A fun, challenging Friday puzzle today. I very much enjoyed many of the answers, starting with my favorite - YOUREAJERK (28D: Intemperate put-down). I laughed out loud at that one. It's neighbor, BAZOOKAJOE (29D: Comics character seen on gum wrappers) didn't fool me for a second, but STARCRAFT (5D: Hit sci-fi video game set around the 26th century), on the other hand, was something I had never heard of. I had mineCRAFT in there for a while, but eventually the crosses worked themselves out.
It was funny (ish) to see "D'oh!" used as a clue, after my difficulties with that word on Monday. Today it led to IMAMORON, which also got quite a chuckle.
CYBERCAFES (27A: Places to get wired, in two senses of the word), UNTAPED (25A: Live, in a way), and BASESALARY (43A: Amount before bonuses) were, in order STALE, forced, and boring. But BUZZFEEDQUIZZES seems adequately timely. Those are still a thing, aren't they?
1A: Place to order sardinas and sangria (TAPASBAR) - B. Good Friday clue.
Favorite: YOUREAJERK
Least: NOA (32A: "____ thousand times ..."
I enjoyed this one, how about you?
- Horace
Happy to see my favorite band represented with AJA. Yes, I enjoyed this one too. The tougher the better on Fridays and Saturdays, and this one was tough for me. I too had mineCRAFT filled in for the longest time and that made the northwest very hard, even though I was pretty sure TAFT was right (I didn't put it in right away.) Finally I got FIREAXES and BOX, and the rest of that corner fell. As usual, when I look at that area now, I think it should have been so much easier. I like seeing BAZOOKAJOE in the grid. CYBERCAFES are stale already?? Not sure I've even been to one. Life moves too fast nowadays. Aren't TAPASBARS passe too then?
ReplyDelete24:42
ReplyDeleteI love a nice, palindromic time. This seemed pretty easy save for the SE, where SAYONARA and FAKENAME took quite a while. The fact that I entered Stan (instead of SARA) off of the "S" in HASPS didn't help too much. There was also a slight slowdown in the NE where I'd entered SQft off of the "Q" in QUEEQUEG (which went right in), but as Horace mentions, the crosses sorted everything out just fine. We seem to only be missing a "v" for a pangram. And yes, I enjoyed this one.
10:47
ReplyDeleteClose to my best time for a Friday.
Due to unfortunate recent events, I've been listening to Aja for most of the past three days. So that one went in pretty easy.
Only struggle was the NW corner for me. In general, it was nice to see lots of Q, Z, X, J, and K in a puzzle that still played quite smoothly.
11:36
ReplyDeleteSo much scrabbly goodness. Interesting that it misses being a pangram by the space of one V. Which is better, IMAMORON or YOUREAJERK? Both outstanding.