Friday, May 23, 2025, Kate Hawkins

Were you as surprised as I was to see KISSEDBUTT (Sucked up) in the grid today? Hah! 

AKEE (Fruit that grows on Jamaican beaches) put the song "Jamaican Farewell" into my head, and it's one of those times that learning something new made another thing that I had long heard as only sound suddenly make sense. This time it was the line "AKEE rice, saltfish are nice are nice, and the rum is fine any time of year." I have sung that many times, but I always just glossed over the first word." 

The top left gave me a lot of trouble at the end of my solve, mostly because I held fast to what I thought was a clever answer to "Dining at Chipotle or Panera, e.g." - hAuTCASUAL. I guess FASTCASUAL must be a thing, but what's "slow casual?" Or is that just "casual?" FASTCASUAL strikes me as a little like festina lente. And speaking of Latin, nice bit of trivia in "Fish bred by Roman nobles" (EELS).

Lots of fun clues in this one. "Watch this space!" (WRIST) took me forever, but I guffawed when I finally got it. And "A lot can be made of these" (ACRES) was cute. "Place for a cabin" (SEMI) was tricky. "Check for pieces, say" (FRISK) was clever.

Finally, always nice to see TOM in the grid. :)

- Horace