Tuesday, September 7, 2021, Zhouqin Burnikel

I finished today's puzzle just shy of yesterday's time - both more than three times the zippy solve posted by Philbo yesterday I might add - but vaguely interesting in that they were so close. I definitely had the "read the clue, enter the answer" experience today more so than yesterday, although there were a few answers I didn't know right off including "Spread on a bahn mi" (MAYO), "Mascara shelfmates" (EYELINERS), "Founder of Zoom" (ERICYUAN), and I did start with the wrong four-letter-last-named Jessica - alba instead of BIEL. Dough! Our dear Readers will not be surprised to learn that I also did not drop in GHANA for "Country separating Togo from Ivory Coast." Sigh. Someday, I'll master countries and capitals.

And speaking of world capitals, today's theme cached a variety of CURRENCIES in the second half of theme answers throughout the grid: PRESSPOUND, ISITREAL, HARDWON, AYNRAND, and ERICYUAN. I am familiar with most of them - sadly, more thanks to crossword puzzles than travel - but I don't remember seeing 'won' before. Here's a little gravy for you: the Wikipedia says that the word 'won' is  a cognate of yuan and derives from a word meaning "round."

Other CAPs that were up to scratch include "Butter serving" (PAT), "Bend out of shape" (WARP), and "Ripen, say ... or show embarrassment" (TURNRED). 

The constructor padded the grid's pockets with fun juxtapositions: VOLT precedes CURRENCIES, though not part of the theme,  ATLAS appears right below AYNRAND, and maybe CRUISER right next to CONS. :)

OSHA seems to be the money answer right now. It has appeared in three of the last four puzzles. It might be time to start thinking about making some change. 

~Frannie.