Ms. Weintraub and I seemed to be on exactly the same wavelength today. After a stutter-start guess of "BESTactress" (1A: Award for "Hairspray" but not "Hair" (BESTMUSICAL)), that was fixed when I got MOET (5D: Big name in Champagne), I was off to the races.
I very much like both triple-stacks today. I haven't thought of the phrase ETPHONEHOME in a long time, but boy that was huge in the '80s. I loved it when I saw the movie on opening night in Worcester, but Frannie and I watched it again maybe six or seven years ago, and boy is it sickening to watch as an adult. But enough on that!
THREEINAROW (17A: XXX, for example) is a fun meta answer at the end of a three-stack. And on the bottom I love all three answers MICROMANAGE (52A: Oversee to a fault), PLAINSPOKEN (56A: Bluntly honest), and especially HORNETSNEST (58A: Dangerous situation). Even the two-stacks (is that a thing?) are solid. I smiled at DOIHAVETO (12D: Question from the unwilling), and at the cute clue for RUNAFEVER (30D: Have a hot body). I briefly tried inTRUdIng for OBTRUSIVE (31D: Meddling), but HUBCAPS (35A: Lug nut hiders) fixed that up.
There's a ton of good fill today, and very little glue. I guess OVI (51A: Lead-in to duct), NEV (55A: Home of Paradise: Abbr.), ILE (18A: Land in la mer), and ILO (53D: U.N. worker protection grp.) are the worst of it, but really, it's a pretty clean grid.
1A: BESTMUSICAL - A-
Favorite: 50A: Intimate (GETAT). Totally misread this one.
Least: STENT (47D: Vessel opener). Gross.
Speaking of 50A, I also liked the misdirection in "17A: XXX, for example," and "30D: Have a hot body," both of which resulted in unsexy answers.
Thumbs up on this one, but it went a little fast for me. It's not often that I have descending solve times from Wednesday to Friday. Let's see if I can get into the sevens tomorrow! :)
- Horace
15:11
ReplyDeleteI crushed this one, too, for a Friday. Nothing slowed me down. I don't know much about TENON, though, unless I'm totally missing something. Nice to have CORLEONE in there, and I liked the clues for both COLORIN (38D Fill with crayons) and TOAST (19A A goner).
As Wikipedia puts it, "The mortise and tenon joint has been used for thousands of years by woodworkers around the world to join pieces of wood."
Delete9:21
ReplyDeleteI was excited to get a new Friday personal best time on this one, until learning that one of my buddies did the same, and apparently just about everyone else. So maybe this was more of a Wednesday puzzle, but still enjoyable nonetheless.
I also got hung up a bit with INTRUSIVE, as well as LOOPS instead of DROPS for 24D: Roller coaster features. Our leader still seems stuck on the former, as I believe the real answer was OBTRUSIVE.
Right... I'll fix that. Sorry.
DeleteThe big question now, I guess, is will Colum break 5:00?
ReplyDelete6:01
ReplyDeleteNot quite, Horace! I finished the west in 3:09 and the east in just under 3 minutes. Getting BESTMUSICAL made the NW simple as all get out. I thought I might have some difficulty getting going into the other half of the puzzle with just LYMPH and LEWIS making entries, but it was just as smooth and straightforward as the first part. I'm not a big fan of the clue for TSPS, and nobody likes SSNS. Otherwise I'll accept the glue for the nice long answers. Agreed that it was more of a Wednesday level themeless. Looking for more of a challenge tomorrow!