Wednesday, May 31, 2023, Brandon Koppy

I was introduced to the BEASTIEBOYS in 1987, at 30,000 feet above the Atlantic Ocean, when a friend put his Walkman headphones over my ears and had me listen to Brass Monkey. So thanks to Chris Benbow, I got 37A immediately. The theme, however, has little to do with that classic hip hop group, and more to do with a group of men with hip wild animal names: WOLFBLITZER (his actual given name), TIGERWOODS (Eldrick), BEARGRYLLS (Edward), and BUFFALOBILL (William). It makes me wonder if I should take an animal name... I think I might like a bird name like Hawk or Harrier... Falcon Fawley? ... Let's move on.

Speaking of names, I quite like the name VINCENT (Grammy-winning singer St. ____). And is RATSO ("Midnight Cowboy" nickname) a little bonus theme material? Heh. 

"Spooky-sounding lake" for ERIE is fun. And "Gets the lead out" is clever for SMELTS. Hah! But the all-text-based "In which pictures of a bill + gates = a noted business executive" is a long way to go for REBUS. And what about "Boom sticks" for TNT? It is ridiculous and I love it. And finally, in this "interesting clues" paragraph, I will just say that the FIC (I had to look it up in our glossary... "False Imperative Clue") "This sucks!" for STRAW was also amusing.

YEE (Start of a rodeo cry) is tad weak, and there's a little ATA, ABLER, TEM, and PIS, but SHH... we won't mention any of that. I'm still waiting for this blog to GOVIRAL, and nobody likes reading a blog where someone just complains all the time, do they? 

- Horace

Tuesday, May 30, 2023, Kathryn Ladner

It's an ornithologist's paradise today, as EIGHT BIRDS perch on horizontal branches (answers) in today's grid: robin, eagle, tern, lark, wren, loon, egret, and owl. It's a tidy theme, and they all blended into their surroundings so well that they didn't ruffle any feathers in the fill. I didn't know IMANI Perry (award-winning author of "South to America") or Jennifer EGAN (who wrote "A Visit From the Goon Squad"), but both were gettable, if you knew AMA (Reddit Q&A) ("Ask Me Anything") and MENSREA (Legal term meaning "guilty mind").

Just two long Downs today - THATSALIE ("Untrue!") and LENTANEAR (Offered quiet sympathy, in a way), neither of which is terribly exciting, but that didn't bother me. There's plenty of other interesting fill to enjoy. GAMUT (Entire range), BASK (Soak up the sun), INGOT (Block of gold), BALSA (Model airplane material), CAGY, HORDES, and everybody's favorite Vergilian hero AENEAS.

It's really quite elegant that the birds are all centered in their containing words, and it's impressive to have found eight such possibilities, and then to have set them in what is really a very clean puzzle. Excellent.

- Horace

Monday, May 29, 2023, Katie Hale and Zachary David Levy

Today's theme celebrates the flexibility of the English language. The endings of all five theme answers sound just the same even though each is spelled in a different way.

HYPOTENUSE
FASTANDLOOSE
CHOCOLATEMOUSSE
WHATTHEDEUCE
JAMBAJUICE

Fun! The first one is from the Greek, the second from Old Norse, apparently, and the last three are all from French, but it hardly matters where they are from, because once they get here, we pronounce them the way we want. Right?

But then, look at BETE (____ noire (bane)). Why don't we pronounce that like "beet" or with two syllables? Because it's still French? (And did Bette Davis' first name have one syllable or two? (The answer is two.)) Now contrast with NENE. Now with CEDE. Now FETE.

And do you pronounce DEI with one syllable, with two, or as a diphthong? Sure, it's easy to TOSS them off as foreign words, but is any word truly foreign if we use it on a regular basis? When will we be able to get rid of the word foreign? Or use it only for non-terrestrial things? Perhaps that's a rant for another day...

So what else...  LAYTOWASTE (Completely destroy) is fun. As is SPOOFS. Nice to see TOM in the grid. :) And BEMUSE (Perplex) - is that theme-adjacent? 

I approve of this theme, and this puzzle.

- Horace

Sunday, May 28, 2023, Chandi Deitmer and Taylor Johnson

U-HAUL

Fun theme today, revealed by a phrase from the "Bachelor" TV show: CANISTEALYOUFORASECOND. In four paired answers, a U travels from the left answer into the right answer, and hilarity ensues. Sometimes we rank the pairs in order of funniness, but today that has already been done for us, as they progress from top to bottom.

In the first, the missing U from LEISURESIT (Enjoy a La-Z-Boy recliner?) goes to SUITUPFRONT (Head exec?). This one's really more of a "huh, ok" than a laugh. 

Next, ITSALOSTCASE ("My luggage has gone missing!"?) gives its U to COLDCAUSE (Germs from day care, e.g.?). And that got a smile.

CAKEDONTS (Things to avoid when baking desserts?) took me far too long to get (because I don't think I've ever made any :P), but once I did, DONUTDESPAIR (Sadness at the last Boston cream being taken, e.g.?) fell right in. And who hasn't experienced that at least once in their life. 

Finally, THISOLDHOSE (My garden waterer that's seen better days?) and PANTYHOUSE (Shopping destination for your underwear needs?) got an actual laugh. Hah!

In other areas, I was happy to see SHOGI in the grid. I really enjoyed this game as a youth, but it was extremely hard to find anyone who wanted to play. It was kind of like chess on steroids, and it was already hard enough to find people who wanted to play chess. Sigh. 

I enjoyed the pairing of ORGY (Bodily function?) (heh) and PORNSTAR (One who's barely acting?) (guffaw) ... (add FLESH and LURID and we're really getting somewhere!), but I fear I may have AGEDOUT of both categories... sigh. 

"Drive home?" was tricky for USBPORT, and "Northwestern follower" (EDU) took me forever! And I'm just getting "What a pump might squeeze" (TOE) now. Hah!

Overall, an enjoyable solve on this beautiful New England spring morning. I hope you are all relaxing today and that you have a moment to enjoy this holiday weekend. I'll see you AGAIN tomorrow.

*KISS*

- Horace

Saturday, May 27, 2023, Samuel Smalley

Another tough themeless for the last day of my week! These grids with wide open middle sections often pose a challenge for this solver. I typically chip away at the corners until enough of the ends of those answers give me a foothold in the middle.

Today, the NW was not such a foothold initially. I broke in to the grid in a meaningful way with the NE where RAS and RACEBIB confirmed each other. The Y of ALLEY was not enough to give me much help, and while I had BIGNONOS in place, leading to DINED and IONS, I was not able to see much across the middle here.

Off to the SE! ROI alert with 38D: Largest country without an official language, for short (THEUSA). In a related direction, 49A: Sarcastic response to a first-world-problem complaint (POORYOU). Hah! I put in PARTYBOSS, which was enough to guess ____PROOF for 30A: Impossible to get into (TAMPERPROOF), but I couldn't see the start of the answer.

CLEA Duvall

Once again I jumped to the SW. SALUT, ETS, and IPOS were all I had for a while. Things were looking bleak. What could it be at 47A: More than one? I had ____PLE. And I couldn't see it. Some mornings are just not your PEAKTIMES. Well, anyway, I managed ARF and then HAHAHA, and that was enough to finally break things open.

42A: Impediment to picking things up (HERNIA) was good. I really wanted something like "dyslexia" and my neurologist brain refused to let it go for a while. Also, 52A: Some credit opportunities (APTESTS) was not the direction I was thinking of (banks and loans). To be fair, many colleges aren't accepting credit from advanced testing any more anyway.

33A: Squee-inducing (TOTESADORBS) is the best answer in the grid, in my opinion. 32A: Bad things to lose track of? (MODELTRAINS) is not a clue that works for me. I understand that they run on tracks, but it hardly seems like a tragedy if a toy jumps off the table by accident.

20D: Steal (SWEETDEAL) is a good example of a tough clue because of the ambiguity of a single English language word. Meanwhile, 19A: Pop corn? (DADJOKES) is so meta.

Horace takes over tomorrow. See you around the blog, folks!

- Colum

Friday, May 26, 2023, Hemant Mehta

What a fun Friday! I don't really have a more favored style of puzzle between themeless and themed, but a really great themeless can really sparkle. And today's merits a comment of "Smart!" (VERYCLEVER).

So many wonderful colloquial phrases, including AMITOOLATE, NOTONEWORD (always reminds me of "Bullets Over Broadway"), and ICOMEINPEACE. 

Also, the slang is excellent: MERCYRULE is a longstanding phrase, but I'd never seen HOTDESKED before. And PLAYERHATERS is pretty well established, but I more commonly see it only with the second half.

I was pretty sure that 1A would be OMANI, but was briefly held up by 1D: Shaped like this answer's first letter, say (OVAL), because I misread it as referring to the clue's first answer. Fortunately that old piece of crosswordese, ARIL, helped open the corner up.

25A: Tragic flaw for Oedipus (HUBRIS) is a wonderful ROI (reference of interest - c.f. Frannie's entry in our vocab post). That caused me to look up the definition, as I had an idea of what it meant but was uncertain. Hubris is excessive pride toward, or defiance of, the gods, leading to nemesis (downfall). In Oedipus's case, his hubris was that he could ignore the fate set in store for him by the gods, when all of his actions led directly to that fate. Tough situation, you might say.

The RHINE

39A: Teacher's sleeve, in a pinch (ERASER) made me chuckle. 30D: Pursues a passion? (MAKESLOVE) made me raise an eyebrow. But here, the meaning is the more Victorian concept of wooing, rather than engaging in physical amorous activity.

10D: Knowledge, or a means to acquire it (SCHOLARSHIP) is an example of a kind of clue that I am increasingly appreciative of. It highlights the flexibility of the English language (I'm assuming other languages also have some flexibility as well, but I think that English is more so). 

I did not have to use BRUTEFORCE to finally finish the NW, but there was a moment where I was worried I was headed in that direction. Seeing SLAP helped open the rest. For a hot second I had CHoCKS and was trying to convince myself that it would work. Until I realized it was CHICKS.

- Colum

Thursday, May 25, 2023, Andrew Kingsley and Garrett Chalfin

Well, this was an odd Thursday. It has a tricksy component, but the challenge is the extreme segmentation of the grid. Also, in case you hadn't noticed, the grid is asymmetric, with the two tetris segments of black squares placed differently and the southwestern border consisting of 2 squares as opposed to three in the northeastern border.

This is to allow for an extra set of SPLITPEAS at 11D/30D. The theme is phrases or words with double-Ps, which work as two independent words when you break them in between the Ps. Thus "whippets" becomes WHIP/PETS both of which work on their own. The best is definitely 28A: *Electrical current converter (POWERSUP/PLY). Nice to find that "powers up" in there!

I have noted before how little I enjoy grids where the flow of solving is dammed up by single letter connections between sections. In this grid, there are really five segments, all of which are connected to the other segments through single letter connections. So now I have complained, but it didn't really hurt my solve time too much (6:51).

Clues I enjoyed:

23A: Pronoun heard in "Hamlet" and "Richard II," appropriately (ROYALWE). Nice.

24D: Like the fact that Lance Bass sang bass for 'N Sync (APT). Apt!

43A: American charges (AIRFARES) - excellent hidden capital there.

47D: Flattened, in a way (IRONED). That's a very peculiar way to describe the act of ironing, but accurate.

Finally, the oddity of IINSIST must be mentioned. What a great way to account for adjacent Is. We approve.

- Colum