[Hello, Dear Readers, it's Horace here, filling in for Frannie on a day when she really must prepare for a presentation at work, and can't spare any time to work on one of her carefully crafted reviews. So you get me instead - but she promises to be back tomorrow!]
Today Ms. Gray put herself into nine of the answers by finding landmarks that contain the letters "me" in succession. It's a cute idea, but not one that particularly AMAZEs. The introductory "Facebook Status:" seemed a little unnecessary.... or maybe it could have rotated through different social media types, like "Instagram post:" or "Incoming Snapchat:" or whatever the kids are using these days. Also, there was nothing really tying the answers together except that they are all things or places or companies that most people have heard of.
So the theme was a tad meh. Let's move on to some things that were better. Seeing ADORBS (17D: Very cute, in slang) in the grid made me smile, and 109D: You might take it to go (EXLAX) was hilarious, but my favorite clue was definitely 11D: Dingy part of a kitchen? (OVENTIMER). Hah! I was immediately thinking "How can I make 'behind the stove' fit in there?"
There were some other nice entries, like HELLNO, AMBLE, UPBRAID, and RATTRAP, but as there often is on a Sunday, there was also a fair amount of DAH, ORANT, AREOLA, SAO, IEDS, and SEM. I don't want to dwell on it, but some of it was a little AGEWORN.
- Horace
14:08
ReplyDeleteNew personal best Sunday time for me, but I did have to take a guess on the last letter, where BWANA (112A: Swahili "Sir") crossed TINORE (99D: Cassiterite, e.g.).
I agree that the theme was a bit forced, but I did find the concept amusing that the person writing these clues is really just all about themself. A one-joke theme, but at least the answers were gettable.
31:14
ReplyDeleteAmazing time, Mr. Berman. I've been to MALLOFAMERICA, the JEFFERSONMEMORIAL and TIMESSQUARE, but none of the other theme answers as yet. A bit easy for a Sunday, and, like Mr. Berman, my final entry was the TINORE/BWANA cross. OVENTIMER was an unexpected answer.