Another Halloween-related theme today, in which normal-ish phrases are clued Zombie style. The first one I got was IFALLTOPIECES (Country music standard at zombie karaoke night?). The Willie Nelson song made famous by Patsy Cline fell into place with just the first half of the clue, but the next one - ITSANOBRAINER (Reason the zombies are, of course, skipping the empty house?) took a little more of the ol' braaaaaiiins to figure out. Hah! WEARESODEAD (Zombies' cry in the face of defeat?) was a perfect ending. Apt!
The hardest one for me was the first one, and not because BERIGHTBACK (Future zombie's last words?) was so tricky, but because so much around it was. At least for me. I had BOzO for the "Classic clown name," and the "Sweets" clue had me thinking about Halloween candy, not my Honey BABE. I saw "Discover alternative, for short" and immediately thought "NatGeo" not AMEX. Hey - it was the second or third thing I looked at, and there could have been a rebus... I don't have much interaction with TMZ, so coming up with BADPR (Possible result of a TMZ story) was difficult. Luckily, Frannie and I sometimes just scream "Map!" thanks to DORA (Toon with a talking map), so that, at least, gave me something to work with... In the end, it all worked out, but I was certainly no ACE on that EXAM.
So, it was an amusing theme, and there was lots to like elsewhere, too. AMALFI (Picturesque town on the Gulf of Salerno) is still on our list of places to visit. (We've been a few times to Italy, but we've never been south of Rome, nevermind Naples.) Frannie famously pulled two or three ALLNIGHTERs in a row while writing a research paper, and then started to go a little cuckoo before conking out mid-day. But at least she could yell IDIDIT. :)
A fun start to the turn - the end of the week puzzles. Will we see Halloween mini-themes in the next two puzzles? Or will we have to wait for Sunday for the big finale? Tune in tomorrow to find out!
- Horace
Oh, I didn't do very well on this puzzle, but I did finish it. BOBO? BOBO is a bear. A Muppet bear. But BE RIGHT ZACK was, alas, the wrong answer only I didn't know it...thought it was a funny reference to something I just wasn't up on. Thankfully, the app told me I had something amiss when I finished and so I took out the Z and -- finally getting the joke, duh -- put in that B!
ReplyDeleteI wonder how many of us were tripped up by that BOZO/BOBO thing? 90%? 95%? And I wildly guessed BOONE not CLINE (having the 'NE') which was a bit of a hiccup. All well in the end, 6:05. I feel like I should tip my hat every day to the setters of these puzzles, especially the themed ones.
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