A LACKOFCHARACTER appears in today's three theme answers (THELADYVANISHES, RUNAWAYBRIDE, INVISIBLEMAN). I enjoyed the theme and thought the missing person in each was clearly apparent. I thought another possible theme answer might be "Gone Girl."
A number of excellent entries materialized elsewhere in the grid:
Getting close (WARM)
Scandalous suffix (GATE) - ha!
Silent type (CLAM)
Like some oils and remarks (CRUDE)
Clog or pump (SHOE)
Make a lasting impression (ETCH)
Other fill I found fun included PLUM, JIVE, ANEMONE, PRURIENT, and NAYSAY. I also thought both "Top of an outfit, for short?" (CEO) and "Bussing on a bus, e.g., for short" (PDA) are entertaining clues that spice up otherwise humdrum fill. And was "Vera" anyone else's first thought for "Fictional Charles" (NORA)? Or does that faux pas mean I've seen Auntie Mame once too often. :)
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| Scanning tunneling microscope image showing the individual atoms making up this gold (100) surface. The surface atoms deviate from the bulk crystal structure and arrange in columns several atoms wide with pits between them. |
NAIVER belongs to the category of words I would rather not see in a puzzle, but try as they might constructors can't always make fill like this disappear.
~Frannie.
15:50 (FWOE)
ReplyDeleteExcellent theme, with TELEVISE maybe being a bonus word. My error was at the VERMEER/RICES cross, where I'd entered a "d" and never looked back. It's TRUE, there probably wasn't a Dutch master named Vedmeer, but one certainly dices items regularly in the kitchen, whereas one rarely RICES things. MALENAME had a nice clue, but I'd rather have seen a mathematics clue for LOGS. Obviously, PRURIENT was my favorite entry.
20:14
ReplyDeleteVery nice puzzle, indeed. But, Frannie, my first thought about that Charles' clue was "ASTA"! Ha! (I suppose it could have been "NICK"!)
To carry a thought on from before, I have been wondering why my solving times aren't that much improved in the last 20+ years...so, I tried solving on paper several days and tried using AcrossLite on the big PC for several other days. There was some improvement over the ipad app that requires I use just one finger to enter answers. Is that because of familiarity with paper or AcrossLite? Dexterity in general? Hand eye coordination - or lack thereof? Hmmmm.
Thanks for the review and the atom pic.
~MLou
8-something (paper)
ReplyDeleteI do not think RICES is VALID for "Chops finely." No one, and I mean no one, would ever say that chopping was the same as ricing. Ricing is done with a food mill, a thing called a ricer, or with a food processor. Not with a knife. Period.
Other than that, I thought this was fine.