Monday, November 19, 2018

Monday, November 19, 2018, Jim Hilger

4:14 (FWOE)

Happy Thanksgiving week! Today, I am expressing gratitude for music. It's so important to me to be able to participate in music making on a regular basis. This year, I've been a part of Albany Pro Musica, a choir in my area of the highest quality. Last week we sang Britten's War Requiem, with the Albany Symphony, and it was a joy to help create something of so much emotion and wrenching beauty.

On the other hand, I blame the exertions for my current nasty pharyngitis, so no good deed and all that.

Today's error (a bad start to a week to FWOE twice in a row) came because I chose EwAN, the Scots version, rather than EVAN, the Welsh version of John. And of course, it being a Monday, I forgot to look at the crosses.

The theme is an odd one: there are only three answers, each a movie title in the form of "The A of B." The clues then call each movie an adjective which can be defined by the movie title. That's complicated to describe, and I'm not entirely convinced I've gotten it quite right. In any case, I guess that's why THECOLOROFMONEY is a "green" movie, or THESOUNDOFMUSIC a "noted" one.

That being said, all three movies are pretty good ones. I'd say that The Sound of Music is my favorite of the three, especially given the nostalgia factor. The Shape of Water was very good, but is a bit recent for me to be able to sense its overall value. I was certainly not in favor of it winning Best Picture. The Color of Money was a ton of fun, but clearly pulls up the rear of this trio.

With only three theme answers, the rest of the puzzle is free to have very good fill. I enjoyed BABYBUGGY, GRILLE, and BOTOX. MAKEME is also very nice.

- Colum

3 comments:

  1. On the musical theme I was glad to see ORFF. Partly because I could fill it in off the clue, partly just because it was nice to be reminded of one of my favorite pieces of music.

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  2. 5:30 (FWOE)
    I had the exact same thing happen to me, Colum! And speaking of not checking crosses, I'm pretty glad I didn't even look at 56A, because ORFF is not within my ken. But as you frequently say, Mr. Kingdon, one solver's wheelhouse is another solver's "whatever the opposite of a wheelhouse is." Well, maybe you don't say that exactly...

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