THEME: Add a RAY of sunshine. The word RAY is added to a common phrase to create a new and completely different phrase. This is our first puzzle from this veteran constructor since her Friday, February 25, 2011 effort. We seem to be in an "add something" to create a Friday, but this has too many short words for me to feel like it is Friday. But some humor and some trickery, so it is all good. I did like the theme, especially:
20A. Picasso in preschool? CRAYON ARTIST. Our CON ARTIST, became a famous painter. Some do think Picasso could have used crayons for all they see.
31A. When only a synthetic will do?: RAYON OCCASION. Rayon is actually a semi-synthetic, discovered in 1855.
39A. Double-cross Old MacDonald?: BETRAY THE FARM. Don't bet the farm on fooling me with this one. Ei Ei O!
54A. What Eddie did to warm up for his "Shrek" role?: MURPHY BRAYED. Is there anyone here who does not know what a Murphy Bed is? Donkey steals the movies. And the hint,
64A. Tampa Bay team playing in this puzzle's longest answers?: RAYS. They used to be the Devil Rays, but that would have ruined his hint.
Let's examine the rest:
Across:
1. Secret rival: ARRID. The deodorants; I felt so smart when I put this right in.
6. Pool regimen: LAPS. Despite the 80 degree day, our condo pool is heated, so come on by and swim anytime.
10. Devoid of emotion: NUMB. Maybe Jim Carrey could do a NUMBER and NUMBER movie.
14. Pope after John X: LEO VI. Okay, it is Friday, but this obscure prelate did not even last the whole year starting in 928 and did nothing but make a nice letter combination.
15. Lamb by another name: ELIA. beloved essayist, CHARLES LAMB. Always reminds me of our own JL.
16. Australian gem: OPAL. 97% of the world's opals come from down under, right KZ?
17. Recesses: APSES. Not the break in an elementary school day, but the ones in churches.
18. Riffraff's opposite: GENTILITY. A five dollar word, but it remind me of this MOVIE.(0:28)
22. WBA stats: KOS. World Boxing Association:. Knock Outs.
23. Estonian, e.g.: BALT. It is in the Wiktionary, but there is debate. "An ethnic descendant of the Indo-European Baltic people, especially including ethnic Lithuanians, Latvians or Prussians, but generally not including ethnic Belorussians, Estonians, Germans, Jews, Livonians, Poles, Russians, Swedes or Tatars, who have also inhabited or currently inhabit the modern Baltic states."
24. Critic who's a Chicago talk radio co-host: ROEPER. Richard, a Chicago Sun-Times movie critic carrying on the tradition of Siskel and Ebert.
28. Rub the right way?: PET. I love this clue and with all the cat and dog people we have...
29. Feel crummy: AIL. I am sneezing, but don't worry it is not contagious.
30. Way to go: Abbr.: RTE. Route.
35. Home to many Indians, but few cowboys: ASIA. More than a billion, and they all work tech support.
37. Television network with a plus sign in its logo: ION. A network built on a pun, for a positive ION.
38. "This just __ my day!": ISN'T. How did she know?
44. Mother of 35-Down: EVE. The dreaded internal reference with 35D. Son of 44-Across : ABEL. All three boys had 4 letter names like their dad/ Where did they get their baby naming book?
45. __ Cruces: LAS. New Mexico, home of missile testing at White Sands.
46. Passé platters: LPS. A 50's reference to records, which have made a strange comeback.
47. Not as critical: LESSER. One of the Evil twins.
49. Clay pigeon flinger: TRAP. How picaresque, TMI.
51. Pipe cleaner: LYE. The old fashioned way, either Sodium or Potassium hydroxide. Not to be mixed with 51D. "Advertising is legalized __": Wells : LYING. This was H.G. a long time ago. Interesting cross.
57. Kept an eye on: MONITORED. A nice word.
60. Outstanding: OWING. not a containment, but an unpaid debt.
61. It may be gross: Abbr.: ANATomy.
62. Spy's device: WIRE. A hidden microphone, generally worn by undercover people or spies and a hit HBO SERIES.(2:57)
63. Sale, in Calais: VENTE. Calais is the town in France where the Chunnel ends, and the ferries land, therefore, our French lesson of the day. I said Ferries, NOT FAIRIES!
65. One trading in futures?: SEER. Another cute clue, punning on commodity traders.
66. Award for Elmore Leonard: EDGAR. The Mystery Writer's award named after Mr. Poe, and at 90 degrees with 53D. Landscaping tool: EDGER. One of many interesting intersections.
Down:
1. "__! what poverty my Muse brings forth": Shak.: ALACK. They all know I love my man WILL.
2. Camera-ready page: REPRO. One of those made up words, in this case from reproduction.
3. Día de San Valentín gift: ROSAS. A few days late for our Spanish solvers.
4. "Hurlyburly" Tony winner: IVEY. Judith, who has done lots of THEATER and TV and movies.
5. Fail to follow: DISOBEY. Cannot think of a PC comment.
6. By the book: LEGAL. But who WROTE IT? (2:08)
7. Flag down, say: ALERT. Not to be confused with 40D. Bering Sea native: ALEUT.
8. Lager order: PINT. Oh goody, law and beer.
9. Like The Onion: SATIRIC. They have their own NEWS. (0:36) very short, but very bad words.
10. "Cape Fear" co-star, 1991: NOLTE. Actor famous for his work, and his mug shot.
11. "100 years of journalistic excellence" org.: UPI. United Press International.
12. Yoga equipment: MAT. Is that really equipment?
13. 1889-'90 newsmaking circumnavigator: BLY. You should read about NELLIE.
19. Sicilia, e.g.: ISOLA. Italian for Island. The senior group I volunteer with is mostly Italian, we still do not understand each other.
21. Defense gp : NATO. North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
25. Binoculars component: PRISM.
26. Historic prep school: ETON. The Duke of Wellington famously said "The Battle of Waterloo was won on the playing fields of Eton".
27. Musical modernization of "La Bohème": RENT. Never seen it.
28. "I Kid You Not" author: PAAR. Jack most famous now for quitting in the middle of his live show. LINK.
29. Puberty woe: ACNE. Has nothing to do with your knee.
31. Custom-made things?: RITES. Another pun.
32. Quibbles: NITS. Now we come to Marti's corner, with her nits and her 33D. "How impressive!": OOH.
34. Impersonal letter intro: SIRS. Now we write dear reader to avoid sexism.
36. British Open champ between Jack and Tom: SEVE. Ballesteros, who sadly died recently very young. We are talking golf.
41. Plants with flat-topped flower clusters: YARROWS. Total unknown, but filled by perps. LEARN.
42. Blubber: FLAB. Whale blubber is very valuable, and useful.
43. Sanction: APPROVE. Isn't English great, this one word can be good, sanctioning an event, or bad, the UN sanctioned Iran.
48. President Santos portrayer on "The West Wing": SMITS. I liked him on Dexter.
49. "Voilà!": THERE. More French, and Wallah to Jeannie, good to see you.
50. U-Haul rival: RYDER. I like Winona better.
52. Busybody: YENTA. A bissel Yiddish.
55. __ dieu: PRIE. The place they kneel to pray.
56. Agape, maybe: AWED. Were you by this puzzle?
57. Transitional mo.: MARch.
58. __ tight schedule: ON A. So am I so I must say
59. Anti vote: NAY. No more tonight.
Lemonade wishing you all a fine long week end, if you get the President's Day combo holiday off. Thanks Ms. Brethauer for the tour of your brain, and now I return control of your computers.
Note from C.C.:
Happy Birthday to Ron Worden! Your optimism and humor are truly inspirational. Hope everything goes smoothly next Wednesday.
95 comments:
Morning, all!
Struggled a bit today. The West coast was especially troublesome owing to the cross-referenced clues at 25D/44A as well as my unfamiliarity with SEVE and YARROWS. The tricky clue for RITES didn't help any.
Lots of foreign words today which, although I was able to get them all, did slow me down a bit.
Loved (and fully agree with) the quote by H.G. Wells about advertising. I'm training my son to disbelieve any commercial he sees on television since they all lie in one way or another.
Greetings!
Have not been able to blog at a reasonable time for past few days. I worked those puzzles without a hitch. Some red letters today.
Thanks Annemarie and Lemonade!
Got a kick out of RITES and OWING, and, of course, MURPHY BRAYED.
Happy, happy birthday, Ron!
Time for beddy bye!
Hello Puzzlers -
Too busy to post yesterday, but I can't resist these remarks:
1. Nobody mentioned HOLY CROSS legs. Worcester is famously hilly, and the HC campus is much atilt. It's uphill in either direction between classes :-). The girls therefore get a lot of exercise, and develop muscular Holy Cross Legs!
2. Jayce at 1:26 mentioned his sister's Holy Smoke song. Well, over in Hatfield, a small neighborhood church was converted to a smoked ribs restaurant, and naturally it was named Holy Smoke. It was fabulous! Sadly, it burned to the ground. True story.
I better go do today's puzzle.
Tough little Puzzle good for a friday i guess Got the unifier but did not get some of the theme clues right away and groaned when I did. I also agree with Barry's assessment on the wells quote advertisers are liars in almost every aspect, and i am trying to teach my son my same cynicism.
Happy Birthday Ron Wordon.
Hope everything fits 'just right' next Wednesday.
Well, at least I got the theme reveal RAYS.
I was NEVER coming off "WOW" for 33-D, "How impressive!" nor my "Ta-Dah" for 49-D,"Voila!" (it worked with my TRAP, go figure).
As such, I 'Crashed-and-Burned' on the themes.
Did like the LYE/LYING crossing.
So a DNF and a "There's always tomorrow."
Cheers!
Hello Again Puzzlers -
A lot of What Barry Said, and maybe more so. Rang up a Technical DNF today, had to Goog SEVE, PAAR, and IVEY just to patch up those areas. Never heard of Hurlyburly, sounds like a yawn on the IMDB site.
Never caught on to the theme fill, because I expected to find the name or location of a stadium. Oops. All in all a tough puzzle for me.
This one was a solid "Oof Dah!" for me. Picked around for a long time before establishing any type of beachhead. Took the obvious flyer on Rays, then got MurphyBrayed to uncover the theme. The rest then took numerous leaps, but it came together. Especially liked the cluing for Elia and Seer. Not so much that for Rites.
Fantastic clip from the Onion, Lemon!
Good day folks,
I got my butt kicked pretty good today. Had the RAY thingy, but the until Lemonade explained it, the theme answers were leaving me thinking WTF. Not that I was having much success with the rest of the cluing either.
Eventually went to Mr G in order to get all the squares filled, but it was an official DNF.
Tried to fit Wilbraham in foe 26D, historic prep school. As usual, it didn't work out.
Working both days this weekend, so I'll have to wait until Monday to rebound from this disaster.
Ron, happy birthday and good luck on Wednesday.
Happy Friday all! And HBD Ron.
I used up the full 20 minutes on this one. West-Central was the problem area. Finally the "S" in Asia caused me to think of SEVE (don't ask me why), which gave me EVE, which gave me ABEL, which gave me LESSER, and it was finished. Another DNF avoided. Whew!
Hahtool, how'd you manage to get one pic for your postings and a different one for your profile?
Good morning Lemonade, C.C. et al.
Happy B-day, Ron! And good luck next week with your custom-made thing. I hope it fits you just RITE!!
Fun, fun write-up, Lemon. I missed the LYE/LYING and ALERT/ALEUT crossings, so thanks for pointing them out. I had no NITS with this puzzle! Did not need the unifier, as I had already figured out the theme with CRAYON ARTIST. Fun stuff, and an excellent Friday challenge.
To quote from yesterday’s puzzle, “TGIF”!!
desper-otto, When you(or Hahtool) posts, your current avatar is used and stays with that post. If you change to a new avatar afterwards, anyone visiting your profile will see the new picture.
Just that easy.
HH, you are correct Wilbraham has been (along with its pieces, Monson and Weslyan) a pioneer in American education, though they were separate schools when we used to thrash them in sports. 1st co-ed prep school, first Chinese students, C. C. (one of whom became the 1st to graduate from an American college). It is fun to have you New England natives to refresh my mind.
I took "laps" around this one before it knocked me to the "mat". Couldn't beat the ten-count so it rang up a "KO" on me. Tomorrow is another day!
It took a while, but I finally finished it (with a little help from Google). I looked right at the list of Brittish Open winners but couldn't find a name that fit between Jack and Tom....My eyes kept reading STeve Ballesteros. I was seeing a "T" that was not there.
I loved 65A: One trading in futures? SEER. I didn't like 49D: Voila: THERE. There must be better clues for the word THERE.
I tried Suave instead of Arrid, and Bucs instead of Rays. A lot of correction fluid later, I got it done.
Have a great Friday everybody (especially the birthday boy!) To my fellow Presidents Day celebrators: have a nice LONG weekend!
Good morning all. Good write up Lemonade.
Happy birthday, Ron.
I did a lot of bouncing around on this one. Solve was mostly what Avg Joe said, eccept I liked the clue for RITES. I remembered Ms Brethauer from her previous efforts and from reading her Bio after her first puzzle. I knew this would be tricky, punny and cover a wide range of topics with some obscure stuff. I liked it!
We just had ROEPER a few days ago and here he is again. At leeast I remembered and didn't try to put in Roemer like I did then.
I definitely thought of Marti when NITS emerged. YARROWS was perps all the way. I had the same initial thoughts as Tinbeni on wow/OOH and Ta-dah/THERE, but something told me to wait before jumping on those.
Have a great weekend, all.
Good morning all. Great write-up, Lemon.
Happy Birthday, Ron.
I found this quite difficult and ended up with red letter help in the NW. ALACK and LEO VI crossing; give me a break. Eventually got all the themes first, tho. Very cleverly done. Especially liked MURPHY BRAYED. I agree with Lemonade on 23a, BALT. Racially, the Letts, lithuanians, and Prussians were usually grouped as Balts. The Estonian language is closely related to that ofthe Finns. A large Russian minority dwells there. If the clue was meant to mean a resident of the Baltic littoral, I guess I could let my NIT go. JMO.
Have a great day.
"Whale blubber is very valuable, and useful."
You can say that again. Not only an efficient insulator it also aids buoyancy and stores energy.
Is that what you meant?
Good day, Lemonade, et al.
Thank you, Lemon, for your ever detailed analysis coupled with wit.
Happiest of birthdays, Ron Worden, and yes, good luck with that fitting.
Well, like some of you, I finished the eastern section right down to the bottom fairly easily, caught the theme and loved MURPHY BRAYED!
Misspelled PAAR as PARR so I thought ASIR must be a place in India. Hand me the V-8 please.
My knee is AILing at the moment so that was a distraction and now I'm returning to bed.
Have a lovely weekend, everyone!
Yes, Lemonade, a MAT is definitely yoga equipment.
Interesting solve got sections in bunches but could not punch through and connect them all. I had to wait until I got the fortunate "reveal" on the bottom and then went back and looked at the theme answers and put in my "ray" words. Last section to fall was the EVE/ABEL/SEVE area which was made more difficult by it crossing right through the theme answer.
Yes Lemon, I enjoyed the theme, fun and trickery! It’s a beautiful, sunny day on the prairie and Joann and I are celebrating 45 years together today! Granddaughter is in The King and I in Lincoln tonight. Very nice way to celebrate our anniversary.
Musings
-A lot of art is great because someone tells me so
-Betray the Farm got me the theme
-ELIA is cwdese that got me started
-The WBA was the WNBA for a while getting PPG
-My last two tech supporters have been domestic, well spoken, competent and polite. How ‘bout dat?
-Hey Ion, are you sure you lost an electron? Yup, I’m positive.
-I’ve sat in some TRAP houses as a kid
-I suspect the NEA is around because of the 1 down quote
-All the versions of Cape Fear are frightening
-Those flat-topped plants ain’t dandelions
-Off to Omaha to pick up sick computer. 5 years with an iMac, no problem, 2 years with a PC, many problems.
Thanx, Argyle. I also post on a local message board and there it's always your current avatar which appears -- even on posts several years old. Learning moment.
Good Morning,
This Puzzle was a DNF and frustrating But I thoroughly enjoyed the writeup. NOLTE did well in Cape Fear but no one could out evil Robert Mitchem in the original. He gave me the creeps for days!
I thought Jimmy Smits or Duane "The Rock" Johnson should have been cast as Ranger in One For thr Money.
Not only is Lemonade's comment on 35a un-PC, it is boderline racist.
Too many names for me not to be totally frustrated. I got most of the top half unassisted, but came here to get a foot in for the bottom, where I wasn't getting BETray or MURPHY BRAYED. That helped a bit. I knew the Indian clue was referring to India, but didn't think of ASIA, had LOOSER/LESSER and misspelled the unknown PARR, so Asia wasn't appearing. The mother / son thing never came until I cheated here for betrayed and got ABEL from that.
The foreign words were about my only certainties for quite a while. i tried AIR tight schedule, which slowed that corner too. Never heard of EDGAR, ROEPER, YARROWS or SEVE, and don't like animated movies so had forgotten Murphy was in Shrek. I was actually wondering who played Shrek himself.
Nice blog, Lemon.
I spent as much time reading links as doing the CW today.
Yes, opals are a significant export these days. When I first came here, I was amazed that opals available here were all the insipid milky variety. Then I couldn't believe the prices of the opals at home after living here for a while and returning to find they'd increased dramatically after they became known overseas.
Prie Dieu actually means "pray to God" so I wonder if at one time they were labeled so people knew what to use them for!
"Sale" in French means "dirty", so don't confuse it with its meaning in English. It's a false cognate, like "Gift" in German, meaning "poison".
Bill G.,
Did you get my email about Picasa? C.C. might have forwarded it too.
Happy Birthday RW, and I hope your delivery goes well, as well.
Happy Anniversary 45 HG and Mrs. HG.
HBDTY my ex- m-i-l who turns 85 today.
Good morning all:
I didn't get to post yesterday as I was busy cooking and preparing for dinner guests. I did do the puzzle and found it fun and very clever. Thanks Barbara and Don, and Marti, as well.
Marti, The Alienist is a very good novel, as is the follow
-up, The Angel of Darkness. (I believe that is the title.). It's not a true sequel; it's a completely different story line, but does have the same cast of characters as The Alienist. In fact, the author ran for a nearby local political position a few years ago, but he lost.
A belated Happy Birthday to Crazycat.
On to today. This was a DNF due to NW corner. I had nooks instead of apses and that really threw me off. Otherwise, it was a good Friday challenge. Thanks for your usual witty commentary Lemonade.
Hatool, love the QOD, even if I'm dog vs cat person.
Happy Birthday, Ron, and good luck with your fitting.
One of my dinner guests set up my new Acer laptop last night but I haven't had any time to use it. I like the size and styling so I'm sure I'll be happy with it. I was glad to see the old one go to laptop heaven for all the h--l it raised with my blood pressure!
Another 40 plus degrees day, Spitz, so you may be right about Mother Nature's plans for this winter.
Happy Friday, everyone.
It's a false cognate, like "Gift" in German, meaning "poison".
You know what they say, one man's fish is another man's poisson.
Kazie -
Shrek was voiced by Mike Myers, the Canadian who was probably best known for his SNL work. He was Austin Powers in that string of movies (not my style). Shrek was done in a Scottish accent, something Mike pulls off convincingly.
Hi gang -
Happy Birthday Mr. Worden, I-RON-ically.
More than a technical DNF for me today. Theme was slow to reveal. Never got CRAYON ARTIST. Guessing IVES for IVEY and not knowing REPRO didn't help.
I agree with Thom Hartmann that culture precedes religion, but "Custom-made things" for RITE is still a reach to far.
PRIE dieu?!? PAAR-PARR? ISN'T VENTE something you get at Starbucks?
ALACK, I'm feeling NUMB and NUMBER
Cheers!
JzB
I am going with what most everyone else said. True DNF today, thanks to that West Center. I finally looked on the blog to get the rest of betRAYEDTHEFARM. Once I had the BET in there, I was able to finish 35,44 and 47 across. After feeling smug by doing Wednesdays puzzle in record time, this brought me down quite a few notches. Hand up for BUCS instead of RAYS, and also SHEEN instead of SMITS. Cant wait for tomorrow!
Wasn't a DNF, technically, since I DID finish, but, alack, I finished with a couple of bad fills, resulting in RAYONACCESSION. Nope, didn't make any sense to me either.
ELIA brought back memories of reading "An Essay on Roast Pig" [sic, as taught in 7th grade], too many years ago. One of the few classical works of literature I remember.
All in all, a fun, witty puzzle.
Thank you, Annemarie, for a good, but difficult, puzzle today. Got through it, but it took me hours. thank you, Lemonade, for the excellent write-up, including 35A. I have no problem with that description. Truth is truth.
I started this last night on my IPAD coming back from Chicago. Slow start. I picked up this morning on my IPad, but gave up and went out and got the newspaper. that worked better. I still like doing puzzles in ink on paper.
Got ABEL and EVE right away. Then SEVE appeared. that got me started.
The theme and theme answers were tough for me to get going on. My first was RAYON OCCASION, then CRAYON ARTIST. The rest came easily.
Not sure what a Murphy Bed is.
LEO VI and APSES were easy. I wagged ROSAS and lucked out. Also ARRID.
EDGER and EDGAR crossing was neat.
See you tomorrow. I may be off to Jacksonville, IL. If so, my IPad will be in use.
Abejo
I was not sure if people knew beds that hide in walls, but that is the MURPHY BED.
Morning all,
SEVE was ABLE to RITE the ship and save PAAR
to win the British Open in 1979
DNF , Googed Yarrows, Alack , slowed down with Ligit/Legal , Solde / Vente , Ooh / Wow
Didn't know what a Murphy Bed was , now I do
But why ? Anybody ?
TGIF, fore.!
I think I have slept in a Murphy Bed long ago, just did not remember what it was called. Thank you, Lemonade.
Abejo
I can't believe I got the whole thing! Not a speed run, for sure, and struggled near the end. But somehow, it finally all worked with no cheating. I think this blog deserves all the credit, since it's made me so much more aware of double meanings of words (e.g. 'Secret' as a brand; 'custom-made' referring not just to manufacture; 'trading in futures' referring not just to economics, etc.). I love learning new skills, and the Corner is certainly helping with that!
So many thanks, Ms. Brethauer, and Lemonade for a delightful write-up, as always. And Happy Birthday, Ron Worden!
Good afternoon to all and thanks for the BD and leg up wishes. Wow what a struggle for me on my day. WTS (what Tin said) Going to have chineese for lunch not much else to say. Have a great day to all. RJW.
Wow, super-tough for me today. Nice write-up, Lemonade.
I saw Eddie Murphy on Wednesday at one of the studios I'm doing some work for in LA. He waved. Happy man.
ROFL @Tuttle's "poisson".
Busy week - got to get back to business. Happy Friday, y'all.
Happy anniversary, H.G. and Joann!
No problem with 35A; it's a sad indication if we can't laugh at ourselves.
Last night there was some discussion of DON, DAWN as homonyms and Webster's dictionary agrees with Alex.
Lucina - that gets us to a fundamental problem with dictionaries.
As I understand it, dictionaries make it their business to report on the language as it is used at the time of publication. For better or for worse, they don't try to establish the rules.
An example came to light a year or two ago: I pointed out that the phrase "home in on" has its roots in navigation, a subject I know well. Americans often say "hone in on" instead; it's simply wrong, yet Lemon was able to quote Wiktionary or the like with a definition that supports this common but erroneous usage. I see it as supporting my claim that dictionaries have the power to propagate public language use for good or for bad.
Granted, your Dawn/Don example was about pronunciation rather than phrasing, but the concept is the same.
Hello everybody. I enjoyed this puzzle today. I usually enjoy the LAT puzzles. They're the best.
Really wanted VISAS for 31D.
Having filled in MURPHY BRAYED, I also kept wanting to put in PABLO something for 20A until I finally realized the theme answers were not necessarily somebody's name.
I thought the clue for ASIA was excellent.
For some reason I just knew ROEPER.
Lemonade, I laughed at your comment about LESSER: one of the evil twins.
GENTILITY is indeed a neat-o word. Hahtool, your photo shows gentility. Nice hat!
Didn't care for BALT much, nor REPRO.
Happy birthday, Ron Worden, and best wishes to you all.
Dudley, would you call Alicia Witt's legs Holy Cross legs? LOL
Don't know, send her over and I'll take a good look.
Soon, please.
Dudley,
Thanks for Mike Myer. I agree--not my style either.
Tuttle--good one!
On a different linguistic note, I'm sure the Yiddish "bissel" is a diminutive of the German "Bisschen", but in true form, the Saxons all say "Bittel".
Ron W,
Happy Birthday once again!
Jayce:
Do you mention Ms. Witt because she is from Worcester, where Holy Cross is located?
I would have Aced this one if it had not been for,,,
The Sports Theme
The French
The Shakespeare
The obscure Popes
The Mystery Writer Awards
Obscure countries
More French
(and if i ran out of TP and was stuck in here for a month...)
1 question, even with the write up, i still do not get 31D custom made things = Rites?
So today Ms Brethauer has brought a RAY of sunshine into our lives.
I was nice to see a new answer for an island clue - ISOLA
and a new clue for ION
and BALT instead of CELT or SLAV
I got tripped up by the indians but no cowboys clue for ASIA, I wanted it to be AGRA.
Thought WBA was the Women's Basketball Association so I went down for an eight count.
I'm not sure why ANATomy is GROSS though. Picasso certainly didn't think so.
Happy Friday all!
Yes, Lemonade, that is why I mentioned her.
TGIF - Hi CC, great write up L714, party on DFs and DFettes.
This theme reminded me of this little ditty...Mr Johnson!
A rite is a ceremonial practice, such as burning insence during a service. It became ceremonial through custom, that is the custom becmae a rite.
Gross Anatomy is a specific course of study in pre-med and medical schol where you study the macroscopic body, the stuff you can see withotu a microcope.
Husker Gary, I loved the ion joke. So did my engineering colleagues.
Virginia, I agree with you about Robert Mitchum in the original "Cape Fear." So frightening! A superb performance.
My huge unabridged dictionary has an article pointing out that there are several acceptable pronunciations of the same words used by educated people. These pronunciations are often shaped by the region in which they are spoken and by the history of the speakers.
I am fascinated by the rigor with which some assert that only ONE pronunciation, ONE spelling, ONE choice of grammar is correct. I have read a great many articles in recent weeks about Linguistic Prescriptivists and Descriptivists. Prescriptivists emphasize the rules, but "whose" rules? Descriptivists discuss how language changes over time and describe how words are used these days. Being B-R-O-A-D minded and an "on the other hand" type of thinker, I believe that in this, as in most things, the real answer lies somewhere in between.
Link Don/Dawn
After having talked out loud to myself for a while, I think I must be one of those Americans who has 13 vowels. I don't pronounce Don and Dawn the same, nor Cot and Caught.
Language is so freaking interesting.
I wrote a thesis in college on the differences and similarities between how English-speaking Americans and Mandarin-speaking Chinese swear. The short version is that for English speakers the worst swearing involves religion and a deity, while for Chinese speakers the worst swearing involves family members and relationships. Not that there isn't plenty of overlap, of course, and bodily functions occupy a high place in the swearing of both cultures.
Sowwy, I'm waxing pedantic again.
My Egyptian friend once observed that "You Americans sure like sh*t. I mean, you say things like 'That's my sh*t' and 'Stay away from my sh*t' and 'sh*tloads of stuff' like it's a good thing." He has a point! LOL
A pedant walks into a bar. Well, it's a restaurant with a bar. Technically it's a brewpub since it has an onsite microbrewery.
Avg Joe, good one :)
JAYCE:
I love it when you talk pedantic!
Dudley:
Point taken but I agree with Yellowrocks about the regionality of pronunciations.
And I repeat: being able to laugh at oneself is a sign of a healthy psyche, IMHO.
Why it's called Murphy Bed ? Anyone ?
This comic ran a couple of days ago and it reminded me of a recent discussion here on the blog.
I almost linked it but thought it might offend.
But, since were laffing at ourselfs...
Pearls Before Swine
tgif
zcarguy, this should help: "Murphy Bed, the bedding idea of 1900 was invented by American William Lawrence Murphy (1876–1959) from San Francisco. The space-saving Murphy Bed folds into a wall closet. William Lawrence Murphy formed the Murphy Bed Company of New York, the second oldest oldest furniture manufacturer in the United States. Murphy patented his "In-A-Dor" bed in 1908, however, he did not trademark the name "Murphy Bed". "
Cross-Eyed Dave,
Don't wait until you run out of TP--I do most of my best thinking sitting right next to it. How else did I get more than half this puzzle done alone?
YellowRocks,
I guess I must be a prescriptivist. The descriptivists are the ones who agree to let incorrect usage creep in and take over. A student of foreign language becomes much more aware of why certain grammar rules are important, since other languages aren't necessarily as lax as English.
I cringe whenever I hear incorrect usage, I can't help it, it's just a nail on a chalkboard reaction that comes naturally and will automatically drop my estimation of that person's intellect a few notches.
Seen, by far my favorite comic strip. Rat's my hero.
RW, a very Happy Birthday; I've long admired your positive attitude and I wish you success with the new 'accessory'.
Hi all. Thanks Lemonade
Happy Birthday to Ron and congrats to Husker G and his wife. Hope you all have a terrific day.
I started out very slowly on this puzzle. Since I was in a rush, I put down the paper and went online with red letter help. I had many missteps, but was finally able to wrap it up, get the theme and get to my Pilates torture session.
Secret Confession: I hate Pilates. Time to dust off my MAT and get back to doing down dogs.
The most annoying thing about the new LAT puzzle format is that when you finish, it's impossible to look over the puzzle since there's a dialog box smack in the middle. Why is that?
Hahtool - Your quote of the day is so true. Love it!
Lemon, thanks for the explanation on GROSS ANATOMY, that makes more sense.
Happy birthday Ron! I'm pleased to have gotten to know you a little bit.
This was a long, hard puzzle for me. I enjoyed it but it didn't come easily.
It's a beautiful day here in the upper 60s. I'm going to head out for a bike ride and macchiato.
This morning, I had a bone density scan. I've never had one before. It was easy.
I just finished getting two fish tacos for lunch. Very tasty. The sunroof was open and I played me some Andre Segovia en route.
Yes, Kazie, I got your email. Thank you. I'm still struggling to get it all understood.
I know, I know, if you have to explain the joke it ain't good.
Murphy's Law...Murphy's Bed...anything that can go wrong will go wrong. Groan...
Its Friday and happy hour...time for a beer.
prescriptivist/descriptivist
tomato/tomahto
My pet peeve is when people use a word twice when it is unnecessary, like the word Do. (i do do it, when it should be just i do it). Where i come from Doo Doo is just crap!
(and why does the Blog spellchecker not like "prescriptivist," it's in the dictionary...)
Seen, I had to read it twice, but I got it.
A friend of mine has a poster on the wall of his shop:
"Murphy was an optimist!"
And yet look at how language has changed over the years and has become accepted (by some):
real good (really good)
sure it is (surely it is)
me and you (you and I)
it's me (it's I)
You all know what I mean, I am sure.
Lucina: saying me and her sets my teeth on edge.
It also hurts my ears when someone says: let me axe her, when it should be let me ask her.
My puzzle sheet had A LACK of any squares filled the first pass over. Looked up what I could and did not much better. A lemon of a puzzle for me, rescued when I went to Lemonade's write-up. Got a good giggle watching old Sha Na Na clips. What a hoot!
I love yarrow aka Queen Anne's Lace locally. My niece had a lovely outdoor wedding. The bridesmaids carried sprigs of yarrow. I asked my upscale SIL if she had to pay extra to get it since I'd never seen it at a wedding. She laughed and said she ran around to country ditches and picked it and tied ribbon around the stems. It's so funny because her husband raises fancy roses and they live in an expensive city neighborhood.
As a newspaper producer who spent many hours preparing camera-ready pages for print, I say, "boo hiss" for 2D. We called 'em dummies or proofs, if anything besides pages, as in "these pages are ready to go."
Happy birthday, Ron. Happy anniversary Gary & Joann. May you have many more!
I am glad to know that I am not the only one who had difficulty with this puzzle. I hate to admit it, but I had to go online in order to finish, as there were so many things I did not know. (What CED said, except I was not on the throne when I did the puzzle) Still in all, it was a learning experience. I do so appreciate this blog, as it satisfies my curiosity, and I am always free to ask if I do not understand something. Thanks Lemonade for a great job today!
My pet peeve with speech is split infinitives. Even Star Trek did it: "to boldly go where no man has gone before" when it should have been boldly to go, or to go boldly. This hurts my ears, and the television news reporters are guilty of this on a daily basis. Part of the problem is nobody teaches parts of speech in school anymore. I think it is called linguistics? I agree with Lucina and Gramma, and fear that things will get worse before they improve.
Pk I have always loved yarrow, Queen Anne's Lace.
Happy Birthday, Ron.
Happy Anniversary. Hg and Joann
LA CW Addict,
The problem with split infinitives is that the rule emanates from the descent of English from Latin and other languages where the infinitive is only one word. Unfortunately, in English it isn't, and sometimes it adds meaning when an adverb comes between the two words. That is one grammar rule I consider minor compared with "between you and I" or "they asked he and I".
Cross Eyed Dave,
I hadn't noticed your avatar the last time I posted. I LOL when I saw it.
#5 and out for today.
Lemonade@8:25 AM,
Wasn't happy about the 1971 merger, but I understood the reason. Wilbraham had the facilities, Monson the $.
Went to the 50th reunion in '08. Was surprised how little of the outer shell had changed, but the class rooms, labs, etc were all up to modern standards.
Lots of pleasant (and not so pleasant) memories were reminisced. There were roughly 30 Wilbraham grads and 5 Monson alumni who attended.
Thanks Dennis
wow I thought this was easy for a friday. I usually struggle hard on this day. I didnt like lamb clue or the abel and eve clues. But being a friday I was ready for stump the chump questions. Loved cowboy indian and always ales and pint questions, cheers!
I wanted to chime in and wish a happy anniversary to the HGs. Also happy birthday to Ron Wordon and others whom I have missed during the last week or so. Also, all the best with your leg, Ron. Prayers.
Today's puzzle was a frustrating DNF because this week has been easy to moderately difficult until today. I kept trying to find a secret rival, not a Secret rival. Had to red letter that and REPRO, which still doesn't make sense.
An error I have noticed in newspapers lately is the use of the word "after" , i.e. "A City truck was damaged after a drive by shooting." Did somebody hit it with a baseball bat after the shooting? "The pedestrian was killed after being hit by a car." What? Somebody really had it in for this guy. Maybe hitting him with the car didn't complete the job, so the driver got out and banged his head on the pavement?
*I am trademarking my name. None of ya sons a bitches can have it.
Happy Anniversary, HuskerG!!!
Happy Bithday, Guy with a new leg.
Everybody here seems to like kittens and dogs, so here are both in one video.
Queen Anne's Lace and Yarrow are two different plants that look alike. Yarrow is the more beneficial of the two.
Hola Everyone, Alas, Alack, I had a real DNF today. I finally gave up and read Lemon's great writeup to fill in the spaces that were missing.
I have the same feelings that Carol did today--frustration with unknown names, and I certainly wasn't on Ms. Brethauer's wavelength. Definitely a hard Friday puzzle.
Learning moments were Trap for Clay Pigeon flinger and Vente/Sale, in Calais. French words escape me for the most part.
I had minor surgery on my left big toe and I've had more pain with this, than with some of my major surgeries in the past. Sometimes the smallest things cause the biggest upset. I'm blaming some of my angst on this. LOL.
Kazie: It's all bad - the usage of the English language is going to hell, and nobody seems to care about it, 'cept us old fogies who know better because we were taught well! It is the least of this country's worries right now, but still something that needs to be addressed - just one more thing that has been allowed to slide, and to this nation's detriment, unfortunately.
Happy Birthday Ron W. and Happy Anniversary to HG and Joann.
May you have many happy days ahead.
I'm glad to see the Don Dawn discussion as I don't pronouce those two words the same and was really surprised when they were considered homonymns. Regional pronuciations are tricky to say the least.
I don't pronounce Don/Dawn the same either. My wife was always surprised as an elementary teacher when her students pronounced Mary/Merry/Marry all the same. She pronounced them all differently. Of course, growing up on Long Island, she used to pronounce coffee as Kaw-fee. I agree with Kazie. When people say stuff like, "Do you want to go to lunch with my wife and I?", I have a hard time keeping my big mouth shut.
I said Happy Birthday to Ron but I neglected to congratulate H. Gary on their 45th anniversary, so I'll do it now. Very excellent!
So how do you pronounce Don versus Dawn if they aren't the same?
Hi All ~~
A tough puzzle today but I enjoyed it. Had to look up SEVE to be able to solve that whole section. Thanks for all the explanations, Lemonade!
Happy Anniversary, Husker Gary and Joann ~~ hope you enjoyed your special day.
Happy Birthday, Ron and the best to you in the days ahead. Your attitude is one to be admired!
Donny, my thoughts exactly. I've been saying Don-Dawn-Don to myself for awhile now and they sound the same. Mary also sounds like merry, but not like marry.Definitely regional. I also say saw, not sall.
Coach J @ 8:48, thanks for summing up my battle with today's xwd. There were no learning moments, but very much enjoyed all the comments and Lemon's write up.
HBTY Ron
H.Anniversary Gary and Mrs. Husker.
Chickie, sorry about your ouchie.
Don, Ron, John
Dawn, Lawn, Brawn
If Don and Dawn sound alike, which sound is it? If someone already said; sorry. I missed it.
I've recently become a big fan of Ellen Degeneres. Her talk show is cleverer and funnier than either Letterman, Leno or Conan. Plus, she is generous and has a kind heart. It's well worth recording, watching the good parts and skipping over anything that doesn't interest you.
Argyle ~~ That's exactly how I hear it here in CT. Curious about other parts of the country.
Does anyone notice, expecially on cop shows, how everyone puts the word "AT" at the end of a sentence? "Where are you at?" "I am Crossword Corner at!!"
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