I think this is one of my favorite types of theme - the "add letters to a normal phrase to make it absurd" theme. For example - take four things, a podcast, cranapple juice, med school, and a TED Talk. Most people have heard of all of them. Then, just because you can, jam the letters "ium" into them, and clue wackily. The result?
PODIUMCAST - Group of winners at a film awards show?
CRANIUMAPPLE - Target for William Tell?
MEDIUMSCHOOL - Where séance leaders get their degrees?
TEDIUMTALK - Lo-o-ong lecture from a parent?
OK, so only the last two clues are good, but I still like the idea. :)
I had never heard of LUCIAN before - in either context - as "One-named ancient satirist ... or a Pokémon character," and I didn't know that to DECOMPILE something meant to "Convert into a higher-level language, as computer code." Should I have?
Looking through the answers today I came to SHOT and, like the word "forlorn" for Keats, the very word was "like a bell / To toll me back from thee to my sole self!" Even the crossword cannot cheer my sad heart this morning. Pandemic, war, subway shootings, and now grade-schoolers. Again.
O, for a draught of vintage ... that I might drink, and leave the world unseen, And with thee fade away into the forest dim.
- Horace
DECOMPILE, although a thing, is pretty obscure, even in that specialty. Maybe the idea was that you would have heard of compile and could derive it from there?
ReplyDeleteToday's puzzle was one of those where I confidently put in answers off the clue and ended up being wrong. So this solve is dedicated to the strong bow, the long bow, and the blood orange. (5 down and 51 down, in case I'm being too elliptical).