Tuesday, July 20, 2021, Sam Buchbinder

OK, let's just start at 1A, shall we? I'm not a fan of a THONG, on a sandal or otherwise. It just looks uncomfortable. There, I said it.

Aside from that, though, I liked the puzzle fine. :)

The theme is WOMENSGYMNASTICS, an entry that acrobatically stretches the puzzle out an extra row top to bottom to fit its sixteen letters. And running through it are the four events involved: SEALEDBEAM, GLASSFLOOR, INTHEVAULT, and KITKATBARS. Very nicely done, I think. I'd give the theme a 10. Or have they changed the scoring system? Or is that only for skating?

There was a brief discussion about "judged events" vs. sports in the comments a few days ago, but for now, I think I'll just let that go. And what's more, I'll most-likely end up watching the judged events, and I'll get irrationally upset by what I think are scoring inconsistencies, even though I have absolutely no training in gymnastics, or gymnastics scoring, and I only watch gymnastics once every four years, at best. Ahh, us hairless APES, eh? Always grousing about something.

Loved the clue for ILIAD (It's a long story), and "Cheery sort?" was cute for FAN. And apt! And wouldn't it have been funny if 27-Down (SLOP) were clued as "Entry like 46-Down" (UPKEY)? I kid, I kid, it's fine. I guess maybe there's an UPKEY on an extended keyboard, but on my laptop all I have is the up arrow. 

Sure, there were a few places where it strained, but you can't do all four of these events without a few aches and pains, right? I always enjoy seeing TOM in the grid, and GREEKGOD (Uranus, but not Neptune) was a good one. 

It'll be interesting to see what happens with the Olympics this year. We'll find out soon enough, the opening ceremonies are this Friday!

- Horace

p.s. It took me a few minutes, but I eventually did walk out onto the GLASSFLOOR in the CN Tower! It's quite a feeling, especially for one who doesn't particularly like heights! :)