"Joint Ventures"
18. Joint venture?: ORTHOPEDIC OFFICE.
28. Joint venture?: PRIVATE PRISON.
47. Joint venture?: MARIJUANA SHOP.
62. Joint venture?: FURNITURE FACTORY.
Four types of joints.
Two maintenance guys were smoking a joint and offered to share some of it with me. I don't partake, so I declined. Besides, I really don't care to be around high maintenance people.
Across:
1. They may be counted: SHEEP. A study by Oxford showed that counting sheep doesn't help you fall asleep. It has the opposite effect. So unless you are a worried shepherd...
6. "Masterpiece" airer: PBS. Home of Dour Downton Abbey.
9. Hideaway: LAIR.
13. Disinclined: LOATH. Inclined: Predisposed.
14. One in the script: LINE.
16. Tribal leader: ELDER.
21. Neon tips?: ENs. "N or n is the fourteenth letter in the modern English alphabet. Its name in English is en (pronounced /ˈɛn/), plural ens." - Wikipedia.
22. "C'mon, play along": BE A SPORT. As in, "C'mon, play along. Be a sport, and quit the crabbing every day about the clues and answers."
23. A toddler may be put down for one: NAP.
24. Curtails, with "in": REINS.
26. Of inferior quality: EL CHEAPO. Pseudo Spanish.
31. Winter Olympics event: LUGE. "Luge is one of the most dangerous sports in the Olympic games, and the athletes who race down an icy, high-banked track at speeds typically up to 90 mph are a special breed." daredevils ! Most of us won't drive that fast in a vehicle equipped with airbags.
32. Programming pioneer Lovelace: ADA. Nailed it. Her mother believed in rigorous study. Her father was a poet. Read all about it at Biography.com by clicking her name.
33. Hustle: MOTOR. Verb. Informal. Run or move as fast as possible.
37. Combustion residue: ASH. Combustion fuel: Ash. Or Oak, Hickory, Elm etc.
38. Like the object of an "Aww!": ADORABLE. So passé. Now it's totes adorbs ! If you wanna be a cool cat daddy-o, you gotta dig the new kings jive. Can the lip and focus your audio, or you'll be swinging in squaresville. Totes = totally. Adorbs = adorable. YMMV.
42. U.K. singer Rita __: ORA. Would you like a frozen margaRITA ORA classic margarita ? Wait, never mind. I was channeling Boomer there for a moment. Anyway, from what I read, she's very popular in the U.K.
43. Food packaging abbr.: NET WT. Net weight.
45. Cause of some royal sleeplessness: PEA. Just add another mattress.
46. Salt Lake City team: UTEs. The college team. The professional basketball team in Salt Lake City is the Jazz.
52. Coastal evergreen: SAND PINE. Pinus clausa Florida, and a little bit of coastal Alabama.
55. Character usually seen in 41-Down (LA NIÑA): TILDE. An image of an adorable little Latina ? No, the diacritical mark to tell you how to pronounce a letter.
56. Nail: ACE.
57. Pink drink: ROSÉ WINE. There's another of those accent marks.
59. "Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very __ Day": 2014 film: BAD. A Disney film. Anyone see it ?
65. Trauma pro: ER DOC. Emergency Room Doctor. With just the D in place, I tested for medic. No go. Don't know why I was thinking about the battlefield.
66. Timbuktu's land: MALI.
67. "Stronger" rapper West: KANYE.
68. 1975 Wimbledon winner: ASHE. Arthur.
69. Coddling, briefly: TLC.
70. Place: STEAD.
Down:
1. Plum used to flavor spirits: SLOE.
2. Jazz band staple: HORN. The Utah Jazz periodically play the Charlotte HORNets in pro basketball. In fact, the Jazz will be hosting the Hornets tonight at the Vivant Smart Home Arena in Salt Lake City.
3. Adheres to a healthy diet: EATS RIGHT.
4. E. African land: ETH. iopia. The capital of Ethiopia is Addis Ababa. You will be tested on this in a future crossword puzzle. The currency is the Birr, just in case that comes up some time.
5. It commonly involves spiders: PHOBIA.
- Arachnophobia – The fear of spiders.
- Ophidiophobia – The fear of snakes.
- Acrophobia – The fear of heights.
- Agoraphobia – The fear of open or crowded spaces.
- Cynophobia – The fear of dogs.
- Astraphobia – The fear of thunder and lightning.
- Claustrophobia – The fear of small spaces.
- Mysophobia – The fear of germs.
- Aerophobia – The fear of flying.
- Trypophobia – The fear of holes.
6. "I'd love that!": PLEASE DO.
7. Auction action: BIDS.
8. Last-second online auction participant: SNIPER. New to me. A brief article from eBay.
9. Moved out: LEFT HOME.
10. Furry TV ET: ALF. Alf (né Gordon Shumway; b. October 28, 1756) is the nickname (based on Alien Life Form) of an extra planetary visitor who followed an amateur radio signal to Earth from the planet Melmac. Be careful WikWak !
The series lasted about 4 years. It was very popular in Germany. During the series run, a place in Germany named Alf had municipal signs stolen so many times they had to have extras made and stored in reserve. The municipality also created replicas and offered them for sale to curb the thefts.
11. Tony winner Menzel: IDINA. Thrice nominated. She won in 2004 for her role in Wicked. DW saw it in Chicago with her gal pals. I tended the farm. I best know Idina Menzel from crosswords and for the Top 10 song, "Let It Go" from the Disney animated film, Frozen, in which she voiced the character of Queen Elsa.
12. Summarize: RECAP. As a speaker, tell them what you told them. As a listener, tell them what you heard. Key takeaways.
15. Food recall cause: E. coli. Escherichia coli.
17. Auctioned wheels: REPO. Repossessed automobiles sold at auction. You don't actually own the automobile until you get clear title. Lenders have repo clauses in the loan agreements to reclaim the asset for payment failure and loan default. Some lenders may repo for failure to provide adequate insurance.
19. Fivesome: PENTAD. This pentad is known as the Greek Church. It's said to be the hardest of all splits to pick up. As all bowlers know, splits happen.
20. Tolkien brutes: ORCs.
25. Halloween __: EVE. I've never heard of Halloween Eve as a thing. Heard of Halloween. Heard of All Hallow's Eve. Different names for the eve of All Saint's Day, right ? Halloween Eve would be like eve of the eve. Is it a thing ? Oh well, it's a crossword puzzle, and it perped right in.
27. "Reflection" musician Brian: ENO. Understanding The Importance Of Brian Eno
28. Map out: PLAN.
29. Subterfuge: RUSE.
30. It's expected: PAR. On the golf course. It's incredibly easy to get par and more on every single hole, but the goal is to get par or less.
34. As much as possible: TO THE BONE. Very much, or thoroughly. "I couldn't get to the clubhouse in time; I got soaked to the bone from the sudden downpour. "
35. "Wonderfilled" cookie: OREO.
36. Coarse file: RASP. Coarse voice: Coach Orgeron of the LSU Bayou Bengals has one.
38. Not without ramifications: AT A PRICE. "Yes, we can add those additional features", the project executive said. He quickly added, "At a price", knowing full well that this customer had a history of using "unclear communications" and "customer satisfaction" complaints to get more than was bargained for. PEs and PMs call it scope creep. Contract terms and conditions need specificity, with special focus on deliverables. Ask Jinx. He teaches this stuff.
39. "The Problem with __": 2017 documentary about racial stereotypes: APU.
40. Blissful: BEATIFIC. Wanted Edenlike, but quickly ruled it out.
44. Iraq war issue, briefly: WMD. Weapons of Mass Destruction.
46. Currency mkt. money: USD. United States Dollar.
48. Real hoot: RIOT.
49. "To recap ... ": IN SUM. Didn't we just have that word in an answer ?
50. Boo: JEER AT. Increasingly common fan interaction with players, coaches, owners and teams.
51. Smart set?: ALECKS. Loved this clue / answer.
52. Cautious: SAFE.
53. Automaker whose current models end in X: ACURA. Fooled me. The Tesla Model X came to mind.
54. "The Big Bang Theory" crowd: NERDs.
58. "Actually ... ": WELL.
60. "Game of Thrones" girl __ Stark: ARYA. As Abejo would say, "Four perps and I had it." I never watched Hunger Games of Thrones.
61. Turned green, say: DYED.
63. Japanese drama: NOH.
64. Skin pic: TAT. Picture / tattoo.
Here's the grid so you can check your answers:
Wrong grid. Here's the real grid so you can check your answers:
FIRight, with a lot of helps from perps. a lot of iffy clues.
ReplyDeleteRECAP definitively signals the official death of any rule about answers recapping clues. Before now they were were marginal -- different senses of the words, or embedded in phrases.
Halloween is all-saints EVE (Hallow's eve), Halloween eve, if anyone bothered to use the redundant phrase, would be the evening before Halloween.
The other themers were good, but FURNITURE FACTORY as a "joint" venture was over-stretching it, IMHO.
I've never heard of SNIPER in today's sense. SAND PINE was also new to me. SAFE for cautious was stretching a little. MOTOR in a sense similar to today's was in yesterday's Jumble.
I'm not an oneophile, but is ROSÉ ever called pink? I started with LEMONADE in those squares.
I've been told before, but I still can't remember how KANYE is pronounced.
"The measure of an acrobat's SAFETY is his NET WT."
I thought this joke would make me an Internet wit.
But it fell flat,
With a resounding splat,
And left me being nothing but a nitwit!
The kid didn't like being LEFT HOME.
So he packed his bags and he LEFT HOME.
He moved to the next
Unit in the duplex,
So now he's at home in the LEFT HOME!
{B, B+.}
FIR with no erasures. Maybe a first for me on a Friday.
ReplyDeleteYes, TTP I teach that stuff. Almost all projects will encounter scope changes, but the better the project requirements are understood, the fewer changes the team can expect. Some outfits LIVE on changes - they bid the initial work below cost, knowing that the customer will require profitable additional work. Kind of like being a consultant.
Looked like a theme with OO, PP and FF to start the theme words, but then the Mary Jane Shop rolled onto the scene.
I thought that the cause of royal sleeplessness was Megxit.
Didn't know I was an EBay SNIPER, but that's the way I bid.
Thanks for the nice, easy Friday grid, Joe. And thanks to TTP for the informative review.
Good morning!
ReplyDeleteI struggled with this one before checking it off in the win column. Didn't recognize ORA or ARYA or MOTOR, as clued. Went sideways thinking "One in a script" could be CAST, so "One in a cast" could be LIMB. Bzzzzzt! Got 'er done in the end, so life is good. Thanx, Joe and TTP (I saw what you did there at 22a).
APU: Didn't remember it while solving, but after it filled in I recalled the foofaraw about the mini-mart manager in The Simpsons.
TILDE: I don't see it as a "character."
SAND PINE: News to me. We've got dozens of loblolly pines in our woodlot. They grow fast and very tall. The only limbs are up at the very top, usually 80+ feet off the ground for a mature tree.
"Agoraphobia": I absolutely hate crowds, but there's no fear involved, so I guess I'm not truly agoraphobic, just crabby.
Good morning all.
ReplyDeleteTough slog, but in the end I filled it all and thought I had it .
Checked with the corner and saw I had guessed ARLA wrong for ARYA and since KANYA was unknown I left it.
Good workout. Tough enough for my McD’s coffee to cool off .
Cheers
I was surprised when I was finished so quickly as I was slogging through the grid. I’ll take the W.
ReplyDeleteI suffer from hackophobia. I fear career politicians.
ReplyDeleteOwen, it's Kahn'-yee.
ReplyDeleteClever word play with no real clunkers today, so it's a good puzzle. Finished in just under 10 minutes, though felt a little longer than that. I knew Kanye, but not Arya, so I safely survived that Proper Name Crossing. Didn't know Ada or Ora either.
ReplyDeleteGood Morning:
ReplyDeleteI'm invoking Thumper's words of wisdom today.
FLN
Wilbur, good luck.
oc4beach, thanks for the suggestion, but I like my Dewar's with a splash of water and as much _ _ _ as the glass can hold! (Sorry, Tin).
CED, that photo of the kitten and duckling made my day. Thanks.
have a great day.
Sorry, TTP, I forgot to thank you for the usual wise and witty review. Great job!
ReplyDeleteThis puzzle took forevah! FIR eventually. APU, IDINA and APU were all perps. Neat theme.
ReplyDeleteWho doesn't like the hapless actor in the LIMU ad? Me!! I also dislike the LIMU Emu and his handler. I seem to be in the minority in liking the Gecko.
TILDE for character seems fine to me. We are asked to have 8 or more characters in our passwords, including upper case, lower case, numerals and symbols.
I don't hear totes adorbs, don't like it and will never say it. I guess I am too old. It is not an adorable phrase IMO.
Too many important people make life altering changes without considering the ramifications.
TTP, thank you for your great review.
Loved the adorable kitten and duckling photo.
Musings
ReplyDelete-Zipping through a puzzle is fun but MIT grad Joe made me work on the bottom tier and I loved it down TO THE BONE!
-97-yr-old MIL’s ORTHOPEDIC surgeon repaired her broken femur in a 26 minute operation and had her on her feet the next day
-It is said of a very aggressive athlete, “He has a real MOTOR!”
-When I was three, Perry Como sang, “A, you’re ADORABLE, B, you’re so beautiful…”
-What musical based on The Princess and The Pea was Carol Burnett’s Broadway debut?
-At 28, nephew is a fast food worker with a B.A. that hasn’t LEFT HOME
-If priests asked me for a RECAP of their homily – crickets
-Congressional partisanship – PAR for the course
-JEER AT – “Hey, for $10M/year you could at least give an effort!”
-I asked one waitress about her TAT and her response was, “Immaturity and alcohol!”
Thanks IM, the nurse said "Hold on I just have to insert some data .". I said " Careful with that word". I was having a prostate biopsy (ugh). Classic TMI. All is well. Results next week.
ReplyDeleteLoved TTP's write-up esp (hi D-O) 22A
I didn't find this FIR easy but once I got that J it was done. Joe, I'm guessing you're a CC protege off the cleverly clues and doable XW.
I am was looking for a typhoon or tsunami not a Pacific breeze
SANDPine held me back. Most of the south was white but I was able to hunt for clues to work with.
WC
The other words are "I'll 'just'..."
DeleteHola!
ReplyDeleteI finished this puzzle earlier but returned to bed in a fit of frustration. I'm still dealing with ATT about the damage they caused.
Good puzzle, Joe Deeney, thank you. AT least these are two of the things in life that are constant: good puzzles and good commentary. Thank you, TTP.
I'm used to seeing LOATHE but I know that LOATH is acceptable, too.
LAIR and SHEEP seem appropriate across from each other.
For Timbuktu's land I was undecided between Chad and MALI but realized that Chad is too far east from there. Many years ago I read Iberia by James Michener and much of the action was also in Timbuktu. That is when I became fascinated by the idea of visiting there and promised myself that someday I would. I never made it as far as Mali or Chad but only to Morocco. I think I've related before how I almost got left when the custom's official thought I looked like a native.
As for the Emu commercials, I think they are all inane and not funny at all.
46D, USD also the initials of my college, the University of San Diego.
MOTOR as a verb almost baffled me until I recalled that one can "motor down the highway."
At five months my great-grandson is ADORABLE, I don't mind saying so. Maybe not quite BEATIFIC, but close.
Have a lovely day, everyone!
Amen to OwenKL on the redundancy of "Hallowe'en"and EVE, and on the FURNITURE FACTORY stretch (I still don't get that one).
ReplyDeleteFurniture making involves many kinds of joints . Lap. Mortise and tenon, dove tail. Dowel and others.
DeleteI find it funny that DC has a fear of commitment. need I say more?
ReplyDeleteJinx In Norfolk, I agree.
I used to have trouble distinguishing these two similar looking words until I memorized them.
ReplyDeleteThe TH is LOATHE is the TH we hear in THESE.
The TH we hear in LOATH is the TH we hear in THERE
Loathe is a verb and means to detest or dislike. (very strongly dislike).
Loath is an adjective and means reluctant or unwilling.
We are loath to associate with things we loathe.
We are reluctant to associate with things we detest.
I loathe some of the inane ads we see on TV.
I am loath to sit through five ads in a row before I can get back to my program.
Good afternoon, folks. Thank you, Joe Deeney, for a fine puzzle. Thank you, TTP, for a fine review.
ReplyDeletePuzzle was typical Friday level. Real tough!!
Caught the theme after a couple tries. Had ORTHOPEDIC EFFECT before OFFICE won out.
Tried EL NINO. No cigar. Eventually LA NINA worked. Never heard that term.
Got the North easier than the South. Tapped my wife to help me out and she got several. This was a JOINT effort.
Well, I have to run. Going to a dinner and meeting in Chicago tonight and I have some things to do. See you tomorrow, maybe.
Abejo
( )
I am Yellowrocks.
ReplyDeleteI can read the blog and comment as anonymous on my new smart phone. I cannot get my blue name on the smart phone. I have two Google accounts now. My xword.puzzle@aol.com is tied to the blog and the phone wants to use my new gmail which is not tied to the blog.
ReplyDelete
ReplyDeleteI have to say that the EMU ad where he starts slamming the plate glass window with his beak just like a canary always gets me. BAMMM!!
I also like the one where his “wife” is in the audience, all dressed up.
Super tough Friday puzzle, especially the south...it took a lot longer to fill that in.
I had TESLA before ACURA. WARY b4 SAFE, LEMONADE b4 ROSEWINE, YOU b4 APU. Not a pretty grid but a complete one.
So if this is Friday, tomorrow ought to be even tougher? We’ll see....
I've been meaning to pontificate on TV advertising for a while, so since I seem to be between crises, I'll give it a shot this afternoon. How does a big company know if its ad campaign is successful? It starts with an objective. What result is the company seeking? Could be improving sales, market share, brand awareness, company reputation, community involvement awareness or building demand in advance of a new product introduction, among many other objectives. Sometimes the objective includes a market segment (such as women aged 22 - 35), and not the general public. It is never to create a commercial that people like, and definitely not to win a Clio. The second component is to decide how to measure results. Some things are easily measured, such as market share. Others, such a brand awareness, are measured with before, during and after testing with focus groups. The executive who signs off on the campaign expenditure will require these metrics.
ReplyDeleteOne of the most successful ad campaigns was the Wisk "ring around the collar" ads. They were nearly universally hated, but boy did they sell soap!
I should add that frequently small ads are taken mostly to support favored local causes, such as an ad in a high school track meet's program or to place the company logo on a banner in the local half-marathon. Not much payback, but not much expense either.
WELL, I solved it all but did have to look up the APU answer. Halloween EVE, eh? My nose just wrinkled again.
ReplyDeleteI did like how SHEEP and PEA were clued.
The color of ROSÉ WINE is pink, so I suppose it could be called a "pink drink." Cute little rhyme clue, anyway.
I could nit pick about the symbol ~ being called a "character" in LA NIÑA, since no other diacritical marks are called characters as far as I know. Yes, it is suggested and sometimes required that a password contains upper case, lower case, numerical, and punctuation characters, and in that context I agree that ~ counts as a character in the string of characters, just as $, *, ^, and ' work as punctuation characters in passwords. To push it, Ñ is itself an entirely separate letter in the Spanish alphabet, pronounced "en yay", and is not regarded as the letter N with a tilde over it. I'll stop now. Yes, it's just a crossword puzzle.
Good wishes to you all.
Jayce:
ReplyDeleteI agree with you on the TILDE being an integral part of the letter. In the Spanish alphabet a letter with a TILDE is a separate and distinct letter from n.
Hi All!
ReplyDeleteThanks Joe! After two DNFs this week, I needed this puzzle. A solved Friday puts the confidence back in my solving step. And, it was a very fun puzzle ta'boot!
Great expo TTP. I still have links to click!
What Abejo said - The top of the puzzle was easy(ish) while Marijuana down was mostly empty [just ASHE, ACE (settled Tesla/ACURA coin toss), ACURA, BAD, and DYED] for quite some time. Finally, IN SUM->MALI, RIOT (I kept wanting 'card')...
WO: TO THE Brim
ESPs: ARYA, APU (as clued), BEATIFIC(?)
WAG o' the Week: -ANDP--- and filling SAND PINE. Never heard of 'em.
Fav: MARIJUANA. Made me think of the different types of smokers depicted in Half-Baked. [4:44 - Cameo laden]
Re: SNIPER. A buddy of mine collects comic books (among other things; has a whole room full of boxes of stuff). He told me about SNIPERs (think, 'shoots w/o being seen') "stealing" from him at the last minute; now he does it.
{A, B+}
WC - Good thing the input the data in the correct terminal.
Jinx - As a consultant, the way I'd deal with scope-creep (and extend a gig): "Well, let's have a Phase II and include that." As a 10-week project finished, a new one would begin. #Profit #Eat
Lucina: As far as I'm concerned ~ is a character - 7E in the ASCII table :-)
Cheers, -T
I am impressed with the cornerite who finished in 10 minutes! I managed to get it done without any whiteout, but my time was close to an hour, with much sighing and huffing. Nice, tough puzzle, Joe.
ReplyDeleteHusker Gary, the play was Once Upon a Mattress.
We are enjoying The Greatest of All Time contests on Jeopardy. The 3 participants show good sportsmanship and comraderie which makes the show fun to watch. We think Ken Jennings will prevail.
I was thinking "redundancy" but Halloween is an EVE
ReplyDelete-T did you hear the Rush news? I like the part about the grade school 'punishment' being "drum on the desk for an hour"
I found the above while looking up APU whom I knew from xwords. Comedy should entail laughter even at ourselves. My Boston accent "Mahbull" for marble continually gets guffaws*
Since it's common in non eBay auctions what do you call the "plant" whose job it is to simply boost the price without buying anything
WC
* There's a XW word
PS, -T, I didn't go for "Punch in" data either. Talk about "groaners"**
** Talk about one of the great blog handles that fit perfectly. A Cleveland Brown fan, need I say more?
The "th" sound in there and "these" is the same: voiced "th". An example of a voiceless "th" would be in "thin".
ReplyDeleteAnonymous G
WX @ 1652 - - - Shill, maybe?
ReplyDeleteAnon, of course, they are. I meant to stay TH in thing. Good catch. Sorry for the brain fart. Loath rhymes with BOTH.
ReplyDeleteAfter a day of painting a pantry, I sat down to work this difficult puzzle. The Joint Ventures were fairly easy, just not some of the unknowns. But I got it done.
ReplyDeleteMARIJUANA SHOP- I laugh that the states that are legally selling it ( but NOT federally legal) trying to get tax revenue. The illegal drug dealers aren't about to give up their business. Too much profit for them.
SNIPER, SAND PINE, The problem with APU, BEATIFIC, ORA, ARYA- thank your perps, all new to me.
MOTOR for hustle- that's a stretch.
Halloween EVE- a WAG; never heard of it.
had to change EL NINO to LA NINA, ANYA to ARYA, & TESLA to ACURA to finish correctly
WC - I did and I thank you for remembering. I posted earlier about Canada's Greatest Drummer ever but linked the wrong link(D'Oh!) as I was looking for a compilation of 'He's that F-ing Good.'
ReplyDeleteHere's one of the links I had on tap. I've been watching all of them for #Catharsis.
Sis* texted me earlier when she saw it on her Twitter feed.
I'm saddened by Neil's passing [no more touching lyrics; no more Keith Moon/Stewart Copland/John Bonham ++ drumming]. But, I stop and celebrate the Joy he (and RUSH) gave to me and the world.
#RIPTheGoat. Vapor Trails to you Neil.
Cheers, -T
*Yes, contrary to popular belief there are (a few) chicks that dig RUSH. Sises are two, daughters ++2. DW? -1 [she was a pretender! 2112! We kissed after (I made her listen) to Side One in the driveway!
I was smitten (chick that gets RUSH?!?) She was putting me on.]
Time for a little whinging (whingeing?)...
ReplyDeleteI was in our local supermarket yesterday. I would have paid them an extra fee to turn off their intrusive, repetitive, lacking melody and droning 'background' music. Aargh!
Some of the ads on TV, especially for medicines, have gotten really unpleasant and annoying. They spend about half of their allotted advertisement telling you of all the possible and dreadful side effects, including death. Aargh again!
Why is the word 'affect' being replaced by 'impact'? Pay attention and check it out. You hardly ever hear 'affect' or 'affected' these days. Instead, it's 'impact' or 'impacted.' 'Affect' is being quickly relegated to the vocabulary scrapheap. Why?
TTP, awesome job. I really appreciate all of you that tried to put me into the puzzle but it was not Joe's plan.
ReplyDeleteDid anyone answer the question about seeing the movie
“ALEXANDER AND THE TERRIBLE, HORRIBLE, NO GOOD, VERY BAD DAY” (I never heard of it or the movie)
by Judith Viorst
I went to sleep with gum in my mouth and now there’s gum in my hair and when I got out of bed this morning, I tripped on the skateboard and by mistake I dropped my sweater in the sink while the water was running and I could tell it was going to be a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.
At breakfast Anthony found a Corvette Sting Ray car kit in his breakfast cereal box and Nick found a Junior Undercover Agent code ring in his breakfast cereal box, but in my breakfast cereal box all I found was breakfast cereal.
I think I’ll move to Australia.
In the car pool Mrs. Gibson let Becky have a seat by the window. Audrey and Elliott got seats by the window, too. I said I was being scrunched. I said I was being smushed. I said, if I don’t get a seat by the window, I am going to be carsick. No one even answered.
I could tell it was going to be a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.
At school Mrs. Dickens liked Paul’s picture of the sailboat better than my picture of the invisible castle.
At singing time she said I sang too loud. At counting time she said I left out sixteen. Who needs sixteen? I could tell it was going to be a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.
I could tell because Paul said I wasn’t his best friend anymore. He said that Philip Parker was his best friend and Albert Moyo was his next best friend and that I was only his third best friend.
I hope you sit on a tack, I said to Paul. I hope the next time you get a double-decker strawberry ice cream cone the ice cream part falls off the cone part and lands in Australia.
There were two cupcakes in Philip Parker’s lunch bag and Albert got a Hershey bar with almonds and Paul’s mother gave him a piece of jelly roll that had little coconut sprinkles on the top. Guess whose mother forgot to put in dessert?
It was a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.
That’s what it was, because after school my mom took us all to the dentist and Dr. Fields found a cavity just in me. Come back next week and I’ll fix it, said Dr. Fields.
Next week, I said, I’m going to Australia.
On my way downstairs the elevator door closed on my foot and while we were waiting for my mom to go get the car Anthony made me fall where it was muddy and then when I started crying because of the mud Nick said I was a crybaby and while I was punching Nick for saying crybaby my mom came back with the car and scolded me for being muddy and fighting.
I am having a terrible, horrible, no good, vary bad day, I told everybody. No one even answered.
So then we went to the shoestore to buy some sneakers. Anthony chose white ones with blue stripes. Nick chose red ones with white stripes. I chose blue ones with red stripes but then the shoe man said, We’re all sold out. They made me buy plain old white ones but they can’t make me wear them.
When we picked up my dad at his office he said I couldn’t play with his copying machine, but I forgot. He also said to watch out for the books on his desk, and I was careful as could be except for my elbow. He also said don’t fool around with his phone, but I think I called Australia. My dad said please don’t pick him up anymore.
It was a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.
There were lima beans for dinner and I hate lima beans.
There was kissing on TV and I hate kissing.
My bath was too hot, I got soap in my eyes, my marble went down the drain, and I had to wear my railroad-train pajamas. I hate my railroad-train pajamas.
When I went to bed Nick took back the pillow he said I could keep and the Mickey Mouse nightlight burned out and I bit my tongue.
The cat wants to sleep with Anthony, not with me.
It has been a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.
My mom says some days are like that. Even in Australia.
RIP Neal Peart
ReplyDeleteBill G, could it be because so many people don't know he difference between "affect" and "effect"? That misuse grates on me like sand in cole slaw.
ReplyDeleteI love this preschool book. All of us have days like this.
ReplyDeleteLemonade, yes I have heard of Alexander and his...DAY because I love Judith Viorst. Her first book was of poetry called How to be Hip over Thirty and Other Tragedies of Married Life. Her last book is I’m Too Young to be Seventy and Other Delusions. I love her humor.
ReplyDeleteWEES by now re this CW and I am out of time to post further, but I wanted to say RIP Neil Peart.
ReplyDeleteI thought of you immediately AnonT when I heard the news this afternoon.
Jinx, you might be on to something. Still, I think sand in cole slaw is significantly worse...
ReplyDeleteBut grit in the whole belly clam..
ReplyDeleteIf there's nae grit there's NAE clam roll. If there's nae clam roll you're nae in Boston*
Another thing I have to pass on with my gout
WC
* Or so. NH or Maine not to speak of cape cod
TTP: “high maintenance” — funny. And you don’t have to worry: I have Melmac filters on all of my radios. I am not as dumb as I look. :P
ReplyDeleteWEESANEE. I have little to add at this late hour. As most others said, I found the south more difficult than the north, and it took me just over 20 minutes to FIR.
My brother does a lot of buying and selling on eBay; I’m quite familiar with the practice of sniping.
Gonna play a little radio and go to bed. Tomorrow looks to be lots busier than any day should be allowed to be.