Theme: Don't Touch That Dial! Each theme answer is a made-up two word phrase using the names of two television shows.
17A. Family line of bar makers? : SOAP DYNASTY
24A. Windfall of chicken pieces? : WINGS BONANZA
37A. Glasgow girl under a spell? : BEWITCHED LASSIE
47A. Frat guy with a spatula? : HOUSE FLIPPER
58A. Unwanted grass at the Cotton Bowl? : DALLAS WEEDS
These kinds of themes take some extra creativity, and must be pretty challenging to clue. I don't watch much tv, but knew of all these shows. Except for House and Weeds, all are older shows. Appears to be Frank Virzi's debut LA Times puzzle.
Melissa here, late work night, rushing this out with no links.
Across
1. Note for a soprano : HIGH C. The C two octaves above Middle C.
6. Puts away : JAILS
11. Jet or time follower : LAG
14. Heart chambers : ATRIA
15. __ vincit amor : OMNIA. Latin for "love conquers all."
16. Dander : IRE
19. "Wheel of Fortune" request : AN E. I'd like to buy a vowel.
20. Huge amount : TON
21. Malamute and mastiff : DOGS. So simple.
22. "The Road to Wealth" author : ORMAN. Suze.
27. Four-time Masters winner, familiarly : ARNIE. Arnold Palmer. Wikipedia says he was the first star of golf's television age, which began in the 1950s. He is part of "The Big Three" in golf along with Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player who are widely credited with popularizing and commercializing the sport around the world.
30. Cockamamie : INANE. I want to see cockamamie in a puzzle sometime.
31. Vichyssoise veggie : LEEK. Soup made with potatoes, leeks, cream and stock.
32. Lloyd or Paul of Cooperstown : WANER. Brothers who both played baseball for the Pittsburgh Pirates.
34. Teachers College advanced deg. : Ed.D. Doctor of Education degree. Bill Cosby earned his from the University of Massachusetts. For his doctoral research, he wrote a dissertation entitled, "An Integration of the Visual Media Via 'Fat Albert And The Cosby Kids' Into the Elementary School Curriculum as a Teaching Aid and Vehicle to Achieve Increased Learning".
41. Pitches between innings? : ADS. Great clue.
42. Clod choppers : HOERS. Cute. You chop dirt clods with a hoe.
43. Source of Davy Crockett's cap : COON
44. City on the Aar : BERNE
46. Slugger Ramirez : MANNY
52. Angiogram image : AORTA
53. Like San Francisco's Coit Tower : DECO. Déjà vu.
54. Google Earth image : MAP
57. Popular ending? : IZE. Popularize. Alright then.
62. Celestial Seasonings product : TEA. I like Bengal Spice.
63. Hot coal : EMBER
64. Bunsen burner cousins : ETNAS
65. Terre Haute sch. : ISU
66. They may be French : DOORS. Kisses wouldn't fit.
67. Reservations : DOUBT. Nice misdirection.
Down
1. "... why __ thou forsaken me?": Matthew : HAST. Words uttered by Jesus Christ from the cross in the book of Matthew. Prophesied in Psalm 22.
2. "Am __ strict?" : I TOO. This seems odd, is it a phrase you hear often?
3. Nana : GRAN. Wanted Gram.
4. With it : HIP
5. Links assistant : CADDIE. Lots of them running around where i work.
6. Mah-__ : JONGG
7. Build up : AMASS
8. __ and outs: peculiarities : INS
9. Blotto : LIT. Slang for drunk. Slammed, smashed, plastered, hammered, sloshed. Just a little toasty is enough for me.
10. Michener novel set in Japan : SAYONARA. My favorite Michener is Centennial. How about you?
11. "Michael Collins" star : LIAM NEESON. Never saw it.
12. Desilu co-founder : ARNAZ. Desi.
13. Davis of "A League of Their Own" : GEENA
18. "Who touches a hair of __ gray head ...": Whittier : YON. Seems a bit obscure to me, this is a line from the poem Barbara Frietchie, by John Greenleaf Whittier (1807-1892). About Frietchie, a Unionist during the Civil War.
23. Campaigned : RAN
24. Collaborative Web site : WIKI. A Hawaiian word for "fast."
25. Tight spots : BINDS
26. Turow work set at Harvard : ONE-L
27. Goya's "Duchess of __" : ALBA. A departure from the usual Jessica clue.
28. Pond plant : REED
29. Reuters, e.g. : NEWS BUREAU
32. Big shot : WHEEL
33. Cousin of atmo- : AER
35. "Runaround Sue" singer : DION
36. Say no to : DENY
38. Like some machinery nuts : THREADED
39. Part of NFC: Abbr. : CONF. National Football Conference.
40. Fight memento : SCAR
45. Me. hours : EST. Maine - Eastern Standard Time.
46. Sounded like a Siamese : MEOWED.
47. Greater Antilles nation : HAITI
48. Percolates : OOZES. Percolate - Filter gradually through a porous surface or substance.
49. Lazybones : IDLER
50. Orchard fruit : PEARS
51. IBM products : PC'S
54. Maître d's offering : MENU
55. Not much at all : A DAB. A dab'll do ya.
56. Soft "Hey!" : PSST. I'd recognize my mom's pssst from across the room.
59. Latin 101 verb : AMO
60. Wall St. action : LBO. Leveraged Buyout. The acquisition of another company using a significant amount of borrowed money (bonds or loans) to meet the cost of acquisition.
61. 1940s mil. venue : ETO
Melissa
57 comments:
Morning, all!
Real slog for me today. Between the overly generic clues and the bizarre answers (HOERS? AER?? WANERS???) I just had a real hard time making headway. I got 'er done all right, but it took a lot longer than usual and the non theme fill took some of the joy out of what was otherwise a fun themed puzzle.
Oh -- and I renew my objection to WHEEL as a synonym for "big shot." I don't care if it's in a dictionary somewhere; I just don't like it... ^_^
Good Morning Melissa, C.C. et al.
Thanks for the great job blogging this morning Melissa! I really like the word “cockamamie” too, and I accept your challenge. (If Jerome doesn’t beat me to it…)
I, TOO, wasn’t sure about 2D, and put GRAm instead of GRAN at 3D. Hoo boy!
My other trip-ups were putting “apple” instead of PEARS for 50D and “A tAd” instead of A DAB at 55D, but those were soon corrected.
I thought the theme was quite clever, and it must have been a bear to find TV shows that would go together to make sensible phrases when clued. The rest of the fill didn’t bother me, and it seemed like a pretty easy Wednesday offering.
Cheers, everyone!
Good Morning, Melissa and friends. This was a fun puzzle. Seemed easier than many Wednesdays. I got the SOAP DYNASTY immediately. I never really watched any of the shows listed, although I have heard of them all.
I initially tried Stows instead of JAILS for Puts Away. Jails is ever so much more clever.
My favorite clues were:
Pitches Between Innings = ADS; and
Reservations = DOUBTS.
Sorry to hear of snow storms in the midwest. Everything is all pink here with the azaleas all in bloom.
QOD: Anger is never without a reason, but seldom with a good one. ~ Benjamin Franklin
what happened to the "o" on the end of 33D Cousin of atmo- AER ?
and, when are 38 D (Like some) machinery nuts NOT THREADED ??
Morning MelissaB, CC and All,
Gram for Gran started that corner off to a bad start which was the typical experience for the rest of the grid. Weird answers that Barry already mentioned sent me on line for help.
Geena Davis has always been a favorite.
Snowed again yesterday and we continue to get flurries today. Oh boy!
Thanks for the write up Mel!
Happy Hump Day
Happy Birthdays to Crockett and Doreen! Come back, we miss you!
D - Constructors use the words “like some” to imply an adjective. I agree that the word “some” was not necessary in this case, but it didn’t really throw me off.
And ”aer-“ is a valid prefix according to Webster. (It’s also in my Funk & Wagnalls.)
Seeing Mainiac reminds me I didn't care for 45D. The two-letter abbreviation for Maine is ME and not Me. unless that was the old style of abbreviating it?
Good day folks,
After my first pass thru, (both across & down), my puzzle looked like Eliot's Wasteland. Thanks to the baseball clues, which were gimme's, I had a toehold that got me rolling.
The theme eluded me because I saw the TV shows only with the 2nd word, not the 1st. Duh! I had to rely heavily on perps to correct my misdirection. But overall, I enjoyed Mr Virzi's offering. It was a fun solve.
I knew Mah Jongg, but wanted two N's & one G. 21A, dogs, got me out of the woods. For 4D, I began with Hep, but atria saved me.
56D, soft hey/psst bothers me. I don't think anything about psst is soft. I liken it to a threat or a hustle. Maybe I've seen too many B movies over the years. Like others, between inning pitches was a fav, but in real life there are too many of them.
Enjoy the day, stay warm & dry.
Hello fellow cruciverbalists!
Nice puzzle, Frank. Good expo, MB. Expected something more of the theme somehow. Learning moment: WANER. This old duck had GRAN right off!
From yesterday: Chickie--do not mind if you spell name wrong; just great that you think of me. Jeannie--young Russian friend is Alexander. Has been here off and on for 8 years. Perhaps will not see him again after this May, though, as he will have permanent position on a faculty far, far away in the fall. I edit his math papers and applications. He helps out around the house when here. (No monetary arrangement.)
Went to rheumatologist yesterday and had chest x-ray. Have enlarged heart. Anyone else? Alex taking me for more tests this afternoon.
Happy hump day!
Today's puzzle was unusually easy for a Wednesday. Since I never get the theme, I just plug along!
It's another beautiful day in NC! Lots to do today. Starting off with the eagerly anticipated mammogram! Color me happy.
Happy Wednesday!
On the road today; thanks MB, sorry you had a late night but your information was good. I thought this puzzle deserved a gold star for the theme, which not only found that many compatible TV shows to create the fill, but did it in the difficult 11,12,15,12,11 pattern and without using a single obscure show. Also the long fill LIAMNEESON and NEWSBUREAU along with 5 letter words, instead of 3 or 4 letters showed a lot of effort.
I agree, Crockett a HOF corner member and Doreen, Happy Birthday and many more, and do say hello now and then, along with all our other friends hiding in cyberspace.
Melissa: I forgot to answer your question about the Michener novels. I loved all his books, but would have to say Hawaii was my favorite.
Good morning MB, CC and solvers all.
This was an interesting puzzle. Some parts very easy, other parts that really had me searching for a letter to fit the blank space. I agree with Barry's comment that some of the entries were a bit wierd, but I disagrre with him about the use of WHEEL for big shot. The term 'Wheels' or 'Big Wheels' to describe company execs and other leaders has been so common for so many years it was an obvious choice. It was at least thirty years ago that the common response when someone was called a big wheel was "Blessed are they that run in circles, for they shall be known as big wheels".
Hand up for GRAM before GRAN, TAD before DAB and STOWS before JAILS. All were corrected via perps.
Wanted engineers for 'some machinery nuts, but it wouldn't fit. The only machinery nuts I can think of that aren't threaded are Palnuts, a brand name of a push on fasterner that locks in place with spring steel barbs.
MB, et al, the theme got by me as in each pair I thought only one of the words was a TV show and then HOUSEFLIPPERS appeared and I thought houseSlippers but not so much
Musings
-Everybody rooted for Arnie against Jack
-Waners, Big Poison and Little Poison
-I have never seen a degree make someone a better teacher. You can either teach or you can’t and you get better by practicing the trade!
-I thought HOERS were Plows. You never see Plows around here anymore as minimum tillage is the order of the day to save water and fuel!
-MANNY reminds you that there can be an I in team. Ya love him when you’re winning!
- “You can get French fries in one aisle and French doors in the next”
-I had a cute 14 year old caddie yesterday!
-If NFL strikes maybe we’ll get women football like GEENA Davis’s WWII baseball team
As usual, I didn't get the theme until I was about done. baseball didn't help me a bit. The center was the last to fall.
Mel,
Thanks for the blog, so late at night --your brain works better than mine at that time.
Crockett and Doreen, come out wherever you are and be wished HBTY from us all.
LIT is unknown slang to me, had to ask DH for that one, but the perps and WAGs got the rest of the unknowns. I remember the "YON" quote from somewhere, though am not aware of knowing that author. OMNIA was easy since my high school motto was "Labor Omnia Vincit"--sounds like a labor camp, I know, but it was a very academic selective public school. I had ITY before IZE, and PEACH before PEARS. I've never heard of WEEDS as a show.
Argyle, you are correct. It used to be Me until the PO changed to all caps. I paused on that one as well.
Got a nice "brain stretch" figuring out those T.V.shows!
Liked this puzz a lot: not too
much "stuff you never heard of and
have to Google/cheat"
Thank You Frank for your construct.
Melissa, Excellent write-up.
What a FUN Wednesday.
Since I live alone, the TV is always on (kind of like having another person around).
Fave was that BEWITCHED LASSIE.
ARNIE's golf tourney is this week in Orlando.
Hmmm, I had a tough time with 'Blotto' being LIT.
Then again what would I know about drinking?
Last to fall was JAILS for 'Put away' ... was thinking in the 'stows' direction.
Mainiac, Argyle, all those 'way-up-North' I wish I could send you our weather.
Should be perfect for the St.Pete Grand Prix this weekend.
Cheers to all at Sunset.
Good morning all. Great blogging job, Melissa.
I had some of the trip-ups that others experienced; ie. apple for PEARS. Also misspelt ALBA (Elba) and wasn't sure of the stats on Ernie or ARNIE. - sigh. Had LIT but didn't 'get' it until coming here. Guessed at WANER x ONEL crossing. It was a fun theme, though, and much of the clueing was fun to tease out. ATRIAL was a gimme because I'm one of those affected with A-fib. No searches were needed.
Enjoy your Wednesday.
Handgun fog
BARETTAGUNSMOKE
Lucky Pals
CHARMEDFRIENDS
Worthless clericals
THEOFFICEDEADWOOD
Toasts in a cab
TAXICHEERS
Noah’s mentor
WEBSTERCOACH
Potato option
MASHED
Off to bowling!
Edancergrl,
Good ones!
I forgot earlier to say my favorite Michener novel was Chesapeake. I loved that it started looking through the eyes of the geese. His historical breadth was impressive in Hawaii too though. I read that one while staying with my cuz in Honolulu in 1971.
Grumpy 1, I thought of the same answer for "Some machinery nuts"!
There are also non-threaded shaft retainers that are self-threading when you screw them on...
Kazie, I was waiting for our resident poet to show up today to give us the complete poem of Whittier. It's a rather famous one, and describes an encounter between an old lady from Maryland and some Confederate soldiers marching through her town. I remember reading it first in H.S.
It's a rather long poem, but the two lines referred to in today's puzzle were spoken by Stonewall Jackson:
"Who touches a hair of yon gray head,
Dies like a dog! March on!" he said.
You can read the entire poem at The Poet's Corner under the title "Barbara Frietchie". Quite stirring.
Tinbeni, it’s not so bad – we’re getting in some great spring skiing this year, at least. But my golf clubs are sitting in the corner, beckoning me…
Just wanted to say hi and thanks Melissa although I got all the answers and everything sounded familiar I didn't realize the connection of all being TV shows until I came here. Duh!
Good Morning C.C., Melissa B and all,
MB, Thanks so much for your write-up. I didn’t miss any links; just enjoyed your ‘shiny voice’.
I had the same problems as BarryG {thanks, Barry}; plus an extra special problem I made for myself.
I entered NewsAgency w/o checking any perps for agency. After wrestling with that mess, I was able to reconstruct EAU, and finally BUREAU worked, then AORTA, then HAITI. No I’m not through. I then had to take MENU and DOUBT out of ‘dates’ and ‘seat’ . Oh well, ya’ hadda be there.
Thanks, Frank for your effort. Great theme.
In major hurry.
Have a nice day everyone.
PSST HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO CROCKET and DOREEN. Where have you two been?
Just say Hi!
Hi There ~!
I liked this one, thought it was very clever. I got SOAP DYNASTY from the DOWNS, and that led to the theme - my only hang up was not getting the connection to "HOUSE" as a Frat reference - and I was in 'old show' mode, looking for a show in the '60's (like Dobie Gillis?)
I don't like "WHEEL" either - it sounds only "half" right - like "BIG" is missing from the answer.
And 'some' machinery nuts? I took a look, Grumpy1, at the Palnuts, but it still has a "single" thread, really. Great clue otherwise.
Splynter
Hello.
No problem with the puzzle. Did it while watching PHO beat STL. Sharks just can't get any seperation. PHO one point back.
Hand up for the heart problem. They found mine with an ECHO. Accounts for the large differental
in systolic pressure and PAD.
Got tired of using the placard and got HCP plates for the truck. No
extra charge.
Weeds is on SHO and rated TVMA for drug use and nudity.
Will be watching, Tin.
Take care.
Almost got it all, but got tripped up in the center by the bane of a pen solver -- confidently putting in an answer that happened to be wrong. It was HOOFS for "Clod choppers." (Since my first WAG had been PLOWS, which I didn't enter but tried to get the perps to match, once I got the HO___, I felt sure I'd slipped the constructor's trap!)
It didn't help that I had no idea who those baseball brothers were, and was similarly stymied as others have mentioned by the lack of parallel structure between the prefixes "Atmo-" and AER. And WHEEL never crossed my mind as a "Big shot" -- it seems to me that WHEEL by itself doesn't quite fit the clue, although BIG WHEEL might have.
Other than that, I too was slow to pick up on the theme, with it not emerging for me until after I'd gotten BEWITCHEDLASSIE, even though I had the first two all filled in at that point. I knew there was some theme at work, I just couldn't figure out what it was.
All in all, a fun, challenging solve today, with just those minor quibbles in the center section.
Good Morning All, unlike yesterday's theme, today's theme answers didn't seem to be "complimentarily glued" together. The phrases could just as easily have been "Cleaning bars windfall"/SOAP BONANZA, "Glasgow girl at the Cotton Bowl"/DALLAS LASSIE, or "Frat guy under a spell"/BEWITCHED HOUSE, and so on.
I really did enjoy seeing both NEWS BUREAU and LIAM NEESON. "Michael Collins" was a much better movie than the one we saw yesterday.
Although Barbara Frietchie was a real person, the incident in the poem never happened. It seems Mrs. Frietchie was sick in bed on the day Stonewall Jackson marched through Frederick MD.
Edancergrl, those were clever phrases for one so young. I think others here will agree that you should ask your mother or father if you should read more than the original blog page. We often talk about adult subjects and make jokes that aren't meant for 12 year olds.
I loved all your plays with state names yesterday. What a clever bunch of people.
Fermatprime-take good care of yourself.
Loved the reference to "Google Cheat". I look upon that not as cheating, but as an educational experience.
Clear Ayes--I live in Vacaville, right between Sacramento and San Francisco. Love it here.
Michener is one of my favorite authors. When I was working and driving 42 miles to work, 42 miles home, I listened to some of his books on tape. Loved The Source and think Centennial is a great depiction of American history. He did incredible research (pre Google, for heavens sake!)
Still raining here.
I am reminded that I know next to nothing about baseball. 32A/WANER was almost impossible with the cross of 32D WHEEL. I've seen "Big wheel", but Big Shot is the phrase I'd use. (Didn't ya just love 1979?)
Then, next to 33D/AER and finally onto the cross with 42A/HOER. Whaaat?
I felt your pain, Barry G. Bad area for me too!
Jeannie, last night. I may also have missed what Dennis has been doing. He's stopped by in the last week, so I guess he is fine.
Jeannie's Anon, don't worry, she is "buried knee deep into foodshow preparations". I'm sure she will be back regularly as soon as she can. (Lousy weather in MN too!)
Cherylptts, we're all practically neighbors. Your rain is heading our way...dark and windy out there.
Melissa, nicely done as usual.
Oops, we're back from the Y and I see that my granddaughter was signed in.Therefore edancergirl is really her grandfather.
Gary
The term 'Wheels' or 'Big Wheels' to describe company execs and other leaders has been so common for so many years it was an obvious choice.
Sorry. My point was that I've only ever heard the phrase "big wheel" in real life, but crossword puzzles insist on just having "wheel" or "wheels". I mean, seriously -- does anybody ever say, "He's a real wheel at his company"? You might as well be saying, "He's a real tool..."
Husker Gary, I thought there was something weird there. Phew, now that we know a psychic 12 year old child (who couldn't possibly have known the shows "she" listed) isn't auditing the blog, we can relax and enjoy comments like Barry G.'s "You might as well be saying, "He's a real tool..." Glad there aren't any 12 year olds listening :0)
I'm going to work on my manzanita pastel drawing for a while...Being stuck in the house for most of the week is very challenging!
As least it is only rain. Chickie, it looks like your sister is due for a bigger load of snow
Splynter, this Pal Nut, which I first encountered about 1959, doesn't have a thread. You push it onto a shaft and almost always destroy it if it has to be removed. They replaced cotter pins for holding the wheels on kids' wagons, but were a bear to remove if you needed to replace a wheel.
I agree with Husker Gary about a degree not necessarily making somebody a better teacher. You need to be outgoing, have a strong personality, good sense of humor, knowledge of your subject matter, sense of fairness, etc. That said, while I think I was already a good teacher, a certain learning experience made me a better one. I heard a presentation by Madelyn Hunter at a teacher 'inservice' about monitoring and adjusting, guided practice, etc. Her input about 'wait time' had a big positive effect on my teaching.
C.A., thanks for understanding. Emma has no interest in this blog but was blogging elsewhere. Therefore when I sent in my TV shows, it came up with her name. She is currently napping on the couch. I think I wore her out yesterday and today!
Bill G., I agree with all you said about teaching. Madelyn Hunter was a big influence on me too. Too many really good teachers get advanced degrees so they can get higher paying admin. jobs and not have to be in front of kids for 7 hours per day! It's hard work if you do it right! Omaha Public has to lay off a bunch of staff next year and they are starting in the central office rather than in the classrooms.
Good day, puzzlers.
Thanks, MB, for a really good blog. I glanced at it when I shut down the computer at 3:30 A. M. after returning from my daughter's home. I stayed with the baby wile they took the older one to the hospital with a bad cut.
Luckily I was on Frank Virzi's wave length and zipped through most of it, danced around the center until WANER and WHEEL merged.
We watched BEWITCHED, WINGS, FLIPPER, and SOAP during their respective runs.
I've enjoyed most of Michener's books but POLAND was one that affected me deeply.
Have a super Wednesday, everyone!
Good Afternoon, folks. Thank you to Frank Virzi for a great puzzle. Thanks Melissa Bee and C.C. for your hard work.
Thought the TV show answers were neat. That really helped with the solve.
I got through it, but with one error. I had BEET instead of LEEK. I enjoy both of those vegetables, but was not aware of what was in Vichyssoise. I was thinking of borscht, which has beets. Oh well. That's what I get for thinking.
Thought Cockamamie/INANE was excellent. I checked for Cockamamie in my 1956 Webster, after I had finished. It is not there. I believe it is a generally accepted word, however. Didn't we have a COIT TOWER the other day day? As an answer? I worked for a while in San Francisco. I do not remember that tower. However, I do remember Lombard Street. Quite curvy. I found it by accident. I went over a hill and I was on it.
See you tomorrow.
Abejo
Abejo, you mentioned vichyssoise. Have you had it? My wife found a good recipe years ago. It's served chilled and even with a chilled spoon if you want to do it right. When you were driving down Lombard Street, you could have seen Coit Tower if you looked about a mile ahead. Of course, you don't want to take your eyes off that street when going downhill.
I was listening to a great song on a CD in my car on the way home from the supermarket. It was, "Life is like a Mountain Railway" with Johnny Cash, the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band and other bluegrass notables. I love that simple old song and the wonderful background accompaniment including a mandolin and a dobro.
Hello everybody. I liked today's puzzle okay except for a couple of things. For me it flowed pretty nicely, and I thought the theme was fun and clever. The middle part stopped me dead in my tracks, however, since I had no idea about WANER, couldn't get past HOES to arrive at HOERS (oh, the persons wielding the hoes, not the tools themselves), and refused to accept AER as a "cousin" of ATMO (ATMOsphere -/- AERsphere?). So, I was forced to google the sports references such as WANER, MANNY and NFC (got ARNIE only from the perps.)
One very good thing is that ANE was freshly and cleverly clued. It was not the usual INANE "chemical suffix."
Melissa, thanks for the writeup.
Hi gang, a cute puzzle today that I had to finish online. Waners?
Here's a link to Where's Flipper?
I too wanted to put APPLE or PEACH in for Orchard fruit, but was soon disabused of that. My reaction to AORTA as the answer to Angiogram image was "Oh, the thing imaged, not an image per se."
Interesting how we all think differently, slide easily through some situations and get tripped up by others.
I like Red Rose tea. It's a nice black and Pekoe blend from Canada.
Best wishes to you all.
Help me out here. 64A is ETNAS?? I don't get it.
OK. Got it. Refined my Google ADAB and learned a new word.
55-Down: A little DAB will do ya.
Hi Again ~!
Grumpy1, I know what you mean - we called those little bastards axle caps, since that's the only place I ever found them - the irony here is that the first time I remember seeing one was on a BIG WHEEL - not the kind from the puzzle, but the plastic ride-on toy of the '70's - and I was too big to have my own...>-(
BIG WHEEL commercial
C.C., check out the Montreal Expos hat on this BIG WHEEL rider ~!
BIG WHEEL
Splynter
Hola Everyone, A bit easier for me me today. When others whiz through I seem to slog and visa versa. A fun puzzle and I caught onto the theme pretty quickly. Over the years we've watched most of those shows. Some have been off the air for a while, now.
Hands up for apples instead of pears,and I put in An A instead of An E for "Wheel of Fortune"clue. But Geana looked right so I left it in. I also put in News Agency instead of News Bureau for Reuters, so that held me up for a while. The perps took care of that error.
I didn't realize that Berne had an E on the end or that Jongg could be spelled with a double G. But after looking up both of those spellings, they are acceptable.
Just getting to the blog as I had meetings this morning. More later.
Abejo- You won't find 'Cockamamie' in a 1956 dictionary because the word wasn't in general use then. A new "Merriam-Webster's Eleventh Edition" dictionary costs around 28 bucks. It's a great dictionary and widely used by puzzle constructors and editors. If things are a little tight, Merriam-Websters has a free online version.
Thanks, MB for a great writeup.
CA, my sister is here in SJ right now, but will be travelling home, in the snow I suspect.
Whew, Glad to know that It was you, and not your Granddaughter, Gary. Those were some very clever show phrases, though.
Pears went in finally. I should have put those in first as I earned a great deal of my college tuition wrapping and packing pears here in the valley for winter storage. Good money, even back then.
The percolation ponds near our house are working overtime these days. More rain to come from now through the weekend.
Have a great evening, everyone.
I just got an email from an engineering friend of mine that started off, "If you are awash in cash ..."
It made me laugh because it contains a word that begins with "a" as in atilt, alee, alit, etc. Interesting that "awash" seems so right, though, while words like "atilt" seem so forced.
Well heck, he's my friend, so maybe that has something to do with it :)
It's our turn here to be tired of rain, just as many of you have been tired of snow. Mother Nature, fill the damn reservoirs then please turn off the faucet. Thank you.
Affection to you all.
test
OK, now I will say hello..lost my words
Good evening Melissa, C.C.& all,
Lemonade, I 2nd your gold star for today's puzzle.It was a fun/clever theme that made me smile when I FINALLY got the a-ha.
Favorites: they may be French doors and pitches between innings
:-( waner (areal whiner), and one L
hand up for gram; had a hard time with that last g in jongg
Other catchy place was the SE corner: weeds, eto, etnas& a dab
Husker or is it Cha Cha.. loved your charmed friends et al
Favorite Mitchner was Hawaii, but Tales of the South Pacific was my 1st. My parents were avid readers and our family went each wk to the library,(which was upstairs from the BH police Dept)Anyway, I had to sneak into my parents bedroom when they were gone to read such delicious books.
Hi gang -
A real slog today, and not much fun, IMHO. Lost patience and got a DNF.
We're off to T-Town tomorrow for my MIL's B-day.
Cheers!
JzB
Chickie,
Berne is the French spelling and Bern is the German version. It sits right on the edge of each language area of Switzerland, a country with four official languages. In addition to the above, there is also Italian and Romansch. Each linguistic area is adjacent to the country of that language. Romansch is a throwback to Latin, and only exists in the isolated mountainous regions where the more modern languages didn't penetrate until modern times, in some of the high alps, the best ski areas.
g8rmomx2 how nice to see you; at least one of our troop phoned home. '
E. I really loved MASH ED
not home but I had to check in
Thank you, Kazie for the Bern and Berne explanation. I always learn something when I come to the blog, and this was my learning moment for today. I was aware of the four official Swiss Languages, but hadn't thought about the spelling of a particular city's name.
Our daughter worked in a supermarket in Lausanne as part of a work study program with her university. She was in total French immersion while working and living there for a little over six months.
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