Good morning, cruciverbalists. Malodorous Manatee here with Buck Henry & Mel Brooks' Maxwell Smart and The Chief to introduce today's puzzle.
If my research is correct, today's constructor Michael Paleos made his L.A. Times Debut on June 28, 2019. He has also had puzzles published in the L.A. Times on March 12, 2020 and, more recently on June 10, 2021. Apologies in advance if I have missed one or more.
The Cone Of Silence seemed appropriate today because Michael riffs on those silent letters that are not uncommon in the English language. The reveal comes at 54 Across:
54 Across. Cold shoulder . . . and a hint to four circled letters, individually and as a unit: SILENT TREATMENT
The interesting twist here is that the four circled letters spell, in order from top to bottom, MUTE. That is an impressive twist on an otherwise pretty straightforward theme.
17 Across. Aids for retrieving things: MNEMONIC DEVICES MNEMONIC DEVICES are tools used for memorizing a string of words. Well-known ones include HOMES (for the Great Lakes), King Philip Came Over For Great Spaghetti (Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family Genus, Species) and ROY G BIV (for the colors in a rainbow and, yes, Indigo has been dropped by some).
28 Across. Hendrix's "Star-Spangled Banner" at Woodstock, for one: GUITAR SOLO
33. Made bad news easier to take: SOFTENED THE BLOW
41. Bond of the '70s and '80s: ROGER MOORE. Not a T-Note or a Junk Bond, but a British spy.
. . . and now for the rest of the story:
Across:
1. Something going to the dogs: ALPO. Right "off the bat" a bit of misdirection. Not the idiom for a crumbling situation but literally something you would give to a dog.
5. Chirpy sci-fi critter: ARTOO. R2 D2 aka ARTOO DEETOO from the Star Wars franchise. R2 D2 visited us last Friday, also.
R2 D2 Noises
10. Joe by another name: JAVA. Slang for coffee.
14. Welsh actor Roger: REES. Unknow to this solver. Diolch, perps.
15. Domain: REALM.
16. Kalahari-like: ARID. The Kalahari Desert.
20. Hunted ones in a 2016 craze: POKEMON. POKEMON GO
21. Rare forecast: HAIL. Less frequent than sunny skies, overcast skies, rain or snow.
22. Teeing off: IRING. Alternative clue: What this clue is to solvers. Irking? Okay. But the present participle of IRE?
23. Provider of colt comfort: MARE. Not Cold Comfort. Nice wordplay. No, not jeu de mots.
24. "On the Road" narrator __ Paradise: SAL. Jack Kerouac's (nee Jean Louis Lebris de Kerouac) thinly-veiled self in the book.
Cassidy (Cassady / Dean Moriarty) - 1977 - Grateful Dead
27. Zippered shelter: TENT. Looking at the local streets, other clues come to mind.
31. One might be slipped: DISC. Hands up for having had L5 / S1 or something similar added to your vocabulary at some point.
32. Some urban pollution: NOISE.
39. Word with box or light: IDIOT. Two idioms. IDIOT box for television and IDIOT light for the lights on an automobile dash board that illuminate to tell the driver that something has gone amiss.
40. Bush hoppers: ROOS. Bush is used to indicate Australia and hoppers provides a slangy hint for KangaROOS.
44. Part of CSNY: NASH. Crosby Stills NASH and Young. DSGN work not work as well. A local school once held a charity auction featuring Graham NASH's Nash Rambler automobile.
48. Its returns were never sales: Abbr.: IRS. Tax Returns.
49. Strong lobby for seniors: AARP. This clue requires no explanation here.
50. Game with scratching: LOTTO. Scratch off that ticket. You might be a winner.
51. 2019 Broadway biomusical: TINA. TINA Turner.
52. Big squeeze: BEAR HUG. Again, nice wordplay.
58. Rapper-turned-actor: ICE T. Alternatively, Rapper-turned-actor who often visits crossword puzzles.
59. Something one may be dying to hide?: ROOTS. Hair Dye. Nice pun.
60. Pro foe: ANTI.
61. Smart-alecky: CUTE. CUTE, real CUTE. Do we detect a note of sarcasm?
62. Affected: ARTSY. As used here, too, too pretentious.
63. Zap: LASE. Zap often turns out to be Nuke, as in microwave.
Zap Comix #0
Down:
1. Axilla, commonly: ARMPIT. Today's let's skip the graphics moment. The A from ALPO at 1 Across proved helpful as, initially, I had no idea about 14 Across.
2. Lost love in "The Raven": LENORE. Edgar Allan Poe.
James Earl Jones and Friends
3. Spy, in a way: PEEK IN. LOOK IN was, briefly, considered as was PEER IN.
4. "Pay It Forward" actor Haley Joel __: OSMENT. Unknown to me. Thank you, perps.
5. River in Tuscany: ARNO.
The Arno River at Night - Firenze 2015 - Photo By MM
6. Bit of equestrian gear: REIN.
7. Tic __: TAC. A bit surprised that it didn't turn out to be Tic Tok. What do you get if you cross some ants with some tics? All sorts of antics.
8. So last year: OLD HAT. Idiom meaning passe. It may have developed during the time when women often wore hats and the styles changed annually.
9. 1998 Masters winner Mark: O'MEARA. In 1998, golfer Mark O'MEARA became the oldest to win two majors in the same year. He was 41.
10. Monopoly corner: JAIL. Do not pass GO. Do not collect $200.
11. Parabolic path: ARC.
12. Contend: VIE.
13. They pop up too often: ADS. Online Pop-up ADS.
18. IM gasp: OMG. Instant Message gasp = Oh My God!
19. Sábado preceder: VIERNES. Today's Spanish lesson.
23. Emphatic end to a killer performance: MIC DROP.
24. Lowe's bagful: SOIL. Lowe's home improvement centers sell bags of SOIL in the Garden Department.
25. "And another thing ... ": ALSO.
26. MGM co-founder: LOEW. Marcus LOEW. Not to be confused with Lowe's from 24 Down.
28. Gimlet option: GIN. 2.5 ounces of GIN, 0.5 ounces of Simple Syrup, a squeeze of fresh lime and a lime wedge to garnish.
29. One of a Swiss Army knife's many: USE. Many uses.
30. Blubber: SOB. To cry. Not, in this case, flab.
31. Disembark, maybe: DETRAIN. Not to be confused with DEPLANE.
33. Aide to millions: SIRI. A modern-day reference. My girlfriend asked me why I was whispering at home. I told her that I was worried that Mark Zuckerberg was listening. She laughed. I laughed. Aexa laughed. SIRI laughed. We all laughed.
34. It could be fishy: ODOR.
35. Cookie fruit: FIGS. Fruit, as with fish, can be singular or plural.
36. __ the mark: TOE.
36. __ the mark: TOE.
37. NBA's Raptors: TOR. A National Basketball Association team. TORonto. Canadian, eh?
38. Groundbreaking invention: HOE. Quite literally.
42. Watchword: MANTRA. There was an indecisive Buddha. His mantra was, "ummmmmmmm...."
43. Address provider: ORATOR. A nice play on words. Why did Lincoln give the Gettysburg Address? Because the Gettysburg was naked.
44. Not odd: NORMAL. Not EVEN. Not even what?
45. She turned Arachne into a spider: ATHENA. I did not know this but the assumed that it would be an ancient goddess and the perps made it fairly easy to guess correctly.
46. Action film fodder: STUNTS.
47. Stymie: HOGTIE.
50. GPS finding: LAT. LATitude. For a modern take on location-finding take a look at the What Three Words app. What Three Words
51. It's under un beret: TETE. Today's French lesson. TETE = head.
52. Risks: BETS. This makes more sense as a couple of verbs than it does as a couple of nouns.
53. "Nothing to it!": EASY.
54. Attack, to Rover: SIC. (Not my error)
55. RN workplace: ICU. Registered Nurses work, sometimes, in the Intensive Care Unit of a hospital.
56. Tennis call: LET. A serve that hits the net and lands in the correct court.
57. Rubbish: ROT. Another idiom Used as a noun not a verb. I was once on an airplane and found myself seated next to a man who held a backpack full of ROTting meat. He said that it was his carrion luggage.
. . . and on that note . . .
______________________________________________________________
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37 comments:
Good morning!
I found several ways to go wrong with DEplAne, tASE, and I comforted my colt in a bARn. That's what Wite-Out is for. Noticed the silent letters, but not that they were circled. D'oh. That S in SOIL took an alphabet run, but then it was done. Thanx, Michael and Mal-Man. (Ninny broth? Syrup of soot? Never heard of 'em.)
My pet peeve: the crossing of proper names, Rees and Osment. Really poor crossword form. Yuk!
MalMan you really have found your calling blogging here. You not only explain hidden issues, throw in groaner humor, but make it all fit together. I enjoyed your adding DIOLCH to highlight Roger Rees' heritage, finding the meta MUTE in the circles and expressing the unfortunate use of IRING , my last fill. You obviously need to experience more pop culture if you have completely missed HALEY JOEL OSMENT who at 33 already has 102 credits including the boy who saw dead people which he was in when he was 10.
Wonderful way to start the week, thenk you michael and joe
FIW, getting a bagful of tools instead of SOIL at Lowes. That gave me tal instead of SAL and noose instead of noise. Tal seemed as good as any, but noose didn't make sense. Even though there are plenty of legitimate reasons to be ANTI taxpayer-subsidized electric cars, one big benefit will be a huge reduction in NOISE pollution. But they need to outlaw electronic artificial "vroom" generators at the same time. And while we're at it, how about a dB limit on vehicle audio systems. And you kids, get off my lawn!
I remembered Roger REES only from Cheers. DNK Kalahari, SAL, axilla, LENORE or OSMENT.
My favorite MIC DROP was when Obama said (in reference to Trump) "at least I will have BEEN president."
CSO to the object of this blog at LAT.
Took 9:34 today, and in keeping with the theme, I won't say anything else.
SILENT TREATMENT? I saw the four circled letters but gave them no thought until most of SILENT was in place on the grid. Then I noticed they spelled MUTE. In addition to the four theme answers with silent letters there were a few "MOORE"; VI-E, HOG TI-E, TO-E, HO-E, LENOR-E, MAR-E. and even PE-E-KING & B-E-AR HUG. But English just has some strange spellings.
VIERNES- thank you perps
DETRAIN- never heard that term used. I've only heard disembark used when getting off a ship.
TENT- driving north from Seattle on I-5 there are a lot of them pitched along the road.
IDIOT lights or gauges? Maybe the idiot lights are better because most people don't look at the gauges anyway. At least the idiot lights give you a warning.
I just couldn't work up any enthusiasm for this CW. I suspect it is a fine CW, but I quit about halfway through it, just couldn't get into it. "IFING"? Really?
Good morning everyone.
Stifled for awhile in the middle but eventually got it all. Accepted spelling aid for VIERNES; knew the French, though, so guessed at the V start. Took a bit to get the grid spanner MNEMONIC……, but the other two came right in. Knew OSMENT and REES sounded right; so, no Natick there. A good Thursday workout.
I eschew AARP. They just want to sell you insurance products, and their politics don't align with mine.
IRING - Don't know that I'd ever use it in speech or in writing.
Enjoy the day.
Lots of white-out today but got ‘er done. Sean Connery was the best Bond IMHO. I’m excited to go see No Time To Die this weekend; the new Bond movie. Thanks Michael for a clever puzzle and Manatee for the expo.
Musings
-Not even the ODOR of IRING and DETRAIN impeded my enjoyment of this puzzle and gimmick
-My “Low On Gas” IDIOT LIGHT has saved me a lot of grief
-CSNY – At first I kept trying to ferret out part of a school in New York
-We math peeps learned this MNEOMIC – All Scholars Take Chemistry (not worth explaining)
-Bagged SOIL and bottle water – I never thought I’d pay for them
-SIRI reminded me of the Apollo 13 astronaut whose name had slipped my sieve-like memory yesterday (I had forgotten my mnemonic of Lincoln High School)
-Allowing VB serves that hit the net to be played was an improvement to the flow of the game
-Back to Lincoln for a funeral today after the visitation last night. I don't need the RTE from my GPS devices
This went pretty quickly for Thursday even though my initial reaction was head scratching-
very creative with the meta theme of the silent letters spelling MUTE.
I've wondered how Haley Joel OSMENT fared as an adult after making an impact with his roles in The Sixth Sense and Forrest Gump and Pay It Forward.
Thanks MM for the fun blog which helped explain all the layers!
Thank you Michael Paleos ( = a diet in the plural ? ) for a very challenging puzzle, and MalMan for very comprehensive and exhaustive review. I'm sure I didn't get atleast half the jokes and pointers ....
I did not know a lot .... REES, OSMENT, POKEMON ( never played -), TINA etc.
I thought 18 Down IM gasp was Inner/Internal Meditation ... Hence OMS, or OMM, or OMA
I also confused CSNY with CCNY ... totally different subject.
Have a nice day, all.
I’ve been anticipating this, and today the first signs of the impending demise of the once great Baltimore Sun showed up in the Crossword puzzle. I guess the mini-Murdoch hedge fund that bought them a year ago is taking the “bottom up” approach to dismantling the paper and ultimately throwing it out with the trash:
Several things seemed odd about the puzzle: much too easy for a Thursday (< 5min. solve); no apparent theme or reveal; and today’s answers were printed upside-down in the lower right corner. When I dialed into the Corner to read Joe’s review, I immediately had to TURN A BLIND EYE to it, as I couldn’t find any of the clue/fill on my copy and quickly realized what had happened. The only salvageable fill for commenting on was 24A GROAN, which I had already decided we should henceforth call a BOOMER. Closed the screen and went to find another source for the LAT puzzle (and the Chi Trib Jumble, which Teri solves). We’ve already decided to cancel our subscription (what after 50+ years?). SOB.
Having completed the LAT puzzle to SOFTEN THE BLOW, I’m ready to toss in my two cents.
A thanx to Michael, even though I FIW, not on a NATICK, but just on poor proof reading. There was a fishy ODOR about the spelling of OSMINT (whom I remembered from the “The Sixth Sense”) and crossing it with POKEMON would have worked just as well phonetically. A clever theme which I got from the reveal, but couldn’t quite suss, because I was somehow expecting letters in the DOWNS to be silent (I’m still depressed about the Sun).
Leave it to MM to flesh out the explanation, complete with the circles spelling MUTE. And thanks for all the BOOMERS, Joe!
14A REES. Didn’t recognize the name, but remember his character, the multi-millionaire Robin Colcord, from Cheers. He was Sam Malone’s rival for the affections of Rebecca Howe (Kirstie Alley).
17A My favorite clue. Now if I can only find a MNEMNIC DEVICE for it.
22A IRING Least favorite as several others have pointed out. Rich needs to hire a grammar cop.
41A BOND My favorite is SAMANTHA BOND, who played BOND GIRL Miss Moneypenny during the Pierce Brosnan years. She also played Lady Rosamund in Downton Abbey.
63A LASE Can also refer what they do to your EYES during CATARACT surgery.
5D ARNO Nice pics MM. Teri and I bought new wedding rings at a shop on that bridge to celebrate our 25th. It was daylight then, so I don’t think we’re in your pic.
29D USE My Swiss Army is my third hand. They can have TOO many uses though, making it hard to quickly find the one you need. After buying a lot of them, many of which have been donated to the TSA, I have experimentally determined that the Explorer model has just the RIGHT number of USES.
inanehiker @9:25 AM According to the Wiki, OSMENT has retired.
Cheers,
Bill
Are those geese flying away south over my head? yes, and there goes the theme too.. so FIR but the theme escaped me.😏
Inkovers: ovation/MICDROP , toc/TAC, set/net/LET,
What an IDIOT, how long did I think biomusical was science with songs..I almost wrote in TUNA..!!! 😳 "cookie fruit" singular? thus FIG? 🤔
Since it was an island, Tattoo could never have shouted "DETRAIN, DETRAIN!" 🚃🚃
IRING, seriously, ired isn't bad enough? 😤😡😖
Osment's best performances were in "Sixth Sense" ("I see dead people") and "AI Artificial Intelligence" where he played a Pinochio like robot boy.
Regrets....RUES
"Disembark": give a hound the ____....SILENTTREATMENT
Slow Jamaican....POKEMON
Beeeuuuutiful day in the Adirondacks..DW is driving so I can appreciate the foliage. 🍁🍃🍂
Big fat DNF in the NW. I would say that I'm IRING, but I'm never going to use that word.
I hear that.
Ray - O @10:29 AM Maybe you were thinking about this SCIOmusical with songs featuring Neil DeGrasse Tyson, et. al.
Waseeley - Good for you to drop the Sun. I'd like to drop our local rag; it's become more like the Weekly Readers we had in ELHI. But we keep it because BH likes to read the obits which keeps forgetting to read. Very IRING.
OSMENT - I liked him in Secondhand Lions, too.
Thank you for the entertaining write up. Hand up for not knowing the two actors. Favorite mnemonic device: PEMDAS.
Thursday toughie for me, but at least I got the top middle to get me started. Still, thanks, Michael and Mal Man.
Had to laugh that GUITAR SOLO came right above NOISE. Surely not.
Didn't know TINA was a musical.
Thought the clue for CUTE was cute.
Have a good day, everybody.
Puzzling thoughts:
Maybe Moe is on crossword overload. He had lots of trouble with today’s despite knowing that axilla meant ARMPIT. But his biggest struggle was getting MAGNETIC DEVICES out of 17-across (I was thinking retrieving things in the literal sense - like treasure on the beach)
And once I did finally figure out the NW corner I still was unsure as I RING had no connection to the clue …
Ahh the W/O’s; where to begin: JOSE/JAVA; SAND/SALT/SOIL; FAT/SOB; RTE/LAT; YORK/NASH (please don’t ask me why!)
I wanted to put MALODOROUS MANATEE into 10-Across but it wouldn’t fit 🤡
And since when is GIN a Gimlet option? I thought that was a given
So much for the SILENT TREATMENT! But there was more to like than hate with the puzzle, and nothing to hate with the recap. Favorite clip was the Simpson’s rendition of “The Raven”
Hi Y'all! Think I'll stand MUTE on my feelings about this puzzle. Er..thanks, Michael. Good one, MalMan.
Had a hard time getting started. NW a groaner. I've heard of OSMENT but never saw him in anything nor could I remember the last name correctly. NW corner last to fill. Thought MNEUMONIC started with "P". Duh! forgot AXILLA which I saw/heard somewhere recently.
DNK: REES, SAL, NASH (he never sticks in my mind. Hand up for thinking it was a college.), TINA (BIO didn't stand for biology?), OMEARA, VIERNES< ATHENA as clued.
Couldn't remember MOORE without a couple perps which came slowly.
Finally filled it after 38:33 minutes. Oh well, I had nothing better to do.
DNF today,
As I had to hit the reveal button because of
Names I did not know crossing names I did not know cross8ng names I did not know...
Normally this would provoke this posting reaction...
But, telepathically I knew what was really happening.
Which somehow led me to this...
Why don't they just a useful one...
Re: Swiss Army knives.
I don't know how to link directly to his home YouTube page,
But if you follow Felix, you will learn uses for your pocket knife
You never knew were possible.
A surprising FIR after a lengthy struggle in the NW. Didn't know how IRING could be right or what the crossing letter in OSMENT and REES was for sure. But perps seemed to make sense so stopped puzzling and began to read the blog. Got the theme fine and congratulate you Michael on working it out. Thanks!
Thanks to MalMan for confirming my FIR and bringing info and humor to our puzzle enjoyment. As usual I had WOs due to spelling uncertainties and senior moments, but smiled when I saw my Jose needed to be changed to JAVA, (hi C Moe). And more smiles looking at CED's links. Thanks. Hope everyone is having a happy day.
I had a beautiful Swiss Army pocket knife, but the TSA stole it, .... in Switzerland ...;-(
HJO was also very good as Alan Arkin's surprise grandson in the KOMINSKY METHOD where he played a double agent member of the Church of Scientology. He like me is listed at 5'6" but obviously packed with talent. He played young Forrest Gump when he was 4. I do not believe he retired as IMDB shows him in an upcoming show NOT AN ARTIST and other projects.
PEDMAS
A solid challenge from Mr. Paleos, a PZL tough enough to force several write-overs, yet yielding to P+P in the end.
24A SAL drove me a little batty because I Knew the character's name but couldn't retrieve it from the back of my mind. That kept me from solving three perps for the longest time.
44A was also nasty for me. I kept thinking of CCNY, and just wondered why the "S"...?!
But in the end, FIR.
~ OMK
____________
DR: We have one diagonal today, near side.
It offers a near-Jackpot anagram (14 of 15 letters).
It reminds me of the decade-plus I lived in Richmond VA.
I moved there in 1969, not long after the end of legal segregation.
Today's anagram utilizes an archaic term for "before," and it takes us back a few years earlier, to a time...
"ERE 'DESEGREGATE'" became the watchword of the day.
Hi All!
Like Winthorpelll, a big fat DNF in the NW - had looKin @3d, didn't know 4d nor 14a, so never saw ALPO. *sigh*
CUTE with the MUTE, Michael. The rest of the grid had little surprises sprinkled about too. Fun cluing (well, frustrating at first - but when the penny-dropped... :-))
Thanks for kicking-off the Thursday after-party MManatee.
WOs: tried to get eleanor to fit at 2d
ESPs: OMEARA, [see above DNF]
Fav: ID-10-T is my favorite error-code to log.
Runner-up: Athena - made me think of The Who.
I hope JAVAmama shows to take a bow at her CSO.
Sorry, OMK - re: DR... I don't know Latin (or is that Greek? - It is to me :-))
LEM - thanks for linking PEDMAS. Never heard that before but I know my order of operations ala equations.
waseeley - LOL 'donating' your Swiss Army knives to the TSA. Lost few Lethermans that way (and one cork-screw [I always have to buy a new one when DW vacation] that made it through >4!!! airports in my backpack until some Alert Johnny-on-the-Spot TSA lady in SPI [they only have two gates!] took it from me on my way back to HOU).
CED - #3 is going to be reUSEd by me. I may print & hang in my office.
More salt to mine; Play later.
Cheers, -T
I liked most of this puzzle and enjoyed seeing the gimmick. Interesting to see REES and ROOS. My nose wrinkled as much as y'all's at IRING. I wish that whole NW corner could have been redone to (1) avoid crossing proper names and (2) maybe making O RING instead.
Technitpickingly, there is no corner in Monopoly called JAIL. There is a "GO TO JAIL" corner and an "IN JAIL/JUST VISITING" corner. I know, crossword puzzle clues, especially later in the week, often play fast and loose.
Wishing you all a good day.
There were enough hooks to suss out the unknowns today. MalMan's write-up on the grid helped my understanding today.
DNK: REES, VIERNES, OMEARA and DETRAIN. I also had RTE before LATitude became apparent. Perps and a few SWAG's filled them in.
I agree that Sean Connery was the best BOND of the bunch. His style was a little more tongue in cheek than some of the others. The others weren't bad, except for Lazenby possibly. The PARADE magazine insert in the Sunday papers recently had an article on the Bond films and actors.
If the Droid is R2D2 why isn't it ARTwO instead of ARTOO in CW's?
IRING just didn't seem right to me, but that's just me.
Today is National FRAPPE day, whatever the FRAPPE that is. I just drink coffee.
Waseely: I too, have lost a few knives to the TSA, mostly because I forgot to put them in my checked luggage. I was able to get a box of cheap knock-off Swiss (ie. Chinese) Army knives with my company's logo on it that we handed out at trade shows that ended up being fodder for the TSA.
Have a great day everyone.
I've seen IRe clued as a verb, but not IRING
LENORE as an answer on the 172nd anniversary of the death of Edgar Allan Poe
Recognized HJO but tried spelling it as OSMoND
S on REES was a WAG. Big splotches in SE as City and Common seemed to satisfy the clues. CSNY(Thinking of City College of NY*) ANTI and T/LASE cured that. The NA gave me ATHENA and the rest filled as I have LOTTO tix in my pocket from Wednesday night
My son actually had me out chasing POKÉMON during the "craze".
I can't believe I FIR on this one. Clueing was imaginative and tricky. Not knowing my pop-cul at least I know my golfers(OMEARA-My aunts maiden name)
WC
*Oh that NASH. Oh hair dye.
Lemony @3:04 PM Thanks for the PEDMAS Mnemonic. Saved it for one of my grandsons who has some difficulties with Math.
Waseeley @ 10:26. The local Intelligencer-Fish Wrap newspaper posted its annual post office notice yesterday. Included was a list of owners of the paper: of the 38 owners, only three had human names; the rest were all corporate (Wells-Fargo, Chase Bank, etc.)
NONE of them live in Oregon; the closest were in Montana and Wyoming.
Tricky Thursday. Thanks for the fun, Michael and MalMan.
I am very late to the party after a family day. I started this CW on the 45 minute drive and tried to finish it on the way home . . . but ended in the fog (literally). I finished it when safely at home and saw the MUTE theme.
All sorts of ink blots, but you have already listed them. I agree with AnonT re “Fun cluing (well, frustrating at first - but when the penny-dropped... :-))”
I will take a CSO with TOR; I lived there in my student days.
Wishing you all a good evening.
IMO, Woody Allen was the best James Bond.
Wiktionary:
Verb
ire (third-person singular simple present ires, present participle iring, simple past and past participle ired)
(transitive) To anger; to fret; to irritate.
>> Roy
I got beaten up pretty badly in the NW and SE. Got the reveal and the bottom three long fills (ROGERMOORE being the first, of course), but I never got 17A.
I would have liked to have seen a question mark at the end of the 1A clue, and I don’t like R2D2’s name being spelled incorrectly.
What made me maddest, though, was that I couldn’t remember LENORE --- drew a complete blank all day long --- and The Raven is probably my favorite poem. Old and senile! Missed NASH! Stupid of me. Had I gotten those two, I might have been able to pull off a win, but I’m not sure.
Thanks for beating me up, Michael! Great expo, MM!
As I've mentioned before, the LAT crossword puzzle is available for free (gotta watch a 15 - sometimes 30 - second commercial first) at the LAT website at exactly midnight eastern time. I've already printed it out, but I doubt that I'll mess with it tonight, since I have to up and work early tomorrow. (Yes, I will! Who am I kidding?)
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