Finally got around to this gem --- so many new words for me --- incommode from the quote, strigine from the clues, and colophon and ensiform from the clue answers. Solved without references, however, because I had eight fill-in's at the start --- Stowe, eulogy, tithe, French, red oak, Haiti, Rodeo, and suite. Cox/Rathvon amaze as always.
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YEMEN, TITHE, EULOGY, ESTUARY, LOS LOBOS, and YIDDISH came on first pass, but so did a couple of miscues: Presumed instead of PUTATIVE and Opera instead of SUITE. Some great clues and words, with my favorite being ENSIFORM.
Trying to do acrostics more regularly and hope to get to a point of not needing “Check word” and occasionally “Reveal word” to finish.
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Stephen Fry is a very funny fellow, and I also fondly recall his Jeeves. A marvelous series that I highly recommend, including the delightful opening music and graphics. I (fortunately) have never been plagued with “incuriosity,” quite the opposite. One teacher in my grad program would pretend to hide under his desk when he’d see me coming. Got a nice start on the quote with ESTUARY, TITHE, RED—, HAITI, RODEO, NOTORIOUS, CLOCKS, and fairly soon remembered LOS LOBOS. I think the French word for clock helped me with that one. Thanks for the Kakapo clip.
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@Beejay --
My gimmes were very much the same as yours, with the addition of YIDDISH. Leo Rosten's The Joys of Yiddish is a marvelous book.
My "half" of the Quercus clue was ---OAK!
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This was a fun one, with just enough GIMMEs to get me off to a good start (HECTOR, FOOTNOTES, TITHE, FRENCH, YIDDISH, HAITI, NOTORIOUS, CLOCKS and LOS LOBOS - although I soon got a wrong answer (I had NUMBSKULL for IGNORAMUS) that steered me wrong for a bit). Love Stephen Fry - and thanks, Caitlin, for posting that Kakapo video. That was fun!
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@Peggy Robin Yep. I had NUMBSKULL for IGNORAMUS at first, too.
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Ha. You know you're a bit addicted when you're hiking in the Cotswolds for two weeks and having a lovely time, but really miss the NYT Acrostic (September 15).
Then yesterday, when the September 29 acrostic posted, I was in Seattle -- again without my laptop. I've been traveling without my laptop a lot lately, and it's very liberating, but I will admit to being happy to finally get to EC & HR's acrostics.
Both seemed about medium level difficulty to me -- good, solid puzzles with satisfying clues/answers, but nothing that had me stumped for long. Like others, I especially enjoyed the quotation by Stephen Fry, whom I love. Has anyone else ever seen the film, "Peter's Friends"?
No comments other than that this week. Too brain dead from all the traveling. ;)
Gotta rest up and get my brain back online because I'm finally getting back to work tomorrow -- editing CynAcrostics Vol. 5 for publication. It should be out soon!
Thanks for the wonderful puzzle fix, EC & HR. It's great to be back.
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I thought the clues were pretty easy, which I never ever say. Only needed three Google searches. Enjoyed it.
Catilin mentions QI (which is short for "Quite Interesting"), the UK panel show which Stephen Fry hosted for a number of years. (It's now hosted by Sandi Toksvig.) It's one of my favorite go-to programs over Britbox. Here is a cllip in which the panel discuss the persistence of conspiracy theories doubting the reality of NASA moon landings. It seems particularly on-point with the quote in this week's puzzle.
QI - Versus Moon Landing Conspiracy Theories
Host: Stephen Fry, with Sean Lock, Alan Davies, David Mitchell, and Danny Baker
https://youtu.be/F7cl0hmI0Yk
(If you go looking around for additional QI clips, be warned that the level of humor is often NSFW, but is generally hilarious, IMHO.)
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Seeing Stephen Fry's name made me think of his wonderful performance as the unflappable valet Jeeves in the "Jeeves and Wooster" series which ran on PBS in the US decades ago. (Hugh Laurie was also terrific as Bertie Wooster). Well worth watching if you're a fan of the P.G. Wodehouse stories.
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Snake Charmer is always an enjoyable “middle” puzzle.
I realized, back when it first appeared, that the snake shape was not necessary to solve it. I make up my own diagram around the perimeter of a piece of paper.
[SPOILER ALERT]
MAGIC MARKER was a square too long, so I held off on that one and came back to it at the end.
The only answer that I had to search for was EVEREST, which then made me remember GUINEVERE, which in turn gave me the PENGUIN of KING PENGUIN.
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@Jerrold
I also had to hold off a bit on the marker. I tried STANCES which turned out to work, but it was knowing GUINEVERE that was my breakthrough, giving me EVEREST, PENGUIN, etc. A fun one.
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@Jerrold --
I had to go all the way around twice, but that was because I wasn't sure how to spell GUINEVERE and which "relentless pest" would be.
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On Thursday evening, I E-mailed Caitlin about the following:
Right at the end of doing the Acrostic, the message came up that says the grid is full but at least one letter is wrong.
But after I corrected it, my computer was jumped back to the main Puzzles page. When I finally got the Acrostic back, all my work had been wiped out and the Acrostic was blank.
I had to re-enter all the answers, which meant I had to search a second time for those which I did not remember.
Does anybody else here ever have that experience?
[MAJOR SPOILER ALERT]
Anyway, my gimmes were ESTUARY, FRENCH,
CLOCKS, SUITE, YIDDISH, EULOGY, PUTATIVE, TITHE and HAITI.
I had to search for TIMOTHY, OWLISH, LOS LOBOS, RODEO, EDUCATION and NOTORIOUS.
As usual, there were “tricks”, the consecutive FOOTNOTES and REFINERY.
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EC & HR provide many delightful discoveries within the cluing of this fine Acrostic. Most enjoyable.
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