This is one of the rare puzzles where the write-up is harder than the puzzle. But before we go there, let's welcome back David P. (my second straight David constructor) who has his 52nd LAT publication here. He was the first constructor I wrote up when I switched to Fridays in 2010. I think this is my 11th DP puzzle. Like the most recent one published two years ago, I need to begin by sharing the reveal.
40A. Hotel room amenity ... or one of the configurations that resolve four puzzle answers: MINIBAR. In retrospect, this explained the missing "MINI" in 29A/30A and 47A/49A. 21A and 57A just fit with adding the "MINI."
21A. Cornerstone phrase: ANNO DO (
29A. In a humiliating way: IGNO (
47A. Resident at Ottawa's 24 Sussex Drive: PRIME (
57A. Little versions: (
With the limited number of theme letters, there is room for much long fill and some Friday challenge. CATSPAW, ENCORES, MARAUDS, NOB HILL, CARL SAGAN, RED ALERTS, ALGORITHMIC, and ISOMORPHISM. For those complaining about puzzles being nothing but pop culture, David presents so many areas of knowledge, I hope you had as much fun as I did.
Time to go to work.
Across:
1. Really big show: SMASH. What else comes to mind?
6. Sharp bark: YELP. This a very common clue/fill.
10. Software product with a cup-and-saucer logo: JAVA.
15. Maintain: AVER. A favorite word of people who draft legal complaints.
16. Australian __: OPEN. Timely as Susan pointed out on Tuesday, the tennis is being played there now and the Williams sisters and the defending champion NAOMI OSAKA all lost in the first week. The ladies' final has two unseeded players Saturday.
17. __ Marbles: historic sculptures: ELGIN. I did not know about this HISTORY. Though I know this ELGIN. Very sad about Kobe and his daughter and the other 7 on the helicopter all of whom had families and life left to live. Maybe if they had driven...
18. Serious warnings: RED ALERTS. Why Red? The phrase "Red Alert" comes from the naval tradition of "General Quarters" ("Action Stations" if you're British), where a ship prepares for battle. Much of the procedures are the same.
20. Narrow range: A TO B.
22. Plunders: MARAUDS. This is from the late 17th century: from French marauder, from maraud ‘rogue’.
24. Upper-class San Francisco area: NOB HILL. HISTORY.
33. Takes pieces from?: UNARMS. Does he mean "Disarm" like taking a weapon or Aphrodite?
38. Beast hunted in Hercules' fourth labor: BOAR. I have a cute LINK that includes a Hercules crossword.
39. Can. sign letters: KPH. Kilometers Per Hour.
42. Fr. title: MME. The abbreviation for Mademoiselle. And the Spanish counterpart 69A. Span. titles: SRAS. Señoritas.
43. Arizona city: YUMA. Not Nick Adams.
45. Horn of Africa native: SOMALI. It looks sort of like a Rhino horn, home to the countries of Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Somalia, whose cultures have been linked throughout their long history.
46. W. alliance since 1948: OAS.
Organization of American States. MEMBERS.
51. Added numbers: ENCORES.
54. Unwitting tool: CATSPAW. Derived they say from this FABLE. Later used by Mark Twain.
59. Smoothie seed: CHIA. Do you like them better as pets?
60. "Cosmos" presenter: CARL SAGAN. He was so much more.
64. Baker's tool: WHISK.
65. Mayberry moppet: OPIE. I love me some alliteration.
66. 1920s chief justice: TAFT. He went to the Supreme Court after his Presidency. HISTORY.
67. Binary pronoun: HE/SHE.
68. 2001 Microsoft debut: X-BOX.
70. Financial guru Suze: ORMAN. Anybody watch her lectures?
Down:
1. Cook, as bao buns: STEAM. If you are not familiar, this dish that originated in Northern China, where wheat, rather than rice was more prominently grown. I am sure C.C. has enjoyed many.
2. Smallest European Union nation: MALTA. We are the closing agent for a transaction between a client and a company from Malta.
3. Like search engine ranking systems: ALGORITHMIC. A Friday word that is very relevant in your life now even if you do not know it. LEARN. Nothing to do with Al Gore dancing.
4. Winter luggage item: SKI BAG. I don't know much about this winter item as my skiing days are long over, but I was shocked/amused seeing this AD.
5. QVC sister station: HSN.
6. Tall tales: YARNS.
7. Tied: EVEN.
8. Deceived: LED ON.
9. Museum with Goyas: PRADO.
10. 10-Across: JOE. I love how wheeled the "J." WHY IS IT CALLED JOE?
11. Boston Marathon mo.: APR.
12. Boxer's fixer: VET. Doggie pun.
13. "Jeopardy!" ques., actually: ANS.
19. Timber wolf: LOBO.
21. Dreamboat: ADONIS.
23. One for the money?: UNUM. A Latin lesson from the dollar bill.
25. Center: HUB.
26. Type of mathematical equivalence: ISOMORPHISM. A shout out to our Mathematics whizzes, derives from the Greek iso, meaning "equal," and morphosis, meaning "to form" or "to shape." Formally, an isomorphism is a bijective morphism. Informally, an isomorphism is a map that preserves sets and relations among elements. Easy, right?
27. Parent of a cria: LLAMA. Or a baby alpaca, vicuña, or guanaco.
28. Minstrel strings: LYRES.
31. FaceTime alternative: SKYPE.
32. Disdainfully reject: SPURN. Harsh, but it is time that you...
34. "I'll take that as __": A NO.
35. Canyon edge: RIM.
36. Wharton deg.: MBA.
37. Latin dances: SALSAS.
41. "Norma Rae" director: RITT. I now know this MAN's HISTORY.
44. Latin trio word: AMO. Amas, amat.
48. Jazz and Swing: ERAS.
50. Artist known for optical illusions: ESCHER. Maurits Cornelis Escher.
52. Les __-Unis: ETATS. USA.
53. 10-Down sweetener: SUGAR. The third reference for all of you who are drinking your coffee as you solve. I have my cup at hand.
54. Euro fractions: CENTS.
55. Tyler of "Criminal Minds": AISHA. Dr. Tara Lewis on the show. LINK.
56. Rouse: WAKEN.
58. Tennis nickname: RAFA. Nadal. He also was bounced out in Australia.
60. Crew chief: COX. A coxswain is also the helmsman of a racing crew, like a rowing crew in a competition. The swain part is from a word meaning "servant," and cox is from cok, meaning "a small boat."
61. PD heads-up: APB.
62. Kia subcompact: RIO.
63. Latin law: LEX. The translation and root word for Legal and many others. Or Superman rival Luthor.
64. Dr. Seuss' Cindy-Lou, e.g.: WHO. They lived in Whoville.
Another month here at the Corner in the record books, as we move toward 5,000 publications. Thank you, David, for a slightly different challenge and thank you all for reading and commenting. Lemonade out.
Note from C.C.:
Happy
birthday to dear Bill G, who's been with this blog for over over 11
years. I enjoyed his bike rides to the coffee place and observations
over the years. Have a very special day, Bill!
 |
| Bill and his wife Barbara |
40 comments:
When a grifter attempts something huge
H needs a CAT'S PAW, a stooge,
A tyro to dupe
Who'll end up in the soup,
And IGNOMINIOUSLY blamed as a noodge!
So the villain MARAUDS about at will,
Fooling the fops that frequent NOB HILL.
The marks are UNARMED
By the conman's charms,
And LED ON by his innocent shill!
No RED ALERTS to the victims flash
Until they find they are missing cash!
Away wealth WHISKED
As if 'twere mist,
And with only the sad sack to SMASH!
{A.}
Good morning!
That northwest corner was a bear, and the last to fill. The east coast filled quickly, but incorrectly. Alas. I chose BEAR for Hercules' labor. Would've known the perp had to begin ISO and not ISE had I looked. But I didn't. DNF. Do I get some points for getting the MINI theme without the reveal clue, which I failed to read. Didn't think so. Thanx, David and Lemonade. (I really liked your Al Gore dancing line.)
YUMA: Tried MESA first. We see it more often, and it's more crossword-friendly. Nope. I used to drive through Yuma from CA to visit the parentals when they lived in AZ.
Happy birthday, Bill G. Got any brain-teasers for the celebration?
I had a lot of fun with this puzzle, but I don't understand the phrasing for the theme revealer being a "(configuration) that resolve(s) four puzzle answers." I get that MINI is missing, but how does the BAR part come in? Is the dash overlying a deleted letter called a BAR? Or is it that MINI is "barred" from appearing? Neither seems quite right, and neither really seems to be a configuration that resolves something, at least to me. Is there a third way of looking at it that I am missing? Can someone help explain?
I liked that all four theme answers had exactly four black squares at the part where MINI (4 letters) should be.
HBDTY and many more Bill G. I thought about you when I posted the line "an isomorphism is a bijective morphism."
Anon at 7:15, if I could have explained it better, I would have. My explanations are my own and do not necessarily match the constructors
Anon@7:15, I thought those 4 black squares were the "bar."
UNCLE. DNF. Even solving the MINIBAR I couldn't get a handle on the - clues. I've never heard of a CATSPAW or ISOMORPHISM. I incorrectly guessed some type of SAW, had no idea who RITT or ESCHER were, didn't know BOAR and tried to figure out:
cria- LARVA or LLAMA?
instrument- LUTES or LYRES
Fr. titls- FRE or MME.
I got IGNO, ANNO DO, & ATURES by perps and just left them. Nothing made sense to my simple mind.
Australian OPEN- Mugaruza may be unseeded but she is a TWO-TIME grand slam champ, having won both Wimbledon and the French Open.
I thought this was an excellent and creative puzzle. Took a while to get, but loved the MINI bar theme.
Good morning everyone.
Happy Birthday Bill G. Nice picture.
Finally figured out how the gimmick should work and got IGNOminiOUSLY and PRIME miniSTER. Perps got the other theme fill. MARAUDS was the only word I accepted help on. Got everything else. Good guesses at LLAMA and CHIA. Knew ELGIN from archeology reading of long ago. There's a Lord Elgin hotel in Ottawa not far from the PM's residence, I believe.
Nowhere near finishing. The SE corner etc did me in. Never heard the term CATSPAW... with a CA and a ending W only able to come up with "cashcow"
Knew the term COX Swain. If you're a 1 percenter your HS grad can get into a prestigious college pretending to be one.
PRIME, ANNODO, IGNO ATURE and other correct answers fit but didn't make sense. Never got the gist of the theme.
Disagree with UNARMED. "A perp is UNARMED (not carrying a weapon) so doesn't need to be 'disarmed'."
Did change Lute to LYRE and Australian crawl to OPEN for what it was worth.
Though familiar with the film did not know RITT or AISHA from the series.
Learned what a cria is...
Definitely do not TGIF. Fearing tomorrow's challenge will be cringeworthy.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY BILL G.
Lemon: Excellent write-up.
I know this will surprise many of you ... but the one thing I never enjoyed in any of the Hotel rooms I stayed during my 5 continent career was having a MINI-BAR.
Oh, I enjoyed toasting the Sunset in every city my travels took me to.
But a 1.5 oz bottle of Scotch for $ 5.00 a pop (or more!) was too expensive for me ... even when I was on the Company's travel allowance.
Looking forward to "Toasting-You-ALL" at Sunset with my Duggan's Dew.
(which goes for $ 25.99 for a 1.75 liter bottle) tonight at Villa Incognito.
Cheers!
Good Morning:
I must admit that it took way too long for the penny to drop vis a vis the theme and, by then, I really didn't care. Isomorphism and Algorithmic led to a DNF and a little confab with Thumper. Nice shout outs to CanadianEh with Prime Minister and KPM and to our own OAS.
Thanks, David, for a Friday stumper and thanks, Lemony, for the informative and fun review and links.
Happy Birthday, dear Bill G, I hope you celebrate with one of your famous, delicious lunches. Do share the details! 🎂🎁🎈🎊🎉
FLN
Good news about Janice's homecoming, Keith. Best wishes for a speedy recovery.
Have a great day.
Good morning. Thank you, David. Thank you, Lemonade.
Happy Birthday Bill !
One stupid letter. Nuts ! Keyed in ESCHiR, glanced at HiS HE, and moved on. HE SHE. D'OH !
D-O, I had YUMA first, but had twa before SST. Didn't take long to fix that error.
It was the east side for me. Had BeAR and had ste where MME belonged. So with ISesOR-HISM in place, and after a few minutes to make coffee, the es went out and ISOMORPHISM went in. Not familiar, but the word made sense.
Didn't know cria, but with LL in place, it had to be LLAMA, right ?
So everything locked in except that i where the E belonged.
Ray-O-, I know CATS PAW, but not in that sense. I have 3 cats paw tools (different sizes) in my tool collection. They are great woodworking / carpentry tools for removing moldings and trim.
Thanks for the explanations Lemonade.
Gotta love a theme that requires an explanation. Just one big natick. Virtually everything about this puzzle was unfun. Voluntary DNF.
Another CSO to Yuma, AZ the winter lettuce capital in the world, located on the borders of California and Mexico. I would like to see Yuma clued differently than “Arizona city” how about “train to 3:10?
Off to store to get chicken wings to air fry for Super Bowl.
Hola!
Happy birthday, Bill! Yes, do tell us what special lunch you are having. And I hope Barbara is doing well.
There was much to like about this puzzle but I dislike the missing parts. It's not my favorite kind. Now, though, I realize how clever it is and I see the BAR between the MINIs.
ELGIN marbles evoked some history lessons from long ago as well as my reading of historical fiction and I really liked seeing all of CARL SAGAN's name. The PRADO recalls my visits there. One thing about going to museums is seeing the enormous size of those paintings some of which fill an entire wall.
From visiting San Francisco often, NOBHILL is well known.
In my mental debate with Mesa and YUMA I saw that SKYPE would determine it to be YUMA.
LLAMA is only one of many mammals that bear cria. And speaking of bear, that's what I had instead of BOAR.
Having read most of Dr. Seuss's books to my daughter and grandchildren and seeing The Grinch numerous times, Cindy-Lou WHO easily emerged.
Thank you, David Poole, for this very challenging puzzle and kudos for your creativity. And many thanks, Lemonade, for unraveling the mysteries.
Enjoy your day, everyone!
I came close to solving everything, but only after reading the blog and thinking more about the "configurations" did I realize that *every* four-block "bar" represented "MINI." I had been wondering how on earth we were supposed to get MINIatures, and now I see that it makes perfect sense. Very clever!
Well, at least I got the north-east corner right at the beginning. YELP helped me get YARNS and PRADO, and then RED ALERTS got me APR and OPEN and soon the corner was all filled in. But that was pretty much it for me, with a few chunks here and there throughout, but no clue about the theme or what those little dashes as clues were all about. Looks like one of the more complex puzzles we've had, David--and I admire it even if it didn't work very well for me. And great pictures and helpful explanations, Lemonade.
Happy birthday, Bill G.--have a great day.
Fun poem, Owen, many thanks for that too.
Have a good weekend coming up, everybody.
Wow! Great puzzle. Had trouble in the south-east. I'm weak on proper names.
Easier than most Friday LAT's. At first, regarding the clueless prompts, I was clueless and a tad frustrated, but when I saw the light, I was enchanted by them. Thanks, David, and thank you Lemonade for your always informative posts.
I was sure 47A had to be PRIME MINISTER. I had PRIME. From perps I had STER. Ooh! there is a mini black bar in between! I see the prime mini ster. The rest of the puzzle was quickly solved. Very little unfamiliar fill. I knew ESCHER and PRADO. I have seen CAT' PAW before. That seems to be the role of many politicians today.
"Takes parts from/ unarms" - I took to be a play on words. Taking the arm parts form Venus de Milo unarms her.
I loved Norma Rae and saw it several times. I was not aware of RITT or AISHA, but they were easily perped.
Knowing the syllables ISO and METRIC made ISOMETRIC a reasonable guess from a few perps. I can't explain its meaning, though.
ALGOR-THM-- made ALGORITHMIC a good guess having heard of search engine algorithms.
A very happy birthday to Bill.
YR, the clue in my paper was "Takes pieces from."
YR - How did we get to 'isometric' from ISOMORPHISM?
A bit of a grind, but loved the helpful theme. I taught several classes based on Doug Hofstadter’s book, “Godel, Esher, Bach., at two different universities.
With a BS and PhD in Mathematics, ISOMORPHISM was a snap.
Friday fiasco. Thanks for the fun, David and Lemonade.
Well, this was a workout which required some Google help. I got the theme only for 30A & 49A which had the MINIBAR clue. I had to read Lemonade's explanation to see ANNO DO MINI and MINI ATURES. Wickedly clever.
But fellow Canadian David, I have a couple of quibbles!
1. Our current PRIME MINISTER is not a resident of 24 Sussex; Justin Trudeau and family reside at Rideau Cottage (on the grounds of our Governor-General) because 24 Sussex is in a state of disrepair. (But he did live at 24 Sussex as a child). Perhaps Rich made up the clue. (Please pop in to clarify, David)
24Sussex
2. Can. sign letters are not KPH but KMH (actually Km/h) as I have stated here before.
CanSignLetters
We can now go 120 Km/h on parts of the QEW.
Hand up for lutes before LYRES.
A TO B took a while to parse.
The old CW seesaw between AVER and Avow.
I did not know TAFT, SAGAN, OAS (wanted NATO), ORMAN, AISHA.
Smiled at SRAS and MME.
I was agape at ISOMORPHISM and ALGORITHMIC. No Thumper though, IM.
Do the locals call it SNOB HILL?
Yes, Spitzboov, there is still a Lord Elgin Hotel not far from the Parliament Buildings.
Big Easy commented on other SKYPE alternatives yesterday; Google Duo and WhatsApp besides Facetime.
Glad to hear that Janice is home, OMK.
Happy Birthday Bill G.
Wishing you all a great day.
Just a clarification:
Mme = Madame, Mlle = Mademoiselle
Sra = Senora, Srta = Senorita
Musings
-Just back in town from two days with our wonderful family! Saw granddaughter play mediocre basketball and excellent violin
-I got the puzzle done before I finally saw OUSLY was not a LOUSY anagram and then... Brilliant!!
-ELGIN on the Great Plains - The State of Nebraska has nearly finished returning bones and artifacts to the Ponca Tribe in NE Nebraska. More
-A TO B assessment of Katherine Hepburn
-Unwitting tool = “Useful Idiot”
-HE/SHE lifted the MAN/WOMAN hole cover
-No SUGAR or anything else in my JOE!
-HBD, Bill!
Well.....got the solve while trying not to lose my temper.
I mean...how gimmicky can one puzzle get?
Many write-overs....LOGARITHMIC/ALGORITHMIC, BEAR/BOAR, REX/LEX (duh), ACIA/CHIA.
By the time I finished I had no patience left...left ANNODO and the others because I just didn’t care. I didn’t care they were correct either.
So a solve and aggravation at the same time.
See you tomorrow.
Hi Y'all! This puzzle was so far out of my ballpark, I barely got to first base. Thanks anyway, David! I spent too much time doing red-letter runs then disbelieving what turned up. The math terms were brutal. My theme was utter frustration. Had to come for Lemonade's great commentary to make any sense of a theme at all. Thank you very much, Lemony.
Happy Birthday, BillG! Prayers for Barbara's health!
Complicated
Thank you Canadian Eh for the very important information on 24 Sussex and road signs
Hi All!
Ouch, David Poole, that was a doozie. Big DNF for me. Thanks for the puzzle.
Thanks Lem, for the Expo.
Left blank: M of AMO, T in ETATS, 1st T in RITT, and I had SAMBAS. Oh, in the NE, LOB-, L-Ad- (LLAMA, but I had MdE).
Never got the theme; kept thinking '-' clues were going to be small "bars" of some sort...
WO: Km/H (Hi C, Eh!)
Fav: JAVA / JOE placement
{A}
I was pretty sure 47a was Canada's PM but Trudeau had too many letters.
TTP - I have a few CATS PAWs too [ff to 1:15].
I finished a book over the weekend re: AI ALGORITHMS and how they work / affect our lives. You Look Like a Thing and I Love You is a fun quick read [and you don't need a background in Artificial Intelligence nor Computer Sci. to understand it.]
Happy Birthday BillG!
Cheers, -T
Hi everybody...
Wow! I've never had so many thoughtful birthday wishes. You are all very kind. Thank you.
No big fancy lunch today. I spent an hour visiting with three old friends at a local coffee shop.
Barbara is doing OK at present. She is going for radiation treatments for her lymph gland in her neck. They are a quick five minutes every day for another week or so. I am very hopeful that will take care of everything. We'll see...
My mother had radiation treatments on her neck soon after I was born. I think they put an actual piece of radium on her neck each time. She ended up with a small burn scar under her ear. It did the trick though.
Mind how you go...
I had a long day and carried this groaner* with me. I started at the VA where I had to wait to get fitted for new glasses. The glasses are free but making them progressive and transitional added up
Conversation with obstetrician: "Have you ever seen the TV program "Criminal Minds"?. "Oh yes, it's one of my favorites, love it". " Great, who is Tyler?". "mmm, errr, ahhh. Let's Google it". Aaarrgggh!!!!!
So that was a big Natick along with ESCHER. I actually recognized ORMAN when lemonade pointed it out. I also had ANTHROMORPHIUS. Actually, finding the four MINIs (didn't catch the bar thingy) was some satisfaction. Did I add that I had to WAG/Perp KITT?
Grok'ing this kind of theme is not my bailiwick. Clue for CENTS was odd(IMO). I like the Venus de Milo explanation for UNARMS.
I knew SAGAN, BOAR and TAFT. Art, music, pop-cul , Spanish and Latin are big weaknesses. Plus, I've gotten too close to Mr Stupidity in my waning years.
Hbd, Bill G. Glad Barbara is doing okay. Full W on your poem today Owen. You are the comeback kid.
WC
**When I see "-" for a clue….
I found the theme very clever. At first I thought it was a repeat of the TURN DOWN theme we had recently. Then the light slowly came on as I solved the MINI BAR theme reveal as well as the theme answers. Biggest hangup was unknown RITT. Interesting to learn about him. FIR.
Of course, I enjoyed the math answers for a change. ALGORITHMIC is a word we all should know. And ISOMORPHISM is also handy for expressing similarities of a certain type. ESCHER is also a favorite artist of us math nerds. My mother took me to a show of his art when I was a teen at the National Gallery of Art. Free!
I remember watching Suze ORMAN during the stock market bubble in the late 90s. She had just one piece of advice: Get an index fund and hold it forever. When the bubble burst and the market bottomed out, she frantically told everyone to sell! Worst possible advice. I would never trust her.
CATSPAW I only know from a creepy Halloween episode of the original Star Trek series.
Here is a one minute preview of the CATSPAW episode of Star Trek from just before Halloween in 1967
I was just eight years old and fortunately too young to stay up and watch it. I saw it when I was a bit older and could appreciate the brilliance of what they were doing. They were showing how easily we can be manipulated to have "creepy" feelings. When it is all just fancy stage magic.
Here someone has posted the entire 50 minute episode, but it does not allow fast forward or rewind.
From yesterday:
Glad to have stimulated the KALE discussion. I should have been more clear.
People should be free to eat whatever they like. The problem is that this fad has restaurants putting this in healthy foods that used to taste good and ruining them. Imagine your most favorite food. Now imagine that everywhere you go to get it, they have added your most hated food to it. That is my gripe about KALE.
I feel I should say something after being AWOL all week. This was waaay over my pay grade David but I enjoyed doing battle with you. Loved the theme when the light finally went on!
Early week puzzles were easy for me but I had no time to comment. Thanks after the fact.
Owen, all week you have amused me. Today was the best.
Lemon, thanks for ‘splaining the hard parts and for the chuckles.
3rd attempt at posting from the IPad today,
Bill G, I had a great cake all picked out
When a silly theme link caused my iPad to freeze up!
HBD Bill!
Hmm, this back door link might let me in...
I was trying to say that the mini bar theme gave me a lot of trouble...
Picard, substitute the word MAYO for KALE and my sentiments exactly. The dining industry simply assumes that all love mayo and they splatter it routinely on anything.
I am not allowed to have a hearty dislike nor offered a substiture. re horseradish on turkey or roast beef.
WC
I shared your pain on this one.
Hold the mayo is a common refrain for me in restaurants; another reason I eat home most meals. I like horseradish on most meats and if the restaurant won't accommodate you it is time to find another.
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