Theme: "Double Talk"- Clues, all in quotation marks (hence "talk"), serve dual purpose (hence "double talk"), explaining both words in theme answers which are all in the pattern of *ING *
23A. "Uh-oh, there's a ball and glass shards under the window"? : BREAKING NEWS
45A "Give 20% for great service"? : TIPPING POINT. Tipping was new to me when I first arrived in the US.
61A. "You shoulda seen the one that got away"? : FISHING LINE. The Annandale flea market we go on Saturdays are surrounded by many many lakes.
70A. "The children were angels and in bed by eight"? : SITTING BULL
86A. "Hooray, you're up!"? : ROUSING CHEER
112A. "Here's a good way to use your comb"? : PARTING WORDS
17D. "Who's ahead?"? : LEADING QUESTION
43D. "A daily jog is good for you"? : RUNNING ARGUMENT
So,
all the theme entries are completely re-interpreted with amusing
effect. It takes imagination & humor to execute this type of
gimmick. Ed is a pro.
Also I love the fill today. So clean for a 140-worder.
Across:
1. Be a slacker : DOG IT
6. Soft-bodied swimmers : OCTOPI. The meat is chewy.
12. Kin of raspberries : CATCALLS. Not other fruit.
20. One may be seen with glasses : OPERA. Opera glasses.
21. Forgoes : WAIVES
22. Like sloths : ARBOREAL
25. "No sweat" : REAL EASY!
26. Prohibited : BANNED
27. Organ with a drum : EAR
28. Small strings on the Big Island : UKES
30. Presages : BODES
31. Destroys, as illusions : SHATTERS. That's why I disliked Juiced.
33. Forced with a crowbar : PRIED
35. 68-Down maker : DELI. 68. 35-Across order : BLT. I already harvested two tomatoes from our garden.
36. __Kosh B'Gosh : OSH
37. Rhone feeder : SAONE
38. "The Great Schnozzola" : DURANTE
41. Taj Mahal setting : AGRA
48. St. leader : GOV. "St" can stand for quite a few things.
49. Dull-edged : BLUNT
51. Trekkie, to some : NERD
52. Get into : DON. Oh, clothes.
53. "__ se habla español" : AQUI. Here. Spanish is spoken here.
54. Wrigley's Big Red flavoring : CINNAMON
56. Silver lining : UPSIDE
59. Pitch : HURL
60. RR stop : STN
64. Composer Camille Saint-__ : SAENS
65. Link up with : TIE TO
67. "The Dark Knight" director Christopher : NOLAN. I confused him with the creepy X-Men director Bryan Singer.
68. Brazilian dance opener : BOSSA (Nova)
69. Jamboree quarters : TENTS
74. "Enough already!" : TMI
76. Therefore : ERGO
77. Like this answer : ACROSS. So meta.
78. Things : ENTITIES
80. Indian flatbread : NAAN
81. Mauna __ : LOA. "Long" in Hawaiian.
82. Part of a family business name : SONS
84. Unmanned flier : DRONE
85. Copier size: Abbr. : LTR
91. Hold 'em opener : ANTE
92. Most monumental : BIGGEST
94. Aloe targets : SORES
95. Batt. terminal : NEG
97. Sources in a modern bibliog. : URLS
98. Playwright Chekhov : ANTON. Masha, one of "Three Sisters", was modeled on his future wife, a stage actress.
99. Mason : STONEMAN
104. '50s first lady : MAMIE
106. Cocktail hour spread : PATE
107. Hieroglyphic serpent : ASP
109. Wisconsin city on Lake Michigan : RACINE. Not familiar with this city. Siren, Wisconsin has a Burnikel Road.
110. Mass approval : AMEN AMEN
115. Beltway : RING ROAD
116. Each : A PIECE
117. Like a good watchdog : ALERT
118. Chant : INTONATE. Only know the noun "Intonation".
119. Headed for the Styx : DOOMED
120. Helps through difficulty, with "over" : TIDES
Down:
1. Lou of Fox Business Network : DOBBS. I used to watch him faithfully in his CNN days.
2. TV book club creator : OPRAH
3. Actress Davis : GEENA
4. "__, Therefore I Am": Dennis Miller book : I RANT
5. Become fond of : TAKE TO
6. Possess : OWN
7. Cockatoo quarters : CAGES
8. '90s "New Yorker" editor Brown : TINA.
Sharp wit. She bought this famous cartoon & published it
immediately. Like LA Times crosswords, "New Yorker" has a long queue of
cartoons.
 |
| "No |
9. Didn't shop around, maybe : OVER-PAID
10. Benchlike seat : PEW
11. Distributing : ISSUING
12. Liked, with "for" : CARED
13. Greek war god : ARES
14. Not decided, in skeds : TBA
15. Comic with a satiric news show : COLBERT. I prefer Jon Stewart. Who's your favorite comic, Jayce?
16. Colorful ring : AREOLA
18. Zap : LASE
19. Stone and others : SLYS
24. Caesar's "that is" : ID EST
29. Maintain : KEEP
32. Endangered Sumatrans : RHINOS
34. Kim Possible's sidekick __ Stoppable : RON. No idea. Never watched Kim Possible.
35. "An Inconvenient Woman" novelist : DUNNE
37. Three-mo. period : SPR
38. LED component : DIODE
39. Open, for one : TOURNAMENT
40. Bad things : EVILS
41. Kindergarten basics : ABCS
42. People people : GLITTERATI. People magazine.
44. Gothic novelist Radcliffe : ANN
46. Phnom __ : PENH
47. God in both Eddas : ODIN
50. Political family spanning three centuries : TAFTS. I even remember Bob Taft. Must be some scandals.
53. Cries of discovery : AHAs
55. Mine in Milan : MIO
56. Citrus hybrids : UGLIS. Very juicy.
57. It may contain steps : PLAN
58. Perform, in a way : SING
62. Digging : INTO
63. Have-__: disadvantaged ones : NOTS
64. Reliable, as a citizen : SOLID
66. Prince William's alma mater : ETON
69. Workout wt. : TEN LB
70. Jamboree attendee : SCOUT. Have any of you read "The Mockingbird Next Door"? Harpee Lee called Truman Capote a "psychopath".
71. Some savings accts. : IRAS
72. Prefix with diction : BENE
73. Not posted yet : UNSENT
75. "Understood" : I SEE
77. Puzzled, after "at" : A LOSS
79. La-la lead-in : TRA
82. Script outline : SCENARIO
83. Aptly named Quaker cereal : OHS.
I've been enjoying the Test Kitchen steel cut oatmeal D-Otto mentioned
on the blog a few months ago. Too bad he does not like it himself.
86. Master again : RE-LEARN
87. Ain't good? : ISN'T. Grammatically.
88. Place for a to-do list : NOTE PAD
89. Garden product word : GRO. Miracle-Gro.
90. Bankruptcy result, briefly : REORG
93. "__ Viejo": Carlos Fuentes novel : GRINGO. Carlos Fuentes said Spanish was the only language he could make love with. That's why he only married Mexican women.
96. Plague : GNAW AT
98. "Duck Dynasty" airer : A AND E
99. Rub ingredient : SPICE
100. Bacteria found in the GI tract : ECOLI
101. Stuck in muck : MIRED
102. Wrestler known as "the Giant" : ANDRE. He was in The Princess Bride.
103. Tweeting locales : NESTS. Not Twitter tweet.
104. Spouse on the Seine : MARI. Husband.
105. Ugandan despot : AMIN
106. Organic fuel : PEAT
108. Poppy prop : STEM
111. Minn. shopping mecca : MOA. Mall of America, where Gary & his wife will visit next month.
113. GI's address : APO
114. Beatty of "Deliverance" : NED. Wish I did not see the movie.
C.C.
C.C. must have been in a hurry to have not linked this.
ReplyDeleteThanks C.C. for explaining Ed Sessa's puzzle.
ReplyDeleteBaseball fans, today's our big day! Step up to the plate and try They Sure Managed, Chicks Dig the Long Ball, and (ironically) What Do These Great Sluggers Have in Common?.
I'm definitely improving! No look-ups and no red letters today, though had to WAG naticks at (D)OG IT/(D)OBBS & R[O]N/SA[O]NE. Not familiar with DOG IT, but it was nicely balanced by CAT CALLS in the opposite corner.
ReplyDeleteThe entire theme of today's puzzle is examples of the Cryptic technique of "double definition," although presented in a different form. For a Cryptic, both meanings would have to be in the clue, not just one. For example, 70a would have been: Indian warrior says, "the children were angels and in bed by eight".
~~~~~~~~~~~~
The solution to this Cryptic clue is in today's puzzle.
Life, shining unfocused, is wrapped around a reel (7,4)
~~~~~~~~~~~~
The first date a girl seldom declines
She's sure we'll be having high times.
But they accuse me of gimmicks
When I have us write limericks --
Though I warn them we'll be "doing lines!"
Morning, all!
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed the theme and all the various theme answers. I enjoyed most of the rest of the puzzle as well, until I got down to the bottom and ran into INTONATE, AMENAMEN, RINGROAD, STONEMAN, MARI, and MOA. I won't say that section ruined the rest of the puzzle for me, since the rest of the puzzle really was quite good. But it did end things on a sour note for me.
Good morning!
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed Ed's offering, and it came in right on schedule. When I saw the SSA of BOSSA I thought maybe Ed was going to pull a CHRISTIAN stunt. Nope.
C.C., nice shoutout to you with the M-O-A. And no, I'm just not a fan of oatmeal -- steel-cut or otherwise.
Racine, WI may be best known as the home of Johnson's Wax.
RHINO's in Sumatra? Who knew? I thought they were all in Africa.
RING ROAD is a sore subject around here. A third loop around Houston, this one 30-40 miles out from the city center, is going to pass just a mile south of our town. We are not amused.
This went pretty smoothly (a nice recovery after yesterday's debacle) though a two-minute typo hunt was required (I had TASE instead of LASE) before I heard the "TaDa!".
ReplyDeleteI didn't get to (and fail at) yesterday's puzzle until last night as I had spent a very enjoyable day on Governors Island. A friend's daughter was producing a dance performance and, as I had never been there, I went along for the ride. It was a great day and a great place with great views of the Statue of Liberty and the lower Manhattan skyline (including the new "Freedom Tower"). If you're ever in the area it's definitely worth a visit.
[20:46]
Hi Y'all! I got the theme early and found them amusing and fun, as are most of Ed's puzzles. But this was not REAL EASY for me with the NE corner remaining white except for ARES & DURANTE until last. I could not remember COLBERT although his show is certainly well-advertised. I've never watched it. Just enough perps & WAGs to fill it.
ReplyDeleteTINA & DUNNE also evaded me awhile although I had read the latter's book years ago.
AQUI gave me fits. I'd forgotten that basic Spanish. Tried "esta".
Skeds is not an abbreviation I recognized. All perps followed by "Hunh? Oh!"
Good workout for an early Sunday morning when I woke up earlier than I wanted to. Think I'll go back and try to finish my rest.
Good morning all.
ReplyDeleteCSO to MARI, and I think she doesn't do the weekend puzzles.
I wasn't feeling it today, although I did get her done. Had to use red letters at the end.
DOG in the upper left and CAT in the upper right. And OCTOPI in between.
Stone and others = SLYS. The only Sly I know is the same one you've heard of. Are there others we would know ?
Liked raspberries kin CATCALLS. LASE not so much. Meh.
Another haboob in Phoenix yesterday. I saw it on TV. I wonder if it has colorful rings ?
CC, Jose Canseco shattered your impression of baseball. Years before, Jim Bouton did the same to me in his book, "Ball Four."
Good morning C.C. et al.
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed this one in the end...the beginning, not so much. It took me the longest time to get into it, but once I "got" the theme, I started chuckling to myself. My favorite entries were SITTING BULL and PARTING WORDS. Very clever!
C.C., Bob Taft was convicted of receiving gifts from lobbyists. He had the lowest approval rating of any politician in the history of Ohio. He himself is the one who initiated the investigation, as he was unaware of the ruling about gifts. I remember thinking at the time, that there were probably many other politicians who accepted gifts like that, but never admitted it. For that, I admired his honesty.
It's raining here today, so no outdoor work. (Yay!!) Have a relaxing day, everyone!
Good Morning:
ReplyDeleteThis was a FIW due to tase/lase and accepting cat calts, thinking it was some sort of raspberry (fruit) that I had never heard of. Oh well, win some, lose some.
Kudos to Mr. Sessa for a clever theme and an enjoyable, if somewhat tricky, solve. Nice write-up, CC, with your MOA shout-out.
I think we're in for some stormy weather for the next few days. It's been a roller coaster summer, so far.
Have a relaxing Sunday.
Good morning. I found that the theme answers were REAL EASY to guess, all INGS but there were many unknowns that wracked my brain. My wife just got in from Norway last night and I took a break from the puzzle (with many blanks) and we went to IHOP. As a GRINGO, I should have known 93A even though Fuentes draws a complete blank. I had some trouble with the NE because I had STEWART instead of COLBERT and CAFE instead of DELI and don't know whether ARES and/or MARS is Greek or Latin. SW was another guess because MARI was a WAG and INTONATE was new to me but A&E was a gimme, especially since my brother played college football at LA Tech with Phil Robertson & Terry Bradshaw. TEN LB gave ,e fits and I had always heard GLITTERATI used for the glamorous big spenders, not people who like other people. French rivers always give me trouble since they are usually used as fill ins but QTR kept SPRinging into my head for the three mo. period of 37D.
ReplyDeleteThe one clue and answer I still do not get is St. and GOV. I know it is state government but I don't recall ever seeing it used as st. gov. ERGO let's have a ROUSING CHEER FOR Mr. SESSA and those are my PARTING WORDS. You can say AMEN to that twice.
118A INTONATE is not a word. You INTONE for an intonation.
ReplyDelete86A "Hooray, you're up!" is not a ROUSING CHEER; it's a POST-ROUSING CHEER.
Hello.
ReplyDeleteVery quickly I first have to admire Ed Sessa's puzzle. Much of it was EASY but SAONE & RON eluded me. I've never watched Kim Possible so the answer was impossible for me.
Otherwise all went well with some really clever clues. MOA was fun to visit and we met C.C. there.
The center gave me fits for a while because I entered FISHING TALE and of course couldn't make it work. Once I erased TALE, LINE became obvious and the PLAN emerged.
Have yourselves a lovely Sunday, everyone!
Hello to all,
ReplyDeleteHad to go back and read yesterday's comments, because I was sure someone would say something about TRS-80. Mainly because this was my first computer and boy did I get hooked on electronics!
Good morning everyone.
ReplyDeleteWorkaday puzzle today; not real difficult. The perps seemed to give small nudges where needed, so the solve came in due course. The theme fill was fun to suss.
109a - RACINE. If I recall correctly it was the home of J I Case Company, manufacturer of farm equipment. Our first corn chopper was a Case; it was powered by a Wisconsin air-cooled engine.
I loved this theme and knowing it helped greatly in the solving. SITTING BULL was clever. This theme is more in my wheelhouse than the Cryptics.
ReplyDeleteI wanted BETTE Davis. I watched all her old movies many times over. When I erased her name I was able to fill the NW corner. The crossing N in DON and DUNNE caused me to run the ABCs in my mind. Oh, "Don we now our gay apparel."
I didn't have any nits.
INTONATE is a less common form of intone. Who says weekend puzzles need to use the most common form of a word?
"Hooray, you're up," is a rousing cheer because it is said upon someone's rousing.
I like both Stewart and Colbert.
GOV. is commonly used as an abbreviation for Governor, especially when used as a title, Gov. Christie.
I hated to be on teams in school where we got a collective grade and some students would DOG IT. We had to do their work or receive a bad grade.
LASE is OK with me. "Laser (light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation) surgery uses an intensely hot, precisely focused beam of light to remove or vaporize tissue and control bleeding in a wide variety of non-invasive and minimally invasive procedures." The tissue is LASED or more informally zapped.
I liked this puzzle a lot. Got it done with no write-overs.
ReplyDeleteSouthern Belle, we always referred to them as Trash-80's. My first computer was a you-put-it-together Heathkit H-11. Came standard with 8KB of memory, but could be upgraded to 64K. J.I. Case was a big company in my ute, but got "swallered" up by the competition. I don't think the name even exists anymore.
ReplyDeleteYR, your DOG IT comment describes the way our military runs its boot camps. Woe be unto the poor slob who screws up and brings punishment down on the whole recruit company.
Case merged with IH and they are Case International now. Farmall Red though.
ReplyDeleteLife, shining | unfocused, | is | wrapped around a reel (7,4)
ReplyDelete[LIFE SHINING] [anagram] [=] [FISHING LINE]
Big Easy: As C.C. implied in her write-up, the clue for GLITTERATI was misdirection. Not "people people" (people who like people), but "People people" (people who are talked about in People magazine).
Also misdirection was "St. leader" -- we've gotten used to that form of clue meaning a prefix, so this time it's literal -- the leader of a state is it's GOVernor!
Sly and the Family Stone was a rock band. I was working the desk at a hotel when they were at the height of their fame, when they came to check in. This was in Alabama, c.1973, and a group of about 20 Black men (including roadies), no reservation (de rigueur for any group), show up at my desk at 2 AM! Sly was quite miffed that I'd never heard of him, and insisted on extra ID before I'd accept his credit card!
I also had QTR > SPR, had trouble with MOA because I thought it was Mall Of The Americas. Saw "Deliverance" for a film class (also c.1973) and I agree, except for the dueling banjos, I wish I'd never seen it either.
Marti and others,
ReplyDeleteRegarding Robert (Bob) Taft. ex-Governor of Ohio. 1999-2007.
I will let the record speak for itself.
Since this blog prohibits politics, I will merely link Robert 'Bob' Taft, 67th Gov. of Ohio. Wikipedia.
The so called 'scandals' in his administration, were self declared, and IMHO were very minor. His achievements were far more significant, meaningful and profound.
He was a great Governor, and IMHO, served with great distinction.
He comes from a distinguished family, and was aware of his antecedents, and lives to serve accordingly.
There have been others, who, even without the exposure of scandals, have been much worse and simply terrible.
Its too bad, that especially in the USA, a politician is only known for his scandals, however minor, - never for his illuminating successes. I guess, thats the way the cookie crumbles ...
D/O. Those students dogging it to our detriment were begging for retribution, but in the college milieu we couldn't administer retribution the way you in the military did.
ReplyDeleteSouthern Belle and D/O, my first experience with computers was at the school where I taught. We called them Trash-80's, too. They were not that good but they provided much experience.
My first at-home machine was a Brother word processing typewriter with which you could edit and save to discs. When those machines became obsolete my discs became useless.
Then I bought an ancient out-of-date MAC floor model, creaky and slow. It required inventing countless work-arounds. No multitasking. Upon my retirement my son and DIL bought me a Dell PC. It was very fast and it could multitask. Amazing! I have replaced it twice and have been able to transfer everything I needed to keep.
I have been a life long library user and have looked up everything under the sun in books. With the computer it is wonderful to have all this at my fingertips 24-7.
Ed Sessa, I enjoyed your puzzle. WEES.
ReplyDeleteSouthern Belle, I knew of the TRS-80 (Radio Shack, yes?) but my computer was an Apple II+. I got pretty good at programming in Basic and I enjoyed the early, simple-minded computer games. Later on, I was a big Myst fan. These days, the only game I can remember playing and enjoying is Samorost.
CC, Owen and others, we have the same opinion about "Deliverance." Barbara disliked it even more than I did. I'll bet she wouldn't take you up on it if you offered to pay her $100 to watch it again.
As I understand it, Truman Capote royally screwed Harper Lee, who was of great assistance to him in researching his book In Cold Blood. Reportedly she was so traumatized and disillusioned that she never wrote another book.
ReplyDeleteMy favorite comic is Ryan Stiles.
Loved this puzzle! Each and every theme clue/answer elicited a laugh. I was smiling and giggling all morning! SITTING BULL almost made me snort coffee out my nose.
Southern Belle, I once owned a TRS-80. Although I liked it a lot and even designed and built a joystick interface board for it, the Commodore PET eventually won me over. I wrote a game, called "Pipes," for its successor, the Commodore 64, which won the 1982 Consumer Electronic Show (CES) award for best game of the year. Fond memories.
ReplyDeleteTime Magazine's take on the TRS-80 in August 2012.
ReplyDeleteLink from TIME
Of course, back in the TRS-80 days I was not at all qualified to opine about this.
A gentle, pleasant, stroll today.
ReplyDeleteI'm surprised SITTING BULL made it through the censors.
One pet peeve: OCTOPI. This is so often seen nowadays that I suppose it should be considered "standard" English. But it still bothers me, nearly as much as the misuse of DECIMATE does.
OCTOPUS is NOT of Latin origin; it is NOT a -US masculine noun, but GREEK for 8 Feet: OCTO-PUS. The plural of PUS is PODES, so it should be OCTOPODES, if your are feeling pretentious.
Otherwise, OCTOPUSES will do just fine.
End of rant.
NC
OwenKL
I got your cryptic. An anagram for a change. Nice.
NC
Since we're ranting, what's up with people who "sign" their posts (twice!) when the heading clearing indicates who's posting?
ReplyDeleteLink octopodes?
ReplyDeleteMost dictionaries list octopuses and octopi, but not octopodes. Spell check flags octopodes.
ROUST vs ROUSE; you roust someone out of bed and then you can give them a rousting cheer.
ReplyDeleteooops, that would be a ROUSING cheer!
ReplyDeleteRousing means awakening someone, not rousting. The Japanese regretted rousing the sleeping tiger when they attacked Hawaii.
ReplyDeleteGreetings!
ReplyDeleteSwell puzzle, Ed, and fine expo, CC!
No cheats! But I still do not understand the theme.
RING ROAD is new to me.
Am very tired, even though I had a good sleep.
Cheers!
Growing up back east, I was used to lightning and thunder in the summer months. It's much more unusual on the southern coast of California. I was startled by a big boom a couple of hours ago. The warm, humid weather had produced a thunderstorm. (If there was lightning and thunder when I was teaching, I might as well take a break 'cause nothing would be accomplished for the next few minutes.) Anyway, I see on the news that several people were hit by lightning on Venice Beach about 10 miles north of here.
ReplyDeleteLos Angeles Fire Department spokeswoman Katherine Main told CNN the lightning hit in the water and on the beach. Those that were injured were either in or near the water, she said.
At least 13 patients were assessed on the scene, and of those, seven adults and one teenager were transported to local hospitals -- including one who had to be pulled from the water.
Witnesses tweeted they saw a huge bolt of lightning strike the area, with one Twitter user describing an explosion that blew off nearby roof tiles.
MISSING: A small scruffy brown dog, blind in one eye, one ear chewed off, limps; answers to the name of Lucky.