Interesting solve for me today. Several answers were in my mental memory banks, but it felt like they were waaaay in the back, if you see what I mean. I could almost feel them working their way out of the deepest filing cabinet drawers of my mind. Specifically, "Onetime chain that offered Free Battery Club memberships" (
RADIOSHACK), "Best-selling heavy metal band named for a torture device" (
IRONMAIDEN) - in my case, it was the torture device element of the clue that clicked, "Duo in an ellipse" (
FOCI), "___ Yaga (folklore villain)" (
BABA), and, very luckily for me, the name "Aimee
SEMPLE McPherson because otherwise, I would still be working on the mid-southeast corner of the puzzle. I didn't immediately know the missing part of her name, it came out one letter at a time, almost like my mind was using a Ouija board. I had some of the other Across answers in the upper block including
AREA and
ALA (natch), but I couldn't catch on to any of the clever clues in that corner "The art of politics?" (
PROPAGANDA), "Entitled sort" (
LEGALOWNER), or "Desire of a quick study?" (
EASYA) until I had the start letters from SEMPLE.
Other clever clues included:
"Experts in English?" (POOLSHARKS) - nice.
"#1 dad?" (ADAM) - ha!
"Register" (TILL) - anyone else enter TeLL first?
"Stay good" (KEEP)
"Bit of a character" (TRAIT)
Fill-wise, there were these gems: BESOT, LAVISH, ABIDES, and NUMB - I've always liked that word, for some reason.
In the lower southeast block, possibly due to a personal distaste for the entire crustacean family, PRAWN for "Cocktail tidbit" was a real stretch. And, unfortunately, as far as I could tell, STRIKEPAY and ANNE Archer weren't in my data banks at all, but the real cause may be the ERRORPRONE nature of my personal wet ware.
~Frannie.
Delightful puzzle! DON'T BE A STRANGER was worth the price of admission alone. But all the words -- and their clues -- were wonderful.
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