Theme: "I am not a crook"*
17. Cookies named for their flavor : NILLA WAFERS. Vanilla flavored.
28. Flu sufferer's complaint : I FEEL AWFUL. DH's complaint for the entire month of January!
34. Fib : TELL A WHITE LIE. Would I lie to you?
40. Washington county or its seat : WALLA WALLA. Love the name of that city. I'll have to visit it one day.
And the reveal:
55. Ones often in custody ... and what 17-, 28-, 34- and 40-Across are? : LAW BREAKERS. The word LAW is "broken" in the theme entries.
My old friend Jeffrey is back in the Thursday lineup with a buried word theme. I wasn't looking for the theme, but spotted LAW in the first two entries, and confirmed it with the third and fourth. I liked the reveal, because it describes the phrases perfectly. I finished this one in about my typical Wednesday time, so slightly easier than normal for a Thursday. Let's see why I was on Jeffrey's wavelength.
*(Bonus points if you can name the source of the quote.)
Across:
1. Move suddenly : DART. Filled immediately.
5. Art style emphasizing gritty reality : VERISM. In old Roman art, it could be described as "warts and all," for busts that represent the subject realistically instead of romanticized.
11. Cut, as a branch : LOP.
14. Maker of BESTÅ storage products : IKEA. Odd-looking diacritical marks? Probably Swedish...
15. G8 member country : FRANCE.
16. "__ Got No Strings": Pinocchio : I'VE.
19. Chemin de __ : FER. French for railroad. Literally, "road of iron." Much better clue than "Not agin'…"
20. First name in American poetry : EMILY. Dickinson.
21. Carrier with a hub in Oslo : SAS. Scandinavian Airlines System. I wonder how many BESTÅs they carry each week?
22. Physics unit : ERG.
23. Toed the line : OBEYED.
25. Modesto-to-San Jose dir. : WSW. 1 hour and 23 minutes, depending on the route you take.
26. __ speak : SO TO.
27. Agree, in a way : NOD.
31. Trig ratios : SINES.
33. "It's a Wonderful Life" director : CAPRA. One of the all-time greatest movies ever, and my personal motto!
38. Some stereos : SONYS.
39. Stage device : ASIDE.
43. Spooner, for one: Abbr. : REV.erend.
46. "Perhaps" : I MAY.
47. Have the flu : AIL. Kinda sorta clecho with one of the theme entries.
48. Plant with edible seeds : SESAME.
51. On behalf of : FOR.
52. Initials on old globes : SSR. Soviet Socialist Republic.
53. Stingy one : PIKER.
54. Yank : TUG.
59. Computer add-on? : ESE. (Why not "Crossword add-on?") He could not clue it as a direction, since WSW was also in the grid.
60. Brought down : ABASED.
61. Really important : HUGE.
62. Blushing : RED.
63. Desert shimmer : MIRAGE.
64. Shot : SPED.
Down:
1. Eat at the main meal : DINE ON.
2. Like Superman's arms, often : AKIMBO.
4. Running amount : TALLY.
5. Group for ex-GIs : VFW. Veterans of Foreign Wars.
6. Stat that's better if it's lower : ERA. Earned Run Average. Baseball. I wanted "par."
7. Luftwaffe foe: Abbr. : RAF. Royal Air Force.
8. Actually existing: Lat. : IN ESSE.
9. Poor penmanship : SCRAWL. DH needs me to read his "notes to self" sometimes, because he cannot make them out.
10. Fool (with) : MESS.
11. 2012 film for which Ang Lee won Best Director : LIFE OF PI. Read the book. Saw the movie. Loved them both.
12. Operatic opening : OVERTURE. Recognize this one? 3:06
13. Vine-covered walkway : PERGOLA. Pretty!
18. Assent to a captain : AYE.
24. Actress Merrill : DINA. I remember her from "Operation Petticoat."
25. Formal group assent : WE SHALL...overco-o-ome
26. Soggy lowland : SWALE.
29. Handful : FEW.
30. Completed with one stroke : ACED. Golf. If you hit the ball into the hole in one stroke on a par three, it is called an ACE. I have had exactly one in my life.
31. In a foxy way : SLYLY.
32. "As Time Goes By" requester : ILSA.
34. Burns' "tim'rous beastie" ode : TO A MOUSE.
35. Blew up : ENLARGED. Nice misdirection. I wanted "exploded" at first.
36. Catalina, for one: Abbr. : ISL.and.
37. Familia members : TIAS. Spanish "aunts." Uncles = tios.
38. More rapid : SWIFTER. I get housework done SWIFTER with my Swiffer.
41. Horseradish relative : WASABI. Yesterday, I bought some WASABI peas. Healthy and yummy!
42. Elevated conflict : AIR WAR.
43. Gather, as fallen leaves : RAKE UP. As opposed to "Gather, as money": RAKE in.
44. Come out : EMERGE.
45. Skilled : VERSED.
49. Pollution-fighting org. : EPA. Environmental Protection Agency.
50. Followers of Guru Nanak : SIKHS.
52. Bang on the way out : SLAM. (the door)
56. Merit badge gp. : BSA. Boy Scouts of America.
57. Short rule? : REG.ulation
58. Stamp ending : EDE. Stampede
And that's it from me for this week!
Marti
Notes from C.C.:
1) Here is a photo of Mike Alpern & George Barany at
the ACPT. Mike organizes the annual Cru Dinner. Our own Minnesotan George was the judge
this year. You can click here and view Mike's ACPT 2013 pictures. See Marti and Rich? Hopefully Mike will have a 2014 Picasa album to share with us.
 |
| March 9, 2014 ACPT |
2) Happy Birthday to JJM, who has been posting here on our blog for quite some time. Yet I don't feel I quite know him. So, use your imagination for the cake picture, Dave! (Added later: JJM's birthday is tomorrow. Sorry for the mistake.)
All Theme Entries
ReplyDeleteIn WALLA WALLA, Rafe was mad at the bakers,
So he crumbled a shelf of NILLA WAFERS,
"I FEEL AWFUL," he'll sigh.
Still he'll TELL A WHITE LIE
Or else join the ranks of LAW BREAKERS!
Selected Non-Theme Entries
EMILY Dickinson feared FOR the worst.
Robbie Burns an ale often nursed.
But each was sublime
When SCRAWLing a rhyme.
At verse they both were well-VERSED!
Non-Theme Entries Illustrating The Theme.
The crossword RED made had no flaw.
Its perfection would hold all in awe.
But the editor said nope,
There's a REG. that it broke;
Every puzzle must have nits, its a LAW!
Morning, all (and Happy Birthday, JJM)!
ReplyDeleteMostly smooth solve today, but I totally turfed it in the SE corner. Had a sea of white down there and just couldn't get any traction. Finally turned on the red-letter help to see if 43D was RAKE IN or RAKE UP. And then, even though it had nothing to do with 43D, SIKHS suddenly came to me. Should have waited a few minutes before turning on the red letter help, since SIKHS really got me going down there. Just ran out of time...
Richard Nixon was famous for not being a crook, btw.
Good Morning, Marti and friends. Fun Thursday puzzle. I got the LAW BREAKERS before the other clues, but getting the unifier helped with the rest of the puzzle.
ReplyDeleteG8 stands for Group of 8, and besides France, the other countries are: Canada, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the UK and the US.
I spent the weekend RAKing UP leaves from the live oak trees in my yard. The leaves fall in the spring instead of autumn.
Happy Birthday, JJM! Hope you have a fabulous day.
QOD: I do not recollect when I had such a mental treat. ~ Abigail Fillmore (Mar. 13, 1798 ~ Mar. 30, 1853)
A nice Thursday puzzle with a clever theme. SWALE came late (with perps). It's a word I'd like to remember.
ReplyDeleteIn the end, another typo hunt. I didn't know the way to San Jose so had to change SSW to WSW and, even after hearing the "TaDa!", it took a few seconds to decipher WESHALL: WES HALL? WESH ALL? D'oh!.
We dodged a weather bullet yesterday. All rain. I hope Irish Mist (who, I believe is a little farther north) was as lucky.
[10:02]
Good morning, everyone!
ReplyDeleteHappy Birthday JJM! If those two adorable children are yours, you must be a very proud papa! I hope you do something special with them today.
¸¸¸.•*¨*♫♥♫¸¸¸.•*¨*♫♥♫¸¸¸.•*¨*♫♥♫¸¸¸.•*¨*♫♥♫
OwenKL, great rhymes today, but that last one really cracked me up!
We were supposed to get "snow showers" today, but looking out my window, it looks more like a Nor'easter to me. Is Spring ever going to arrive???
So you DO know the way to San Jose.
ReplyDeleteGood morning!
ReplyDeleteTo quote the REVerend Spooner, this one was "smoother than a well-boiled icicle." Didn't get the theme til the reveal. Didn't need it. In fact, after seeing NILLA and WALLA I expected that double-L to appear in the third theme answer. Nope.
Happy birthday, JJM.
Marti, in VERISM do they paint the busts so as to make 'em look more lifelike???
In my newspaper BESTA was all caps -- no diacritical marking. No Swedish hint.
To call my handwriting a SCRAWL would be a compliment.
Hand up for claiming my bonus points.
d-otto, oops - ya got me! Now I feel the pressure to link a realistic-looking BUST.
ReplyDeleteGood morning, folks. Thank you, Jeffrey Wechsler, for a fine puzzle. Thank you, Marti, for a fine review.
ReplyDeleteGot a really slow start with this puzzle. Went here and there plugging in a few words. Slowly everything fell into p[lace.
AKIMBO was unknown, but with six solid perps I went with it.
Read LIFE OF PI. Excellent book. I would like to see the movie.
PERGOLA was unknown. Six perps and one wag it worked. Chemin de FER. The R was my wag in Pergola. I would rather have seen agin'.
We sure get IKEA a lot. Our local IKEA has a breakfast for about $1.00 each day. Top floor, of course. It does get people into the store. Those Swedes are pretty smart. Makes me feel good because I am 3/8 Swedish. The rest of me is in smaller proportions. I guess I am a mutt.
Well, 9 degrees here today. It is going in the wrong direction.
See you tomorrow.
Abejo
(304 8449943)
Theme and related answers came easily once I got a few footholds.
Happy Birthday, JJM. And many more!
ReplyDeleteAbejo
Thank you for the puzzle Jeffrey. Thank you for the informative review, Marti.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Marti. In the end, this was easier than a typical Thursday puzzle for me, although it didn’t seem so along the way. I had several white areas in the south-central and southwest for a long time, but recovered with WAGs and perps to finish in about Wednesday time.
I didn’t know VERISM, TO A MOUSE, and didn’t know Spooner was a REV, although I’ve probably read that some time ago. I didn’t know WALLA WALLA but the theme helped me get it.
I had AMFMS before SONYS, SLIER before SLYLY, and ILE before ISL.
Hand up for EXPLODED before ENLARGED. That held me up for a while until I let it go.
I love the word AKIMBO!
Swale was a racehorse that died 8 days after winning the Belmont in 1984.
Happy birthday, JJM!
Good morning everybody. Nice puzzle today. I got LAW BREAKERS first and then began to see LAW in the other theme clues.
ReplyDeleteI liked the clue for 57D: Short rule? REG.
Interesting words today: WASABI and AKIMBO
But I was stumped on 34D. I had to look this one up and found out that Burns wrote his TO A MOUSE in 1785. No wonder I didn't know it!
Have a gret day, and happy birthday to JJM, wherever you are!
I agree, Marti, a puzzle with a Wednesday or even a Tuesday feel. I always enjoy your posts. The theme was quickly evident. I, too, enjoyed The Life of Pi, both the movie and the book.
ReplyDeleteMy son had a swale in his back yard which was soggy for days after a rainfall. When he remodeled his house and added a larger patio last year he re-landscaped part of it, omitting the swale.
If you are put off by Burns's old dialect, here is a version of To A Mouse in Standard English.
Link To A Mouse
Easy run, I'll get to work on time today! Some of my favorite words just to say, like "akimbo".
ReplyDeleteLearning moment for today: pergola.
I always think it means something like cupola that you would find on a house.
Happy birthday, JJM , thanks Marti, and happy Thursday (which is my Friday!)
ReplyDeleteGood morning all,
I agree with Marti, this was a bit easier then the normal Thursday, but in the end I had one error. 19A FER & 13D PERGOLA were totally "foreign" to me. iInstead of the R, I wagged an I.
Even though I SPED along at my normal pace, there were a few tricky/fun clues to suss through. For 35D I began with Exploded before ENLARGED appeared.
57D REG & 64A SPED were clever. 2D AKIMBO was a ???? but I was confident the across fills were spot on.
Thanks to Jeff for a fun offering and Marti for her usual informative & witty write up.
Winter is back in the Nutmeg state. Low temps, big winds & flurries.Hope I get the lawn raked seeded & fertilized before May.
ReplyDeleteOOPS! Happy Birthday to JJM. Hope you have a fun day.
Hand up for remembering Nixon saying "I am not a crook".
ReplyDeleteI must be the only person in the country who did not like Life of Pi. A very good friend recommended it, and we usually like the same books, so I watched it. I thought the movie was slow and boring.
Hahtoolah: Was intrigued by your QOTD, so been looking up bios of Abigail Fillmore, who seems more interesting than her presidential husband. For instance, her romance with her future husband began in a scandalous manner - she was his teacher and he was one of her school students! And she died the same way as William Henry Harrison - pneumonia caught at an outdoor Presidential inauguration!
ReplyDeleteDig I butress, as Spooner might say. The quote "I do not recollect when I had such a mental treat" was reference to a discussion with a theology professor, though some sources say it was about her assembling the first White House library (which Congress was reluctant to fund because "it would give the President too much power!").
YR: Thanks for the translation. Burns was Freemasonry's first poet laureate, so most Masons are familiar with his works, but I'd never seen an English version before.
I was on Jeffrey's wave length this morning. Our paper didn't arrive so I did it on line in 13:18. That's Monday time for me.
ReplyDelete@ inanehiker 8:09 AM --
ReplyDelete"...happy Thursday (which is my Friday!)"
You got my curiosity up. Where are you located? I don't see you on the Blog Map. Or are you referring to a work schedule?
Musings
ReplyDelete-As often happens, my experience was the same as Marti’s.
-I FEEL AWFUL, an email this morning revealed my old friend just had a heart attack and is not doing well
-VERISM and INESSE took care of themselves because I surely wasn’t going to
-If you’re the head of FRANCE, do your wife and mistress both come to your birthday party?
-Show me a politician who can sing I’ve Got No Strings
-I remember when this SONY product was cutting edge
-John Kerry rued the day he said, “I was FOR it until I was against it”. For political balance, Bush the elder also regretted, “Read my lips, no new taxes”
-Oh, I thought this was AKIMBO (:13)
-I kept a TALLY on my board every time a girl said “like” while she telling a story and she never got it. When I told her and had her start over, she couldn’t even start without using that word.
-A low ERA is fine but…
-Sometimes ELARGEMENT doesn’t work
-I told Joann the glob WASABI I ate was fine but “a little bitty tear let me down”
-HBD JJM!
Good Morning everyone.
ReplyDeleteHappy Birthday JJM
Good Thursday puzzle. Some alternate definitions. Don't see AKIMBO much. New words VERISM and PERGOLA. Theme gimmick, broken LAW, helped with some of the fill. Had swamp before SWALE and explode before ENLARGE - Only 2 white-outs needed.
Welcome aboard to Mary Keller.
Have a good day.
Husker's story reminded me of the time I took my cousin to the Chinese buffet. He thought the wasabi was guacamole and took a big spoonful of it. I could have stopped him but where' the fun in that?
ReplyDeleteHi gang -
ReplyDeleteHBD JJM
HASTIER before SWIFTER, EXPLODED before ENLAGRED. But my real trouble was in the NW corner.
JERK, JOLT, VEER before DART, though I drive one. Stared at _ _ _ _ Y for though longest time, though EMILY is our youngest granddaughter.
Good puzzle, nice theme, overall I liked it, but hate "computer add on" and even more so "Stamp ending."
Bright sunshine today, but only 12 degrees, heading for the 20's.
Extremely cool regards!
JzB
Good Morning:
ReplyDeleteRather easy for a Thursday but enjoyable just the same. Clever theme and some fresh fill, e.g., pergola and akimbo. Thanks, Jeffrey, and thanks, Marti, for your sparkling write-up.
Al Cyone, although we had rain, then sleet, and then snow and blustering winds, it wasn't as bad as what had been predicted. I'm sure driving conditions were dicey for a time but, overall, we escaped the worst of it.
Happy Birthday, JJM, hope it's a great day for you.
Enjoy your Thursday.
Thank you one and all for the B-Day wishes, but my B-Day is actually tomorrow (Pi-Day)(56). Regardless. thank you so much! It's always nice to be remembered! There are lots of wonderful people on this blog. I'll post a picture later.Thanks C.C. for remembering!
ReplyDeleteI found this to be hard until the theme finally came to me, then it was smooth sailing. Fun puzzle.
30 minutes today which is about the usual for a Thursday. Lots of first fills which needed to be changed - CANADA/FRANCE, DEKE/DART, SWAMP/SWALE, SAW/LOP, MISER/PIKER.
ReplyDeleteNE fell first, then S central, then NW, and SW was the last to fall. Even then I could not figure out WESHALL??? Oh, WE SHALL. DUH!
Calgary STAMPEDE is fun. They even managed to hold it after the floods last year.
We don't have NILLA WAFERS here but I have learned of them from CWs. VERISM was new to me. I love the word AKIMBO!
Some CSOs today with 31A for Bill G. and 39A for Keith.
I have seen lots of poor penmanship from MDs over the years with SCRAWL on Rx orders. Thankfully now, most of them are printed out of computers!!
Thanks for that pergola photo, Marti. We need some flowers here after 12 inches of snow yesterday and -18C temps here today. We don't need to RAKE UP, we need to shovel out!
ReplyDelete"The best-laid schemes o' mice an' men
ReplyDeleteGang aft agley,"
Thanks for posting YR. I had forgotten that this famous line came from To A Mouse.
Nice offering by Jeffrey. Like Marti, caught the theme quickly. Some unknowns which perps helped out for me.
ReplyDeleteNice write-up, Marti!
Happy Thursday to all!
Not a speed run today, but I was able to do it in the paper using a pencil and an eraser (a big eraser) and no look-ups. Perps helped.
ReplyDeleteTomorrow is Pi day (Link to PiDay). Pi Day is celebrated on March 14th (3/14) around the world in math circles. It's a little different from the "Life of Pi." On a culinary note I prefer homemade peach pi(e).
Husker, now that song sounds like Burl Ives. I was afraid to click on your "Enlargement doesn't work" link.
ReplyDeleteI get WASABI and wapiti confused. I don't eat either one. Then, of course, there's the Mesabi range in Minnesota. Not edible, either.
PERGOLA is a common word across the southland. It seems every other yard has got one. My yard is the one that doesn't.
The theme could've been better executed if the LAWBREAKERS were evenly and symmetrically distributed among "_L AW_", "_LA W_" and "_L A W_", two of each. For instance:
ReplyDeleteSTEAL AWAY
SPACIAL AWARENESS
GUERILLA WAR
SELA WARD
CORAL A WILD HORSE
PULL A WEED
VERISM: I mostly know this word from Puccini's style, together with that of Mascagni, Leoncavallo and a few others. It is a translation of the Italian word verismo and is used to also described the styles of Émile Zola, Guy de Maupassant et al.
EMILY Brontë? She was the first EMILY that popped in, and she wasn't even a poet or American.
Favorite words: AKIMBO and PERGOLA.
I did not like the EDE and ESE suffixes, and the 135° turn from ESE to WSW.
FRANCE and OVERTURE inspired me to this OVERTURE in the French Style in B minor, BWV 831, by J. S. Bach.
Enjoy your day.
The north-west 3x4 corner was blank for me but everything else was filled.
ReplyDeleteMarti: Thank you for a wonderful write-up & links.
ReplyDeleteOnly needed "5-perps" to figure out who followed Guru Nanak (SIKHS).
Learning moment already forgotten.
Don't a lot of plants have edible seeds? (like SESAME).
Not going to SLAM the puzzle ... but I prefer the ones with booze answers.
Guess I'll have to look elsewhere.
Well the "Sun-Is-Over-The-Yardarm."
Cheers!!!
I started this puzzle at the bottom, and came across the theme reveal before the other theme answers. When I read the clue, my first thought was BEHINDBARS, thinking the other theme answers would have word(s) after BAR.
ReplyDeleteIt didn't turn out that way, of course, but I thought I'd mention it in case CC or Marti wanted to use the theme in a future puzzle.
Happy Birthday JJM!
Oh. Never mind.
Anon @ 12:07, only if you turn blue and agree to collaborate! (^0^)
ReplyDeleteFourth Ta-da this week--makes for a set of great mornings! Many thanks for a fun puzzle, Jeff, and a fun write-up, Marti. I'll take my bonus points for NIXON, too.
ReplyDeleteSaw a sweet play called "Kimberly AKIMBO" some years ago, but still couldn't remember exactly how the arms were held until Marti's Superman picture.
Had ENGORGED instead of ENLARGED at first, and SWAMP instead of SWALE. Glad I fixed them in time.
How did I miss ever hearing about VERISM? Thought I knew my art.
Lots of FLU going around in this puzzle.
In case I forget to send birthday wishes tomorrow, JJM, just want you to know I'm hoping you'll have a great day.
Have a wonderful Thursday, everybody!
Nice puzzle and thanks for the expo, Marti.
ReplyDeleteTo each his own - harder than the average Thursday for me, and a Natick at VERISM/VFW - a total WAG and I got it at the second attempt.
WBS about the southwest - I was staring at a sea of white until RAKE UP and then I got a toehold.
Happy Birthday for tomorrow JJM in case I don't make it here.
So many abbrs. I'm with Jazzb in not liking the "Stamp ending"=EDE technique. I was particularly put off the other day by "Capri suffix"=OTI. Could just as well have been ATI (as in Jennifer), and besides, it's not a suffix, no more than RO is a suffix of ICHI or REY is a suffix of JEFF. Anyway ...
ReplyDeleteI am not a grump!
Best wishes to you all.
Jayce;
ReplyDeleteThe other day (Tuesday) the "Capri suffix" was OTE.
But I agree that these "type-of-clues" are signs of "lazy-construction" ...
(And now we will probably see "Suffix of Jeff" and get REY. lol!!!)
Barry G.
Richard Nixon was famous for the quote "I am not a crook."
As for "famous for not being a crook" ... I disagree. He was!
Very clever yet somewhat difficult puzzle, that I enjoyed. Thank you Jeff Wechsler and a very fine blog, Marti.
ReplyDeleteA small nit ... Does the answer, REV for ..... Spooner, for instance .... Stand for Reverend or reversal ( of prefixes - ). You're probably more correct, since the clue refers to the man, rather than the figure of speech.
Happy birthday, JJM, for tomorrow. Remember e, to the power ( pi times i ), is equal to minus one. Euler's identity.
Have a nice day, all.
Not too difficult for a Thursday, but of course there were a few WAGs.
ReplyDeleteI am not familiar with "akimbo," & thought it sounded funny. But when I went to look for funny akimbo images everything I found had something to do with guns... The dictionary was no help, but the last paragraph in this WIKI entry explained why it is a recent phenomenon.
OwenKL@5:41, I especially liked your last poem, & go so far as to say it should be recited instead of linking "what Thumper said."
What are you going to do about those darn fool lawbreakers...
Tinbeni, your constant "over the yardarm" references are making me want to break a few laws myself...
It is not too often I get to send a (what's the opposite of "belated?") Happy Birthday. Hmm, Early (Nah.) Punctual (Oh Please....) Oh well, here is a "preemptive" HBD cake! (I took a WAG with the theme...)
HBD JJM!
ReplyDeleteThis one made me realize how naked our pergola feels without vines!
I was hung up for a while at 34A. I had LA WHITE LIE and kept trying to find the noun variation of LITTLE. I don't know why it took so long to go for the verb phrase. But all fell in place by the end. Like others, I felt Mr Wechsler's pzl put up a little fight, but just a little one. It has been a long time now since I've had a DNF. I wonder if I'll make it through Saturday with my record intact...
~
I guess we all know why the usual answer to "Luftwaffe foe" is RAF rather than France's Armée de l'Air or FAFL! I'm reading Not I these days, by Joachim Fest, about a German kid coming of age during the Third Reich and his captivity by the allies after the war. When you get right down to it, WWII was the most devastating turning point in French history. From forcing German diplomats to enter through the back door at Versailles to collapsing in two weeks of Blitzkrieg... Mon dieu, quelle catastrophe!
CED: For JJM (tomorrow) shouldn't he get a "Happy Birthday Pi"???
ReplyDelete3.14 is National Pie Day.
Also, here, at Villa Incognito, the "Sun-Is-Over-The-Yardarm" happens at dawn. Just sayin'...
"Wella, Wella, Jeff's a jolly good puzzle fella!" Before I saw the unifier, I kept thinking there were a lot of "L's" (15) and "W's" (8) today. Isn't that a bit unusual? Thanks, Marti!
ReplyDeleteThis was pretty speedy for me. Last to fill was the "V" in REV/VERSED cross. Never heard of REV Spooner. The only thing I could come up with for Spooner was someone in the act of spooning (cuddling). That sometimes REVs one's motor.
I had trouble with the "P" in the PI/CAPRA cross too. DUH! But haven't read the PI book. Probably won't.
Chemin de FER came easily, but I thought it was a game of chance.
JJM, Happy Birthday tomorrow!
My take on the Arthur Chu loss yesterday was that he decided it was time to go home. Has there ever been a contestant who got more flak? He wasn't exactly lovable, but he didn't deserve negative comments. Bravo to a formidable contestant!
I wondered about –ede as a suffix in STAMPEDE, but I discovered that, at least in its origin, it really is a suffix, an ending that adds meaning to the original word. I agree it is not so clear cut in English.
ReplyDeleteSTAMPEDE Origin:
1815–25, Americanism; < American Spanish estampida, Spanish, equivalent to estamp ( ar ) to stamp + -ida noun suffix
Demonyms denote residents of a locality The English language uses several models to create demonyms. The most common is to add a suffix to the end of the location's name, slightly modified in some instances. –ote is added to Capri to denote a resident of Capri. With a spelling change, -ot or –ote can be added to Cyprus to denote a resident of Cyprus. Cypriot or Cypriote.
In HELLO, the last syllable is not a suffix, just the last syllable.
I tend to agree that sometimes in crosswords when a last syllable is called a suffix, it is not. However, Rich has experienced researchers vetting all the clues, so I very carefully look up my nits and everyone else’s. 95% of the time or more, the work of Rich and his aides holds up.. Occasionally an error slips through. A notable example was Rich’s rejecting of Marti’s snake in the grass puzzle which referred to a rattler, on the grounds that rattlers do not inhabit grasslands. I was aware that rattlers inhabit grassland s as well as deserts and research confirmed it. If I were younger and willing to be tied down to a job, I would very much enjoy being one of Rich’s researchers.
Happy Thursday everybody!
ReplyDeleteThought I had ACED the puzzle, but I was one square short of a Ta-Da, I had WNW instead is WSW, and since the cross was from a dead language....
When I lived in the Tri Cities area of WA, it always amazed me that folks would hop in their cars to drive 50 miles to WALLA WALLA just to DINE ON Olive Garden fare....
Put me down for liking LIFE OF PI the movie....
CED, what's the opposite of beloved - behated...?
Finally Happy Birthday Eve to JJM...!
Hello Puzzlers -
ReplyDeleteNo major problems, though I did try the same thing Misty did, i.e. Engorged before Enlarged. Piker is not very familiar to me but I've heard it before.
The definition of Akimbo was told to me sorta recently, by an intelligent young woman with whom I occasionally solved crosswords at a local café. I was surprised at its meaning. I probably saw the word in a novel and mis-estimated it, somewhere over the years.
Afternoon, Marti! Enjoyed the write-up. Congratulations on surviving your remodeling project, it sounds like a major a$$ buster!
JJM, Happy Birthday tomorrow!
ReplyDeleteTinbeni, cheers!
OwenKL, bravo!
PAR isn't a stat; it's a standard or goal of achievment. Lower isn't necessarily better (or worse).
ReplyDeleteYR @ 2:53, I think you would make a great researcher for Rich! Bless you for supporting my "Snake in the Grass" puzzle theme. I was particularly fond of that one, and was devastated when it was rejected on a (what I thought was an erroneous) " technicality."
ReplyDeleteMikey @ 4:08, who knows what goes on in the minds of men (and women) when solving a puzzle? I know that PAR on a golf course is "standard," but if you are "below par" then you are a really good golfer!! OTOH, if you are "below par" in performance, as in a job, then you are not really very good. English is a wonderful language, isn't it??
TINBENI @ 1:27, wouldn't that make him "IN-famous"???
ReplyDeleteI was all over the place in this puzzle. Got CAPRA right away, BESTA in caps threw me off - - never heard PIKER before. Remembered PERGOLA when I saw it written out. RAKED IN before UP.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the welcome, Spitzboov.
Thanks again, Anonymous T. Found it without a problem.
Argyle, funny about the wasabi /guacamole episode. My oldest son when he was about 9, tricked his younger brother who was 3, and he told him to lick a block of hot ice in the frozen foods section of Thrifty. So he did, and I had a bloody-tongued child screaming through the store. Older brother got punished, and I thought that was the end of it.
Twenty five years later, younger brother comes back from Florida, and he and big brother go out to eat. Nice side of "guacamole" for big brother.
After the teary-eyed, red faced big brother calmed down, the younger one says, "THAT'S your payback for Thriftys!!
Revenge is a dish that should be served up cold....or hot, as the occasion warrants!
Mary Keller, funny story about revenge! Glad to hear that the younger one finally got his…
ReplyDelete(Being the youngest of 5 children, it gives me an especially warm feeling to read about that!!)
@Buckeye Bob at 8:37 -- It's still Thursday for me too-- but I was referring to my work schedule. I work M-Th in the office-- Friday just clean up odds and ends from home. I guess I should let HG put me on the map as being from Jefferson City, MO - the crossword is in the Jefferson City News-Tribune.
ReplyDeleteinanehiker, welcome! I, too, am usually finished with my work week by noon on Fridays. I'm curious about your name. As an avid hiker / climber in the Alps, I would love to know which trails you like the most?
ReplyDeleteMusings 2
ReplyDelete-I am watching a golf tournament from Florida and par is certainly a stat. One par 4 Hole is rated as +.815 which means statistically the pros shoot that much over par on that hole. That is certainly a STAT in terms of par.
-inanehiker, your map is on its way, even though you are probably a Mizzou fan ;-)
-Marti, I’ve got a deck that could use a little staining. Do you have a union card?
-Olive Garden is fine but a 50 mile drive?
-I hope everyone had a wonderful JJM BD Eve!
What a tedious annoying puzzle, going out of its way to find odd or unlikely connections. "Blew up" for "enlarged"? "Shot" for "sped"? Or odd uncommon words like "pergola", etc etc. LA Times crosswords are getting awfully boring.
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