Monday, September 25, 2017

Monday, September 25, 2017, Bruce Haight

0:03:59

An amusing start to the week, with rhyming two-word phrases. I smiled at all of them, but had the hardest time coming up with HOTSY/TOTSY (sophisticated). I don't know what that says about me, and I'll thank you not to opine on the subject. :)


My favorite answer today is CYYOUNG (24A: Award named for the winningest pitcher of all time) because, obvious as it is, I had not read the clue until after entering the double Y, and I was already starting to re-think 2D: Book that might require a key to open (DIARY). "Hmm... I've seen locks on old bibles, I think, and what about... nope, never mind, the clue has the word "pitcher" in it. We're good."

Not much long stuff, but BULLMOOSE (8D: Symbol of Teddy Roosevelt's political party) and FOURSPEED (33D: Like most manual transmissions in the 1970s and '80s) were fine. I enjoyed DIURNAL (43A: Active during the daytime), which crossed the fun SCULPTS (50A: Produces a large body of work?). TWIRL (34D: Spin, as a baton) was fancy, and MARTYRS (26A: Ones sacrificing for a cause) has that nice string of letters at the end.

1A: Puff ____ (snake) (ADDER) - C+.
Favorite: 32A: She raised Cain (EVE) - Simple, but amusing
Least: hmmm... maybe ORD (20A: California's old Fort ____). It's just a little esoteric for a Monday. On the other hand, I think I may have played disc golf at that old Fort, so maybe I shouldn't give it such a hard time. :)

Oh well, me and my AMIE are on vacation this week, but as usual for us, we've got an agenda, and if I'm going to be one who ADHERES to his HONEYDO list, I should probably shut the ol' laptop and AMBLE over to the toolbox. I enjoyed this puzzle. Fun theme, with no need for a revealer. Good start to the week.

- Horace

4 comments:

  1. Wow - Horace- you got this out early today! When you're not on vacation you sleep in till noon? :) Bruce

    ReplyDelete
  2. 4:53
    I'll start here and work my way back to Friday. The "T" of the HOTSY/TOTSY cross was my final entry because, like Horace, that's a new one to me. STDENIS is the Roman Catholic church of my youth in Douglas. DIANA is timely, as is TREKS, as in "I look forward to watching the new Star TREKS that I DVR'd from last night when I get home today." My favorite theme answer was probably NAMBY/PAMBY, but Frannie probably liked LOVEY/DOVEY the best.

    ReplyDelete