Today's puzzle proved to be a worthy adversary for this solver. I ended up with one of my highest solve times in a while (44:26), but I was satisfied with that because I *did* finish it with no errors. Huzzah!
Although I had trouble spots all over the place, the most difficult section for me was the southeast. I won't YAMMERON about all the wrong turns I took, but one in particular caused so much trouble I was about ready to SCRIM. At 37D: "Place where shells are put away?" I had the reasonable - or so I thought - PASTABAR. Didn't we just have NOODLEBAR yesterday? Anyhoo, that was the wrong kind of shells, my friends. When PASTABAR failed at various cross points, I tried 'tratoria' (maybe a variant spelling?), and when that didn't work, I was was stymied. As if that weren't enough trouble, off to the right, I headed down the garden path with "Apple selection?" by entering 'Icon' instead of IMAC. Derp. I also had the - again, IMHO - reasonable SUITSME for "'Why, yes indeed!'" When I did finally get the correct QUITESO, then and only then, could I see TACQUERIA, a locale that is not exactly in my wheelhouse. Also, way out in left field for this solver was "Standing at home, say" for UPTOBAT. While SAMSMITH and CAREBEARS are in my databanks, if you're wondering how much associated information is in there with them, I'd have to say NOTALOT. "Belly badges" were not in there, but they are now, for better or worse. The one thing that kept me going was that I *knew* "Rowlf the Dog and Robin the Frog, for two" were MUPPETS. REALMATURE. :)
I enjoyed the very rarely seen "Soft-soap" for COAX - nicely followed up by a totally different kind of soap - TELENOVELA. And how about the very trixy "What comes before a bet?" ALEPH? For some reason, I enjoyed TAPETO as an answer. So random. "Draw" for LURE was very good. And how about, "Low call" for MOO. Splendid.
~Frannie.
TACO BAR for me at first. Loved so many of the clues in this one. Nice puzzle. Thanks for the week, Frannie!
ReplyDeleteGreat challenge!!! A worthy way to spend part of a Saturday (Friday night actually)
ReplyDeleteThis was a fun one, probably around a half-hour. No errors, but five
ReplyDeletewrite-overs, two of which replaced the S and M of sEmANTIC. I guess I
was striving for a more benevolent take on the grammar police:) I put
in the answer to "Coveted object" quite awhile before I fully understood
it. Unlike Philbo, I guess I'm not the ENVY of any solvers. I outdid
Frannie and Kelly on the "shells" question: TAcoshop was my first
thought. Fortunately I put in only the Taco part; I guess I knew deep
down that taco shops aren't really a thing. My post-solve learning
included finding out that "bet" is one of at least four possible
renderings of the second Hebrew letter (along with beth, beit, and beis)
and re-learning exactly what scrim is. Nice review, Frances. You KILLEDIT.
Well, I'm early again. Probably a west coast thing.
ReplyDeleteI finished today's Sunday puzzle in 10:34, probably my fastest ever, Sunday or other day. What has come over me? Perhaps I should look into plane fares for next year's tournament in CT. Then again, my median finishing time is "DNF." Well, I enjoyed some of the clues, so maybe I'll write about them later. The arrangement of the shaded areas was pleasing.
Yowza! 10:34?! That's a very fast Sunday. And yes, I think you'd enjoy the tournament. :)
DeleteHmm... these clues don't look familiar at all. Apparently I was doing the Monday puzzle on Sunday. I'm sure I went to bed well ahead of midnight, probably more like 10pm or so. I guess I'll go look at the actual Sunday puzzle, now that it's Monday and today's is already done! I probably won't do Saturday's puzzle, which should have been the subject of this comment thread.
DeleteLOL. Nice. I recorded a 3:26 for the Monday.
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