google.com, pub-2774194725043577, DIRECT, f08c47fec0942fa0 L.A.Times Crossword Corner: Friday, November 11, 2016, Patti Varol

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Nov 11, 2016

Friday, November 11, 2016, Patti Varol

Title: Time to clean the kitchen

Patti V., who doubles as Rich Norris' assistant at the LAT, has turned on the creative juices again in 2016 with 5 puzzles in the last 10 weeks. Today we have a variation of the definition puzzle, where words that are associated with each other - here items in a kitchen - are used as clues for completely different things. My only nit was including both DISH and PLATE and leaving out KNIFE, but then I realized there really are no other meanings for knife that do not relate to cutting. This is a very friendly puzzle with some new material as well as bringing back some memories from the 50s and 60s. We have as additional long fill ARTESIAN,  READ UP ON, PLEASE HOLD and  DEAN MARTIN. Cool, let's do it!

17A. Spoon : HUG TENDERLY (11). Do you want to be an EXPERT?

24A. Dish : SPREAD GOSSIP (12). Garbage Of Stupid Silly Ignorant People. I think it implies dishing dirt.

38A. Fork : BRANCH IN THE ROAD (15).  Who can forget Yogi Berra's saying "When you come to a fork in the road, take it"

49A. Plate : COAT WITH GOLD (12). I have nothing here except the old joke about the man (in the old un-pc days it was a Polish man) who won an Olympic gold medal and was so proud he had it bronzed.

60A. Bowl : PLAY TEN PINS (11). Boomer, is this acceptable or only used with duck pins?
In Canada, the United States, United Kingdom, Ireland and Australia, the game is commonly referred to as just "Bowling". In New England, "bowling" is usually referred to as "ten-pin bowling" or "big-ball bowling", because of the smaller diameter, lighter weight ball used in the Worcester, Massachusetts-conceived sport of candlepin bowling from 1880, and the similarly "small-ball" sport of duckpin bowling (conceived in 1895), popular in the Northeast United States

Across:

1. Assuming it's true : AS FACT.

7. "Bloom County" penguin : OPUS. I gratuitously linked him recently.

11. Jams : PJS. Jammies-yes. Jams?

14. After-dinner gathering : SOIREE. The forties and fifties were filled with soirees.

15. Go in different directions : PART. Part company.

16. Service to redo : LET. Tennis. 46D. Org. for netmen : ATP. The Association of Tennis Professionals  HISTORY.

19. Flight status info : ETA.

20. In addition : ELSE. Put it in, took it out, put it back.

21. "The Fault in __ Stars": John Green novel : OUR. if you like crying...

22. Leader's domain : REALM.

28. Chatter boxes? : RADIOS. I like the clue and remember the nights before we had TV and listening to all those great voices.

31. Light weight : OUNCE.

32. It may precede bad news : I FEAR. I fear we have run out of caviar, deah.

33. Beavers, e.g. : HATS. I bet you did not know all of THIS.

35. "Girls" channel : HBO.

42. Icarus, to Daedalus : SON.

43. Bar employee: Abbr. : ATTY. Please let us never have att as fill for lawyers.

44. String quartet member : CELLO. A string quartet is a musical ensemble of four string players – two violin players, a viola player and a cellist – or a piece written to be performed by such a group. ... The string quartet was developed into its current form by the Austrian composer Joseph Haydn, with his works in the 1750s establishing the genre. Wiki.

45. Prefix with arch : MATRI. Patri anyone?

48. Bulldozer companion : LOADER. LINK. Can you name them all?

53. Marx with a horn : HARPO. Or many horns.
54. Vienna's land: Abbr. : AUStria.

55. The munchies, e.g. : URGE.

59. Hairy TV cousin : ITT. Great theme song to the Addams Family.
64. Flowery welcome : LEI.

65. It's retold often : LORE.

66. Greet on the street : TOOT AT. A rhymsical clue.

67. Roadside shelter : INN.

68. "Oh, ew" : YUCK.

69. Fancy, and then some : ORNATE.

Down:

1. New York stadium named for a sports great : ASHE.

2. __-searching : SOUL.

3. Tree fruit : FIGS.

4. Like some wells : ARTESIAN. This CONCEPT fascinated me as a chikd.

5. One of a Chicago duo : CEE.

6. Group of like voices : TENORS. We all the most famous group of three tenors but how about this GROUP which sings...

7. Purcell's "Dido and Aeneas," e.g. : OPERA.

8. Four score, often? : PAR. Really fun deception as more than half of all gold holes are played a par of 4.

9. Address bar address : URL.

10. "Lie Down in Darkness" author : STYRON. A truly influential writer who along with others started the Paris Review as well as authoring The Confessions of Nat Turner and Sophie's Choice.

11. Request before the music starts : PLEASE HOLD. 33D. Order before the music starts : HIT IT.

12. Beijing-born action hero : JET LI. Was he a STAR in your world C.C.?

13. Passport mark : STAMP.

18. Payable : DUE.

23. "I didn't mean that" key : ESC.

25. Bordeaux butcher's offering : PORC. French word for pork.

26. Eccentric : DOTTY. I think of Aunt Clara from Bewitched.

27. Write effusively : GUSH.

28. Smokehouse order : RIBS.

29. Coiffure style : AFRO.

30. '60s-'70s variety show host : DEAN MARTIN. After leaving Jerry Lewis, Dean has his own show.
34. Colony occupant : ANT.

36. Agricultural bundle : BALE.

37. Reminder to take out the trash? : ODOR.

39. Big name in WWI espionage : HARI. She is back. The 100 year anniversary of her execution will be in October 2017.

40. Green sci. : ECOLogy.

41. Research : READ UP ON.

47. Like some paper towels : TWO PLY.

48. Underscore? : LOSE TO. Very tricky; we use the other meaning of underscore often in legal writing.

49. Some like it hot : CHILI.

50. Like Cheerios : OATEN. To me they are more often eaten.

51. "Frida" star Salma : HAYEK. Seeing her with Antonio Banderas in Desperado was eye opening!

52. Prepare to remodel, maybe : GUT. Of the 16 definitions for this word, 4 are verbs.
13. (Cookery) to remove the entrails from (fish, etc)
14. (esp of fire) to destroy the inside of (a building)
15. to plunder; despoil: the raiders gutted the city.
16. to take out the central points of (an article), esp in summary form

56. Poet Dove : RITA. I like poetry but I am not up on my POETS.

57. Pest in a swarm : GNAT. Not a midge.

58. Where el sol rises : ESTE. Sun rises in the east even in Spanish speaking places.

61. Murderers' Row teammate of Babe : LOU. Ruth and Gehrig.

62. Part of a hinged-door floor plan symbol : ARC.

63. Fish-fowl link : NOR.

Wow, we are done already. Well I hope you enjoyed our kitchen duty and don't forget to turn out the lights when you are done. Thanks PV, it was fun. And thank you my bride Oo who will have a birthday tomorrow.  Lemonade out.
                                                  Celebrate all veterans now and before!!!





47 comments:

OwenKL said...

FIR, easy theme to guess.

{B+, A, A-, B+.}

When young, we loved to attend SOIREES,
Listen to whatever the RADIO plays.
But with age, I FEAR,
We grow so drear,
All we want is to SPOON in our warm P.J.s!

At a BRANCH IN THE ROAD, I FEAR we must PART
But let me never depart from your heart!
NOR ELSE shall I
LET a day go by
Without remembering how much you fart!

An artisanal brewer, to make his beer swell
Took all of his water from an ARTESIAN well.
His grain was OATEN,
His hops were soaken,
The yeast was his wife's, and it tasted like hell!

In my poems today, I meant not to GUSH,
Nor touch your hearts with a load of mush,
But I FEAR it's enough
That you'll feel in your GUT
An URGE in your SOUL to bellow out, "YUCK!"

desper-otto said...

Good morning!

Patti served up a meal that took the full allotted time to complete. I had my share of write-overs with SHEA/ASHE, MATA/HARI and PATRI/MATRI. I also had some qualms about how "Beavers" would turn out. Nicely done.

Lemon, why does the box say 10 but only depicts 8 machines? Rip-off, anyone? BTW, happy birthday to Oo.

RIP, Leonard Cohen.

Big Easy said...

I completed this puzzle on page 3D of the "Bloom County PICAYUNE" ( Times-Picayune) very slowly this morning. Lots of unknowns filled by perps- HBO, STYRON, DOTTY (named after Dorothy?), HAYEK, RITA, ARC.

Austria- The Olympic abbreviation for Austria is AUT, not AUS- that's for Australia.

I only had to change JOKE to LORE and HONK to TOOT to complete. I've always thought that calling ECOLogy a science is a misuse of the word. It's not a science. Biology, botany, chemistry, physics-those are sciences. "Ecology is a study of relationships" of plants and animals with their surroundings.

CartBoy said...

Got it! SOCIAL morphed to SOIREE to finish and the NW was finally done.

Lemonade714 said...

Tom, since the 10 is in a gold star, maybe it is intended as a rating not a vehicle count? No list of the vehicles from you?

Yellowrocks said...

Slightly easier than a typical Friday for me, but the start up was slow. JET LI and RITA were unknowns, but solved with perps and wags. Because I could not recall OPUS that was my last entry after I found the P and S in perps. OH, yeah! Now I remember. I liked the theme answers.
After yesterday, I hope all knew how to special ARTESIAN.
Although I have heard of ten pins, no one around here uses that for bowling.
The Austrian Alps and villages are lovely. I was not surprised that AUS was its abbreviation. In studying it I see now that AUT is more common. Thanks, Big Easy.
Happy birthday, Oo.
Thank you to all the veterans reading this.
Off to our commute.

Anonymous said...

A BRANCH is only one tine of a fork IN THE ROAD. Foul.

DUE and "payable" are not the same thing. For example, your taxes are payable anytime after January 1, but not DUE until April 15. Foul.

I took "sports great" to mean athlete, so SHEA never crossed my mind for 1D (William A. Shea was a great sports organizer but not an athlete).

Tinbeni said...

D-N-F ... Thanks Lemon for explaining all my "blank-white-spaces."

Patti: I enjoyed the 80% I filled in, but your clever themes "got-me!"

A "Toast-to-All Veterans" at Sunset. It will be my extreme pleasure to do so!

Fave today was SOIREE ... go figure. LOL

Cheers!

billocohoes said...

Someone diving to the bottom of the pool is said to KNIFE thru the water.

Yogi was giving directions to his home, which was on a circular street, so he was correct; when you got to the circle it didn't matter whether you turned left or right, you'd still get to his house.

Irish Miss said...

Good Morning:

I enjoy Patti's puzzles a lot and often find myself saying "Why didn't I think of that theme?" This was a fun solve that had some bite but perps were kind so no real hang-ups. My brain spun its wheels, though, trying to come up with ornate. I knew the word I wanted but it took forever for it to surface. The same thing happened with gold in the plate answer. Oh well, it all fell into place eventually, so no harm no foul. W/o's were wave at/toot at and tale/lore.

Thanks, Patti, for a Friday frolic and thanks, Lemony, for the grand tour. Birthday wishes to Oo.

Thank you to all those who have served and continue to serve our country.

Have a great day.

desper-otto said...

Lemon, from left to right, top to bottom:
Motor Grader
Cement Truck
Dozer
Hydraulic Crane
Backhoe
Front-End Loader
Dump Truck
Asphalt Roller

Lemonade714 said...

Before the day slips by, I wanted to thank all who have served our country with a special thanks to my grandfather who served in WWII at 46 years of age.
I have added his picture to my write up.

Hug a veteran!

Husker Gary said...

Musings
-Wow, PJS and JET LI were right. Natick, be gone!
-A wonderful struggle where parts of the long fill emerged to help
-Old western villains used to put a BRANCH IN THE ROAD to stop the stagecoach
-TV ads have .9999% pure GOLD PLATED nickels for $9.95. That .00049 OUNCES of gold is worth about 63¢
-ELSE/ALSO, UPDO/AFRO, GRADER/LOADER, HAMS/RIBS
-Mom listened to this RADIO soap opera
-FIG Newtons are a love/hate item. I’m in the former camp
-My course has a 200-yd PAR 4 but it is over trees and sand if you go for the green
-PLEASE HOLD (I’m putting you on “Ignore”)
-Famers around here are now making BALES out of corn stalks
-Using the right URL’s greatly eases READING UP ON topics

Spitzboov said...

Good morning everyone.

Lemon: What D-O said.

FF today. Finished it on Friday. Really enjoyed Patti's puzzle. At first a sea of white, but then gradually filling in from the SW. Got the gimmick with BRANCH IN THE ROAD. Some erasures, but dodged having to look up anything - perps came through.
Funny to see ARTESIAN and GUSH in the same puzzle.

Thanks for the good wishes to veteran's and thanks to all the veteran's for their service.
Belated Happy Birthday to the Marine Corps vets. Hope the pilots of the 2 F-18's that crashed into each other near Miramar recover fully.

TTP said...

Whoa ! Patti, what a toughie.

Started out strong in the SW. Felt sure I knew the ruse as I had COATWITH on that climb to the NE. Mistakenly believed this puzzle was going to be easy for me.

So many great clues to lead one astray. Among them: I didn't mean that key,Jams,Underscore, Four score,Request before the music starts, Order before the music starts and Go in different directions.

Compound the great cluing with the unknown names, and yeah, it was tougher today.

HUG TENDERLY was a long time coming. Had HU-T-NDE-L- and couldn't see it - until I got the G from FIGS.

The north west was made harder because I initially went with two Rs instead of two Es in SOIREE. Wanted ELSE but couldn't pull the trigger. Finally realized it was FIGS and FACT, so ELSE was good, and then saw the error with SOIRrE. Self-referential clue for Chicago. Thought I had gained enough solving experience to not miss those...

The north central only got solved because the R gave me AR so PAR (D'OH - especially for me), and then easily wagged the missing S in unknown OPUS / STRYON.

And then it was done. Time to read the write up.

Yellowrocks said...

I liked the clue, a sports great. It does not necessarily have to be an athlete. This type of clue with its slight misdirection is why crosswords are so much fun.
A fork in the road can be the point where the road divides or a fork can be one of the resulting arms.
A branch in the road can be the point where the road divides or a branch can be one of the resulting arms.
The thesaurus calls branch and fork synonyms.
Another warm and sunny day. Our leaves hung on late this year. Only about 1/3 are down. Last week was about the peak of color. Yesterday and today NJ is holding its teachers' convention in AC. Usually by then the trees are bare, except for some of the oaks.The only way you can tell it is November is the too early onset of darkness. The heating bill will be inexpensive this month.

Lucina said...

What a great challenge from Patti Varol! It seemed like a real stumper until slowly, very slowly a few cells filled. The entire bottom yielded its fruit first then it was an uphill climb. INTHEROAD was in but since I couldn't decide between AFRO/UPDO BRANCH seeped out in time.

Patri preceded MATRI, verified by Mr. MARTIN. I really liked the theme's play on words and smiled when I sussed them. DIW, thought, at LOSETO since I had GILD not GOLD. But got the unknown JETLI.

Thank you, Patti and Lemonade! It was a challenging hour well spent!

Happy Veterans Day to all our service men and women, past and present!

Enjoy your day, everyone!

TTP said...

Thanks Lemonade.

Ten Pens is a type of game of bowling. Everyone calls it bowling. Candlesticks, duckpins, bocce etc are also games of bowling. Just as cricket, 301, 501 are dart games, and straight, 8 ball, 9 ball etc are games of pool.

Desper-Otto, I have no allotted time. But if I had, I would have gone over it today.

Abejo said...

Good morning, folks. Thank you, Patti Varol, for a fine puzzle. Thank you, Lemonade, for a fine review.

The only way I am done this early in the day is because I started the puzzle last night on the IPad. Finished minutes ago. Last night my wife and I went to "Schnitzel Platz" restaurant in Glendale Heights. OUTSTANDING! When we got home I started the puzzle. Have you ever been there, TTP? Not too far from you.

BRANCH IN THE ROAD was my first theme answer. The rest came slowly. COAT WITH GOLD was the last.

NW corner was especially tough. Had SHEA for 1D. That messed me up for quite a while. I finally erased it and ALSO at 20A, and then I got cooking with gas. Getting ARTESIAN was a big plus for that corner.

Tried UPDO for 29D. Fixed that to AFRO.

Never heard of JET LI. I have had JET LAG myself.

PLAY TEN PINS reminds me of my cousin (R.I.P.) who played on a Duck Pin league in Erie for years. Played at the Maennerchor Club on State St in Erie. I have eaten there. Great place.

Never heard of STYRON. Perps.

Tried WAVE AT, HOOT AT, and then TOOT AT.

Lots to do. See you tomorrow. Going to Park Ridge tomorrow morning for a Master Gardener Answer Table at a Farmers' Market. Park Ridge is the home town, by the way, of Hillary Clinton.

Abejo

( )

Anonymous said...

Lemon:

I seem to remember toy companies put the age of the child the toy was designed for on the box. Maybe this is what the "ten" denotes.

Don

Bill G. said...

Good morning.

Thanks Patti for the enjoyable challenge and Lemon for the exposition.

Thanks to all of our veterans. Old war movies give me a small taste of what it must have been like in battle. Even the flashback war scenes from Downton Abbey...

Growing up in northern Virginia near Washington D. C., the only kind of bowling available at that time was duckpins. It's harder to get a high score than with 10-pin bowling (with the big ball and pins) because the pins are smaller with more gaps between them. A good score is anything over about 120. You get to roll three balls but still...

MJ said...

Good day to all!

A challenging Friday puzzle, yet doable in the end. Last cell to fill was the "J" at 12D as I am unfamiliar with JET LI and have never heard of PJS referred to as jams. Had to do the alphabet run to get it, and I'll stick with Thumper as to how I feel about it. Favorite clue/answer was "Underscore?" for LOSE TO. Thanks for a fine puzzle, Patti, and thanks for being our faithful Friday guide, Lemonade.

Thank you also to all the veterans out there for your service in the past, and thank you to those now serving.

Enjoy the day!



Lemonade714 said...

Don, I think you may have the explanation for the 10 in the picture of the toy trucks. I never thought of that but I do recall seeing such numbers on many toy boxes.

Speaking of Downton Abbey , I am looking forward to Michelle Dockery's new show starting on the 15th and the return of the Librarians on the 20th.

TTP said...


Abejo, yes, we really like Schnitzel Platz !!!

C6D6 Peg said...

Thanks, Patti, for a fun Friday outing. Knew it would be a definition theme, and not related to actual dining/kitchen items! Also loved the sparkly fills.

Nice job, Lemonade, and thanks again for your work!

Nice Cuppa said...

Happy Armistice day. 'Twas not so happy for Ms. HARI.

I will wear my poppy proudly.

Great theme; lots of N. Amer. slang to add to my ASL lexicon. I was disappointed that the theme answers were all verbs, EXCEPT for BRANCH-IN-THE-ROAD. Although I have read that Americans can make a verb out of just about anything. Even the President-elect......I wonder if Bridge schools will find an alternative bid to "ONE NO-TRUMP", or UNDERSCORE RED-suit contracts.

To BOWL in the UK may refer to the act equivalent to baseball "pitching" in CRICKET; or rolling the ball along the ground toward a jack in the genteel game of LAWN-GREEN BOWLING (also called "BOWLS"). The latter is still played, mostly by many seniors, in thousands of public parks across England. TEN-PIN BOWLING is a loud U.S. import from the 70s, and quite popular among the younger crowd.

Nice Cuppa said...

Owen

In re your answer yesterday:

RIC

But, the U.S. penny does not have the numeral "1" on it – only the spelled-out "ONE".

Lemonade714 said...

NC, your comment brought me to some very interesting reading about the POPPY . Of course you retain the common name, Armistice day. commemorating the end of WWI (more Downton Abbey)?In my childhood, it was on Memorial Day that all the red poppies were handed out, perhaps because it was to honor all those who served in WWII also.

CrossEyedDave said...

Hug Tenderly!

Spread gossip?

Branch in the road...

Coat with gold!

Play ten pins?

Hungry Mother said...

Nice puzzle today. Hard enough to be on Friday; easy enough for me to solve.

Ol' Man Keith said...

Hey, Veterans - enjoy your day! Let's all of us devote part of it at least to meditating on their sacrifice - at a time when most of us are enjoying the liberty (& security) they have won and held.

Nice pzl today. Thank you, Ms. Varol. I appreciated the offbeat cluing. I was generally ahead of the challenges, although "Underscore?" kept me guessing 'til the very end.
I needed one look-up. It was for "Poet Dove," as I'm not familiar with her work, and thanks to "Underscore?" (See above) I needed help in the SE corner. The rest of the unknowns came my way through perps.
Thanks, Lemon, for the blogging. Neat links.

PS. Anonymous @8:29, I get your point about a BRANCH being only one tine. But you won't find it anywhere ELSE but at a fork. It is in fact the active member of said fork, in that it forks. It does the forking; it BRANCHes off.

Lucina said...

What happened to CED's post? I know it was there when I scrolled down and now it's disappeared!

Misty said...

A perfect Friday puzzle--thank you, Patti! I was totally daunted when I started out and got practically nothing until I hit the Southwest corner. But then slowly it all started to fill in, and in the end I got the whole thing--with not one bit of cheating. Woohoo! Yay! Great feeling! When I was done I looked at the theme answers and said "What the . . .?" But thank goodness I looked at the clues and saw the dinner table sequence. Very clever, Patti.

Love the Yogi Bera line, Lemonade.

Cool to see TENORS and OPERA right next to each other.

DEAN MARTIN, cousin ITT, and HARPO were all nice memories of a bygone era. So no regrets that TV replaced RADIOS.

The relation between Daedalus and Icarus was a gimme for me, thanks to James Joyce's "Portrait" with its hero Stephen Dedalus.

Austria is where I grew up--hope to go back there this Christmas to visit my 92 year old aunt.

We're having a lovely warm and sunny day, and there are still Monarch butterflies around the milkweed in our garden--even though it's almost Thanksgiving.

Have a wonderful day, everybody!

Anonymous T said...

Hi all!

YUCK - I FEAR it was a Friday DNF. W/ aLSo @20a fitting Shea [right letters, wrong order] and SOUL, I had @1a SS-A-- and was stuck. It started so well too - OPUS right off the bat. I love Bloom County.

Thanks Patti for the pzl and Lem for the writeup - enjoyed HARPO Duck Soup clip.

WOs: JETLe; rOllER b/f LOADER; updo b/f AFRO. @48d repEat [16% right!] b/f LOSE TO. I also tried to go with BRANCHING procs* @38a
ESPs: HAYEK, ATP.

Fav: OPUS. I have the URGE to post a recent link but my GUT says "too political."
So, I'll just Kill the RADIO Star.

{A,A,A-,A}
HBD Oo!

To my Brothers & Sisters in Arms - Salute.

Cheers, -T
*Re UNIX processes: There are -9 ways to kill a child but you can only create one by forking. :-)

Anonymous T said...

Lucina - CED's links are back and #5 is LOL! Even DW giggled a bit. Thanks Dave. Cheers, -T

AnonymousPVX said...

Finished, a bit of crunch, but still do not understand:

62. Part of a hinged-door floor plan symbol : ARC.

What does ARC. mean?

Anonymous T said...

PVX - Arc as in a bit of a compass. On blueprints it's ____|      )____ to depict the opening area of a door. I hope my ASCII comes out OK. C, -T

TTP said...


Anonymous PVX,
Door ARC on a plan

Anonymous T, funny UNIX line.

Lucina said...

Rita Dove teaches at ASU in Tempe, AZ. She was named Poet Laureate in 1993.

Tinbeni said...

CED
Outstanding links today.

Anon-T
Thanks for the "Kill the Radio Star" tune.

TTP
Thanks for the ARC on a plan. I was wondering about that when I filled it in this morning.

Oh, well ... I couldn't wait until Sunset.
Once the Sun-Got-Over-the-Yardarm I began Toasting-All-the-Veterans.

Cheers!

Jayce said...

Hard hard hard. Had to look up RITA Love. Didn't understand how ELSE could mean "In addition" until I thought of a waiter asking the patrons if they would like anything else. Liked the "Underscore" clue. ECOL made me change viola to CELLO. Excellent puzzle, Patti.

Happy birthday, Oo.

A toast to you, Tinbeni.

Happy Veterans' Day, all.

Jinx in Norfolk said...

Too tough for me today, but I still liked the challenge. No problem with the south, but the north threw me. I took my paper copy to the LAT web site and plugged in everything I had penciled in. That got me SPREAD GOSSIP instead of repeat GOSSIP and a couple of other fixes which helped me finish. The only nit I had today was "in addition" for ELSE. I guess we say "what ELSE would you like" to mean in addition to what you already have, but I didn't find this clue clever. To me, ELSE connotes "or", not "and". "If...then...else" in pseudocode and some programming languages.

TTP said...


Had to go get my ears lowered. Like Brooks and Dunn sang, I'm a Brand New Man.


Tinbeni, You're welcome. Anon-T actually beat me to it, but I already had the link so I thought I'd go ahead and post it.

CED, what Tinbeni said.

Jayce, what you said. That's why I couldn't pull the trigger on else, and came to nearly the same thoughts. Like Jinx, I was somewhat stuck in Basic.

Wilbur Charles said...

I could have finished this XW earlier if I'd not spelled Groucho's brother HAPRO and put an S in CHILE. Yielding SOLD AS PLATE. Aarrgghh!

Excellent work by everyone, Patti, Lemonade and Owen: bookend As

And the bloggers were great. I learned a lot.

I'm a Vietnam veteran who is very proud of our current service men and thankful they are getting so much support.

Unlike when I served and the 70s when it became prudent to hide that fact. There was a Lisistrata (sic) syndrome in those days.

WC in Great Unreadsville

Argyle said...

Please, no comments, (spoilers), on the next day's puzzle until the blog is published.

Anonymous T said...

TTP - After I posted I thought "find a link to a blueprint dummy!" and then saw you did. Thanks for having my back. Cheers, -T

Picard said...

For me ATP = Adenosine triphosphate which is the fuel for our cells

WEES: Never heard of "jams" for PJS. ELSE mystified me. JET LI an unknown with no idea how to parse it, either.

Learning moment for "Murderers' Row" which I never heard of.

Is there a name for themes like this? Misdirection themes? I enjoyed this one, though that is not always the case.