Tuesday, February 6, 2018

Tuesday, February 6, 2018, Bruce Haight

0:05:24

A DEVIOUS, or "D - V - ous," set of theme answers today, all two words, the first starting with D, the second with V. If I had taken the time to understand this while solving, I might not have had so much trouble figuring out DEMOVERSION (59A: Prototype, maybe). I think I had "Pond" for 57D: Common fishing spot (PIER), and for some reason I had "SAVEsUP" for 40D: Put some money away (SAVEDUP), so sEMOVERSoON did not look very good. And another thing that slowed me down was guessing "DacapO" for 53A: From the beginning: Lat. (DENOVO). I would argue that DENOVO means "anew," whereas "da capo" means "from the top," or "again." It's a small distinction, and one that I probably wouldn't argue too strongly. Ah well... it all got sorted out eventually. And in the end, I enjoyed the theme, especially the amusing revealer.

31-Down

The conversational SAYWHEN (13D: Pourer's instruction), ILLBITE (11D: "O.K., tell me more"), and especially NOCANDO (3D: "Sorry, Charlie!"), and the slangy RAD, DOPE, GAG, and ADORBS (49D: Cute, in modern slang), give the puzzle a nice contemporary feel. And then we have a few uncommon, interesting words like BLEAR (65A: Dim with tears) and MUM (66A: Closemouthed) to balance it all out.

Overall, I enjoyed it.

- Horace

6 comments:

  1. Thanks Horace! Jeff Chen says ADORBS should never be allowed, but I think those kind of teen slang words are OK if popular.....Bruce

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I'm totes down with ADORBS. Chen's gotta get with the program!

      Delete
  2. 8:48
    I agree with Mr. Haight, since even I've heard the term ADORBS. Of course lines begin to BLEAR on what's considered popular by different people. I've never heard the term ORONYMS, but I'll try to remember it since I like it, not that it will ever come in handy. I loved seeing AXIOM in there, which I wrote in off of the clue, and I enjoyed the puzzle as a whole, taking about the proper amount of time to complete it for a Tuesday.

    ReplyDelete
  3. 5:57
    Thumbs up on ADORBS. Got off to a bad start with putting ADO where DIN should be. Even when I figured that out, I tried DADgutS (?!). That's just gross. Other issues I ran into was trying ReBBe at RABBI. The former is a term of respect. Anyway, once I got going, things went much more smoothly.

    Horace, "da capo" isn't Latin, so even though I agree with your translations, it couldn't have been the answer...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Can we say it's Vulgate? :)

      No, you're right, of course. Thanks for checking up on me!

      Delete
  4. Also had ado before DIN even though I was telling myself ado didn't quite fit the clue. The dangers of overlearning the crosswordese lesson.

    AXIOM was a high point for me as well although at first I was thinking theorem (which doesn't fit).

    Nice revealer, good answers, I would take heed if the constructor were wearing an ADOPTME sign.

    ReplyDelete