Dividing Line

Loved the clever cluing in this puzzle. I caught on to the theme with BEND. My only nit is with using NISEI as a generalization for all Americans of Japanese descent, when it refers specifically only to the first generation born here. Some of the earlier answers cover this topic in far more detail than I was aware of. One of my best friends in HS was shipped off to Manzanar very suddenly. I didn't approve. He was as good an American as anyone I knew. I missed the Ceres definition, probably because I have not yet fully accepted the IAU's "new" definitions. Maybe I'll have to read Mike Brown's book, "How I Killed Pluto and Why It Had It Coming."

Very nice puzzle. Good aha moment, when everything started making sense. My one nit to pick - CERES is now a dwarf planet, and no longer an asteroid: https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/ceres Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

Caught onto this one quickly when I filled in "STARS" at 3A and had to do a double take at the dates -- the team was called the North Stars before relocating to Dallas. POLE and FACE were gimmes then. I love the incorporation of the tropics. Very creative.

Our very own Johanna has a puzzle published today in the Los Angeles Times -- fun and worth doing!

I didn't think of a rebus--because it's Wednesday, I suppose. And it wasn't until the Notre Dame clue that I caught on to what was being done to those clues, but that brought everything together nicely. Add in the bonus terms in gray, and you have a puzzle with style!

Would nisei refer to a person of Japanese descent rather than Japanese origin? One born in Japan who comes to American is issei.

I was almost expecting another POLE at the bottom. A TAUTOLOGY, so to speak, but a South one.

Mr. Polin certainly knew how to POLE INTO FIRST.

Great puzzle. Thought it was a rebus but took out the extra directionals...too much work!

Today's crossword started my day out in the right direction.

Loved it, loved it, loved it. Exactly what was needed to start this pre-Thanksgiving week/end when so many are traveling. The perfect beginning to the day.

This was a tough one for me! Beautiful design, though, and lots of fun to figure it out. It took me 2x longer than my Wednesday average :O

Just as I was figuring out why I got an error message, my son, who is flying south to the Tropic of Capricorn a little later today, sent me a message to say what an impressive construction today's puzzle was. I promptly returned to the puzzle, quickly found the error of my ways in he Southeast corner, and won my gold star! Indeed it is an impressive construction, and great fun to solve!

I seem to be operating with theme radar on Full. I got the theme at 1A, confirmed it with 1D, and the rest of the solve consisted of the pleasure of seeing the remaining ones reconfirm it, one by one. The equator and tropics were icing on the cake. This was so much fun, that I didn't care that it was easy for a Wednesday.

Polin gets "POLE in" the puzzle in the pole position. Liked the SHIP about to cross the EQUATOR. Puzzle could have used pollywogs and shellbacks. Early lament: I think ON DVD is already almost passé. Blue Ray and digital download have started putting DVD's on the path to obscurity. If someone worked this puzzle 10 years from now, they would struggle with that one (I have been working all the 2004 Sunday puzzles and can tell you some of the clues have not aged well).

Wasn’t expecting a rebus (of sorts) on a Wednesday, but this was still an entertaining, if easy, crossword-cum-geography lesson. Caught on right away with the POLE @1A, soon followed by SIDE down the east SIDE. Like Deb, my first though was A BAG of rocks, but seems like I’ve heard A BOX too. Also tried to squeeze TANGIBLE into 43D, before TACTILE. The EQUATOR and the two tropics added to the fun. NINO atop ANOS is timely, as I plan to see the new Disney/Pixar film “Coco” later today. British singer Lisa Stansfield scored a number of smooth easy-listening hits in the early 90s, leading off with the sublime, theme-appropriate “All Around the World,” which got to #3 in 1990: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JVuuatjHGnY

Clever. My way in was to recognize cancer, and, to my relief that this wasn’t a puzzle about death and disease, Capricorn. What else could live in the middle but equator? I had worked in face, and being from Seattle was pretty sure that North Face was not referred to as The Face, and … Click, the structural logic of the puzzle fell into place.

Very elegant and entertaining! Nice work, Timothy P. Another winner to show my trainee solvers...or perhaps even give them to solve, with ALOIS, COSEC, and ODEA filled in as a jump start...

Loved this puzzle! Always fun to have the aha and then rush to fill the grid in. Thanks to the constructor and editors for this one!

What a fun puzzle. And, in Indiana, we are as dumb as a box of rocks.

Really enjoyed today's puzzle. It took a few minutes to catch the theme and I was bowled over by how extensive it was. My favorite answer was READE because it made me think of his book, "The Cloister and the Hearth" which I thoroughly enjoyed many a moon ago. I now have it on my Kindle to reread at some time.

Does anyone know what happened to the "ink saver" function? I like to print out my puzzles every morning and, suddenly, it isn't available. Hope it's temporary, because it gives me the chance to reduce my black ink usage. Please advise. And thanks! /s/ Jeff Neuhauser

Brutus, Stabilo Bionic is my pen of choice. NYT no longer delivers the weekday paper to rural WI so early week puzzles are solved on line. Later week puzzles are printed off and solved on Bond Paper. Tried to fit accessible in where TACTILE went to no avail. Got the "word drop" at 1A&D making for a speedy solve. Got tickets for George Clinton's Tipitinas show. Like Iggy Pop a performer who loves his fans and a show well worth the price of admission. Thanks Tim

Very nicely done by Mr. Polin, and a joy for the geographically minded among us. I have no real quibble about clueing Disconcerting for FAZING, but will spend the rest of the day pondering the subtle difference.

I agree that this was an Impressive Feat Of Construction. More on that below, but first my solve. I kinda/sorta caught on with NorthPOLE and then maybe NorthPORT(?) in that corner and then had more or less the same thing with SouthBEND and WIND in the other corner. Furrowed brow. Finally completely caught on and then it was relatively smooth sailing, except for the middle. I wondered why there were two signs of the zodiac in the circled squares and just went dim-witted on the tropics, so EQUATOR and various crosses took me a while (and a great 'aha' moment) to figure out. So an enjoyable solve overall. Sometimes it's fun to be dumb. Moving on: I'm glad there is almost universal acclaim for this, as it makes me not feel so bad about a slight dissent on two points. Disclaimer - this all has to do with the way my brain is wired. First, Jeff Chen counts the answer lengths with the implied directions included. I don't see it that way and so from my perspective there are 2 ten-letter, 2 nine-letter and 54 four and five letter answers in this grid. That's a lot. Secondly, my step-grandson recently appeared in a high-school production of a farcical play called 'The Explorers Club.' In the play, one of the characters goal is to be the first to discover the East Pole. Hopefully you see where I'm headed with this. Once you add in the global map feature, I can't quite wrap my head around the west/east 'sides.' Probably just me but it did bother me. A musical selection in a reply.

The invaluable website x-wordinfo has informed me of the fact that there is something else Friday has (I too had the 'f' at first glance) that no other day does.....a big fat goose egg under Timothy Polin's tally of NYT XWP listed by days of the week. When will the elusive cycle be hit for, I wonder?...I solve with a fine point ink pen on newsprint. Denoting the omitted words with an asterisk, I let my minds eye interchange them as geographically REQD. I was momentarily taken aback by the un-timely appearance of grid chicanery as I am less wary of rebus puzzles and the like on Wednesday. However, I never rule out the the trickster factor any day of the week...The Clash co-founder Mick Jones led a short-lived splinter group in the early nineties, Big Audio Dynamite. This is a '92 live performance at London's Town and Country Club of "The Globe." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yk2t6E_m-ic Wishing The Denizens Of WP A Happy Thanksgiving, Bru

Terrific puzzle. Worthy of tougher clues and a later placement in the week, imo.

ANOS *and* NINO [heehee] This puzzle put me all on edge; seems my early-morning brain was solving in EXTREMIs. Some days you just lack the e-QUIPment. Tossed in a definite GAZA, for a small country with too many areas of contention Thought 1D might be gORT ['ON' whatever followed at 27D] till I realized I was thinking Gorton for Groton: DARIEN was a non-starter Wanted 'clear LIQUIDs' and had to ADAPT to AMEND Down South, it's a SACK of rocks and so it went... It took reworking the SW corner to see exactly how I'd been framed, and then all the NEWS was good. Crossing the EQUATOR clarified the remaining unfilled circles. At las. And then the requisite pause for a moment of admiration. Had a rough time mapping this one out, but I wouldn't change a thing for all the world.

When I first saw CANCER in the shaded squares, I thought "Really? We're going to have a disease based puzzle?" (I'm happy we didn't.) I liked the cross of TACTILE and NTILE, and the answers MEDULLA and EQUATOR. Knowing NISEI, ITINA, and CERES from crosswords, I'm sure, hastened my solve. Timothy's puzzle with its set of directions is highly appropriate on this heavy travel day. My own GPS took a while to figure out the theme, but when it came -- that is, when I finally saw the puzzle through rose colored glasses -- it was with a smile-producing aha.

Kudos to Timothy Polin for a fine geographically themed puzzle, with interesting non-theme fill (e.g. MEDULLA, TACTILE, TITANIA). The remarkably few contrived entries (REQD, AN I, N TILE) in such an elaborate construction can be taken in stride. Just right for Wednesday. The EQUATOR and two tropics were immediately obvious, but it took me a bit longer to see the “directional” frame. Thus, filling in the southernmost block and correcting REDS to PAWS raised a last-minute smile.

I didn’t realise the theme until I had just two words left to go. I’m obviously dumb, but in retrospect it was a very elegant puzzle.

I really enjoyed this one! Heading south for Thanksgiving later this morning.

I was nearly oblivious to the theme, knowing that several answers seemed like they were missing qualifiers but neglecting to recognize that all the missing bits were directional. And the Tropics of CAN CER and CAPRI CORN did not register in their locations relative to the EQUATOR until I noticed the shaded cells when I solved the puzzle.

Brilliant puzzle!

What a BEAUTIFULLY CONSTRUCTED PUZZLE! One of the best of the year in a year chock full of treasures! Nice job, Mr. Polin! The constructor could have stopped with the 9 theme words, but EQUATOR and the two Tropics also? So fun and well placed! I love how a couple of the themers were getable without the missing direction word; KOREA came easily, and even BANK and POLE weren't crazy without WEST and NORTH. So that threw me off the scent for the first half of my solve, but later, when I realized the trick, going back and looking at those was delightful. And it wasn't just the 14 theme words and crossword fill. We had MEDULLA, TITANIA, LASTINLINE, LIQUIDDIET, TIMESUP, and TACTILE, which all added to the solving experience, too. It helps that 9 of the themers were so short. (I've been working on a puzzle and benefiting from that.)

The answer to 32 across is technically incorrect. The clue reads: "Resident of China or Japan, but not India or Iran. The answer was "Asian." Last time I checked, both Iran and India are located on the continent of Asia, making their residents Asian.

and Elke I just knew that Santa is at the (NORTH) POLE, and have seen people advertising for (NORTH) FACE on their jackets, so I got the trick at 'I-5' . Living on the WEST COAST as I do. Having driven I-5 numerous times from Blaine, WA to San Diego,CA with many stops in between, it had to be (WEST) COAST. The highest point on I-5 is the Siskiyou Pass on the Oregon /California border. The stretch in Oregon just before the Pass is very pretty in the spring when the arbutus/madrona trees are in flower . And Mt. Shasta can be awesome. By the way there are (WEST) PORTs in Washington and California, too. Really liked this puzzle. Hint for Jeff Chen- would have saved my POW for this one (rather than the Monday puzzle). Barry A- you agree ? On the other hand, who knows what else is in the pipeline ? Can't wait for the winter solstice- means the days will get longer again-yeah !

11 theme answers, great for us theme lovers. I found it much easier than yesterday and didn't mind a bit. Very impressive construction, loved every minute of it, so thanks Timothy.

I solved it without much problem although I also had ANF before ANI. Alas. Like ABOX of rocks, I did not figure out the theme until the very last letter, the N in BANK. Lovely puzzle. Thank you.

Nice puzzle, but I would have clued 27D differently. True, a wee bit of Interstate 5 is on the southern California coast, but most of it (thousands of sprawling miles) is decidedly inland. I never would have known this during my many years as an East Coaster. However now that The Hubster and I have retired & relocated to California's Central Coast, I've become more educated about geography.

Forgot to say, I absolutely loved the clue "Like Edward Lear's Owl and Pussycat" for ASEA. Great to see a fun, creating clue for a ubiquitous bit of crosswordese. Will should encourage more such clues!

Just missed my Wednesday record - spent too much time talking to my wife (and fellow "Sherlock" fan) about one of the theme clues. One of the most enjoyable puzzles in a while. Very clever, without feeling forced.

We just had ANI a couple of days ago. Someone wanted it to never be used for Anakin Skywalker, but instead to use Ms. DeFranco. Here we have an alternative. And COSEC makes another appearance. Fast solve for me - about .43 of my average time. Got the hint right away on 1A - it was a giveaway. I didn't get smarter. Sigh... I particularly liked LIQUID DIET, MEDULLA, TACTILE, EQUATOR and EXTREMITY

I tried the rebus route at first (well, I thought NORTHPORT might be a town in Connecticut?) but disabused myself of that notion when I figured out the other corners. Also fell into the F is for Friday trap at first. A nice puzzle, with its layers of theme. And my rocks have always been in BOXes.

Fun. Took me a while to get the hang of it, but it was fun working it out. Just about my average Wednesday time.

Impressive construction. Loved it.

Fastest Wednesday in quite a while for me - 2/3 of average solve time. I caught on right at the 1st square and guessed that no rebus was needed - once Can-cer appeared the other two shaded lines filled in by themselves. I'm not saying I didn't like it! Well done with placing all the themers around the perimeter, and putting the three extras across the middle. The ñ crowd will have a field day today. Hope everybody knows these are done long before publication - Will is not getting back at commenters who objected to Señora Senora! Corny Capricorn, signing off.