole discussion on why the PEEN is so useful, concentrating force so effectively, with Sue. I'd used the device to break apart some cement that was encasing our oil line (tank to furnace, neither of which exist in our house any longer). As some may know, we've recently stopped using fossil fuels around the YBH, and I'm currently removing abandoned vestiges.
13:31
ReplyDeleteExcellent rebus puzzle, with randomly placed rebus squares in the corners. I got the trick within the first two minutes. I had put "paulryan" in at 1A, but that didn't work, so I had to think back to 2008. RA[PAL]BUM is good also, because of the split across words. The NE took me forever. I couldn't get "Golden galloper" for the longest time. And HOLISM... whew. That's tough. I thought of ANENT, but couldn't commit to it. OHSNAP! Thank goodness for LSU, or I wouldn't have figured out LEHI either.
I only just now figured out LORES. Lo-res. Not "lores". I wanted "pixilated", but that's a bit long.