Saturday Themeless by Lindsey Hobbs
Hi Gary,
A few clues that didn’t make the cut — for 1-across I originally had, “Like Bob Dylan, controversially, at the 1965 Newport Music Festival.” And for 20-across, “Emulate the Scooby gang.” I’m particularly proud of “Order of magnitude” for SUPERSIZE, which made it in. There are a number of clues I can’t take credit for, but I'm thrilled to see so many women in the puzzle.
Also, this is my first themeless and my first puzzle for the LA Times, which is super exciting. Grateful to Patti Varol for helping to whip it into shape!
When I'm not making crosswords, I'm usually conserving books and paper at the archives for New York City, gardening, or taking silly pictures of my partner Steve and our cats.
Thanks, and hope you enjoyed the puzzle!
1. Connected: PLUGGED IN - The guitar that Bob Dylan controversially PLUGGED IN sold at auction for $965,000.
10. "All good here!": I'M SET -Yup, I've got a nice Saturday puzzle to blog!
15. Order of magnitude?: SUPER SIZE - A precursor to being 24. __ shape?: IN BAD.
15. Order of magnitude?: SUPER SIZE - A precursor to being 24. __ shape?: IN BAD.
16. Not touch: LET BE.
17. Paleolithic innovation: STONE TOOL.
18. Turning points?: KNOBS - Ah, TV's and radios of my misspent youth.
19. British pound note featuring Jane Austen: TEN.
20. Horn in: MEDDLE.
22. Jettison: TOSS - The Saturn V rocket that took us to the Moon did jettison every part except the tiny, by comparison, Apollo CM (Command Module) which is the only part that returned to Earth
26. Hardly rosy: GRIM.
27. "Broaden your horizons!": GET A LIFE.
30. Bank security: LIEN.
31. Self-evident pick: NO BRAINER - Calling off this game looks like a NO BRAINER to me.
32. Top pick: FAVE.
33. Big name in Early American art: PEALE - Charles Willson PEALE's 1772 portrait of George Washington and 2. Gentileschi's "Self-Portrait as a __ Player": LUTE. Our retired art curator/constructor Jeffrey Wechsler would know both of these works.
34. Emmy winner Helgenberger: MARG - MARG got a big kick out of having her hometown of North Bend, NE co-naming Locust St. Helgenberger St. (Yes, we had MARG in Robyn's puzzle last Saturday)
35. Drunkenness: INEBRIETY - An inebriated person can be said to be in a state of INEBRITY. Not by me but...
37. Cut off: SAWN.
38. Backs: REAR ENDS.
39. Herb used in some Indigenous smudging rituals: SAGE - Smudging rituals
41. Personal matter?: GENE - About as personal as you can get
42. Parking space: SPOT - Got that?
46. Cool amount?: MIL - I had to get rid of LIL (diminutive of little) for "cool amount" because of 46. Nutmeg spice: MACE. Then it hit me, A million dollars is a Cool MIL. 😳
49. Sierra __: LEONE - Recent Saturday puzzles have had Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana and now...
51. Smell-O-Vision rival: AROMARAMA.
53. Source of intelligence: ASSET - With A _ _ _ T, I had AGENT first
54. Summary of top headlines: NEWSRECAP.
55. Prankster's declaration: GOT YA - or GOTCHA
56. Mail order?: DO NOT BEND.
Down:
1. Start of a library conversation, maybe: PSST.
3. Just after: UPON - UPON passing my driver's license, I immediately drove home
4. Mil. title: GEN.
5. Troublemaker: GREMLIN.
4. Mil. title: GEN.
5. Troublemaker: GREMLIN.
6. Prize: ESTEEM.
7. LED component: DIODE.
8. Hilfiger rival: IZOD - Preppy wear?
9. Pen name of journalist Elizabeth Cochrane Seaman: NELLIE BLY - What a fabulous woman!
10. Sort: ILK.
11. Element of some meditation exercises: MENTAL IMAGE.
11. Element of some meditation exercises: MENTAL IMAGE.
12. Admired with quiet reverence, with "of": STOOD IN AWE - There's this woman in Minneapolis who runs our blog...
13. Goes back out: EBBS.
14. Crossword editor Harper in Hallmark's "Crossword Mysteries" series: TESS.
21. __ nous: ENTRE - Juste ENTRE NOUS, avez-vous apprécié ce puzzle? [Just BETWEEN US, did you enjoy this puzzle?]
23. Hashtag that went viral during a pop star's legal battle: FREE BRITNEY - Lindsey's seed
entry.
25. Ewe said it: BAA.
26. Elevate: GIVE A BOOST - Ya gotta love this video!
26. Elevate: GIVE A BOOST - Ya gotta love this video!
27. Kids on a farm: GOATS.
28. Plant that sparked the Victorian craze "pteridomania": FERN - Pterido is Latin for fern.
32. Cone source: FIR.
33. Pub trayful: PINTS.
36. Classic car: REO - GTO, XKE, BMW...
37. Coastal formations?: SAND ART.
39. Appear to be: SEEM SO.
41. Cultivated: GROWN - Nothing beats home-GROWN tomatoes
42. Refinery waste: SLAG.
43. Cuban bar tender: PESO - Oh, a PESO that is tendered as payment!
45. Little dipper?: OREO - "How shall I clue thee, Let me count the ways!"
47. Supermodel with a cosmetics line for women of color: IMAN.
48. W. Coast force: LAPD - UCLA didn't cut it
50. "When will u b here?": ETA - C u l8er
52. Hoops stat: REB: Rebounds
A repost of Chairman Moe's link from last week:
39 comments:
FIWrong. It's Saturday.
SlOT < SPOT (assumed the perp was a Spanish word I didn't know -- good clue for PESO!).
MAR[y|v|k] < MARG (no idea what the perp, ER?, could be).
Considering how white it was UPON my first pass, that I got anywhere near this close is awesome!
Some may ESTEEM a matchmaker's plan
As paving the path that True Love ran!
While others say
It's not okay --
A yenta is just seen as a MEDDLE-man!
A Paleolithic innovation, the STONE TOOL
Launched the inventions leading to Man's rule!
Now did Spooner declare
He had a musical chair!
He STOOD IN AWE of his creation -- a Tone Stool!
{A-, B+.}
Good morning!
All for the lack of a B. Bzzzzt. I finished with DO NOT SEND and wondered what a RES might be, but let it stand. Thank you for playing. This one had a "Silkyish" feel to it, with WAGs and nibbles filling in here and there. Fell into the GTO/REO trap. (Wite-Out, please.) Is Ash Wednesday a "smudging ritual?" Nice debut, Lindsey. Enjoyed your recap, Husker. Wordle/Quordle/Waffle calls...
Like Gary, I originally had "agent" for "asset"
And I first had "inebriate" for " inebriety" But I came round right eventually. Whew! Quite a slog! In the end, FIR so I'm happy.
Hi Y'all! This puzzle was a big surprise -- to find out I had indeed managed to fill it. Groan! Some of the stuff should have been easy but wasn't for me. I just keep trying. Thanks, Lindsey. Many thanks, Gary.
I see Subgenius was left speechless not once but three times. Know the feeling.
Dylan's "Goodbye song" was on the radio as I was about to get out of the car. I stayed the 3 minutes to listen and really enjoy. "Know'd…road" rhyme tickled me
I wanted ILK for sort but what to do about the K? The B in EBB V8'ed me. Also, we had the IZOD clue just recently
Oops, the artist isn't wEALE and its PINTS not wINgS on the tray- must be a British pub. BIOTA made a lot more sense than BIOgA. I'm going to fire Mr S as my editor. Is Teri available? FIW, boohoo.
Aha, that's why MARG seemed familiar. And… I'm going have to use INEBRIETY in a sentence. Rhymes with its opposite sobriety?
Perping RAMA I actually guessed AROMA. Re. ASSET, recently read two books on the CIA: Mailers Harlot and The Company so ASSET was familiar
When saw the obscure Seaman I ignored but NELL… got me going; the spelling had to perp
Oui, j'ai beaucoup apprécié ça, aussi, l'exposition de Gary. Tres bien
Despite FIW I feel good about the two hour slog to ink in every box.
WC
FIW. Had slot for spot, didn't see peso. Misspelled inebriety (even spell check doesn't like it) , didn't see the y in Bly. And never heard of erg, except as a unit of force.
Been the busiest at work in ages this week. It's probably part of the post COVID surge of delayed procedures and studies. Unable to get to comments or puzzles consistently but off for three weeks now.
Vidwan from ApriI 28...
.....'Ray O Subshine your homophones / homologues / homophobes whatever," .....
Homophones, homologues. But not homophobes (I live in NY State not Florida where we can still "say gay" 😃)..come to me as I'm doing the puzzle. Then add them to elate (or annoy?🙈). They all make sense at least to me. Happy to explain anytime.
Good to see your your health issues are stable.
ENTRE NOUS ~~ I did find this themeless offering very enjoyable, required some thought and the usual perp help but I managed a FIR in 19:08, a decent time for me on a Saturday. Congrats to you Lindsey on your LA Times debut, some very nice and original fill you provided, and Patti’s help with the clueing really enhanced your fine piece of work! (And I did like your original clue for PLUGGED IN 😊). Also liked the clue for OREO. Vaguely recall ever hearing about Smell-O-Vision or AROMARAMA, but the whole concept seems - weird.
Thanks Gary for another of your sparkling reviews! Always interesting to get the constructors insight into the creation of the puzzle, and I like how you always start your expo with their bios and inspirations.
Good for you, Subgenius! Like OwenKL and DO, I Finished It Wrong. Like DO I had one bad square at the very end, DO NOT sEND, which I justified by thinking the perp called for a plural. Actually I thought REs might stand for REbounds and should have thought about it a little longer. But like OwenKL said, so much white to start with made me happy to get so close.
Once again the NW corner was my last area to solve, though I got STONE TOOL quickly. Tried one/six/TEN and huSh/PSST. BeerS were on my pub tray before PINTS came along and lAND ART/SAND ART. (my lawn is cut off?) Most of the rest of my puzzle was WO free. Lots of fun today, Lindsey and Husker Gary. Nice debut, Lindsey, and thanks for your note to HG, our splendid reviewer.
FLN. I also did your puzzle C Moe, and enjoyed it. Well done! Nice to know there will be more.
Like Subgenius I first put INEBRIaTe/INEBRIETY which looked funny but is similar to sobriety. In my present sober condition, I send you all good wishes for a super Saturday!
FYI. AROMA RAMA Sells coffee and tea
The key to solving a Saturday is finding solid fill ie LHF. REB was easy for me (How 'bout them Celtics)
The other factors are reasonable guesses like TEN
WC
eg. I just needed the R for Rebounds. FGS and FTS were possibles
Good Morning:
The very first word on my notepad is Silkiesque, so DO and I were on the same wave length. The next notation is Free Britney which was my first toehold and I did wonder if it was the seed entry. Additional observations include the dearth of proper names and the low number of three letter words. After my first pass, I thought I was headed for a DNF but, ala a Silkie solve, a chip here, a chip there, and pretty soon everything falls into place and you’re home free. I hit a few stumbles at Gear/Gene, Slot/Spot, Chip/Oreo, and Light/Diode but there were only a few unknowns, Peale, and Lane and ERG, as clued. Overall, the cluing was clever and tricky but, true to Silkie’s style, fair and square. Delightful duos include: Toss/Tess, Goats/Baa, Mace/Sage, Fern/Fir, Pints/Inebriety, Peale/Art, Peso/Mil, Mental/No Brainer, Reo/Oreo, Slot/Spot, And Flee/Free.
Thanks, Lindsey, for a true Saturday challenge and congrats on your LA Times debut and thanks, HG, for another eye-popping visual feast and interesting links. I enjoyed the brief article on Nellie Bly. What gumption she had at such a young age, especially considering the societal norms and constraints at that time.
Have a great day.
Google tells me ERG in this case is short for "ERGometer", an exercise machine that measures work. They also come in skiing and biking varieties.
Took 18:09 to get plugged-in to the correct wavelength.
I fell for the slot before spot and the agent before asset, Peale was unknown, and couldn't make sense of "___ shape" for the longest time.
Thanks, billocohoes. I was wondering what "erg" could possibly mean. Now I got it.
Thought this was a well constructed and challenging puzzle. I started out slowly, but once I got SLAG, the SW corner filled in and I went from there. SUPERSIZE was a fun fill, and helped immensely in solving the puzzle.
It was a big fat do not finish today. I was able to get the left side but the right side had me stumped. Just too many unknowns.
Tried LIE BY, LAY BY, OUST, ANY DAMAGE, ITS OK instead of LET BE, NEED A HAND, I'M SET, or TOSS.
Thank you Lindsey and congrats on your LA Times debut! This was really a toughie for me (definitely NOT a NO BRAINER) and after struggling to the finish line I ended up with two squares (4 clues) wrong (gory details to follow).
And thanks as always for your review Husker. I STAND IN AWE of your ability to do this Saturday after Saturday.
I found the cluing in this very tricky (all those question marks!), thanks I'm sure to the combined efforts of Lindsey and Patti!
Here are some favorites and my Waterloos:
1A, 15A, and 17A were left blank for a long time but eventually fell to sustained attacks from the below.
35A INEBRIETY. Had INEBRIATE and INEBRIATY before 31D NEED A HAND sobered me up.
9D NELLIE BLY. My favorite. What an heroic woman. We've seen her before but usually as only the first or second name of her nom de plume.
34A MARG. I think we have seen her before, but but settling for ERM (Electronic Rowing Machine?) I settled for MARM as the first name for Ms Helgenberger. Apparently the abbreviation ERG derives from the ERGOMETERS that measure work units (Ergs) for these machines.
56A DO NOT BEND. I had DO NOT SEND (something GMAIL gives you a few seconds to invoke before making a fool of yourself), instead of the NO BRAINER DO NOT BEND. Duh! Should have filled REBounds instead.
All in all though this was a great puzzle and a great first visit to the Corner for Ms Hobbs.
Cheers,
Bill
FLN Thank you CMOE for the fun Friday puzzle you linked in yesterday's review, edited by Stanley Newman. My S.I.L. gave me a collection of themed Sunday New Yorker puzzles that he edited. These are a lot of fun as well. You are fortunate to be working with him.
ERG, as defined was new here, too. I will have to check out the skiing variety. I think they are probably of the cross country variety. Crossword Crosscountry.
In retrospect, I like this puzzle, but as I struggled with some entries, I felt like abandoning it. Once I got supersize, NW all fell into place. The rest needed patience. I too had do not send, and I misspelled inebriety. Oops. The Little Dipper took a while to get. Didn’t we have Izod in a recent CW?
All in all smart CW and great review. I always look forward to this blog, in fact the only blog I frequent.
GOTYA, this puzzle was a GOTCHA for me. I threw in towel after not getting a toehold.
SUPERSIZEd Saturday. Thanks for the fun, Lindsey (congrats on your LAT debut) and HuskerG.
Well, WC did warn us . . . and encouraged us to hang in there. And that’s what this CW required - P and P!
My first pass left a sea of white, but I finally got a toehold and things started to fall into place. I’M SET!
NW corner was the last to fall.
FAVE was SUPERSIZE. PSST was Next (my first choice for “just after=UPON”)..
Glum changed to GRIM.
I tried to get Mantra into my meditation exercises. MENTAL was needed.
Is it LEONE or MADRE today?
My turning points were Knees before KNOBS (ok my knees may be Knobby!)
Hand up for Inebriate before IETY.
I thought I had a Natick cross with PEALE and NELLIE BLY, but with enough perps, I recognized the names.
This Canadian knew ERG as clued. Daughter of a friend won two gold medals in Pan Am rowing. I remember her talking about Erg training and competitions. Perhaps this is more common in Canada where our cold weather keeps rowers from being on the water outdoors.
Wishing you all a great day.
Hand up MAR?/ER? utterly unfair. You would just have to know this and MAR? could have been MARA, MARC, MARI, MARK, MARV, MARY or even something odder. I did WAG MARG but I cry foul. Had no idea about SMALLVILLE, NELLIE BLY, AROMARAMA, PEALE.
Very slow to get how REARENDS is BACKS. Some clever clues like CUBAN BAR TENDER. Learning moment about JANE AUSTEN on the TEN. Other countries have wildlife and non-political figures on their money. Perhaps we could do with some of that, too.
SAGE is meant to ward off evil spirits. All too often our local events open with burning of sage. Ignorant white people coo over how nice it smells. It is supposed to smell vile and it makes me ill.
Here is an example of a SAND ART piece at our local SAND Castle Festival that was not a SAND Castle!
I have some even more interesting COASTAL FORMATIONS for another time.
From Yesterday:
Lucina, Subgenius, Irish Miss and others Thank you for the kind words about my photos and connections. Sorry to create such conflict over TRIBBLES and favorite Star Trek episodes.
To be clear, the TRIBBLES episode was meant to be a chance for the cast to have fun. It was not meant to be deeply meaningful. But it is what might be called a "crowd pleaser". I agree that there were many other episodes that were much more deep and meaningful.
At the risk of starting a new battle, I will say that if I have to recommend one episode to watch it would be the pilot for The Next Generation series with Picard: "Encounter at Farpoint".
A thinking-person's PZL today from Ms. Hobbs, the second this week to require three cheats from me.
But it was fun all the way.
Well tamed by HuskerG....
It is fun, isn't it, when you really haven't a clue what exactly the clue is saying...
UNTIL you stumble into the correct fill? 12D was like that for me.
18A too. I had KNEES before KNOBS.
Picard @ 1:49 ~ MARG was EZ, since we had it just a coupla days ago.
~ OMK
____________
DR: Just one diagonal, far end.
Its anagram (12 of 15 letters) speaks to what happened within a half year when the zookeeper placed a pair of mature opposite-gender papio primates in the same exhibition house.
Naturally,
they ...
"BEGOT BABOONS"!
Inebriety? Did she just make that one up???
Why did all of the comments switch to italics?
Italian? No still in English...🤭
Italics?
That explains it,
I was holding my iPad at a tilt...
(Hmm, but in preview, it is still standard type)
I was daunted by ERG, as I always think of that as an objective unit of energy, not the measure of human output, neither of the energy expended while rowing nor related to a tracking device on a rowing machine.
~ OMK
This is one of those puzzles that seem to work better backwards than forwards. Once you have the answer you can go back and appreciate a clever clue, but going from clue to answer is nearly impossible. I found this puzzle to be so far beyond my solving skills as to be impossible. I don't like to, but will resign myself to, looking things up; in this case even after looking up the half dozen or so of the clues that were look-uppable I remained stumped. Good job, Lindsey Hobbs.
I think Ray-O forgot to put a closing </i> into his comments. I'll put one here and see if that untilts the remainder of this blog page.
Nope, it didn't work.
I was three squares away from finishing 7 consecutive days in black!
I was convinced the pub tray was WINGS as I didn't know BIOGA or PEALE. Also got stuck on the G in ERG/MARG.
Quite a fun puzzle, I was hoping to learn that FREE BRITNEY was indeed the seed. I really appreciate the time spent by C.C. and others to reach out to creators and maintain this blog!
Something screwed up with my blog comments. Preview button is gone and can only type and publish.
Hi All!
I was doomed from the get-go... 1a) PUT TOGETHER, 10a) ITS OK; at least STONE TOOL was right in the North (dang it! I knew it was DIODE). I got most of the Midwest & SW and other smatterings but spent the day with DW house hunting and it got late...
UPON revisiting the grid, got a few more THEN(not 3d!) TOSS'd the towel, started cribbin' cheats for fill (thanks HG!), and had a little more extra-play.
Thanks for the puzzle Lindsey and giving HG some inside-baseball to share with us. Congrats on the LAT debut.
Great RECAP HG - thanks for your efforts. I loved the 'cheerleader gets the ball' video.
FAVE: ENTRE Nous [RUSH]
FLN - C. Moe - I sent you and email re: enjoying your grid.
Subgenius - I like the new Avatar.
OKL, KS, & Speedy GonSolver - DW always makes fun of me for saying parking slot; glad I'm not the only one.
Ray-O: re: I-MAN... I worked with a guy we always joked with (remember metro-sexuals? :-)): He married A MAN, 'Duh! (Amanda was his wife's name)
I (as did Jayce) figured out the italics issue. Ray-O somehow posted:
'a lot of __<i> ... LUTE<br /><i>Ired... ESTEEMED<br><i>'
The <i> never got closed and subsequent post reads in italics. A bug in Blogger input parsing.
Cheers, -T
Thought I was heading for a FIW with WAGS in the SE corner: AROMARAMA. REB, IMAN. (I man is a female?) which perped the unknown ERG. I guess MIL isn't an abbr...so a fortuitous surprise FIR (and it's Saturday no less).😁
Inkovers: seemsto/SEEMSO, newsreels/NEWSRECAP.
INEBRIETY..sounds like a "Waz word of the day." Just when it seems there are no more clever clues for my favorite cookie....MARG knew from my short term puzzle memory
GOTYA sounds like a character in a Tolstoy novel. 💂 Liked "Cuban bar tender" gave me SPOT instead of parking slot. Lots of Saturday worthy challenges 😊. Isn't "nutmeg" a spice🤔
Didn't realize NELLIEBLY was a pen name. Think of FAVE as an abbr. JETTISON? "forceful sudden elimination of"....or Elroy, Jane, and George (nevermind, that's Jetson ☺). Thought "smell-o-vision" was a joke not real.🤧
Used to attend and watch the formation of incredible SANDART at Fort Myers Beach the American Sand Sculpting event every year till the date changed. When I was a kid and William Shatner opened the curtain on the airplane window to see the GREMLIN staring in. I JUMPED put of my seat!!🥵
Has a fender bender.....REARENDS
A Gentileschi work can go for a lot of ___...LUTE
Ired...ESTEEMED
Pæen to a late princess....DIODE
Ms. Hobbs thanks for pointing out at least some your clues that were changed. Nice to know what you were thinking and not the editors. It's your imagination, time and energy.
Jayce and Dash T, yes, an unclosed tag.
Not sure why he didn't get a "Your HTML cannot be accepted" message, or if he did, how he managed to post the comment. Makes me wonder if he got an option to "dismiss", which is used in the sense of ignore. Mox nix. A one-off, AFAIC.
Anyway, I copied the comments and pasted into a new entry, and then deleted the one that screwed up the rest of the comments.
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