Wednesday, September 20, 2023

Wednesday, September 20, 2023, Gina Turner

Who doesn't love a good POWERBALLAD? Well, me, apparently. When I ran through a list of the top fifty, I only knew a handful. I guess they just weren't my thing. Luckily for me, I didn't have to know any for this puzzle. I only had to know words that can precede "power" to make familiar phrases like "Black Power" "superpower," and "higher power." I wasn't familiar with "love power," but I looked it up, and the first thing that came up were two songs. Is that power enough for theme material? I guess it's like Virgil said: omnia vincit amor. And it's a nice touch that all the theme answers that can be broken apart are songs.

Is it just me, or did you all chuckle at "Who blows thar?" (SHE). Those in the Northeast might remember a restaurant called Yoken's in Portsmouth, NH, the sign for which was a neon whale with "Thar she blows!" written on it. When I was little you could order a "whale burger" that was, I believe, made with real whale meat. Sigh.

Marisa TOMEI makes another appearance today, and we get some fun trivia in "Onetime capital of Poland" (KRAKOW), "Ingredient in Roman concrete" (ASH), "Creatures that are often catadromous..." (EELS), and "Like AB negative, among all blood types (RAREST). We also get a couple of deep-cut crosswordese answers in ASCI (Saclike structures produced by fungi) and OVIS (Sheep genus). And I've never heard of GIA Carangi (considered by many to have been the first supermodel) or RENEE Elise Goldsberry (who won a Tony for Hamilton), but I really ought to know both of those names.

I'm an ADMIRER of this one.

- Horace

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