Theme: This is only a test, so don't be alarmed.
17A. Unwise act that could be dangerous: FALSE MOVE. False alarm.
25A. Time-out for a cigarette: SMOKE BREAK. Smoke alarm.
35A. Dashboard music provider: CAR STEREO. Car alarm.
51A. Pre-talkies movie: SILENT FILM. Silent alarm.
60A. Hot chili designation, and a literal description of the starts of 17-, 25-, 35- and 51-Across: FOUR ALARM
Argyle here. Big beefy corners today, a bit unusual for a Monday. Also, a déjà vu feeling; a lot of recent clues/answers. Or is it just me?
Across:
1. "Death of a Salesman" salesman Willy: LOMAN. 1949 play written by American playwright Arthur Miller.
6. Abysmal grades: EF's
9. "__ Cross": 1949 Lancaster movie: CRISS
14. Friend's opposite: ENEMY
15. Minor point to pick: NIT
16. Convened again: REMET
19. Video game pioneer: ATARI
20. Singing syllable: TRA, La, La...
21. Vicinity: AREA
22. Type of cleansing acid: BORIC
23. Actress Skye: IONE
27. Upper crust groups: ELITEs. Um, not elists.
29. Courage and fortitude: METTLE
30. Done in, as a dragon: SLAIN
31. Swoosh company: NIKE. It takes courage and fortitude to slay one's dragons. Just do it.
34. Cold War state: Abbr.: SSR. (Soviet Socialist Republic)
39. Oral health org.: ADA. (American Dental Association)
42. "Piece of cake!": "EASY!"
43. Real doozies: LULUs
47. Dips for tortilla chips: SALSAs
50. Agree: ASSENT
55. "Please leave your message at the __": TONE. [BEEP!]
56. Illegal lending tactic: USURY
57. Wrath, in a hymn: IRAE. Dies Irae (Day of Wrath) definition: a famous Latin hymn of the 13th century, describing the Last Judgment. Collins English Dictionary.
58. Round green veggie: PEA
59. Helped: AIDED
63. "The Accidental Tourist" actress Davis: GEENA
64. Z, alphabet-wise: END
65. Start of a tennis point: SERVE
66. Opinion piece: ESSAY
67. Part of GPS: Abbr.: SYS. (Global Positioning System)
68. Passover feast: SEDER
Down:
1. Southpaws: LEFTIES. Also, LEFTYs.
2. Winning at craps, say: ON A ROLL
3. First lady after Michelle: MELANIA
4. Wee hrs.: AMs. (from the Latin, ante meridiem, meaning before midday)
5. PBS "Science Guy" Bill: NYE
6. Huge, in verse: ENORM
7. "Hawaii __": TV cop show: FIVE-O
8. T-bone, for one: STEAK
9. Buster who played Flash Gordon: CRABBE. Got to go back in the archives for this one. "Embedding disabled by request" No trailer, just a pic.
10. Sharp comeback: RETORT
11. Turkish travel shelters: IMARETS. Pretty fancy shelter! Learn more at Wiki.
12. Continuing stories: SERIALS. Like Flash Gordon.
13. Place for a new-car price: STICKER
18. Sunday service: MASS
24. Suffix with diet: ETIC. An adjective, pertaining to regulation of the use of food. Add an S on the end and it becomes a noun.(dietetics)
26. 911 situation: Abbr.: EMER. (emergency)
28. Disney doe: ENA. Bambi's aunt.
31. CIA cousin: NSA. (National Security Agency)
32. "__ not up to me": IT'S. "Go ask you mother/father."
33. Vitally important: KEY
36. Relax: REST
37. Overhead trains: ELS. (elevated)
38. Kick out of office: OUST
39. Appease: ASSUAGE
40. Yellow-disked flowers: DAISIES
 |
| Daisies by Ernst Arnold |
41. Refers casually (to): ALLUDES
44. Spotted wildcat: LEOPARD. Their spots can't be changed.
45. Rattle: UNNERVE
46. Soft-shell clam: STEAMER
48. Williams of tennis: SERENA. Sister of Venus.
49. Very soon: ANY DAY
50. From the States: Abbr.: AMER. (American)
52. Small winds paired with drums: FIFEs
 |
| Old Sturbridge Village |
53. Literary twist: IRONY
54. Heaps praise on: LAUDS
61. Beast of burden: ASS
62. Golfer Trevino: LEE. "Pressure is playing for ten dollars when you don't have a dime in your pocket."
Argyle
54 comments:
Greetings!
Thank you, Janice and Santa!
Nice puzzle to start the week! Clear theme.
No nits, apart from EFS, which I thought should be EFFS, as usual.
Have a nice day!
Yáʼátʼééh [Ya-ta-hey] Indigenous Peoples Day!
(Hope anyone who was interested saw my ingenious poem late last night.)
SMOKE was a-billowing from the fair's CHILI-Rama!
At the crypto-zoo pavilion, it was causing some trauma!
The keepers could ASSUAGE
Some creatures afraid,
But not Ogden, the legendary FOUR-L LLLLAMA!
The time traveler was happy, her METTLE re-set.
Her mission ON A ROLL with a successful project.
With the Chrono-council's ASSENT
She'd changed an event,
So that she and her true love years before had REMET!
{FLN:B, B, A.}
Good morning!
Very nice Monday offering. No, I didn't get the theme. Yes, I failed to read the complete reveal clue. Again. Thanx, Janice and Argyle.
I remember watching the Buster CRABBE Flash Gordon serials on TV in my ute. Ming was scary.
We had an after-market CAR alarm in our old Celica. After driving through flood water it no longer screamed -- just grunted. We named it El Silencio.
LULU is the name of one of our many cats. Yes, she is. Her favorite passtime is to sit on top of the car in the garage.
DAISIES -- another of those "rayed flowers." I'm still waiting to see 3-letter "raid flowers" in a cw. Answer: pot.
GASP! FIW with not one but TWO bad cells. On MONDAY! One was just my hand not obeying my mind, writing CRoSS Cross when commanded to write CRISS. I didn't catch that one, having never heard of IMARETS. The second was due to my certainty of IONa Skye. I assumed that dietaTIC was a var of the real spelling.
Chili is may favorite food, and fitting with yesterday's theme my favorite food topping. Dogs, burgers, omelets, salads, nachos, hash browns. Not steak or pizza (yet).
I tell my project management students to go outside for SMOKE BREAKs even if they don't smoke. Its a great way to hear whats really going on, absent the filters of title and organization.
Good Morning,
Thanks, Janice. No NITS for me today. Pretty smooth.
Yes, Argyle, I also thought there was some familiarity here, but the PEA did not bother this princess. Thanks for the tour.
Hope you Gulf Coasters are safe.
A bit crunchy to start the crossword week. No problems and enjoyable solve.
Good Morning:
It was nice to see Janice's byline as she has been absent from Monday puzzles for awhile. I enjoyed this offering and needed the reveal to catch the theme. No nits, no problems, just a smooth and easy solve. Although I know the name, Ione Skye, I can't say that I have ever seen her before. Was she in anything memorable?
Thanks, Janice, for getting our week off to a good start and thanks, Argyle, for your steady guidance.
Wilbur, from last night; don't ever lose your unique sense of humor. 😉
Is anyone watching "Ten Days In The Valley" with Kyra Sedgwick? It's good but confusing, to me, anyway. I suppose it'll all tie together at some point. I'm also watching another mind-boggler series on the Sundance channel titled "Liar." It, too, is confusing but suspenseful.
YR, I wish Alan continued good health and you, peace of mind.
Have a great day.
Enjoyable solve. I didn't get the theme until the reveal.
When I first started to square dance more than 30 years ago, we used to say,"If you need to smoke, please take your butts outside." Now almost no square dancers smoke and the occasional one who does goes outside automatically.
Ione Skye appears in many crosswords, but I have never seen her picture before or heard of her in any other way.
I was happy to see the return of Madam Secretary and Tea Leoni last night.
I must go tot he supermarket now to beat the crowd.
Thanks for the support for Alan. Cross your fingers.
46D: I've eaten pounds of steamers in my lifetime and not a one of them ever had a soft shell.
Musings
-Me too, Argyle, on big corners (Wow!) and recycling
-Being too lazy to unlock my vehicle I simply reached through the open window and did so manually. It was then I realized I didn’t know how to stop the CAR ALARM
-NITS are a fruit frequently picked here
-SMOKE BREAKS taken right outside the main entrance of a building? Hmmm…
-Take a guess where the ELITES sit
-My Uncle died yesterday (he had had dementia for five years) but I found out via Facebook because my sister who called twelve hours earlier refuses to leave messages or call my cell
-Joann says “Ya gotta pick a lotta PEAS to get a meal’s worth.”
-BTW, who called himself “The Ol’ Pea-Picker”?
-Men’s tennis has become mostly exchanging 150+mph SERVES
-Bill NYE’s advocacy topics today violate our blog rules: Global Warming and Atheism.
-Buster and his shipmate aren’t wearing space gear I’ve seen before
-Salesmen start “knocking thousands off” CAR STICKERS’ MSRP immediately
-Who are Dale and Grace leaving it up to? (2:06)
-BTW, this song went #1 the week JFK was killed
Definitely a Monday puzzle, but I did have a few erasures.
I needed perps to fill in IONE, and BORIC. I had BEEP before TONE and I wanted RADIO before STEREO. Other than that it was a fast run.
Today is National Submarine-Hoagy-Hero-Grinder day. Basically any kind of sandwich made using some form of long roll. They all sound good to me today. Also, it's National Kick Butt day. I think I'll stick with the sandwich. No butts to kick here, except maybe my own and I don't have the flexibility to do that.
Natural disasters and weather are plaguing us theses days. Fires out west, hurricanes in the east, and now I see that snow is falling in the Rockies. I hope everyone came through Hurricane Nate OK.
Montana, are the fires still burning in your area? I hope the snow can help slow them down.
Enjoy the day.
Good morning everyone.
Happy Thanksgiving to Canadian Eh!
No NITS today. Had more of a mid-week feel to it.
Had 'raves' before LAUDS, so that bollixed up the whole central south for awhile. But it got sorted out.
Got the theme fill without fully focussing on the theme.
SLAIN - Dutch infinitive for 'to kill' is 'slaan'.
HG: Tennessee Ernie Ford was “The Ol’ Pea-Picker.” Here is his rendition of 16 Tons.
Wonderful write-up Argyle!
Needed ESP (Every-Single-Perps) to get the 1949 Lancaster movie CRISS Cross and the Actress Skye IONE.
Both complete unknowns that I will probably forget by noon.
Funny thing about CAR ALARMS ... when you hear one "Go Off" the only thing you think is "Will that guy shut it Off!"
A "Toast-To-ALL" at Sunset ... The "toasts" are earlier, Yeah!
Cheers!
Thanks Janice and Argyle. I enjoyed it all.
Re. car alarms, yep. When one goes off, it never occurs to me that the car might be in the process of being stolen. I just get pissed off at the noise.
My used Camry came with a car alarm. I paid $50 to have it uninstalled by a professional.
Yesterday I wrote how much I enjoy reading the comments by Jayce and Wilbur. I realize I might have seemed to be giving short shrift to all of the other Corner denizens who have interesting stuff to say and write well. I didn't mean to do that. I appreciate the input and comments from everybody here. It's nice to be surrounded by such interesting and pleasant thinkers and writers. Genuinely nice people too...
Go Dodgers!
Definitely a swift sashay today, thank you, Janice Luttrell!
Interesting connections with MASS and Dies IRAE which is sung during Lent and at funeral Masses. Some churches still use the Latin but, thankfully, mine is always in English.
Good to see a photo of IONE Skye who appears in many crosswords. My brother, one sister and one granddaughter are all LEFTIES.
Thank you, Argyle; I appreciate your photos and links.
Have a beautiful day, everyone!
Very smooth sailing except the cross of CRISS & IMARET. Unlike JINX, I guessed correctly, even though I had never heard of either one of them. And with the dictator in charge of Turkey, I doubt that I will ever see the inside of an IMARET. STEAMERS is also a term I didn't know but the perps took care of it. As for the theme I never noticed it and had solved FOUR ALARM from perps before I saw the clue.
CAR STEREO- the manufacturers have made it difficult to use any car radio other than their own by incorporating GPS, voice speakerphones via bluetooth, and other things into one aggravating display.
BORIC acid- I didn't know it was a cleansing acid but it sure keeps the roaches out of the house. When I built my house in 1990 I wouldn't let the guys close in the walls until I covered every horizontal 2X4 in the frame with BORIC acid. They thought I was nuts but 27 years later and I'm yet to see a roach in my house.
"Puzzling Thoughts":
Yes, Owen, I saw your limerick from yesterday. Did you, mine?
Though it's happened before, I solved today's puzzle with nary a single write-over or mis-STEAK
While the puzzle contained many long lettered solves, it was very doable. No clue/solve seemed overly clever; just a good, straight-forward, interesting puzzle. Kudos to Ms Luttrell
My daily limerick has nothing to do with the puzzle or theme, but thought you might enjoy:
On a lighter note ...
In the nudist camp's pamphlet enclosure,
Says, "when you join, requires exposure
Of your naked bod."
That's not really odd.
They are just giving you full "dis-clothesure".
Perfect Monday puzzle, Janice--many thanks! Got my week off to a great start, and I also got the Sudoku, the Kenken, and even the crazy Jumble. Yay--a perfect score for a change!Got Willie LOMAN and GEENA Davis, but didn't know IONE. Had a little trouble, for about ten seconds, with FIFES, but you'll be glad to hear that this morning I actually got PEA, Ol'Man Keith. So, a great puzzle and great expo, Santa.
I think I remember seeing BUSTER CRABBE in a Western serial of some sort, when I first started watching television in this country in 1954. Is that possible? I think I actually had a little crush on him (hey, I was only ten).
Quiet week coming up, which feels good. Have a great day, everybody!
Big Easy - I HATE the factory GPS in my 2013 Honda CRV. I tell it to find Home Depot, and to sort by distance. It insists that I select a subcategory, and lists about a dozen. Depending on the subcategory (lamps, hardware, lumber, plumbing, etc.) the nearest store might be 1,800 miles away. All I want it do is list all stores named "Home Depot", listed by distance to travel, regardless of subcategory. It can't do it. I really wish I had purchased the lower "trim level" CRV, and had an aftermarket head unit / GPS installed.
What dies the term "red letter" mean in crossword lingo ?
Ron E, when you solve online, an incorrect letter displays in red (unless you disable this “cheating” feature)
Ron (1:36)
If you solve the puzzle online, you can select a 'mode' that will give you help if you are having trouble. One helpful mode is to get red letters when you enter an incorrect answer. You aren't given the correct answer but you are given a hint when the 'red' letters let you know you have made a mistake. I use the online puzzle at the Mensa site.
Ron: red letters when solving an electronic crossword indicate incorrect letters. Most crossword apps give you the option of using or not using this feature. Most of us, I think, complete the puzzle without the red letters first, then turn them on when we are finished (to see if we had made any errors).
Hi Y'all! Good puzzle & theme, Janice. Argyle, you sure had to dig deep for some of those links, good job! Thanks.
Thought that singing syllable would be "sol, la, TeA, do". Oops, TRA lala.
Hand up for not knowing the IMARETS/CRISS Cross.
Buster Keaton before CRABBE. ESP
Liked ASSUAGE, ALLUDES, ASSENT & LAUDS in the bottom tier. Don't ask me why. Just like it.
We're too far inland to know STEAMER clams. I thought I had read that soft shell something were molting "females" so tried that. Think that must be crabs maybe.
Ron Eomurian: "red letter" means we work the puzzle on a computer program in which wrong letters turn red. A red letter run is when every letter on the keyboard is tried until the right letter stays black. Some people consider this cheating. I unashamedly consider it research.
Pretty normal Monday puzzle, just a hint of crunch.
HuskerGary, your sister sounds like a real LULU. Sorry for your loss. I’ve got one of those as well, an aunt. A real pleasure, it’s all about her.
Misty @ 12:47 ---> I had to cheat the Jumble today. I'm usually pretty good at Scrabble, Words w Friends, et al, but I was not very "speedy" in discovering the answer. I had all the letters; just couldn't arrange them ...
Misty and C-Moe, was that jumble about the porcupine?
Thank you, members of the jury. However, since Owen voted guilty, I went to the judge and he let me off if I'd promise to buy one of those erasable pens plus put on reading glasses.
IONE SKYE looks like acting's version of ISAO AOKI the golfer.
Lee Trevino was a Marine. All those old E-7s and above claimed to have known him.
Jayce, I meant to wish you a HBD yesterday.
WC
Enjoyed the puzzle today, and am pleased that it had some really cool answers such as ASSUAGE and UNNERVE. I, too, am not familiar with soft-shell clams but have eaten many soft-shell crabs; now I'm going to look it up. Speaking of ref letters, I had to turn them on to discover that I had put in USR instead of SSR; IMARETU looked like a perfectly good Turkish word. Actually, it was a simple typo, but I'm sticking by my thinking re IMARETU.
Thank you all for the nice birthday wishes yesterday. Much appreciated. I enjoy reading all your comments as much as you kindly said you like to read mine. Misty, that's a terrific photo of you and those two classmates. LW and I spent the day out at the coast (what you New Jerseyites and Pennsylvanians call the "shore") yesterday enjoying the tide pools at our favorite beach and the clam (not crab or Crabbe) chowder at our favorite hole-in-the-wall seafood joint. Didn't get to the puzzle until this morning and enjoyed the food and toppings.
desper-otto, very interesting about El Silencio.
Best wishes to you all.
Jayce, thank you for the very kind words about the photo.
Wilbur, the Jumble this morning was the one about the porcupine. Glad to hear you do the Jumble too, Chairman Moe. I was pretty SLOW to get the one this porcupine one but happy that it worked.
Misty, I only glanced at the jumble. I got PAUSE and SKUNK, so there's a P and K in the Answer.
We had a Boston Radio guy who created a character named Lefty Sprocket. I did a pastiche for which the terms "Souse-paw" and Port-sider were explained. I'll see if I have it. The jockey, Norm Nathan sent me a nice letter. He said he laughed.
In my wild days I ate steamers, shell and all. I claimed I was after those good minerals in the shell. Not to speak of the whole chicken wing. My pal claimed that I ate the only two things one can't put in a Garbage disposal.
Gotta run
WC
Got it Misty. Slow POKE
WC
An excellent Monday pzl from Janice Luttrell!
Some fine old-fashioned words like USURY and METTLE endowed this Xwd with a gravitas usually lacking on a Monday. IRAE contributed its deep tone. Both SMOKE BREAK and FOUR ALARM added to the heat. I am speaking independently of the "alarm" theme, which I hadn't bothered noting until Argyle elucidated it so well.
If nothing else, METTLE is a particular fave of mine.
Misty, I'm glad about your fresh success with the PEA. As for Buster CRABBE, the year '54 seems about right. I'm not sure about a western, but I *loved* those old Flash Gordon serials. They were popular when my baby sister was old enough to enjoy them. I was then a little "too old," but sorta peeked over her shoulder to get my share of Flash's encounters with the evil Ming (the Merciless).
And despite Mr. CRABBE's anticipatory porn star name, I appreciated Flash's sweet platonic thing with the lovely Dale....
Nice to hear you were a bit of a Buster C. fan too, in the early days, Ol'Man Keith.
I looked it up and, by golly, there is such a thing as a soft shell clam. From Wikipedia: Soft-shell clams, scientific name Mya arenaria, popularly called "steamers", "softshells", "longnecks", etc. I see Wilbur "The Disposer" Charles has eaten them, shell and all.
Pretty much the only Flash Gordon I remember with any clarity was a movie not too long ago starring Max von Sydow as Ming the Merciless. If I recall, the theme music by Queen was not memorable (so of course I remember it.) I just looked it up and it came out in 1980! "Not too long ago," eh, Jayce? Sheesh.
I also liked Jeroen Krabbé in many movies, not that that has anything to do with anything. And, even less to the point, I used to work with a fellow named Jaron Lanier, whom I admired a lot. He's the guy who claims he coined the expression Virtual Reality. I've been to his home; man oh man he had dozens of different kinds of flutes and knows how to play them all! I could never keep up with him intellectually.
Tinbeni @ 9:55 said, "Funny thing about CAR ALARMS ... when you hear one "Go Off" the only thing you think is "Will that guy shut it Off!"
They are also a very cogent argument for the occasional use of the .50-caliber M-2 (machine gun, that is) as a public service measure!
Jayce, "Not too long ago" is anything before last week ... as in "1945 wasn't too long ago." (Says he who was born in '45, in an attempt to persuade his inner crossworder that he's really only 16.)
Just got word that my sister who lives in Santa Rosa, California was evacuated at 1 a.m. from the fire's path and is now in a motel. She doesn't know whether her house is standing or not. She lives in a retirement enclave.
What a weekend. Sis in the path of fire. My bro lives in Colorado where it is snowing. My granddaughter under dorm curfew during a hurricane passing and my niece and nephew also in the hurricane path. Everybody okay. So far we are just having a little rain as the temperature drops here.
Maine steamers and Ipswich (Massachusetts) clams are soft-shelled, although I've never known anyone to eat the shell, which you can do with a soft-shelled crab. Wilbur, are you pulling our legs?
Hi All!
I feel you Jinx! I too had a Monday FIW. I've "heard" it SaDER and spelled it that way. I also thought it was eMARETS like the airline w/ an I not an A. Oh, well. Thanks Janice for the fun; at least I got a lucky guess with 'E' in IONE.
Thanks Argyle for kicking-off the after-party and the multimedia illustrations of answers like CRISS Cross and IONE.
WO: None; I shoulda had two :-)
ESPs: IONE, ETIC, IRAE, GEENA
Fav: What PK said. Janice put in a lot of grid-sparkle and that more than makes up crossing old names with old movies.
{A, A} { :-) }
PK - Oh, my! Glad to hear that everyone's safe.
Misty, C.Moe, and WC - Dyslexics really can't do the Jumble; To me, the "clue words" kinda looks OK from the get-go (I read the 1st one as 'a soup' just because of the letters). //ok, I see the answer now - but it takes forever and is usually fruitless until MIL shows me the un-Jumble when we compare xwords.
Like Jayce, I only know of The Flash via the movie scored by Queen (not their best stuff). No clue who CRABBE Buster was before today
Who else, @35a, The CAR's Moving in STEREO?
Oh, IM - this is your fault: Ipswich is a palindrome of Bolton [Python's Parrot].
Cheers, -T
Irish Miss, I was on a nutrition kick. I remember the bartender at a seafood restaurant in Copley square getting a little worried. After awhile I kept it down to two or three.
In fact I had a conversation with another nut who matched my clam, with a variety of insects: I topped him with the infamous 9" nightcrawler then he put me away with a tale of monkey brain's from a live monkey. No mas, I cried.
Hopefully no one but the night owls will read this.
Btw. Thanks Owen and C-Moe for xcellent l'icks.
WC in the gloamin
PS. Did someone slip some real into my DECAF???
I call bullshit.
@7:52 - Me too. Clearly, WC is still on decaf :-)
-T
WC- the crowd ain't buying it.
Speaking of which - Norm Nathan? I listened to Dusty Dick Summer and Larry Glick in my overnight youth.
Thank you, Janice and Argyle, for starting the weekday week
Here is this part of southern California, we don't get hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, etc. We do get the occasional earthquake and brush/forest fire. There are two big fires burning now; one near Napa and the other near Disneyland. The smoke is blocking so much sunlight that it seems like an eclipse. The sun has a tannish hue. Yuck. I hate fires.
Very late to the party today. Thanks for the fun Janice and Argyle.
I completed this CW on Cruciverb because we did not get a newspaper on the Thanksgiving holiday. (Thanks for the greeting Spitzboov!)
I'll blame my thinking it was crunchy on too much turkey and being tired after the crowd went home and I cleaned up.
But I did smile when I got the theme.
SMOKE BREAKS have become socially unacceptable in our area. We have had no smoking in public buildings, offices, restaurants etc. for quite a while now and it has more recently been extended to parks, and other public outdoor areas. Even hospitals have no smoking on their property. (Patients are given smoking cessation products to help.)
DH likes to do the Word Jumble. When he is stuck, I help him out. Often, I can figure out the answer from the clue and then work backwards to figure out any hard words because I know the letters that I need. DH calls that cheating!
PK, glad all are safe. We got a lot of rain last night from the remnants of Nate but then it cleared up nicely for the holiday. It seems that some areas have too much water and others not enough.
I'm calling it a day. No decaf here!
Well, AnonT, the Jumbles are always hard--sometimes I get them, sometimes I don't. This morning it just didn't work. Patience, patience, and willingness to win them and lose them, I guess that's my motto.
C, Eh! - So rude of me. I had Canadian Thanksgiving Day on my calendar (we preload all holidays in the countries we operate), I interrupted a Vendor in Ontario with a meeting request (and he noted it Thanksgiving w/o mentioning my American rudeness), yet I still forgot. Happy Thanksgiving. Glad you had a one today; did you get the "wish" bit of the wish-bone?
WC, I hope you noted I was joking in 'agreeing' w/ Anon... I'll eat a few peanut shells and Gulf Coast shrimps' shells if they're not too crunchy.
Misty - I donno; DW, MIL, Army Bro, Step-mom, and both my Sisters can nail a Jumble in seemingly seconds. I always figured I couldn't un-jumble 'cuz I belonged on the Short Bus to spelling school.
Cheers, -T
*er, Glad you had a GOOD one today... See now why they put me on the Short Bus? -T
Moe: yes, I saw the good limerick you posted while I was writing mine!
I'm also a jumble fan. I try to guess the answer first (get it around 60%) and only if I can't do I bother with the individual words. Anagrams are not my thing! 5 letters I can handle, 6 is too much. The page becomes covered with permutations!
Re: red letters, it's become a convention to call them that, but different interfaces use different signals: a double line-thru, a black X, an animation of a bomb exploding and erasing all adjacent letters.
Yeah, I made that last one up. Rule of three.
The struggle for attention is palpable.
I've agonized over whether to ask this because it makes me feel so stupid, and why bother as it's almost 2130 here in GMT-10. But I still can't figure it out and maybe somebody will see it who can.
Re: theme & reveal. I got all the answers from the clues, and of course have heard of false alarm, smoke alarm, car alarm and silent alarm. What I cannot see for the life of me is how "four alarm" is a "literal description" of false, smoke, car and silent.
Thanks from Mike in HI.
There are four alarms in the puzzle.
It seems I am the only one who was unhappy with the absurd Natick in the NE?
CRABBE/CRISS/IMARETS? On a Monday? I would hate it on a Saturday, too.
I guessed CRASS/AMERETS which seems just as possible.
Too bad. I got the theme right away and enjoyed that. But the puzzle was ruined for me by that nastiness.
Agree with Big Easy about the new CAR STEREO systems being dangerously unusable. Aren't there already enough driving distractions to have to fumble with a computer screen just to do basic functions? How is this even legal?
I love my 1996 Corolla which still has real knobs and dials for everything. If they ever bring that back I might consider buying a new car.
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