I was fine with the theme, but I’m apoplectic over “let on” and “pretend.” Argh. Gnashing of teeth.
1
Full disclosure: took Vicodin an hour ago in a last ditch attempt to not be in agony from a migraine I’ve had for a week.
The puzzle didn’t seem too hard for a Wednesday (they go either way), but the theme was waaaay over my head. I sorta like the idea (it took reading the article more than once to grok it), but it didn’t seem to translate well to the puzzle for me.
As a former rider and stablehand, though, I loved OVAL and HAND.
Just horrible.
Fun puzzle with a silly theme that brought me a smile once I discovered it.
I'll echo a few of the nits picked: arcs are not lines (perhaps replace "lines" with "curves" in the clue), "let on" has had the opposite meaning of "pretend" in the contexts in which I've always encountered it (i.e., if you let on to a friend you're having marriage trouble, you've STOPPED pretending that things are okay), and had to google for the ELK/KREWE crossing.
Overall, though, I really enjoyed the puzzle and its theme. Great work!
1
Agnostics lack belief. Atheists believe there is no god.
Confusing! Why is a blowup mattress like dynamite? & then I change it to blowup matter? Why not just matter anyway. Pretty funny but my last letter was finally replacing delivery udder with adder; I was trying to make it more “feminine” not less. Got my neutrality backwards. Udder is utterly female.
Somehow I had never heard or seen the word KREWE during my almost
30 years of speaking English!
3
Wow! This was my fastest Wednesday ever. I thought the crosses were very friendly, the crosswordese was stale (so easy), and the theme was kind of obvious. But I have spent considerable time with both language and gender.
I know English isn't riddled with gender as much as other languages, but it was especially clear what was going on if you know either Latin, German, et al.
I found it to be a very clever and subtle use of changed word endings to illustrate the limited gendered words English does have. All the moreso, as the constructors did it with things instead of people, as they mentioned in their notes. I didn't notice that further aspect until I was done and had read their comments. Wow! Just wow!
2
I’ve tried but cannot agree that “delivery address,” “flying buttress” and “blow-up mattress” are “female-sounding,” despite the “ess” ending. I don’t think the editor should had accepted that.
2
There is a question mark in the clue in questions, but a question is not being asked. That is a clue.
1
I don’t keep track of these things, but 294 comments with still 150 minutes until Thursday rolls out seems like a lot of action.
4
I was just thinking the exact same thing.
1
Perhaps you weren’t around for the April Fool’s Prank of ‘16, or the Patrick Blindauer puzzle that everyone screamed bloody murder about.
1
Brian,
We haven't seen over 300 posts for a while, but it's not close to a record.
Foe of Russia, with "the"
I'm not sure that the West or at least the U.S. part of it, or the GOP part of the U.S. is a foe of Russia.
3
Like others, I'm here to figure out the theme. Even after Deb's explanation it still seems like a stretch.
It was just so odd. DELIVERY ADDER isn't a thing. FLYING BUTTER isn't too bad. You can at least imagine it at a food fight.
Further confused because I thought the revealer clue was referring to the theme clues when it said "female sounding phrases they are based on". And I thought what is female sounding about dynamite or the others
2
The puzzle was fine, Bee not bad, but what struck me immediately was the column title Trotter's Course over a picture of ... NOT a trotter. If you wanted a celebrity trotter, how about William Shatner in one of his buggies?
2
Not fun and not interesting.
1
I haven’t read the comments yet since there are over 275 at this point. I suspect that the reactions to this puzzle may be akin to my own, so please forgive any redundancies. If not, then it’s just a different perspective.
Not my cup of tea. I absolutely did not “get” the GENDER NEUTRAL theme until I read Deb’s clarifying column. Even after reading it, I don’t agree with the constructors that MATTress, BUTTress, or ADDress are in the least “female-sounding.” I do get that actress, waitress, post mistress, and other -ress words were created for female employees/artists at a time when the societal norm was to define Gender roles. Still, for a themed puzzle, I believe it is too obscure/intellectual to be fun. As a matter of fact, I found it less fun after “understanding” what the constructors were doing.
It’s just my opinion.
:-/
8
I guess I'm in the minority today. I really liked the subtle cleverness of the theme and found the long entries giggle-worthy. Alan J. expressed well my take on this puzzle, so I won't repeat.
But I can't pass up an opportunity to connect the revealer to an editing job I just happened to finish up this morning. It's the fifth edition of a college textbook. Back when he first wrote the book, around 1992, the author--being an aware guy--wanted to be inclusive, so the book is filled with "he or she," "his or her," etc., sometimes with three pairs in one sentence. Now it sounds ridiculously awkward, not to mention the issue of using binary pronouns in this fashion. What seemed inclusive 25 years ago now could be off-putting to many who prefer to choose their own pronouns. So part of my work was pluralizing all those sentences or finding other ways to make the pronouns GENDER NEUTRAL.
8
@arcoiris
I missed some comments initially scrolling through this long long list. Leapy and David Connell also explained better than I can why this was such a clever theme.
It’s so wonderful how things like gender neutrality (gender neutralness?) can grow and change even in a person’s lifetime.
1
Alternate Clue for 68 across:
Foe of 45's friend, with "The"?
I walked through this one without any real trouble, but I never did figure out what the theme was until I read Deb's column.
9
Am I the only one who knew meemaw from "Big Bang Theory"? I haven't watched it for quite a few seasons now but when I did, Sheldon's meemaw was an unseen regular.
9
I’ve met a few northern Meemaws. Did not realize it was a southern expression.
2
@Martin
Meemaw is one of the central characters in "Young Sheldon"....she's been in virtually every show for two years...
@Martin - first time I'd heard it was on Big Bang Theory. Was going to mention it but have been too busy to post.
And then there was someone that I worked with who had her first grandson a few years ago. Her grandson calls her meemee. Obviously, we are northern here. (She didn't come from the south).
My solving prower may have taken a beating today but I enjoyed the discussion and link to the Gary Gutting interviews.
4
@twoberry, my very best regards to your persistent solving prower.
I got the "ER" ending before realizing what it was replacing. Then I didn't understand why it was replacing "ess" 'til I got to the revealer. Only then did I get its cleverness. As I said yesterday, sweet!
4
Count me in the (apparent) minority who enjoyed this playful puzzle very much. Did some commenters overlook the question mark at the end of 56D and/or fail to read the Constructor Notes? Please see earlier explanations by Alan J., et al.
FWIW, I grew up in the upper South and know only one person who has a MEEMAW. Perhaps I led a sheltered life.
4
@Robert Nailling
I didn't grow up in the South, but a friend who did called her grandmother "Mamaw," which I took to be adoption of baby talk. Never heard of MEEMAW. Thank goodness for crosses!
1
@Robert Nailling I live in NC and have three friends who are called by their grandchildren, respectively, Mamai, Mimi, and Moomey. I am called G'ma by my oldest grandson, and my youngest hasn't started talking yet, so we shall see. I'd love to be Meemaw, or even another favorite in the south, BiggaMama—as in the mama who comes before your mama, the one you REALLY better listen to—but I expect I'll be G'ma again.
@Michael Dover That's said Maah Maw, right? I have also heard that one in NC.
Almost 180 comments before10 AM ... yikes.
IMHO this one was pretty clumsy and I was bothered by several things. I also had a Natick at squares 26 and 27 -- almost adding insult to injury... :-)
Issues (and apologies if I repeat any raised earlier):
One does not draw lines with protractors -- lots of protractors do not have straight edges. Arcs yes, but not lines. And arcs are not lines.
I do not understand the 26D clue. The fill usually means "reveal"
64A has issues. You can await something and not necessarily look forward to it.
36A is weird. You either fry something or you don't. What "up" has to do with it seems a downer.
8D may or may not represent a quibble: my sense of usage prefers "sprung".
Last time I looked the plural for 40D had an ending in E, not S.
Quibble re 4D: an agnostic doesn't know if God exists. An atheist doesn't believe.
9
@Dr W
Good morning Dr.
Several of your nits have already been discussed. As for AWAIT, the point here is that it has not yet happened yet so you would be looking forward to it, though not necessarily with pleasure.
Fry "up" takes us back to our conversation of the other day. I don't see a problem with it and as Steve L pointed out, if you are frying up a scamburger then sketchup would be an appropriate condiment.
1
@Andrew
Good afternoon, A -- regarding the Steve L comment, I confess to being at sea here, because I can't seem to locate it. In any case I prefer tomato slices to ketchup, and to hamburgers pan-seared as opposed to fried (up, sideways or down).
Off-topic but concerned: have you gotten much snow up there? The weather boffins for NYC are, as usual, all wet.
1
@Dr W agree, felt kind of sloppy, esp that agnostic entry.
I never really think about the themes - I usually have to come here to find out what the theme is/was. I prefer just playing the clues and crosses. The theme is an afterthought. I appreciate the passion but there's no need to hate.
7
@Julian
I like the theme idea, because that is the only thing that makes one puzzle uniquely different than another.
1
@Andrew I agree and I don't mean to say I don't like themes - just never my focus when solving.
1
Since when does pretend mean “let on”?
6
@FNL Never. This crossword is spiraling down lately.
1
Well, according to the dictionary, it can mean pretend.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/let%20on
2
I'm wondering how young FNL and prophit 1970 are...I grew up in 19026 (i.e., I'm assuming both of you are from that neck of the woods), and heard "let on" used to mean "pretend" or "dissimilate" or "give a false impression" all the time. Sincere question - is it just outmoded? Chief Quahog correctly points out that it is defined in dictionaries as the idiom "let on", with two meanings, one of which is "pretend" (the other is "share information").
8
I'm surprised that the theme left so many solvers confused and/or unimpressed.
https://goo.gl/images/eQv2gM
I thought it was a clever trick to pretend a gendered aspect where none exists, and then to boldly 'correct' it incorrectly. However, as you can see, I only admit this UNDER DURER where I can also HAND it back to @BarryA
Now I'm off to the kitchen to julio some potatoes.
33
@Leapfinger - you were in the Spelling Bee today!
I've been mulling it over, and think, based especially on Rex & Jeff's comments, fortified by Jeff's addendum, that the major difficulty arose from people thinking in terms of "-ess" subtraction. The words all involved weak-stem-vowel deletion.
Actor / act'ress
Waiter / wait'ress
Hunter / hunt'ress
Emperor / Emp'''ress
which made the effective element -ress, not -ess. Seems to have whizzed by a lot of folks.
5
@Leapfinger
I found it clever too. I wasn't looking for deep meaning or logic in it as I did it or after I finished it. I saw the pattern of what was going on, found it amusing and enjoyed doing it. I'm a little surprised at the deep dissection and analysis of what I found to be a pretty smooth under 8 minute Wednesday solve.
Different strokes for different folks.
9
Glad I'm not the only one who tried LEAPY.
2
I agree with everyone who found the puzzle lame.
FWIW Kate Hepburn preferred actor not actress to define herself.
7
@Nina Rulon-Miller
And yet she won the Academy Award for Best Actress four times. She never won for Best Actor.
1
@Steve L That was a long time ago. Times have changed.
1
@Deb Amlen
My point is that if she were still alive, she’d still be competing for Best Actress. Regardless of what some are saying, the word actress has not been put in the ground
1
Although I didn't get the theme (I was thinking more along the lines of churches, what with the flying buttresses and apses and St. Leo), I found today to be a pretty easy solve.
I just kept solving the crosses until I had enough letters to get complete the responses . I can't remember the last time I was able to solve a Wednesday this fast, and without an assist. I had "ADDER" filled in, but kept trying to force something related to "mother" in the first part of the clue. It wasn't until I filled in "CRAB" and "OVAL" to see "CLODS" that I realized what was going on there.
2
A very cute idea. I imagine if this sort of thing has been done before, it would be by adding the ESS rather than taking it away. This feels more imaginative. And the complete GENDER irrelevance of all of the theme answers -- with and without their ESSES -- also makes it more playful and unexpected. I had fun with this, even though it was pretty easy, even for a Wednesday.
5
I can't remember a puzzle that left me feeling so confused, and even stupid.
I started by filling in FLYINGsaucer for the second themer but saw that didn't work with the downs so moved on.
I filled in BLOWUPMATTER which fit but didn't make sense.
Then I got GENDERNEUTRAL. So I went aha, that means 45A BLOWUPMATTER is referring to a BLOWUPDOLL and all the second parts of the themers will be endearments like DOLL, HONEY, DEAR, SWEETIE etc. Not.
I need a nap.
3
Johanna,
Quite a few posters seem to need CATNAPS.
1
Thanks for explaining the theme. I didn't get it, and I shared with my uber puzzler husband, and he did not get it either. Seems a bit too obscure. But I agree that 'flying butter' is fun!
2
@Con Lombardo
If your husband is an uber puzzler, does that make you an ubress puzzler? (I realize here I'm assuming you identify as female.)
3
@Michael Dover - things can certainly go sideways fast with discussions about gender around here. For same sex couples, they could be both ubers or ubresses by your coinage. But would there be transubers and transuberesses and cisubers and cisuberesses? (recall the ciswoman from a short while ago).
All of this is not to make light of gender issues or terminology - that wasn't my intention. But the variations and combinations are quickly getting out of hand based on the theme and gender of words discussions.
@Wen
You're reminding me how interesting it is to me that cis- and trans- have migrated from chemistry (at least that's where I first encountered them) to gender identity prefixes. It either shows how fluid our language is or how erudite the coiners of these terms are. Despite all the struggles over terminology, my linguistic elf kind of enjoys the word play.
BTW, cis- vs. trans- isomers can make a big difference down there at the molecular level as well as up here in the stratosphere of human relations.
4
Didn't get the theme until I read Deb's column.
I was breezing along until I got to the lower third of the grid, but I was finally able to slog through it. After that I still had a mistake but found it in DELIVERYUDDER from SPRUNG. Changed to SPRANG and voila.
Good puzzle even though I missed the theme entirely.
5
SADLY, I was not a fan of this theme. I struggled with uDDER instead of ADDER briefly, but thought it was not possible. I really was thinking it was a DELIVERY orDER that was being punned at first. I hate to complain, but the theme just felt too forced.
4
Why would one say aten just before opening one's eyes, I asked mine self? And, what the heck is a delivery udder?
H. Pencil was rolling in the aisle. I threatend to remove Happy's lead, only to hear the retort: 56A chump!
Pencil's taunts aside Wednesday is my favorite puzzle day and this one hit the mark.
Thank you Amanda and Karl
ps. Can one still get the Flying Toaster screen saver?
8
dk,
(1) I don't know about the screen saver, but...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gwn59R8Mdps
(2) I'm glad to know I'm not the only one who liked it.
3
Go on dk, remove mhp’s lead (pony) and let the horse enjoy an unencumbered romp over the oval.
1
SPELLING BEE GRID
33/158, 1 Pangram
T 4 5 6 7 8
A 6 1 3 1 - 1
C 7 2 2 1 2 -
E 1 1 - - - -
L 2 1 - 1 - -
N 1 - 1 - - -
P 12 1 4 3 3 1
Y 4 3 1 - - -
14
@Evan
I almost stopped short of QB, butting up against my loose 1 hour limit (but I was also avoiding getting out of bed). Tedious letter set to me.
The 8 letter P is one that experienced solvers have seen before, but might give Newbies fits. One 4 Y is a word that I believe was rejected the last time this letter set appeared. @Wen will know for certain, however.
HINTS:
goat birthing
sinful state
and look at yesterday's list!
3
@Liane - I thought the 4Y word was accepted previously and much discussion ensued about it. I put it in confidently this morning recalling that I learned the word back then. I'm at work right now (obviously not doing work) but I'll check on that when I get back home.
1
@Wen
It may well have been so. The vagaries of the Bee are such that I forget after a while, almost leading to missing that archaic P word today.
If Cal Chrome is trotting in the blog pic, I’m going to Cooperstown with Mariano as an inductee this summer. Four hooves aloft would suggest a pace a bit (there’s an equine pun in there) quicker than a trot; just sayin’ {;-)....I had to peruse the column from DEB in order to figure out obliquenESS of the ESS factor...SW was last to fall on account of the three-headed ad man/agent/AD REP monster...MEEMAW, in our house, was Bobchi. Hee Haw, now that was a thing though and a go to music weekly program I spoon fed the kids...Speaking of music, here is Shania Twain’s GENDER NEUTRAL (hardly, strictly) comeback to Robert Palmer’s “Addicted To Love” vid, “Man, I Feel Like A Woman.”
https://youtu.be/ZJL4UGSbeFg
G’Day MATES,
Bru
4
Hambletonian phoned me and said that California Chrome may well be exercising on an OVAL, but California Chrome is no Trotter, so Hambletonian is just a little sulky about that.
I profer that as a minor point about harner racing.
10
Leapy,
Can we give Deb a HAND for the photo?
4
I received a pair of similar calls Leapy, from Niatross and Cardigan Bay. They both winnied affirmatively into the phone when asked if your post is recco worthy.
2
@bru, I read a fairly in-depth book about Hambletonian X (the American one) when I was about 10, and never quite forgot over it.
There's something about horses, isn't there?
The puzzle puzzled me, even after I had it all filled in. I did it before I went to bed. My sleeping mind figured out address, buttress, and mattress. yay.
Thank you, NYT, for fun and interesting!
4
Just want to offer my condolences, Deb, for your having to defend the alleged “theme” for this puzzle. I’ve tasted WATER that had more substance!!
And the apparent underlying BASIS for the “theme” - i.e. words that happen to designate gender - strikes me as a proverbial “Tempest in a Teapot”.
What better way to designate a “female lion” than to use “lioness”? The word never had any intent of diminishing said female lion or her role in life. SHE is the one, after all, who hunts and provides for her pride - not her lazy male counterpart. I ask, “WHO has the more important role?”
What better way to designate a “female actor” than to use “actress”? If we drop the word from acceptable use, the Academy will have to drop an entire award category. Why BOTHER with designating male/female at all?!?!?
I don’t suppose it really matters whether a “wait person” is male or female - - but what harm is there in using “waitress”? It’s not denigrating in any way and it might actually be helpful in pointing out which one of the staff in a restaurant is responsible for a particular table. And the suggestion that “wait person” be the only acceptable term is just plain stupid!
There are numerous words in our language that designate gender and I cannot recall any that are (or ever were) *intended* to denigrate or demean. It’s troubling to see so much “energy” wasted on resenting their use.
I’m just speaking of WORDS here! I have NO tolerance for gender inequality in any way.
16
@PeterW I'm generally in favor of gender-neutral language as much as possible, but I agree on actor/actress - it only makes sense if the academy decides to stop separating awards by gender entirely (which I would be fine with). "Female actor" is way more clunky than "actress" and doesn't (to me) do much in the way of elevating the people referenced.
As for "wait person" - never heard that used or suggested. "Waiter" or "server" are perfectly succinct terms.
1
@Ben
What is interesting is we also have "waitress" but not "servress". "Server"is apparently hermaphroditic.
@PeterW
This is not a big issue of mine, but for those concerned with gender equality I think that it is an issue as fundamental as racial equality. While having a "best white actor" and "best black actor" category would mean more Oscar categories, I don't think that anyone would seriously tolerate such a thing. Given the ongoing trend, I can seriously imagine one gender neutral "best actor" category at some point in the future. It really is not that far-fetched.
1
This one seemed very easy for a Wednesday. I admit to a couple lookups (I had to look up a list of popes to get STLEO, and I straight-up looked up ELK).
However, given where I live - 62A was my time to shine.
Odd struggle: 4D. I only had the second letter for a crossing, and could only come up with DEITYS which isn't right in any way, shape or form. It wasn't until I got the F of FLYINGBUTTER that it finally clicked.
I was a bit thrown by the theme initially. I had bits of 45A in place, and knew "BLOWUP" was part of it. I was able to fill in the theme clue quite easily by the crossings, and after a couple minutes of thinking suddenly it clicked. I don't know where I knew of a FLYING BUTTRESS from but it came immediately once I had the theme down.
Seen a couple comments about "KREWE". Oddly, I'm more familiar with that word from my time spent playing Guild Wars 2; the Azura race form scientific investigation teams called "krewes".
Time for a CATNAP.
2
@Chris Finlay completion time: 12:15. My average for a Wednesday is as near as makes no difference half an hour. 12 minutes would be a tricky Monday or a regular Tuesday for me. I had to actually check my calendar to make sure it was actually Wednesday.
2
TIL the word KREWE. I resisted putting the K on the front of that for a bit because it just didn't seem right, and mis-reading the clue for ELK didn't help. Still managed to finish below average. One nit I'm wondering if anyone else thinks is a bit off... FLYINGBUTTER as clued "Dairy item thrown in a food fight?" would just be the butter, no? It isn't FLYING until it's thrown right? Unless there is an imply "that was", as in Dairy item that was thrown in a food fight?".
1
@Steve Faiella - you two should take a little trip to Nola and experience Krewes first hand at Mardi Gras time.
Laissez les bon temps roulez...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9wBhm69R2aY
Letter box
P...A (9), A...X (8)
I had the published solution yesterday for the second time. I was glad about it, but I still can’t figure out whether there’s a particular objective in selecting the published solution. It would be nice if the puzzle maker would comment here about that!
1
@Mr. Mark - it would be good to understand the process in the first place. Maybe it's machine generated. Maybe it's hand-curated like the Spelling Bee. It's hard to know. But it's a bit of a sport to try to guess the NYT solution from all of the solutions we come up with.
@Mr. Mark
Got the same solution as you. Didn't come to me as fast today. Kept trying to work a different angle at first. Still, I am finding Letter Box faster and as satisfying as the Bee in much less time.
It would be nice if alternate solutions were displayed, but I don't know anything about how this is being constructed or how plausible that is. If it saved our solutions (like the Bee), then those could be compiled in the next day's list, I suppose.
So far, the objective seems to be the fewest possible words, likely to always be two, but maybe one day we'll see supercalifragilisticexpialidocious? That said, I remain okay with it not becoming hyper-competitive (least words and least letters and/or timed). There's enough of that going around!
@Mr. Mark
I entered Backpack and KnowledgeABLE instead of Knowledge because I thought the favored answers leaned towards longer words. Apparently not. Next time, I will enter both a longer and shorter version of the same word and see what happens.
SPELLING BEE THREAD
I do not have time to post rhe entire grid this morning, but I can offer a few hints and personal comments.
158 points, 1 pangram, bingo, and 33 words.
There's only one E word, and the same goes for N. The pangram and one other word have 8 letters each. I got well past genius, but these two eluded me (I had to cheat). I did not realize that the compound word for the pangram was not separated. I've always written it as such. The other long word has to do with pretty grievous sins and faults.
My final new word for today was a 4 letter one about birthing goats. I raised goats while growing up on a farm, and we never used this term. Are there very specific words for other animals giving birth as well?
7
@DLM
Thanks - this was enough to get me to QB, thanks to the goat-birthing word (which we have seen before) and a new 8 letter word that starts with P and means sinfulness, or, in Medicine, a diseased state.
A honey of a Spelling Bee today!
@DLM - Absolutely
Rabbits kindle
Dogs whelp
Pigs farrow
Fish spawn
Sheep ean
Goats yean
Horses foal
Elephants drop
...
Lots of very specific words, it's a feature of English.
3
Just following up on that one - because it's my thang.
All the comments on Wordplay of the type "since when is x a word that means y?" divide into:
it's a real word (or idiom) with hundreds of years of history that you've never met
or
it's a new word (bit of slang, neologism) that you haven't encountered yet because you don't hang with the right crowd.
I can't help the second case - but there's a really cool way to deal with the first. Read the dictionary.
Get a real, live, printed dictionary, pull up a good hot beverage and sit in a comfy chair. Have a bookmark handy. Start with a. Don't skip the parenthetical stuff and the italics. It takes a while, but it's awfully good reading, and it opens worlds.
Kindle is a word I know, partly because I used to raise rabbits, partly because the first time I read the whole dictionary was in fourth grade. When I look up "kindle wiktionary" - the first sense of the word, Etymology 1 - is "rabbits having baby rabbits." First. But you bet your sweet bippy there would be complaints if "kindle" were clued to rabbit multiplication in a crossword!
6
Any puzzle that makes my brain wander makes me happy, and here four possible themers came to mind: STATE OF UNDER [Australia?], MOTION TO SUPPER ["Let's eat!"], BENCH PER [Start using "for each"], and LIBRARY OF CONGER [Place for the eel at ease].
27
@Lewis, these are great!
2
I like yours better than the ones used in the puzzle. It’s the theme reveal key that I have a real problem with.
3
@Lewis, 'the eel at ease', I LOVE it!!
Moray, please.
2
I agree with many or most of the comments of my fellow solvers.
I had no problem with ‘krewe’, but although I’ve lived in the south for many years, I’ve never encountered ‘meemaw’ before; it’s always been ‘mammaw’.
I look to the theme as being an “aha!” moment, that, although it takes some time to realize, does help me solve other squares.
With this puzzle, however, I could not decipher the theme even after solving the entire puzzle. I had to go to the puzzle website and be told what it is.
This is the lamest, most obtuse theme I’ve ever seen. Since when have mattress, buttress, and address ever been identified as female-gender?
4
"Since when have mattress, buttress, and address ever been identified as female-gender?"
Wayne Johnson,
They haven't; that was the point.
6
My daughter just had my third grandchild yesterday. I expect she, as the other two, will call me MeeMaw. Not sure if it is southern but I am sure that it is more fun that Grandma. I never thought of Grandress though...
5
Congratulations, Meemaw!!
When my baby learns to talk, my mom is hoping she calls her Nanny, which is typical where she’s from in England.
comment on the picture: Trotters are usually harness racers. They don't have jockeys, they pull a sulky.
5
Susan,
I trust Deb intended the picture to relate to HAND (9D), not the clue for 17A ("Trotter's course").
2
@Barry Ancona Yes. That’s, um, exactly what I did.
8
And, of course (as it were), the photo and headline were unrelated...
2
One of the easiest Wednesday solves I can recall, though I paused for a long moment over the ELK/KREWE crossing, having never heard of the latter. Then I tried to figure out the theme. I said the theme answers aloud several times each and just couldn't get it until I came here. I don't have much else to say about this one.
So... completely off topic: I found out yesterday that an independent movie released last year was filmed in large part in my home town of Iron Mountain, in Michigan's upper peninsula. It's apparently a crime thriller and has gotten varied reviews. The title of the film? "Nowhere, Michigan." I can relate.
4
This song would, hopefully, have to be on the movie soundtrack, yes, Rich?
https://youtu.be/BaY_iaaPGGI
Head out in a ESE direction from your sleepy border hometown and arrive at Neil’s, Toronto, in a mere 10 and 1/2 hrs.
1
The FLYING B gave it away. Only three themers plus the reveal....pretty thin, so I'm guessing that is why we are seeing this on Wednesday.
Eagerly AWAITing Thursday.
Kindly do not blame the entire South for the hideous MEEMAW business. 'Granny' is much more common, along with 'Grandma' ...plus among my contemporaries the trend is personalization: I know an Emmy, a DiDi, and a Nonnie, the latter being the only one close to an actual word for a Grandmother.
It is just after 4 a.m., so more than 90 Comments portends a fooferaw, methinks.....
5
@Mean Old Lady My southern grandmother was 'MEEMAW,' though I always thought of it as being spelled 'Mema.' A warm, loving and wonderful woman; I have many fond memories of her. So please explain exactly what is 'hideous' about that term of affection.
Oh, and my northern grandmother was 'Nana' and her husband 'Lolly.' Feel free to have at it.
3
@Rich in Atlanta I knew lots of kids with Memas (and variant spellings and pronounciations) growing up in Baltimore, and my husband has some in his family. I always thought it was usual in families of German extraction, but I can't really think why. I agree , there is nothing hideous about any terms of affection!
2
@Mean Old Lady
We called my great-grandmother "Meemaw."
2
Fun clues to solve, all the way through. Answers just kept on coming until I hit the clue pretend.
Had PUT ON, though BUTTER was clearly going to be the answer.
And the Mardi Gras clue? That corner held me up.
And antennae. What, I wondered, was WEET?
Till I finally changed the E to the simple plural S and got WEST.
Got GENDER NEUTRAL, but the big picture eluded me.
Fun clues to solve, though!
Thanks!
2
ANTENNAE held me up as well!
2
This is exactly what cost me some extra time - I figured WEET was some sort of acronym.
1
Maybe I’m a CRAB and a CLOD, but I didn’t enjoy this one. Too forced. Thanks @DebAmlen for the explanation of the “gender neutral” theme.
6
Now that the theme has been explained for me by various posters I have to say I like it. But I sure didn't get it on my own. Flying buttress, great. Blow up mattress, great.
Like snowflakes, there are so many ways to play with the English language, and I am always grateful to learn a new way, especially when it make me laugh.
12
Can somebody explain Elk please?
@Pork
The Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks
A club, lodge for men, I believe.
Wikipedia says they are a fraternal order.
1
Thank you, and I just got that non collegial here doesn’t mean they are not friendly, it means they are not a college fraternity.
4
@Pork
I show noncollegiate, not noncollegial.
2
Of course, California Chrome isn't a trotter, but he is a stud, and a lofty 16 hands.
I suppose Dan Patch is a bit too obscure.
1
Hildy,
Readers in the Twin Cities should know the name (even if they don't recall the horse).
2
@Hildy Johnson
Dan Patch is mentioned in The Music Man. Something along the lines of "Can you imagine a jockey sitting on Dan Patch?" to emphasize heartland values.
2
Some random observations about the fill--
1. Both DEB and EMU appear in the puzzle.
2. It's explosive fun to see BLOW UP MATTER crossing with TNT. Alternatively it just could be referring to MAGMA coming up through the VENTS.
3. Sometimes an OWIE can be a scraped HAND that SADLY produces SCABS.
4. SAUTE with BUTTER is a nice way to cook but which tastes better -- ELK or CROW?
5. AWAKE or AMEN could be said before opening one's eyes.
13
@Henry Su
And the President might like to use TNT to BLOW UP CNN.
2
Solved but could not make any sense of the theme. With Deb’s comments, some sense emerged. It was a stretch.
15
I thought we drew arcs with compasses, and used protractors to draw and measure angles? Also, technically, arcs are not lines. While we don’t formally define lines in Geometry, we do define an arc in terms of a contiguous subset of a circle.
- Tom
7
@Tom Martin
Another definition of an arc, from M-W:
"a continuous portion (as of a circle or ellipse) of a curved line."
Also, if you want to draw an arc of a specific degree measurement, you need a protractor and a compass.
I used to rail that an ion is NOT a charged atom, but an entirely different species. But I've accepted that sometimes dictionaries are more relevant here than math or science texts.
4
Tom,
I did use a compass, not a protractor, to draw arcs in math classes more than half a century ago, and I'm sure that compasses -- or their digital counterparts -- are still being used today to do so.
But one could then, and one can now, use one side of the protractor to draw an arc and other side to draw a straight line.
2
Pretty easy solve with only a few brief miscues: CARP before CRAB, SPRUNG/SPRANG, ANTENNAE/ANTENNAS, YES/YEP. Did get ELK right away, and it took a minute for me to remember KREWE.
My take on LET ON is that it's conspirical, and probably somewhat local idiom: "Let on that you don't know anything about his party—it'll be a complete surprise."
5
Another example of a theme irrelevant to the solving process. FLYINGBUTTER makes sense as clued. No need to worry about an extension. Same with the others. An average Wednesday.
I did smile at the misdirection of SPRUNG/SPRANG. SPRUNG puts UDDER in the delivery room. They wouldn't do that would they? No they wouldn't.
10
@Al in Pittsburgh,
There's a separate room for that. It's called the lactation room.
6
What a hoot! I ran the 'spring-sprang-sprung', but never thought to follow where it led. Thanks for sharing the best laugh in the solve.
2
I’m generally pretty easily amused and grateful to those who take the time to construct puzzles for my daily amusement, but this theme just doesn’t make sense. The clues aren’t clever or punny, and the original words weren’t gendered. But, still, fun and quick to solve!
8
It does say, "female-SOUNDING," not gendered.
I agree that it felt like a stretch, though.
2
This puzzle was easy for a Wednesday, and the theme was as far-fetched (i.e., silly) as anything I’ve seen in the Times. One has the impression that the constructor was trying too hard.
6
The problem is that the -er words are not related to the -tress words. Butter is not the gender-default version of Buttress, unless there are things to do that I don't know about.
5
@Marjorie
"The problem is that the -er words are not related to the -tress words."
Not a problem in my mind.
2
Problem?
Point!
4
@Barry Ancona
Pithy
2
DELIVERY ADDER is related to something female sounding? I thought of "delivery at her", which didn't make any sense but became an earworm that sang right through FLYING BUTTER and wasn't even exploded by BLOWUP MATTER ("mat her" or "matte her"). Thank you, Deb, for curing the torment.
1
Why oh why does the New York Times have so many clues involving The Simpsons?
11
@WendyS
Why shouldn't the Times instance the Simpsons? As one who was raised to value the mind, an intellectual, so to speak, and grateful for it, I spent much of my life as a working man, physical work, and and met many wonderful people during that time.
The U.S. Constitution does not say that intellectuals only are worthy of praise. Every person, regardless of race, sex, or status, is equal.
My Einstein thought experiment is what if Archie Bunker had been elected president. A good man with attitudes that were not up-to-date, yet willing to change. My observation is that many posters here would not like that yet there is nothing in the constitution that would prohibit him from being the President.
3
@Peter Jackel
I would say it is just that so many of us have never seen a single episode, so the frequent clues related are stumbling blocks..... No need to imply we are snobs for wishing there was more variety, eh?
5
@Peter Jackel Wendy simply asked why are there so many clues involving the Simpsons. Your essay on intellectuals did not answer her question.
4
NOT ABOUT THE WEDNESDAY PUZZLE
Could someone please explain 51A in the Puns and Anagrams puzzle? Thanks.
@Ron - put the three letters of 51A in front of "wing" to produce a "kind of wing."
Get it?
It's a fairly standard kind of clue in P&A puzzles.
Kind of board? Card.
The answer is still required to be a stand-alone word, but, unlike card/board = kind of board, it is wacky and nonsensical.
One of the reasons I much prefer Cryptics to P&A puzzles, btw.
@David Connell
"Viewing?" OK, I guess. Thanks, DC.
A quick Wednesday puzzle; I didn't even notice the theme until I finished. This was definitely a stream of consciousness fill for me.
Then I read Deb's explanation, and now I think the theme is a bit of a stretch.
A few clues were also suspect e.g. an agnostic is more concerned with lack of knowledge, something more rational than belief, of a supernatural being; "A fairground staple" for STRONGMAN instead of "Dictator", etc.
Then again, having STRONGMAN in a GENDER NEUTRAL crossword is quite ironic.
22
Fungase,
I appreciate irony.
1
Easy puzzle. The theme is odd; the solver's reward is a slightly puzzled shrug.
12
Etymology!
I find it interesting that the theme word and the word it replaces are unrelated in all three cases. Butter and buttress, no relation at all - the "bu" in butter is the same bovine as in "boustrophedon" and "bovine" - while the "butt" in buttress is the same leaning up against as in "abut" and "abutment." Matter and mattress, no relation at all - the "mater" of matter is the mother out of which things are made, and relates to material(s) and madeira (wood) - while the "matras" of mattress comes from Arabic via Italian & French and means what it means. Adder and address, distant cousins due to the prefix ad-, but still essentially unrelated. "Add" is "give to" while "address" is "direct to."
Moreover, none of the theme words has the feminine suffix -ess as a root. That comes from Greek -issa through Latin -essa through French -esse. Among the "neutral" words, only the -er of "adder" is the productive suffix for (male) "person who does something."
Adder - the hissing kind - joins "apron" in etymological curiosity. The original words were nadder and naperon; over time the n migrated from "a nadder" / "a naperon" to "an adder" / "an apron."
22
@David Connell,
Thanks for the etyma and the link to "Eye for an Eye." Very beautiful.
@Henry Su - if you liked the video, a "like" or a subscribe on Facebook will help the group get grants! Visit
https://ourtonality.org/
@David Connell - thanks for the learned etymological insights. Your discussion of Ns migrating from nouns to pronouns brought to mind another instance: A NORANGE became AN ORANGE. See the interesting discussion here:
https://lithub.com/color-or-fruit-on-the-unlikely-etymology-of-orange/
2
Congratulations to Mike Mussina, a great fan of the NYT crossword, on being voted into the baseball Hall of Fame.
11
@Susan
When we saw that on the national news last night, I mentioned his puzzle habit to the DHubby! LOL That was neat... May have to watch 'WordPlay' again....
See Jeff Chen's comment on XwordInfo. He expresses my thoughts better than I can.
@Wags. What did he basically have to say?
@Rod D Here it is.
https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=1/23/2019
1
@Wags
Thanks for the link. I agree with Jeff.
This is the crossword puzzle equivalent of a comedian having to explain a joke.
57
@Dave Rosenbaum
Could you explain that?
2
Yoikes! I finished quickly, thanks to the downs, but holy moly, the theme eluded me. Or maybe my middle-aged brain is now into midweek CATNAPS.
2
The only part of the puzzle that gave me some trouble was a small corner of the East, at the crossing of ELK with LET ON and KREWE. I didn't know KREWE and so I had to squeeze ELK out of my brain, which I did. The cluing of LET ON still doesn't make sense to me, however; it seems like should be LED ON.
But to my surprise, there was no happy music, and so I was forced to flyspeck the grid, entry by entry. I figured out the theme as part of this process when I finally realized that DELIVERY ADDER was a gender-neutral modification of DELIVERY ADDRESS. Then the other themers made sense, and I knew that they were correct.
So what was my error? It seems that I had ANTENNAE as my plural for 40D and never bothered to see if WEET was right for 68A.
Those who said that PAPAWS should have been PAWPAWS the other day should love the appearance of MEEMAW today.
2
Just saw Steve L's response after I composed my comment. I guess LET ON can mean "pretend." Make that two TILs for today.
1
@Henry Su
I too had ANTENNAE/WEET and caught that. Still no happy music. So, performed some Henry Su-ing (ugh, not intentional but impossible for my pun-hungry brain to now erase) a/k/a flyspecking but just could not find my error, as I thought 27D must be CREWE and 25A was ELC, a Greek letter I was unfamiliar with. But I knew enough to know that was my weak spot, so I just started changing C to B, D, F, G .... K! Voila, happy music. Does that count as a “clean” solve? It is computer-assisted in a way, though my puny streak (5) survives.
3
@Henry Su
That's OK, I don't use LET ON to mean pretend either, but it's in most of the online dictionaries, so someone must.
2
I don’t think it’s successful when nobody gets the theme. It’s sort of like having to explain a joke.
28
@Linda
Sometimes succer is in the eye of the beholder, and sometimes it's a case of nobler oblige.
12
@Leapfinger
Your comment deserves most recommendations for the day. If I could I would recommend it 20 times. It took me two reads to get it. Also, your other comment, "It's a crossword, not a mission statement" should be second-most recommended comment of the day, followed closely by Ottawa Andrew's observation in response to David Connell's question about the ages of Prophit70 and another poster, that if he were a betting man, he would bet that Prophit70 might be 48 years old. Also, on a much different note, Henry Su's comment linking to the Gary Gutting interview of himself deserves to be at the top as well. And, also at the top, David C's etymological tour de force (as usual),
Perhaps I should ask Russia for help with the voting process.
4
@Leapfinger
Allow me to exper how much your post did imper me.
For the record, I got the theme and was tickled.
3
I really like this theme, once I read the revealer and saw what was happening. But there seems to be some theme-blindness going on (read Jeff Chen on XWord Info for a case in point), so I'll risk over-'splaining in my own way.
It plays off of the traditional pattern in English where a verb such as "wait" or "act" becomes a noun referring to someone who does that action by adding "-er" or "-or," as in "waiter" or "actor." Then in the "good old" (not!) gender-separating days, the "-er" or "-or" might be changed to "-ress" to refer to a woman to does that same thing, as in "waitress" or "actress." Nowadays, we like to use the formerly masculine word "waiter" or "actor" to refer to anyone regardless of gender who performs that activity.
So the theme involves other words which end in "-ress" which have nothing to do with gender roles, playfully and unnecessarily "neutralizing" them by changing the "-ress" endings to "-er" endings. I thought that was lots of fun!
9
@Alan J
Very nice. As one who got the joke/theme as I was still doing the puzzle, I enjoyed it. If asked to explain it, however, I could not have done so as well as you.
1
While agnostics, and atheists for that matter, may lack a specific BELIEF set, I think it is wrong to say that they lack BELIEF. Often their positions are much more considered than those who adopt the BELIEFs they acquired at a young age without ever considering the merits of alternative views.
Nobody believes everything, but everybody believes something.
8
@Mike R,
This may be TL; DR for some but I very much enjoyed a series of philosophical discussions about religion--structured as interviews conducted by Gary Gutting, a professor of philosophy at Notre Dame--that ran in NYT back in 2014, which I clipped and saved. Here is the link to the final interview, which delves into the positions of philosophers who self-identify as theists, atheists, and agnostics, https://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/10/13/notes-on-an-unanswerable-question/.
As the interviewee explains, agnostics don't lack religious belief; rather, they choose to withhold judgment because they view the existence of a transcendent God as an unsettled question, but a question worthy of continuing inquiry.
8
@Henry Su
Thank you. That was very much worth the read, even at 4:30 in the morning. As a self-doubting agnostic I especially appreciated Gary Gutting’s surprise at the discovery that most philosophers are _not_ agnostic; most are atheists and a minority are theists, with an even smaller minority identifying as agnostic.
I share his surprise at that and yet it makes a kind of sense to me. Agnosticism can feel like a cop out. If this is our one life, shouldn’t we choose a side now? Or, if this isn’t our one life, shouldn’t we get on board the theistic train and embrace God? Yet, I am drawn to agnosticism’s essential humility - the concept that, though humans are clearly pretty amazing beings and I am human and therefore amazing - we are tiny in the scheme of things (whether there is a “God” or not) and the fundamental nature of all things remains ever beyond our grasp. That may not be everybody’s definition of agnosticism, but it’s mine.
I love the interview. Thanks, Henry.
6
@Puzzlemucker,
Well said.
A couple other nuggets from Gutting's self-interview:
Practice and philosophical reflection are more important than doctrine and blind faith, and corruption comes from failing to give practice the religious priority it deserves.
1
How can “pretend” mean “let on”? Baffling.
2
@Neal Puzzler
https://www.google.com/search?q=let+on&rlz=1C1FGUR_enUS808US810&oq=let+on&aqs=chrome..69i57j69i60l3&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
Believe it or not...
@Neal Puzzler I wondered the same. Maybe "led on," sort of, but I think it is almost the opposite or resolution of pretending. I must be missing some nuance.
1
@Sean - it's a standard idiom, long established but maybe it is past its prime. I grew up with it.
"Trump lets on that he is really smart and really successful in business affairs."
That kind of usage.
14
puzzle went along pretty quickly. After I finished I saw the trick endings that had been omitted. not so exciting. Much more exciting was the first-ever unanimous election of Mariano Rivera to Baseball's Hall of Fame!
3
Something is not kosher....downloaded the puzzle a few minutes after 10PM....solved it with no major problem...went to read the blog and noticed the title(still looking at it.."Trotters Course"...had no relevance to what
I solved)...started to read it and Deb's comments bore no semblance to the the puzzle I solved....looked at the Comments and they tied back to Deb's column, not the puzzle I solved...what's going on....(eerie Twilight Zone music in background)....is this a gaslight...?
@BK
Of course something is not kosher. Just look at 1A.
@BK
(BK to BK).....I'm an idiot....I did not have the opportunity to do today's puzzle last night...I must have caught the download tonight before they updated it to tomorrow's puzzle....since it was new to me, I went ahead and solved it....when I went back to read the column, it had been updated and etc., etc, etc....
3
@Steve L
Haven't done THAT puzzle yet....
1
Seemed an easy one, 2/3 my usual Wednesday time. The theme was clear with "Delivery adder." Easy clues all round and few obscure names.
2
I had to come here to understand the theme. I finished the puzzle quickly, but didn’t seem to get the theme (and honestly didn’t want to spend more time thinking about it.)
So thanks for the explanation - nice to see I’m not alone on this.
20
I'm going to go out on a limb and say that Rex Parker isn't going to like this one, and I'm going to tell you what reason he's going to give. Lest you say, wait, this is Wordplay, not Rex Parker, I'll interject I'm telling you this because this might be the rare time I'd agree with him.
You see, taking -RESS off a word and replacing it with -ER does not make it gender neutral. What happens when you take -ESS off WAITRESS and replace it with -ER?
You get WAITER. That's not gender neutral. The gender neutral term is SERVER.
What about ACTRESS? ACTER is not a real word.
STEWARDESS? STEWARD is a real word, but it's someone in charge of wines in a fancy restaurant. A female wine STEWARD isn't a STEWARDESS. And a male STEWARDESS--not to mention an actual female one, these days--is a FLIGHT ATTENDANT.
EMPRESS? EMPEROR. SONGSTRESS? SINGER. MISTRESS? MASTER. None of them follow the rule, not always even gender neutral.
To be fair, some, mostly obsolete, terms do work: HUNTRESS, SORCERESS, TIGRESS...but I DIGRESS. This is not a rule and there are more exceptions than examples.
This theme should have been sent back. (Jeff Chen at xwordinfo.com agrees with me. Example entries in this comment are from xwordinfo as well.)
Ironically, the social justice warriors got the female constructor they've been waiting so longingly for.
8
@Steve L wrote: "Ironically, the social justice warriors got the female constructor they've been waiting so longingly for."
And another generous offer to assist aspiring constructors from underrepresented groups.
4
@Henry Su
Sorry to address this to you, but you used the word and maybe a legal approach will enlighten me:
I've been wondering how NYT decides a constructor of a submitted puzzle is a member of an unrepresented group in the community of puzzlers. Granted, many names imply gender, (except for the occasional Chris, Terry, Leslie), but do they ask about race, sexual identity or preference before looking at a submission? Do they have the numbers? Might some minorities be over-represented?
Maybe there's an assumption that puzzlers face the same hurdles as in society at large. I find that dubious, since puzzling, both solving and constructing, is largely a solitary pursuit.
2
@Al in Pittsburgh,
Good question, and one to which I don't have a direct answer. Deb, Steve L, Liz B, Barry Ancona, David Connell, Wen, MOL, et al., any takers here?
Regarding "underrepresented groups," I was merely using a term that today's constructor, Amanda Chung, used in her invitation (see Constructor Notes), and I did not mean to imbue it with any legal significance.
Instead, here is the way I would look at the generous invitations extended by Ross, Amanda, and other seasoned constructors. They recognize that we as solvers are enriched by a more diverse community of constructors because we are then exposed to a wider range of themes, fill, clues, and other ideas. That way we aren't getting the Simpsons, Star Wars, or baseball all the time. There is no need to resort to head-counting here; the mentoring of any aspiring constructor (male, female, young, old, LGBTQ, black, white, Asian, Hispanic, etc.) redounds to our benefit.
I'm glad to see that constructors are so passionate about their craft that they want to bring others into their special community.
16
Darn that ELK/KREWE. Took me several minutes getting to that “K” after such a smooth run through the rest of the puzzle. There should be (maybe there is) a term for a personal Natick that’s not really a Natick. That was 25A and 27D for me.
5
@Puzzlemucker,
You too, huh?
If it's not quite far enough on Mass Pike from Boston to be Natick, maybe you and I are in Newton.
4
@Henry Su
I like it, though Newton is probably Natick for most non-Northeasterners (U.S.). Trivia question (to which I don’t recall the answer): what was the cross if Natick that made it a Natick? First non-Google assisted answer wins .... a free trip to Natick?
@Puzzlemucker,
N.C. Wyeth, a painter, if I recall.
1
Looking somewhat askance at MEEMAW and KREWE, which i’ve never seen before. However, I enjoyed the theme, and I am always grateful for a trivia-free set of clues.
1
@Alan Young
MEEMAW: Obviously, you've never watched Young Sheldon, on which Sheldon's MEEMAW is a regular character portrayed by Annie Potts. Or are a regular viewer of The Bing Bang Theory, in which grown-up Sheldon has often referred to his MEEMAW.
However, he has no PAPAW.
1
I grew up in an area that some consider to be in the southeastern US. MEEMAW, Mawmaw and Memaw are all acceptable names for grandmothers. I do wonder if these monikers will last; Boomer and Gen-X grandmothers seem to prefer Mimi, a younger-sounding and less rural variation.
1
@Steve L
I also think of Hillbilly Elegy by J. D. Vance, whose Meemaw was the stable center of his childhood.
I think the puzzle is correct in saying an agnostic lacks belief. An atheist strongly believes there is no God. Just my two cents. Also, this theme came quickly, as soon as I had FLYING BUTTER. Liked it.
8
@Geoffrey
My understanding of "atheist" is different. Think of "a-theist": not theist, i.e., no need for God. From the American Atheists website: Atheism is not a disbelief in gods or a denial of gods; it is a lack of belief in gods.
Ron,
First, the puzzle. "Agnostic's lack" is the clue for BELIEF. I'm fine with that and Geoffrey is fine with that. How about you?
Second, the column. Deb suggests agnostics "question" rather than "lack belief." I'm not holding my breath to learn more about the distinction.
Third, the definition you cite. The American Atheists want to define atheism as broadly as possible, to get agnostics, humanists, and everyone else not aligned with a traditional theistic religion under their umbrella. While dictionaries may have cultural biases, I'd take their word here over AA.
@Barry Ancona
The clue for BELIEF is fine with me. I didn't object to that.
As for "atheists," fair enough to question the AA definition. Here's from the OED: "A person who disbelieves or lacks belief in the existence of God or gods." Pretty close to the AA definition, I'd say.
Seemed rather easy for a Wednesday. I had "sorry" before SADLY and "up and" before LEMME, but otherwise any difficulties were handled by crosses.
I got the theme when i read the revealer, but I can't say I was happy with it. It did point up the fact that actresses became actors rather than actors becoming actresses. I wonder why? [Not.]
@Kathy
What about Laverne Cox?
@Steve L
I don't think she is gender neutral.
@scb
To spell it out, Laverne Cox was an actor who became an actress.
1
This was a quick and easy for me; no lookups required. The theme jumped out pretty quickly but wasn’t needed to complete the puzzle.
Peter,
I would hope that you wouldn't need the theme to complete most M-T-W puzzles.
2
I know that a compass can be used to draw ARCS, but have only ever used a protractor to measure angles. The theme made little sense to me until the grid was done, but it's pretty clever. LET ON must be a Janus phrase because I've only ever heard it used in the phrase "don't let on" that you know something...such that LET ON means the opposite of pretend.
5
@Kace
I had exactly the same two notes on my puzzle: a frowny face next to the 5A clue (for ARCS) and a question mark next to the 26D clue (for LET ON). I've not yet read the further posts on this page, but I hope to see something that will make both of these clues more palatable.
10:20 pm and the mini is still grey - not live.
2
@Jenny H
I did the Mini at 10:00 sharp. Maybe it's the platform you're on, or you need to refresh.
At 11:10pm, I don't have the mini puzzle either. Is it the iPad app?
@Patience Little
Solved it no problem on the browser, but when I went to the iOS app on my phone, it shows my solve time, but the puzzle is grayed out and will not open.
Tito Puente!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5XQ8yteABE
1
... and flautist Mann fits the theme.
@Leapfinger
Might have to change that to Hisbie though.
1
@Andrew
Or maybe Theirbe.
1
I liked the puzzle; thought it was good; couldn't figure out the theme at all on my own. It makes sense once it's explained to me, but it does seem something of a stretch. I think that neither the original ("female") phrases nor the revised ("gender neutral") ones sound like they have anything to do with gender--so it was just a stretch. I spent some time trying to figure out what to change in each theme answer to have it make sense, and just never came up with it.
So while I thought it was a good puzzle, it left me sort of cold. I've enjoyed Amanda & Karl's puzzles before and I know I'll enjoy them again--this one just didn't quite do it for me.
5