Numbers in a crossword? I was so angry when I finally put a 7 in there. Blasphemous, in my opinion
2
Aww with two (2) Ws....quite a stretch. I expect better.
Me too. 3 Ws would have been even better!
2
Help! Help! I have an iPad but alas I see no “more” button.
I hate to lose out on my gold star for want of ”more”.
I’m the same; completing this on my iPhone and the clock is still ticking. For the life of me, I cannot find an error!
On my iPad I have a 123 button next to the space bar.
2
Well duh Robbin k, I was so busy looking for “more” I completely overlooked the number option right in front of me. Fortunately I picked out before midnight and maintained my gold star. Tragedy averted.
1
This comment is directed at Spelling Bee. I don't know anyplace else to post comments to that feature.
It's a pleasant recreation interrupted frequently by the inadequacy of the word validation software. For example, in today's puzzle my first instinct was "coliform" or "coliformic", two pangrams that would be obvious to anyone who has studied biology, and should be valid to anyone with a decent dictionary.
Yesterday I recall being similarly frustrated when "milt" was rejected, a word that is similar to "roe". Again your validation software seems to have a blind spot in biology.
For the record, I am not a biologist; I do not work in the life sciences, and I am not trying to foist my arcane jargon on the rest of the world. These are words which should be in every educated person's vocabulary. Why aren't they recognized by the Times?
3
I have some personal rules when it comes to my puzzle-working. I look at all acrosses before going to the downs, and, most importantly, I don’t like to look up answers and will make myself crazy before going there. On the verge of cracking over 1718, I must confess I looked at the key. I just hated to break my streak. Haven’t encountered a date before except in Roman numerals.
Confession being good for the soul, I feel better now. Loved CHADS. Reminded me of POTATO.
2
Just curious. Why did Chads remind you of Potato? Chads was a relevant term in the 2000 election. Potato hasn't been politically relevant since Dan Quail fled from the scene.
Chads + Quayle = Republican
1
POTATO was 9down in Tuesday’s puzzle and tickled me (Quayle memory). CHADS tickled me re Gore, Bush, Supreme Court brouhaha.
Thanks for asking!
I would think many crossword solvers here also do the Spelling Bee puzzle. The word "coliform" (as in coliform bacteria), a valuable pangram, is not being recognized as a word. Seems to be not uncommon with this puzzle, an otherwise welcome addition to the daily offerings.
4
Indeed! My delight in realizing I'd thought of a pangram was matched by my disbelieving annoyance when that "Not a word" sign popped up for the forlorn 'coliform'.
It also rejected 'corm', and I've planted them in my garden. (Hardy cyclamen, which are my heart's delight)
1
a few days ago they rejected "ruff"and they said they were working on which words to approve (huh?/. they rejected my coliform but they took microfilm and microform
1
Great puzzle! Welcome back, numerals! As I replied to Bob Burns earlier, I used to think they were verboten until I encountered the great Thursday puzzle of Jan. 4. (That one had a little more subtlety than this one, however.)
8BALL convinced me there had to be a numeral, then the adjacent downs fell quickly. Like other commenters, NOT1BIT was preceded by NOTABIT.
In spite of the trickery, this turned out to be my fastest Thursday solve ever!
I really enjoyed this one today, shout out to the author!
Luckily I didn't get stuck behind it and instead hit 8BALL immediately, which made me look for a 6 or 7 or 9 in a few squares west of that, then filled the rest of the teaser clue in immediately. Lived my entire life in Texas so half the themes were easy from there.
2
This is geeky, not about content.
Observations regarding Wordplay browser comments (not app):
When the "Comments" count showed 94 today, there were actually 86 comments shown (after view all and read more), according to my count. (Same count sorted by newest and oldest.)
Under Barry/Deb sequence, one of the longer lists of replies, it says "11 Replies." There were only 8 replies showing.
For fun, I've been grabbing whole sets of comments (copying them within Chrome on Mac) and letting Word count things. (Not your idea of fun, eh? It's "part of the puzzle" for me!) Basically counting the word "commented" which mysteriously appears in the Word file. Not foolproof, but I've been color-coding the find by font size, and a quick look indicates pretty accurate results.
Regarding disappearing posts, that's very hard to keep track of. I know that I have seen it happen myself, but have not yet had a screenshot to prove it.
I think that these are Comments issues, not App issues, but the jury is still out. I've tried glancing at other comment sections and have not found anything to compare to Wordplay; has anyone regularly seen "replies to comments" elsewhere?
My instinct tells me that single replies are handled easily, and then there's us!
Anyone else have data on any of this?
180517 3:08pm EDT
3
There are at least 4 comments missing from the 'Barry/Deb' post you referenced - mine and 3 others that I noted earlier. But my browser says there are only 7 comments there.
I've also found that I seem to have lost the ability to recommend posts. The recommendation will show up when I click on it, but if I close the comments and re-open them, the recommendation is no longer there.
I guess this is the 'fun house' version of comments. We had the 'hall of mirrors' a couple of days ago with some replies being repeated multiple times. Now we have a disappearing act.
2
My browser says "7" until I click on "view all." Then it says "11." I count 8!
180517 3:53 pm EDT
Yes, from an earlier sequence, six of the twelve replies (marked here with asterisks) are not currently posting. I just realized that I had made an earlier copy of that thread:
12 REPLIES:
*Patrick Cassidy commented May 16 (Freefall)
*Mickey D commented May 17 (seaplane glider)
*Rich in Atlanta commented 6 hours ago (father, Germany)
Deb Amlen commented 5 hours ago (more recent hero)
Etaoin Shrdlu commented 1 hour ago (when was it submitted?)
Barry Ancona commented 29 minutes ago (emu?)
*Cindy commented 11 hours ago (thanks Patrick)
*archaeoprof commented 4 hours ago (son of crewman)
*Margaret commented 3 hours ago (gather stories)
Margaret commented 4 hours ago (sexism?)
Mickey D commented 2 hours ago (not sexism)
Deb Amlen commented 1 hour ago (Shults can also be hero)
180517 4:21p EDT
Sierras? With an S? We don't call that range that here in California! Harrumph.
? What *do* you call it?
As a native Californian, I agree, Theresa. Since SIERRA means "jagged mountain range," the clue should have been pluralized to "ranges." But this is a pretty minor nit to pick.
Thank you!
from a resident of the Eastern Sierra
Today's xwp had me seeing double and admiring the realization. I worked at the fill with only one lookup (I am embarrassed to say that one was for the Nobel winner), realized 24D, 38D, 39D and 40D made it a number-rebus puzzle, and then stared at the whole 37A fill .... and since I do the newsprint version I also happened to look at the lower right corner of the grid and read 5/17/18 ..... and then experienced a double take. Wow.
So ... were those cities founded in May of 1718? Will check after I post this. Wow again.
2
In fairness, I’m not sure how many first names of Soviet physicists your typical non-Russian in the field could come up with. I could think of one, Lev Landau, but I think it’s mostly because of the alliteration. Out of curiosity, I just looked up a bunch of others. But I already forgot them.
1
Barry, I very often agree with your comments.
But I really question your initial comment to Deb’s note in the column about Captain Shults’s landing.
I found your comment abrasive and argumentative. It seems petty to weigh these two events against each other. I don’t think that Deb’s note did that.
I think that you should have granted the editor some professional respect in that regard.
And we know that comments have not been consistent, even as I write this. No point in taking it personally, is there?
180517 2:08pm EDT
1
You are right that the column simply points out a more recent harrowing event that involved a female pilot. The equivalence of these two heroic accomplishments is for qualified individuals to determine. The instant cause of the give and take is, to my mind, the reactionary comment that the clue could have been linked to the latter heavily reported emergency landing. The implication is that the male pilot is celebrated, and the female pilot is overlooked. This may be possible, but we have no knowledge about when the puzzle was submitted, edited, and readied for today's appearance. Obviously, a lot of planning went into the design of this puzzle. But, to suggest that a clue is demonstrably tilted toward the male pilot without any corroboration? Please let the constructor and the editor inform us. Could this puzzle have been amended in time for publication?
As I said in another comment this doesn't matter. One event has been replicated by many other pilots. male and female. The other event happened once in history and is unlikely ever again. It happened to be a make pilot. Please. His genitals had nothing to do with it. How do I know? Well I'm pretty sure.
2
My first try used the letter I for the 1's in 1718, but Across Lite did not accept it, so I had to put in 1's instead. This made the 1718 in the finished diagram look much more elegant. Fun!
At first, with just the NEW part of 18A, and neither New York nor Newark fitting, I feared this might be a gimmickless Thursday. But ENRON appeared, so I got NEW ORLEANS and thought there might be something funny going on with states. But what?
NE proved impossible, so I continued downward until I hit 8BALL. And 1LS. A gimmick! Getting somewhere.
Pretty smooth going after that, until I got back to that sticky NE. I had the DOME part of 11D, having taken a chance that the Mr. Blount was a MEL. But I kept thinking ASTRODOME. See, I knew SAN ANTONIO is in Texas, and I was pretty sure that there is a Texas sports team called the ASTROS, and they could easily have their own DOME. But the A from NEW ORLEANS ruled it out the puzzle but not my mind.
Once I concentrated on the "mountain" part of 10D instead of the "jagged" part, I thought of SIERRAS, then DOORMAT and the rest of NE, even ILYA, and thus ALAMODOME. I hope it's named for the mission, not the car rental place.
Besides ILYA and MEL, I didn't know LILI or RAJ. Never heard of a SORE sport, just a poor one.
Liked the clues for VOODOO and CHADS (ah, the memories)!
And I'm proud of me for spotting the May 17, '18 part. I gather from the Note that it was fortuitous, with just the teensiest editorial nudge.
OT question: Does anyone remember a song from the late '50s with the lyric "We're up to here / With the wedding of the year"? It's from something -- musical or revue -- but I can't remember what.
4
This C-i-C apparently took 3.5 or 4 hours to post.
That's based on recollection of when I came to Wordplay this morning, but I didn't note the exact time, and the non-time/date stamp saying 2 hours ago as of 4:30.
Comment-in-Comment?
[C-I-C]: I don’t remember seeing it anywhere except in word play comments. So that’s my best guess as to what it might mean; am I close?
180517 6:11pm EDT
Close.
C-in-C is 'Comment-in-Chief' which designates the main comment posted by a given solver on that day, presumably one that offers the more substantive review than an offhand reply or minor opus.
I believe the designation was coined by Ms Deadline several years ago.
Hrrrrumph! First time I ever encountered numbers. NOT fair! :)
Thursday puzzles in the NYT are the weird ones of the week where almost anything goes. For the uninitiated it might seem unfair, but once you realize Thursdays are special, it becomes much more fun.
2
I had the same complaint when I solved an older Thursday puzzle that contained entries like "12DOWN" and "8ACROSS" (I think). I put in rebuses for the numbers (ONE, TWO, etc.). This proved unacceptable to the online software.
Indeed, Thursday puzzles can be "weird!"
Interesting! I actually used rebuses for all of the numbers on today's puzzle, and it accepted them and congratulated me on the solve! I went back to it again after looking at my stats, and I saw the rebus entries replaced with their numeric equivalents. It must be platform dependent whether or not they recognize rebuses for numbers. I'm solving in the Chrome Web Browser on my Chromebook Laptop...
I refrained from chiming in on the "hero" discussion till now -- maybe the editors felt HERO called for a male example? Nowadays, I think not, but I can get it.
And here's another example from today's puzzle. Definitely it's in the language, in common usage, and I am not criticizing the editors, but I cannot refrain from mentioning my *immediate* reaction to the clue for TYLER,: "President who had 15 children": no, **Mrs.** Tyler had 15 children!
In point of fact, Mr. Tyler *fathered* 15 children and Mrs. Tyler carried and *had* them. The scale definitely tips towards Mrs. T. on who should get the most credit! ☺
(Ye gods, how did women *do* that? It beggars the imagination, what with the conditions they lived and gave birth in!)
8
I think *had* children is a problem of tense, not intents, spenyc. I trust it does not ring the same gender alarm bells when I, a male, say I *have* children.
1
The first Mrs. Tyler had eight children. The second Mrs. Tyler had seven children. That, and with extensive help, is how they did it in those days.
4
So the second Mrs. Tyler apparently knew to stop before 8?
My very genteel little mother used to say that you can only ever be certain about a child's mother.
Nice theme, nice puzzle... but too gimmicky. I should finally swear off Thursdays. Maybe this will do it for me.
Haven't gotten to the xwp yet, but here's an advisory for those who subscribe to the New Yorker magazine -- check out the cartoon on page 84 of the May 21 issue.
2
Terrific puzzle today. I especially liked the second anniversary, that of a puzzle Mr. Kahn constructed with his daughter twenty years ago. And some very nice cluing: VOODOO, TATTOO, CHADS.
BTW, if you are from Philadelphia, you EAT a hoagie, definitely not a sub(marine!)
4
Nifty idea for a Thursday and how fortuitous that it runs on 5/17/18. In fact, that helped me finish. I figured out the numbers rebus pretty quickly, but puzzled over MAYA718 for some time--area code? Sussing out NOT1BIT was a real head-smacker.
How humiliating to admit that I misspelled Haagen-DAZS at first (DAAS). Please don't revoke my ice cream privileges. I also carelessly flipped BILLNYE's last name (NEY). DONTASK.
Twofer Thursday in tribute to today's theme. First up, Neil Young's seething cover of "Walking To NEW ORLEANS," performed on a fundraising telethon for victims of hurricane Katrina. Powerful.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmfpkQwR4xk
Next, country music superstar Charley Pride, who crossed over to the pop chart in 1970 with the #1 country hit "Is Anybody Goin' To SAN ANTONE?"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XzHHvxNh4PY
5
Not to worry. I had DASZ on my first pass.
1
Ditto re MAYA718 and NOT1BIT.
1
can someone explain MYNA to me?
1
MYNA bird, sometimes spelled mynah.
1
Myna bird
Thank goodness for this question. MINA was my only mistake.
Lovely Thursday puzzle with the numbers for date, and the cities and their sights. I wish we could have onion rather then anion, but an almost perfect challenge.
Very nice puzzle. I liked the numbers. TIL what 1L means in law-school language.
One thing that threw me off for quite awhile, though, was the plural ending for 10D, since the clue indicated a singular answer. A jagged mountain range is a SIERRA, right, not a bunch of SIERRAS?
1
I think this answer “Sierras” is meant as the nickname commonly used for the Sierra Nevada Mountains (or “Sierra Nevadas”). If we’re being strict about Spanish, neither of those names seem correct either; the former is redundant and the latter pluralizes the adjective versus the noun. Once a word also gets used as a proper name, especially from another language, I’d say it’s OK to treat that name differently than the original word.
2
I believe Jack Hughes is correct; living within sight of them, I can say that those mountains are always called "The Sierras," much as other ranges are "The Cascades," "The Rockies," "The Appalachias," etc.
2
I was wowed by the fancy numerical footwork of creating the year 1718 with numerals embedded in the down answers, without even realizing the bonus spelling out of today's date, May 17, '18!
If I didn't read Wordplay after the solve, that bit of puzzle finesse would have been lost on me.
Thanks, Deb. This is one of many reasons I am a devoted and daily reader of your column.
PS: also a fan of your facebook page - LOL at yesterday's post on the visual representation of crossword clue misdirection:
https://www.facebook.com/debamlen
2
I find the link to the facebook page "broken." ?
Didn't know there was a way to enter actual numerals. So, I entered ONE, SEVEN, ONE, EIGHT. That worked fine; got Mr Happy Pencil.
3
I'm surprised that worked! See my reply to Bob Burns earlier.
I squealed with joy when I got the numbers! I did the free "practice" crosswords on the NYT site in January or so when I first really started solving, and one of them had numbers in it. I thought then it was really cool.
Now there were numbers again, and I got it, and I thought it was exactly as cool as the first time I encountered numbers in a crossword! Really enjoyed today's puzzle, although it was very difficult for me and took me over an hour to finish.
I had MAY18th first, but finally figured out 8-BALL and realized the last four squares have to be a number. I had to guess the third digit, because the clue for 39D (or even the answer until I did a post-solve google) meant nothing to me, but beginner was a good nudge in the right direction. :)
10
You would be a great friend. Apparently you are very very easy to please. No wonder Finns are so happy!
Very enjoyable puzzle. Took me a while to suss it out.
question - what are 1LS ? I had to guess at the number in this clue until the app accepted 1.
Law students are designated by their year as one-L, two-L and three-L, as in "One L: The Turbulent True Story of a First Year at Harvard Law School" by Scott Turow.
Hence 1L's are just starting their brilliant careers!
1
First year law students are referred to as “one Ls” where I assume the L stands for “law”.
1
Given this discussion, I wish to call attention to " The Llama" by Ogden Nash:
The one-l lama,
He's a priest.
The two-l llama,
He's a beast.
And I will bet
A silk pajama
There isn't any
Three-l lllama.
Nash later reported someone told him the last itim is associated with conflagrations.
1
This puzzle had me guessing all the way through: is there a rebus here or not? Finally decided there wasn't, until I came to my last answer at 37A, and all things became clear. Fun!
6
Enjoyed the puzzle this AM, though with internet out here, we used the Android app on my phone and the hard copy of today's paper for The Hen Neither rain nor snow...
Liked all those Js, and 7-up got me started on the date. Now to look up Green Eggs and Hamlet.
4
Am I the first to admit utter failure?
I got everything pretty easily until the middle. I had no inkling of a trick going on, so I filled in NOTABIT for 24D and BEAM for 44A. Beginning law students seemed likely to be BAS. And then I was utterly stuck. For 37A I had MAYA_B_. I did try fiddling around with the things I had, but putting in numbers never occurred. I even googled and found a red circle logo for something called PEP. Wronger and wronger as the minutes ticked on. Perhaps if I was more familiar with pool the 8BALL would have come to mind and helped out (that is pool, right?).
I often miss a letter here and there on a late week puzzle, but I can't remember the last time I missed an entire theme entry and gimmick. Well, I'll console myself with something from the archive.
8
I had NOT A BIT for awhile too; and was confused by MAYA—-. But “behind the 8 ball” is a pretty common expression.
1
If I had gotten the number trick, it would have been from 7UP or 1LS, not 8BALL. I probably have heard it before, but it apparently didn't stick. I know it now!
It's fine. Onward and upward. It's just been awhile since I had that frustrating feeling of, "How could anyone be expected to guess THAT??"
The 8BALL came early on but I never heard of 1LS for law students and the crosses didn't help. Because I had JIGSAW instead of RIPSAW, I was looking at _UG and figured it must be one of the new souped-up energy drinks. So I didn't come to the fact that it was a date until I read Deb's comments. I was looking for 37A to be a place, not a time.
I ended up getting everything except the 171 and thoroughly enjoyed the difficulty I had. A real workout. Beautiful job Mr. Kahn.
I'm always up for a Thursday novelty. This was the first puzzle with numerals that I have encountered, and thoroughly enjoyed the discovery. I caught on with 8 BALL, and 1LS. I had BOB HOPE before BILL NYE. RABBIT before BASSET. POETRY before POSTIT. LAMP before BULB, and DASZ before DAZS.
For that last one, I have devised the following mnemonic: S before Z except after dinner.
8
Hungarian is the only real language that uses both SZ and ZS as orthographic units (legitimate letter combinations designating single sounds); it uses SZ to designate an "ss" sound as in Franz (Ferenc) LiSZT and ZS to designate a "zh" sound as in ZSa ZSa Gabor.
It's also in a tiny minority of languages where the single letter S denotes the affricated sound of "sh" - if Liszt were spelled List it would have to be pronounced "Lisht" in Hungarian. Also not the nicest word in German.
I always remember "Dazs" as such because it is wrong in EVERY language in the world, other than the world of capitalism...and that discussion is for another time, another place.
12
DC, frankly I thought you would add that Ferenc is pronounced Feren[ts].
Thanks David.
1. I think that is the first time I have ever seen Franz Liszt and Zsa Zsa Gabor in the same sentence, (though I am sure they might have made fast friends).
2. Between Haagen Dazs and David’s comments I am beginning to feel quite Hungary.
2
A fine puzzle, but not really Thursday material. Once the numbers become apparent, and they did as soon as I saw the 7, 1, and 8, the trick was over and too soon. Perhaps I missed another element of the theme, which happens often with very tricky puzzles. Is it intended that 1718 is not only the year but that today is 5/17/18? I feel a bit let down and the weather is not helping!
OTOH, I believe SAN ANTONIO was a Jeopardy answer last night. Is the ALAMODOME where pie EATing contests take place?
Early on, I thought I was doomed to failure on this one. Then I took a stab at NEWORLEANS based on a few crosses, eventually had enough to suggest ALAMO and filled in SANANTONIO and then the whole thing just fell together quite quickly.
I figured the reveal had to be a date and at one point was afraid it might be roman numerals (which is not a strong point for me). Then 8BALL and 1LS and... okay, must be the anniversary. And that was pretty much that.
A very rare 5 day streak for me. That will almost certainly end tomorrow, but it ain't over 'til it's over.
7
Well, wasn't that fun?! Maybe a few too many names (ILYA, ADAM, LILI, RAJ, MEL, AMES, BILL NYE) but getting to put 1718 into the puzzle was a thrill.
The theme cities are making the most of their three-hundredth birthdays....as if they weren't relative newcomers!
The A was scarlet, not RED, not crimson, etc. , but oh well.... and once again I am reminded I don't know how to spell the ice-cream!
1
As much as I felt the tug against "red A" - every scarlet letter is red, just as every sheet of canary paper is yellow and all of the lime skittles are green. It was, after all, a red "A" emblazoned on that lady, wasn't it?
pomegranate and ecru
5
This was really fun, though I set no speed records as I did on Sunday and Tuesday. One note for future solvers: Entering the rebuses (rebi?) as multi-letter squares instead of numbers also worked in the iOS app.
What a fun puzzle!
Of all the nerve: A Thursday trick with actual numbers after I dutifully entered them as text. Happy Pencil wept with joy at my downfall.
Son and sister live in NOLA and I am planning a move there in a year or two. Both live in Uptown which is as pleasant a neighborhood as one could find. Shout out to my friends at Toast where I solve with NYT and pen (Stabilo) in hand.
Thanks David
2
Not only did I have to labor my brain to crack some vague cluing and names I didn't know -- and this is a good thing -- but I also had a satisfying aha at figuring out the number gimmick, and I learned about two tricentennial anniversaries. That's a lot of good bang for my stint with this offering and an energizing springboard to my day. Very grateful to the Kahn man for this one!
3
Happy birthday NOLA!
3
It's rather fun to visit NOLA and Cajun Country and meet surprising numbers of tourists from France :0)
A challenging but enjoyable puzzle, provided you are not numeral shy. Thank you, Deb, for bringing out the fine points of the theme
I worked up from the SW corner so SAN ANTONIO appeared early, and ended in the NW, finally recalling CHAD from the BUSH-GORE election 18 years ago.
Lots of ONEs in this puzzle. Not just in the dates but:
RED ONE, I ONE, even WE WON! ;-)
4
Although it looked like it wasn't going to be the usual tricky Thursday, I was intrigued from the start to see what the cities and sights were going to be. NEW ORLEANS came fairly quickly, and when I had MAY with 4 squares left it dawned on me that a year was required, so a number rebus! And of course the 8BALL confirmed that. Soft drinks are not my strong point, but did figure that it must be 17 something.
Another terrific puzzle this week.
3
I knew 7UP has a red circle but only started doing crosswords a few weeks ago, so it was at least 20 extra minutes of being confused (having CURVE in for 8BALL and NOTHING for NOT1BIT initially also didn't help) before I finally realized numbers might be allowed. I was very lucky to finish this one totally unaided (first time I think), so far I almost always have to look up at least few proper names up but not this time. The lower left baked my noodle partly because I couldn't remember if it was DAZS or DASZ and refused to look it up.
7
I started by trying to enter Roman numerals, but quickly ran out of real estate.
2
DK, its amazing that you could solve this puzzle with only a few weeks of experience behind you. The numeric year was indeed a major league curve ball which you just hit out of the park!
2
Since when have numerals become admissible in lieu of letters? I may not have been subscribing to the puzzle
app long enough (over a year)to have become aware of this fact.
2
I think it would be interesting to know when the first puzzle had numbers, so hope someone answers your question, Kathleen.
1
As Jim Horne noted on the Xword Info site, 8BALL (with the numeral) first appeared in a puzzle in 1956, so it's at least since then.
..
2
September 6, 1954.
https://www.xwordinfo.com/PS?date=9/6/1954
A list of all puzzles with non-alphabetic or rebus squares can be found at xwordinfo.com 's rebus page:
https://www.xwordinfo.com/Rebus
You're welcome!
5
Only one complaint. This has to be my fastest Thursday ever. I haven't checked yet. Because I wasted time double triple and quadruple checking only to find that I had to have a number 1 instead of a I. Well I sort of knew. But to spot it after everything was filled in wasn't easy. Otherwise a very clever puzzle which looked tougher at first than it was. Except for that 1
1
Ha. Not only not my best time but longer than average. It's like asking a kidnap victim how long they were in the trunk. How's that for a crossword metaphor.
3
An additional connection to New Orleans in this puzzle is Mel Blount. My grandfather and my uncle owned houses in a subdivision outside New Orleans and I remember him as a neighbor.
10
NE corner, my "connected answer" approach had DOORMAT filling in, and then an N above the a, so my eye picked up "DOORMAN" with the N making the 90-degree turn. So "MY DOORMAN" who said Hello a lot when I lived in NY, so . . . I thought that was the Thursday-level answer, but I couldn't get any other words to make turns. Then (DOH!) MYNA came into view as the one saying Hello, not my doorman. Oh well, that's what I get for trying to "thursday up" a puzzle!
2
Ugh, MYNA was the very last clue I filled in, even after finishing the center, and I have seen it as an answer twice recently in crosswrds so no idea what the mental block was. I guess the other times the clue mentioned a bird, but this one didn't.
3
Fun puzzle - got most of it done and then figured out that there had to be numbers to finish it off. Interesting history and neat coincidence!
1
New Orleans, San Antonio, and 7up? Heck yeah! I liked that one a lot!
4
I liked NEW ORLEANS in one corner and JAZZ BANDS in the other. Same with ALAMO in one corner and SAN ANTONIO in the other. And crossing N'AWLINS, was VOODOO! And the lovely SRTAS crossed SA.
4
A rebus puzzle that gives you new pieces of knowledge -- pretty cool about SAN ANTONIO and NEW ORLEANS Also who knew TYLER had 15 children! Some interesting clues: Give one a hand for CLAP and make a sub disappear for EAT!
4
As of March of this year (I can't find any later information), two of Tyler's grandsons were still living, born in 1924 and 1928. Tyler was 75 when their father was born, and he was in his 60s when the grandsons were born.
7
Good substitute for golf.
I tripped on the preposition for some minutes because I first saw it as May 17, 18, which I assumed was referencing 1718. I thought it odd that both cities would be founded on the same actual day, but was more troubled by the, "US city founded IN 37-Across" which would need to be "ON" 37-Across" if it were the specific date.
Took a few beats to see the larger idea of just the month and the actual year of 1718, confirmed by the appropriate "ON."
Lovely doubleness.
3
This is why I like Thursday's. What fun!
Didn't get it until I had almost everything filled in, and finally sussed 8BALL.
4
I think the puzzle was a fantastic labor of love. It was thoroughly enjoyable and impressive construction.
Caught on to the number with 40D - it's gotta be 8-BALL, right? And then 7-UP.
Liked the clues for 45A, 8D and 12D. Mr. Kahn's story of coincidences - sure, it's coincidental that he found out about the two city celebrating 300th anniversary, but quite another to link them together, realizing they are both 10 letters long, construct the puzzle, getting it just so and have it published at the right time and so on. No mean feat.
10
What Wen said.
1
Meanwhile, back at the puzzle...
A rebus puzzle! No, a *real* rebus puzzle! Not a puzzle with letters squished together, but a puzzle with non-letters. IN A WORD, rebus. A TAD easy on the cluing, a bit of SASS (DAZS, ADZE), not a RIOT, but all the SAME, I'm not SORE; I'll CLAP.
Give it a RED A...or a RED ONE?
2
For me, the NW filled in pretty quickly, and then things stopped working together and I had to fiddle (TOY?) with things to make headway. I saw JAZZ-something appearing, so I could fill in NEW ORLEANS. Then some of the crosses (ISIS, SEAWAYS, and SON) gave me SAN ANTONIO. (And I learned some interesting history)
"one-ls" and "eight-ball" were obviously the right answers and didn't fit, so it was delightful to realize that they had to be filled in with numerals.
My first thought for the bow-tied TV person was someone much older, like Garry Moore or someone of that vintage, which obviously didn't fit. But BILL NYE showed up pretty quickly.
4
Well that’s interesting because the NW was the last region to fill for me. I had CLAP right away but none of the downs came to mind so I erased it for awhile. Couldn’t think of Aldrich’s first name but that was because I should have been thinking of his last name. ;-)
Other difficulties were initially spelling DASZ as DAZS, RABBIT before BASSET, JIGSAW before RIPSAW, and NERD before GEEK. But it all worked out in about 80% of my Thursday average.
1
Liz, I too thought of earlier TV, like Wally Cox or Dave Garroway. I just looked them up and Wally didn't seem to wear bow ties much, but Dave did.
1
BILL NYE was a gimme for me.
Re: 14A
Deb,
Captain Shults did a terrific job last month, but flying and landing a twin-engine jet on one engine is by no means "similar" to flying and landing an aircraft with no working engines.
5
If you can find a copy, read "Freefall," by William Hoffer.
The riveting story of the Gimli Glider, a Canadian Airlines flight that became an inadvertent 132 ton glider at 42,000 feet in the 1970's.
2
You're right. Landing a multi ton jet with no engines in the water is basically turning it into a seaplane glider. And they don't exist. As seaplane pilots like to say, any and all aircraft can land in the water...once. Only a seaplane can do it again.
4
Thanks for the tip, Patrick. I ordered it immediately for my father-in-law who spent a career in aviation and, in retirement, rebuilt planes and volunteered at Seattle's Museum of Flight. Hopefully he hasn't already read it, but even if he has, he probably did so when it when it first came out. I'm sure he'll enjoy it now.