The day is off to a FLYINGSTART, with airline companies beginning each theme answer: Spirit, United, Frontier, and Delta. Nice, tidy Tuesday theme. I have no complaints.
How is it that I have never before heard of the Haitian currency unit, the GOURDE? (You don't need to answer that.) Seems like that would have come up somewhere along the way, but no, you may count me among the IDIOTS. No SAGE, I. Another thing that hasn't come up a lot for me is TEAURN (Steeping container), and while I believe that the GOURDE is a thing, I am more skeptical about a TEAURN. Coffee urn, sure, but I wanted tea pot, or even tea cup. Anywhoo...
What about the things that I did like? Well, I enjoyed seeing YIELDS for "Surrenders" at the outset. Nice to have something other than "cedes." And SPURN (Snub) is a nice word. Well, not a nice word, but you know what I mean. And we watch a lot of BritBox, so it was fun to see ERM (Hesitation sound across the pond) in the grid.
No actual CONS to speak of in this one, and that makes for a quick review, but "ITLL have to do."
- Horace
p.s. I went looking for images of ASPS on papyrus to use for the photo today, but they're not all that easy to find!
Yeah, I was skeptical about TEAURN, as well. My favorite word in the puzzle was LEMONADE. Just yesterday evening, three young girls from down the block set up a stand just to the left of our driveway. My wife bought three glasses for $1.50. Childhood entrepreneurism is alive and well! I enjoyed the puzzle. FRONTIERJUSTICE across the middle was the best themer, I thought. Same reaction here regarding GOURDE. I actually looked up the etymology; turns out it comes from the Latin for "dull or obtuse." How bizarre; only in Haiti! I know it's crosswordese and a gimme, but wasn't that some of the best cluing ever for ODE? I'm all for socks, onions, and salt, but it probably wouldn't occur to me to praise them in verse.
ReplyDeleteNice about the LEMONADE stand. It's been far too cool for outdoor pop-ups out this way. Interesting about GOURDE, but money can be dull. Hah! And finally, I agree about the ODE clue. It's always great when they find some cool new way to clue those entries.
DeleteI'd have probably given the girls a fiver for the three glasses. I'd probably have clued DELTADAWN with a Helen Reddy reference. I also never heard of a GOURDE. Shame that Jet Blue couldn't have gone in somehow. And no to TEAURN; I hope to never see that again.
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