Theme:
17A. Downside of reading in poor light : EYE STRAIN. Private Eye.
24A. Drive-thru cleanings : CAR WASHES. Private car. I think of the old railroad cars.
39A. Range for indoor comfort : ROOM TEMPERATURE. Private room, if your lucky.
49A. Staunch political group member : PARTY HACK. Private party, that's what I hear when I try to get in.
62A. Solid baseball hit : LINE DRIVE. Private line, telephone.
7D. Doctor's self-employment, and a hint to the starts of the five longest across answers : PRIVATE PRACTICE
Argyle here with a rare Monday pangram. Grid spanning row and column. Interesting fill. Should be a good week.
Across:
1. Brewpub choices : ALES
5. Bottle tops : CAPS
9. Newly hatched pigeon : SQUAB. I wonder at what age they stop being SQUAB and become flying rats.
14. Lower California, familiarly : BAJA. The actual name of the peninsula, nothing to do with the state.
15. Mother Goose baddie : OGRE
16. Hearing-related : AURAL
19. Magic wand wielder : FAIRY
20. PC go-to type : TECHIE
21. Use the ballot : VOTE
23. Mlles., in Spain : SRTAs
29. Checkpoint "Hold it!" : "HALT!". "Where are your papers?"
31. Little-known information : ARCANA
32. Prefix meaning "billion" : GIGA
36. Harbor landing : PIER
38. Bridge positions : EASTs
42. "Tomorrow" title singer : ANNIE
43. High spirits : BRIO. From Italian but of Celtic origin.
44. 1974 Sutherland/Gould spoof : "S*P*Y*S". Asterisks were to indicate bullet holes.
45. "Burnt" crayon color : SIENNA
47. Egyptian cross : ANKH
51. Montezuma subject : AZTEC
56. Admin. aide : ASST.
57. Hawkish : PRO WAR
58. Not so many : FEWER
64. African antelope : ELAND
65. Muscular woe : ACHE
66. Born and __ : BRED
67. Prepares, as cocktails : MIXES
68. "Little" Dickens girl : NELL. Nell Trent, fictional heroine of Charles Dickens's novel "The Old Curiosity Shop".
69. "Besides that ..." : "ALSO ..."
Down:
1. Helps illegally : ABETS
2. Hen, vis-à-vis eggs : LAYER
3. Kick out : EJECT
4. Olympic skater Cohen : SASHA. She is the 2006 Olympic silver medalist.
5. Apple heart : CORE
6. Turkish title : AGA
8. Hombre's title : SEÑOR
9. Low-crime section of town : SAFE AREA
10. Sine __ non: essential : QUA
11. Ocean State sch. : URI
12. River to the Rhine : AAR. In Switzerland, Aare.
13. Activist Nellie : BLY
18. Addams Family nickname : TISH. Morticia Addams (TV)
22. Howard Hughes's airline : TWA
24. Scale, as Everest : CLIMB
25. Improvises like Armstrong : SCATS. Scatting with Louis and Ella. Clip(3:09)
26. Welcomes to the penthouse : HAS UP
27. Blog piece : ENTRY
28. Freelance writers' encls. : SASEs
30. Zoo swinger : APE
32. Hold tightly : GRASP
33. Ancient Greek region that was home to Heraclitus : IONIA
34. One with no hope : GONER
35. Make ___: rake it in : A MINT
37. Sign anew, as a contract : RE-INK
40. Thirty feet : TEN YARDS
41. Soldier of Seoul : ROK
46. Sighs of relief : AHs
48. Difficult : HARD
50. "The Chronicles of Narnia" lion : ASLAN
52. "___ the Greek" : ZORBA Novel and film.
53. Handle, as a baton : TWIRL
54. Rain gutters run under them : EAVES
55. System of belief : CREDO
57. Banana covering : PEEL
58. Like "la" in Fr. or Sp. : FEM.(feminine)
59. Quarterback Manning : ELI
60. Like many lifelike museum displays : WAX
61. Opposite of WSW : ENE
63. Buffalo Sabres' org. : NHL
61 comments:
Good morning, Argyle, C.C. and gang - fortunately, very much a speed run this morning as I've got to hit a couple distributors before I open up.
I really didn't have any pauses going exclusively horizontal until I hit 49A, where I needed some perp help to get the 'hack' part of the answer. Luckily for me, 'Aslan' got filled in by the perps as well since I never saw Chronicles of Narnia. Never saw the pangram until I read Argyle's always-excellent write-up. Nice Monday puzzle.
The store's been rocking for the past week or so; seems like educational kits and radio-control helicopters are going to be the big movers this year. I hope everyone's done their shopping already, because it's starting to look zoo-like out there.
12 & a w/u.
Marti, great pictures! It's taking all I've got to pass up commenting on the cucumber picture...
Morning, all!
Typical Monday puzzle. Not quite a speed run due to some minor hangups on the eastern front where HAS UP really wanted to be ASK UP or SEE UP before I (finally) noticed the tense. I also wanted ESSAY instead of ENTRY for 27D and ARCANA didn't exactly spring immediately to mind.
The theme was OK, although I didn't need it to solve the puzzle. Of the various theme answers, I don't think I've ever heard the term PRIVATE CAR before, but everything else was common enough to me.
Have a great Monday!
Good Morning, Argyle and friends. Well, this wasn't the typical Monday speed run for me, although I got the PRIVATE part easily. The GIGA/GRASP segment had me stumped for a few moments. After getting EJECT and MIXES, I realized we were in for a pangram.
We recently saw a production of The Addams Family. It was one of the best productions we had seen in a long time.
I agree with Dennis about your cucumber photos, Marti! Call them pickles if you want ... LOL!
QOD: We forget all too soon the things we thought we could never forget. ~ Joan Didion
If you've got the where-for-all:
Private rail cars.
Oops, that should be wherewithal.
Good Morning Argyle, C.C. et al.
Thanks for posting the pictures, C.C. It is such a beautiful time of year to there, with all the Christmas markets and displays of ornaments and toys. And of course the "Glühwein" (hot mulled wine) always ensures that you will stay warm! (Pickles are optional!!)
But it's great to be back, because I was feeling puzzle-withdrawal after two weeks.
This was a fun Monday offering to get me back in the swing of things. Like Hahtool, I was thinking "pangram", but my suspicions were aroused with AZTEC. MIXES confirmed it.
We used to have a four-party line when I was growing up. When we got our own PRIVATE LINE, it seemed like pure luxury.
Have a lovely day, everyone!
Good day folks,
Not a speed run for me either, but the puzzle moved along at a steady pace. Slowdown in the mideast because I entered TRIVIA for 31A. Perps eventually cleared it up, but ARCANA is a definite learning moment for me.
Rest of the puzzle was no problem.
Where are Marti's pictures? A quick run thru the weekend posts yielded zip.
I thought it was a speed run. I never got the theme, because I never read the clue for 7D -- it was already filled in.
Were there really OGREs in Mother Goose? I thought those where characters in Grimm.
Hondo, follow the link at the bottom of today's writeup.
Nice Monday!
Good pace for a Monday. I didn't know SQUAB or BRIO, but the rest went well. I hope you all have a great week.
Very nice puzzle Mr. Rosen, and a very interesting blog, Argyle. I initially had 'Tera' for 'Giga', and 'arcana' and 'spys' gave me a pause.
The big item today is Marti's pictures from Germany and Austria. Looks like you had lots of fun - and you look terrific. ( DH looks terrific too.) The store decorations and public artwork is fantastic. The rich meats, and confectionery and ales could really test one's will power. Coming back stateside, must feel like a blah. Enjoy the rest of the season.
ALT QOD:- My agent always gets ten percent of what I get - except my blinding headaches. ~ Fred Allen.
Good morning all. Thanks for the comments, Argyle.
Nice pix, Marti. You seem very happy with the pickle.
Fairly easy today, but did do it in a herringbone pattern (across and down at the same time). The grid spanners were easy and the unifier @7d was not used for help.. Had 'hosts' before HAS UP. No searches were needed. Nice to work on a pangram.
Have a good day.
Good morning! nice write up, Argyle. Welcome back, Marti. I enjoyed the pix. Looks like you had a great time.
The only slow spot on this one was that middle east block. I was trying to think of something the later Armstrong might have improvised on his moon mission, ARCANA just wasn't popping into mind, HAS UP just never seems quite right and ENTRY wasn't my first choice. Fortunately, there were other known items that let me hack my through the jungle.
Private car is a phrase I often use when traveling. We frequently hire a private car as opposed to the ship's tours when we visit foreign ports on cruises. I've never tried a private rail car though.
Nice start to the week.
I had no trouble today except the theme, which I didn't get at all. I kept trying to put the actual beginning words of the long clues together, rather that teaming them with PRIVATE. Otherwise, all went quickly.
Heart,
I'll be seeing the Christmas market in Chemnitz and Dresden soon. Your lovely pictures had me already smelling the Wurst and Glühwein! Looked like you were having a great time. We'll be with family there for the holidays this year.
Fun puzzle. The theme is prolly a little weak, but there was plenty of fun stuff to make up for that. Didn't realize it was a panagram til I got here.
I for one remember party lines. I grew up in a little town that didn't even have dial phones until 1970. Prior to that our phone "in town" was two party and the number was 54-J. The farm phone was on a huge party line and the number was 122 on 27.
Argyle, your private car link reminded me of Snowin on Raton. It feels appropriate for the recent weather.
The "No Public Access" theme is very appropriate, because I cannot find the puzzle online. I get a message that the puzzle is free because of their sponsors, and after I sit through the ad, there is a message saying that there is no puzzle for today.
Bizarre!
After having 24 relatives here for Christmas yesterday, this was a fun time!
Musings
-Great pix, Marti! Did you go down the slide in the salt mines?
-Car washes ain’t so busy this time of year.
-Yes, my Mother Goose villain was a WOLF, don’t remember an OGRE
-MIL raised chickens and any chicken that weren’t LAYERS, she called clucks because they strutted round making noise but doing nothing. Sound like anyone you know?
-Oh, a school by THAT ocean. Not USC.
-Usually you see the whole 9 yards for machine gun belts
-Eli led an incredible comeback last night against Dallas. What a game!
Joe, Not only was my number 116-X and then 132-J, my grandmother was the operator and I could have no secrets from her.
BTW,my hometown where I made those calls, Arlington, NE, was recently judged to be the second best city in America in which to raise children by Bloomberg Businessweek
Hi all,
Good Monday puzzle....although I didn't know all of the answers. Never heard of 13D activist Nellie.
Also did not know a pigeon 'chick' was called a squab. Ewwww, seems so bad to eat a baby bird. But, what is an egg??? Arghhh, now I've ruined my breakfast.
Marti, great pictures, sure looks like you enjoyed your time there, especially that 'pickle' hold ;)
Hi C.C. & gang,
We (my wife and I) easily finished today's puzzle without any online help, typical only for Mondays though.
The Chronicles of Narnia is a book that I've never read and was an unknown.
EddyB: Thanks for coming to the BHC holiday pottery sale, Ruth told me you picked up one jar of Olallieberry Jam, I hope you like it. The 3 day event was much better than our fall sale, the total sale came in slight over 16K, we hope to get a small piece of that total by Wednesday (but keep your day job, it's hard to make a living selling pottery and jam).
Hello Puzzlers -
A good quality Monday puzzle, smooth going from top to bottom.
Welcome home Marti! Nice pictures, I loves me some Germany and Austria, particularly at Christmas.
Good Morning All, It's nice to get back to the puzzle after a busy weekend. My sister and brother-in-law were visiting and then we had a party to attend on Saturday night. Now it's back to sorting and hopefully packing some of what I sort.
I had more trouble with the theme entries that with the rest of the fill. I suppose I've heard of PARTY HACK, but it only came with perps. Then I just couldn't make a good connection with PRIVATE. PRIVATE CAR and PRIVATE ROOM didn't seem to have much zip to me. Thanks to Argyle for putting it all straight for me.
I did like SQUAB and ARCANA. Of course I first entered M*A*S*H at 44A. I loved that movie, but never heard of S*P*Y*S.
Marti, Pickles? You seemed to have a thing for those juicy sausages too. :o) All the photos were wonderful. I'm glad you had such a good time.
Hi gang -
Good Monday puzzle. Not a speed run, bogged down a bit in West-central region. Like the two grid-spanners.
Great Pix, Marti - welcome home.
Busiest week of the year for me. I'll check when I can.
Cheers!
JzB
Katie Dyer,
Looks like this was indeed a PRIVATE PARTY that you and I, and probably a few others, didn't get invited to. I used to do the LATimes puzzle by clicking on the link at cruciverb.com. That went sour, so I started going to the Times web site. But today that didn't work either.
I've been mildly critical of an entry or clue or two here and there in the past. Nothing scathing. Maybe I've been blackballed.
Katie Dyer & Anoa Bob,
Please bookmark this site. It works in the old format.
Got it. Thanks C.C.
Great Monday puzzle, got it readily if not easily--many thanks, Mel Rosen, and Argyle for the write-up, and C.C. for posting those great photos of Marti. As a native Austrian who also spent a Christmas in Heidelberg many years ago, these pix made me downright homesick. What a treat to see them.
As for the puzzle, sometimes I don't get it even when I get it. Got "scats" all right, but was sure it had to be a biking term referring to Lance Armstrong. Go figure.
Final question: what's a pangram?
Misty, in this case, it's a puzzle that uses every letter of the alphabet.
Hello.
Got home last night about 11:30
and copied puzzle from cruciverb.
com. No problems.
Warren. Didn't have much time to spend at the Sale. Did get my jar of jam. Got totally lost again
driving around Los Gatos. My sun glasses are still down there-some
where.
dodo1925. Same person. Beard came off shortly after that photo.
Lemon may be out of ICU but, he is not out of the woods.
He is being monitored very closely. Recovery will be long and slow.
Marti. Loved the photos. Reminded
me so much of Garmish.
Take care. Have laundry to do.
eddy
Good day, Argyle, C.C. and all.
Lovely blog, Santa.
What a nice way to start Monday, thank you, Mel Rosen.
Rarely do I work straight across but today I sashayed at full speed, filled the center 7D and kept going.
Slight pause at GIGA because I can not recall between that and TERA which is which. Perps to the rescue.
We, too, had a party line in the 50s and for us kids it was tempting to listen in until our Dad caught us and we were almost GONERS.
Marti, wonderful pictures and it certainly looks like a good time. Pickles and sausages, oh, my!
I agree about OGRE that is was the brothers Grimm who coined that one.
Have a marvy Monday, everyone! Raining here.
Gosh, I didn't realize the pickles and sausages would create so many comments...I ate both of them with relish ��
Just saw that in Berlin, several women were drugged at the Christmas Market this weekend. So Kazie, be careful - and never let your Glühwein out of your sight!!
Welcome back Marti. Your great pics bring back happy memories.
Most everything already has been said about today's puzzle.
I am very interested in fairy tales and folk tales. I took a literature course concerning them in grad. school. It was interesting that very many cultures independently develped Cinderella stories. We read translations of most of them, including one from the American Indian culture.
It seems the word ogre gained popularity from its use in Mother Goose tales.
From the Encyclopedia Britannica:
"Ogre, feminine ogress, a hideous giant represented in fairy tales and folklore as feeding on human beings. The word gained popularity from its use in the late 17th century by Charles Perrault, the author of Contes de ma mère l’oye (Tales of Mother Goose)."
@Dennis--many thanks for the explanation of pangram. Sure enough, I see the q and the z and all the others!
Am so glad to hear Lemonade is out of the ICU. Hope he continues to recover.
Marti,
Those women were most likely much younger and more attractive than I am. I doubt I'll be in any danger. Plus I'll always be with the family while there, and the Glühwein gets cold if you set it down. Thanks for the warning though!
Ogres appeared in Charles Perrault's Tales of Mother Goose in 1697. approx. 90 years before the Grimm brothers were born (1785 and 1786.) Perrault's stories were derived from pre-exisitng folk tales handed down buy oral tradition, so they were obviously already old when Perrault picked them up.
Years later the Grimm brothers also collected and adapted old tales, among them those those of Perrault.
Hello everybody. Wonderful photos, Marti! Thanks for sharing them. I especially liked the one of the guy with his head down from laughing.
Good puzzles these last few days. As for today's theme, I got PRIVATE PRACTICE and solved EYE STRAIN, so I kept looking for medical terminology, wanting something like EYE, EAR, NOSE, THROAT, etc. in the long answers. Argyle's comments cleared that up for me.
Best wishes to you all.
Hi all!
Good puzzle, good commentary, good trip-sharing pictures! Hands up for most of the comments. Didn't get the "C" in the ARCANA/SCAT cross. Had audal instead of AURAL.
I was the night operator on a telephone switchboard in a town of 500 population my senior year in high school. Good place to study while learning a lot about my neighbors that I never dared tell. The rural customers were on eight-party lines. To tell if the conversations were done, we had to key in and listen. If the line was empty, we'd pull the plug cord.
After 11 p.m. there was no operator on the board, but the system private owners in the adjoining house would answer if someone rang in long enough with an emergency. When the owners were out of town, I slept on a cot nearby. Interesting time. The town went dial in April just before I graduated in May. Better money than waitressing.
- PK
Thanks, C.C. Mission accomplished! Another question. Is the LA Times puzzle available on Across Lite?
Katie, I prefer the old format on the Chicago Tribune but I checked Cruciverb and their link to the puzzle using AcrossLite still worked just fine.
I enjoyed the photos, Marti. Eating the sausages with relish seems OK. Relish with the pickles seems like overkill. :>)
I don't know if this link has been shared before but it involves some beautiful nature photography and a stark vision of what we are doing to our home, the Earth. It's powerful, beautiful and sad at the same time. Mother Earth
Marti,
Great pix, looks like you had a great time.
Desper-Otto,
Thanks. I was in such a rush earlier, I never saw the link.
It was not a speed run at all for me this morning, although I did get it all done in the end. Of course, I have the expectation that Monday's will be super fast, so that always throws me when I have to think too much.
I too had trouble with the LA Times site. It booted me out of the old format late last week, so thanks CC for the link to the Chicago Times. Much easier. I knew if I came here I would find a way to get to it.
I know the LA Times site is annoying, but with the financial hardship our papers are experiencing I can totally understand why they must go this route.
Marti, great pics. I took a similar trip to those places in January once. Some of my favorite memories. The most amazing day was spending the morning at Dachau where it was gloomy and gray (just as I imagine it must have felt 24/7 if you were there) and then leaving around noon and traveling to Neuschwanstein to see the sun out and a hoar frost over everything. Talk about magical.
Happy week to you all.
Boy, it's not Lucina weather around here today. It's gone from uncomfortably low humidity (at least for me) to fairly steady rain today and tomorrow. The temperature is 52 F at the moment. I like the sound of rain on the skylights. It makes me sleepy.
I just started watching "From Here to Eternity" recorded from TCM. For some reason, I've never seen it before.
Thank you for the link to the "old" LA Times crossword. I hate that new format.
Bill G., hauntingly beautiful, and then disturbing, pictures of our blue marble...
KQ, I visited Neuschwanstein a few years ago with my dear friends from Munich...Crazy King Ludwig II outdid himself on that one! I have never been to Dachau, but I can imagine what it must have felt like on a gloomy grey day...
Had fun with this puzzle. Got stumped by the word ankh, had anch instead and roc for the Soldier of Seoul, even though I knew roc is an old bird. Well, that's what I'm getting to be.
Loved Marti's photos! Hope I get there someday.
For me not a speed run not being a regular. Stuck on 28d cause "writer's encl." Was cut off on my news paper so I thought it was only freelance. For me mlle. Never heard of, arcana, sases, anch, aural, brio are difficult words for a monday. Didn't put aga cause I spell it agah having lived in turkey in the army. But ill get better see yall
Hi All ~~
A fairly quick, fun puzzle for me today. Had 'Clasp' before GRASP so it took a bit to get ROOM TEMPERATURE. Perps helped on a couple I wasn't sure of. Last to fill was the cross of GIGA and GONER.
~~ Bills G. ~ Wonderful video ... thanks for posting.
~~ Good to have you back, Marti ... great pictures -- thanks for sharing them!
Enjoy the evening!
anon@5:58
SASE Self-Addressed Stamped Envelope
PK and Marti,
I first went to Dachau in 1970, and swore I never wanted to return. Of course I did, each time I went to München again with students. I also have seen Sachsenhausen outside Berlin, and Buchenwald near Weimar. I really don't pretend to be able to imagine what any of them was like for those there during the 3rd Reich. I just know it had to be terrible.
The Bayrischer Wald and the area around Neuschwanstein, OTH, is lovely, and reminds me a lot of the landscape around here.
Thanks for the citations on OGRE. I was sure I had heard that it originated with the Grimms so I stand corrected.
Bill, our usual weather has been overtaken by rain clouds which are due to persist until Wednesday so we join you in cold and rainy weather here as well.
Sorry, by PK, I meant KQ.
BTW, I've never really heard what has befallen Lemonade, or why he's in hospital. Can anyone please clarify? I must have been missing a few days when that happened.
At least Screwy Louie built a gorgeous castle.
Lemonade, please get better.
The weather here sucks. Barely 50 and rain showers.
Hi Kazie, We stayed in München during our trip to Europe in 1997 but we didn't know how to pronounce it so we called it munch town...
;-)
What's the proper way of pronouncing it?
--Warren.
I enjoyed this puzzle, but got stuck with arcana. I tried trivia first,but came here and got unstuck. I still do the puzzle by hand (Axpen Daily News), but use my Kindle to come to this site for help. Love reading the write-ups and comments. Thank you for explaining pangram.
What with Marti's trip, and the general discussion, I couldn't help myself. I have Glühwein simmering on the stove right now MMMMMMMM
Marti - for safety, I promise not to let it out of my sight.
:-)
Good evening, folks. Thank you, Mel Rosen, for a great Monday puzzle. Your name reminded me of Al (Flip) Rosen of the Cleveland Indians. Thank you, Argyle, for the equally great write-up.
This puzzle started quite easily in the NW corner.
I bogged down in the East Central. Had HOSTS for a while, then fixed to HAS UP. ARCANA was an unknown, but wagged it successfully.
Wanted MASH at 44A, then SPY'S. Never saw that movie.
IONIA and SIENNA were wags, but worked.
Thought the horizontal and vertical grid spanners were very good.
HeartRx: Great photos of Europe. The food shots looked delicious. So did the beer. We were there once circa 1978.
Hope you are feeling better Lemonade. Our best to you.
I made it to Johnsonburg, PA, today. Was not able to print the puzzle until this evening.
See you tomorrow.
Abejo
Kazie - only eddyB seems to know about Lemonade714's illness and he isn't telling
Anon @10:46,
thanks, I guess I'm no more in the dark than anyone else then.
Warren,
that ü is kind of hard to nail down in writing. You have to purse your lips and imagine it's a "y + u" kind of getting strangled on the way out. It's the same sound as the letter "u" in French, as in "tu", or "vue". The "ch" is like our "sh" in this word, (though not always in others), and the "e" before the final "n" is a schwa. Put it all together, and it's München!
Argyle, thanks so much for explaining the theme. I didn't need it to finish, but I actually made an effort to figure it out.private car and private room doesn't do it for me.
I had lots of erasing going on for a Monday. Had audio for aural, so ended up with udi, not URI, and air for AAR.I knew it was wrong when I saw activist Nellie.
Arcana did not come to me, and I wasn't fond of easts.
Burnt sienna is getting. A lot of mileage...still my favorite
Crayon.
Martin, WONDERFUL photos all...even the pickles.
I know I have lots of errors, but am not fixing them until I get better on this iPad. Can you tell I've never texted?
JD - I've been using the iPad for about a year now, and though I've gotten accustomed to the keyboard, I find I keep getting a letter C, V, or B when I mean to hit the space bar. Hurrying too much, I guess.
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