OK, I have to say that I'm proud of myself for getting "lunar crater" right away.
3
The SE Corner was the first area for me as Mahal was my way in. I had Flower Print at first, up in the NW Corner which threw me off for a bit. Must say I have never seen beefed in this sense used as a verb. When referring to increasing as in beefed up as an adverb yes, but not as in complaining. Ya' just never know, but far be it from me to beef about this.
2
I haven't read all the comments (240 at this point!) so I don't know if anyone else did it, but for 32A the clue was "prayers" and I put "popes" instead of "hopes" so couldn't get 32D.
Otherwise I did eventually get everything else once I got a few from my first pass. Often takes so long to do on Friday or Saturday that I give up hopes.
3
@Anne Schultz, no matter, it's still heaps better than giving up popes.
2
31D was not PORNSTAR. :(
3
Today's gimmes were fascinating. I started with just PAINE and SUSIE and, wrongly, EASTEREGG but that latter wasn't getting me anywhere so I dropped it in favor of CHATS (up). That allowed me to find SADAT and CHEATCODE and from there the rest followed, slowly but enertainingly.
I see a lot of mentions on here about solvers' "first pass." Is the common approach to try to go through all of the across clues and fill in as many as you can before working on down clues and filling in sections?
1
@Matty Bow
In a late-week puzzle it's pretty common for folks to read through all the clues to see if there are any answers that sound reasonable. I tend to go through section by section, seeing what I can fill in for either acrosses or downs. Others may have their own preferred method.
8
Hi @Matty Bow, I hear a lot about people who try to do all the Acrosses or Downs in order, and I sometimes try that myself.
I still maintain that it's your puzzle and you can do it any way you want, though. :)
LETTER BOXED. I haven’t seen any comments about it and here it is 6PM.
Well for what it’s worth I have a ridiculously long solution for 2 words.
M-S 11 S-D 9
Yesterday my solution was the same as the NYT.
INFLOW WATERMARK
@TPB
I noticed the same thing - I kept checking back hoping for help. Surprisingly hard since there are so many good starts. I got
M-D(8) D-C(7)
@TPB I had U-C (10) C-S (4)
@TPB
Got busy and forgot to post. Had U-C (10) C-S (4) today.
Yesterday I had FLATWORM MONIKER.
Today was a bit of a tennis match between Linda and me. Linda served first with the crossings RSVP/ADVANCE in the SE corner. I forehanded back with LATINo when she got me on a drop shot with LATINA and AGENCY then I played her at the net with DIRGES...she lobbed up SWEARJAR which I countered with the possibility of curseJAR so we played on. She soon backhanded with JOSHING which I followed up with RUNNERSHIGH, SNEAD and SADAT before her earlier lob landed for the kill as SWEARJAR became a winner! We continued volleying back and forth through the rest of the grid ending up in the SW corner. My initial let serve of ROLLingr was followed on the second serve with ROLLEDRS and the rest of the corner ended in a tie. Game,set match both of us!! Great fun with this doubles of constructors - a volley of thanks to Anne and Erik!
11
@Joe And Linda
Love it!!
3
This puzzle is very special to me, as it marks a full-year streak, breaking my previous streak of 221 days. I feel so accomplished — like I need to give an Oscar-style acceptance speech!
20
Emily,
We're waiting!
3
I’d like to thanks my manager, my parents, my partner...
Actually, I really owe it all to my obsessive nature, strategic planning when crossing time zones, and my car — for when I had to drive 20 minutes away from campsites to get a cell signal.
And god, of course. I feel god in this Chili’s tonight.
14
Congratulations, @Emily!
5
The answer to "caseload?" is bottles. I don't get it. What am I missing?
2
@Diane
I’ll assume it means like wine. A case of wine is 12 bottles.
Rule of thumb: when stumped, always think alcohol...
3
@Newbie
Although thinking about it, I think a case if beer is 24 cans...
Newbie,
Forget the beer; you were fine with wine.
(Or harder stuff.)
1
Finally making it to the column/comments, albeit rather late in the day. Ferrying the DHubby to PT messes up my morning routine (though of course, the pay-off will be that he will be in less pain....eventually....and able to take a walk with me.... and his CANE.
I really wasn't sure I could finish this puzzle! I wanted a TAPA cloth PRINT, or a TIKI, or ALOHA in there for the Hawaiian shirt.
Then I had "Aha!" cleverly entered MARKED cards and a SKI PLANE.
There were Two Places where AWARD would work: 33A and 27D; neither was correct.
Why would I know Steve Jobs' children's names??
People STAND PAT. Only pikers would SIT.
TRILLED R is a feature of Spanish. I have never heard anyone use ROLLED there.
PUPAL was extremely doubtful, and TESTEES (which nobody said, ever) was the same.
The whole puzzle went that way. I would say more, but I need to scout out some change for the CURSE JAR.
8
@MOL, stand pat, moi aussi, and PUPAL on by virtue of grid and forceful crosses rejecting PUPATE/PUPAE.
I've had some erratic weeks, so missed hearing about what DHubby has had happen, whether surgery/ injury/other. I hope things are improving and/or resolving, and that you're both bearing up in y'all's own inimitable ways. It has certainly been a full year for you, so I hope you're up for a happily uneventful period ahead.
Maybe plant asparagus.
@MOL
Good to see your post. I hope you and Dhubby find peace soon. My Hubby and I are doing some hospital back and forth too. Frustration is the new norm.
1
Hindi for "palace," five letters? Probably MAHAL, I thought, but checked before filling it in. MAHAL turned out to mean country house, so I held off to the very end. But the stupidest thing for someone who graduated high school intending to become an astronomer and still knows his lunar mare was having to get L__ARCR___R filled in by Deb! More proof I'm going fast.
4
In my defense, let me add that it is a lot easier to picture craters in maria than to find "mares" inside craters.
1
Bart,
Also in your defense, you are not going fast.
4
Wow--your gimme was the very last clue I filled in (and I consider myself mostly current on pop culture). I enjoyed this puzzle very much and got off to a good start with Tarots, evasive, seaplane (a favorite fixture of my local Seattle landscape) and then rolled.
3
Terrific puzzle. I had to complete in fits and starts because of my schedule today. Deb, your solving description was right on! Everything came to me slowly, then all at once. Fun!
4
Definitely took me two cups of coffee to get through. My “gimmes” were SPRINT, IRONS, DELT, CRAFT, LADE, ROLODEX, DOGE, ROLLEDRS, PAINE, CAT. I held on much too long to some bad guesses like Ivans for TSARS, and plains instead of CRATERS. At least I decided early on that mare was not a horse but something to do with the moon, since I got most of LUNAR in there from crosses like SADAT and LADE. Thanks for a challenging puzzle and a great debut.
7
Probably the most doable Friday puzzle I've experienced! My first entry was MRT, and I think I got GLENS and CRAFTS on my first pass of acrosses. (As well as "hall pass," which made me smile but was wrong.) When I got to the downs, I smugly put EASTEREGG at 29D. Also wrong! Very enjoyable puzzle. I love a puzzle that just slowly comes together for me, at a steady dribble. I went from dismal first pass to filled grid with a smile.
8
My first pass? Egyptian Nobel winner Anwar SADAT, SUSIE Dinkins, Slammin' Sammy SNEAD and SANTOS (I watch a lot of soccer) and Tom PAINE were all gimmes.
Toyed with DIMWIT for 36D, because I frequently listen to AMRADIO, although mostly in PODCAST format, because I work the night shift.
Favorite clue was "A mare might be found in it," for LUNAR CRATER, which had me initially thinking it would be some kind of STALL.
4
That's SUSIE Derkins, of course. Dinkins (as in David) was a former mayor of NYC.
re: mare - I see your STALLing tactic.
1
@Wen
AAAARGH!
1
So much love for the cluing! The ones for LUNARCRATER, TAROTS, and SWEARJAR were particularly delightful.
8
Great, great puzzle. Deb, thank you for the encouragement!!
One thing: EWERS ?! Really.
4
All I can say is: (swear words)
1
Too many comments to read by now. Sorry if this has been covered. Can someone explain 16A: “in more ways than one”?
Hi Nobis — What I get from it is:
Players taking warm-up shots and
The talking heads showing “shots” or highlights, or even taking “shots” at some of the players/teams.
Pregame is a time when players warm up by taking practice shots, and colloquially, taking a shot or having a drink before you leave the house for a night on the town is called pregaming.
3
A pregame can be a pre-party, where people take shots of liquor.
One might also practice their shots on goal in the pregame time before a hockey, basketball game etc.
3
Suitably challenging for a Friday but ultimately doable. The NW corner was the last to fall for me because I had "Ivans" for "they range from terrible to great;" once I removed that error everything fell into place.
4
I had IVANS for quite awhile too! Nice to know I wasn’t the only one. It’s amazing how one can cling to an entry and try all kinds of possible crosses to make it work. I keep reminding myself not to do that.
5
@Shari Coats
Me too on the Ivans. NW corner was the last to go for me.
1
@Shari Coats I hung on to MOODS for far too long, and appreciated the answer all the more, once I finally got it.
Even better than merely turning off the clock, do as I do each night: print the puzzle, pick up a pen, and solve the old fashioned way, in the comfort of your favorite chair, preferably with a cat on your lap. You can even include a glass of wine. The epitome of relaxation.
Regarding the obsolete ROLODEX,by coincidence I just bought a new one at Staples this week. They had two sizes.
(I suppose these comments mean that when Deb writes "Hi kids," she doesn't mean me.)
9
Wags,
Hello, fellow non-kid.
(ROLODEX on my desk.)
2
@Barry Ancona
A few years ago, I took my Rolodex into a conference room for a working meeting. I forgot that I left it there and sent out an inter-office email asking if anyone had seen it. Got it back (whew!)but not before a youngun asked me whether I had found my watch!
12
@Ann Wonderful story.
1
My gimmee kicked in around the GLENS and CANES area, from where I sank into the SW, which filled in but left me somewhat TESTEE. All the rest was what @Lewis would ruefully call a "Tussle". Can't say how long I spent reviewing bodies of water around ICELAND and IRELAND. [I know, I know: 'Land' in the clue should have warned me off, instead of being suggestive] The LUNAR CRATER clue, to my mind, was a regular night 'mare'. The RUNNER floored me before it gave me a HIGH, but I didn't mind having to juggle FLOWER vs FLORAL, DRIPS vs DRAGS and JESTING vs JOSHING.
Had a skosh of regret about TEXTED: with an EVIL GRIN (and a strong antacid) it could've been clued "Senator Cruz".
Am impressed with a Friday debut and an Agard collaboration. I was SADAT reaching the end.
9
@Leapfinger I noticed some of your comments are in upper case. Would that be considered capital PUNishment?
3
@Leapfinger - the clue mentioning oceans and instead of seas, I thought, what more appropriate land than the one called OCEANIA? But then I had trouble naming 4 oceans that it is abutted to.
3
@Jim
No, but you do make me want it reinstated.
2
Congratulations Anne Flinchbaugh for your collaboration with Eric Agard and thank you for the tight and chewy Friday.
The last to fall was and today's TIL was LUNAR CRATER. For too long I wanted to associate it with a bad dream. This image from Wikipedia opened my eyes to a whole new way to look at a full moon.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunar_mare#/media/File:Moon_names.svg
4
Enjoyed the puzzle to day but I’m puzzled by the clue for Lunar Crater “A mare may be found in it”? What am I missing?
Also — I don’t have any friends to put on my leaderboard (no one will play scrabble with me either😥). If anyone out there wants to add me I’d love it.
1
@Leigh Mueller - mare=sea
@Leigh Mueller
The flat plains on the moon are called seas, such as the Sea of Tranquility, but they are also known my their Latin names, i.e., Mare Tranquillitatis.
3
"Turn off the clock" is the best advice for beginners.
6
@Ethan It's also the best advice for anyone who wants to enjoy doing a crossword.
7
Very long time solver of NYT crosswords but just recently started reading Wordplay (after my grid is complete). Is it just me, or does anyone else not care about personal bests, or whether it takes 10 or 40 minutes, or even an hour to solve a Friday puzzle. I don't watch the clock or use google, but rather love to sit with a paper printout on my clipboard, pencil with eraser and cup of coffee in hand, and simply enjoy the journey, while admiring the skill of the constructors. Why rush through something so enjoyable? You can call me old school.
24
Richard, I think of it like running. I don’t go out on any particular run thinking “I need this to be my best time ever,” but after the fact i do look to see how fast I ran to get an idea of how easy or difficult that run was in comparison to past performance. It also allows me to see if I am improving over the long term.
A personal best on a puzzle may be an indication that that puzzle was easier than usual.
4
I’m with you, Richard, although I solve on my iPad, the mind set is the same. ( and the cup of coffee)
4
@Richard Monday and Tuesday puzzles I try to solve in under 10 minutes, only doing the across clues in order, but occasionally peeking at the down clues. When I get to Friday and Saturday, my target for solving is 2 cups of coffee.
2
When my Hawaiian shirts need mending, I take them to a floral surgeon.
(I'd better go lei down.)
28
Difficult, as always, for a non native speaker who never lived in the US. Never have I heard of „to josh“, sit pat, dirges or ewers.
I still fail to understand 10 - pec(s)/delt, help anyone?
Also, I am not quite clear on how 22 „get down“ is connected to „eat“. Get your head down into a trough/bowl/like a farm animal?
Lastly, I am clueless why 42 „the“ would be helpful in solving cryptographs and was not quite successful in googling that.
Thank you and a beautiful weekend from across the pond, I greatly enjoyed this one after yesterday’s—for me—nightmare (which was the first „mare“ association I had for 43).
4
@Markus - "Ewer," das bedeutet "Krug/Waschkrug."
Get down - think of a person who is so ill they are barely able to eat, they can hardly "get anything down."
"The" is helpful in deciphering a cipher (= letter-for-letter code) because it is such a common three-letter word; in a large body of text it will keep coming up.
Nightmare (there's a horse in there, too!):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PaBNUzVSnj8
2
@Markus Pecs (short for "pectoralis") are chest muscles. Delts ("deltoids") are shoulder muscles.
To get something down is to eat it (to get it down your throat as it were).
Finally, in a cryptogram, the letters have been ciphered. That is, each letter replaced with a different one -- but the replacements are consistent. You have to try out different possibilities to start deciphering it. A good guess in English for a 3-letter word is "THE" as the most commons such, plus "E" and "T" are two of the most common letters in the language. So figuring out which word is THE would give you a good start on deciphering.
2
Thank you, David.
I was stuck along the lines of technical deciphering, like the OMI https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/OMI_cryptograph
The horse I found. Despite having solved it correctly, it did take me a while to see the Latin mare.
Any thoughts on „delt“ (guessing from „deltoid“), but is „delt“ a common short form that is in use?
I loved RUNNERS HIGH as it brought me back to when I experienced a "Rhapsody in shoes." Great clue, Anne! "It's a rush, appropriately enough," is brilliant, too.
You and Erik together deliver a wealth of riches. Congratulations and thank you!
4
When I got the “i” in dirge I groaned as I always do at the plethora of Star Wars clues. Begrudgingly I entered Jedi for camel riders. Didn’t they ride camels in one of those movies? And “j” seemed like a perfectly good start to a Hindi word. Oh.....
@TPB PS. I meant to congratulate the two constructors on this wonderfully entertaining and challenging puzzle. Thanks!
2
@TPB You may be thinking of "The Empire Strikes Back" where on the ice planet Hoth they rode camel-like creatures (Tauntauns, specified as a snow lizards in the literature). A memorable scene where Han slices open one of the creatures to put Luke inside so he does not freeze to death. (I had look most of this stuff up)
1
@Jim Thanks, that must be it. I did see the first three films long ago in another universe,
3
No SWEARJAR in the young dk’s household only the admonition that each time one swore one lost IQ points and one had little to spare.
Thanks A and E.
5
As my dentist likes to say about golf, and she is a scratch player, "if you think, you stink." That applies to today's puzzle. My first pass quickly gave me sidebar in the top right, d'oh. But since bar did not connect with the down clues I started thinking there were going to be tricks aplenty in this puzzle. Double d'oh. Straightforward and challenging. Congratulations Ms Flinchbaugh and thank you Ms Amien for an illuminating column about your methods.
5
Just last week as I was cleaning up boxes and boxes of papers at my recently deceased mother-in-law's house, I came across a ROLODEX, so that was fresh on my mind, aiding a very fast Friday solve.
I'm glad that by the time I'd stopped working, I'd already moved on to a computerized phone list . . . and yet there was some charm and elegance to rolodexes that Deb's "Hey Kids" will never know. They're sort of like an album of old colleagues and friends without the photos. However, if you hold on to one too long, it turns into a series of tombstones (as this one largely had).
7
@Liane
I keep a Rolodex near the kitchen phone; it's the kind that holds business cards--so I have plumber, electrician, doctors, knife sharpener, etc. close to the phone and easy to find. Easier for me than going to find the phone when I need one!
4
Nice Friday puzzle. I had to brute force IT’LL, just wouldn’t come to me. DRS was another one, I kept looking for a biblical reference. Good job proving that you don’t need a lame “theme” to make a strong, enjoyable puzzle. Thanks!
4
Dear Deb -
You are so inspiring!! Just reading your intro today gave me the "gumption" to keep going with this puzzle. First pass, I had a few entries, but nothing substantial. But then I kept going with the second and third read. btw, I look forward not just to your comments, but also to your particular philosophy wrt solving crosswords - we are on the same wavelength which makes each day such a treat!! Thank you!
24
Hi @Norma Corrales,
Thank you so much for your kind words. Kudos to you for hanging in there and getting better at solving!
8
Very enjoyable challenge that went smoothly until there were two big holes, in the east and the southwest. Finally, guessing at Susie allowed finishing the southwest, and that's when I noticed the last letter of seaplane was an errant A. Fixing that was just what was needed to finish. The two-part long entries, floral print, runner's high, lunar crater, evil grins, and cheat code infused the puzzle with a nice rhythm, which the symmetrically placed referenda nicely complemented. Some good deceptive clueing. Fun!
5
I'm one of the least skilled solvers here, but was still expecting that many would find this one tough. Imagine my surprise.
Anyway, I think I had four things filled in after a first pass. Did my allowable 3 googles and that helped, plus other things were dawning on me with a second look. Still took me a long, long (long) time and multiple breaks, but I somehow managed to fill it all in. Very good puzzle.
Answer history search today was for TRANQUILITY (inspired by LUNARCRATER, of course). Much to my surprise, it's appeared 4 times in total - twice by itself and both times clued to the lunar sea, and twice in TRANQUILITYBASE. So the only tranquility in Times crossword puzzles is on the moon.
Lastly, upon reviewing the answers after I finished, I Iooked at AMRADIO for a long moment and realized that if you toss in two L's, you could rearrange it to ARMADILLO. Not sure what to do with that.
9
I have a streak of 553 days going, and I found this one tough. Went over my Friday average time, for sure. ITLL pass and HITHOME hung me up for a very long time.
3
Wow, that's a looong streak, you are really dedicated. I lose my streaks on vacation or at Christmas. One time I lost my streak just for doing it after midnight though it was on the same day.
I'm up to around 50 again and today was my Friday record, smooth sailing.
3
@Rich in Atlanta that's a good rule 3 googles allowed. I'm pretty new and I try not to Google unless I'll really stuck. I'm pleased when I can finish a hard puzzle with only 1 or 2. I think it's usually Proper names that I don't know. And will never know. It's true just getting one letter can open up a solved area.
2
My way in was the playful entry for TAROT. I then immediately filled in Ivans next to it (great idea, terrible answer) but that gave me two correct crosses from which I could start building.
I got EGO from the crosses. Never even saw the clue until after the music played.
2
A treat from beginning to end. No trivia. Phenomenal cluing based on very clever wordplay. How wonderful are the clues for PREGAME (16A); RUNNER'S HIGH (30A); LUNAR CRATER (43A); TAROTS (3D); TSARS (4D) and SIDE BET (8A). There's enough here to keep @Lewis busy for a week naming favorites.
LUNAR CRATER fooled me completely. Like everyone else, I'm quite sure, I was looking for the female horse. I never heard of a SWEAR JAR, but I suppose it's about parents penalizing kids monetarily for swearing? And I'm not a video gamer so I didn't know CHEAT CODE. Would I want to play a video game against someone who uses a CHEAT CODE? I bet they all have EVIL GRINS and make SIDE BETS.
This was fun, fun, fun. I think Anne F is a good collaborator for Erik A. More from the two of you in the future, please.
13
@Nancy: I learned SWEAR JAR from my uncle, who was a fireman in the 1950s. Apparently, they were pretty common at workplaces. Don't know if they still are.
1
@Robert Nailling - They can still be found, for sure. I knew them from childhood, and the principal contributor being the dad.
Definitely a thing!
1
@Nancy - re: SWEAR JARs - not meant for kids. Meant mainly for grown ups. You're not supposed to be able to do them for kids because you are implicitly condoning swearing as long as you can pay for it. Not a lesson we'd generally want to teach kids. It's like the legal system. You can get away with crimes as long as you're rich and pay legal fees for it. I have only ever seen it in work places. And maybe on TV, though I can't remember a good example of it.
4
For me the first pass gave me EURASIA and LISA. This opened up the NW in a few seconds and it was smooth sailing from there. Thanks for an excellent Friday puzzle and congratulations on you first, Anne.
1
‘Turn off the clock’ Blasphemy
5
That was a perfect Friday puzzle!
5
Nice puzzle, smooth solve (almost Friday record). I had the whole puzzle filled in, but there was a mistake. After several passes through, I realized I had misspelled ROLODEX with an A - having entered EGA. So Deb’s first gimme was my final blocker. We are, indeed, all different.
5
After a couple of decades of solving, I have learned that my mind works on a puzzle at several levels. When the brow-furrowing conscious is stuck, the sub-conscious is busy connecting the neurons in new, unpredictable combinations. The resulting aha moments are the most rewarding. This puzzle took far longer than my average Friday, but it was very satisfying.
13
After a couple of decades of solving, I have learned that my mind works on a puzzle at several levels. When the brow-furrowing conscious is stuck, the sub-conscious is busy connecting the neurons in new, unpredictable combinations. The resulting aha moments are the most rewarding. This puzzle took far longer than my average Friday, but it was very satisfying.
1
Congratulations on the debut and stunning collaboration! The clueing was right in my wheelhouse, so I had no need for CHEATCODE and finished with a nice puzzler’s HIGH.
3
@Kate P.S. Love SWEARJAR!
As Deb says, find one you are sure of to get a toehold. Today mine was "sub card"for "not the main action", thinking of an evening of boxing matches. Turns out sub card is not only incorrect for the puzzle but is not the correct term for the preliminary fights, which is under card.
An incorrect "I'm sure of that one" adds a lot of time to the solve. I have had hundreds of incorrect sure of that one answers over the years
9
@coloradoz
As I’m reading your humble comment, an ad for a Broadway musical about The Temptations called “ain’t too proud” [sic]* appears next to it at the top of the Wordplay column.
* is “[sic]” appropriate here to indicate a title that appears in lower case in the original?
1
@coloradoz
As I said earlier, I had SUBPLOT, which was along the same lines, thinking drama rather than boxing.
But in boxing, aren't the preliminary bouts called the undercard?
@Steve L
yes.i mentioned that
Liked this puzzle. A welcome antidote after yesterday. Congrats to to Ms. Flinchbaugh.
1
This puzzle was a delight! Wonderful clueing led to a constant smile as I worked my way through what I’m proud to say was a smooth solve. Kudos to Ms. Flinchbaugh and Mr. Agard, and thanks for a great start to my day!
3
My number one tip is to drop it if you get stuck. For me, at least, I usually get one of the answers that had me stumped within minutes of putting it down. It happened to me last night, as it often does, I started to get ready for bed with a couple of open spaces in the SW and suddenly the answer popped into my head. So, back downstairs, and within seconds of reopening the laptop the happy music played. I'm guessing many others have the same experience.
16
Why is a mare in a LUNAR CRATER?
@Lisa G
Mare in this case is Latin for sea used in naming the moon's craters.
6
@Lisa G Apollo 11 landed in Mare Tranquillitatis.
It’s maybe worth understanding (as I do after research) that although many lunar craters are inside mares or maria, the mare itself is a basaltic plain inside an impact basin, which is a very big crater.
3
Smooth puzzle with the stamp of quality. Never felt like the constructors were trying too hard; and they were kind and expert in fairly crossing answers that many solvers might not know. The puzzle hummed. Like the word REFERENDA, it just rolled out with an almost musical feel.
My biggest holdup was from having POPES as [Prayers] -- people who pray, no? -- rather than HOPES. But my imaginary solver friend finally whispered in my hear to erase the P and run the alphabet. A trio of colorful answers beautified the solve: FLORAL PRINT, BADMOUTH, and EVIL GRINS. Adding to the music were the rhyming EMERGES and DIRGES. And to the happiness: [Recipient of a lot of #@&! money] for SWEAR JAR.
And now I enter my day floating, having been drawn through a grid that felt a bit like a spa. Thank you greatly, Erik and Anne!
8
@Lewis -- Not that this was easy; there was Friday resistance, which just added to the bliss.
4
@Lewis
Hand up for POPES here, too! and I wasn't sure about THE. I wanted 32D to be PITY. . . something, but nothing worked. I had to go through each Across word (from the bottom up) until I ran the alphabet on POPES to figure out the problem.
1
@Liz B -- Ditto on all counts.
My gimmes were Ivans and EGO, the latter because I didn’t hesitate to look it up; the former stayed in until the very end.
I successfully guessed ROLODEX and PAINE (which I google checked)
I hate not knowing if my entries are correct, but had another successful crack at no checks bringing my streak to 5.
Lots of fun entries today, so like others look forward to seeing this pair again.
5
Oof, after last weeks miracle 7:39 Friday, this was a hard one at over 45 minutes. I sat staring at an empty grid for longer than the entire puzzle took me last week. A couple of tricky initial errors, too: I started with 'Ivans' for TSARS and, misremembering the name of the classic Konami sequence (↑ ↑ ↓ ↓ ← → ← → B A Start), 'Atari code' for 29D. Taking a break and coming back with fresh insights really helped.
Great debut!
(Off to try the Konami code in the Crosswords app...)
4
@Robrecht It has been a while, but didn’t the sequence end A, B, A, B, select, start? (I can’t believe how ingrained that still is 25 or 30 years later).
1
@Heroy
Haha, very possible and hard to say without a gamepad to jog my muscle memory! I have to confess that, for that reason, I copied the sequence from Wikipedia, which may well be wrong.
1
I haven't read the comments yet but wanted to say this puzzle is also free of the usual NYT gimmes. For example I had awards before ewers. And my first guesses that I usually get wrong were actually right or very close to right.... rolltop before rolodex. Sidejob and side gig before sidebet. I had to sleep on runners high, I had runner from the crosses but had to step away before I saw high. Such a natural phrase how did it not immediately pop into my brain?
Very enjoyable. What at first appeared a daunting blank expanse of long words turned out to be chip-awayable.
Happy debut!
4
Tough! Solution was EVASIVE -- had to work it corner by corner!
1
congratulations on the debut. good one
.
1
Congratulations, Ms. Flinchbaugh. I hope this is the first of many.
2
i had an entire comment written out, about my first toehold in the puzzle, LISA, and the childhood of the real-life lisa brennan-jobs but the quirky commenting system kept spitting errors. we’ll see if it works this time... her life was in some ways more dramatic/ traumatic than fiction — and in fact when a grade school friend of mine who grew up in the same community as her told me
about it, i thought it sounded like fanciful gossip and didn’t believe her. from claiming he wasn’t her father, to begrudgingly admitting he was but then treating her poorly, steve jobs really was... quite a piece of work. LISA has the last laugh, though, bc despite all the trauma, she loves him, forgives him, and has turned out perfectly normal, even astute and sensitive (she’s a writer) — good for her.
my other toeholds were SEAPLANE and FLORALSHIRT. i really enjoyed this puzzle. and finished it in two thirds the time i finished yesterday’s! congrats on your debut, anne.
8
Steve Jobs was, without a doubt, a horrible human being.
SPELLING BEE THREAD
02/21/20
Center Letter: R
6 Letters: F G I L O Y
26 WORDS, 103 POINTS, 1 PANGRAM=Perfect
First Letters:
F x 6, G x 10, L x 2, O x 1, R x 7
Word Lengths:
L4 x 11, L5 x 9, L6 x 3, L7 x 2, L8 x 1
Grid:
4 5 6 7 8 Tot
F 1 3 2 - - 6
G 4 3 1 1 1 10
L - 1 - 1 - 2
O 1 - - - - 1
R 5 2 - - - 7
Tot 11 9 3 2 1 26
52
(My hints are in the thread below this one.)
There were a lot of posters yesterday encouraging me to be more expansive with my clues, and a couple who wanted fewer. @Deb & @Caitlin’s daily Wordplay, as well as this forum, contain many spoilers for the crossword. I don’t see people complaining about that. Apparently there are even Twitter feeds with Bee hints. Who knows what goes on there?
Even with my hints, yesterday people asked about acacia (which I forgot to clue), indicia & cicada (which I did clue), and even picnic (which I thought didn’t need a clue). So my hints did not hinder discussion yesterday.
From now on, I’m taking the advice of the moderator, and doing what I want. If you’d rather avoid hints, just scroll past posts with my name & photo. Enjoy the game!
108
@Kevin Davis YAY!!!! Kevin! YAY!!!!! Good for you and glad you got to see just how much so many people love you clues and are grateful for them!
42
@Greg Two letter list:
FL = 1
FO = 1
FR = 4
Gi = 2
GL =2
GO = 1
GR = 4
GY = 1
LO = 2
OR = 1
Ri = 3
RO = 4
28
SPELLING BEE
26 words, 103 points, 1 pangram.
8
@Kevin Davis Several words end in Y, 2 end in LY.
Hints:
Decline to take
Decorative edge, noun & adj.
Kermit, noun & adj.
Sexist adj.
Praise & worship, pangram
Watered-down rum noun, adj., & adv.
Pita meat sandwich
Balance contest with tree parts
British term for truck
Sex party
Short repeated musical phrase
Thoroughness (or stiff, to a doctor)
Small stream
Annoy or stir up dirt verb & adj.
51
@Kevin Davis I waled away & realized that there are 4 -LY words, but 3 already have L as the last letter, so only 1 has -LY added.
Also, the balance contest with tree parts is a compound word.
3
@Kevin Davis With your help got to QB in no time! Thank you, thank you!
5
With a lot of help from @Deb today, I filled on all the squares, but the puzzle wasn't solved. It turned out that "got in line" should be TRUED, not queued, and "make by hand" was CRAFT, not draft.
3
Great puzzle! DOGE/TRUED/DRAGS were the last to come for me.
1
@Amy I held onto DOMO too long.
Is there a way to see my game stats through the (Android) app?
11-D is poised to cue an existential crisis for some:
“Quis sum ego?” One may ask, solving in the wee hours.
Weeellll... “EGO non sum.” Not EGO Nwodim, at any rate.
Contemplata aliis tradere, etc.
@Sam Lyons
Oh sure. And Esse quam videre to you too!
A Friday record! Yay me. TGIF and happy Friday everybody.
3
Great, great puzzle.
I like Agard puzzles a lot, but feel like he always puts a very esoteric slang in his puzzles. Not so much today. I’ll credit his co-constructor.
The clueing was amazing. Really appreciated this one. Oh, and “coincidentally” gold star, which is very rare for me on a Friday. That ATE rebus from yesterday cost me a 6 day streak, which is crazy for someone like me,
I misspelled Payne, so had STINKEYES for 6D: dastardly looks. That messed up that section for a long time...
And like many others, rolOdex / egO, was the last to fall.
I had one of those, pulled it out of the recesses of my mind moment, many speak of, with LISA.
4
I’m still grumpy about my streak ending at 104 with that last h(ate/oo)ful little puzzle, but certainly the unused “Rhapsody in shoes” helped me feel a bit better. :-)
3
This was my favorite crossword in terms of lateral thinking / multiple meanings in years -- genuinely took me back to 20+ years ago doing it in the paper and that thrill of seeing through the confusion. So many excellent clues that were head scratchers (43A -- fantastic) that made for a very fun Friday. More 'aha!' moments than I can remember ever having experienced in the past.
Very much looking forward to more from Anne Flinchbaugh.
16
and Elke
Using Deb's tried and TRUED method-, the first pass had me considering to SIT PAT. But
then ROLODEX whirled into view. And then I filled in all the plural sss and past tense endings which saved Mt.Sinai people as DRS . (The "D" came from BEEFED).
Wanted that "mare" in 43A to be in a stud stable, but LUNAR CRATER would work better for emus, I think.
Liked how PAIN(E) is just above RUNNER'S HIGH.
Neat to see both BADMOUTH and CHATS (up) intersecting.
Have to confess had a different word for CHATS, but did not want to have to feed the emu's SWEAR JAR (or be quarantined).
Anne F. -am sending in ADVANCE my RSVP - I'll come for your next puzzle.
8
I've tried to post twice now - to no avail.There must be something objectionable in my post.Too bad, because I thought it was pretty good.
I liked the puzzle. IVANS before TSARS. I didn't know that anyone called themselves EGO. It's almost OVULAR. Certainly more breakfast appropriate than MR T.
All I could see from the Wordplay headline was Rush Flinchbaugh, and that depressed me. Then my southwest corner gave me PODCAST over AMRADIO. That Agard sure has TESTEES.
4
@Andrew I also had Ivans first. It was on the right idea at least. The clue was excellent, like many others today.
5
So the lore of you emu-baiting, ready-to-sow-offense, can’t-take-y’all-anywhere Canadians is true, then; all true.
I knew it...
3
@Andrew EGO is short for egobunma — full name egobunma nwodim. she’s of nigerian descent.
5
Broke in with EMERGES, PREGAME, DOGE, CRAFT, and SEAPLANE. Then, REPLAYS, RSVP and ADVANCES. Eventually, and was surprised, to pull SILAS from grey cell storage. Really liked ROLLED RS. Good puzzle, congrats on the debut!
2
I hereby nominate "A mare might be found in one" for the cleverest clue of the week.
16
@RAH
I could not @!#& agree more, but SWEAR JAR could give that MARE a run for the £€$.
4
@RAH --
And I'm partial to today's "They range from terrible to great".
5
I’d like to just add that EGO Nwodim is one of the best SNL cast additions in years.
7
I had to get all the way to MR T before entering anything. Not sure how I knew it though. Possibly from a non-NYT puzzle. Then I had LAD and LATIN__, holding out the last letter to wait and see if it was going to be LATINx or LATINA. And after CAT there was nothing for a long time.
Really nice cluing Anne and Erik. Hard to pick a favorite, but I think it's a tossup between Some camel riders of note/MAGI and A mare might be found in one/LUNAR CRATER.
Congrats on your debut, Anne.
5
My first pass resulted in the correct MRT, REPLAYS, OVULAR, SEAPLANE, CAT, RSVP, MAHAL and LATINA. But also a few wrong, such as 'key' in place of THE and 'emotes' instead of TEXTED staying in place for ages, slowing down those two corners for about 30 minutes.
I had to research a few as well, including Deb's gimme, EGO!
3
IVANS before TSARS at 4D....
8
@BK
Me too !!
@BK -- Ditto.
I begin late-in-the-week puzzles with the (usually) shorter down clues.
TSARS LISA, SEAPLANE, SPRINT, IRONS, DELT provided the entry and set up the central GLENS, CRAFT, PAINE and it was smooth sailing to complete the grid.
Then 5 minutes of flyspecking before I corrected ROLaDEX/EGa to get the music. Arrgh.
I'm new so I was happy to solve this with no look ups in 40 mins but I had one error. I'm mad because EWER is on my crosswordese list. I see they clue it as America's Cup a lot. I had Smear Jar? And emers. I ran the alphabet. And nothing made sense to me. I was not thinking that the clue meant vase, I waa thinking about the race. Well now I know grrrrr!
2
@Santi Bailor - most "Cups" that are awarded as trophies in sports have two handles or none. The America's Cup is a rare Ewer trophy, shaped like a pouring pitcher with one handle. Here's a photo:
https://tinyurl.com/wt26ugr
So, yes - it was the race, but a ewer is a pitcher, not a vase.
So that part isn't crosswordy as much as facty.
(^_^;)
4
@David Connell - just in case there are readers who object when they read in the dictionary "a ewer is a vessel shaped like a vase" - please keep reading: "with a handle." A vase with no handle is a vase; a vase with one handle is a ewer.
1
@Santi Bailor Fun fact: The America's Cup was originally the (British) Royal Yachting Squadron Cup, but the yacht America (New York Yacht Club) won the first iteration of the contest in 1851, hence the name. Bet that chafed the Brits to no end!
1
For those whose video game heyday was in coin-slot arcades, an alternate 29D clue:
Line in a Kevin Davis Bee post?
@Guy Quay My hints are a clue in themselves now? Nice!
1
@Guy Quay
Well, I can see where you stand on the "Is this cheating?" question.
2
Great combination of challenge and speed. Almost impossible to start, but that rather rapid fire as the meanings of the enigmatic clues became clear. 70% of my usual Friday time, but 200% of my usual Friday enjoyment!
6
@Thomas Givnish love your orchid research
@K Barrett, thanks for the heads-up.
I could say that I Givnish a hoot for plant taxonomy, but that would put the lie to Botany 100 days. After 60 yrs, am still remembering Selaginella kraussiana, Mimosa pudica, Zea mays, Quercus quercus, Diefenbachia picta and all.
Without a doubt, you meet the most interesting people on these boards
4
Tough but fair. Entertaining clues: BOTTLES, SIDE BET, TSARS, RUNNER'S HIGH, LUNAR CRATER, SWEAR JAR.
There are so many things now that can be considered obsolete. It took a while, but ROLODEX EMERGES the winner.
PODCAST vs. AM RADIO, which would you do on the road?
Interesting connections -
EVIL GRINS - are they associated with a BAD MOUTH?
Is it a good idea to use SEA PLANES for EURASIA seeing as it's surrounded by oceans?
The little bottle you got, it's inadequate. Around where I work, SWEAR JARS are the size of EWERS.
Right - the puzzle. I didn't run - my pace was more of a crawl, but it was nonetheless enjoyable for the clever clues and crunchy entries, so I still got a bit of a HIGH from it.
14
PODCAST over AMRADIO of course
1
@Chris
Music, hands down. Something commercial-free, preferably. I mostly do SiriusXM these days.
I think it's pretty much generational.
1
Wen--
On the road? Sirius XM, unless I can persuade Mr B to listen to my vintage iPod with all the really great stuff on it!
2
I love me some Agard (collaborative) puzzles. Challenging, but fast for me--77% of my Friday average.
1
“Rhapsody in shoes” for RUNNER’S HIGH is one of my favorite cut clues of all time (“all time” being since October 2018, when I started reading Wordplay and Constructor Notes).
NW was tough for me and, looking back at the grid, has the least sparkling fill . . . except for FLORAL PRINT, EVIL GRINS, SEAPLANE. Well, EVASIVE’s good too, especially as clued, and the “Caseload?” clue for BOTTLES was pretty inspired. And, OK, EURASIA’s cool too. Still, as Deb pointed out, the rest of the puzzle is filled to the brim with so many sparklers. I mean, LUNAR CRATER! CHEAT CODE!! (Never heard of it but once I had CHEAT, CODE immediately came to mind). And, of course, that uplifting central RUNNER’S HIGH. Even the minimal glue (IT’LL on top of THE) was so well-clued that it felt fresh. Such a great puzzle. Thanks, Annie and Erik!
7
This feels like a Golden Age of crossword construction. The combined age of the five Tues-Friday constructors — John Guzzetta, PARALLEL PARKS, Alex Eaton-Salners, SWIPE LEFT/RIGHT, Joe Deeney, PIECES OF 8, and now Erik and Annie — is less than some of my socks. We are lucky, imo.
28
Not my fastest ever Friday but very quick. Less than half my time for Thursday this week. It took me a minute or two to get into it: nothing immediately obvious to start hanging answers off. The first one I actually got was 4D They range from terrible to great: and TSARS just popped out at me. Loved that clue.
I had a lot of what seemed like wild guesses based on a letter or two but I think they all survived to the end.
A fun Friday puzzle which gave me my first Mon-Fri gold star streak!
27
Unlike Deb, EGO was not my first answer, but rather my second. If you've ever seen the cast credits for SNL, you're going to notice that there's someone whose first name is EGO, and her second name looks like (at least from my point of view) a rack of Scrabble tiles. Of course, in Nigeria, Nwodim is probably Smith.
But the reason I'm mentioning it at all is because it dislodged my very first entry: 8A, for which I confidently put (as "not the main action") SUBPLOT.
Different kind of action.
But after that, this puzzle flew. Two-thirds of my Friday average, although nowhere near Friday record time.
@Steve L
Nwodim made no sense to me. I got EGO from the crossings.
8
EGO was my last fill
4
@Steve L
She was in a recent puzzle, at which time I learned that her name is pronounced Eggo. EGO is short for Egobunma.
3
Well, Deb's gimme was my last entry to complete, mainly because I haven't watched SNL in years and I misspelled ROLODEX with an A. I had a Natick at OVULAR/DRS for a while until I decided it must be an R and for the ROLODEX error. Even after things were done I struggled to figure out DRS meaning for a while, thinking Middle East.
4
@Steve
Mt. Sinai Hospital is a well-known hospital in Manhattan. Perhaps there are Mt. Sinai Hospitals elsewhere as well (Google says there's one in Chicago), but I'm waiting to hear from the "we don't all live in New York" crowd to complain about the parochiality of the clue.
1
EGO was also last for me. Don't remember my 'way in' but it was a tough puzzle! Nice debut!
2
@Steve L
I eventually got it, but then I lived in the Chicago area for a time.
Thought I was a good step into the game with FILOFAX and EGO. Imagine the dent I got reading Debs first lines. Deflate EGO...
10
Fast Friday, at 13 mins, only 4 behind fastest ever.
Ditto