Cleaning my cat's litter box is a PET PROJECT.
(My puns are always a meowthful.)
4
Any queen bees sharing a two letter list today?
@Tami Martin - here you go:
AD 2, AR 1, AT 4
CA 4, CI 1, CR 1
DA 3, DI 5, DR 2
MA 1, MI 1
RA 2
TA 8, TI 2, TR 6
3
Being British, I have to channel my American wife’s thought processes before attempting the puzzle each day. Today this caused me grief. I completely missed the hint provided by ‘uni’ and failed to even consider A LEVEL as an answer, despite having 4 of the b****rs. I spent a fruitless hour or so diving down Wikipedia (and other) rabbit holes covering the American education system. My wife only ever mentions SATs which she sat in the early 70s.
FANFIC??? I can just about accept fan fiction, but the application of ‘informality’ or some other pseudonym for abbreviation for such neologisms leaves me cold. Back to the archive for me.
@Alan Hunter, how does one come to accumulate 4 of the A LEVEL b****rs in uni, SON?
@Alan Hunter
I am also wondering how many here may not have understood your very British "despite having 4 of the b****rs". It took me a while...
@Andrew, it should be apparent that AlanH is an entomologist.
1
Saturday worthy!
I don't understand how FANFIC is so unknown to puzzlers here. It's all over the place. It isn't new. While it may have been obscure in the 60's through 80's, it has exploded in the digital age. If there is a book, movie or t.v. show that has not been so honored or dishonored by now, it passes the test of obscurity.
A little secret: a tiny portion of it is quite well done. A not so big secret: the majority of it is not. I may have even engaged in writing some. Which kind? Further affiant saith not.
11
@Liane
Thou SAYST not?! O No!
3
Perhaps those who have a problem with the widths clue could consider this:
Say you are taking the measurements of the doorways in your house. They each have a width and a height. Make a list of each door, with a column showing its width and a column showing its height. Half (exactly half) of the measurements you wrote down are widths and half are heights. It has nothing to do with the numbers you wrote down. Just the number of things you measured.
Read it again: The clue doesn't say _width_ is half of a_measurement_. It says widths are half of measurements.
Btw, this works with any two-dimensional scheme (widths are half of the measurements you took, whether you measured w x h, w x l, or w x d).
7
Was I the only one who first had WAISTS?
Power restored. What a mess this was. The last day was waiting for PG&E to repair a crack in a pole that had probably been there for 40 years. ("Since the wood dried," was the candid opinion of the lineman.)
But the Public Safety Power Shutoff protocol says anything found in the "pre-re-energization survey" is storm damage, so we waited another day. Without finding ancient issues, the damage assessment would have been zero because there was no storm whatsoever. PG&E is already touting this imaginary storm damage as justification for this stunt.
The union took out a full page ad in the paper. It basically said, "I didn't do it."
4
@Martin Fortunately we escaped the shut off here in West Sacramento. What a mess.
1
@David Connell That's a good explanation, but I still don't like the clue.
4
You got me fair and square on this one. A solvable puzzle that was just beyond my reach. Nice work.
3
ADAM WEST is a debut?! Holy incredulity, Batman!
Maybe my fastest Saturday ever. Some days you eat the bear, I guess.
4
@Roger ADAMWEST has appeared three times before.
1
@Rich in Atlanta
You got me - I read Deb's column a bit too quickly, saw "Mr. Ries also debuts eight entries" and ADAM WEST in close proximity and went off half-(bat)cocked.
1
@Roger Yeah, my Saturday record as well. It was fun, but a bit too easy.
oh saturday was a challenge! but i loved it anyway, bc so satisfying when i finished!
4
What a bloody great Natick with ILENE and A LEVEL! That alone did me in. Respect.
Loved seeing the late ADAM WEST in the fill (he’s easily my favorite Batman). AROMAS do draw me to the kitchen—what a great clue! More clever cluing/fill with SIERRA CLUB and DIAL TONE. Just wonderful.
Despite my initial trouble in the north central region, I thoroughly enjoyed this Saturday puzzle.
:-D
3
@Just Carol I had no idea about ILENE, so I'm glad that I've watched enough British telly to be familiar with A LEVEL. (I think I've heard it in the plural as A LEVELs, though).
1
Great puzzle and would have completed it had I not used Irene instead of Ilene. That wrong r plus getting stuck on case worker as a social worker kept me from seeing Alevel. aRRgh!
Kept trying Bio/Bleu for 1A but couldn't reconcile the word amateur and then had the aha moment for fanfic. After that, the NW corner fell into place. Loved Serenaslam and Sierraclub. Feeling pretty clever this morning.
3
Tough and wonderful, but FANFIC did me in. Pop culture slang is not my strong suit. Yet I keep trying. Sometimes my daughters roll their eyes: "Dad, nobody says that anymore." But when I get the terminology right, they ask what I used to ask them: "Where did you learn that word?"
3
67A...OMAR. The crosses did it, and neither BINGO Bongo nor BANGO Bongo fit the spaces. ”Bingo, bango, bongo, I don’t want to leave the Congo.”
3
@SteveG, are you really old enough to remember that song? Another Andrews Sisters recording, which (much like "Rum and Coca-Cola") they probably were unaware of any racial implications. Myself, as a preschooler, was unaware of anything racial , period.
2
@Leapfinger
Yep, I'm older than dirt. And, I never saw racial implications, at least in the words that I remembered."Oh, no, no, no, no!" 🎶
So intent on getting out early Friday morning for groceries that I forgot I had a Thursday puzzle to finish. Phony streak came to end at 113. It had quite a few "crossword puzzle clue" lookups in its early days, so good riddance.
First pass Saturday got me only FETA, SECRETCODE, and ARARAT. May not start a new honest streak yet.
4
I enjoyed this. A rare Saturday for me where it all came out of my head - no last gasp lookups. FETA and FANFIC came right off the bat to start, and I eventually finished by getting ADA and RAE each on the first guess.
It never ceases to amaze me, that for a such literary and erudite crowd there seems to be among some the presumption that their experiences are the defining experiences. That a term or phrase that is unknown to them is a universal offense, rather than an opportunity to learn, or at least recognize that what they find obscure others are familiar with.
Discussion and debate, likes and dislikes are fine. But the apparent outrage over a clue that is obscure to them, baffles me.
43
@MJ
Maybe the solution is to just have the Xword printed with the solution already in it😉
2
There are definitely days I’d endorse that!
1
My guess is that most users of this blog are advanced in years; with that comes some calcification of ideas about the way things should be. (I'm 65 and I try not to be like that myself but I'm not always successful.) In any event, I found today's puzzle to be more challenging than the usual Saturday. Even though I knew "uni" from doing British puzzles I still could not get A LEVEL. FANFIC makes perfect sense but I missed that as well.
4
I thought 1D, FANFIC, was too easy for a Saturday, a gimme for the first clue. Turns out a number of people in the comments didn't find it so easy. I guess this makes up for (some of) the "obvious" sports clues that leave me scratching my head. To each her own fandom!
10
@Adina FANFIC is surprisingly divisive.
2
@Ma AM
New word for me, but finally got enough crosses to guess it. I half remember knowing a similar word back in the 50's but I think it was different.
1
@kilaueabart
It first came to my attention through scifi girl communities 20+ years ago. It seemed to largely center around erotic speculative artwork, not my thing, but also usually bad, fan-generated writing.
This conversation got me curious and a brief google tells me that fanfic was popularized among Star trek fans (not surprising) but has been used derogatively since the 30s in the science fiction community. What you remember hearing may have actually been this word.
2
Every true native NYer knows that kitchen cabinets are filled with DRAWS, not DRAWERS, based on pronunciation.
5
@Charlie B I think of completely different pronunciations for each of the three options (the lure, the underpants, and the millwork).
@Charlie B
Actually, to call a kitchen aroma a DRAWER is wordplay, as evidenced by the question mark in the clue. The word DRAWER doesn't normally mean "thing that attracts"; that word is DRAW.
https://www.google.com/search?q=draw+def&rlz=1C1FGUR_enUS808US810&oq=draw+def&aqs=chrome..69i57j0l5.3269j1j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8 (Noun definition #3.)
The definitions for DRAWER do not actually include such a sense:
https://www.google.com/search?q=drawer+def&rlz=1C1FGUR_enUS808US810&oq=drawer+def&aqs=chrome..69i57j0l5.4111j1j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
So, this year, Pete Alonso, the rookie home run king, was a big DRAW for the New York Mets, not a big DRAWER. (He brought fans to the ballpark.) But the question mark makes it a valid clue, as word play: the verb DRAW plus the suffix -ER that turns a verb into a nouns meaning "one who..."
@Steve L
I just assumed we had all accepted the wordplay at face value because of its inclusion and had moved on to riffing on the pronunciation. Hence, I would say "draw-er" for the lure word to indicate that I was being playful with language, but "dror" for the the millwork enclosure because I enunciate terribly.
Professional, polished and playful (clues). I love Andrew's puzzles.
Today's was a great solve from beginning to end even with my dnf at FAN pIC. Wish I'd looked harder at that because on retrospect FRI totally makes sense there.
Of course it does, thanks to Andrew!
4
@Deb, please change your 14A Tricky Clue to read " a Greek OR ROMAN word" before si more people mention AMOR is Roman. Better throw in a "probably" somewhere, because of the FRIg/ FRIgga/ FReya FANs in the crowd
9
Leapy, please email me?
1
Given all the grief that Will Shortz gets, it seems only fair to give him props for a great edit/clue: “Green giant” for SIERRA CLUB (changed from Andrew’s “Green group”).
19
@Puzzlemucker
Ho Ho Ho!
;D
4
@Puzzlemucker
A jolly good clue!
1
@Steve L
I thought it was a bit corny.
3
EROS before AMOR was only part of the reason for my not loving this puzzle. I completely ground to a halt with FANFIC crossing FRI, and WAPO and WIDTHS (Halves?), and DET. This was my first DNF in a very long time.
The leadoff comment today from a fellow Ottawa resident was a tersely written "Terrible puzzle". I am assuming that she is perhaps equating DNF with "terrible". I would not relate my own miserable solving experience to the quality of the puzzle, but if losing a 7-0 hockey game is a "terrible" game, then this was for me a "terrible" puzzle.
3
@Andrew
WIDTHS are half the measurements needed for AREAS, the other half being Lengths [to which you may have to go great...]
Sadly, WIDTHS are only a third of measurements when Depth is also wanted .
3
@Leapfinger And with beauty, it's apparently the only measurement.
2
@Leapfinger
If WIDTHS are halves, does that mean that the halve-nots must go WIDTHOUT?
9
Fun puzzle, but tricky! Having some ice fishing experience, I was ready to put ice auger before realizing it wouldn’t fit. No experience with ICE SAWS, I’ll stick with my augers.
5
FANFIC? FANPIC? FANZIC? FANTIC? I went for a second F at 1D, because at least FRI (20A) was an abbrev I'd heard of. (Yes, it's based on a Norse goddess instead of the usual Roman god, but those people who name days of the week can always pull a fast one.) My guess was right, as were my guesses on the I in TORI AMOS and on all the consonants in ADAM WEST. And so a correct finish. Yay, me!
Why isn't "uni" capitalized (15A)? Is an "A LEVEL" exam the same as the SATs? The LSATs? The MCATs? Is it an actual term or is it Green Paint?
Yes, WAPO -- "Democracy Dies in Darkness". How true. So then why, on those rare occasions when the internet brings me to one of your articles, DOES MY BLOODY SCREEN GO DARK BEFORE I CAN EVEN BEGIN READING IT????? Inconsistency -- that's what I call your blackout policy. Don't you know that I've subscribed to The New York Times for 47 years AND THAT I WILL NEVER BE UNFAITHFUL TO THEM? NEVER! To paraphrase Clint Eastwood: They will have to pry the NYT out of my cold, dead hand.
Found this very tough in spots, but thoroughly engrossing.
5
@Nancy
A LEVEL is definitely not Green Paint. Here's the wikipedia article, which I don't find especially fun to read:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GCE_Advanced_Level
O-levels were the "ordinary" exams for school-leaving in the UK, now replaced by the GCSE's. A-levels are the "advanced" exams for students planning to go to university. Students study for them in 3 or 4 subject areas.
If I've got any of that wrong, I'm sure someone in the UK can straighten me out!
5
@Nancy I don't know about the exams but people say "uni" generically the way you might say "college."
5
That’s a lot of yelling there, Nancy.
5
I thought 31D was the best clue! The puzzle was very good. I am still amazed when I can do a Saturday.
4
“Halves of some measurements” - - - WHAAA????
“FANFIC” - Gimme a break!
LUGE TEAM was terrific though. And “Joe might need this”. And “Kitchen drawers” - - UBER clever!!
Have to call this one a “Completion” though- relying too much on Deb’s WoW and researching Ms. Chaiken
1
AMOR is from the Latin "amare," to love. I first tried Eros, which *is* Greek, but quickly switched to his Roman counterpart. Good Saturday puzzle!
3
@Michael Dover
Amor is also another name for Cupid....
After the worst three days of my puzzling life (Wed, TR, Fri) I rebounded today in near record time. As I age into oblivion, I feared that maybe I was losing my wits, but I think now it was just not enough coffee. Northeast corner was very fast with FETA and NERF almost instantly determined. Having read all of Harry Potter, I knew that at uni you have to have A LEVEL. The middle was also quick, thanks to my infatuation with Batman in my youth and ADAM WEST (RIP). All in all, a very satisfying start of the weekend. Thank you!
6
@PK
Yes, Coffee!!
The more I solve, the more in tune I become with my "solving head". To me, there is a certain point in the morning where I feel I'm ready to solve. It isn't that I can't solve before I reach that point, it's just that I know I'll do my best solving once I reach a certain level of awareness and focus. And it's coffee that gets me from being half asleep to being ready for a challenging Saturday.
Does that make sense to anyone else? I suppose that this makes me a bona fide addict. But I'm OK with that... :-)
2
@Steve Faiella
Yes absolutely, though I often solve when my “solving head” is unaccounted for. “Solving head” is a great expression, BTW. Looking forward to your next puzzle!
1
FANFIC cost me the gold. Penning in FRI gave me a doh and head slap. Cue “call me Deacon Blue”
@dk
There's a fascinating (really!) article on Fan Fiction on Wikipedia (link below). The two things that stood out to me of the many cool facts about FANFIC were:
80% is penned by female authors. Topics that are usually associated with male nerds (Star Trek, Star Wars, video games, etc) are primarily penned by females. And readership is also heavily skewed to female readers as well. Let the guys know gals! Nerd love rules! (P.S. please don't start carping about gender roles and my choice of wording here. Relax, this is supposed to be humorous).
Number 2: "Fifty Shades of Grey" was originally written as fan fiction for the "Twilight" series of novels, replacing the main characters of Bella and Edward with Anna and Christian. Kinky vampires, eh? Works for me! :-)
Enjoy the weekend, peeps!
The Link:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fan_fiction
3
I gave up on the upper middle section, certain that Post crossing O levels was correct, and not able to figure out widths and son. Just not on the constructor’s wavelength, I suppose. I enjoyed the rest.
2
I know of O LEVELs and A LEVELs, but I didn't know Chaiken or what "The L Word" is/was, and I didn't know the newspaper...and although I had WIDTHS in there, I had guessed that a PTA PROJECT (and I'm a veteran of many) would be unremunerative (as in, you're working for free.) Spell-check says that's not a word, BTW. I was stuck, so I googled and got ILENE.
After WThF puzzles, I was expecting something a bit more interesting...but I guess some lackluster clues are inevitable.....
And then there is 'Will figure'--at 21A... What a weird way to clue SON.
@Mean Old Lady
Speaking of PET PROJECTs, In my experience they were never non-remunerative! They were projects that some high level manager deemed important because they appealed to the manager, not because they were necessary or important. I've been involved in many PET PROJECTs that were responsible for a LOT of corporate spend, usually while most of us were shaking our heads and wondering why were were doing the project in the first place. But hey, we got paid and the manager was happy. Corporate silliness at it's very best.
2
What a great puzzle. Pushed my streak to 19 (my longest) and beat my Saturday average by 1:15:43 (!!) for a Saturday best of 36 minutes.
WIDTHS, COMMAS, DIALTONE were all fun groaners. Friday and Saturday have put this week back on track.
9
[wurf] I thought FRIday was named after Freya. Seems asif there are more way to spell Odin's wife's name than there are to spell Dwayne/Duane/.../Duwain so Wotin the Hel.
More Woman trouble in the grid RE MISS ELLIE, where I couldn't decide between LC, LE and LN. Wasn't seeing the CLUB that went with SIERRA as my view was obstructed by the 'pair' of LEGGINGS I INKed in for the Winter Olympics. Still don't think I can TAT something lacy for the LUGETEAM that will keep any of us warm.
Biggest problems up top however:
*For starters, I don't know O-LEVELS from A-LEVELS
*Secondly, I calculated that half of "tenths" are FIFTHS
*Thirdly, I thought I might need half of "twelfths" to be SIXTHS
*Mainly, the world of NGOs has taught me that 'nonremunerative undertakings' have got to be NONPROFITS
*Don't remember exactly how I weaseled out of that one, but it took some INTENTSive application to achieve SUCCESS.
*I have yet to sort out the JLO/ Jude LAW/ JLOW/ JLAW mishmosh. Even if the mishmosh is of my own making.
I'm slowly starting to let go of NONPROFITS for 18A, since some things are more important than $$$$, and when the resident pooch commences to yodel at some favourite TV commercial, I must admit it's wonderful how our PET PROJECTS.
Agree with the Riesling approach that a SLAM is better than a DING, but would suggest a modifed 33A NO PRESS - R U SURE?
Despite all, many a FRIsSON in 45-odd minutes of Saturday pleasure. Only next time, remember I prefer BLEU to FETA compli.
12
@Leapfinger
I had the same mathematical thoughts as you, until I realized that half of "tenths" are TWENTIETHS, which definitely did not fit. SIXTHS as halves of thirds had me wondering if XET was some kind of case worker. Seemed as likely as a DET to me.
@Andrew
Yikes! (In spades!!)
Of course I should have known better, but I wrote it the way I thought it. Mr CP Batt (HS math teacher extraordinaire) would have beaned me with a piece of chalk.
1
Can someone explain the 'son' answer?
@Annie
One's son is often named as an heir in a WILL.
5
Mostly quite enjoyable, but the center top section could have been much better. For example, WAPO? I have a hard time believing that millennials read newspapers, let alone that they have their own inane slang for specific newspapers. WIDTHS is fine as a word, but has no necessary connection to its clue (halves of some measurements). Same with SON and its clue (will figure).
1
@Gary
I'm no millennial, but like some of them, I read the WAPO online.
15
@Gary
Google WAPO and see what comes up.
6
@Gary
I thought about it, and we do speak of "lengths and widths" and so half of that phrase would make the clue sneaky but correct....
7
A NO PRESSURE Saturday! We would be REMISS in not saying AMEN!
3
So, here's the complete package, with obvious exceptional care given to every answer and clue -- beauty everywhere!
Specifically, gorgeous answers like PET PROJECT, NO PRESSURE, DEGREE MILL, SERENA SLAM, and BONANZA. Saturday tough vague cluing and smile producing word-playing clues like those for ARF, DIAL TONE, RUN, COMMAS, and AROMAS, shifting those answers from the everyday to the sublime.
A puzzle glimmering with such beauty can't help but be a most lovely solving experience, and thank you for that, Andrew. What a ravishing piece of work!
9
I had MOMMAS for 28A until the very end, sure that it was a reference to Dick Shawn as Sylvester racing through the desert crying “Your baby’s common’ to save you Momma!”
It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World’ definitely deserves its own puzzle, constructed around “a big W.”
5
@Brendan
I too was a mOMMAS boy for a while.
2
@Brendan I had CAMEOS to start out with, thinking of a huge cast of small roles. Held me up for a bit, that...
2
It was a frabjous day when I discovered, a few weeks ago, that my subscription included the crossword. Shortly after that, I discovered the archives. (Callooh! Callay!) Today I celebrated day 14 of my first streak and completed all the 2019 puzzles to date.
26
@Faye
How Brillig!! :)
4
@Faye
Slithey טוב מאוד
3
There is a wee AROMA of smug in my kitchen these past two mornings, which is where I puzzle in Maine. The Friday and Saturday puzzles both proceeded, like bankruptcy, slowly and then all at once. (Apparently a common misappropriation of Papa's "Gradually and then suddenly".) So many delightful clues.
Ah, NYC kitchens, I do not miss you. So very tiny. Luckily, I don't cook. But my special pair of underwear barely fit inside, let alone the rest of me.
3
@AudreyLM
Honest NYC apt ad: “¼BR, ½BA, 1BK. Very expensive, no light, no pets except vermin. Super moved years ago. Doorman? HaHaHa. Rent just went up while writing this ad.”
(BK = Bu++ Kitchen)
8
@Puzzlemucker What a coincidence! I lived in that one! And while there was indeed no doorman, there was a friendly local drunk who manned the vestibule.
9
@AudreyLM In a bit of what I'm sure is psychological priming, I read your last clause as "a friendly local drunk who marinated the vestibule."
Am I right?
7
Fun puzzle!
IrENE for ILENE, then I was done. Didn't know what kind of nutty ArE-VEL or ALE-VEL exams kids in England were taking. Doh!
ADAM WEST is still my favorite Batman.
I also thought this about " kitchen drawer:" ARCHITECT. Couldn't make it fit, but it's the first thing that came to mind, probably because we are getting ready to hire one to help us with a renovation project. My partner thinks it could be done by Thanksgiving. Cute!
5
@Ann
ADAM WEST is my favorite Batman, too. Second favorite is Will Arnett as Lego Batman.
As far as the kitchen reno goes, you're talking Thanksgiving 2020, right?
1
A comment on TREASURE TROVE. In common law countries like the UK and Australia this is a legal term referring specifically to found buried gold or silver which are forfeit to the Crown and so no “Bonanza” to the finder.
I note that US law differs.
1
LETTER BOXED
N-B(4), B-R(9)
@ Mari. I knew N-R (6) R-K (9) could be topped, but settling on quick solution. Expect many of them today unlike yesterday.
Hope I don’t run into word 2 today on my way to fetch kid from airport. Pride Parade gears up today. Always a fabulous giant outpouring of love and support in the ATL!
2
@Mari
I had a quick B-R(7), R-N(7).
@Mari
I went for the quick in and out with
C-M(8),M-E(8).
SPELLING BEE GRID
Oct 12th 2019
T A C D I M R
Words: 44, Points: 212, Pangrams: 1
A x 7
C x 6
D x 10
M x 2
R x 2
T x 16
4L x 11
5L x 14
6L x 10
7L x 3
8L x 3
9L x 1
10L x 1
4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Tot
A - 4 2 1 - - - 7
C 1 2 2 - 1 - - 6
D 4 1 2 - 2 1 - 10
M 2 - - - - - - 2
R - 1 - 1 - - - 2
T 4 6 4 1 - - 1 16
Tot 11 14 10 3 3 1 1 43
32
@Mari A couple of swearwords (one in the tradition of 'DUNNO'), hardtop long and short, a road-train wagon long and short, and a word that means an addition to a letter to indicate pronunciation (specialist word of interest to linguists and typesetters only). The usual Bee R-word indicating a knocking sound and T-word for bad stuff on teeth (or a baking ingredient).
11
@Mari
Help with T10?
1
@Carl Adler The long form of hard-top road surface material.
6
Very nice smooth puzzle, great stack and even fill throughout, nothing to grumble about. A healthy level of misdirection but not diabolical. Inched along to completion, pleasantly without lookups. Just right for the end of a long week.
Favorite clue? 45A Cradle sound. Dare I say, rang my bell?
12
Overall an enjoyable puzzle. Great clues for COMMAS and DIAL TONE.
But I struggled with 4a "Halves of some measurements" for WIDTHS. I'm reluctant to question clues, giving constructor's plenty of latitude to, well... puzzle me. But this one seems pretty vague even for a late week clue. After finding the entry I see that the measurements in question might include shoe size or area calculation. For me, though, the clue just doesn't relate well to the entry.
A blemish on an otherwise solid puzzle.
10
@Mike R I found the answer eventually by seeing the clue as relating to the measurement of an area.
A rug has a length and a width. You need both to have the size. There are two dimensions and width is one of them (hence, one out of two, hence "half" of what is required).
The shoe notion may be valid too, but I like the "area" reasoning a bit more as it can be applied to any surface (a desk top, an outdoor deck, etc).
4
WIDTH and length are discrete measurements whose product is the further discrete measurement: the area of a rectangle. Neither is “half the measurement” of that rectangle’s area*. Inaccuracy in language is not the same as misleading in language, the latter being a good thing in a late week NYT crossword.
*Consider the question of volume. Is height a third of length by width by height, or half of area by height. It is a matter of the relevant measurements being in different units.
4
@Patrick
I don't disagree with your overall view but this particular clue seems fine to me.
Think of it this way - two parts of a pair are often considered "halves".
The measurement of a rectangular area is derived from a pair of individual measurements, one being length and the other being width.
3
Mucinex and Stollen instead of ADVILPM and DATENUT in the SW held me up for quite a while.
There was an article about Boys Don't Cry posted to the Times website in the last day or so so Brandon TEENA was fresh in my mind. Funny how that happens.
7
@vaer
Mucinex and Stollen. What a folk duo they were!
6
@Puzzlemucker
lol. Or possibly a husband and wife comedy team.
1
@vaer
Stollen!! I haven't heard that term since I was a (not so wee) lad! Mom would make one every Christmas, but we weren't fooled. Call it what you will, but to us kids, it was fruitcake and therefore inedible.
Sorry Mom! If you're listening up there, the adult me would kill for a piece of your Stollen today! 💟
3
Nice to see an Andrew Ries Saturday puzzle with a great staggered middle stack the day after Andy Kravis gave him credit for inspiring his staggered stack Friday puzzle. Coincidences abound in CrossWorld.
Fast Saturday. Two words I rarely say in the same sentence. I think my biorhythms are clicking this weekend. Bring on the anagrams and math!
(Loved the puzzle).
6
I've spoken here before about puzzle entries that posed difficulties for solvers outside the USA. Do we have a counter-example today?
I've always thought that A-Levels terminology was a feature of British and Commonwealth educational systems. Is it common on this side of the pond?
1
@Al in Pittsburgh - not at all. Neither is "uni" common in the US (or as they sometimes say in the British and Commonwealths, "the States"). So A-LEVEL goes with "uni" in the clue.
8
Way too easy. Until it wasn't.
8
I always thought the common mistake was "all intensive purposes." Had never seen "intense and purposes."
@Figgsie
It’s intents, not intense.
4
@Bill in Yokohama - @Figgsie is referring to Deb's blurb. I agree - I thought most people mistakenly says "Intensive" and have never seen "Intense" either.
4
@Wen & Figgsie,
My bad, I thought Figgsie was talking about the puzzle answer, not Deb’s column.
1
Deb, I had a choice D for kitchen drawer before I got the right answer - the dry erase markers and boards that people put on their fridges. Not sure what that says about me. Maybe that's why I often don't do well on multiple choice questions.
4
@Wen I had the same type thought, except I was thinking of children and coloring books ... of course there was no such six letter answer.
1
And I thought of cake decorating gizmos. Happy Birthday!
3
Friday isn’t named after Frigg, the Norse goddess of wisdom; it’s named after her Anglo-Saxon counterpart Frig. The seven-day week was introduced to Scandinavia upon its conversion to Christianity, and there were consequently no Norse weekday-names until then. The Norse forms were modeled on their Anglo-Saxon forebears.
There is also no mountain in Genesis named “Ararat.” Ararat is a kingdom or region, not a mountain; see Genesis 8:4 (“And the ark rested in the seventh month, on the seventh day of the month, upon the mountains of Ararat”). NB: "mountains" (plural) and "*of* Ararat." “Ararat” appears four times in Hebrew scripture. It is rendered in KJV twice as “Ararat” and twice as “Armenia.” The same is true of the Latin Bible (loc. cit.):
Requievitque arca…super montes Armeniae (“The ark came to rest…upon the mountains of Armenia”)
Here’s a comparison of two passages in St. Jerome’s Latin, having to do with the murder of Sennacherib by his sons Adrammelech and Sharezer (2 Kings 19:37 and Isaiah 37:38). They are identical down to the last word:
Adramelech et Sarasar filii eius percusserunt eum gladio fugeruntque in terram Armeniorum (1)
Adramelech et Sarasar filii eius percusserunt eum gladio fugeruntque in terram Ararat (2)
“His sons Adrammelech and Sharezer smote him with a sword and fled into the land…” (1) of the Armenians; (2) Ararat
“Ararat” and “Armenia” are interchangeable. Both are the name of a country, not a mountain.
27
@Fact Boy
You frighten me.
But ... I mean ... in a good way.
Also, I liked the puzzle.
12
@Fact Boy
Very interesting. I just hope I can use notes for the test
8
@Fact Boy
You are my hero. That is all.
1
Tough one but good. Way more abbreviations than usual, making it a bit tougher and I suspect people will hate it for that reason. CSI, WAPO, JLAW, FRI, RSS, ADVIL PM, TRI, A LEVEL, DET, TV PRODUCER. It's all like a SECRET CODE BONANZA!
However, I didn't have a problem with it myself. It was slow going at first, but NO PRESSURE. Through persistence and some luck, and BENT on completion, SUCCESS!
The other problem people have will likely be the names - I have to say, I had problems with TEENA, OMAR, ILENE. I knew of SERENA and SERENA SLAM, but didn't think of it as a feat. If not for living in Boston, EMERSON would have been harder. Don't read the tabloids, so didn't know Jennifer Lawrence had a moniker like that.
Had TEC before DET (because we had TEC recently), HEAVIEST before SCARCEST, INK before TAT.
Until I got VOTE, I kept thinking Capitol Hill activity was VILE, or VICE.
TIL: DATE NUT...is not someone who loves to go out with others.
4
@Wen
Since I worked at EMERSON for umpty years, it's always my first guess for 7-letter Boston college. Other possibilities: Simmons, Suffolk (University)--probably others I can't think of off the top of my head.
1
@Wen I imagine a lot of us here don't read the tabloids, so perhaps something along the lines of "Nickname" would have been a better clue for JLAW. I suppose "in tabloids" is more colorful, though.
Much easier than most Saturdays. Nice to be done in time for a good night's sleep!
2
Quickie at under 15. Far from PB of 10 but still pretty easy. Had OSU for PSU which added almost a minute of staring.
15 hours?! ☺️
8
My solve here was an odd combination of really easy & smooth and really hard. Starting in the NW corner and down through the middle to the SE, it all filled in really smoothly. Although I've always heard DIPLOMA MILL and not DEGREE MILL. But I had real trouble in the NE and SW corners. I still don't quite get WIDTHS for halves of some measurements, and CREAMER/SUCCESS/INTENTS filled in from the bottoms up.
ADVIL PM was the sticking point in the SW, and I wasn't sure if LENS FILTER was a thing, but it fit. (That NSF in the middle looked odd before I had vowels around it).
My final time was about 2/3 my average Saturday time, so I guess overall it wasn't too difficult--but those corners felt hard while I was working on it!
6
@Liz B
After I filled WIDTHS from the crosses, I decided that the constructor considers LENGTH and WIDTH as equal components (halves?) of some measurements.
I guess that's true iff SOME means only SQUARES.
If half was used because WIDTH is one of two words, I feel that that is stretching "it's only a clue" to the breaking point.
Similarly, I have trouble visualizing a contraption used to filter lenses out of a pile of camera equipment.
Light filters, on the other hand . . .
Still managed to finish below average and that's how I'd grade this puzzle.
1
@Liz B thank you for LENSFILTER. Was my last holdout!
2
@Al in Pittsburgh and Liz B WIDTHS doesn't make much sense to me, either.
"If half was used because WIDTH is one of two words, I feel that that is stretching "it's only a clue" to the breaking point." If that is the explanation, I agree that is pretty weak.
Does anyone have any other ideas?
Had it all except for the F in Fri. Pretty smooth solve.
1
@Liz
The F was my last letter as well.
1
@Liz
Me too.
Fri at last, Fri at last, thank God Almighty I am Fri at last!
(Is it pronounced free or fry?)
- Tom
Deb, you need another cup of coffee. I’m sure you know that the love of Greek myth is EROS; AMOR is the Roman counterpart.
Sure, I knew that “kitchen drawers“ was some kind of word play. My first thought was somebody sketching pictures of kitchens.
9
@Alan Young I had that idea with regard to kitchens drawers as well - architects or interior designers. That or people actually drawing IN the kitchen.
That was my last section to complete.
3